SPANGST

Man alive! I love my son, but 5th grade has sone a number on his attitude. He is not only the whiniest kid on earth, he has also mastered the art of showing his exasperation with his incredibly stupid parents.

I remember that. I remember when I got so hip to the jive that my parents suddenly became the STEWPIDEST people roaming the earth. It was a miracle they were toilet trained, seeing that they spent thier entire lives in OBLIVION... and lucky for them, they had me to teach them. How did they fumble thier parts together TWICE in order to make my brother and I? Was it some moment of drunken clarity that they accidentally created life, I mean... these guys were dumb. I couldn't figure out how they managed anything, let alone both of them getting thier Masters Degrees.
(not to mention doing it BEFORE they got married ,and getting married BEFORE they had kids... now see, I did it exactly the opposite way around, first kids, then marriage, then a degree, no masters... not yet.. pine for that. smart me.

The new thing at my house is that whatever I go to tell my 11 year old, he already knows. He is showing a very astute psychic tendency, I will tell you that...

"Nolan, time to get up for school!"
"I KNOWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWUH!"
Oh OK I didnt know.

"Nolan, I am going to pick you up a"- Interrupts- "I KNOWWWWWWWWWUHHHHH!"
"a new minibike after school" (i finish with a lie to get his attention)
"oh but you knew that already didnt you?"
"OH MY GOOODDDDDUUUHHHHHHH!"
He knows about my game.

"Nolan, could you put"--YES I KNOWWWWWWWWWWUHHHH!"
"your-" -"I KOWWWWW"
"socks-" -"YES I KNOOOOOOOOWWWWWWUUUHHHHHH!"
"in your-" -"I KNOWWWWWWWWWWWWWWW.. Im putting them in my dresser, GODDDDDDDDUHHHH!"
"MOUTH???? ALL OF THEM???? CAN YOU FIT THEM ALL IN THERE SO I DON'T HAVE TO HEAR YOUR CRAP?"

OK I dont say the last part, but I want to.
Dont even let me get started on when I ask for blood sugars.

Nolan is eleven. He is at the age that he wants to be with his friends more than with his family. He likes girls. Girls like him. They text him all night long. Zoe, Kaylee, Irelinn... constant phone flirting.
I will tell you that some of these girls are quite grown up in thier phone text conversations... When it gets out of hand, I take the phone away for awhile, and we talk.
I had taken it last week, with the unstated intent of keeping it for a couple of weeks to really teach him a lesson, but ended up giving it back to him on Friday.
On Friday, I went to his friends house, where Nolan was about to eat dinner, and go to a Hockey game... And I gave him his Glucagon, slipped it into his inside pocket, and his phone along with it, told him really quietly that I loved him, and said goodnight.

The next day, he spent a good amount of the day on the phone with a girl he'd met at the hockey game. We took a short road trip, and had a pretty laid back day.

I was feeding the baby in the kitchen when Nolan came downstairs. He sat across from her high chair in a high stool, with that silly look on his face, and a bit of a pallor.
"You Low?" I asked him... but he was busy texting. I imagined texting him..." u lo?" and chuckled to myself.
"Put the phone down and check your sugar." I told him.
His pump said 50 but the sensor was old, and who knows... it may be lower or higher and he would still look like that.
He did, but the lancet device broke, at that very moment, the poking mechanism did not work. I would have done a manual poke, but I knew he would not let me, so I started looking for another poker.
I pulled open the kit drawer, where we have nothing but blood glucose kits.
Kit after Kit after Kit I opened, and tossed over my shoulder-- NO POKER! some had nothing in them, some had only a meter that we never used, some had a meter strips and no poker... I handed him some candy.
I went to the other room to get Nolans backpack. He is supposed to always have everything in there... I felt around... nothing.........
No kit, and also.... it seemed like I felt the absence of something else... AH yes! The glucagon! I had put it into his coat pocket. So I checked the coat. No glucagon. Now, wait, I am still looking for a poker, I gave Nolan some more candy. I then continued my search.
"wheres your glucagon?" I asked him.
*shrug* he did not know. "maybe at the Tyson event center?" He said.
Now I was getting panicky. I left the room again to look one last place for a poker, and found one. My secret secret super secret stash of one kit plus poker.
I pulled it out of its hiding place, (a place so secret that it will not be named here.)Then I heard it. THUD!!!!
I took two steps back into the kitchen to see Nolan face down on the floor, pasty-white and in a stupor. He had fallen off of his stool.
I called for James, and starter crusing candy into a fine powder and gave it to Nolan, who was able to stand back up.
We poked and he was 42. It must have been lower than that before we treated with candy under the tongue.
The baby laughed and giggled at our silliness, and in his stupor, Nolan smiled at the baby and sang to her from his chair.
I read him the riot act about losing his glucagon.
I read him the riot act about not having a poker.
I mourned a little, that he is growing up and away from me a little. I mourned that he has to have diabetes as well as just being a pre-teen.
I mourned that he is not a tiny baby anymore, that I can fix all the worlds problems for.
I made him go to the pharmacy with me while I bought a new glucogen kit.
Today getting ready for school he checked his sugar, and I was just about to give him the standard lecture on keeping the kit in one place all the time, and just as I opened my mouth The stereo turned on.
My husband put in some Ska to get us all happy in the morning.
It is almost a religion for us. You cant be mad when there is ska music on.
So, we started dancing. I tried to teach Nolan to skank properly, but he wont get his elbows out quite right. But It was fun anyway. He does a really good job otherwise, and instead of fighting about diabetes today, we skanked in the living room while Patrick brushed his teeth, and James got Lily dressed.
And for once, we started off on a good note.
Nolan went to school laughing at my dancing.
And that, though I cannot fix all the worlds problems for him now, is maybe just what he needs.

