#1646 Engineering Mind

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An engineer dad shares his daughter’s type 1 diabetes diagnosis, his data-driven approach to mastering management, and how technology, persistence, and the Juicebox Podcast transformed their journey toward independence and control.

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DISCLAIMER: This text is the output of AI based transcribing from an audio recording. Although the transcription is largely accurate, in some cases it is incomplete or inaccurate due to inaudible passages or transcription errors and should not be treated as an authoritative record. Nothing that you read here constitutes advice medical or otherwise. Always consult with a healthcare professional before making changes to a healthcare plan.

Scott Benner 0:00
Hello friends, and welcome back to another episode of The Juicebox podcast.

Mitch 0:14
Yeah, my name is Mitch. I'm the parent, caregiver of a type one diabetic, and I'm 48 years old, and I'm from Illinois.

Scott Benner 0:24
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Speaker 1 2:29
Yeah. My name is Mitch. I'm the parent, caregiver of a type one diabetic, and I'm 48 years old and I'm from Illinois.

Scott Benner 2:38
Mitch, are you the parent, or did you mean to use the word caregiver, and then was disappointed in yourself when you said

Speaker 1 2:44
parent? Well, no, I'm the parent. I'm her father, and I used to be her caregiver, but now she's 18 years old and started college, so you know, I'm there when she needs me.

Scott Benner 2:52
I understand. I understand. So you're always going to be her parent, but you're starting to feel like maybe you're not as involved in the diabetes stuff.

Speaker 1 2:59
Yes, yeah. How do you feel about that? You know, it was, it was, it was different, because I was very, very involved. In the beginning, my daughter was diagnosed August the eighth of 21 was very much involved for until, you know, for the first couple of years, she very, I mean, in the beginning, she quickly learned. It didn't take too long, but so you know now that she's at college. You know that was nerve wracking for me, but she's doing very, very well. Had a little bit of a hiccup earlier this week. Never happened before. Waited too long to change her pod. Blood Sugar got really high, and I called her and she didn't answer because she was on hold with her local children's hospital with her Endo. So that made me very proud that she took care of that herself and talked to the nurse very quickly got it back down. But yeah, she's she's doing a great job. That is awesome. What was she about? 14 or 15 when she was diagnosed? Yeah, she was 14. Do you have other kids? I do. I have an 11 year old son? Anybody else have autoimmune stuff going on in the family? Yeah, I've been thinking about this this morning. My ex mother in law has some thyroid issues, but when this diagnosis happened, I just never dreamed that it would be type one, because we, we don't have any of that in our family. Yeah, you hadn't seen type one before. Just hadn't seen type one. I thought that, oh, she can't be diabetic because she can't be a type one, because we don't have that in our family. I didn't know that, you know, spontaneously it happens,

Scott Benner 4:28
yeah, or that maybe auto immune stuff travels in families too, yeah. And everybody gets a different thing. You know, your ex, mother in law, how long have you been divorced? Tomorrow actually, will be three years. Oh, do I congratulate you? Are you sad? Which would you prefer?

Speaker 1 4:43
Either way, it's fine. So So think things, things are going great. So it was not, not expected, but it happens.

Scott Benner 4:51
So you got, I'm sorry to ask, but your your marriage broke up soon after your daughter's diagnosis.

Speaker 1 4:57
It actually did. So she was diagnosed in. August of 21 and we separated in February of 22

Scott Benner 5:05
in July of 21 did you have any inkling that you might not be married anymore soon?

Speaker 1 5:10
You know, we were having, definitely having some issues, but didn't really think that that was going to happen.

Scott Benner 5:15
No, okay. Do you think that did? I hate to say this, but like, because I'm not blaming your daughter. But do you think that the diabetes made things I don't know worked as an accelerant on your issue, or do you not see them as related?

Speaker 1 5:28
I would say accelerant probably not, not necessarily the the actual diabetes per se. But you know me being the primary caregiver, lot of lack of sleep in the beginning. I'm an engineer, so I dug deep into this disease and said, I'm going to figure this out and spend a lot of nights, you know, watching the Dexcom understanding, you know, when this thing first started, being an engineer, I wanted to know, how quickly can the blood sugar drop, you know, how quickly can this happen? You know, I'm watching a trend curve. Even before we had the Dexcom, I was writing stuff down, you know, writing numbers down and visualizing, making your own chart, yeah, trying to make my own chart. Yeah. Before I even knew what a Dexcom was, and I got a Dexcom, I was like, Oh my gosh, this is amazing. How in the world did you know you like, you started out when Arden was so young? How? How in the world did you survive without this thing? Yeah, yeah. So there was a lot of sleepless nights, a lot of honeymooning. There's no way you can really figure out honeymooning. But and then we were on Lantis before we got on a pump. And she was very active. She was in volleyball and competitive dance, so that was a constant challenge. Yeah, yeah. So during

Scott Benner 6:39
covid, I did group zooms during covid that were huge, like three, 400 people. They acted like, like an AA meeting for people with diabetes, almost, is what it felt like. Sometimes, I don't know why. Like, during zoom people were very cool, like, nobody wants to do that anymore, which is fine. But anyway, the point of it is, is that there was this woman on that would come up every week, and she was really struggling. You could see people trying to help her. I tried to help her. I tried to help her like everybody was trying to help her, but she didn't have a CGM, and she kind of couldn't imagine everything that was going on. So I had her make a plot like I had her plot out her blood sugars. Then I was like, Okay, now just draw a line from the one on the left to the next one on the right and keep doing that. And I said, it's not exactly like a CGM, but here's the basic idea of what's happening to your blood sugar. And just seeing those lines like, oh, it was raising up. Here it was coming down. Here, she was, like, two weeks later, doing so much better. It was really and you're like, you listen, you've said twice, I'm an engineer. The first time I thought you were gonna say, I'm an engineer, I'm difficult. That's how I ended up divorced, but,

Unknown Speaker 7:38
but I'm definitely difficult,

Scott Benner 7:42
all right. But instead, you know, you were like, I'm gonna try to figure out how the insulin works. And I thought that was pretty brilliant. Like, you know, like, let's first understand the action of this thing so that we can I'm assuming your thought was, once I understand what it does, I'll learn how to stop it from doing it, or make

Unknown Speaker 7:57
it do it. Yes,

Scott Benner 7:58
yeah, that's brilliant. Yeah, very good. Yeah.

Speaker 1 8:00
Because when I learned, when they explained to me, honey, of course, I had all these terms thrown at me when this first happened, and they're honeymooning. And I mean, you were mentioned. I said, you need to get on the Juicebox podcast. I wasn't really a podcast guy. One of the nurses at our Children's Hospital recommended that, and I thought, man, I've got to get on here, because I've got so many questions. And these people, these doctors, these nurses, they don't have time for this, yeah, and I want to figure this thing out. And, and I remember the first time I got the Dexcom, and I started watching every five minutes or whatever. And I'm like, okay, so because my earliest fear was, you know, how fast is it going to drop? You know, because you know that you're afraid of getting too low, and how fast is going to go up anyway. You know, there was, there was a lot to figure out, a lot of research, because I knew about type one. I had a very basic understanding of it, but not enough to I remember even thinking, before she got diagnosed, I thought, oh, I should, like the night before, I should test her blood sugar, and then I would wake up the next day and forget about it. And, you know, I wish I would have done that earlier, because, you know, when she was diagnosed, her a 1c was 15, and she was in severe DKA, it was not it was scary.

Scott Benner 9:11
But, yeah, if you're thinking before someone tells you she has diabetes, and you told me you didn't think it could be diabetes. What was happening to her? How long was it happening that you actually thought like I should get a meter.

Speaker 1 9:23
You know, August, the eighth Sunday morning. That's when I took her to the ER that summer. I mean, I mean, even as early as the early part of June, and I didn't suspect anything in June, but she was losing some weight, not June, I guess she wasn't. But In June she she went on a trip with her mom. They went to, like, several beaches around Florida, and every time I was talking to her, she's like, Oh, I I've been taking lots of naps, and you know, we have to stop, and I have to stop and pee regularly. And I'm like, Oh, wow. You know you're finally drinking more water, because I I push water on my kids all the time, even before this, even before. Diabetes, okay, well, she's, she's drinking water like she's supposed to, and she's losing some weight because, you know, she's, she's getting older. Well, then practice started, and early June, after she got back from her trip, she had to go to volleyball practice, volleyball conditioning at like, 8am at the high school. And she did that for like, an hour and a half. And then she had an hour break, and then she had competitive dance practice for like three hours, and then she had a couple hour break, and then she had full on volleyball practice for like two hours. Wow. So you know, she was doing all this exercising like she's never done before. She was losing weight. I didn't really notice her losing weight until maybe around mid June to July, and she'd already lost some weight, even before then some and I just thought it was, you know, she's getting older. This is just part of it. She's getting taller.

Scott Benner 10:50
She's your oldest, right? So this is your first experience with all this, right?

Speaker 1 10:54
Yeah, absolutely. And I always thought she would be the healthy one. I mean, had issues with my son, other other issues with eyes and whatnot, and, well, this is my healthy one, because she she really doesn't get sick very often at all, and still doesn't get sick very often. You know, the all the practices are going on, and maybe a couple weeks before practice start, our IHS a dead week at the high school where they don't have any practice except for band stuff. And I remember her in the refrigerator late at night, and she just kept going back and forth the refrigerator. I got up and I said, and she was drinking milk, and I said, I said, Are you do I need to make you some food or what? She's like, I'm just really hungry and thirsty. I don't know what's going on. I'm like, well, you're doing all this exercise. Did you eat much today? And she said, Well, I got kind of nauseated at volleyball practice, and so I didn't eat a whole lot, so maybe that's what it is. Well, then I remember hearing her pee from all the way across the room, you know, she had the door shut, and I'm like, holy cow. You know, that's the one time where I thought, you know, maybe, maybe I should get a glucometer and see what her I didn't even know it was called a glucometer, but, you know, see what her blood sugar

Scott Benner 11:59
is because of the of the noise from the urination, like, because she was, it was so much, yeah,

Speaker 1 12:04
it was just so much volume, and she was, she was drinking, you know, she was drinking a lot. And then I remember maybe 30 minutes later, she got in, peed again. And I remember at that moment, I thought, oh yeah, the trip. I remember she said she was urinating a lot. So this is, like, the week, maybe the week before she started getting sick. Like, I really started noticing her getting sick. And she wasn't really sick up until then, but once in a while she'd say, Oh, I got nauseated at practice. I thought I was going to throw up. I said, Well, were you running? She said, Yeah, I was running, which I didn't even know vomiting was a symptom of type one. And then, you know, once that IHSA dead week got there, well, she stopped all of our exercise, and she went to band camp, and that's when she got sick. Okay, like, I remember that Monday band camp started, and she was okay, but then Tuesday she started, she's just like, I don't feel good. And I thought, Man, she's really lost some weight. You know, there was no, like, vomiting at that point because she wasn't as active. I'm assuming, you know, all the activity stopped, and then her blood sugar just spiked, I'm assuming is what

Scott Benner 13:05
happened. It's a reasonable thought, I mean. And then you're saying, by the time you got her to the hospital, she was her a 1c, was 15. This episode is brought to you by Omnipod. Would you ever buy a car without test driving at first? That's a big risk to take on a pretty large investment. You wouldn't do that, right? So why would you do it? When it comes to choosing an insulin pump, most pumps come with a four year lock in period through the DME channel, and you don't even get to try it first. But not Omnipod five. Omnipod five is available exclusively through the pharmacy, which means it doesn't come with a typical four year DME lock in period. Plus you can get started with a free 30 day trial to be sure it's the right choice for you or your family. My daughter has been wearing an Omnipod every day for 17 years. Are you ready to give Omnipod five a try? Request your free Starter Kit today at my link, omnipod.com/juicebox Terms and Conditions apply. Eligibility may vary. Full terms and conditions can be found at omnipod.com/juicebox find my link in the show notes of this podcast player, or at Juicebox podcast.com when you think of a CGM and all the good that it brings in your life, is the first thing you think about. I love that I have to change it all the time. I love the warm up period every time I have to change it. I love that when I bump into a door frame, sometimes it gets ripped off. I love that the adhesive kind of gets mushy sometimes when I sweat and falls off. No, these are not the things that you love about a CGM. Today's episode of The Juicebox podcast is sponsored by the ever since 365 the only CGM that you only have to put on once a year, and the only CGM that won't give you any of those problems. The ever since 365 is the only one year CGM designed to minimize device frustration. It has exceptional accuracy for one. Year with almost no false alarms from compression lows while you're sleeping, you can manage your diabetes instead of your CGM with the ever since 365 learn more and get started today at ever since cgm.com/juicebox, one year, one CGM. Yeah.

Speaker 1 15:18
So Saturday, Saturday night, I remember, I took the family out to Joe's pizza, and she didn't really eat much, and she got done, we were coming home, and her respirations were fast, and she was sitting in my passenger seat. My wife, at the time, was driving our son. We were in separate vehicles. And I said, Why are you breathing quickly? And she still hadn't had covid at this point. And I thought, Well, is it difficult for you to breathe? And she said, No, I just can't really get my breath. And she was breathing fast. And so we got home, I did a covid test on her, I said, I checked her fever. She didn't have a fever that Saturday morning, she had woke up and she looked really swollen in her face. There was two things going on. She looked really solemn in her face. She felt terrible. I said, you have a sinus infection? She said, No, but I fell asleep first. She had a bunch of friends over Friday night, and Saturday morning she woke up and said she fell asleep first. I'm like, okay, so then I'm really watching Saturday night. You know, she's doing the fast respirations. I look at her arms, and her arms have like purple splotches on them, and and I said, Wow. I said, I said, How long have that? Has that been there? She said, why? I don't know. I just noticed it. And I said, Wow, you look really skinny. She said, Yeah, I'm eating plenty, but I'm not feeling good at all. And anyway, so we got home and we talked. I said, Okay, if you're not better tomorrow, I said, we're going to go to the ER. And she woke up the next morning and she had the splotches even on her legs, and she said, I just feel there's something wrong. I feel absolutely horrible. And so I said, All right, get you a drink. Well, she grabs a quart of regular Gatorade. And, you know, like full sugar Gatorade. And we had to head to the ER and, you know, just by chance, I went to the the smaller hospital that is less crowded, and we get there, and they take her back immediately, and I go in to see the doctor, and doctors, like, ask her some questions. He's like, two minutes, and he's like, okay, you know your name is Mitch. I said, Yeah. I said, Give me about 15 minutes. I really think I know what's wrong with your daughter, but I'm not going to say anything until we run sometime. We run some tests. You know, 15 minutes. He comes back and he's like, Well, I got one more test to run. First of all, she's positive for mono, he said, but I don't think that's the problem. He said, There's definitely something else here. I'm waiting for about another five minutes so she's positive for mono. He comes back and he says, you know, your daughter's a 1c is 15, and her blood sugar is 610, he said, your, your daughter is a type one diabetic. And I'm like, wait a minute. I mean, this is the model, right? Doesn't the model somehow affect the pancreas or something? You know, this is temporary, right? He said, No, no, your, your daughter's a type one diabetic. He raises up the sleeve of his shirt and he says, And he points to his Dexcom. He says, I'm a type one diabetic. He said, I've lived a normal life. I'm a doctor. He said, Your daughter is going to live a normal life. Everything's going to be fine. He said it's going to be a big adjustment for a few months. But you know, you guys can do it. Which Children's Hospital Do you want me to have come and get her? He said, Because she is in severe DKA at this point, she was kind of not really lucid. She was a little bit out of it, not just really not present. You know, she was awake. He was very concerned. And we picked the hospital that we had experience with. The team came, and I remember they had her take a potassium pill because her potassium was way low, because she was, I guess, severely dehydrated. Was terrible at swallowing pills, and swallowed this big, giant pill. You know, she actually swallowed it, and she remembers that. But anyway, I just, I thank God that we ended up going to that hospital, because usually people don't go to that hospital. And you know, I heard this podcast she did the other day of the kid that the hospital didn't recognize that he was a type one and sent him home. And even checked his blood sugar, and it was like 500 and they sent him home anyway. But you know, I'm just so thankful that this guy was a type one, and he was there to tell me at the time, hey, I'm a doctor, you know, she's gonna live a normal life. You know, I worry about people that don't have that, you know, and or they don't have a doctor, like we did at Children's, that said, Oh, you need to find the Juicebox podcast. You need to listen to that guy. Because, I mean, you, your podcast saved me. I mean, without having that source and that, you know, that information, I wouldn't have had somebody to answer all my questions. And you know, you did all the special series that the name escapes me right now, but I appreciate it serious, but anyway, Oh, great. Thanks to you, and you know, great, thanks to the god how the diagnosis came out. Because if I'd gone to a hospital that didn't have a type one, who knows what would have happened,

Scott Benner 19:54
but I sat a little, I mean, they would have, I mean, something would have gotten figured out. It sounds like she was really at the end of the. Did they give you an idea how much longer she would have been conscious?

