Week Eight - One Nice Thing

At least I think it's week eight... I know lockdown officially began on March 23rd but I'd definitely been working at home for about a week and a half before that.

Some of the days do have that sense about them and at times it definitely feels like they're merging into an amorphous blob of stuff.  Some days fly by and then others seem to draw themselves out forever.  A three-day weekend definitely helped me reset to a large degree but there's something about this situation that's exhausting.  A couple of days with no alarm and no real need to do very much or even get beyond the garden feel like they've wiped me out.  I'm fairly sure it's down to the mental effort we're expending trying to keep on an even keel.

Most of this last week's diabetes problems have been about keeping out of the red and in the black which I will admit has felt a little relentless at times.  After some extensive research over the last few days, I think I'm close to publishing a paper confirming that bourbon biscuits have little to no effect on blood sugar whatsoever.  I am also implying that they therefore have no calories either...  It'll pass as it always does, but feeling like you're constantly scouring the kitchen cupboards for something to eat can be another layer on top of everything else you're trying to think about.

A couple of things sprang to mind this week.  Firstly that it's felt harder at times to maintain that 'deep breath, think before you speak' approach to communicating, whether that's at home or at work.  I think the current climate (sick of writing that) and how far we are into this way of living gets to us all at some point, and it's almost inevitable that some part of us will snap, however briefly.  It's also easy to have our head down thinking about our own situation, when the reality of it is that everyone has their own version of that too.  I'd like to think I've been generally conscious of that - what feels like 40 hours of video calls a week means you can't help but understand people's circumstances, but it's no bad thing to be more explicit about it in my thinking.

The other thing is really to think of One Nice Thing about the day and try and hold on to it.  After StressControl I tried to write three positive things down from each day before I went to bed as a reminder that the stress and anxiety was always balanced out by other things.  I've lowered the bar a fair bit for the time being, but hoping it continues to make some small difference.

After a couple of glorious days, the weather turned yesterday so we had some ultimate comfort food in meat and potato pie

This was the sunset on Thursday after my dad got taken to hospital (and thankfully discharged with antibiotics about 8 hours later)

Managed to order some Lego that's usually only available from one shop at Legoland in Denmark - they've made it available online due to COVID

It's still a massive set of ups and downs and it's the same for everyone I talk to as well.  In some sense, it's hard to take comfort from the fact that everyone is on this relentless roller coaster, but at the same time it's kinda reassuring that everyone can almost certainly relate to how you're feeling at any given moment, even if it remains largely unsaid.

Safe safe alert safe x

Standing on the edge

"Come to the edge, he said. They said: We are afraid. Come to the edge, he said. They came. He pushed them and they flew." - Guillaume Apollinaire (1880-1918)


Today is a strange day for me.  It's the last full 24 hours that I'll be medicating my diabetes with multiple daily injections (MDI) for the foreseeable future.  Tomorrow afternoon I'll be switching to an insulin pump as part of a two year clinical study aimed at determining what is more effective at treating people with Type 1 diabetes.

I won't go into too much of the detail about the study here.  I'll be writing a blog for Diabetes UK about that later this week (and I'll post it here as well) so if you're curious, you can read that (or drop me a line on Twitter @Broomowl).

This blog is more focused on that greatest of intangible things - feelings.

I genuinely don't know how I feel about it to be honest.  Overall I'm pretty positive about it I think.  As I understand it, the pump will allow me greater control over my condition and allow me to alter my medication much more proactively around things like diet and exercise.  There's also some altruistic benefit I guess as it will help determine whether or not an insulin pump is truly beneficial for people with diabetes.  This should mean that, in the future, people being newly diagnosed with the condition will receive the best treatment possible.

If you've read a few of my blogs before, you're probably familiar with the concern I have that at some point, my daughter will also develop diabetes.  I think the odds are roughly around 1 in 7 so I suppose I'm partly doing this for her as well as me.

The other side of the coin is the fear and the doubt that accompany any lifestyle change.  For the most part, I control my condition pretty well.  I don't struggle to understand what to do or how to comprehend the science behind it all.  I struggle with self discipline.  I'll have some chocolate because I'm feeling a bit down, or I'll forget/not bother to test my blood as often as I should.  It's lazy and there's no excuse for it - I'm my own worst enemy.

But when all that's said and done, with the correct discipline, I can manage my condition pretty perfectly, which is something to be proud of.  But it's taken me a number of years to get to that level and from tomorrow I'll have to start from scratch.

Thinking about it rationally, the principles aren't going to change overnight and the science will remain the same.  I'll just have to learn a new way to practice it.  I don't think it can be quite as terrifying as it was nearly 12 years ago.  I'm also going to be part of a group of people all in the same boat, so I know I'm not alone.

My only other concern is how it will affect the day to day stuff I take for granted at the moment.  I haven't figured out how I'm going to sleep with the pump attached to me yet (though I suspect "not very well" would be a good answer for the first few nights).  I also don't want it to stop me playing games with my daughter because that's obviously a hugely important part of my life.

I think that overall this will be a good change for me once the learning period is over.  There's a chance I might take to this blog a little more frequently to 'think out loud' about it but as a mechanism for ordering my thoughts a little, the blog really helps.  I'm also lucky that I've got a group of close friends that I know I can rely on to help me when I need it.

Thanks for taking the time to read this.

Andy