I almost said this was a terrible Christmas. I was going to hilight the high blood sugars and the lows, and point out how diabetes does not take a Christmas Hiatus.
But I got about halfway through this story and it hit me how the little things can make or break an entire holiday.
This year things were just too rushed. I wanted to spend time sitting on the sofa with James, sipping coffee, while we watched the kids open surprises that would make their young eyes light up with joy. I wanted to enjoy how sweetly the kids got along on Christmas day, just as I remember my brother and I doing as kids... Playing together, getting along, laughing... while my parents sat in thier pajamas for an extra long time and we layed on our backs with our heads under the Christmas tree, basking in the glory of the day being all about us getting what we wanted while we gazed up at the lights and talked to each other out of happiness.
But this year... It was just too busy.
James had foot surgery on the 23rd, (had to get it in by the end of the year, for insurance purposes) And that caused loads of paperwork to have to be done for the days preceeding, and of course, one of the nurses at my work quit, her last day being the 19th, so I had to be on call more often, and all the shopping was last minute, and I was wrapping presents on Christmas day still, all the while stopping to feed a hungry baby, stop kids from arguing, and make a futile attempt to pick up some of the slack with James being a foot shy of a helpful husband. (he is usually more than helpful... In fact, I need him... just dont tell him I said that out loud)
I found myself wishing I could stop the clock and just enjoy....
And to make things glorious, Nolan lost his kit twice at Grandma and Grandpa Deans house house.
I had just finished feeding the fussy baby and told him to check when he admitted to me that he could not find it, and walked into the kitchen to ask if anyone had seen it.
What did not surprise me was the immediate response of all the adults around, "OH he lost his blood sugar kit? I have not seen it.... and then they all ask around, and do some looking, not find it, and go back to what they were doing, assuming I had located the little bugger.
But I was still looking. Once in awhile, someone would ask if we found it... show some concern, and then go back to what they were doing.
And they probably don't see the importance of it. I used to become really upset when people did not understand... But now I dont feel bad about it. I am no longer on a quest to make the whole world see how crucially he needs his supplies. I have given up on that with no hard feelings. Sure, it would be nice, but that's not realistic, and they are just being who I was before I had a kid with Diabetes.

Nobody is being uncaring, but most of the time, they just dont know how to help, and perhaps the best way to help, is just to stay out of the crazed lunatics way as she tosses stuff around like a wild woman as she looks for a 3X4 inch black sqare case containing a key to her childs life support.


Normally I would be able to enlist James' help... But since he is not walking well currently, I couldn't. I had to get someone to hold the baby, get my coat, and go outside to join Nolan in his quest to find the kit, after the house had been unsuccessfully combed.

As I was opening the front door, and saw a black coat sitting on the bench right next to it, and squinted my eyes a little, and there it was... the outline of the kit.

Leave it to my kid to find the ONLY black thing in the room below eye level and put his kit right there, right on it. COMPLETELY camouflaged.

