#1578 Fear of Hypoglycemia

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

Scott and Erika discuss fear of hypoglycemia.

+ Click for EPISODE TRANSCRIPT


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.

Low blood sugars can be incredibly scary, both from the perspective of the person having them, and from the people around you today, Erica Forsyth and I are going to talk about the fear of hypoglycemia in a way that I hope you find valuable. Check out erica@ericaforsythe.com

my grand rounds series was designed by listeners to tell doctors what they need, and it also helps you to understand what to ask for. There's a mental wellness series that addresses the emotional side of diabetes and practical ways to stay balanced. And when we talk about GLP medications, well, we'll break down what they are, how they may help you, and if they fit into your diabetes management plan, what do these three things have in common? They're all available at Juicebox podcast.com, up in the menu. I know it can be hard to find these things in a podcast app, so we've collected them all for you at Juicebox podcast.com, nothing you hear on the Juicebox Podcast should be considered advice medical or otherwise, always consult a physician before making any changes to your health care plan or becoming bold with insulin. Today's episode of The Juicebox Podcast is sponsored by the Dexcom g7 and the Dexcom g7 warms up in just 30 minutes. Check it out now at dexcom.com/juicebox. The show you're about to listen to is sponsored by the ever since 365 the ever since 365 has exceptional accuracy over one year and is the most accurate CGM in the low range that you can get ever since cgm.com/juicebox. The episode you're about to listen to is sponsored by tandem Moby, the impressively small insulin pump. Tandem Moby features tandems newest algorithm control, iq plus technology. It's designed for greater discretion, more freedom and improved time and range. Learn more and get started today at tandem diabetes.com/juicebox Erica. Welcome back Today we are going to talk about the fear of hypoglycemia.

Erika Forsyth, MFT, LMFT 2:27
That's right. Thank you. Good to be here.

Scott Benner 2:30
I appreciate I love it when you're stopping. So you know, this is just one, right? This is easy. People share their fears constantly online when I'm speaking to them, I think some people have the fear and they don't address it, and I was hoping that we could talk about it today a little bit and maybe find some practical steps for them to take that could help. Yes, that sounds good. Awesome, awesome. Well, what did you learn when you dug into the fear of hyperglycemia?

Erika Forsyth, MFT, LMFT 3:00
Okay, so I think it might be helpful for us to talk about what, what is it? So basically, it's, you know, you're experiencing symptoms that might feel like you are having either an actual panic attack or anxiety, but you're experiencing that intense fear about having a low blood sugar, you're anticipating having the low, or you're actually having the low, and the fear becomes so intense that you might keep your blood sugars higher than recommended to avoid the possibility of going low, Which might look like you're not giving yourself the full, you know, the suggested Bolus, if on your pump or MDI, you might be correcting at a higher number because you are anticipating and you feel that intense fear,

Scott Benner 3:55
yeah, you want to play the insulin game up a little higher, you Think, to avoid the frequency of low blood sugars.

Erika Forsyth, MFT, LMFT 4:03
Yes, and I think it's important to note that every person or caregiver has some fear of hypoglycemia, which we might also say fo H or just or fear. They might have some fear of going low. And that's that's common and helpful and adaptive, right? We want to be mindful of not crashing, yeah, but it becomes problematic when it interferes with your quality of life, the decisions you make on a daily basis. It interferes with your T, 1d management. Maybe your A, 1c is going higher as a result. Maybe it might not be also, the research has indicated there's not a direct correlation to experiencing fear of hypoglycemia and having a higher a, 1c although that can be experienced.

Scott Benner 4:52
So there's that layer of anticipation, right? Like something's going to happen, I'm going to be in line somewhere, I'm going to be driving or something. I'm going to get low out of. Nowhere. I think that's part of that anxiety. Is that correct?

Erika Forsyth, MFT, LMFT 5:03
Yes. And I think I have found not only my own life, but in kind of anecdotally, there's this public or social component too. And then there's the private, privately, when you're at home, maybe you're feel safer. You still might experience this fear, but you might be more comfortable going lower because you're at home, you're not worried about how you're going to look or speak. But then this public or social component, if you're going out to a restaurant with friends, if you're speaking, I notice I'm more hyper aware of my blood sugar even before recording right? And there's something about that, like, we don't want to have to deal with feeling low. We don't want to have to deal with maybe, is there any kind of embarrassment, and then you're gonna have to explain what you need. There's also, like, a time component, like, if you know you have, you're going to a doctor's appointment, and you don't want to go low during that appointment. You might experience it in different kind of environments, too differently that this, this type of fear. Does this

Scott Benner 6:04
happen to you professionally, like before you see a client, do you stop for a second assess where you are in an appropriate amount of time so you can fix it beforehand?

Erika Forsyth, MFT, LMFT 6:11
That kind of thing I do, yes, I mean, I I try to be in range, but I will notice I'm more vigilant meeting with a client who does not have diabetes. Oh, okay, then with someone who does, and I have had to treat either, you know, have a tab a glucose tablet, or I'll correct if I need to, you know, adjust, you know, with a Bolus. But I have noticed that difference,

Scott Benner 6:38
but you don't feel the same pressure if the person you're talking to has type one.

Erika Forsyth, MFT, LMFT 6:43
It's not correct, harsh, yeah, because then it's it's exactly why, you know, I think people like to meet with someone like myself who has type one, but there's an understanding. We don't have to explain it. We don't have to justify it. You just do what you need to do.

Scott Benner 6:59
You don't run the risk of one person not believing it's even true. Where, I've seen that too, where people like they explain their situation and they realize that they're met with somebody who's like, yeah, I don't really believe that you're just making it up. Or you hear that stuff all the time. So do you find yourself Can I ask you questions here? Do you find yourself doing the what do you guys call it catastrophic forecasting? Is that what they call it like, where you run scenarios in your head over and over again, like, Oh, this is going to happen. I'm going to go here. I'm going to get low this is like, you end up freaking yourself out. Is that the risk you run by doing that? And is that a thing people can really even control? Or do you think some people just get caught in that cycle? So

Erika Forsyth, MFT, LMFT 7:37
catastrophic thinking is basically, well, this kind of the if scenarios. What if this happens? Also, if this happened this one time? Is this going to happen all the time? Often, when we talk about this fear of hypos, we usually assume that someone might experience the heightened fear if they've had a seizure, or if they've had a really extreme low episode, or they passed out, you know, all the different levels of, like, an extreme low, right, I would say that's maybe 50% of the case. People don't have not had that experience, but they're trying to prevent that. So there's kind of like that, the actual you you're really wanting to avoid the experience and the feeling of the low, that's kind of like the management side. But then there's also this kind of psychosocial side of not one have to deal with it in front of other

Scott Benner 8:30
people I see. So it's possible that you've either had the experience and you're remembering it and wanting to avoid it, or you've heard about it and you're making up in your head what it could be. And therefore, either of these things is making you have that feeling of like, I just this can't happen. I need to make sure this doesn't happen, and then the result of that is a higher blood sugar that you accept.

Erika Forsyth, MFT, LMFT 8:48
Yes, and we'll get into kind of understanding what's going on cognitively, how those thoughts, those are distortions that we've talked about before. It feels like truth. It feels like reality, like this is going to happen. I'm going to feel out of control. This is going to if I dip below 150 and the arrows going down, I'm going to die. I'm going to, you know, whatever the worst case scenario is running through your head. It feels so strong, so that you kind of counter that by feeling like you have some sort of semblance of control and keeping yourself higher. Okay,

Scott Benner 9:24
let me ask you a question. So I don't have this experience. Obviously, I don't, I don't use insulin, right? But I have kids, and my children have, at times, been in really dire situations, and there's that feeling that comes the like tension in your chest, rapid heartbeat. You feel sweaty, out of control. You feel like you can't there's nothing you can do to help the situation. It's a feeling of being lost. Is that mimicking how it feels when your body betrays you, like, because that's what it feels like, right? Like your body betrays you, so like when that happens, I think the closest thing I have. A pair it to is when something happens to someone who I love so much that I can't help them at all. Like, am I anywhere near trying? Because I'm just trying to understand for people who don't have it, like, what is the feeling?

Erika Forsyth, MFT, LMFT 10:11
I think it's it's a two sided experience. There's the physical symptoms that we we all know well the shakiness, the kind of fast heart rate, the difficulty really thinking clearly. And then there's, there's kind of this uncertainty for a brief period of time of how quickly that feeling is going to go away. So that's where you you do feel a sense of out of control, because you but even though you can maybe, if you don't have this intense fear, in that brief moment, you feel like, okay, I know that these that this one glucose tablet or three tabs or Juicebox is going to break me up, but every time is different. So when you're in that space of feeling the low, it is scary, and you do feel a sense of out of control, but you also in that. And we'll get again, to these steps of like, okay, I know I have this many units of insulin board. I know I have this many carbs digested. I just need to sit here and wait. That's a hard process to get to.

Scott Benner 11:15
That could also be difficult because you're, you're altered to begin with, right and correct. So that's the over treating. That's where the like, I you just keep eating or keep taking stuff in, because you just, that's my assumption. So the assumption I make about over treating is either you can't do the math that you just described, like, how much is in, how much is digested, what have I covered? And so it's a panic, like, I'll just keep eating until, like, this goes the other way, right? Or it's the the fact that you're out of it to begin with. And, I mean, how are you going to keep track of this, even while you're trying to accomplish it? I have to tell you that, like when I see Arden get low and she, you know, she eats or treats something, and then she needs to sit for a minute, she seems so composed, right? Like, and she's, she's not a, like, a panicky person. And I have to remind myself that like, this isn't like me saying, Oh, I'm winded. Let me sit here for a second like there's a lot more going on that I can appreciate. And anyway, like I don't want to come off, like I understand this, like, from a personal perspective, I just, I'm trying to help people talk their way through it, because it is not, and has never been lost on me that she feels a certain way, and I don't know what that is, so it's just Yes,

Erika Forsyth, MFT, LMFT 12:27
and that there's like, the physical component, and what you were asking earlier about, like, kind of that emotional component of someone's there's nothing you can do to help that other person, like, kind of that helplessness, or perceived helplessness in that zone. If that becomes so overwhelming that you are avoiding that experience by keeping yourself higher, then you know that you might be dealing with that intense fear.

Scott Benner 12:54
So from a parenting perspective, people avoid doing things that might put them in peril so they never have to feel like that. And on the diabetes side, I'm going to keep my blood sugar higher, because if it gets too variable and low, I don't want to feel like this. So it's all about avoiding the feeling that comes with it. This episode is sponsored by tandem Diabetes Care, and today I'm going to tell you about tandems newest pump and algorithm, the tandem mobi system with control iq plus technology features auto Bolus which can cover missed meal boluses and help prevent hyperglycemia. It has a dedicated sleep activity setting and is controlled from your personal iPhone. Tandem will help you to check your benefits today through my link, tandem diabetes.com/juicebox, this is going to help you to get started with tandem, smallest pump yet that's powered by its best algorithm ever control IQ. Plus technology helps to keep blood sugars in range by predicting glucose levels 30 minutes ahead, and it adjusts insulin accordingly. You can wear the tandem Moby in a number of ways. Wear it on body with a patch like adhesive sleeve that is sold separately, clip it discreetly to your clothing or slip it into your pocket head now to my link, tandem diabetes.com/juicebox, to check out your benefits and get started today. Why would you settle for changing your CGM every few weeks when you can have 365 days of reliable glucose data. Today's episode is sponsored by the Eversense 365 it is the only CGM with a tiny sensor that lasts a full year sitting comfortably under your skin with no more frequent sensor changes and essentially no compression lows. For one year, you'll get your CGM data in real time on your phone, smartwatch, Android or iOS, even an Apple Watch, predictive high and low alerts let you know where your glucose is headed before it gets there. So there's no surprises, just confidence, and you can instantly share that data with your. Healthcare Provider or your family, you're going to get one year of reliable data without all those sensor changes. That's the ever since 365 gentle on your skin, strong for your life. One sensor a year, that gives you one less thing to worry about, head now to ever since cgm.com/juicebox, to get started.

Erika Forsyth, MFT, LMFT 15:22
Yes, it's avoid. It's an avoidance strategy, kind of behaviorally. But then there is this, you know, psychological component. And then, as I shared before we started recording, you know, there are not very many studies on how to treat and support people living with type one, or actually both type one and type two, psychologically around this fear, because it is that I think we're, obviously, we're talking about mental health more in the diabetes space, but also we're just, we're noticing, we're giving language. And I think there will be more specific studies around this,

Scott Benner 15:57
yeah, well, they're not gonna need a study. They can just listen to this conversation. That's right. Yeah, that's right. Yeah, that's right. We'll straighten out. Keep

Erika Forsyth, MFT, LMFT 16:03
going. I'm sorry. I think it's also important to note that you are not alone in this. From the American Diabetes Association, they have shared from studies that one out of every seven people living with diabetes, and it's the same for type one, type two experience, and have kind of endorsed experiencing the fo H, and also as a caregiver, you can experience this too obviously from more of a psychological component, because you aren't trying to avoid the fear of feeling the low, but you're trying to Avoid putting your child maybe it feels like in risk and in danger this next

Scott Benner 16:44
point. I mean, I'm super interested in this next point, so I just want you to keep going, but

Erika Forsyth, MFT, LMFT 16:48
that it can develop without a known traumatic low event. Yeah, that yes, yes. So, like, I think we kind of touched on this a little bit without having a seizure or a intense low event or episode, you can still deal and experience and work. You know, you're working really hard, I know, to try and manage the sphere so it is really common. It's not necessarily correlated to having a past episode.