Speaker 1 20:03
They said it was, it was one of the it was a pretty, pretty severe case. They told me what her, you know, the the pH of her blood was, or whatever that number is. And I remember they said it was in the severe level, like it was below. It was in the acidic side. And but the good thing is, you know, he got her on the right, you know, he got her on insulin and dextrose or whatever, right then. And then we got her to the hospital, and she was only in the hospital for three days, and then after the third day, she still had some ketones. And she's like, how do I get out of here? And they're like, just keep drinking water. Keep drinking water. She said, Because they said you're not going to get out until your ketones get into the small range. So she's like, I want to go to school tomorrow, because it was her first day of high school. She was gonna be a freshman, and so we got out of there, and she ended up making it to her first day of high school, even after being in the hospital for three days.

Scott Benner 20:53
So quite a turnaround. I was sitting here wondering how long she was then, because of all the different test results, and how long far along she was. It's even like striking as you're telling the story. And I'm sure you've been over this in your head 1000 times, but purple welts, significant weight loss, urinating strangely and constantly falling asleep all the time doesn't feel well, blah, blah, blah. Like if I walked up to you right now and said, Hey, I'm around another human being and listed all those things. What do you think I should do? You would say, I think we should take them to the hospital. Yeah, yeah. And, but when it's happening to you slowly, like that, it doesn't occur that way, the Kuzma respirations at the end. Like, I've been emotional since you brought that up, because I am sitting here right now and, like, clear as day in my head. I can see my, you know, my now 21 year old daughter as a two year old. I can see her laying on my wife's lap and breathing like that. Oh, really, yeah, just as clear as day. And I remember sitting there, not like, until it struck us what was wrong with her for the week before that, no one said, like, that's weird. You know what I mean? Like, she's acting, all we would say was she seems like she doesn't feel well, yeah, you know. And instead, she's dying, like, literally, Oh, yeah. And you're just like, Huh? That's interesting. And it just, it's weird how it never, I don't know, I don't know what that is about us that we I have so much hope, and the body's so resilient. Like, think of all the things that are happening to your daughter are happening to my daughter while they're being diagnosed, before they are and they just, they keep going. You know what I mean? Like, it's pretty fascinating. Honestly, Wow, you did a great job, man, getting working through all that. Were you by yourself in the hospital that night? Or was your son and your and your ex there as well?

Speaker 1 22:40
My wife, at the time, was there. I took her Sunday, and we had a family group chat. I'm like, okay, she's a type one, you know, at the time, I told my wife at the time, I said, pack a bag. Pack my bag. You know, they said we're going to be gone at least three days to children's, you know, the the emergency, I mean, the the ambulance from children's was coming to pick her up and and then my ex wife's like, oh, wow, the ambulance is coming. I said, Yeah, it's bad, yeah, because I told the doctor. I said, Well, can I just drive her there? I said, it would be quicker. And he said, No. He said, You're not driving her there. He said The ambulance is going to come and pick her up.

Scott Benner 23:14
Yeah, we need somebody with her constantly that can save her life, in case this goes the rest of the way south,

Speaker 1 23:20
yeah, yeah. And, you know, if, if she hadn't been in in dance and in volleyball and pre practices a day, and then if she hadn't got mono, because the mono is what really got me looking at her, because her face was swollen, and I'm thinking she had some kind of sinus infection. You know, all these things kind of came together to where we got her there on time. Or, yeah, it could have been,

Scott Benner 23:41
no, you did, yeah, well, it wasn't. And so there you go. That's pretty great. And she goes to high school. First day of high school, she makes it in.

Speaker 1 23:51
First day of high school, she makes it in, yeah, doesn't have the Dexcom yet because, you know, this is day four, and I'm already learning about, you know, I've listened to enough podcast where I've heard about 504 and I knew the nurse. I go to the church with the nurse. I'm like, you know, we got to get this started. Please tell all of our teachers. I'm trying to get a Dexcom. You know, you're going to have to help me convince her to check her blood sugar, you know, tell the you know, tell the teachers to watch out for signs. And fortunately, the nurse at the school. Her husband is a type one, so she knows quite a bit about it. So well,

Scott Benner 24:24
that's helpful. Yeah, keep running into type ones in very valuable situations. I mean, I heard in your voice how much it meant for you for that doctor to have type one and just to say to you, like, look me, I'm a doctor, I have type one diabetes, like, your kid will be okay. And, yeah, it's a big deal for you right there. Yeah, yeah, huge when you start digging in. First of all, thanks to whoever that. I mean, it's a pretty big Children's Hospital, so I appreciate that you guys are telling people about the about the podcast over there. I think I have a general idea of where you are. Somebody tells you about that, the words that I hear every day of my life. I'm not a podcaster. Person. But you know, you made it to it anyway, because you're looking for, I imagine you're looking for information. This person co signed on it, so you thought it was worth trying. Yes, yeah. So tell me about not just the podcast, but everything that you did in those first weeks to try to get your knowledge base up.

Speaker 1 25:18
Well, I mean, it started at the hospital. I mean, our hospital was, was great. They made us do the calculations. They had a they had a dry erase piece of paper that was laminated, and they said, All right, you're going to do the calculations. You know, we're going to do the carb counts for you. And they told me, they said, you know, you need to get on Calorie King, or you need to, you need to Google search and get used to counting carbs. And so they brought our food in, and they said, Here's how many carbs it is you do the calculation. Because before that, we had somebody come in with on a whiteboard and teach us the calculation, which, honestly, for me, I'm not. It's pretty simple for me, but it's not simple for everybody, and it's, I'm not trying to brag or anything, but I'm a math I'm kind of a math guy, right? So that part was easy, but then, so I did that. And then I'm, I'm thinking in my head, oh, so we've got to do a correction based on her current blood sugar. So I, you know, we have to finger stick her every time I'm hearing this word, you know, when they're going through they're talking about honeymooning. I'm thinking, Well, what if her pancreas kicks in, you know? So we're going to have to watch. How often am I going to have to check her blood sugar and and I still really haven't learned much about the Dexcom, but they're, they're telling me about it. So anyway, we do the calculation. They show me how to do the pin needle, and I'm, I've got to give her a shot the first time. And I'm like, No, I don't want to do this. This is difficult. My daughter's like, just stick it in my stomach. Just give me a shot. You're not going to hurt me. So fortunately, my daughter was fine with it. And so anyway, I gave her the first shot and and then, you know, all the teaching kind of ends, and I'm like, Okay, now what I do? And I remembered, you know, then a couple of the nurses saying, you know, because I'm asking all these questions, I'm asking so many questions that when the team of doctors came around the first time, there was like 15 doctors outside of her door, like, the next day, and they're Yeah, so I'm like, Oh, gosh. I said, What are you all doing here? So, well, this is unique case. You know, your daughter was pretty far gone, and she's making remarkable recovery, and so I'm asking these questions, and she's like, Oh, are you in the medical field? I said, No. I said, I helped my mom study for nursing, and I have an interest in it, but I saw all these warning signs, but I was too dumb to do a blood check, you know, or blood sugar check. I could have done this earlier. And that lead doctor says, Look, we have a dietitian here, and her daughter, the same thing happened to her. She was a dietitian, and she ended up getting almost to the point to where your daughter is. It happens. It's just, you know, anyway, so that helped, helped me kind of reassuring, yeah, it kind of helped me deal with that. But anyway, so, you know, I started looking at the podcast, and I went to the first episode, and I quickly found the Pro Tip series. And, you know, I just started going through the Pro Tip series, and you know, the words like Dexcom, and, you know, pump and basal and Bolus. And I started writing things down because I couldn't remember the difference between basal and Bolus. And, you know, me hearing your podcast helped initially talk to the nurses. Hey, how do I get a Dexcom? Because I remember, I watched, I listened to an episode and says, You got to get a Dexcom and a pump as soon as possible. And they said, Well, we're working with, work with you on a Dexcom, but your endo wants you to wait at least two months, three months to do a pump. And I'm like, three months, you know, I don't want to be on Lantus or this long lasting insulin. I said, we're getting ready to go home, and my daughter is extremely active. I've already learned enough to know that it's going to be difficult to control her with Lantus and honeymooning and being very active and, right?

Scott Benner 28:31
Yeah. And she's got all these different things that she does in high school too, yeah, right. So you're thinking about all that too. There's dance, and there's this, and there's, you know, volleyball and everything else. So you're on it right away. You figure out, like it's enough information that you can cobble together. What good questions they ask next? Is that good? Okay, all right, go ahead. I'm sorry. So yeah, about the Dexcom? Yeah.

Speaker 1 28:53
So, you know, I call, I remember I call the hospital. They tell me how to call the hospital, you know, after hours or before hours. I said, Look, I want to get a Dexcom. I was up late last night. You know, she's not sleeping as well because he had a low last night. Actually, we didn't get low early on, but they still had her kind of elevated early because they didn't know how, you know how much she was going to be honeymooning and all that stuff to you at that time, yeah, low to me was, you know, it's 90 and, you know, how low is this going to go? You know, I I'm not how often it's like 12 o'clock at night, how should I check her again at one? Should I check her again at two? You know, is she hype? Does she have hypoglycemic unawareness or all, you know, all these things are going through my head. So, anyway, so I called the nurse, and I said, Okay, we're going to try to get you a Dexcom. So they called my or they called it in. Well, my insurance denies it, and I call my insurance. Well, she's not been a type one long enough we need to make sure she really is a type one. I'm like, Okay, I know enough to know that this is a done deal. You know? You know she's this is not going to get better. Well, like two weeks goes by and I talked to a different nurse, and she's like, Okay, we're going to tell the. Insurance Company that she has hypoglycemic unawareness. Am I saying that? Right? Yeah, they do that process. And then I finally get approved to get a Dexcom. I have to go through a prior approval, and that was a nightmare trying to get things faxed. And then I finally get the Dexcom. In the meantime, I'm still listening to these podcasts. And then once I got the Dexcom, and I saw the numbers, like in real time, and the graphs, I'm like, I felt a lot better, but at the same time, the honeymooning thing scared me. And, I mean, there wasn't one particular episode that I remember, but I was just listening to it as much as I possibly could. And you and Jenny, and, you know, taking notes. And, you know, like I said, Without that, I see. So she was diagnosed August 8. That was a 15. I remember back in maybe March, she was down to 5.9 a, 1c by March, doing a lot of temp basal is with the Omnipod. For Omnipod dash, temp basal is we really understood that and and the good part of it was, it was a way for me to be able to communicate with my daughter throughout the day in high school, because, you know, she could keep her phone and I'd say, Hey, you're going up a little bit. That's at a temp basal. And she was fine to do it, and she did it, and she could see how it started to go down. And it got us a lot closer, because my wife at the time was very busy at work, and she knew that she trusted me to to learn it, you know, and so she kind of let me do that part of it. She still, still, still was there and still help, but I was the one that was

Scott Benner 31:30
learning. Yeah, and your daughter, seems like she picked up the mantle pretty easily. Like, is that personality wise? Not surprising to you.

Speaker 1 31:40
It really didn't surprise me. I figured she'd learn pretty quick. She's smart and she's very devoted, and I knew she would take it seriously. She didn't mind telling people. I'm not saying that's a bad thing if people don't mind telling people. I totally understand either way, but it just made it to where, you know, more people were aware at the high school, and more people were watching. We had trouble with the exercise in the Lantis, so I didn't attend practices, but I made sure I was at all the games coaches understood that even though there was a no eating policy, she was exempt from that until we got on the pump and then we could set a temp basal. I mean, that was a huge game changer, because, you know, we had to kind of estimate on Lantis based on ball games. And of course, we were adjusting it in the beginning a lot. I was calling, calling that the hospital a lot, which they were extremely helpful, helpful. And they still, they still are. I had trouble getting a pre authorization for a Dexcom, like, two years ago. So we're two years into this, and I had a manager at the hospital that, like, literally went downstairs in the dungeon and found an old fashioned fax machine to fax to my pharmacy company. At the time, my pharmacy provider and Mike spent the whole day trying to get this pre authorization so that we could get our Dexcom filled on time. But so we had, we had a lot of help.

Scott Benner 32:55
People helping. Yeah, two questions, how long did it take to get the Dexcom, and then how long did it take to get the pump?

Speaker 1 33:01
You know, I should have researched that exactly, but I'm going to guess, to me it was probably it really wasn't too bad on the Dexcom. I mean, it seemed like forever, but I'm thinking, and I looked in her log book, I'm thinking around four weeks to get the Dexcom, but I tried to get the Dexcom right away. And I remember the insurance saying, Oh, well, she's not been a type one long enough you're not going to be able to get that. And even some of the hospital people said, No, it's too early. And of course, I'm blessed with really good insurance, and I think it was around three weeks where the hypoglycemic un awareness went in, and then then the pre approval, pre authorization took, like, a week, and then, so I think it was around five weeks, yeah, and we went to see the endo after a month, maybe it was every two weeks, and then a month, and I said, Hey, I'm ready for a pump. And he's like, No. He said, You need to keep doing, you know, manual injections. In case you're not able to get pumps. I'm like, Look, we're experts at manual injections. You know, she's extremely active. Lantus is driving us nuts. Yeah, I think it was around two months, and we got the and we went right to the Omnipod, which I'm so glad we did, because I've got some friends, and, you know, they're used to the pump. I mean, they're used to, like, tubes, tubing, you know, she's never had that. She's always been able to leave it on all the time and and, you know, doesn't get in the way of sports. Yeah, it works for glad we had your recommendation on that.

Scott Benner 34:22
That's awesome. Well, it occurs to me that because of the way you think and the way you process, and I'd like to understand, please understand, it doesn't have to be just from the podcast. I'd like to understand what information moved you along, like, as you were learning, like, what is it you figured out? How did you figure it out? How did you put it into practice? And then, how did you QC it when it was once you had done something?