I grabbed it and opened the front door to see Nolan, walking briskly with his head down, looking through the snow, trying to recall his steps...
And I had to smile, when I saw him, because out there with him, in the cold snow was his Uncle Joe, patiently walking beside him and helping him to look for his kit.

I called out to him, and briefly thanked Joe for helping him....

But I mean to really tell him sometime... just how much that meant to me.

I think the best Christmas gift imaginable is to know that someone else who doesnt necessarily have to, offers some support and love to your kid.

That was the best thing I got for Christmas.

Gouda

Good lord.
People say that little girls whine. As a young child, I was always told to quit whining... especially by my dad and my brother, to which I would reply in the most high pitched voice I could muster, "I'm NOT Whiiiiiiiinnnniiingggggggg-uh!"
Whats funny is that almost any whined word is followed immediately by the syllable, "UH".
Try it. "Give it heeeeerrrreeeee-uh!" try again, "It's not Miiiiiiinnnneee-uh!"
"Leave me alooooooooooooooooone-Uh!"

I think its because we have to grunt to get the whine out. whines are so forced, so frustarated. A whined word is one that resents having to be uttered... never should have to have been spoken, which should have been known before it was incited... by the person eliciting the whine in the first place. Usually a parent of some sort.

Rarely does a teacher hear the whine.

The whine is annoying, and makes communication difficult.

But I will maintain that girls are not the whiners. There is a creature out there that is FAR whinier than the little girl who doesnt get the doll she wants at the store.

There is one creature who utters 99% of all whines that cause sound.

I have said this long before I ever had one, the whiniest creature of all is the eleven year old boy.

And now I have one.
Oh I saw it coming. Not because there was some sort of warning sign, but because I had the joy of working with all ages of kids at a shelter for homeless kids.
Now, if anyone has anything to whine about, its orphans. For sure.
But time and time again, I found myself bristling up the back due to one genre of orphan. the eleven year old boy orphan, and I have suspected that this affliction extends to eleven year old boys with families as well.
And it turns out my suspicions are correct.
Now they don't do it around their friends, but they will do it when any mixed group with adults and kids. And they will do it constantly. They are now the self elected announcers on what is and is not fair in the world.
And there going to tell you.
"No FAAAAAAAAAAIIIIIIR-uh!!!!! He got more than me" to which you should always reply, "what are you Monk??? Its upsetting the natural order of the universe because your brother got one skittle more than you did?"
and the eleven year old boy will inevitably say, "GOOOOOOODDDDDDD-UH!"

My son's teacher emailed me a few weeks ago, asking if I could please set the date/time option for his meter for the correct time.
I hit the "reply" button and started typing away, as I often do before I even have time to think about what I just read... I typed, "which meter? the pink one touch, the green one touch, the one touch ultra smart, the one touch ultra that is round with a yellowish screen, or one of the accuchecks, and by the way have you seen the green one touch anywhere lately?"
But then I hit the delete key, and watched everything I just said go away. Sometimes I wish I could do that in real life...
We do have a lot of meters.... and for a kid like Nolan, who loses at least one kit a day, we need them, or we will be spending all day looking for that little black zipper bag... yelling at each other. I lose stuff too, as does my husband... Actually, I lock my keys in my car. James loses his wallet and checkbook, Nolan loses his kit and his homework and his backpack and anything else he needs. Things just dont stick to him, or his dad. They should be nudists.

Anyway, I erased my words, because I thought first, "why does she need the time to be set... he doesnt use a meter that communicates with his pump..."

I thought naively for a while on that... then I thought... OH. wait.
I get it.
She thinks he is "faking" when he is low.
She is checking up on him, despite what my care plan said.
Despite the fact that I told her that even if he has a normal number, he may still need to treat if he feels low.
That skanky bitch.
I told her... under NO uncertian terms, that he does NOT fake lows, and that even if you think he is faking, even if you KNOW he is, you let that kid treat, because you may be making a grave error.

So I wrote back,
"no. I am not going to waste any time doing that. He has a continous glucose monitor on, and I download that info, the only other reason for doing that is so I can download and find patterns.... He has so many meters, some reset themselves here and there, the battery cover comes off, and suddenly it is november first, 2002 again, so... I dont mess with them these days.
Does it bother you when clocks are set wrong? Is this a "monk" type of a thing, or are you having him show you his blood sugars. He doesnt need anyone to check on this, but If I see fit, I will let you know when and if that ever becomes necessary. "

Then I hit send.