Scott Benner 17:17
So if you asked me to explain to you how Arden treats her diabetes like I've said this a million times. I don't see her talking about herself like type one. I don't see her acting like it's burdening her, but it obviously is. It's burdening everybody to some degree or another, right? But what I've kind of come lately to think is what Arden is doing is she's taking kind of that youthful energy and applying it to diabetes, like, Ah, it's okay. I got it. She's not ignorant of it, and she's not ignoring it, but she she hits it with that, like it's gonna be okay. Let me just get through vibe like that. You know, at a certain age, you have right, and she has had the experience of a seizure, but I haven't seen her freak out about it, but as we're talking about it, like, I wonder, like, is it because of her attitude, or is it because she had to make a conscious decision not to freak out about it, because now she knows, like, she knows what it is, and when she explains it to you, like, in hindsight, she knows how scary it is and beyond scary, like, you know, we're not talking about the safety aspect of it here, but like, this is not an unreasonable thing to be worried about. Like, you can absolutely die from this. Yeah, that's not crazy. I just, I'm always gonna wonder, I guess, like, how she managed it, and if I think she's too young to ask her, like, I think I'd have to wait five more years to ask her, really, like, what did you apply to this situation? When you realize, like, this happens sometimes, and it's not like an hour before it happens, a red light goes off over your head, and it's like, you're gonna have a seizure in an hour, like you it's, you're okay, and then you are not okay. It's, it's that fast. So anyway, I don't know. I

Erika Forsyth, MFT, LMFT 18:51
think that's a good point, because the few studies that are out there have have said that there isn't a direct correlate. There is not a direct correlation between having a seizure and having this fear of hypos, this intense fear. So just because you've had a really severe low event, it doesn't mean that you will that you also experience this intense fear all the time. There there's no really direct correlation. Have

Scott Benner 19:18
you ever met somebody who has had a seizure. It's not about diabetes, like something else, like somebody has a seizure disorder or something like that. Like, I'm always impressed by the blase nature in which they talk about it like it really is, like there must just be a moment of just agreeance that you make with the with the universe at some point when you realize that you might be walking around and just have a seizure. Never seen a group of people handle that, like handle something so unknowable, so well. I guess that's what people with diabetes are doing too, right? They're just, you have no choice. Yeah, what else you gonna do? I'm like, Yes, I could sit here, but you know, I got things. I got. To do. So, have you ever dealt with this? Personally?

Erika Forsyth, MFT, LMFT 20:03
I have not personally interacted like people with who are either. Yeah, have epilepsy, but I understand the point, because there's it's also kind of, I'm thinking about people with anxiety who experience panic attacks most often. They show up out of the blue. There's no known trigger. So then that creates even more anxiety, right? Because you're anticipating when is this thing going to happen?

Scott Benner 20:28
Yeah, I'm guessing that whatever lets us drive cars is what lets us do this. Do you mean because you look around nobody is like, do you ever really think about driving while you're doing it? Like you're up on a highway and everyone's going 85 miles an hour in like, these death rockets, and at this point now, you remember 20 years ago the I it was like, Oh, these cell phones, everyone's gonna run into each other. And for a while, they did. And then we made a generation of people who learned to drive with their cell phone in their hand. They're awesome at it. I know we're not supposed to say that. Yes, no, no, I know we're not supposed to say that, but people are so good at driving with their phone in their hand now, like, it's not like I was on the highway the other day. I looked over and the guy next to me is looking down to his right, and not for a while, like, and I so I kept checking and looking back. He was looking and looking like, I'm like, he's reading something. And then you drive a little farther and there's a guy, another guy, he's got his phone up on his dashboard, a little holder. He's watching Sports Center. And I'm like, Oh my God. Like, so I got reading guy Sports Center. I got, I got a lady on Facebook. I got, like, I look around, I'm like, There's 50 cars around me. Half these people aren't even looking forward. We're all going 80 miles an hour. No one's hitting each other. I'm like, This is amazing. So, like, it's amazing. It is amazing, right? Like, so, whatever I think it is that lets us get involved in that activity which common sense would tell you not to do, right? Like, seriously, if you let Common Sense Decide you would not get in a car. We do that, and we do it so effortlessly. I wonder how much of whatever that is in people adaptability, I guess, and trust that we put into it. I guess you you end up applying it to this at some point, if you can. It just makes sense to me, but I don't

Erika Forsyth, MFT, LMFT 22:06
know, yes, I mean, then that we'll, we'll, we'll talk about that too. It's kind of trusting. No, am I jumping forward? I'm sorry, trusting the body, you know, trusting your body, trusting the medication. No, it's always good. You're always queuing, queuing me up for the next thing that's good. Go ahead. Okay, so also, these studies have have indicated that most of the time, if you are dealing with extreme fear of hypos, you may also be experiencing higher levels of general anxiety depression. So it often not. This is not all the time, but it doesn't often live by itself. Yeah, they do often go hand in hand.

Scott Benner 22:46
So if I'm experiencing fear of hypoglycemia, I could maybe step back and take a wider look at my life to see if I'm having anxiety in other places too.

Erika Forsyth, MFT, LMFT 22:55
Yes, okay, yes, that's that's a good starting point.

Scott Benner 22:58
That's helpful, yeah, okay, oh, that's very helpful to know. Oh, isn't that? I don't know why I never put that together. It's ridiculous that I didn't put that together. But okay,

Erika Forsyth, MFT, LMFT 23:07
again, not, not always the case, right? But they just have noticed that in the research. Yeah, that makes

Scott Benner 23:13
sense. All right. Are we going to talk about ways to address it? Now, the Dexcom g7 is sponsoring this episode of The Juicebox Podcast, and it features a lightning fast 30 minute warm up time that's right from the time you put on the Dexcom g7 till the time you're getting readings 30 minutes. That's pretty great. It also has a 12 hour grace period so you can swap your sensor when it's convenient for you. All that on top of it being small, accurate, incredibly wearable and light. These things, in my opinion, make the Dexcom g7 a no brainer. The Dexcom g7 comes with way more than just this, up to 10 people can follow you. You can use it with type one, type two, or gestational diabetes. It's covered by all sorts of insurances and, uh, this might be the best part. It might be the best part, alerts and alarms that are customizable, so that you can be alerted at the levels that make sense to you. Dexcom.com/juicebox, links in the show notes. Links at Juicebox podcast.com, to Dexcom and all the sponsors. When you use my links, you're supporting the production of the podcast and helping to keep it free and plentiful.

Erika Forsyth, MFT, LMFT 24:27
Oh yes, I was going to note Yes, I want to talk about ways to address it. But also have noticed, and this is also reinforced in the research, people who have been managing type one or type two for a long time, doing finger pricking and then switching to CGM. In the last five ish years, they have noticed an increase, kind of increased fear of hypos, as they have gone from checking their blood sugar, whether it's three times a day or 15 times a day, to then having the constant fear. Feedback, but it also CGM have shown to reduce the fear of hypos. But also, I think, on the opposite side, have kind of increased some of the fear also,

Scott Benner 25:10
maybe, depending on where you come from, when you enter into using a CGM. So if a person's been you, you know, finger pricking their whole life, they don't have these problems. Whether they're having great outcomes or not. They're not passing out. They're not getting shaky. And so they think, well, this works. This is safe, right? And then you put a CGM on them, and they see the variability, and it freaks them out. No kidding, they just the arrows freak them out. That gets going up, it's going down. What are we going to do? Like, and so some people can't say, oh, well, this is what's always been happening, but now I see it. Some people just say I was almost willfully not ignorant, but I was almost willfully ignoring that these things could be happening in the background. I wasn't aware of them

Erika Forsyth, MFT, LMFT 25:49
absolutely. I mean, back in the day, we had no idea you just you were checking three to five times a day and hoping for the best. And so there is, you know, I know we've talked about this before, but there is, you know, that was, like the kind of the gift or blessing of just finger pricking is like you kind of did your thing, yeah? And obviously now it does, you know, kind of increase your ability to have better, like tighter management, yeah? But can also play with your emotional, you know, side of it too. This

Scott Benner 26:22
is, like the modern version of people going from mph and regular, because those people were just like, Look, if, if I didn't get sick and die, I got dizzy once in a while, and other than that, I was good. This all worked. That was the extent I interviewed so many people. The extent of them thinking I was like, I shot it in the morning. I shot it at dinner. You know, I maybe sometimes I got shaky or sweaty, but you know, those lows would come so slowly, they could mostly get in front of them. And nobody was really tracking a 1c the same way. So if they were standing up, they were healthy, and that was good, right? And then you bring those people forward and say, look, here's Lantis and levemir and, you know, like, Let's inject at every meal and count carbs. And they're like, Whoa, no, I'm I'm okay. Like, don't introduce all these other factors. And now the same thing leaving, I guess, just blood glucose meters to CGM, you're just introducing so much more data and so many more things to pay attention to. Oh, no kidding. I wonder how many people this is apropos of nothing that we're talking about, but I wonder how many people get left behind. Left behind because of that, like, every time there's a big jump, I wonder how many people just go, I'm alright, I'll stay here. You know what? I mean, it's interesting.

Erika Forsyth, MFT, LMFT 27:30
And whether or not is that, you know, access, the ability to even whether afford it or insurance, or is your doctor bringing it up, you know,

Scott Benner 27:39
yeah, all that is going to involve. But I'm saying, like, once you have the access and you can afford it, like, I wonder how many people see the data and just go up bridge too far, I'm good. I'll stay here. You know what I mean? Because i Because, you know how I think about it. Like, I think that if you're aware of how insulin works, and you have good tools, and you understand how food's impacting you, that most of the time you're going to be able to use insulin in a way that isn't going to leave you with great spikes or great drops, and that I would like if you, if you let me make a wish for you, I'd wish that you were in that space, right? But if you don't know how to use it in a way that you're having that feeling of, like, I'm brittle, like, you know what I mean? Like my blood sugar is all over the place, and this is freaking me out, then there is an argument to be made for mental health and well being that's more than just your blood sugar, yes, yeah. It's very person to person,

Erika Forsyth, MFT, LMFT 28:27
absolutely. And I think on that note, transitioning to maybe some tools around this. And this is something if you have been kind of struggling with this intense fear, I wish we could, we could fix it all in an episode. But these are some tools that that I use in sessions with people. And so just I want to encourage you to offer yourself Self Compassion. This is going to take time, because you could have been operating, you know, your neuro pathways and these that are like really dug in, deep and firm, and these distortions that you're going to not be okay when you go low. It takes time to change that. That's a shame. So to be patient with yourself, yeah, as you listen to these tools

Scott Benner 29:10
to expand on that. Like, how do you offer that to yourself? Like, because it probably seems, I mean, I'm going by the people I speak to when they're having a block like that, right? Like, they know intellectually where they should be, but they can't get there psychologically. People sometimes get mad at themselves for that too, yeah, yeah,

Erika Forsyth, MFT, LMFT 29:30
right. Or experience shame. Like, why can't I? Like, I know, I know where I want to go, I know what I want to do, but there's something interfering with me getting to that.

Scott Benner 29:40
Yeah, is there a way to help manage the shame while you're giving yourself the time to figure it out?

Erika Forsyth, MFT, LMFT 29:46
That's a great question. I mean, that's that's part of what therapy is about, but also reminding yourself you are undoing if it took you five years to get to this place you've been managing with keeping yourself. Yourself above 150 for safety. I'm just making up that number, right? It's going to take time. It might, I mean, hopefully not five years to change that, but it is going to take time. So just reminding yourself, like, Okay, you're moving the needle, and it might be just really slow, but to say, Okay, I'm changing. I'm being patient. I'm going to be kind to myself.

Scott Benner 30:19
Patience. That's what I was thinking. You have to find a way to be patient. I mean, that's a thing. I think everybody's got to find a way in their life to do that. I was not patient as a young person at all, and it it just really did. It takes a lot of time to stop thinking about it's ironic, right? It takes a lot of time to stop thinking about time like it's judging you. Yes, you know what I mean. And instead of just existing and being, and this does, this takes what it takes, and it will be as long as it is going to be, but at the end, we're going to be better off. Let's not worry about whether it's a week, a month or two years. Honestly, the losing weight for me was my last step in becoming a more patient person. You know what I did first to try to teach myself patience. I started growing cactuses because they grow so slow and so I would just think of, instead of like, I want this thing to bloom and grow and get to its full size right away so I can enjoy it. I bought a thing, and I said it could take me three years for this thing to grow to eight inches tall, and I have to be okay with that. I realized I wasn't very patient, and I started with a cactus to try to teach myself patience. So, you know,

Erika Forsyth, MFT, LMFT 31:30
that is, that's such a beautiful thing. I mean, it's, it's really hard to do in our culture when we have this, you know, immediate gratification type of culture, and, you know, do this for seven days, and you'll feel this way and look this way and drop this many pounds.

Scott Benner 31:46
Yeah, everybody wants it so fast. I have I'm I'll continue on with my stupid story for a second. I have three bushes around my mailbox. They get these yellow flowers on them. So the year you get them and plant them, they're going to have the yellow flowers. But as they're acclimating to the new place you put them, it takes two seasons for the yellow flowers to come back. So I put them out so pretty. Just it sets off the whole thing, you know. And the next year comes along, they get green, and they just sit there, green. And I was like, What is that like? Where are my yellow flowers? So I went and I looked it up, and I was like, two seasons like. I said, What the heck? And I was like, Okay. I just was like, okay, like, this year they're green bushes. Next year they're going to be green bushes. And I swear to you, I had forgotten about it, like in my mind, there are just three green bushes at the mailbox. And I am not lying to you. I can't believe this is coming up right now. The other day, I was pulling into my driveway, and I was like, oh my god, the yellow flowers. I was like, they're back. And it felt so satisfying, like that they were there. I was just like, awesome. Like, now I'm gonna get yellow flowers every year because I waited two years. I'm bitch

Erika Forsyth, MFT, LMFT 32:54
about that. Like, that's like, making me feel emotional. I don't know why.

Scott Benner 32:58
Oh my god, Eric, is cry. Are you crying? I don't

Erika Forsyth, MFT, LMFT 33:01
know. It's bringing tears to my eyes. I think it's like a beautiful illustration of patience.