Speaker 1 34:49
Yeah, probably the bump and nudge episode comes to mind because, you know, it's always the doctors say, Well, you got to do 15 carbs. And, you know, you do their 15 carbs. You wait, and then once you go up, then, you know, take some protein or whatever to help stabilize it. And I can remember texting my daughter and saying, let's try Skittles. You know, one Skittle has, what, two grams or something, okay, you know, she'd start to go low. And I'd say, Just take two Skittles and let's see what happens. And at this point, honeymooning is over this. I mean, we're like, three months in, probably, and we started just doing small amounts of sugar, rather than the 15 or, you know, the entire bottle of juice, or whatever, the bump and nudge episode where you went into that, that was a game changer, because the doctors are like, well, just shoot for a seven, a, 1c, and if she's a little bit high before she goes to bed, well, that's fine. But then I learned from you that maybe 180 is not the greatest thing, and maybe 15 carbs, maybe we could do less than 15 carbs and see what that does and what the Dexcom. I mean, you can, you can see it. That made a huge difference, just hearing you talk about, you know, really estimating the food and glycemic load of food, whatever episode that was. I mean, that was huge, because my daughter was a huge pasta fan, and we didn't even try Chinese food for quite a while. Of course, now she eats whatever she wants, not really, but, I mean, she'll eat Chinese food or pasta or whatever, but, and then, of course, your episode where you talk about, I remember the first time she had pasta, but I was already ready for the rise afterwards, you know, I was ready for this to affect her blood sugar for over three hours. And I can remember, we Bolus, and she ate pasta, and then it was, like an hour and a half later, and she started to go up again. I'm like, Okay, well, this is what they were talking about, you know, with the extra rise, yeah, and you know, knowing that that's coming, and just hearing for me, I like to be I like to know as much as I can, and to be familiar with it. It makes it easier for me to process and handle.

Scott Benner 36:53
So it's encouraging for me, because what I'm hearing you say is I learned about the tools I needed, and I learned how to be flexible around Bolus thing and food. I learned that, you know, I needed to understand how this insulin was affecting the food, how the food was affecting the insulin, so that I could put a little bit in here and a little bit over there and make it, make it balance out, instead of just wild swings and just go for higher, go for lower. I mean, it's the intention of all of it, and it's really great to hear that. That's how it struck you, even early on. Yeah, you know that's that's awesome. I was trying to share this without being too personal, but Arden was explaining. A friend of Arden's wanted to understand diabetes better, and so they were sitting together and spent like hours talking about it, and she got her friend to a good place of understanding. But prior to it, the friend had kind of tried to dig into it on their own, and said to her, so like, you know, you can't really eat a lot of different foods, right? Because, you know, this person trying to figure it out on their own, which is lovely. And Arden is retelling this story to us later, and she says, I said to the person, no, my parents just wanted me to be able to eat normally. And it's like, one of the first times I thought, Oh, wow. Like, I know it's just gonna sound strange, Mitch, but like, we really, really, genuinely do not talk about diabetes a lot here. Arden doesn't like talking about diabetes. Like, I don't, it doesn't don't. It doesn't make her upset, but, like, it's just not a thing she does. And it's been a focus of mine to know what we're doing, do it, make sure everybody's on the same page. But yeah, we don't want to be running around constantly yelling about type one and talking about it all the time. So it's, it's not much of a topic around the house. And to hear her say, not acknowledge like because I know she knows, but it was just nice to know that she was out in the world somewhere, and the message she gave to another person was no. My parents have been trying for a long time to make sure that I'm okay and can live a life that I want to live. And it was, it was really great. It was like such a like a split second. And I think my wife felt it too when she said it. But I don't think Arden knew she was saying something that made me feel so accomplished and warm, you know. So, yeah, anyway, yeah, your daughter's gonna, like, get that too. Because, I mean, the first thing you said about her, I'm gonna ask you how, you know, how's she doing, managing on her own? But, like, when you signed up to do this, you were like, look, she might be starting college by the time I record this. And you said, they're like, I'm nervous about this part of the journey. And then to be able to get on right away and say, look, she wrote her pump too long, her blood sugar got high, and before I could even get a hold of her, she contacted her endo to see what to do about it. I mean, that must have made you feel awesome. Oh, I did, yeah, yeah. It made me feel awesome. Like, I was like, Oh, that kid didn't just sit there going, like, I don't know what to do, yeah. And she also didn't, like, she didn't have that feeling of like, I gotta go up my mom or my dad to help me, like, I can, like, I could figure this out on my own. That's really pretty, pretty great. You know, it's a really motivated. A decision by her,

Speaker 1 40:02
yeah, I was, I was very pleased, and she did all that. And I'm like, Well, do you want me to I mean, she's only, like, she's less than two hours away. So I said, Do you want me to come over there? She said, No, I'm fine. I've got all this stuff to do. Gonna be just fine, and I'm okay. And I said, Okay, well, good. I said, I told her. I said, How proud of what I was ever that. You know what you just said? I called. I went to call and said, Oh no, I'm already on the phone. I'm like, I texted my fiance, and I'm like, hey, look, listen to what just happened. Because I was extremely excited about it, because, because of your podcast, we have had these conversations for a while, and I, you know, maybe a couple of years, I said, you know, you've got to tell your roommate about this. You know, I'll have to have any and even early on, when the first I remember the first time she spent the night with somebody, I said, I got to have phone numbers of some of your friends, you know, because at that time, she was having a hard time waking up. She would sleep through her alarms. And I'm like, I've got to be able to get a hold of your friends if there's more than one, or the parents. So I even, I would text the parents, hey, you know, this is Caitlin's dad. I might have to call you tonight if, if something happens. I never did, but you know, because of your podcast, I remember episodes where, you know you had conversations with her friends, or Arden had conversations with her friends. And I just think that's very important, because I'm sure there's parents out there that send their kids over there, and then they know that they're low and they're like, oh my gosh, what do I do? They didn't think about that.

Scott Benner 41:26
Yeah, the pre planning is important. Yeah, yeah. Also, everyone listening, you should be listening to the podcast the way Mitch does. You're just Mitch. You're making my day. You're not regurgitating the entire episode, right? You can't even tell me exactly what the this makes me feel really good, the Pro Tip series, like you didn't, it didn't actually even pop in. You're like, Oh, what's that thing called? Yeah, maybe it was this episode. And you don't know the titles of them, but you have the information. Like, that's to me, is perfect, like you, it's how I think about it. Like, when you need to know something, you're going to have heard it before, and it's going to populate your brain while you're searching for data, like, while you're thinking, What do I do right now, there's a little unseen hand in the back of your brain, like, handing something up, going like this, think about this, and that's just fantastic. Like, I love that the podcast is working for you the way I intended it to and you and I don't think we probably don't have similar minds, you know, like, if you're in the engineering mindset, like, I don't have that and that my like, sing songy, talky thing stuck to you makes me feel really good.

Speaker 1 42:32
Oh yeah, I've enjoyed every one of your podcasts I can remember, just piggybacking on what you said. You said you can look at a plate and just tell how many units I can't even understand. I can't even understand. I can't even begin to process that, because I have to think very, you know, very methodically. Okay, there's this many carb I mean, I can look at a plate and guess the carbs pretty good, but I don't. I can't just look at a plate and say, oh, there's so many units. But I mean, when I I used to pack my daughter's lunches in high school every day, and so I would weigh everything, and not everything. I would weigh pasta. I would weigh pasta and rice. That's all I would weigh because I wanted her to have, you know, I didn't want her to have to worry about that. But the same time I told her his, I said, be mindful of how much I'm putting in there, so that, which I mean, and she's learned over the four years in high school that, you know, she can guess really good. But I've always thought it's interesting how you can just look at a plate. Oh, that's 10 units, or eight units, or six units or whatever. I can't do that. I, like you said, we think differently, but in that regard, but I'm

Scott Benner 43:31
kind of thrilled that you brought that up, because I don't know what everyone else does when they wake up in the morning, but like, I woke up this morning and I found myself contemplating how thinking works, I still don't get how. Like, my son is a great example, like, he's methodical the way he thinks through things. Like, I've said this on the podcast before, but my son went off to college, got a quantitative econ degree, and after a year of being out in the world, told us I should have learned how to code and bought a $350 online course, and seven months later, got a new job coding. Oh, wow. Had never done it before in his entire life. Actually, was not all that comfortable with computers before that. Wow. And I look at that and Mitch, I don't I if you gave me a lifetime to learn how to do that, I would not be able to do it, because I don't see pieces and put pieces together and build on them. Or however thinking works for him or for you, it doesn't work that way for me. I can't even explain to you that the things I understand I just look at and I understand them, and the things that I don't understand. I could stare at them forever and I don't know how to do the building block thing. Even to say I don't know how to do it, I think is false. I think my brain just does not work that way. As crazy as it sounds like, I'm flummoxed by algebra, you would never be able to teach me algebra. Never. Because I can't just look at it, and it just doesn't occur to me. But then something else will happen, something's broken, or something needs to be done. And it could be a big thing. It could be, you know, a nine step process. We just had a little part of our house renovated, you know, my wife's making lists about what we should do. And I stopped and I looked, I was like, No, we just have to do this, this, this, this, this, and it'll be finished. I think she's looking at me, like, where does that come from? I've been online researching this, trying to figure out all the steps we have to take. I'm like, Oh, it's just obvious. But it's not obvious to some people. And I'm gonna spend my whole life just wishing that some I don't care what it is, God, a book that we find buried somewhere. I want someone to explain that to me before we go. And I know I'm never gonna know, but it's just, it's very cool to see that your thought process and my thought process still mesh together in this, in this specific scenario, I feel warm about it, like it's okay, yeah, it's, it's terrific, good, and you're talking about it with her, because, you know, I've gotta, I gotta. I'm t minus three years here until she's gonna take off and go to college, and I gotta get all this into her head somehow. Does she think more like you or more like me? Probably, probably more like me. Okay, yeah. And how did you find I heard you say, fiance, you found a lady who jives better with the with the engineering mind. Yeah.

Speaker 1 46:20
I mean, I don't know if she would say that, but for some reason she's, she's crazy about me. I don't know why, but yeah, that's awesome. Good for you guys. That's great when you get married. Thank you. May of next year, congratulations. Yeah, thank you. Just got engaged a couple weeks ago on vacation, so

Scott Benner 46:34
that's lovely. Good for you. I want to pivot a little bit. We have a little time left in your note, you said that you started Zepp bound. I did. Yeah, can you tell me about how you got to that?

Speaker 1 46:45
You know, 20 years of failed diets, I've listened to every one of your weight loss diaries. When I started thinking about this, I listened to all your podcasts on GLP ones, and I talked to my doctor back in February. I'm like, I am. I'm ready to try this. I'm tired of failing diets. You know, it's 47 years old. My cholesterol was high. I was high risk. I weighed 260 pounds. I'm six foot one, and I, you know, you have, obviously it's been a game changer for you. I'll get into your episodes later. But My doctor was young, very understanding. Said, Yeah, let's give it a try. And I have good insurance, and I got approved, and a week later, I took my first injection. And people talk about the food noise. The food noise, for me, was loud. It was loud and it was silenced, I mean, and it's, you know, it's February, and this is August, and I'm down 36 pounds this morning, wow. And I've feel better than I thought I ever would. I never thought I would feel this

Scott Benner 47:48
good. And you're nowhere near it yet, and you don't even know really, that's the thing I've learned, having done this now for over two years, that every time there's like, a little milestone that happens, you're like, This, is it? Like, this, is it like, this is the best I've ever felt. It's the best I'm ever gonna feel like, this is awesome. And then 20 pounds later, you're like, Huh? Well, this is the best I've ever felt. I'm never gonna feel better than this. And then one day, you wake up and you say something to yourself, like I've said, which is, I'm now 20 pounds lighter than the number I imagined I should be. Oh, wow. And I'm looking at myself thinking, I'm not really there yet. You don't know where there is until you get closer to it. That's good. And you're going to be stunned how you look back a year from now. And think I remember when I was down 36 pounds, and I thought, My God, my life is better. And now six one and I weigh I mean, honestly, if you end up, I don't know your build, but if you end up somewhere between 192 five pounds or something like that, you're going to have lost 60 or 70 pounds, you know, and you're going to look at yourself and think, I do not recognize myself at all. And I didn't know. I had this thought constantly I was helping my she wouldn't mind. I was helping my sister and we'll all talk through this. Yesterday, I was trying to be, like, motivational to her, so I sent her a photo from Arden's high school graduation and a picture I took of myself the other day. And I was like, here, this is the same person. Like, that's where you're going to be. Just do it. Like, if you're lucky enough that this medication jives with you, right? She's like, What are your quick tips? And I said, If you can't, I said, if you can't take magnesium oxide until you do. And I said, and if you can't stop shitting, put your head down and push through it, because your body will get used to it at some point. Yep, just stay the course. And I'm like, You're gonna wake up a year from now and you're gonna weigh 50 pounds less. That's awesome. I spent an hour talking to her about all the stuff that might happen for her, and how valuable they'll it'll be if some of them happen, and how worth it it is to see if they happen like, you know. So just, you know, the weight loss. And she talked about the food noise too. Just always thinking about food. Or, you know, just constantly, like just being bothered in the back of your mind, like I should eat something, or I'm gonna I'm hungry when I'm not. And then I told her too. I was like, Look, until that food noise goes away, you have to want the medication to work. Make no mistake, you could eat through it. You could give yourself a stomach ache, and you could feel like crap and still get that food in. I was like, but just take the help it's giving you. You know what I mean, like, just try your hardest not to fight with it. So 36 pounds in six months is terrific. What level is that bound? Are you on right

Speaker 1 50:33
now? I'm still on the seven. Was it 7.5

Scott Benner 50:37
Yes, and you're losing weight still.

Speaker 1 50:39
I really need to up my dose. The problem is, my doctor has changed jobs, so he's not going to be my doctor anymore, and I haven't got a new doctor, and I'm supposed to get my refill tomorrow, and I really wanted to up my dose, because this is going to be my third month, and this month's been a little bit of a challenge. But at the same time, I want it to be a challenge, because I don't want to be, you know, I don't want to be completely spoiled by the medicine, because I still have to, I mean, it still takes effort, yes, yeah, still a lot of effort, actually, and but just not nearly what it used to be. I mean, it went from failed diet after failed diet after failed diet to the diet that actually works. And then you get some encouragement, and then you just keep going. And, you know, I don't know if you've done this early on, but every now and then I'll look down like, oh, I don't have this big, giant belly anymore. Sometimes I forget, yeah, or I'll see myself. I remember you said something about seeing yourself in the reflection when you were at an airport the other day your weight loss diary. And I've done that before. I've looked over there. I said, my gosh, I can't get over how much weight I've lost, or the episode where you talked about, you know, your kind of emotional moment you have when you bought new clothes. And I thought, Gosh, I'm not going to have that, because I don't really care about clothes. And then when I actually was able to go from a 38 to a 32 waist size, and, you know, really a triple x to a single x to a large shirt, and I put my clothes on, I thought, well, now I understand what he's talking about, I actually care about what I'm wearing. I care about what kind of jeans I buy, what kind of shirts I buy. I mean, it was bothering me a lot more than what I thought it was, yeah, and you lie to yourself a lot. I guess that's what it was lying to myself for years

Scott Benner 52:15
to make it palatable. I don't care about clothing. I'm not a clothing person, because that's what I always said, Yeah, cuz I look like crap in them and, and I can't buy cool looking stuff, and I, even if I would, I would look dumb in it. Yeah, yeah. That, that vibe. So, oh no, no, no. You're having the whole experience. This is awesome, man, kind of, at the same time, I did, like, you know, my daughter left for college, and I was like, All right, like, I went to the doctor, and I was like, listen, I kept these kids alive for a long time. They seem to be on a good path, like, I think I need to save my own life now, you know. And you're doing you're doing something similar. You're ahead of me, man, by a number of years, so a lot of awesome time moving up and, you know. And I hear what you're saying too, about not wanting to rely heavily on the medication, like you still want it to be about your effort, too. And I've had that experience. You'll hear about it eventually, but I've had that experience in the last couple of weeks, because there was a week here, I don't know what happened, exactly like I really couldn't begin to tell you, other than I think that there was a buy one, get one free ice cream sale at my grocery store. Yeah, and I bought one for my son, one flavor he likes. And I was like, Oh, I like this one. I haven't had this in forever. And I bought one for myself. And as I was walking out of the store, I thought I would make this into an ice cream cone. I like the crunchiness of the waffle of the of the cone. I'm gonna get a cone. And then before I knew it, over the next seven days, I'd had three ice cream cones, and because of the medication, of course, I didn't gain any weight, yeah, but I was off track, and I realized that I was like, Oh my God. Like, this is how this used to happen, but I couldn't stop it before, like, you know. So instead, I was just like, Oh, okay. Like, I was able to, like, kind of collect my thoughts and say, Well, I'm not going to do that anymore. I was like, Oh, I'm going to go low carb for a few days to get this, like, you know, the sugar out of my system and all this stuff. And the impact from it, and the impact of it, is, I spent the first two days of eating low carb just peeing like crazy, because my body was already, like, retaining a bunch of water from, you know, just having a little more sugar in my day. And I was like, wow. Like, what would have happened without the medication back then is, I would have woken up seven days later and been five pounds heavier, yeah, and then that stone would have just started tumbling, you know, and instead, I put on a pound and a half, I was within my like, I have a little swing that I'm okay with. You know, while I'm doing this, instead, I put on a pound and a half, I was able to, like, focus on it and not be overtaken by the fact that the ice cream sale was probably still on, and I just stopped it. I was like, Oh, I'm gonna put a stop at this right now. Now it's a week later. I. You know, it's been a couple of weeks since the it's been a couple of weeks since the buy one, get one free, and I'm back my weights, back to where it was before I saw the ice cream sale. Nice. That's good, yeah. And more importantly, the next time the ice cream is on sale, I guarantee you I'm not gonna, like, get tricked into buying it. I'm just gonna be like, Oh no, I remember what happened last time. I'm gonna have enough clarity to remember and to act appropriately. Because, as I was standing in the kitchen, you know, seven days into it, with my ice cream cone in my hand at the end of the day, because I worked hard, damn it, and blah, blah, blah, I thought to myself, This ice cream is not more valuable than how I feel, how I look, how healthy I am, like, this is not as important as that. And I just didn't even finish it and I threw it away, and I was like, Okay, I'll stop that now. So anyway, that's all because of a GLP one medication.