HI

I get a lot of D mags and rags in the mail. I get a lot of meter ads, and supply ads, and part of that is my fault. I love the freebies. You can get freebies from almost any company, and that is the way it should be.
Accucheck sent us a free Aviva, with cool stickers so we could change the look of the meter, which is a novelty, at least, but is fun and cool. Years ago, I talked sidekick into sending us a free meter. They really didnt want to, and I figured our why as soon as we used it a few times. Novelty Item. Then Glucophone sent us their free phone. Another novelty item as well, because it limits the model of phone that you can use, and ours broke rather quickly, so... But a good concept... hopefully one that will be expanded on.
As fun as all of the freebies are, they are hard to toss out. I end up keeping a lot of magazines.
I decided today to go through them and toss what I did not need to keep.
I went through page after page of ads for foot lotion, sugar free Lorna Doones goodies, along with countless articles on Type-1 diabetic tri-athletes, and older Type 2's who are living life to the fullest by taking walks with thier spouse and the occasional famous old person adding thier face to the many faces of Diabetes, sometimes reinforcing the stereotype... OK almost all of the time...
And, of course, the myriad of ads for the Blood Glucose Meters. Less painful testing, Alternative site testing, Obviously meant to lure in the person who tests once daily or less, because when you need to test six or so times a day... what's pain?
And there are several brands of meters... some I have never even seen in real life... some I have a hundred of at home... like bar soap or a black comb... they are just an object in our house that are often unnoticed. The black vinyl zipper bag, with the zipper pull missing in many cases... They always show the meter on a white or bright surface.
But those ads would not even catch my attention if not for the one thing that makes them stand out, stark and noticable to me...
The number.
They all read 104, 107. 108, 102, and numbers like that.
I dont know if they are trying to imply that thier meter equals better control...
But much like the diaper commercial where they pour blue fluid onto the test diaper, the meters ads are only trying to make pretty what is most often not.
I think they ought to put realistic numbers in thier ads...
Like a sweaty and blurry from shaking hand holding a meter that says 36, or a Kate Moss from the 1990's holding a meter that says, 462, or better yet, "HI".
Cause thats what diabetes is really all about...
But then I'd also like to see a diaper full of mustard on commercials too.

Give 'em enough rope...

Sometimes you know someone who has a big need to fulfill. It is hard to understand why... I mean, we all have needs, desires, everyone wants to feel important. But there is always someone who has some innate desire to step on you to fill thier soul.

It always starts out in a mild mannered way. They ask your advice, and they listen intently... take notes... And you share, because, it is cool to help, it makes you feel good... Anytime someone gives you a good idea, you tell someone else what a good idea that person gave you. You credit them, because they were cool to tell you.
And then later you walk into a room and see that they are telling someone about "the great idea they came up with."

And you cock your head to one side, and say, "but---- I-----" then to the other side, and then you just shrug and let it go... because, hey, it was a good idea, and just because it was originally yours, doesnt mean that you need recognition for it... Heck, if that person needs it so much, let them have it, right? They know deep down who's idea it was, so they cant really feel that good, can they? No not really. To each his own..... Que Sera Sera...... What it Is Bro,

Then you notice they are doing it again. "Hm. Well, Ok. thats a little annoying, I mean, I can see once, but again... Is this person going to tell every good idea I ever had and say its hers?" You ask yourself.
"Probably," you answer, because, who else is going to answer when you talk to yourself? "Better not tell her anything else good..."
Because that is just uncomfortable.
And not that big of a deal, at the same time... so why does that person keep doing it?
"some people are just weird" you tell yourself, and since you grew up pretty adequately socialized, you can't assume everyone knows how to just be a decent gal.... so... You just let it go. Its a Huge Faux Pas, but those things happen. Maybe that person never had a chance to be like that in Jr. High, so you just have to let it happen.

Then you notice that person sort of.... trying to put you down... Hm.
Well, OK thats fine...
And you just let it go on, because, who's the one really looking bad, here...
You have faith in people, that they can eventually see peoples motives, and once they see it, they will lose respect.

You know you do when your co-worker constantly puts down someone that works alongside him.... and constantly puts himself up... You lose respect, and so you just silently let go...

But you are still, ever wondering, just what this person thinks she is doing...
And just how far she will go.

And you throw out more rope to her, because... Sometimes that is all you can do.