Scott Benner 33:06
I swear to God, this happened. Like, I am not making any of this up. I just pulled it. I was like, Oh, I got my flowers. I was like, awesome. And I was like, they're gonna be yellow all summer. It's gonna be wicked. And like a next year, next year. I was like, I did it like, but it really did somehow more meaningful that I had to wait for them. Like, I know this is not me. Like, you know, it's not like I had to do sit ups every day to get a six pack for 20 years or something like that. But like, it was really a, I don't know, I just, I was really, I just felt grateful that when I realized that was gonna take two more seasons, I was just like, Okay, I guess that's just what it is. And I'm telling you that losing weight, like, I tried so many times, like, oh, in two weeks, I lost this many pounds. In a month, I lost this many like, I'm and then, you know, six weeks later, you're like, I can't keep doing this. Like, it's taken forever until I realized that it's the framing of the time that's when it all became easy, like, now I'm here, like I'm where I mean to be. I just said this with Jenny the other day, but you're one of the only people that looks at me all the time, like I'm a completely different person than I was two years ago. You are if I would have said I need to be here two weeks from now when I started, that's unreasonable. It wasn't going to happen. So anyway, like, if you're struggling with this, like the amount of the time isn't important. What's important is if you get there, yes, that's all. I'm sorry. That was 110 points. I just spoke 10 minutes on. I'm sorry,

Erika Forsyth, MFT, LMFT 34:29
but it is really crucial, because I do hear people getting frustrated with themselves, you know, okay, we talked about this once, and I'm still, I still can't do it like that's it is okay, and you're normal.

Scott Benner 34:43
I am overwhelmed by the number of people I see who beat themselves up or even sometimes mad at me, like I listened to your episode, and my a 1c, is not six. I'm like, Well, you don't, you know it's not that quick, that kind of thing, like, and I know how badly you want to get to the thing, but there's a process. Yes. So anyway, I'm sorry, you're you're next. No, it's good.

Erika Forsyth, MFT, LMFT 35:03
I think we mentioned this already, but I think it's important as you are starting to kind of face or if you're wanting to make changes around the fear, if it's impacted your quality of life, if it's impacted how you you know function, make decisions if it's impacted your management. And you're saying, Okay, I want to make changes. Also, just holding that as you are leaning into making some changes, you might experience increased levels of anxiety, which also, as we know, can feel like you're low. And so we're going to kind of walk you through some, hopefully some helpful tools. But I think it's important just to validate that like it is, it's, this is a complicated thing. As you're facing your fear, you're feeling the anxiety, and then that can trigger, oh my gosh, am I low? No, I'm anxious. I'm anxious about being low. It's, it is, you know, just a big thing to tackle. Yeah, okay, okay. So I think first we want to really understand the thoughts that are driving the behaviors. And we've talked about cognitive behavioral therapy, it's really has an emphasis on how our thoughts and our feelings impact our behaviors and vice versa. It's the cognitive triangle. You can start one way. You can start with your behavior, which might impact your thoughts and how you feel. Oftentimes, we are responding from our thoughts most of the time. So for example, if that thought is driving you, the thought of, if I go low, I'll pass out and no one will be there to help me, right? That's a pretty powerful thought. Yeah, yeah. That thought is going to make you feel anxious. I'm sure you're feeling the anxiety. If you're, if you're living with that thought driving you kind of all day long, then your behaviors are what we've talked about. You're going to reduce your basal, your suggested basal rates. You might eat more carbs. You might correct at a higher number, because that thought is, if I, if I go, if I dip below this number, I'm not going to be okay. And so that's impacting your behaviors and your feelings about it, okay? So what we want to do is challenge and examine that distortion, right? Whether that's kind of, that is kind of a catastrophic thought, right, that if this, if I go low, this is going to happen. And that feels like it's going to happen for sure, even though we can step out of our body and say, well, we probably isn't, yeah, it's harder than just changing your thoughts. But that's where you're going to start. So you're going to write down next to wherever your mirror, your kitchen table, in multiple places. I've gone low before, and I've treated it. And I have my my tool, my safety tools. So you could say I have my CGM, my glucose tablets, so and so is following me, and so you have that posted and printed everywhere. Yeah, okay, so that's what you're kind of living you're kind of meditating on that,

Scott Benner 38:06
Okay, should I keep going? I was just going to tell you that this helped me so much when I had back pain when I was younger person, just the idea of, like, the first time I had pain, that I went to a doctor, and the doctor told me there was a problem, and then I saw my back as broken, and then it hurt again, and it got worse, and it became like psychosomatic, I guess is the best way I can put it. I don't know if that's the right phrasing, but I read John sarno's book about back pain, and he told me to repeat, in my mind, my back is not broken. I'm okay. I'm not injured. I'm okay, and that helps so much. I can't begin to tell you. So anyway, yes, you can keep going. But

Erika Forsyth, MFT, LMFT 38:44
so that's so good. I mean, it is. I know it can become changing your thoughts. People can. It might feel like, well, it's, it's not as easy as that, and it isn't, but it's part of, that's part

Scott Benner 38:56
of stupid. The first time I read it, and then, yeah, then I did it and I did it and I did it, and I don't have to do it anymore. So

Erika Forsyth, MFT, LMFT 39:02
yeah, yes, easier said than done, particularly when you are starting to see the arrow diagonal down or straight down, regardless of the number. So again, I keep saying 150 but maybe your number is 200 and we kind of talk about like you have a psychologically safe range, right? If you're living with this intense fear most of the time, you've created the psychologically safe range that you feel comfortable in. But what we're wanting to do is get you to a medically safe range. Okay? So we're going to talk through some steps, and this is kind of a bit of exposure therapy, graduated exposure therapy. So as you're thinking about right now, what your psychologically safe range is, we're going to move you step by step, trying to get you to a medically safe range for one specific tool. I read this. Where is. Reframe your CGM, if you use one, if you don't, maybe reframe how you see your blood sugar meter. Use it as a safety net and not a threat detector. Yeah, I just love that. So you're, you're looking at your numbers, and instead of when we see the arrow down, be like, Oh no, I'm going, like, I'm going down. I'm gonna die. I'm gonna I'm gonna pass out. I'm not going to be okay. I'm feeling really scared to then to say this is also part of kind of changing, being aware of your thoughts is, oh, this is, this is my safety net. This is helping me. This is telling me I'm going low, but I'm okay. I have my tools, I have my my glucose tablets. I have all the things I need right here, right

Scott Benner 40:45
I want that beep, that beep, that beep, is there ahead of time so that I can stop a problem from happening. This is why I would preach all day long that your high alarm shouldn't be 400 or three. You shouldn't be like I don't want the thing to beep, so I'll turn the alarm off. You want it to tell you when you get to 130 so that you can stop the 130 with a tiny bit of insulin that is not going to make you low later. Like, this is, it's so funny that we're getting to this, but like, this is the basis of the Pro Tip series, right? Like, is that bumping and nudging and using small amounts of insulin to keep yourself in range so that you don't have, you know, emergent problems, high or low from all the insulin or the waiting and the mist timing of the insulin that can come from the waiting. It's interesting. Go ahead. I'm so

Erika Forsyth, MFT, LMFT 41:30
sorry. Yes, yes. And that's like the management side, like the How to side, yeah. And what we're trying to kind of fill in the blanks of, okay, what the feeling and the thoughts are driving some of those behaviors? So for like, the high alarm, if the if you're kind of psychologically safe, range is, oh, I'm okay, up until 250 we want to slowly bring that down. I think, to start with, I would suggest, most of the time, if you're living with this intense fear, you're looking at your CGM all of the time, or a lot of the time, at least. That's what the research shares. That's what I hear a lot, is you are just you're constantly staring at it. Okay, so we want to do two things. We're going to talk about, kind of the the ranges, but also, as soon as you get that urge to look at your CGM, you want to wait one minute. And that this is for people who are looking at all the time. If you're looking at it every five minutes, then bump it up by one minute. Wherever you are, bump it up by a minute. Okay, so that's part of the exposure therapy. So you get that, you feel this urge. I'm like, Oh, am I? Where am I? You're gonna pause, set a timer for a minute. Okay, okay. You're gonna do your deep breath. You can do your grounding activity. You can set a timer and do a loop around the space that you're in. You can say your mantra, I'm okay. I have my my glucose, I'm safe. You do the 12345, right? The Yeah, you can do the grounding technique, yes, okay, okay. So obviously you want to increase that. So you are going to experience, as you increase the time of looking at your CGM, you are going to experience anxiety, and that is okay. And so that's we're wanting to distract yourself by these coping mechanisms of deep, breathing, grounding exercise, whatever it may be. And then you get to reward yourself. And so increasing that from every one minute, five minutes, 10 minutes, hour to after meals, then then building in the trust with the alarms, yeah, okay, like with, you said, with the high blood sugar of the, excuse me, the high range number, most often people are setting or creating a higher like, let's say like 150 to 250

Scott Benner 43:58
for example. So with graduated

Erika Forsyth, MFT, LMFT 44:01
exposure therapy, if we're trying to bring you back into a medically safe range, you're going to go slow so you're going to move it by this is kind of going back to the patients and time piece. Yeah, it doesn't really matter if you're bringing your range down by one point or five points, you're doing it really slowly and in that you are again practicing coping mechanisms to calm your your nervous system, while same simultaneously increasing your kind of that frustration tolerance, that anxiety, as you Reduce the ranges. Does that make sense? Am I making sense?

Scott Benner 44:43
So you're trying to, like, extend that hyper vigilant space to keep like, I don't know, like your cortisol or your adrenaline from happening so frequently, right? And is that, am I making sense? Okay, yes.

Erika Forsyth, MFT, LMFT 44:55
So you're you're wanting to swing from being kind of hyper vigilant. To just like appropriately vigilant, right? Because it's it's impacting the quality of your life, emotionally and physically and so again, this is going to take time by reducing these numbers. And this is again building, then building, and trust with your alarms and with your body, the slower you do it, the better, honestly, because it will feel too scary. And then, as you're reducing your ranges and becoming more comfortable with being lower, you're also building trust with your body. You're building trust with your blood sugar. You're building trust with your insulin because you have these like micro increments that are also changing the way you're thinking, okay, so every day your range is lower and you don't crash and you don't have a seizure, you're building in more and more kind of mass experience to replace those cognitions, those distortions, with actual truth, like, oh, okay, I'm 149 and I didn't crash, yeah, I didn't I didn't have a seizure. Okay, I'm 148 I'm okay. As you're kind of playing around with this exposure to lower numbers, it's really important to have that you know kind of off the top of your mind, or that you work for you. So again, whether it's five finger breathing, it's flower candle breathing, it's putting your hand over your heart and doing five deep breaths, doing 54321, or 321, grounding, having something you enjoy in the house or in your workplace that you know you okay when I when I experience this scary moment, I'm gonna do X, Y or Z to calm my body and distract myself until I get to look at My CGM.

Scott Benner 47:00
Okay. That episode, by the way, 913, is the 54321, method that you and I went over if somebody wants to go listen to it, if they're looking for

Erika Forsyth, MFT, LMFT 47:08
a coping mechanism. Yes, awesome. Thank you. Yeah, thank you. That's basically grounding yourself to the present moment, using your senses, identifying things you can see, touch or hear. You can also add in smell and taste, but oftentimes it's easiest to do those, you know, sight, touch and sad sound.

Scott Benner 47:29
You know, I think maybe too it's probably important to remember that that feeling of a falling blood sugar or low blood sugar, it's probably mimics pretty closely anxiety to begin with, right? So if you're anxious and then that happens, the ramping up is is probably significant for people who are experiencing it.

Erika Forsyth, MFT, LMFT 47:47
Yes, and I think you know, there's the the physical fear again, of wanting to avoid feeling the low. And if a lot of what is preventing you from being in a medically safe range is not wanting to deal with it socially or publicly. I would also encourage you to kind of think about what is your relationship like with diabetes, right? And how which is a huge topic, right? But if you are constantly making decisions at your own expense, but to protect the other people around you, for example, if you're already eating out at a restaurant, maybe you're going low, or maybe you don't want to go low, so you're keeping yourself higher because you don't want people to have to feel uncomfortable with you having to correct or do anything you know that feels different in a public space, You are putting the comfort and needs of other people before your own medical safety. And I get that it's uncomfortable to feel low in public. It just is. It really is getting to a place of acceptance and understanding. You also need to take care of yourself, even if it makes other people feel uncomfortable if you have to get your supplies out in front of other people. Health

Scott Benner 49:04
First, I've been feeling organized since she was little, you know, like there's people who are gonna look weird or say something, we don't care about them. We care about you. We care about doing the right thing for you. That's step one. I felt for her, and I feel for anybody else who who is in a public situation and realizing that they're being looked at or judged, and it's hard for them, like, I have to tell you, like, it's not in my personality to care, but I speak to a lot of people who do, and the way they describe it to me, it's debilitating for them. They freeze because they're so concerned, and it's not, it's not just a conscious decision to be concerned about what other people think. It just is like, I don't make a conscious decision to kind of not care, like it's just wiring, you know what I mean? So you got to find a way to put yourself first.

Erika Forsyth, MFT, LMFT 49:53
So yes, and it's and it's a journey, and there's no going back to the time, you know. Like we need to you need to be okay with being okay in public, but certain age, yeah, that you everyone is on their own journey.

Scott Benner 50:10
It should be a goal of yours to try to get to that no matter how long it takes.

Erika Forsyth, MFT, LMFT 50:13
Yeah, I think it's, it's acceptance of the diabetes. It's acceptance of of you living with it. And it's not all of you, right? But it is. It is a part of you, yeah? But it's, it takes work,

Scott Benner 50:27
okay? You've done it again. In my opinion. I feel like, what's that cartoon Phineas? J whoopee, we've, what is that exact I can't, oh, my god, no. I said, so old. You don't know. Trust me, no, I don't know, but what is it? He said, finish. We've done it again, like they're just like, congratulating each other anyway. That's what I felt like just now. I felt like, what? All right, hold on a second. I'll look it up real quick.

Erika Forsyth, MFT, LMFT 50:50
So a cartoon that says we've done it again, I think

Scott Benner 50:53
he's a Phineas. He's like, yes, hold on, Phineas. J won cartoons, I don't worry. I've put chat GPT on. That's figuring it out right now for me. Okay, okay,

Erika Forsyth, MFT, LMFT 51:04
I'm like, I got a song that came up that I don't think a

Scott Benner 51:08
walrus. Is he a walrus? I swear to God, I haven't looked yet. If I'm right about him being a walrus, like, I'm gonna be like, cartoons used to not be as good as they are. Now, those of you who grew up are like, Oh yeah,

Unknown Speaker 51:19
I'd say they were actually better. I've seen Toy Story. You

Scott Benner 51:21
would not have enjoyed this if you think Toy Story is what it needs to look like. Also, Toy Story is 20 years old. So, yes, all right, here it goes. It's Tennessee tuck Oh my God, I am so old. It's Tennessee tuxedo. It's like a cartoon from the 60s. And I'm pretty sure,

Erika Forsyth, MFT, LMFT 51:38
okay, I have it up. Oh my gosh.