Speaker 1 55:51
Seriously, it's amazing to me how it makes your brain make sense of that. Instead of your brain trying to find a way to talk yourself into saying it's okay to eat it, yeah, you know, yesterday I I ate with some of my good friends, or day before yesterday, I'm the only one at the table that had a Cobb salad with steak. And that never happened. You know, I would always get fried fish or a big, you know, cheeseburger with a giant bun, or I would get fried chicken wings or whatever. And I, actually, I'm sitting there. I'm like, Huh? I'm the guy at the table that was able to get a Cobb salad with steak and a vinaigrette dressing, and absolutely loved it. And I still fight with the urge. Once in a while I'll open up the pantry and I'll be like, like, I want to get something to eat. And I'm like, wait a minute, I'm not even hungry. Why am I doing this? It's just I'm still not quite out of that habit yet. Even though I'm not hungry, I just do that once in a while, not very often, but I'm able to say, oh, no, I don't need that so. Or have less of it. Yeah, yeah. Have less of it. Like you said, you know, you were able to eat two or three Eminem's. I'm when I'm listening that episode, I'm like, I can't eat two or three m&ms. I mean, if there's m&ms, peanut m&ms, I'm going to eat all of them. Yes, you

Scott Benner 57:01
know, until, until I'm eating the bag, and then that doesn't happen any longer. Or, you know, I don't know if you've had the experience where you're at dinner with a bunch of people and they comment that you're not eating very much. And I look down, and I've never said it out loud, and I never would, but what I think now is, no, you're eating too much. Yeah, I'm eating the right amount. Because look at my body holding its weight at the proper, you know, composition, yeah, yeah. And that's not a thing, because in the beginning, when they said that, I'd say, Oh, I know. I can't eat enough because the medicine stopping me. And I thought of it as the medication stopping me from the amount of food that I wanted to eat. And now I see it as the medication allowing me to eat the amount of food that I actually need. Yeah, yeah. You got to be in it for a while until you start seeing all the different little lessons that come from it. And still, you know, you have to deal with I saw somebody online the other day. She's like, Oh, that's that. That's just that medicine that stops you from eating. And I was like, Oh, you don't understand this at all. It's interesting, like, and how dismissive they were about it. And I still go back to what I thought in the very beginning, which is, what do you care? First of all, like, I'm overweight, I'm gonna have a heart attack, I'm gonna have a stroke, I'm gonna I'm not gonna live as long. What do you care how that doesn't happen to me? Like, I just need that not to happen, right? Like, what I don't what's your stake in this? That you want to be shitty about this when you're talking about it? And, you know, by the way, that person I saw the other day online, like, if their avatars and a clear representation of them, they're not a person who struggles with any of this, yeah, you know, so easy for you to say, thanks. You know, anyway, Mitch, this is really great, am I? Are we missing anything that we we haven't talked about that we should have anything you want to add?

Speaker 1 58:50
I don't think so. I just, I mean, my main purpose was just to share with you, you know, my daughter's diagnosis. You know, watch your kids. If you have an idea to check their blood sugar, just check it. And of course, you know, most people that listen to this are probably this are probably already past that, but, and then just how, how much I relied on your podcast, how helpful it was, not just for my daughter, but even for my weight loss now. So just a big, big thank you to you and what you've done. And you know, you you went through this with your daughter, and you said, oh, I want to start a podcast and think about how many. I mean, literally, I mean, I guess millions of people listen to this. You, you do a lot, and very much appreciate

Scott Benner 59:26
it. Thank you. It's crazy. We're getting, we, I, I'm getting ready to celebrate our the podcast, 20,000,000th download, wow, yeah, which is, which is really insane. Like, there's, you know, there's podcasts, like, don't get me wrong, there's, you know, podcasts, you know, in the top 1% they probably get, probably get 15 million downloads a day, you know, or whatever. But I'm really proud that something this niche spread this far and wide, because it's. Unheard of for a podcast about type one diabetes to reach 20 million downloads. It would be impressive if a podcast on type one diabetes was up for 10 years and had 2 million downloads. Like that would be impressive. It really, it really would be to say that there's 20 or that, you know, on any given day, the podcast is charting in like 40 some countries. Wow. It's really, really nuts. You know, it's amazing. And for you to come on and share your story with everybody listening is very generous, because the podcast obviously doesn't exist very long if it's just me here talking to myself, I appreciate you taking the time and sharing all this, and you really honored me by the way you spoke about how the podcast helped you. I am incredibly, incredibly proud of your daughter, even though I don't know her. I'm excited for her to to get going and learn everything. And I'm going to tell you right now, Mitch, that there are going to be things that happen over the next four years to college that are going to test everything, and you're gonna have to keep learning and adjusting and being gracious with your daughter. And there's a lot still coming, man. So I It sounds like you're ready for it, though.

Speaker 1 1:01:10
Appreciate that. I hope so. Hope so. I guess one other quick thing, now that you just did a conclusion, no, the first four months of this, you know, with my daughter in type one was very, very stressful, you know, three to four months. But you know, after that, it was just everyday life. So those of you out here that you know are really stressed out, I see it on your Facebook page, I try to comment when I can, you know, the first few months, you know, depending upon the caretaker's personality, as to how long that takes. But you know, the first few months are really stressful, and it seems overwhelming, but you know if, if you listen to the Pro Tip series and talk with your indo and make the changes, and it does get to where it's just normal, and I like what you said about making sure your daughter, you didn't focus on that, I did that too much early on, but then realized that That was a mistake and stop doing that early on. And you know, it makes, you know, rather than talking about diabetes every day, you just, it just becomes the new norm. So yeah, anyway,

Scott Benner 1:02:11
I'm really glad for you that that you were able to see yourself veering and and bring it back. And if I had anything to do with that being in the front of your mind. I'm really happy to know that.

Speaker 1 1:02:22
So, oh yeah, yeah. Definitely did a lot of episodes where you you talk about that.

Scott Benner 1:02:26
So awesome. I appreciate, man, and I appreciate that you kept listening to that you you know, some people just do the management stuff and they're like, hey, everything's great. And then they go away and don't, I think there's a lot to be gotten out of the conversations as well. So thank you. I appreciate you. Benner, listener, Oh, you're welcome. Enjoy it absolutely. Okay, awesome. Mitch, hold on one second for me. Okay, sure.

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#1645 All in the Family

You can always listen to the Juicebox Podcast here but the cool kids use: Apple Podcasts/iOS - Spotify - Amazon Music - Google Play/Android - iHeart Radio -  Radio Public, Amazon Alexa or wherever they get audio.

Three generations, one diagnosis. Mike, his daughter, and his son each face type 1 diabetes at different ages—sharing lessons on family, resilience, technology, and perspective gained through lived experience.

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DISCLAIMER: This text is the output of AI based transcribing from an audio recording. Although the transcription is largely accurate, in some cases it is incomplete or inaccurate due to inaudible passages or transcription errors and should not be treated as an authoritative record. Nothing that you read here constitutes advice medical or otherwise. Always consult with a healthcare professional before making changes to a healthcare plan.

Scott Benner 0:00
Friends, we're all back together for the next episode of The Juicebox podcast. Welcome.

Mike 0:14
My name is Mike, and I am a type one diabetic. When I was diagnosed, I was 54 I am now 56 kind of unfortunately, I have a lot of experience with type one diabetes.

Scott Benner 0:31
I am here to tell you about juice cruise. 2026 we will be departing from Miami on June 21 2026 for a seven night trip, going to the Caribbean. That's right, we're going to leave Miami and then stop at Coco k in the Bahamas. After that, it's on to St Kitts, St Thomas and a beautiful cruise through the Virgin Islands. The first juice Cruise was awesome. The second one is going to be bigger, better and bolder. This is your opportunity to relax while making lifelong friends who have type one diabetes. Expand your community and your knowledge on juice cruise 2026 learn more right now at Juicebox podcast.com/juice. Cruise. At that link, you'll also find photographs from the first cruise. Nothing you hear on the Juicebox podcast should be considered advice medical or otherwise, always consult a physician before making any changes to your healthcare plan. This episode of The Juicebox podcast is sponsored by Medtronic diabetes and their mini med 780 G system designed to help ease the burden of diabetes management, imagine fewer worries about Miss boluses or miscalculated carbs thanks to meal detection technology and automatic correction doses. Learn more and get started today at Medtronic diabetes.com/juicebox this episode of The Juicebox podcast is sponsored by the contour next gen blood glucose meter. Learn more and get started today at contour, next.com/juicebox

Mike 2:07
My name is Mike. I live in Utah, and I am a type one diabetic, newly diagnosed at the ripe age of when I was diagnosed, I was 54 I am now 56 kind of, unfortunately, I have a lot of experience with type one diabetes.

Scott Benner 2:26
Yeah, look at how you teased it out. Mike, that's, that's a bit of a storyteller in you there. That's excellent,

Mike 2:31
yeah, yeah, absolutely, unfortunately. It's, I don't know if you could say it's a horror story or a great story when it comes to diabetes. Unfortunately, baptism by fire, and I certainly thought I escaped it at my age, so I was a little shocked and devastated at the same time. Yeah, yeah. And here we are today.

Scott Benner 2:51
That's how I envision this, actually. So let's do this. Are there any other autoimmune issues in your family?

Mike 2:58
You know there is not. I have a daughter who was diagnosed pretty much same age as Arden, and at the time, I talked to my mom, and she said that they had an aunt that died prematurely, and they think it was type one, but other than that, it was just type two diabetes. So when my daughter, and then later my son, as we'll get into that, were diagnosed, they always wanted to know who to blame, and last spring, they decided to blame me.

Scott Benner 3:24
So when I said, Is there any other autoimmune in your family, you meant no other than my two children who have type one diabetes,

Mike 3:31
other than my two children who have type one diabetes, absolutely. Yeah. So I guess in a way, I was the beginning.

Unknown Speaker 3:37
Well, how many kids do you have in total?

Mike 3:41
Okay, so this will shock you a little bit, but I have seven. My wife has two. I had four, and then we adopted a girl out of the foster care when she was 13 years old. She's now 20.

Scott Benner 3:53
That's interesting that you didn't get to that math the way I expected you to, because I know you live in Utah

Mike 3:59
and I am not LDS and I have a bunch of kids.

Unknown Speaker 4:02
Yeah, when you said I have seven, I was

Scott Benner 4:04
like, why would you think? This is shocking to me, but Oh, so you came about them. You've been collecting them in a couple of different ways.

Mike 4:10
Yeah, exactly, yeah, adding on. But I don't think we're going to add any more. I think, I think, well, we're good at seven,

Unknown Speaker 4:16
yeah. So you have, I

Scott Benner 4:18
almost said, sired. What are we making puppies over here. Yeah. Why? Why did that pop into my head? You're the father of four children, natural children. I am the father of four natural children. Correct? Your wife showed up with two. My wife showed up with two. Yeah. And you stole one from the mall.

Mike 4:35
We stole one from the foster care program, yeah? And it was actually that's a whole podcast in itself, but a rewarding experience, and I could go on the road talking about how successful that is

Scott Benner 4:44
no kidding. Okay, so of your four kids that you had, I'm assuming in a previous marriage, what are their ages?

Mike 4:51
So my oldest son, who passed away in 2011 would have been 30. Five today. I have a daughter who is, will be 34 this winter, this December. She's my type one diabetic. My son, who is he lives in Portland. His name's Zach. He is 30, and he was diagnosed with type one diabetes four years ago, and then I have a younger daughter who's the only one that's not diabetic. She's 26

Unknown Speaker 5:25
like, I'm sorry to ask you, but how did your oldest son pass?

Mike 5:29
He went to a rough breakup and unfortunately, took his own life.

Unknown Speaker 5:32
Oh my gosh, at what age? Yeah,

Mike 5:35
he was 21 just barely turned 21 Oh, so it's been a while.

Scott Benner 5:40
Yeah, no, but still, did he have other I don't know how to ask you, this. Is that a thing you saw coming?

Mike 5:47
No, no. In fact, Scott, you know, whenever somebody happens, maybe even when Arden is diagnosed with type one diabetes, you think this doesn't happen to me, right? Like you're this happens to other people, not not me. So it was a shock. It was a huge shock. Of not something I was expecting by any means, but it, you know, it definitely was shocking.

Unknown Speaker 6:09
Well, I'm so sorry. So your daughter's diagnosed at two. Did you say

Mike 6:14
she was four years old when she was diagnosed? So back in 1995

Scott Benner 6:18
95 okay, so yeah, Arden was diagnosed when she was two, yeah, and in 90 Oh, my God, 2006 Yes, 2006 was a lot of math there. So, okay, so your daughter had had diabetes for 10 years by the time my kid was diagnosed, yeah, yeah. Definitely got a head start on you. Okay, so 1996 she's four years old. Do you remember that process? Do you remember how it presented?

Mike 6:47
You know, just like probably any parent yourself included, when you look back, you're like, how did we not catch it? But at the time, she never wet the bed. She was amazing. And then all of a sudden, she started wetting the bed. And we didn't think anything of it, because I had never even really heard of type one diabetes at the time. The internet is not what it is today. And so she started wetting the bed. And then we would start leaving the house, and we tell her, go to the bathroom. And I swear, we get like, two miles away, and she's, I have to go to the bathroom. And I remember saying, There's no way you have to go to the bathroom. You just went, but we would stop. Didn't really notice her drinking anything. She was only four, so didn't really notice if she was losing weight. And then she got sick, and she just didn't get any better. And my ex wife said, I'm going to take her to the doctor, and she did, and they did a urine test, and it came back, like, you need to take her the ER, right now, okay, and my wife called me, and she said, you know, you have to take her in. She has sugar in her urine. I'm like, Well, what does that mean? And she's, I don't know. And of course, you know, as soon as they get her the ER, they check her into ICU, and then we we find out about type one diabetes. Wow, you

Scott Benner 8:05
said she sick and she didn't get better. Like, would you describe her as, just, like, under the weather, or flu, like, symptoms or and how long did it last?