Scott Benner 51:41
There's no way you know any of this. Like, it's like,

Erika Forsyth, MFT, LMFT 51:45
it is a walrus and a penguin. It looks like a penguin and a walrus.

Scott Benner 51:51
I think the penguin would say to the walrus, if I'm not Jesus, anyway, I listen. Let's stop this. I hope you're not afraid. I hope you're not afraid of hypoglycemia after this or that. It helps you somehow. Oh, but anyway, I think Tennessee tuxedo would say to the walrus, Phineas J Whoopi, we've done it again. That's what I just thought. This could be early onset.

Erika Forsyth, MFT, LMFT 52:16
It must be a Friday,

Scott Benner 52:17
yeah, this could be dementia coming. I'm not gonna lie to you. All right, thank you so much. I really appreciate

Unknown Speaker 52:23
it. You're welcome.

Scott Benner 52:26
I've restarted the recording because I just got the return. I've mashed together 219 60s cartoons. This is what chatgpt tells me. So apparently in Mr. Magoo, they used to go, oh, Magoo, you've done it again. And Phineas J Whoopi would be told by Tennessee tuxedo after every lesson, Phineas J Whoopi, we've done it again. Oh, Phineas, you've done it again. So I'm misremembering the lines, but the lines were actually, Phineas J, whoopee, you're the greatest and, oh, Magoo, you've done it again. And my brain has melded those two together into Phineas J, Whoopi, you've done it again. How about that? By the way, I'm the only one listening to the PI even if Erica re listened to this episode, she shut it off by now. But like, I'm she's like, I'm not listening to this bullshit. Like we already did the thing with the free guy. See me. I'm trying to get the Saturday anyway. Oh my gosh. So everything you think you remember, you probably don't remember, and I'll see you later. Goodbye. Yeah, the podcast episode that you just enjoyed was sponsored by ever since CGM, they make the ever since 365 that thing lasts a whole year. One insertion every year. Come on. You probably feel like I'm messing with you, but I'm not. Ever since cgm.com/juicebox today's episode of The Juicebox Podcast was sponsored by the new tandem Moby system and control iq plus technology. Learn more and get started today at tandem diabetes.com/juicebox check it out. Dexcom sponsored this episode of The Juicebox Podcast. Learn more about the Dexcom g7 at my link. Dexcom.com/juicebox you Thanks. 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. Hey, kids, listen up. You've made it to the end of the podcast. You must have enjoyed it. You know what else you might enjoy the private Facebook group for the Juicebox Podcast. I know you're thinking, Oh, Facebook, Scott, please. But no, beautiful group, wonderful people, a fantastic community Juicebox Podcast, type one diabetes on Facebook. Of course, if you have type two, are you touched by diabetes in any way? You're absolutely welcome. It's a private group. So. Have to answer a couple of questions before you come in. We make sure you're not a bot or an evildoer. Then you're on your way. You'll be part of the family. Hey, what's up, everybody? If you've noticed that the podcast sounds better and you're thinking like, how does that happen? What you're hearing is Rob at wrong way recording doing his magic to these files. So if you want him to do his magic to you wrong way recording.com you got a podcast. You want somebody to edit it. You want rob you.

Please support the sponsors


The Juicebox Podcast is a free show, but if you'd like to support the podcast directly, you can make a gift here. Recent donations were used to pay for podcast hosting fees. Thank you to all who have sent 5, 10 and 20 dollars!

Donate
Read More

#1577 Catholic Guilt

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

Erin, 49, shares her daughter’s T1D diagnosis, twin dynamics, donor pregnancy, and the emotional weight of parenting through it all.

+ Click for EPISODE TRANSCRIPT


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.

Erin 0:16
I am Aaron. I am the mother of a type 112, year old daughter. If

Scott Benner 0:23
this is your first time listening to the Juicebox Podcast and you'd like to hear more, download Apple podcasts or Spotify, really, any audio app at all, look for the Juicebox Podcast and follow or subscribe. We put out new content every day that you'll enjoy. Want to learn more about your diabetes management, go to Juicebox podcast.com up in the menu and look for bold Beginnings The Diabetes Pro Tip series and much more. This podcast is full of collections and series of information that will help you to live better with insulin. 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 or becoming bold with insulin.

The episode you're listening to is sponsored by us Med, usmed.com/juicebox, or call 888-721-1514, you can get your diabetes testing supplies the same way we do from us. Med, today's episode is sponsored by the tandem mobi system with control iq plus technology. If you are looking for the only system with auto Bolus, multiple wear options and full control from your personal iPhone. You're looking for tandems, newest pump and algorithm. Use my link to support the podcast, tandem diabetes.com/juicebox,

Erin 1:53
check it out. I am Erin. I am the mother of a type 112, year old daughter,

Scott Benner 2:00
Erin. How old was she when she was diagnosed? She was nine, nine. So that was like, two years ago,

Erin 2:06
yeah, July 28 2022 stuck

Scott Benner 2:09
in your head a bit, right? Yeah. I

Erin 2:11
hear my husband tell people when they ask him, and he's like, I don't know, it was like, summer of oh, I'm like, July 28 2022

Scott Benner 2:19
you know, I do that, and I'm pretty attached to the whole thing. So that's a boy thing. Yeah, I know if you pressured me right now, I'd be, like, I think it was in August. And then, I mean, I can guess at the date, but I'm not sure. Like, I really don't have that. I don't know. Like, you know, like, I go out, I go grocery It's my life. I go grocery shopping. I do things for like the house and everything. I'll bump into somebody out my wife will be like, Oh, you saw this person again. She starts asking me a bunch of questions about I'm like, How would I know any of that? She goes, weren't you talking to them? I was like, Yeah, we spoke for 10 minutes. But I'm not a lady or gay. I didn't ask about that stuff. And if I was, I'd have all the answers for you. But I'm like, that's not what we spoke about anyway. I don't, I don't understand what you guys like, even when you start talking, she comes back, she's like, Oh, she had a baby. It was seven pounds, four ounces. It was, you know, like this. It was a C section. Do you know what happened on a Tuesday? And I'm like, I don't know what you're talking

Erin 3:16
about. It is funny, the details we hang on to and what we don't. I would say it's since diabetes, I've let go of a lot more details that I used to hold dear so. But that one, yeah, that

Scott Benner 3:28
one you have. But why do you think that is, do you think it's because you don't have the space for it anymore? Or,

Erin 3:33
yeah, yeah, it's the space. It's also just the perspective. I mean, I'm, I'm pretty type A have in my whole life. Can't even believe I didn't prepare for today and, like, wrote out everything I wanted to say I thought I was like, I just don't care. I don't care. He'll ask me questions, I'll answer it's a conversation, not a speech,

Scott Benner 3:50
right? Yeah, look at you. Hey. That's a bit I don't know you, but that's the thing you would have done in the past. I would celebrate not doing that.

Erin 3:56
Yes, yes, it is. That is the one gift that diabetes has brought us is just letting things go, like, Did anyone die today? Did anyone die? No, okay, we're good. Let's move forward.

Scott Benner 4:06
I interviewed uh Noah gray the other day. He's the tight end for the chiefs, and he

Erin 4:11
has type one. I'm gonna have to go look him up now, since I don't know

Scott Benner 4:14
anything, he'll be on the podcast in a week or so, I got it set up through tandem. He's, you know? He's a tandem. I don't know what they call them. He wears tandem Yeah, they give him some money, and he wears tandem pump. I don't think he wears it because of that. I think that's how they find them. Nevertheless, doesn't matter. He does some work for them. And I was able to get him on the podcast. Was awesome. And so the lovely people I work with the tandem or like, Hey, could you give us some questions about what you want to ask him? And I was like, what? So I'm sitting here, I'm like, Oh, I gotta make up a question now, then I gotta maybe say it, you know, so I, you know, first thing I said was, I said it occurs to me that what he's doing is incredibly difficult. He must have some skills or experiences that allow him to do this incredibly difficult thing. That he might want to reverse engineer and put it back on diabetes. So I thought, that's a question. And I said I also realized that he knows how to succeed, but he also knows how to fail, right? Like, so I'd like to know how failure helps him, you know, that kind of stuff. And they were like, you have questions about that? And I was like, oh, so. And this is them. They're hearing this right now, by the way, for the first time like so this is me. I'm outing myself. I also took questions from listeners, which is a thing I would have done anyway, right? And so I get a bunch of questions from them, and I swear to you, I just I went to chat GPT, and I was like, Hey, these are listener questions, and I want to know this, this, and this, can you set up like a list of questions for this interview? And it spit it out. And I was like, that looks good. And I emailed it to him, and then I never looked at it again. I did look at the questions from the listeners, though, because that I wanted to make sure I get in, so I blended those in through the conversation. Anyway, the funny part here is that when we logged on, he says, yeah, they sent me questions, but I figured we just talk right that was like, right on. Man. He didn't look at those damn questions either.

Erin 6:07
But that's a thing. That's what his people get paid for

Scott Benner 6:09
right now, boys, is what I'm saying. Because both of us, he and I, did the same exact thing. We were like, I didn't really think about the questions much, and I was like, Not me either. Anyway, all right, so two years ago, and I guess I unfairly know, because I have your notes, your child's a twin. Is that? Right? She

Erin 6:26
is yes, yes. So Avery and Hadley girl fraternal twins. So not identical, two kids, same birthday. Yeah, I appreciate

Scott Benner 6:36
were you clearing that up for me or for people listening? People listening. I've made the mistake

Erin 6:41
as a mom of twins. I have to explain it all the time, so it's just kind of part of how I explain things. Now, I did it

Scott Benner 6:47
once on the podcast, and it was one of those times where I thought, like, maybe we should just edit that out, where I said the stupidest

Erin 6:53
thing. Just now a little bit of mansplaining, yeah,

Scott Benner 6:56
no, I just I had it wrong. I was like, I don't understand. I'm like, Why don't they look the same? And then the person's going fraternal. And I'm like, I mean, they came out of the same place, the same time, like twins, right? I mean, why do you keep saying twins if they don't look

Erin 7:11
the same? I know. I know. Oh,

Scott Benner 7:15
yeah. Can you tell me a little process about having the kids? Yes.

Erin 7:18
So back up a few years, my husband and I were both married previously me younger than him, and by the time we got together, he had actually already had a vasectomy. So that did not go well for now, two people falling in love who actually decided they wanted kids. So we went ahead and went with a donor, and he, he, we know he's the he, it's actually anonymous. Now

Scott Benner 7:47
you're over explaining. So the person that gave the sperm, he, we got that good

Erin 7:56
so, yeah. So long story short, we used a donor. It's anonymous, but it's what they call open ID, so that when the girls turn 18, they can find out his identity.

Scott Benner 8:05
Okay, how do you pick? Is it hair, color, height, like what do you

Erin 8:09
I totally picked. I wanted him to look like my husband, so total opposite of me. Dark hair, dark skin, brown eyes, I'm pale as a ghost, Redhead, blue eyes. So I was like, All right, we're gonna put your jeans in there somehow. So that's how I picked

Scott Benner 8:29
I want to see your wedding photo? No, yeah,

Erin 8:32
first based on looks, then based on they. It's really kind of a cool thing that you go, you get sent pictures, and then they also have to write an essay. And you have to imagine, these donors are all college frat boys, right? So to hear them put together an essay, if why they want to provide

Scott Benner 8:50
this to your parents, I need beer money,

Erin 8:53
right? Exactly, but they can't say that. So I, I actually went and read it recently, because the girls have known for years that that's how they were conceived, but they never quite asked for more information. And I said, Well, you know, I actually have, like, this little packet if you ever want to see pictures or read his essay. And Avery, actually, the type one got really interested in it, so I showed her, and she was like, Oh, he sounds so nice. And I was like, yeah, he sounded a lot nicer when I picked him. Now he just kind of sounds like a 20 year

Scott Benner 9:23
old. In retrospect, we made a huge mistake, right? I don't even mean like with picking him. I mean the whole thing, the

Erin 9:30
whole thing, it's got to be a leap, right? It is. It's definitely a leap of faith, and it's funny, we, we did, we did six tries, and I think I had a different donor picked initially, and so after a couple of tries with that one, I switched, oh yeah,

Scott Benner 9:48
and it was bad product then, or that's

Erin 9:52
what I'm assuming, yeah, we also learned from our fertility guy when I when we went in for the procedure, like the last time, and we had already decided, like this. Is it, if this doesn't happen this time, we're going to Ireland, and this just wasn't meant

Scott Benner 10:05
to be, did you mean to steal a red headed baby? What do you say exactly? Go back to my roots.

Erin 10:12
It was basically the money thing, right? Like, let's quit. Let's just take our money go on a vacation. I got poison ivy, like, a week before the procedure. So I was put on steroids, and in the procedure room, I mentioned that he's like, Oh, that actually often helps in this like, what helps it take? What do you want to call it?

Scott Benner 10:32
Did you say? Why didn't you give it to me the first time? Then I did.

Erin 10:35
It was like, if that's a known thing, why isn't that just common practice? But lo and behold, here we are, and it must have worked too well, because we got two out of got two out of the

Scott Benner 10:43
deal. No kidding. Wow. I have to say, I think that is, it's lovely that people will do that, and at the same time, like, it's interesting to hear, like your perspective is really being through it. You're like, I know they were just looking for money or for something, but like, yeah, I don't know. I

Erin 10:56
don't in the moment I felt like, oh, he really wants to give you know, he had a great childhood. He just wants to give back and sure, yeah, of course, now that I am a parent, I realize that's not really like this

Scott Benner 11:07
idiot. What am I doing here? Yeah, no, that's really interesting. Okay, so kids come out, everything went well, no, no problems there. Awesome.

Erin 11:14
They actually were preemies. Not that it really matters, but yeah, they were two months early. Oh, wow, okay, but only in the NICU for 30 days and no health issues whatsoever. They called him.

Scott Benner 11:25
They were home a month before they were supposed to be born. Exactly. Yes, yes, sufficient. Your husband didn't try saying, like, I know I've had a vasectomy, but let's try really hard for a little while. I think I can get it to go through. No, I would have made that pitch,

Erin 11:37
I'm sure. But no, I'm not that dumb. And we were still, you know, very early in the days. So that wasn't an issue. Gotcha, I wasn't saying, I wasn't saying, No yet,

Scott Benner 11:48
Aaron, you're a lot of fun. We're gonna have a good time here. Okay, so do you get medical history on the donor, or do you think the autoimmune is from you your side? Let's talk about the tandem mobi insulin pump from today's sponsor tandem diabetes care, their newest algorithm control iq plus technology and the new tandem mobi pump offer you unique opportunities to have better control. It's the only system with auto Bolus that helps with missed meals and preventing hyperglycemia, the only system with a dedicated sleep setting, and the only system with off or on body wear options. Tandem Moby gives you more discretion, freedom and options for how to manage your diabetes. This is their best algorithm ever, and they'd like you to check it out at tandem diabetes.com/juicebox when you get to my link, you're going to see integrations with Dexcom sensors and a ton of other information that's going to help you learn about tandems, tiny pump that's big on control tandem diabetes.com/juicebox, the tandem mobi system is available for people ages two and up who want An automated delivery system to help them sleep better, wake up in range and address high blood sugars with auto Bolus. You've probably heard me talk about us Med and how simple it is to reorder with us med using their email system. But did you know that if you don't see the email and you're set up for this, you have to set it up. They don't just randomly call you, but I'm set up to be called if I don't respond to the email, because I don't trust myself 100% so one time I didn't respond to the email, and the phone rings the house. It's like, ring. You know how it works. And I picked it up. I was like, hello, and it was just the recording was like, you asked med doesn't actually sound like that, but you know what I'm saying. It said, Hey, you're, I don't remember exactly what it says, but it's basically like, Hey, your orders ready? You want us to send it? Push this button if you want us to send it, or if you'd like to wait. I think it lets you put it off, like, a couple of weeks, or push this button for that. That's pretty much it. I push the button to send it, and a few days later, box right at my door. That's it. Us. Med.com/juicebox, or call 888-721-1514, get your free benefits. Check now and get started with us. Med, Dexcom, Omnipod, tandem, freestyle, they've got all your favorites, even that new islet pump. Check them out now at us, med.com/juicebox, or by calling 888-721-1514, 887211514, there are links in the show notes of your podcast player and links at Juicebox podcast.com to us Med and all the sponsors.

Erin 14:30
No, we actually get it from the donor, and that was obviously one of the first things I went and looked at. So no, I have no history of diabetes in our family, no autoimmune anything. So it was never on my radar. Looking back the donors thing, it did say diabetes, didn't say which kind, but it was for like, two really old people in his history. So I'm sure that when I read through it, I was looking for other stuff, and I'm like, Oh yeah, old people, diabetes, whatever. You know, everybody got. That diabetes. I don't

Scott Benner 15:02
know what that means. Yeah, you're, there's no autoimmune on your side of the family. You're redhead from Ireland. You don't have celiac or No, no, no,

Erin 15:11
no. I know. And I've, I mean, I've listened to so many of your episodes, and I was like, He's gonna ask me this question. You're not gonna believe

Scott Benner 15:18
people. Yeah, you find, like, a nervous aunt or anything like that. No, nothing about that. Good for wow, that's interesting.

Erin 15:24
Or maybe it's our side of the family doesn't talk either. Maybe they're hiding out there and we just don't know about it.

Scott Benner 15:30
Yeah, I was telling you a story before we started about somebody I just interviewed recently. Yeah, that's, I guess that's possible too, like, maybe they just don't mention it, don't tell anybody. I just had a guy the other day say I asked the question is on my family wouldn't say stuff like that to each other. Okay? Um, so in the first m I don't know why I just made that noise, but I prefer if that didn't happen again. I was like in the first nine years. How was their health? Generally speaking, amazing. Nothing, nothing, okay, nothing, nope. What's the first sign that makes you think something's

Erin 16:05
up? So the it's funny, obviously all the signs were there for probably a good month, but it took about a week from me really seeing something to be like we need to take her to the doctor. I still didn't think diabetes, but it was weight loss. So she came down one day we were going to go to the pool, and her bathing suit was just hanging on her, and she looked at me, she said, Mom, what is happening? I was like, Oh, I don't know, but I think we're going to take you to the doctor. And I, I'm trying to remember what Scott and I, my husband's name, Scott, what we were thinking about that night, like we were talking, I'm like, I gotta take her. I was like, something feels weird, but I can't pinpoint it. And I'm like, I don't want to go like, I don't want to know, you know, you know you have to do it, but you're like, yeah, so I'm sure we thought cancer, something like that. I called the doctor the next day, and I explained, and it was then I started to realize, I'm like, Ooh, she also has started wetting the bed again, right, a little sporadically, and she was doing it and then washing her own sheets again. She's nine. She hasn't went to bed since, I don't know, four

Scott Benner 17:16
or five, probably in her memory, she probably hasn't, right? Yeah,

Erin 17:20
yeah. I mean, she was a bed wetter longer than most kids, but not consistently so, and it had been many years.

Scott Benner 17:27
I'm reminded of all the children in my life who have told me, you know, I don't know why Mom tells people this stuff when she's talking to them, but I'm pretty sure that's going to fall into that category. Yeah,

Erin 17:36
exactly. So Avery said, as she's leaving for school, she's like, good luck on your podcast. Don't say anything to embarrass me. Well, I'm like, well, there we go.

Scott Benner 17:45
14 minutes in, you screwed that up. She was just a bed wetter longer than you would imagine, you know. So she was like, policing it up. Did she tell you? Did she wet the bed and then tell you?

Erin 17:58
Yes? Okay, yes, yes. So that probably happened two weeks, a couple of times the two weeks leading up to it. It was the is, what? How do you say? Kusma, breathing. Yeah, Kuzma. It was the breathing that really freaked me out. That was happening for two days. And of course, at the time, I had no idea what it was, but I kept asking her, I'm like, Are you all right? Like, you just don't sound right. So are you tired? Are you breathing heavy? And she's like, I don't know what you're talking about. I'm fine.

Scott Benner 18:26
So your super skinny daughter is panting for two days, right? Right? Yes, okay, yep. And at some point you think, Oh, we have to go to the doctor to find out

Erin 18:35
she's so I call the doctor and they say you should probably bring her in. Can you get here today? And I was like, Oh, she has a voice lesson. Horrible. Is this? Like, could it be they? I said she's not, you know, she's eating like everything is normal. I don't think it's that serious, but I just want to get it. Could we have an appointment for Thursday? So let's insert mom guilt

Scott Benner 19:01
there. No, no, we'll just call this episode White Lady problems. That's all. Oh, yeah, right, right. She had voice lessons.

Erin 19:07
Really truthful with you. I thought we were gonna get such bad news, but didn't realize it was immediately life threatening. But I was like, I just want to give her one more day.

Scott Benner 19:15
Oh, you just wanted to find it for her, like, a little more space, yeah. Oh, that's interesting. So can I ask you retrospectively, what would that do the day? Have you thought about it? Yeah,

Erin 19:32
I think just one more thing that she enjoyed doing, right without having that news, whatever that news was going to be, yeah, I hear that maybe it was more for me, right? Yeah, I don't know. Day of normal, I don't know.

Scott Benner 19:47
Listen, some people say things and then they're like, I know exactly why this happened. I did this consciously, and sometimes it's not so. I just like to ask, but I was up later last night working on the podcast, you're welcome. And. It's my choice, and I was up working late on the podcast, and I opened up my app with my pictures in it to find something. And you know how it just like shoves pictures in front of you sometimes. So it's a picture of Kelly holding Arden and Kohl's next door, and they're in an overlook when we enter Yosemite. And I thought, oh, that's before Arden had diabetes. Yeah, she'd gotten it so early in her life. We don't have a ton of pictures that you look at and think that about, yeah, and I swear, I just had this I got overwhelmed. And I thought about, like, I looked at the three of them, and I thought, I wonder who they were going to be, you know, like, like, I wonder what was going to happen, like, before this, because this is definitely, like, one of those things, right? Like, it's a, you know, it's a, it's a ping pong ball that gets redirected, like you're heading in one direction, and then suddenly, you know, you make a turn that you weren't going to make, and now there's a whole new path in front of you, and you know, you're not getting back to the one that you were on before, you're always going to be colored by this, this experience. And I got really freaking sad for a half a second, and then I started tumbling down a rabbit hole. Couldn't remember how long my buddy had been dead. And then I was like, I gotta go to bed. And I just like, first it was that it was, Oh, that was before Arden had diabetes. And then it was like, Oh, look how long ago that was. And oh, my God, I'm old. And then how long has Mike been gone? And then I swear to you, I just thought, okay, you know what? I'm gonna finish up tomorrow. And so I just, I just shut everything down. I was like, that's enough for tonight. I was a little too tired, but I don't know why I told you that, other than it felt like it fit there. So,

Erin 21:40
yeah, no, I, I did the same thing actually, two days ago, where my mom is about to turn 80, my sister was asking, like, hey, send me pictures of, you know, your families with her, and we're going to do this. Like 80 things we love about you, right? Super sweet. Nice. So I'm looking at pictures a we don't have many recent ones. We're just so busy and we're just it's not on my mind anymore to grab the phone and take a picture. Yeah, so I so I'm going earlier and earlier. You know, 10, 987, and need to I had that exact same feeling, I'm labeling these before and after, right?

Scott Benner 22:17
I thought I was past it, but I wasn't. It hit me pretty it hit me pretty

Erin 22:21
hard. Good to know that 20 years from now, I'll still be feeling this way. Matt,

Scott Benner 22:25
yeah, look forward to that. Aaron, in 2045 you might be sad one night while you're working on your helipad, or whatever it is you're doing at that point with your flying thing that drives itself or whatever. Yeah, I'm sorry. I didn't mean by the way, my my friend's birthday is today, and I'm texting her and, like, by the time we're done, I'm telling her this, and I was like, happy birthday.

Erin 22:47
Glad you're alive. Like, what? Geez, I actually said

Scott Benner 22:49
to her, I'm like, I'm gonna start a line of greeting cards. What did I tell her? Hold on a second. I said, I'm gonna start a line of greeting cards that say horrible things inside. I think they'll take off. And then I gave her an example, and I said, Happy Birthday. You know how you can't remember how long it's been since your cat died? One day people will forget you too. Have an awesome day.

Erin 23:08
Oh, I know there's a market. I'm sure someone's already doing

Scott Benner 23:12
this. She sent me a book that's like affirmations that are not affirming. And I was, like, hilarious, perfect. Anyway. So I want to pivot a little here, because I like your notes, like you said something about transitioning to staying home more. So were you a working person like full time when they were diagnosed?

Erin 23:32
Yes. So we both work full time. We both still do work full time. The transition that I probably was getting into was more around her and wanting to stay home alone, right? So you have to imagine, we have these twins. We did not expect twins. We get through all of those years. We don't have no family around, really helping out. We see, we're seeing the finish line. They're getting older. They're about to be able to stay home alone. Yeah, you know all those things were like, oh, okay, we did it. We get to, like, actually enjoy our lives while we still have our children.

Scott Benner 24:08
I'm gonna smoke crack again. No, I'm sorry. I'm just kidding. I was just joking.

Erin 24:14
That's how you've pinned me already.

Scott Benner 24:17
That's the red hair. No, because so

Erin 24:23
you know when, when you first get hit with diagnosis, and I think it hits everyone differently based on the age of their kid, right? So they're not, she's nine, and because they have each other, we were getting pretty close being like, yeah, we can run to the store and they'll be okay. They're smart kids, they're pretty reliable. They're not going to burn down the house. And it just kind of threw this shadow over everything, like, oh, I can never leave her again, right? And it felt that way for a good year, I think, where I did not trust any other adult to be with her. So if it wasn't me or Scott, I. It was

Scott Benner 25:00
nobody. Do you think she felt that? Oh, yeah, yeah, 100% detrimentally or positively?

Erin 25:09
What do you say that a different way?

Scott Benner 25:11
Be clear. I wish people would just go. Could you speak English please? Like, do you think she felt that and felt comforted by it, or do you think she felt smothered by it?

Erin 25:23
Oh, I don't think she picked up on it. Oh, okay, okay. No, no. I it was more us realizing, like, okay, nobody's asking to learn about this. You know, grown ups, right? Nobody is offering to learn and stay and help. So I guess it's just us until she can do it on her own. So even when it came to like maybe finding babysitters, the first time I felt comfortable having a babysitter, I had to make sure that they had type one them. It was and I I've gone through this progression over the past few years of letting that part go. It's kind of like when you hear everybody sit first get diagnosed, they want to tell the teachers everything. They have packets of information. They're educating everybody to ad nauseam, and everyone's eyes are glazing over, and they think you're a crazy person. Now I'm just like, hey, my daughter has this thing. Don't worry about it. We just text each other. I just need your cell phone on, and I'll call you if I if she's not answering me,

Scott Benner 26:23
she passes out. Could you jab her with us? That's

Erin 26:26
really, I mean, that's really, I don't even tell them about the, about the glucagon anymore, really. Yeah, you know, I'm like, if there's a problem, I need to get a hold of you, and then I'll tell them about, hey,

Scott Benner 26:37
listen, don't look at her for a second. I know it's disturbing, but hold on, just in her bag.

Erin 26:42
If you look in her pocket, you're gonna find this thing

Scott Benner 26:46
well, so you feel better now that you've let that go. I imagine

Erin 26:49
Yes, yes. And I think it comes a just with time and experience and realizing that bad things aren't going to happen every other hour, and she has gotten so much better, but that's just a natural progression of age too. You know, nine to 12 is very different. And this is, of course, made her grow up super fast, yeah? So now, you know, we, we went from, okay, we can get sitters, but we need to educate them, or have them have type one themselves that I don't feel like I have to educate them so much.