Mike 8:14
Yeah, just like the flu. That's really what we thought. She just had the flu. She just wasn't getting better. We hadn't put together any type of, you know, urination issues with bed wetting or even leaving the house. We hadn't put that together. But she, yeah, she had the flu and running a fever, and she just wasn't getting any better. And that's, that's when my ex wife

Scott Benner 8:34
decided to take like that. Do you know how long that process was? Was it days weeks where you thought she was sick?

Mike 8:40
I would say she was probably sick for about a week. And, you know, four year old being in daycare and around other kids, that was an abnormal. Kids are kind of petri dishes for disease, you know, sickness anyway, right? We really hadn't thought about it. It just lingered and lingered, and it wasn't getting better. She wasn't in full DKA by any means. So we were, we were very fortunate. Early on, it wasn't a Yeah, a quick trip to the ICU, even though it was, but in a roundabout way.

Scott Benner 9:07
So Mike, who takes care of the diabetes for the four year old, is it? Is it a shared experience between you and your ex, or is it one of the other and what did that look like back then? What kind of insulin? What were you doing for management?

Mike 9:20
So we were doing MDI at that time. There was no really pumps. They were around, but they weren't really readily it wasn't something certainly we were going to put on a four year old back then. I think they were about the size of a car battery. They were big. There was certainly no CGM. So, you know, we went through some education classes at the hospital, and of course, we went through a counseling class that it wasn't any of our fault, and we were sent home with, you know, vials and syringes, and that's what we gave her at that time. I don't even believe pens were available. And as I looked through that, you know, my wife worked in you. In the evenings and at night, and I worked during the day. So it was a shared 5050, and we're trying to, really just trying to figure it out, when I look at today's technology, you know, with CGM and pumps, and then I think back in 1995 I was sent home with a four year old and syringes and vials. How did I keep her alive? Like there was so much of a picture we didn't understand. And back then, you know, you hear this term, and I've even heard it on your podcast, they defined her as a brittle diabetic, meaning hard to control. It was just we didn't know the whole picture of what was going on. That's why she was hard to control.

Scott Benner 10:37
Yeah, no kidding. You said you don't know how you kept her alive, but how do you think you did it? What was it? Did you eventually find a rhythm, something that was agreeable, or, I don't, you know what I

Mike 10:47
mean, I think more, it's, you know, now that I'm on insulin, it's more I look back at how, at the time, I didn't realize how dangerous insulin was, okay, and you were always walking in a way, with a, you know, especially a type one diabetic at that age, you're kind of walking a tight line. But I think because of my young age, the internet wasn't what it is, so we really couldn't research it. We were just counting carbs, giving her the right amount of insulin, doing Lantus at night, and then, of course, trying to finger pricker, you know, as much as you can to get a good picture before meals, after meals, and kind of understand it, but you certainly didn't get that every five minute blood sugar to really obtain a full picture.

Unknown Speaker 11:30
Mike, are you old enough to

Scott Benner 11:32
appreciate that? 30 years ago, you couldn't really research something like that how different the world is. Like I imagine people younger than us are never really gonna understand that you just like somebody said something to and you went, Okay, well, the doctor said it, that's it. I will do this for the rest of our lives. Now, there's nowhere to check. Maybe you'd bump into somebody eventually who'd say something to you. You know, counterintuitive to what you'd heard the first time, but there was nowhere to go to find out. You know, it's crazy how much the access to information has changed in such a short I think of it as a short amount of time, but I'm assuming people think of 30 years as a long time, but it seems fast to me.

Mike 12:08
You know, it's funny you say that because, yeah, we were so isolated. I have a lot of medical professions, professionals in my family, and I look back at, like, just 100 years ago, you know, like when you look at the whole lifespan of humans existent, the leaps and bounds that we have made in the last 100 years, and then really, like you said, with technology information 30 years ago, that that just wasn't available, is such a short amount of time that now we have that. But I also question like, would it have been scary to have all that information back then, it certainly would have

Scott Benner 12:43
helped. It's possible that the knowledge, without the technology, might have been frightening, because you did say, like, you didn't know even that the insulin could be dangerous. So you were just doing you were just doing what they said. You weren't even thinking twice about, like, what might be happening afterwards,

Mike 12:58
right? Yeah, absolutely. And sadly, you know now, like, if you go low in the middle of the night, you get alarms, which are really annoying, because I get a ton of them. But back then, the only way we knew that she was going low is we would hear her cry. And at that point, you know, I don't, I think we were sleeping very lightly, just so we could always hear her. And it's just scary to think what was going on. And then, I think, even, like, what was going on 30 years before she was even diagnosed? How much scarier was that? Because at least we had test strips, and we had more than one a day.

Unknown Speaker 13:30
Do you recall what her a one, Cs were like back then? You know, she was

Mike 13:34
always, actually, for the most part, pretty good. She was in sixes. Never really got down in the fives, maybe, low sevens.

Unknown Speaker 13:42
They must have been thrilled with that back then. Yeah, they were. They were

Mike 13:45
really happy. You know, we were really good at always taking her the endocrinologist every time she had an appointment. We never really skipped any corners on it. We wanted to make sure she got the best care.

Scott Benner 13:57
Have you ever talked to her about what it was like to grow up with diabetes? Does she have remembrances or struggles or celebrations that she shared with you?

Unknown Speaker 14:08
Contour next.com/juicebox

Scott Benner 14:11
that's the link you'll use to find out more about the contour next gen blood glucose meter. When you get there, there's a little bit at the top you can click right on blood glucose monitoring. I'll do it with you. Go to meters, click on any of the meters. I'll click on the Next Gen, and you're going to get more information. It's easy to use and highly accurate. Smart light provides a simple understanding of your blood glucose levels, and of course, with Second Chance sampling technology, you can save money with fewer wasted test strips. As if all that wasn't enough, the contour next gen also has a compatible app for an easy way to share and see your blood glucose results. Contour, next.com/juicebox and if you scroll down at that link, you're going to see things like a Buy Now button. You could register your meter after you purchase it. Or what is this? Download a coupon. Oh, receive a free contour next gen blood glucose meter. Do tell contour next.com/juicebox head over there. Now get the same accurate and reliable meter that we use. Today's episode is sponsored by Medtronic diabetes, who is making life with diabetes easier with the MiniMed 780 G system. The MiniMed 780 G automated insulin delivery system, anticipates, adjusts and corrects every five minutes. Real world results show people achieving up to 80% time and range with recommended settings, without increasing lows. But of course, Individual results may vary. The 780 G works around the clock so you can focus on what matters. Have you heard about Medtronic extended infusion set? It's the first and only infusion set labeled for up to a seven day wear. This feature is repeatedly asked for, and Medtronic has delivered. 97% of people using the 780 G reported that they could manage their diabetes without major disruptions of sleep. They felt more free to eat what they wanted, and they felt less stress with fewer alarms and alerts you can't beat that. Learn more about how you can spend less time and effort managing your diabetes by visiting Medtronic diabetes.com/juicebox

Mike 16:20
No, she doesn't, you know, she doesn't really know life without type one diabetes. So for her, it's very interesting. She just doesn't remember anything. You know, she was really great through the whole thing, especially as I look back now that I'm a type one but the only time she ever cried was the day we brought her home from the hospital and pricked her finger and gave her the first shot. Because, of course, she thought, I'm out of the hospital. I don't have to do this. And now she does. She never really cried. Now I look back and, you know, now that I'm type one, I look back and I think I wish I had understood a little bit more. But of course, I was trying to keep her, you know, her a 1c low, make sure her blood sugar wasn't spiking. So it was harder for me to understand, especially as she got into the teenage years of having a cheat day or a day I just don't want to be diabetic. I didn't understand those then,

Scott Benner 17:13
yeah, well, I mean, I think this is where, honestly, where your story is going to get the most interesting is, is when you're diagnosed, and you have the ability to look back over all this time with her, and then, of course, with your son as well. Yeah. How long does she have type one before your son's diagnosed? And was he diagnosed as an adult out of the house or with you still?

Mike 17:34
Yeah. So my son was in the Navy. He was stationed in San Diego, went in when he was, oh gosh, just 2021, years old. And he got out. He was out in August of 2021, he moved to Portland, bought a house. He was driving down to San Diego to see his wife's family, and all of a sudden he looked at his wife, said, I just don't feel good. He knew something was wrong. So this was December, Christmas of 2021, and he stopped at Walmart and bought a cheap checker and checked, and it said, hi to him. Want to know how he was doing that day, too. And he immediately looked his wife said, we have to go to the ICU. We have to get to the ER really quick. He went to the ER. And I remember when he called me and he said, Dad, I'm I'm in the hospital. I said, well, for what he said, type one diabetic. I just was complete shock,

Speaker 1 18:30
yeah, why, Mike? Because, because it just felt like it had happened once, it couldn't happen again.

Mike 18:36
Basically, yeah, it happened once, it shouldn't happen again. He was, you know, 2627 years old. It just didn't seem right. And then I remember I teared up in the moment we got off the phone with him, I said, you know, thinking like, you know, to God or whatever, you know, I'll take this. And unfortunately, I did, but somebody else didn't live up to their end,

Scott Benner 18:58
didn't do the exchange. They just brought it up. Yeah, exactly. I thought he was crying because he went from living from living in the weather of San Diego to the weather of Portland, Oregon. Oh, yeah, that'd make me upset. Wow. So he's diagnosed as a young married person. Had he been married long? At that point, he

Mike 19:14
had only been married about a year, so it was very new, you know, obviously, you know, he knew all about diabetes, and I would say, in the hospital, he was joking with me. We were FaceTiming, and he was uplifted. He was he was like, I'm going to be fine. It was more me that was almost devastated over it than course,

Scott Benner 19:33
you think that he felt like he was going to be fine, because he grew up with a sister who had it.

Mike 19:38
Yeah, exactly, yeah. He had the confidence. And he's just a great kid. Anyways, everything's positive. He's just fun to be around. You know? He he was kind of, in a way, of a lucky one. His a 1c when he went in was 17. He had been high, but because he had just got out of the military, he was able to go back. That was something they should have caught when he. Got out of the military. So the military will actually pay for his medical supplies, full pump and everything for the rest of his life.

Scott Benner 20:07
Oh, because he was in when this started and it wasn't caught, this falls under his veterans benefits,

Mike 20:14
absolutely, yep. So he'll have 100% and you know, when my daughter had it, one of the first things I was worried about was, like, this is this is not fair in life, because this is a lifetime expense that's not fair to her.

Unknown Speaker 20:27
Yeah, yeah. The cost

Scott Benner 20:30
is, I was just having a conversation with somebody about some generic insulin that's coming, and they're talking a lot about, like, what kind of pen is it going to go into? And, you know, like, they're, you know, at a company level, they're talking about all that. And somebody remarked, you know, I think, really, you should be a little more focused on just the fact that people need affordable insulin, put it in vials and give it to them. Yeah, let's stop worrying about, like, this part of it here, like, let's just, you know, there's a lot of people who can't afford their insulin. They're rationing, they're not eating sometimes because of it, like they don't care which one of the one of the pens you choose. Like, just, like, let's get it to them. And I thought it's interesting the way you you just talked about the financial side of it, right? Like, my gosh. Like, what a relief is it that someone else is going to pay for this stuff for your son versus your daughter, who's you know? Yeah, yeah, stuck paying for her whole life. Hey, yep. Is he still married?

Mike 21:26
Yes, he's still married. Lives in Portland, and he's on a pump and his a 1c was he was down to five, five, and they're trying to kick him up a little bit. They want Him more around that 5759,

Unknown Speaker 21:40
range, okay, is he experiencing a lot of lows

Mike 21:44
more than what they would like? He's on a he's on a T slim. Yeah, he tends to hover a little bit low, but then he allows a spike his his standard deviations a little bit on the higher side. Okay?

Scott Benner 21:56
And can I ask? I've been wondering this for 10 minutes now. Do you think that one of your kids getting type one diabetes at all added to the fact that you're divorced from their mom? Now, did it add a level of difficulty to your marriage? Or do you think they're not related?

Mike 22:12
No, I don't think it is. They've been diagnosed for about six years, and you know, it really didn't cause a lot of friction that part, there was some other things that just caused. Yeah, I

Scott Benner 22:23
don't need to know what they are. I just was wondering if that was a contributing factor or not.

Mike 22:28
No, I don't think it was.

Unknown Speaker 22:30
So now, how long ago was your son diagnosed?

Scott Benner 22:34
So he was diagnosed December of 2021, and it was like Chris day before Christmas, right? So four, maybe four years ago, in that range, this is some, like, couple of decades since your daughter's been type one. So your daughter's diagnosed at a really young age. You grow up as a father through all that, he's diagnosed more recently, and then it's just a couple years later that you are as well.

Mike 23:00
Yeah, my story was actually really interesting the way it came about. I was one of the very fortunate ones that I didn't go in a DKA or ICU or anything. But yes, it was just really about three years later that we had noticed something with me. And in 2023 I had worked for a company for about seven years, and I had another company that recruited me, and I decided to make the jump. And in between, I had a couple week period where I just decided to take couple weeks off. And I thought, well, I'm going to go in and get my physical done, because I have asthma, and so I need to get my asthma medication renewed. And I went to the doctor. They did a full blood palette. So this was September of 23 and it came back a few days later. And my primary care physician, she's a marathon runner, and maybe we should say that I I'm a cyclist. I used to race bikes, and at this time, I stopped racing in 2015 but I still work out anywhere from 10 to 15 hours a week. I'm on a bike, so I'm very I'm a very active person. And so, of course, with a lot of athletes, what happens is you tend to eat whatever you want, because you work out. And so my a 1c she called me, and it came back at five, nine. She said, Mike, your your a 1c is a little high. And she said, you know, obviously you're not a type two, but it, you know, she'd even mentioned diabetes. We really just talked about, you know, I should eat, stop eating sugar, and because I worked out, you know, your normal person would go, let's say, in the evening, eat one or two Oreo cookies. And I'm probably the guy that eats 10 to 12 cookies and then maybe washes it down with a brownie. I said, that's fine. So in September, when she said, You know, I bet if you just stop eating it, maybe just had a treat here or there on the weekends, you'll be fine. So I being who I am, I completely stopped eating sugar. Went to Mexico Cancun for a week. There I had some dessert. Fruits and a few drinks. I'm not a heavy drinker, but I really cut back drinking. And I went back for my and she was fantastic. She could have left it at that and said, Don't worry about coming back. Just stop eating sugar. But she said, come back in three months, and let's test it again. I went back three months later. It was December. It was right around probably December 20, so shortly before Christmas, and got my blood work done. And I remember I was actually in the department store checking out by my wife a Christmas present, and I got an email that my blood results came back, and I started opening it checked out. And as I was walking through the parking lot to my truck, I looked at it, and I saw my a 1c had gone from five, nine to six, and the tears started coming. I knew. I was like, Wait a minute. There's no way it can be six. Something has happened. Yeah, yeah, talk to the doctor. And you know, it was like, Okay, let's just keep watching it. We're going to test again in three more months. So in that time I was working out, there was Christmas Eve, and I thought, I'm gonna go to Walmart and just buy a glucose checker. Yeah, you shouldn't get the them fairly inexpensive there. And I checked, I just finished working out, got home, opened it up, checked it, my sugar levels were 180 I was like, This is not right. I shouldn't be 180 so I started checking it periodically, went through the holidays, didn't really have much sugar or anything. And then in March of 2022, or no, I'm sorry, March of 2024 we started looking for a second home, and we were looking in southern Utah at the same time, you know, there's a lot of stress going on of buying an additional home. My son was a type one diabetic, and I talked to him, you know, almost every other day, and he said, Dad, I'm going to send you CGM. He's like, I have so many. I'll send you one so we can get a clear picture. And he sent it. I was completely shocked. All of a sudden, I was seeing three hundreds. And I was like, This isn't good. I went down to do a home inspection on her house, and I came back and my sugar levels were so elevated, it was causing me a little stress. I actually thought I was having a heart attack. And went to the doctor the next day, did another one, A, 1c, check, and I had jumped from six to six, eight.