Scott Benner 27:24
How long did it take you to find a kid with type one to babysit?

Erin 27:28
Not long. How did I find I got like, three referrals. I'm sure it was some Facebook group, some kind of, yeah, it was some kind of network group, like, how do I find a babysitter? Like, go to this go to this group. They have a whole list, and they'll send you names. That's how I found our first

Scott Benner 27:45
one. Yeah, nice. Did it actually end up being valuable that the sitter had type one, or did it never even come into

Erin 27:52
I think it was Val it was valuable for me because I didn't have to explain anything, right? So it was just, it was nice to just be like, here's her stuff. She knows how to do everything herself, but you know if you could just kind of help her with some carb counting, because you guys are having takeout tonight, or text me if you have a question about something, or if this pod falls off, you know, you wear it too, so you at least.

Scott Benner 28:19
And do you think your daughter found it comforting?

Erin 28:23
No, she did not like it. She was very embarrassed that I felt like I needed to have somebody with type 100.

Scott Benner 28:30
That's interesting. She told you about right? She did.

Erin 28:33
Oh, yeah. She's very open about how she feels about everything.

Scott Benner 28:37
Did you get like the mom? What do you like that? Or is she coming? She's like, I feel

Erin 28:42
like you're just drawing attention to it, you know. And why does it have to she's like, Why? Why does it need to be this way? And I want to be like, well, because I otherwise, I might as well just stay home. Right? Listen,

Scott Benner 28:55
if you can't be uncomfortable about this, you're gonna have to be uncomfortable about something else. Okay, so it's either this or ruining my evening. Which one do you want to be responsible for? Which is ridiculous, but definitely like you're not trying to do that, but it's how she's feeling. It's how she's feeling, for sure, I think Arden would do the same thing. Yeah, yeah. I think she'd be like, why this is not necessary? I think no matter how old they are, they think I'm okay. I know how to do this. I think if you listen closely enough to the podcast, it's true for everybody, no matter how true it actually is. Does that make sense? Yep, everybody's like, I have diabetes and I've got this and I don't need your help. And people say that if they're a 1c, is five or 13, right?

Erin 29:42
Yep, I got that lecture from her the other day. Probably another story she'll be mad about me telling but she wanted to go to her boyfriend's house, whatever that means in sixth grade, right? So I'm driving her over there and and his parents know he knows. But they don't talk about it, like, so she and her little boyfriend, they don't chat about

Scott Benner 30:04
it. How well does she know? 1112, 12? Yeah, there's no deep conversations

Erin 30:07
about, no, no, no. They're not like, how are you feeling? So I said, All right, hey, you're 15 minutes away. Like, just grab your glucagon and a Juicebox, right? Because just have that. That's just our standard thing that we leave the house with. She got real mad. She said, I'm not going to need the juice. Okay, he'll have juice, and he knows. So I can ask him if I need something. Oh, wow, all right, I'm like, but seriously, it's just, like, another thing you put in your pocket. It's not a big deal.

Scott Benner 30:41
And I don't want to, I don't want to panic you here, but you said you were married early the first time. How old

Erin 30:46
were you

Scott Benner 30:47
27 Oh, that's not early. What do you think about ridiculous, earlier in life? Oh, earlier than him. Earlier than Scott. Yes, I see as I I'm starting to hear that

Erin 30:57
like I'm younger than Scott. We both had been married previously. I see I'm

Scott Benner 31:01
just hearing that pregnant at 18, energy from your daughter right now. And I thought maybe you had like, she's like, I don't want that boy seeing this Juicebox. I don't need you telling me what to do and blah, blah, blah. I was like, oh, no, Beauty School is close.

Erin 31:19
It's the it's the I don't want to be different. And that is exactly the five minute little meltdown she had in the car. In the way was, I just want to leave the house and not have to think about this. I just want to go somewhere and not have to grab anything. And I said, I get it, and it sucks, but I ask you for two things. And then she said, But, and that she wanted to argue about it. I said, You know what? You're right, he will have juice or soda or something, and so that is fine. I will concede to that. And she but that's when I got the I know this way more. I know way more about diabetes than you do, and I know my body, and I'm awesome, Yep, yeah,

Scott Benner 32:00
sure, you do. I do.

Erin 32:03
And she does, know a lot she does, but you know, you also have to be like, but you also just said, If you started to go low, you would just put yourself in activity mode and like, that's not gonna catch it. So are you like? So, you know, she's like, that's not what I meant, you know, words. So I have to make sure.

Scott Benner 32:22
Yeah, when does the lady time start soon? Or has it already awesome? Yeah, my wife takes great Glee when I'll start over. And whenever my kids do something irritating, they she loves to look at me and go, that's you. You can see it in them. Do you guys just both put it off on the donor,

Erin 32:42
right? No, she's she's all me. Oh, really, yeah, I

Scott Benner 32:46
didn't mean in front of her. I met you and your husband. Do you go, like, you're like, oh, you know that must have been the guy. Don't you think?

Erin 32:52
No, I recognize it. It's me. It's all right. She got my good stuff and my bad stuff.

Scott Benner 32:59
Does that make it easier, that, you know, it or harder?

Erin 33:03
I think it's easier, yeah? I mean, you know, I I'm proud of who I'm. I think I'm understanding your question, like I'm proud of who I turned out to be, and I gave my mom the same

Scott Benner 33:12
problems. So, yeah, so mom's still alive, or did you have a nervous

Erin 33:17
breakdown? Yeah, right. I almost killed her twice, but she's still kicking it.

Scott Benner 33:22
Was that a joke? Or do you have two things in your head that you think you almost killed? You have

Erin 33:26
two things, but we're not going to talk about them here, in case she ever wants to hear it. And more importantly, Avery is probably going to want to listen to this, and so she doesn't need to know about these yet.

Scott Benner 33:36
Yeah, we'll just leave the cocaine smoking as a joke for now. Right, right, right. Like so you have in your notes here about effects on your marriage. I'm interested.

Erin 33:47
Yeah, sure. So I'm sure it affects every marriage ours. I feel like we went immediately back into newborn twin phase, where we knew that in order to survive, we had to just split it up. So instead of doing things together, we took turns. And that's a really good strategy, right? But you also get further apart from each other. And you know, he'll be the first to tell you that I'm the one always listening to the podcast in those you know, first few months, I was absorbing everything I could. And it's not that he wasn't. It was just a different kind of information that he was scouring. So I think I felt like I'm the only one who knows what's going on. Or, how do you not know about this yet,

Scott Benner 34:35
this episode in the way you're looking for information? Yeah,

Erin 34:39
why aren't you listening to the podcast, right? Quit going to Reddit.

Scott Benner 34:42
Reddit. Is that what he did? I was gonna say, I'm pretty popular on Reddit, so we don't want to bad mouth them at all. Okay, so you don't know how he looked for information,

Erin 34:54
no, and I but I know he did, because he would bring things to me, and I would say I already knew that. That, right, which is such a crappy

Scott Benner 35:03
way to be. How old are you now?

Erin 35:07
I am 49

Scott Benner 35:09
you're like, oh, dummy, what do you have there? Let me see, I learned that three weeks ago I

Erin 35:17
was being so upset. I mean, and I know that again, that was me. It was my way of coping. Was all right. I just have to get all the information I can and figure this out, and then we'll all be okay, right. Then nothing could go wrong, as long as I know everything. But am

Scott Benner 35:34
I right to say that you guys were like, we all do stuff together, people before this? Yes, yeah. So the four of you were everywhere together, yeah, yeah, and yeah. Do you feel like it made you I mean, did it change? Obviously, it changed things, but it changed things for the worse, the better. Did something noticeable come from

Erin 35:51
it? I think it just was different for a while. So, and it's funny, Avery noticed it, but not until, like, a year in, again, early days, when you're still finger poking all of that. I wanted to be close to her, so we have a guest room right outside of her bedroom. So we would just take turns. Whoever had the overnight shift would sleep in the guest room. Then we realized we really like sleeping apart, because we can actually sleep, right? I'm not hearing snoring. He's not feeling me get up four times to pee, and so it's just become a thing we do. It's not that we're not together, right? But when it's sleepy time, go to your own bed.

Scott Benner 36:30
That's a pretty big shift. Yeah. Do you think it's a positive shift? I think for our sleep It

Erin 36:37
is, yes, but we did realize it started to, like, the girls were picking up on it, and Avery all of a sudden, was like, Wait, are you sleeping down here for me? Oh, and

I was like, Oh.

I said, well, sometimes, you know, like it because I'm also 100% honest with her, like that was within days of diagnosis, you know, she's looking at me like, What the hell are we going to do? I said, I promise to always be honest. That's what I can promise you, we'll figure it out together. And such Are you down here for me? I said in the beginning, yes. Sometimes now still Yes, but it is not

Scott Benner 37:15
it's mostly because Daddy farts Right, right. It turns out, we've been at this a while, and I don't really need to sleep with him anymore. He seems to feel the same way, by the way,

Erin 37:30
we like to be together. We just don't like to sleep together.

Scott Benner 37:33
Yeah, no. I mean, I've heard people say that before, also, like, I don't know, like, are you at that part where you're always hot and you're

Erin 37:41
Yes, yeah, yes, right? So I don't need another, you know, heater in that bed,

Scott Benner 37:46
another heater. Did it impact your together time?

Erin 37:51
I would say diabetes has, but not that, not the overnight, no, right? But I think again, it's, it's this, how much space do you have in your head at the end of the day? Yeah. How many times do you try and then something starts beeping that you're just like, I feel like I'm causing this. You know?

Scott Benner 38:16
Am I making her blood sugar? Great. That powerful. It's hard to start and stop a lot when you're older, too, right, right? He's probably like, it's over.

Erin 38:29
That's just, if anything, and so I never want her to think that, that she caused any of that. It's just, it's time of life. It's all the things that happen to people once they've been married a long time. We're tired, we're all that. So you add this extra worry on top of it, yeah, it just makes things kind of just makes things a little bit more

Scott Benner 38:48
difficult. When she realized you were sleeping in that room for her, did it occur to you to go like, Oh no, that's not why, and then never sleep in there again? Or like, I know you told her the truth, but yeah, we

Erin 38:58
did. I mean, I started laughing, and because she I'll never forget, what did she say, something like, you get you get back up in that marriage bed and act like husband and wife. And I was like,

Scott Benner 39:09
what TV show did you hear? What crappy shows are your kids watching on CBS? Exactly

Erin 39:16
what showed you here that on,

Scott Benner 39:18
honey, I don't want you watching any more tracker or whatever else you're finding on old people television.

Erin 39:25
It probably wasn't that eloquent what you said, but, but

Scott Benner 39:27
it felt like that's what she was saying. That's what it felt like, yeah. And so, of

Erin 39:31
course, I bust out laughing. I'm like, all right. It's like she's noticed, and she thinks it's for her. And so let's, you know, maybe try to sleep together more,

Scott Benner 39:39
yeah. And clearly, now I've been a rough it with this guy because to make the kid feel better. But I mean, she had the same exact response about going to the boyfriend's house, like she doesn't want it to be about her, right? Yeah, she doesn't want any attention drawn to it. She doesn't want to be about her. Is she a person? Is she hiding her pump? Is she like? I'm assuming she wears CGM. It's like, are those things, like out in the open or no,

Erin 40:04
they are not, no, and when we talk about it, so I so interesting how you put these things on your kids and you think, you know how they're going to react to things. When we first got the news, I thought, this is horrible, but she is such an outgoing person. She's going to, like, kind of be the champion of educating people on time about type one, right? No, she immediately she had two teachers and a nurse in fourth grade that she would talk to about it. She would not talk about it with any of her friends. Same in fifth grade, sixth grade, I think she's told three people and had actual conversations about it. When I asked her about it, she, she's like, it's not that I'm hiding it, I just don't want to explain it. And I get that, I think it's probably, you know, as her mom, like, it's probably a little of all of it, you know, she, she'll be in certain situations where she doesn't care if anybody sees it. She's definitely strategically putting things places based on seasons, short sleeve shirt, Dexcom, suddenly she doesn't want on her arms, things like that, right? But I think that's so normal, right? 12 is hard. Middle school sucks.

Scott Benner 41:19
Yeah? I mean, I don't, I don't see like it. I think it's personal, but, like, you know, person to person. But I don't think it's weird if you don't want anybody to say it, yeah, not at all. I also don't think it's weird if you slap it on your forehead and you're like, I don't care who sees it. Like, I don't think about I don't watch Arden hide it at all. But she is also not looking to talk to you about diabetes, sure. So, yeah, if somebody took that as an opening, I mean, she'd be like, if you just, if you didn't know art, and you, like, rolled up on her and at some store, and you're like, oh my god, on the pot, I have that too. And she'd be like, Oh yeah, diabetes, right? And then that's it. We're gonna keep doing this, or is it over now? Like, no, I think she'd be incredibly polite. I don't think she'd be turned off by it at all. But I mean, if you're looking for her to like, like, say, hey, let's find a seat and sit down. I really want to chop it up about this. I don't think she's that person, not that person, yeah, yeah, it's pretty much, you know. And I know people who are, and I don't think either is odd. Yeah, I get that. You know, you pointed out too like it's a real that's a precarious age.

Erin 42:27
Yeah, your bangs are too long or too short, and you feel like you can't go to school. So I can't imagine what she feels like. I mean, I think, I think she's only, she's still only one of three in this huge Middle School,

Scott Benner 42:39
all right. So I feel like your example about your bangs was from personal experience, not it's not a thing. You were

Erin 42:46
making a lie. These two girls going through middle schools bringing back some serious PTSD, right?

Scott Benner 42:53
Ma, I can't go anywhere. It'll grow back in three weeks. Until then, I sit here. Okay,

Erin 43:00
I need a black sweatshirt tomorrow or life is over. You know, like, yes. I remember those feelings like, okay, just get through it. I

Scott Benner 43:10
also need eyeliner and I need a hoodie. I just, I need to explain me to cover myself and just wander through life. Yes, yes. That's interesting. I wonder what makes people feel that way, like that, self consciousness at certain ages, specifically. You

Erin 43:23
know, do you feel like Arden never went through that in middle school? A cover up time. No cover up not, not of diabetes, just like in general, of like, I'm figuring myself out, and everything's embarrassing, and,

Scott Benner 43:36
I mean, she'll talk about it in hindsight, but I never noticed that. Like, she's always like, I mean, I think sometimes Arden's artistic expression is her clothing. So I think she's always like, putting outfits together. And, like, there's not a day that goes by that somebody doesn't pull her aside and say, That looks awesome. Like, where'd you get that? Or, how did you put those two things together? Like, she just, like, she rolls through life like that, but she also doesn't want the she doesn't want any of it. She told me the other day, I don't know if I'm allowed to tell you this, let me You mean, like, the attention, yeah, she's not attention seeking. She just likes clothing.

Erin 44:17
I'm not doing this for you. I'm doing it for me. This

Scott Benner 44:19
is not for you. I just, I mean, like, look at these pants. Look how awesome they are. So she was walking across campus the recently, and she said she got cat called by the lacrosse team. And she said, like, they didn't she's like, I kept walking, and they didn't stop, and they didn't stop. So then it's such a funny story, because she's like, I said, what'd you do? She goes, I just gave him like the finger. And then they and I was like, did that stop him? She goes, No. And I was like, I didn't imagine it would. And, you know, like, they're like, come on. Like, you know, they they're doing that. She's, you know, the whole thing. And she said, she just kept walking. And she This is such a crazy story, like, she's seeing a boy now, and she just kept walking. And she's like, I looked up. I was busy giving them the finger, not looking where I was going. She goes, which is my mistake. I almost walked into somebody, and she's like, I pulled myself down. I looked up, and I said, I'm sorry. And she goes, it's my boyfriend. Oh my god, I almost, like, ran right through him, you know, like, out on the on a sidewalk, and then he just goes, Hey, who you giving the finger to? Because he didn't get to see any of the like, the preamble to it. But I think somewhere in that story is Arden, like, you know, she's not going to change how she dresses. And she wasn't like, I want to be clear, like, she wasn't like, uncovered or anything like that, you know, and if she was, it'd be up to her. But it wasn't the case. She's just, you know, she's a pretty girl walking somewhere, and they started talking, and, like, it got louder and louder, and then, you know, it took over, like they, you know, kind of, it turned into a pack of guys. And it's so funny, because she says to me, this will definitely get me in trouble for sharing this. So why not Aaron? She's she's telling me the story, and like, she looks to me for like response. And I go, were they, like, nice about it? Like it was, it wasn't, was it crude? And she goes, Why does that matter? And I'm like, I don't know. I'm a boy. I feel like it kind of matters, like, if it was like, crude, then like, I don't like that. I was like, but were they just yelling, hey? Like, and she's like, it doesn't matter. And I was like, by the way, I also know it doesn't matter. I was just trying to get the lay of the land. Like, what, like, were the people aggressively being

Erin 46:29
intensity of the situation?

Scott Benner 46:31
Yes, you know, intention is important sometimes. And did she care? I don't even know if I asked her now, like, Did it bother you? I don't even know what the answer would be to that, like, I just know that she just, she wasn't looking for the attention. That's all. Anyway, are the girls the same, or they very are they dissimilar?

Erin 46:49
They're very different, especially as they've gotten older. And you know one thing, the first question I usually get, you know, is, like, did we do trial net for for Hadley, and it's, it's funny. So Hadley, strangely, is my hypochondriac for no reason. She's never had anything horrible happen to her. She was like this before April was diagnosed, but that definitely hasn't helped anything. So I had, I think it was when I went to, I did go to a touch by type one conference a couple years back, and so I signed up for the package there. Totally forgot about it. Had a sitter. I'm sure she was the type one still. And when we got back that night, the sitter was like, I'm so sorry. Hadley intercepted a package and she saw her name on it and she opened it. I'm like, Oh crap. And at least she's like, I'm not doing that. She's like, I don't want to know. There's no reason to know if it happens. It happens. And so we threw the box away.

Scott Benner 47:48
Trial that right now is like, so hard. It's so hard to get people I'm also

Erin 47:53
pretty sure it would have been like, past the expiration date by the time we actually threw the box

Scott Benner 47:58
away. No, no. I mean, it's such a hard thing to get people to do, like, you send a lot of those boxes out and don't get them back. Yeah, not uncommon.

Erin 48:06
So I know I just, and again, it was an age thing. Had she been younger, I may have forced it. But, like, why already said she had a choice, so I'm gonna give her that choice. And and I, you know, I think there's some validity to that. I always see both sides. But you know, what is she going to do with the information and for her personality? Knowing isn't going to make it

Scott Benner 48:29
better again, I'll say that. I think this is a very specific thing, person to person. There are people who want to know, there are people who need to know, and there are people who would do better not knowing. Right? You know? So if that's who she is and that's who she is, that's who she is, yeah, yeah. You know, you said something earlier that I wanted to make the title, and I should have said it out loud so Rob would have heard it. Something about honesty. Did you have a saying about honesty,

Erin 48:54
or just that I'll always be honest with her? No,

Scott Benner 48:57
you said it like, in a really musical way. And I was like, oh, that's the title anyway. I guess I could figure it out on

Erin 49:05
my own, but you have no idea. I'll try to say something

Scott Benner 49:07
else, pretty great. You have no idea how much of a problem this is like coming up with the titles. Yeah, it's not easy. First of all, and when I'm

Erin 49:17
sure you have to feel like you have to top yourself each time.

Scott Benner 49:20
Listen, I got on, if you saw on, I was online this morning. I was pretty pissed. I put out an episode called Canadian danger phallus, and I was so proud of that title, and nobody really came back and talked to me about it. I was like, oh,

Erin 49:36
wasted

Scott Benner 49:38
someone to reach out about this. Like, it's a great episode about a Canadian couple, which I think is inferred in the in the title, and the husband a lot of times, if he had sex with people, they get sick. Oh, my God, it had nothing to do with anything.

Erin 49:52
But what do you mean? They'd get

Scott Benner 49:53
sick people he had been intimate with were getting like, diabetes, or like, yeah, yeah. Like, I. I think he was married to a girl who got type one. And then, if I'm remembering it right, then they got divorced, and they married the girl I was talking to, and she got type or the kid. And I'm like, I don't know. Like, I just in the middle of it. I was like, Do you think his penis is to blame? And she's like, I It's so then that's when we came up with the, she said the I've thought of that already. And I was like, of course you have. I called the episode Canadian danger phallus, and I came up with this great, like, graphic for it. It's like a frozen tree that's vaguely in the size,

Erin 50:27
ah, it's wonderful. I'll try to go look for it. Well, I

Scott Benner 50:31
mean, I work hard at that. Here's what ends up happening. It's like, you and I will record together, and then this episode will go over to Rob like it goes magically across the country digitally. You know, people don't think about stuff like that anymore. Like, of course it does, yes, God, I know how email works. But like, you know, it literally goes, like, completely across the country where Rob listens to it. He puts a bunch of processes on it. He does what he does. And in the end, the thing he does for me, that is a huge favor, is he listens for me to say that should be the title, because you'd think I could write it down, but my brain doesn't work that way. So like, and when we get to the end of this, we've tried all different kinds of things, like, we'll get to the end like you and I will say goodbye. And then we used to do this thing where I'd sit down and go, Okay, Aaron is the mother of two. They're fraternal twins, and I do like a little talk up to like, kind of encapsulate what we talked about, like you and I, but the truth is, is I can't remember. It's you talk tell your kid, talk about being embarrassed. I'm in here by myself, and eight seconds after I finished the recording, I can't remember what I just spoke about. Okay, so anyway, it's very important that when I hear the title, I go, Oh, that's a good title, because that's how we actually remember what it's letting you in on a couple secrets about how the podcast is made. I am interested. How long has it been since your daughter was like, are you sleeping down here because of May?

Erin 52:04
Oh, that was a good what, two years ago? Oh, that was in the very beginning. It was in the beginning. Yes, yes. You're very fascinated with that one part.

Scott Benner 52:13
Oh, it's all. You don't think it's crazy. You don't think, like, I mean, listen, do you live at Westminster Abbey? Like, how big is the house? It's not, well, then that's my point.

Erin 52:23
But we're on a different floor, like, our rooms on a different floor, so it's just a little more obvious. Yeah, there's stairs in between.

Scott Benner 52:30
You're like, I'm too old to walk up and down stairs in the middle of the night. Frankly, it was

Erin 52:34
when, so, especially before we before we could have the app on her phone for Omnipod five. Oh, yeah, the separate controller. So we're, you know, we've set it up. Okay, okay, okay, in the beginning, you know, we're like, whoever's on duty, yeah, I could dose her from bed. So if you're on duty, why do we both have to keep waking up?

Scott Benner 52:52
I see where'd you have Ray one saying, and it's still there,

Erin 52:55
yeah? Since diagnosis, so she was over 14, and I think in the ER, she was like, I think it just spread, you know, greater than whatever their meter was. But within the first month, she was down in the sevens, and now she's been in the sixes the whole time. Okay,

Scott Benner 53:16
and so you are very proactive with insulin. We

Erin 53:20
are very proactive. Yes. Is that my fault? It's totally your fault.

Scott Benner 53:25
Sleep in that bed. Yes, yes, yeah. People who don't listen to the podcast and be like, she'll be all right.

Erin 53:30
They're like, I don't know. I think 300 overnight is safer, so good night's

Scott Benner 53:35
sleep. It'll be fine. I'll wake up in the morning. We'll talk about it then. Okay, so you learned about you were learning, and she's growing, and she hits that and, yeah, she's popping up overnight. And you're like, I can't let her stay like this, right? Okay,

Erin 53:49
yeah, no. So finding you, I mean, I found the podcast in the hospital and then started just binge listening. And thankfully, it was the time you you already had some playlists out, right? So you already had bold beginnings. Whatever the new Yeah, bold beginnings. What's the other one? Pro Tip series? Those were already kind of compiled. So I have very distinct memories of power washing the front deck, just

Scott Benner 54:13
listening. Oh, and it actually helped you.

Erin 54:16
It did. It did absolutely, you know, and I'm, I'm sure I said it in my note. I'm sure 1000 out of 1500 people have told you that you know, you just don't get a lot of information. You only see your endo every three months, and they, all they do is say, Do you have any questions? They're not asking you or telling you and saying they don't have a plan for Okay, next time you come in, we'll talk about this strategy. Yeah, it's never like that. And maybe it's not like that for us, because we have her in the sixes, and they have all their other patients are in the 10s, I don't know, but they're kind of like, oh, you seem to know what you're doing. So our job here is done. I feel

Scott Benner 54:53
like if I ever met a billionaire, I'd be like, Oh, this is my chance to find out how to make a billion dollars. And if I looked at. And said, Do you mind if we talk about how to make a billion dollars? And he said, Sure. Do you have any questions? I'd be like, Listen, you prick. If I if I knew what to ask you, I'd be doing it already. Exactly. It's such a backwards way to approach people. Yes, yeah. So,

Erin 55:16
yeah. So obviously, we've learned everything I have. Scott's learning it from Reddit, apparently. So yes, we're definitely bold with the insulin. I even, I mean, I credit the podcast for learning. Just do a reset when Omnipod five wasn't quite doing what we needed it to do. So our settings must have been off in the beginning. And I'm like, Well, I'm just going to do some math on my own, let me look at some data and decide where we think we should be and give it a shot. And I don't think I would have done that without hearing enough stories of other people who just kind of took control, and they're fine. You know, I

Scott Benner 55:54
agree. I think being able to make an adjustment to your insulin is maybe the most paramount thing that that someone could learn if they have type one, especially over time. Yeah, I think that people who struggle into their adulthood, that's their common thread. They said, somebody told them, like, come back in three months and we'll look at it again. And they never thought about it, and they didn't look at changing their insulin. I saw a person the other day, they started taking a like, something for anxiety, and they're like, I'm low all the time now. Is your anxiety gone from the medication? They're like, Yeah, I'm like, maybe you just don't need as much insulin anymore, because you're not a nervous wreck, right? Maybe that's it. And they were like, Oh, it's so interesting that that's not like a thing that would occur to them. But then it's also not surprising that it doesn't occur to them. You know, you have to have, like, autonomy about changing your insulin. It's got to be in it's got to be in your mind. You know that, like, Oh, I'm having trouble. I should see if my settings are, are the issue. It's always your settings. It's your settings, it's timing and amount. I don't know how many times

Erin 56:58
I have to say this. I know. I know I it, then I think what I appreciate about the simplicity of the way you describe things too, is it makes it easier to describe it to Avery makes it really accessible for her. So that's all we have to say. Now, right? You know, she's like, Oh, I'm, you know, I'm going high. Whoa. It was state testing. She said, Look, I know I'm gonna go high. It's gonna be adrenaline. I don't want to hear from you. Just let me get through the test. And I was like, Well, you know, adrenaline still needs insulin. She's like, I know,

Scott Benner 57:33
instead of just accepting it, what if we just used more before? Let's just use

Erin 57:37
more even last night, we were having a failed pump. Didn't realize it at the time, and she's just we attributed it to a mistimed and calculated, gigantic snack. I asked her, you know we were I was telling her to correct and when I went and looked at her pump later in the night, when she's like, look, this isn't working. We have to change it. And she's coming to me, right? She's like, I can tell this is not going to

Scott Benner 58:01
work, by the way, when they're telling you, right, it's really not working right, because they trust me, they've tried everything they could to keep that pup on.

Erin 58:10
Yes, exactly. And she had been dose, she'd been Bolus, seen, trying to get it down before, I think, trying to pre empt me from being like, Dude, we gotta change the spot. She's like, I don't want to, so let's just keep and I was like, Oh, that. So see, that could be dangerous, right? 12 year old mind, but I'm looking, I'm like, she has given herself like, 10 unit past two hours trying to get this down.