Scott Benner 27:25
Mike, the sadness you felt. Was it about your own health solely? Was it about what you thought you were losing, what you're about to experience? Or do you think you started to think more about your kids? Or do you think there's a combination of things in

Mike 27:38
there? I think when I looked at it. It was one of those. So I had worked out, you know, race bikes my entire life. And you know, racing, you know, 10 to 13,000 miles a year. And remember when I looked at my primary care physician, I don't think she even wanted to tell me what my a 1c was, because when she did tell me, I had to ask her, and she got real quiet, and she said, six, eight. And the tears came. And I was, you know, I was like, I did everything in my life not to be here. And of course, she said, It's not your fault. And she's, you know, she was real nice. She said, if anything, because of your lifestyle, you probably would have been here two years ago in a lot worse shape, so you didn't do anything. And so I think it was more it was just a shock, because I had always really taken great pride in really taking care of myself, being active, being healthy. I was the guy that would go to the doctor, and my blood pressure would be so low I would be really proud of that. So to go that was a huge swing for me to go from that to all of a sudden having a life changing disease, it

Scott Benner 28:47
was more about the, I guess, that psychological aspect of like, I think, how is it possible I put this much effort into something that still didn't work out?

Mike 28:55
Yeah, absolutely. And, you know, I've heard, you know, even on your podcast, other older people saying the same thing. I thought, I thought, you know, 5455 years old, I'd escaped that. I certainly knew what it was, but I thought it escaped.

Unknown Speaker 29:10
It was there a piece

Scott Benner 29:12
of the like you said earlier, like, you know, your daughter had type one for such a long time her your son's diagnosed. Later, you think, Oh, God, that can't happen. Like, it's already happened to us. Is is this like the Oh, it can't. How is it possibly going to happen a third time? Has happened twice? Or is it more about feeling like marked? Do you start feeling, oh, this thing feels like it's out. They get like, you know what? You know, I should mention this, right? It's the 50th anniversary of jaws. Remember, in Jaws where they act, they acted like the shark had something out for the family. Like, did you feel like that?

Mike 29:39
That didn't really cross my mind too much. What did cross my mind was my youngest daughter didn't have diabetes. Of Okay, is it going to happen? Pretty much every one of your direct siblings has it now. Your dad, like, are you next?

Scott Benner 29:56
Yeah, yeah. Now you're worried for her. It's going to come for her as well.

Unknown Speaker 29:59
Absolutely. Absolutely. How old is she? He is 27 and

Scott Benner 30:03
I guess it doesn't really matter, because now at this point you have, you have someone diagnosed at four, someone diagnosed at 21 someone diagnosed at 52 like there's no even rhyme or reason to the to the age there in the family. So this is just a thing I imagine you're going to worry about for the rest of your life

Mike 30:21
for her. Oh, yeah, absolutely, yeah. And so, of course, my, you know, my diabetes stories doesn't end there. So I was diagnosed, and then in June, I think it was June of last year, my wife's half brother wound up in the ICU DKA, and then it's like, wow. Now we have another one, no blood relation, but okay, now is my wife on that and we did go get her tested to for the antibodies.

Unknown Speaker 30:50
Like, I'm sorry, your current wife or your ex wife, my current wife?

Mike 30:53
Okay, yeah, oh, geez, yeah. And we've been together for 20 years, so it's been a long

Scott Benner 30:57
time. I was just gonna say, like, if, if we found it in your ex wife's family line, then it makes sense that you know that so many of your kids have it too. Is there anxiety in your family, like with your kids or yourself? Is anybody anxious? ADHD, anything like that?

Mike 31:14
No, not at all. If anything, we're the 100% opposite. We're the family that when something bad happens, we'll lick our wounds for a week or two, and then we'll start picking out the positive. Like, even me with type one diabetes, even though my daughter had it. Like, now I really understand how the whole digestive system works, the liver and everything. And it's like, it's like, okay, now I probably understand more about the digest the digestive system diabetes more than endocrinologists. So we're kind of always that family that picks the positive out of everything. Even when my son passed away, we picked out positive things, and that's just the way we are. Lick our wounds for for a little bit, and then we pick ourselves back up.

Speaker 1 31:56
Can you tell me some of the positive you identified after his passing?

Mike 32:00
Yeah, absolutely. You know, it was devastating because me, I had never even been to a funeral, and sort of to go to my, you know, the first one to be my son. But it really brought my children together closer, even closer than they were. And that was always the positive. And it actually taught me to let things go. There was a lot of things, even, like, I would argue with my ex wife and I was like, so much of that just didn't matter. After that, it was so insignificant. It just didn't matter.

Scott Benner 32:29
Yeah, you gained a perspective of 100 year old man in five seconds, really? Yeah, absolutely. I feel like diabetes has done that for me. Oh, and I feel like I see it with other people as well, you know, just at some point, I don't know the minutia and the silly things that we all like get upset about or argue about, I just when they happen now you just feel like, God, this is just so meaningless. You know, yeah, to

Mike 32:54
get worked up over senseless things. It just that's actually what came up. It was like, this just isn't worth energy, really negative energy anymore. And I really took that approach with my ex wife. I was like, I'm just not going to argue with you. I just don't care anymore.

Scott Benner 33:09
Yeah, just, I don't know, like, the words for it, but it's and it doesn't happen consciously in your head. But you know, like, what are we going to argue about where we're going to dinner? Like, Arden's pancreas doesn't make insulin, you know, or my son's not here anymore. Like, like, this is, this is a real thing that happened. So just because it happened to us this one time doesn't mean it's not happening to other people all over the world constantly, that people aren't battling depression, or, you know, quiet battles that nobody else knows about, and that there aren't shocked families left behind, or health issues that people are are just constantly fighting with, and we're gonna sit here and like, be mad that, you know, I don't know the gutter guys didn't come on the right day, or like, you know, like, just doesn't matter. I don't know. I just think it gives you, like, a lifetime's worth of perspective in a short amount of time. And I think a lot of people are lucky enough to level up from that and maybe find some clarity that they didn't have prior.

Mike 34:04
Yeah, I'll agree 100% Yeah. I really do think, you know, the t1 just changes everything for you. And you know now that I've been diagnosed with it, it really changes everything. More than raising children with t1 was one thing, or a child, and then having an adult or, you know, an adult child, but now having it myself, it's just everything is so different in life now, well, that's

Scott Benner 34:28
what I want to check with you, because it's, I mean, listen, it's easy for me to philosophize about it, right? Like, because it's, I don't have to take the insulin Arden does, right? Like, I don't get low she does, right? I don't have to worry about the future she does like those are all her actual lived problems, not mine, but I know how I feel, and I know how I've been impacted by it. But I guess my question to you is, is the did any of that change or deepen when it became your diagnosis, or are the feelings I'm feeling for a child really the same? That I would get if I had diabetes myself.

Mike 35:03
Yeah, it's, it's interesting. You know, obviously experiencing some lows and some highs. I have a different, completely different perspective of it. Now, when you watch, you know, your your girl, go through it, it's one thing. Now I'm experiencing it, and I don't know if it's worse because of my age. I don't know if that's something that could even be quantified, but I certainly have a whole new understanding. I remember when my daughter would come home and she, you know, her blood sugar would be high, and I'd ask her what she had for lunch, and, you know, how much insulin did you take? And I remember saying, like, did you forget your diabetes, and now I have an old news perspective of that, a clearer picture and certainly understanding of

Speaker 1 35:48
it. Have you contacted her and shared that with her? You know, we have

Mike 35:52
kind of a strained relationship, a little bit, which is sad, but no, I haven't. Certainly with my son. We talk all the time, and we can definitely correlate. He's actually maintained really well. I'm a little bit better than him, I think, yeah, but he's, he's really good at it. But, you know, I had a really scary low last December, and so it's nice to talk to somebody who's gone through that to get some understanding.

Scott Benner 36:20
Yeah, well, I mean, I don't know the source of your strain with your daughter, but, I mean, I would imagine it would mean something to her to know that, you know, like, you have a different perspective now that you have it, and you know you're sorry for for any time that you may have. Like, I don't know if that's fixes things with people or not, but I'm assuming we've all done that to a kid with type one, everybody who's a caregiver at some point or another, you say that thing, right? Like that, no matter how you mean it sounds like, what did you do? You know? Like, why did, how did you make this happen? Like, what did you not do that caused this that, as much as that's not your intention in the moment, I imagine it's overwhelmingly received that way from from the type ones themselves. So I don't know, maybe, you know, maybe she don't want to hear from you. I'm not asking you, but, but I feel like that'd be a thing somebody would want to know.

Mike 37:11
I definitely think we'll get we will have that conversation. You know, as you know, with Arden, when you're they're young, like that, even teenage, you're just trying to do everything to make sure that there's no effects 30 years down the road. So you want to keep them as in line as you can so there's not other health problems. And obviously that's something you very, you know, you care for very much. You want to make sure that they're really, you know, keeping in line and just being healthy. So I didn't really understand that. But, you know, there's days now I look at my numbers and and I'm really well controlled. I'm 98 to 99% in range every day. My standard deviations about 19% so I'm very well controlled. But even then, sometimes it's just like, you know, you just don't want to care about it one day. You just, you know, I read something that said the average diabetic makes an extra 150 to 200 decisions a day. And there's a lot of truth to that, that even though I raised a type one diabetic, I didn't understand it.

Scott Benner 38:15
Yeah, no, you can't possibly and, you know, now, right? That's not a just a thing. You've heard, like, I hear people make a lot of extra decisions, and they have type one now you're making those decisions. And yeah, again, your perspective is raised. You might be an Oracle by the time you're done, Mike, if stuff keeps happening to

Mike 38:30
you, my gosh. So I started having really high blood sugars. I was leaving town. My doctor was out of town, and somebody in her office had prescribed me Metformin because he didn't know me. So he's like, okay, he's got high blood sugar. It's type two. So I took that for a little while, I did nothing, and then I took a C peptide test, and it came back that I had the antibodies. And I called my doctor, and he said, Okay, and I was leaving town again, because, unfortunately, I travel sometimes, and she called me in Lantus, and she said, You know, I don't know if this is good or bad, but she's like, you're one of my only patients I could just call in insulin and not have to give him education. Like, yeah, sadly, I have too much education and type one diabetes.

Scott Benner 39:17
Yeah. Did you find that the experience with your daughter growing up and now your conversations with your son that you really there was nothing really left for you to understand, like you were just like, oh, I have it now. I know how to do it. Is there any gaps in your knowledge at all? Well?

Mike 39:33
So when I was raising my daughter, there was no CGM weren't around. So I definitely saw a very clear picture of what happens when you eat food to get that and see it. Yeah. The other thing is, I feel like no type one diabetes are alike. Everybody's different. We all have different eating habits. We we drink differently. Just everything's different our lifestyles. So even though I knew that you know if you if you draw it on paper or. Whiteboard of what diet, type one diabetes. It's perfect, right? Okay, you bring in this many carbs, you take this much insulin, no problem. But when you're actually living it in real life, it's not that clear. It's it's just an everyday is different. I'm pretty lucky. I eat I know the same thing every day. You know, I have a yogurt in the morning from going out training. I eat the same food. So it was more learning about myself and really understanding how the CGM work. There was that little gap, even though my son was on a CGM, my daughter's on a CGM, I didn't raise anybody on a CGM, right? So that part, there was a little bit of a learning curve, when to when to do a calibration, which it's very rare. I do one. I I'm pretty lucky. I'm one of the very few on the g7 that has failed. I think I've, over the last year and a half, I've had two that have failed.

Scott Benner 40:51
Yeah, my I don't think that makes you like one of the few. I think that maybe just people on the internet are, you know, more drawn to use the internet sometimes for talking about what's not working, trying to get help, and people who are putting on, you know, I say all the time, like, Arden has incredible success with the g7 but I don't go online and be like, Oh, there's another sensor that lasted 10 hours plus the 12 hour grace period, like, or 10 days plus 12 hours. Like, I mean, that's not a thing you get to tell people online, you know, yeah. Can I ask you about biking? How long have you been riding?

Mike 41:22
So I started riding in 1995 it was funny, I just barely moved to Utah, and I had a neighbor who was gonna go do this 100 mile big bike event and not even have a bike. And I was like, okay, yeah, I'll do it. So I went to Walmart, I bought a cheap mountain bike. Probably weighed 3000 pounds. I did it. I swore I'd never ride a bike again, and then that, later that year, I ended up buying my first road bike. Rode it very, very often, but I really didn't start racing bikes until 2005 2005 I really got into racing. Endurance bike racing was my big thing. That was the first year I did there's a race that they do here. It's fairly known throughout the nation. It's called Logan, the Jackson, and it's 206 miles. You go over three mountain ranges, and you do that all in one day. Jeez, yeah. So I did that. And 2005 was my first year. I'd even know I was going to do it until a week before I signed up for it. And then I decided that bike racing was for me. Done it 10 times. Now I actually stopped racing in 2015 but you know, in the highlight of my kind of my career, I raced 62 times in one year. So yeah, I raced, raced quite a bit.

Speaker 1 42:45
And was that just a thing you picked up at some point, or were you incredibly active before that?

Mike 42:50
No, I wasn't at all, really. I got out of the Navy, moved to Utah, done a little bit of running. I blew out my knee, came down into a rut the wrong way, blew it out. And so when I got into racing riding bikes, I always enjoyed it as kid, and it was just something I picked up. I was really good at it. If you look at me now, you would think, Wow, that's a really tall skinny guy by nature. I'm not a skinny person. I'm six one. I think at one point I was up to 225 pounds right now I weigh about 160 the riding is just because

Unknown Speaker 43:28
I'm sorry, the right, did the riding take the weight off of you?

Mike 43:30
Yeah, the riding weight took it off. I had done that event 95 then I gained some weight, and then I got back into it on a mountain bike with road tires on it so there were not knobby tires. And I went into the event, and I was keeping up with all the road guys, and I was like, All right, it's time to get back into this real bike. Time to get out riding. And so I do think the bike racing helped with the type one diabetes, because as I look back now, I think I struggled with this. My honeymoon phase was relatively short, and I think that's because I rode through my honeymoon phase and kept my sugar levels down the

Scott Benner 44:05
amount of time that you knew you had type one was short, but you think that maybe there was a longer honeymoon prior to you knowing that was kind of helped by your activity.

Mike 44:14
Yeah, absolutely. So I really suffered on the bike last year is I was getting diagnosed. I was getting on insulin. They had me on Metformin. I was carrying a lot of fatigue. I go on a 30 minute bike ride, come home, take a three hour nap. I was just wrecked, and I couldn't figure it out. And then once I was I've been on a pump now for about, oh, 50 days. Okay. And so when you eat, as you know, your carbs break down in the sugar, which translates to energy. Well, if you don't have any insulin, where's your body getting the energy from? It's breaking down your muscle. And now that I'm on insulin, and I'm regulated very well, I'm starting to build up muscle again. And I look back and think, wow, I was really suffering for three, four years, because now I can go out ride my bike, and, you know, I can hit four or five. 500 watts and maintain that for a little while, and actually get home and I'm not sore, I'm not fatigued, where I was for many years. And so now I'm starting to look back and think, was this, you know, I plot covid in 2000 did that trigger it? And I've really been suffering with this longer than what I know. It's hard to figure that one out,

Scott Benner 45:20
I actually found myself wondering if your son's service maybe didn't keep him very active, and maybe, like, when he was out, maybe that's why I actually wondered, like it was, you know, not enough there for me to say out loud at the moment, but you said it's able and super 1717. Yeah, right. So, so I don't know, like, you know, the activity definitely can help during those long, slow honeymoon periods, especially with like, Lada.

Mike 45:45
Yeah, absolutely. So one thing we found out with my son was he just found this out a couple months ago. My son has neuropathy, pretty bad. He's walking with a cane, really. And, yeah, he's only 30 years old. So of course, his doctor wanted to know why, like, why is he suffering so bad with all of this? Why is he walking with a cane? Why is he having foot problems? They pulled his medical records, and they found out that five years prior to his diagnosis, they did a blood workup on him and his a 1c was 6.8 and all they put in the note was, we'll watch it. Yeah, so he had been suffering with this for a very long time. The military didn't really thoroughly do what they should have done.

Speaker 1 46:31
Do you think your son had elevated blood sugars for five years before he was diagnosed? Oh gosh,

Mike 46:38
yep, five years because it did come back. He was a six eight. And as we all know, six eight, you know, that's, that's a big trigger. But I think especially, we see this a lot, and, you know, I read this on forums. I've heard it on your podcast of everybody, they automatically think it's type two at first, and older people, you know, and so that's tend to, you know, just eat better and it'll go away. And that's not the case, probably

Unknown Speaker 47:03
what they were thinking there too. So, yeah, absolutely,

Scott Benner 47:06
you know, you're doing a great job of telling your story, but is there something that drew you to want to be on the podcast that I I'm not covering or getting to,

Mike 47:14
you know? I so I started listening to your podcast because when my brother in law was diagnosed with type one. He also had a burning injury, and so I was going to the doctor with him to really help him out. I was already diagnosed at t1 I was just doing MDI at the time. So I was going to his pump education classes with him, helped him pick out a pump. And then when they educated on the educator told me about your podcast, and so I started listening to it. Then from basically Episode One, I think I got up to about four hundreds. Now I'm kind of going backwards, so it was more just helping him. He got the Omnipod. I thought I had a really interesting story. You know that my 30 years worth of diabetes, becoming a diabetic, yeah, and if anything, it was more wanted to, you know, it was almost like through experience of now looking back at what my daughter went through 30 years ago, of do everything you can, be supportive, help out. There's going to be those days, and I can only imagine being a teenager who's lived with diabetes for, let's say, 1012, years of how frustrating that has to be on a daily basis. And it's okay to get in the weeds with them and and let them be mad about the disease. And you know, it's okay. It's not something that can just easily be managed. It's probably one of the most self managed, frustrating diseases you know, known to man.

Speaker 1 48:45
Do you think that you in the

Scott Benner 48:48
pursuit of being supportive or keeping things in the right track? Do you think there were times that your daughter wanted to commiserate or be sad and you didn't let her

Mike 48:59
probably a little well, no, I definitely, we knew it was dying. It was very, very frustrating. But I think we, you know, we definitely wanted to understand, but maybe not as much understanding, of what it was because we weren't living with it. So you can understand as much as you you think you know, but until you're actually really living it, then you really get the full picture of it.

Scott Benner 49:22
Yeah, yeah. I, in the past, have worried that this is a great format for conversation, but at the same time, like, you have to be what the word is. You have to be, like, clear, and you can't get muddled when you're talking all the time. So, like, I've worried in the past that, like, just through trying to tell a story and not being able to tell every second of it. Sharing my perspective could even feel blase at times like and I don't feel that way at all. It's just that sometimes you say something, whether it's to another person, directly or here on a podcast or anywhere, and you can't give the entire context of what you're thinking so you get. Of like, you know, the tiniest point about what's being said right now, and then I can look back later and see how the person who heard that might have really benefited from more context or been put off because it sounds like you're simplifying something when you don't really feel that way. You're just trying to be concise. Does that all make sense or not? But yeah, I'm aware of that, but at the same time, like the podcast also has to be, you know, it has to flow, and it has to be entertaining, and every thought can't get broken down for 10 minutes. And anyway, it's just, it's interesting to me that you have so much time with a with a child, with type one, then you get to re experience it the way you did with your son, and then now you have this personal experience, like you said, it's just an interesting story. It's a it's a bit of a different pathway. Can I ask you, do you have worries about your own health moving forward, like, what are your expectations for the rest of your life?

Mike 50:53
You know, I so I had a really scary low last year 34 and it was more the Lantus went direct into a cell and hit right away. So there was 12 units that just injected me, and within 20 minutes, you hit like a

Scott Benner 51:09
blood vessel with your with your slow acting insulin.

Mike 51:12
Yeah, I hit a blood vessel because I was working. I work from home. I have for, oh, I don't know, about 10 years now. So I work from home. I was staring at my computer, and, you know, the vision got really weird. I hadn't done anything different than what I do any other day. I had my yogurt, my coffee. Was staring at the computer, pretty, you know, intently. Vision started going weird. I looked out the window, looked back, and it still didn't clear up. And then, of course, then the alarms went off. I immediately finger pricked, and I was 34 and I yelled for my daughter to go get my wife, and she came in, and I thought I was in survival mode at that. What's that you thought you're going down? Oh, I was I was going down. I was sitting on the floor trying to open gummy bears. I didn't realize how bad, how hard gummy bears can be to open when your sugar levels at a 34 but it dropped me from 120 to 34 in 20 minutes. Wow. So it was I was coming down really fast. I didn't think a human person could sweat that much without working out. I remember when I finally came out of it. I was just completely soaked. So in that one, it that that was pretty hard understanding that had a great, positive experience with a dog on that experience, and so, yeah, I have incremental steps, you know, pretty well controlled we've talked about, you know how? You know, you typically 98 to 99% in range. Part of me at 56 I'm like, well, at least now I know what's probably, you know, I'm gonna die one day from some side effect of diabetes. I might be 95 or so, but, you know, it's there now that I'm on a pump I was doing MDI. So at the beginning of this year, when my a 1c was at five, five, they decided, like, Okay, we have to get you. We're just taking more Lantus than fast acting, and they wanted to switch it. They were like, you're having too many lows. It's interesting. When I'm on a bike and I'm going, you know, my heart rates, let's say 160 my blood sugars will spike. I won't drop. I'll actually go up really high. I remember one time I was mountain biking up in the mountains, and for 30 minutes I heard my Dexcom alarm go off because I was 252, 75 the whole time when I go hiking or I walk my dogs, that's when I go low and I can drop from, let's say, 120 to 80 within 20 minutes. So one of the things they wanted to do is back off the Lantus and start doing more fast acting insulin. And that actually raised my a 1c I was in Destin Florida for a wedding in May, and at the wedding at night, when I, I think I put my 12th shot in my leg, I said, That's it. It's it's time to go to a pump. Ordered my pump when I got back into Utah and started July 1, actually, of this year. Would you guess? So I don't. I got the Moby I like it. Yeah, I really like it. I love the software. I like seeing how it's works. Awesome when it gets automatic boluses, seeing how the basal rate turns off at night. Duping never bothered me. I actually didn't want to go with the Omnipod, because I, quite frankly, I just didn't want another big thing hanging off me. Because, you know, cycling, you're wearing, you know, tight spandex clothes, you know, outfit and everything. So I just didn't want another device hanging off me.

Unknown Speaker 54:35
You wear the Moby clipped onto your clothing. Yeah, yeah.

Mike 54:39
I just clip it on. I have the 23 inch tube. I tried the five inch tube that that about drove me nuts. I only did that once, so the Moby doesn't bother me at all. I sleep with it on. I think the Moby is actually really good. My daughter and my son are both on a T slim, and my brother in law, who was diagnosed last year, is on the Omnipod.

Scott Benner 55:00
Oh no, well, let me just say tandem diabetes.com/juicebox, omnipod.com/juicebox twist.com/juicebox and Medtronic diabetes.com/juicebox. You want to pump, please use one of my links. That's all I got there. Mike, thank you for letting me inject that.

Mike 55:15
Yeah, absolutely, yeah. I think the Mobi is fantastic, especially with the CGM. And if this pump died tomorrow, I'd go get another movie. Just wouldn't even be a question.

Scott Benner 55:25
It's great to hear people find stuff that jives with how they live and works the way they want it to. It's just the greatest thing. So I'm thrilled.

Mike 55:33
Yeah, I was apprehensive, though I can admit I really wanted to go with the tea slim, and I think that part of that was my age, of having a pump that didn't have a screen or anything, and I had to rely on a cell phone. That part kind of bothered me at first, and then when I just kind of saw maybe a little coaxing for my wife, of giving the Moby a try, I'm really glad I went

Scott Benner 55:57
with the Moby. Awesome, awesome. That's great. I'm very happy for you. Let's see what else we good. I mean, have we done it, as they say, or is there something we've left? I can't imagine we've left something out. Is there anybody left you're related to that could get diabetes?

Mike 56:10
Well, unfortunately, there is my daughter. I want her to go get tested. I want her to get the antibody test so we, if she has that, we can get her, you know, the proper medication to try and push that off.

Scott Benner 56:20
That's what was in my head. Did she respond well to that? When you suggested her, how does she feel about it?

Mike 56:27
He responded really well, I told her, because she told me that her primary physician said that, you know, she doesn't have a danger of being in didn't want to do it. And I said, let me know my endocrinologist will set you up with a chart, and they'll order the labs for you. She did it for my wife, and she'll do it for her too. I said, let me know. I'll even drive you over there. We'll go get it done if we can, you know, push this off as long as possible. Let's do it. She's very open to it. She lives about 70 miles away from me, and so she does want to do it. So we're going to take them to my endocrinologist and get that

Scott Benner 57:02
done. Strange for the doctor to say that that, I mean, you know, two of her three siblings have type one, and sadly, you don't know if the third one might have gotten it at some point. You, you know, you didn't have the opportunity to know that. Like, weird to think that it's not worth looking into. You know what? I mean, like, it seems obvious to me that it's a possibility, yeah,

Mike 57:22
especially when you have, you know your father, who was diagnosed in his 50s,

Unknown Speaker 57:29
yeah, yeah, legitimate.

Mike 57:31
So I really do want to get her tested. I don't know how much time we have, but I do have a great story of a dog story.

Scott Benner 57:37
I'll finish with a dog story. My God,

Mike 57:40
all right, so we have a house in southern Utah, and I would go hiking with my dogs a lot. They're both standard poodles. They'll be three years old this September, and they're brother and sister, and the sister is her name's Delilah, and I took her hiking on a Saturday, and my wife and I, we did four and a half miles, and the next day I got home from, you know, a two and a half three hour bike ride. My wife was not home, so I said, by eight, my blood sugars were about 190 and I said, All right, let's go. Let's go for a hike. And we hiked up to a top of a mesa, which is about 1000 vertical feet, about three quarters of the way up. She started looking back at me, and I was like, I'm okay. I thought maybe I broke her from the day before, and then about five minutes from the top, she just stopped and sat down, and I I pet her. I'm like, you're okay, you're all right. I'm sorry I broke you. And then we went, and then the vision started going. I went, Oh my gosh, I'm going low. Oh, she's trying to

Scott Benner 58:37
stop, yeah. So I

Mike 58:39
knew once I got to the top, I'd be okay, because my heart rate would come down and I'd be okay. So we pushed to the top, and sure enough, it went away. When I really went low last December. I didn't realize this at the time, but when I was sitting on the floor sweating, Delilah was right there, just staring at me, and I didn't put it together or anything. And then three weeks later, I was down Southern Utah again, hiking, and I started going lower, and all of a sudden, she kept looking back at me, looking back at me, and I was and then I put it together. And so whenever I drop low, if we're out hiking or walking, she will alert me. 10 to 15 minutes before that, I am dropping and I assure I'm okay, but she's naturally a diabetic alert dog. She won't wake me up or anything. But when we're out hiking the lower I go, she will actually, at some point, just sit and stop and

Scott Benner 59:32
like, gosh, isn't that awesome? That's really. Do you ever say to her, hey there? Delilah, oh yeah, all the time, I would. Does that start you singing the song, Yep, yeah,

Mike 59:46
but she's great. So we actually looked at having her professionally trained, and at the end of the day, we decided not to do it. Typically, they do that with puppies, not three year olds, but when they evaluated her, they actually really thought, okay, yep, she is an. Alert dog. We feel that we could get her, but I'm not uncontrolled enough to pay $11,000

Scott Benner 1:00:05
listen, you can't teach speed. That dog's a natural. Okay, yeah, exactly.

Mike 1:00:11
She is a natural. And I think part of that was, even when she was a younger puppy, one of her favorite games was to play hide and go seek in the house. And so she could find me in a closet, she would sniff me out. And so she's always really been in tune, but we didn't realize that until you know a few episodes in that she can recognize low blood sugars, which is really amazing.

Unknown Speaker 1:00:33
Is that breed known for that? Or no?

Mike 1:00:35
Yeah, we actually read that. They say one of the better Diabetic Alert dogs are poodles. About that.

Scott Benner 1:00:41
My parents had a poodle when I was born, not born, well, I guess born. When they brought me home, I'm adopted, and the dog, like, went after me one time, and my mom, like, got rid of the dog and, oh, wow, yeah, I've been told that story so many times because my mom loved that dog. Apparently, that was it. Like, my that's the story I was always told. Like, my mom's like, No, I wasn't gonna let her go after you. I believe the dog's name was Gigi, if I'm if I'm not mistaken,

Mike 1:01:09
yeah, I think poodles are great. I had one then she died about a year before we got the new ones. And she was 17. She was my girl. Went everywhere with me. You know, if I was out dinner, I would tell my wife, like, we got to hurry up and go home. I got to go home and play with Lily. That was my whole thing. Was going home and playing with her, and she died at 17, and it took me a long time to get another dog. But I'm all about the poodle breeds. I think they're amazing

Unknown Speaker 1:01:36
dogs. Yeah, 17 is a nice, long life for a dog. You know, if

Mike 1:01:40
I felt I got cheated. I felt I should have had another 17 years.

Speaker 1 1:01:43
Yeah, no, I can imagine. Well, Mike, you have a really good way about you. I enjoyed this too. What do you do for a living?

Mike 1:01:51
So I am director for a company that we do. We build data centers. Okay, so the power side of data centers, so like battery backup energy type system, so if the data center goes down, we still keep it up and running. So I'm a director, I have a sales team and a project management team, and we design and build data centers around the critical infrastructure.

Scott Benner 1:02:15
Well, it's really something, is AI going to put a real drain on power, the way they're talking about it? And do you guys, are you guys working on battery backup for that? I wouldn't imagine you could even, can you even approximate that kind of power?

Mike 1:02:29
You know, it's interesting, when you look at where, what we call is a network rack, of what the power capacity used to be for a network rack, say, five years ago, to where it is today. You know, back then, let's say thrive, three to five kilowatts per rack was a lot. Well, now you're talking anywhere from 511, 100 to 500 kilowatts per rack, really. And so the strain that it puts on those batteries, of course, everything's going lithium ion battery. When the AI servers spool up, they bring in so much power that actually, sometimes the utility can't even keep up, and they actually end up hitting battery backup systems to look for that power. So there's, there's a lot of strain on it, but data centers will never go away. If anything, they're getting more and more popular. They're popping up everywhere. It's an exciting time in our world. The actual hardest thing is now is it's not so much getting power to those systems. It's actually keeping them cool. That's going to be the challenge. Is keeping all those systems cool, because if they overheat, of course, they can't function. And how do you keep that much, you know, coolness around? So there's like direct to chip. You can do immersion it just goes on. That's a whole three hour podcast right there. It's it's exciting.

Scott Benner 1:03:45
Do you think the way that we create power is gonna have to change to keep up with it? I guess I'm asking specifically. Do you think that people are gonna have to look at more nuclear options to to generate electricity?

Mike 1:03:57
That's the way the industry is looking. When you get into like meta, Microsoft, Apple, all of those, they are looking at starting to do some type of nuclear, reactor, type things, many reactors to power those because of the amount of power drop. It's interesting. Data centers used to go to certain areas. Now data centers look for where they're wherever there's available power. So that seems to be what they're looking for. So if there's a utility that has an extra, say, 400 megawatts of power, that's where the data center is going. So that's where they look,

Scott Benner 1:04:30
you're gonna see the centers popping up where the energy already exists. Yep, yeah, that's gonna be how they pick their real estate. That's interesting. And you're not really limited. I mean, our data centers limited by distance. Not anymore, right? Because of the speed of the Internet doesn't really matter.

Mike 1:04:44
Not anymore. Yeah, yeah. And that's the way it used to be, used to want to put, like, data centers and populated areas, and now, with latency, it's just not really an issue. And so now they're popping up, and what you're seeing is is a lot of, like, modular power. Or containers that we can just populate all around the country, wherever we can get data centers. And so it's a changing landscape, and it's really exciting because we talked a little bit earlier, the way technology has changed over, let's say, the last 1020, 30 years. It's almost like a year now is really only like a month. It's just going so fast, it's changing so quickly,

Scott Benner 1:05:23
yeah, maybe one day it'll just be like, Back to the Future, and we'll all have our own, our own little

Unknown Speaker 1:05:28
reactor. We almost wait and then again, Mike,

Mike 1:05:34
it's almost going to be that way, right? Like it just has to power. Is going to be the biggest thing, drivers, but it also as a consumer, it's scary too, because as my utility rate going up because of all these data centers, because they have to add capacity, you might see that too. Your electric bill going up because they got to build more infrastructure to support the data center.

Scott Benner 1:05:55
My electric bill is definitely higher than it was a year and a half ago.

Mike 1:05:59
Absolutely. I asked my wife last night, and she said, Yeah, we were about $500

Scott Benner 1:06:03
a month. Yeah, like, ouch. I see it climbing, for sure. So all right, well, that's a that's definitely a different conversation, but I appreciate you sharing that with me. Thank you. I just, you're, you're, you know, good at talking. And you said, before we got got going, that you speak a lot at work, but I didn't ask you for what, so

Mike 1:06:22
I'm on the phone all the time. And my wife, she's just, yeah, she'll tell you, I can talk to anybody all day long.

Scott Benner 1:06:29
Well, it's, I think it's a great skill to have. It's, it's propelling me through my adulthood. So thank you absolutely. Yeah, I really appreciate this man. Hold on one second for me. Thank you. You

this episode of The Juicebox podcast is sponsored by the contour next gen blood glucose meter. Learn more and get started today at contour next.com/juicebox you thanks for tuning in today, and thanks to Medtronic diabetes for sponsoring this episode. We've been talking about Medtronic mini med 780 G system today, an automated insulin delivery system that helps make diabetes management easier day and night, whether it's their meal detection technology or the Medtronic extended infusion set. It all comes together to simplify life with diabetes. Go find out more at my link, Medtronic diabetes.com/juicebox.

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#1644 Bolus 4 - Bananas

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Jenny and Scott talk about bolusing for Bananas.

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DISCLAIMER: This text is the output of AI based transcribing from an audio recording. Although the transcription is largely accurate, in some cases it is incomplete or inaccurate due to inaudible passages or transcription errors and should not be treated as an authoritative record. Nothing that you read here constitutes advice medical or otherwise. Always consult with a healthcare professional before making changes to a healthcare plan.

Scott Benner 0:00
Welcome back, friends. You are listening to the Juicebox podcast

in every episode of Bolus for Jenny Smith and I are going to take a few minutes to talk through how to Bolus for a single item of food, Jenny and I are going to follow a little bit of a roadmap called meal bolt. Measure the meal, evaluate yourself. Add the base units, layer a correction. Build the Bolus shape, offset the timing. Look at the CGM tweak for next time. Having said that, these episodes are going to be very conversational and not incredibly technical. We want you to hear how we think about it, but we also would like you to know that this is kind of the pathway we're considering while we're talking about it. So while you might not hear us say every letter of meal bolt in every episode, we will be thinking about it while we're talking if you want to learn more, go to Juicebox podcast.com. Forward slash, meal, dash, bolt. But for now, we'll find out how to Bolus for today's subject,

nothing you hear on the Juicebox podcast should be considered advice medical or otherwise, always consult a physician before making any changes to your healthcare plan? Jenny, let's do a simple, simple food, right? Yay, bananas. Banana. Bananas, before diabetes, were a thing that hung in my house on like, a little hook, right? And they were like, grab and go food, you know, like, if you got up in the morning, you running out the door, you didn't have time, you took a banana, you know, your middle of the day, you're hungry, grab a banana, and then all of a sudden it felt like bananas were more like we gave Arden an IV of glucose, and so they became lesser around the house for a little while. They're back now, but you know, let's talk about how to Bolus for one because I bet you that people you know, would like to utilize bananas, but people with type one are probably thinking like, that's a tough one for me. Yeah. So what do you think about a banana?

Jennifer Smith, CDE 2:08
Well, I am excited that you brought up bananas, mainly because I think it brings into consideration something that you wouldn't really know about unless you studied sort of food chemistry and how things how things work in food. So bananas are not unique, but they're a great example of a ripeness factor, and when we're talking about bolusing for them, like my husband can eat a banana whether it's green or yellow with brown spots, it doesn't matter. Okay. He likes a banana. It's totally fine. Green bananas, they make me kind of cringe, yeah, but the fact of the matter is, their glycemic impact is going to be much lower when they are not as ripe, and the reason is because the sugars are not as developed, the easiest way to describe it, so the carbohydrate content isn't changing. But how quick your body can digest the carbohydrates the sugars changes as the fruit becomes more and more ripe. It's also the reason, similar to other really ripe foods, meaning, when we're going to eat them, your tropical fruits, your melons, we eat them at peak, peak ripeness, because that's when we have the most sugar flavor. Yeah. So if you're going to eat a banana, like, I like, if I eat a banana, I like a banana to taste like a banana.

Scott Benner 3:39
So I think that when they're not ripe enough, how do they feel? To me, like they're powdery. Does that make sense? It feels like there's a All right, this is gonna be a weird thing for me. I love this

Jennifer Smith, CDE 3:48
conversation. Okay, you're like, a mouth feel kind of person, too.

Scott Benner 3:53
They feel like they're coated in powder or something like that's the I get, like, an icky feeling when I bite into one that's not ripe enough at the perfect ripeness. And to me, that's, it's still solid, but a little soft and not squishy, and there's no brown like, that's the perfect spot for a Benner. For me, I could probably eat like three of them, if, because they're they're so tasty. There is that your sweet spot for a banana too. No pun intended.

Jennifer Smith, CDE 4:16
It is. They're not squishy yet, right? You would not make banana bread out of them, those usually have lots of brown dots. Yes, they are yellow. And you can, I don't know if you've ever done this, people are gonna be like, Jenny, it's just weird. But I can smell the difference. Oh, sure. I can smell the skin, even if it's turned to the color that I think it should be to have the taste that I want. I can smell it and be like, nope. Another day, like, I know this will be good tomorrow.

Scott Benner 4:47
Does that mean that in practice and theory, there are three different kinds of impacts you might get from a banana, like the ripe impact, the just right impact and the squishy impact. Yes, geez. So you know what it makes me think of. You know when people. Will say, You know what I hate about diabetes, do the same thing over and over every day, and it comes out differently and blah, blah, blah. But if you're just having a Benner every day as they get riper and riper, you are not doing the same thing over and over every day, correct? Interesting.

Jennifer Smith, CDE 5:12
Okay, yeah. Whereas other fruits, you know, things like apples, which tend to be lower glycemic in terms of the whole scheme of fruits, our berries tend to be fairly low glycemic. Kiwi, interestingly, tends to be lower glycemic. Pears that are a little bit more crisp, crunchy, like an apple, tend to be lower glycemic. Most of the fruits that you're going to eat at that place where they taste the best to you, they're going to be a higher impact. You're making me think

Scott Benner 5:40
I'm going to make banana bread next time I see the bananas get a little bananas get a little soft too. I haven't done that in a while. So okay, so if you're gonna, if you're a person who likes a greener, less ripe banana, it's gonna take less Pre-Bolus time, right, significantly, or just less, less by

Jennifer Smith, CDE 5:57
let's say you're a typical 20 minute Pre-Bolus person for a ripe banana, for a non ripe banana, kind of greenish, yet you're probably looking at five to 10

Scott Benner 6:09
minutes honestly. And then to swap on the other side of that middle line. If you're a squishy banana lover, it's gonna hit you right away, right? She's on the face she just made like, Oh, please don't eat them when they're like that, listen, I'm with you. Like, there's a moment they get a little too soft. And I was like, I can't do this anymore. They go in my freezer. Then, oh, that's a good

Jennifer Smith, CDE 6:28
idea, yeah, I put them in the freeze. I've got, like, a banana bag that I put them in in the freezer, and then they either become we chop them up for smoothies, or we make banana ice cream, yeah, which is super fun. Or you can make banana bread out of them. I thought

Scott Benner 6:43
you're gonna say banana hammock. And I was like, wait, don't do that. Here's one for you. When they get too soft, I use them too my god, I use a little piece of a soft banana in the cages with my reptiles. Because if fruit flies get in there, they congregate there, then the animals can go over and, like, pick them off real easily. So see, it's a good you're still functional. Yeah, cool. It's not that cool. It's bizarre. So regular ripeness in the middle 20 minutes, I would

Jennifer Smith, CDE 7:15
say 20 minutes, honestly, and maybe first thing in the morning, if you're a I have to have my banana. First thing every single morning you might be looking at longer is the

Scott Benner 7:25
banana. One of those things the morning that, like, if you're doing the like, I'm gonna Bolus while I'm getting ready, I can time it so that I hit the kitchen, scarf down that banana as I'm going out the door, and it'll just grab the fall the insulin and hold me there. Yeah, yeah. Okay. I know it takes a lot to think about it, but this is a great example of, like, timing an amount. Here it is, you know, and understanding the impact of your food. Now, the real super squishy ones, that's like, liquid sugar, almost when it gets in your mouth, like it hits you real, real quick.

Jennifer Smith, CDE 7:53
It's gonna hit you really fast. I mean, it's one of the things I really like for lower blood sugars, because it does work really fast, at least for me, are the unsweetened banana chips like the dehydrated banana because they work fast. And usually those are, you know, at a point where they're really easy to slice, and then they dehydrate them and whatever, yeah, they do to them.

Scott Benner 8:17
But quick, if Arden gets low overnight, she has two different kinds of lows. Like, there's a low where you're like, Hey, I just need something quick to fix this. And there's a low where she says, I feel like this is because I'm hungry. I don't know. Like, if that makes sense, I don't think there's anything in my stomach. Like, I need to eat something now, even at like, three in the morning, when that happens, she always asks for a banana. Oh, that's interesting, yeah, because it fixes the low and it makes her feel fuller, and then she's good. She doesn't always want food when she's low, like, she doesn't always want a full feeling when she's low. Sometimes she just wants the number to

Unknown Speaker 8:51
get fixed, right? Which would be

Jennifer Smith, CDE 8:53
juice, because juice doesn't really make you have a fullness, yeah?

Scott Benner 8:58
Just bang, bang. That's nice and easy. But when she's also feels hungry at that time. It's always a banana. She asks for, like, always, oh, okay, so, I mean, obviously we're going to need to look down the road and see what happened afterwards, because I think a lot of people are going to get a spike when they're first trying to figure this out, right? If you Bolus for it just right on the Pre-Bolus and the, yeah, the timing and the amount was all settled. Is a banana really a thing you have to look at later. There's not going to be any, like, late rise.

Jennifer Smith, CDE 9:24
There's not going to be lingering. It's going to be a true what insulin was formulated to cover, which is carbohydrate, yeah, in and out, right? And in and out, yeah.

Scott Benner 9:33
So banana and all and simple sugars in general are about like, quelling the spike before they happen. So it doesn't happen, and then just using enough insulin so that it doesn't create a low later. But you shouldn't see a high from it if you stop the high from ever happening. Does that make sense? Because of the right Pre-Bolus? Okay, all right. So, I mean, so still look, you know, afterwards, and see, you know, how am I making out? But that's going to be to fix your Pre-Bolus. For it next time, not really about anything else, correct? Awesome. All right. Well, I'm glad I picked something you were so happy about. I said, Jenny, like, we have a little bit of time left. You want to do bananas? She lit right up. Can I tell people? You said, Sure, I was just talking about bananas with somebody else today. And if you don't want advice from a person who is already talking about bananas, even when they're not being recorded about it, then I think you're crazy that Jenny is definitely the one. Yeah. Thank you very much. Thank you.

In each episode of The Bolus four series, Jenny Smith and I are going to pick one food and talk through the Bolus thing for that food. We hope you find it valuable. Generally speaking, we're going to follow a bit of a formula, the meal bolt formula, M, E, A, l, B, O, L, T. You can learn more about it at Juicebox podcast.com, forward slash, meal, dash, bolt. But here's what it is, step 1m. Measure the meal. E, evaluate yourself. A, add the base units, l, layer a, correction B, build the Bolus shape, O, offset the timing. L, look at the CGM and T, tweak for next time. In a nutshell, we measure our meal, total carbohydrates, protein, fat, consider the glycemic index and the glycemic load, and then we evaluate yourself. What's your current blood sugar? How much insulin is on board, and what kind of activity are you going to be involved in or not involved in you have any stress hormones, illness? What's going on with you? Then a we add the base units your carbs divided by insulin to carb ratio, just a simple Bolus l layer of correction, right? Do you have to add or subtract insulin based on your current blood sugar? Build the Bolus shape. Are we going to give it all up front, 100% for a fast digesting meal, or is there going to be like a combo or a square wave Bolus? Does it have to be extended? I'll set the timing. This is about pre bolusing. Does it take a couple of minutes this meal, or maybe 20 minutes? Are we going to have to, again, consider combo square wave boluses and meals, figure out the timing of that meal and then L, look at the CGM an hour later, was there a fast spike? Three hours later? Was there a delayed rise? Five hours later? Is there any lingering effect from fat and protein? Tweak, tweak for next time. T, what did you eat? How much insulin and when? What did your blood sugar curve look like? What would you do next time? This is what we're going to talk about in every episode of Bolus for measure the meal, evaluate yourself. Add the base units, layer a correction, build the Bolus shape, offset the timing. Look at the CGM tweak for next time, but it's not going to be that confusing, and we're not going to ask you to remember all of that stuff, but that's the pathway that Jenny and I are going to use to speak about each Bolus. Hey, thanks for listening all the way to the end. I really appreciate your loyalty and listenership. Thank you so much for listening. I'll be back very soon with another episode of The Juicebox podcast. The episode you just heard was professionally edited by wrong way recording, wrongway recording.com,

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