Scott Benner 58:35
Yeah, no, I last night. Arden changed a pump. I thought too late, but, you know? And so she had a little bit of, like, a sticky high there for a while afterwards. She's like, she was like, 220 and then she got hungry again. I was like, Listen, you gotta break this number before you, before you eat again, you know? And she's like, I got it. And I said, I think you should just, I said, Can I give you a piece of advice? And she goes, Sure. She didn't say sure. She looks

Erin 59:01
at me like, Sure. That's a lie. She didn't say I was asked. I was hoping, you

Scott Benner 59:05
know, I want to be clear. She looked at me like, why don't you drop dead? And but she was listening. I just the the being accepting of the advice is what I translated into, sure, by the way. And I said, you know, I mean, she's using trio, but I'm like, I think you got to use a Temp Basal here, it's a new pod. The algorithms behind it thinks it gave you insulin. It's not going to push your basal, even if you make a big Bolus here, it's not going to move. The Bolus is going to replace the basal and the and it's going to get eaten up by the high blood sugar. And she's like, all right, fine, I'll do it. I was like, awesome. Did she do it? She did, and it worked, of course. Because, I mean, I'm the guy from the podcast, and I know what I'm talking about, but like, how frustrating that must be for her, and I think that for your kids too. Like, you know, all your kids are in the same situation, like you're the one who's like, you know, if you know what you're doing is making suggestions, and they're working, and they're trying really desperately to be good at it. Yeah. Yeah, you know, so you stepping in and being right. Sometimes it's upsetting.

Erin 1:00:04
It is. Yeah, it definitely is. And so that's that's a good story too, because I probably talked about school nurses and the transition we've gone from there, so like, fourth and fifth grade, elementary school here, amazing nurses, and really, one on one with her and me, right? Like, I became text friends with these nurses, and we're celebrating her, a one, CS together and all that jazz. Get to middle school, Avery. And we asked Avery, we brought her into the meeting. We're like, what do you want? Like, how do you want middle school to go? And she said, I never want to see the nurse. Meaning, like, I hope to be so successful, I never become friends with you, sure. And I was, Oh, God, I've never been so proud of my life. But you can tell that the nurses were a little taken aback, right? Like, ooh, but she's our responsibility. I was like, No, she's our responsibility, and you're helping, so don't worry. You know you're not in trouble. We're always watching her. I can't help but watch for her. We have a situation where she keeps her alarms off, just because that's how we started, and now we just have kind of been like, we'll text you if you need to do something. Now, it's not to say she doesn't watch herself. She can't help herself either. Look at her number throughout the day, but that's just kind of this thing that we need to probably start working on, especially when she wants to be

Scott Benner 1:01:26
alone. Aaron, I hear, I can't help myself. I hear red hair. I hear Ireland. I hear Catholic guilt. I hear Catholic guilt. Did you find a way to pass that on to a kid?

Erin 1:01:37
Yeah? Oh yes, yes, so,

Scott Benner 1:01:41
but not the other one. Let's finish this. No, only the one. You're like, let's finish this story first. Okay, good. Yeah,

Erin 1:01:48
different story. So, nurses, we have a texting thing. We came up in our five before. We're like, look, we will be in direct communication with Avery. We will text you nurses when we've asked her to do something, or if she's not responding to us and we need you to go grab her, that was the agreement. It has worked out pretty well, except for currently, Avery is just kind of going through a I can't be bothered to push two buttons. So the lunch Bolus is not always going through. We are not making a huge deal out of it. She always gets it later. I of course, it hurts me every lunch to see this blood sugar shoot up when you know it doesn't have to, but the nurses, it's really starting to bother so we're so it's like clockwork every day at school, 12 O'Clock Pre Bolus. Yes, I did it. Hour later, blood sugar starts going up. Did Avery Bolus? Has Avery made a correction? And we're like, yes, yes, yes. I'm like, it is going to be this way every day, unless we punish her for not pre bolusing. And I'm not doing that to her. We are about balance right now. This is her time where I'm not I'm just not gonna picking my battles. Picking my

Scott Benner 1:03:00
battles. Have you asked her directly about it? Oh yes, yes. What's the answer?

Erin 1:03:05
It is, I thought I did it to and she's again, she's such a good kid. She answered me honestly. I was rushing out to recess. I thought I hit it. I didn't want to. I was busy with my friends. Don't worry about it. I'll get it when I come in. You know, it's been all the answers

Scott Benner 1:03:23
I understand. I'll just listen if I if I'm starting to die, I'll put it in exercise mode. Don't you worry, right? Exactly. I got this all worked out. Lady, okay, I've got the internet. I don't know if you're wearing this tonight. You're old. You probably don't understand it as well as I do. Actually, you are a little, excuse me, old for their age, aren't you? I am, yeah. Is there a wider generation gap there? Is Right? Yeah. I mean, I couldn't manage a 12 year old right now. I'd be like, Listen, you little idiot. See all the things you people think on the on the tick tock, and you're moron. That doesn't happen when you're when you're younger, and young

Erin 1:03:57
kids? Yeah, no, I'd like to, I think I I'd like to I think they talked to me a lot, so I like to think I'm kind of current with how they

Scott Benner 1:04:07
would respond. How you like to think, Aaron,

Erin 1:04:11
I like to think it,

Scott Benner 1:04:12
oh, my God. The other day, Cole goes, You know what dad's dad would have done? Because somebody was like, Oh, that really hurts again. I've said before, like, my dad would just hit you and go somewhere else and be like, I'm like, this hurts. They hit you somewhere else. You'd be like, do you still feel it? I'd be like, No, actually, I feel this down. Like, hey, it's all fixed. But anyway, that's 1970s a lot of you didn't live through it, you know. Like, I wonder, like, how many generations away from how you think until I hear what you're saying, and I don't disagree with you. Like she's having a moment, right? And you don't want to cause, you don't want to cause a problem, but at the same time, like there's got to be an end date to this, right? Like you can't, how long has it been going on?

Erin 1:04:53
It's just been this year. Oh, and then, not even only, she goes in waves too. Okay? One endo appointment. She she had us like it was a 6.4 and she goes, I want to get in the fives. I was like, All right, I can help you get there. Like it's a lot of work, and you're gonna have to pay attention. And guess what, you're gonna have to pre bull school lunch. Oh, all right.

Scott Benner 1:05:18
It's such an interesting thing like that. One issue is so interesting.

Erin 1:05:23
Just that one and I'm like, and you're with your friend, where you she knows all you're doing is pushing a button. You're not like, pulling out a vial and a needle, and you're pushing a button on your phone, and everyone has them. I'm so confused. Nobody's even looking at you. No one's even looking but I think it's a mess again. Girl thing I just feel for I think it is just, I just don't want to think about it for a hot minute. This is my time. And so I being raised Catholic, as you've already picked up on, and my mom and I have in a very different relationship than I have with my girls. You know? I'm like, Ah, this is where my mom would have pushed me, and it would have made it worse. Is there not a middle? The middle? Is time the middle is growing up?

Scott Benner 1:06:08
Well, I don't know how much time you have allotted for this, but I'll just tell you that you're describing a relationship I have with my daughter, and she's 21 I'm going to say at least nine more years. I just think, I think it's people. I just think your daughter matured a little faster, yeah, yeah. And she's, she's just asserting herself and where she can. She's finding control, where control is available. And this is a good one, because it's not a thing she wants to do anyway. It's not a thing that she caused. It's not, it's a thing you're involved in. It's a thing she doesn't want to do. Like, this is a great thing to ignore, right?

Erin 1:06:45
But she, but she only ignores it every you know, she only ignores it at very certain times. And I think that's why, and that's that's when you're only having these very short text conversations with a school nurse. You know their hearts in the right place. But I'm like, Look, this is going to happen every day. We don't have to keep texting about it.

Scott Benner 1:07:03
Yeah, well, they do, because they're, they're thinking of it differently than you are

Erin 1:07:07
so but I'm thinking, I'm thinking, next year in the 504 we take them off follow, okay, and we just say we will text you if we need you to get her,

Scott Benner 1:07:19
why don't you leave them on follow for low alarms and not high alarms. That's a really good idea, too. Thank you. Thank you. You don't have to thank me.

Erin 1:07:29
What you think I'm not always watching and won't text him anyway if she's

Scott Benner 1:07:32
getting low. Well, let's get to that arm. Because first of all, like, the thing,

Erin 1:07:35
where do I have school nurses looking if I'm already managing?

Scott Benner 1:07:38
No, why are you looking so like, I mean, what is it you're trying to save her from by not having her be aware of the alarms? Embarrassment? Okay? Would you be embarrassed by no no when you were a kid? Would you have been probably okay. So is she embarrassed? Or are you preemptively trying for not to be embarrassed?

Erin 1:07:59
She's embarrassed. Okay? Because I've even, we've talked about, like, Okay, you want to do these things. We need to put your alarms on too. You want more freedom than and you don't want a grown up with you. You need to have your alarms on. And she's like, Oh, I don't want that thing beeping when I'm with a group of friends. Like, Well, what about vibrating? Right? Like, yeah.

Scott Benner 1:08:24
I mean, listen, tell her I've got a list of things I don't want to happen that happen every day. I know your idea is you're trying to get her to it slowly, exactly. Yeah. Do you think it's working? I do. Okay. Am I Joking aside? How many years until you think you've got her

Erin 1:08:39
there? I think by high school? We're Oh, wait, wait, wait. Do you mean how long are like, we gonna be good together, or no? How long until she's managing on her own, listening to alerts and such? How

Scott Benner 1:08:51
long do you think until you that's a good question. How long do you think until she's like, All right, yeah, I need to do this. So, like, let's turn the alarms on eighth

Erin 1:08:59
grade. I can already see it happening this summer. Okay, honestly, because she's she's wanting to do things where another adult won't be present, and she knows that that that's going to be the rule, and she wants it so badly that she'll be like, All right, fine. Well,

Scott Benner 1:09:14
this is one of the benefits of you being an older parent, too. I think there's a lot of wisdom in what you're doing. I hope so. Yeah, I don't think you would have come up with this when this when you were 28 probably not 28 but

Erin 1:09:25
God, some days you still think like I don't. I could still be totally screwing this up. I don't know. Oh no,

Scott Benner 1:09:30
you are. But I just thought not, don't we're all I just went over this the other day in the podcast. Everyone's screwing everything up all the time. Everyone wants the opposite of what they get. You're in a losing battle. Let's get past that. Okay, let's get past it. Remember all the things your mom did wrong? Yeah, she thought she was doing everything

Erin 1:09:48
right. I'm just doing different things wrong. Yes,

Scott Benner 1:09:50
yes, no, and you're not doing anything wrong. My point is, is that no matter what you do for another person, they want the opposite? Yeah, I don't know why. And girls, I'll just go out and let. And say this girl's a little extra so, like, I'm seriously. I mean, no, I 100% agree. Yeah, yeah, Listen, ladies. I mean, I've never seen a group of humans that just want whatever it is. They don't have more than you, okay. But like, also, I think that is part of like, I think it fixes guys. Like, like, when men and women get together. And men are just like, Yo, we could just keep having sex and watching these movies. And you're like, what if we had a sofa that didn't smell? And like, you know what I mean? Like, Oh, she got me focused on this making money for a sofa thing. And that's very valuable. Like, for, listen, I'm speaking for my wife at this point, right? Like, my wife was like, I want this. Like, I want us to be here. It's not even, I don't mean a physical material thing. I want us to be here. And she'd get me there, and then she'd be like, All right, well, I've set some new goals for it. And I'd be like, what where do you remember that time we had sex in the shower and you were in college, like, Can we do that again? Or is that how you tricked me into making sure the sofa didn't smell? I don't know what's happening, but she's very good at improving our situation constantly, or improving for the kids, or improving for anything. Like, I think it's baked into you guys. Like, seriously, I don't know a lot about anything, but like, it feels like that. I also think it gets misused sometimes. That's another podcast. We're not going to talk about that here. But like, Do you know what I'm saying, like, you're like, it's hard and and you you give things to people that you're like, I know this is what you need, because I have experience, and I know that this would help you. And no matter what you give, they're gonna say, that's not you don't know me. That's not what I need. You can't win. Like, there's no winning. If I gave you 1000 babies, this would happen with every one of them. Please don't do that. No, no, no, except for the one where it didn't. And then you'd be like, Oh my God, this one is awesome. And then I'd interview that 125 years later, and she would say, actually, she was doing everything wrong. I just, I'm such a people pleaser, like I didn't want to, I didn't want to tell her, anyway, we don't belong together, is what I'm saying, which you figured out when you got in that bed, you were like, this is way better. Can I ask? I know I've gone back to it six times, but did it ever hurt your feelings? Like when he felt that way? Like, I know when you were like, this is way better. I don't have to hear him snore. But when he agreed, were you? Like, how come he thinks that? No, no,

Erin 1:12:24
because we also both go through this when we're like, God, I really miss you. You know, it's nice. It's there's no rift in this

Scott Benner 1:12:32
marriage. I'm not saying I don't smell that. Yeah,

Erin 1:12:36
it's just that isn't where our connection really comes from. So we're both just very and maybe it's second marriage stuff too, and you just know yourself better. This has no significance to the big picture here.

Scott Benner 1:12:49
Yeah, no, again. I think it's a value just really, like our sleep. I think it's another value of you being an older parent and, and, yeah, actually, like, you know, I'm not advocating for you all getting divorced, but the truth is, if you got married and then got divorced four or five years later and they did it, later and then did it again, it would

Erin 1:13:04
probably go way better the second time. Ah, hell, we're not planning on that. No,

Scott Benner 1:13:08
no, I didn't mean you guys. I met everyone listening. Like, yeah, you guys have already been married. You

Erin 1:13:12
had, I see what you're saying, yes, yeah, it's gonna go better the second time, most likely, yeah, unless, and if not, you're really bad at

Scott Benner 1:13:19
this. You're just a glutton, like, he just reached back out and, like, I got the same guy again. This one I definitely can fix.

Erin 1:13:30
It's gonna be different. This story

Scott Benner 1:13:32
really. Well, no, oh, I'll write back to the same thing. Sorry. I want to say to you, like, right before we started, you were like, I have a great Catholic story. But like, do you want to tell it here at the end?

Erin 1:13:41
Sure, sure. Okay, so Hadley, my non type one. She comes home the other day telling us about this, and actually, we got a we got a notice from the school. There had been an incident at school. Some kid ran after a ball into the street, kind of got clipped by the side mirror of a car. Kids, okay, from all I can tell, Hadley comes home, and Hadley is the first to be like, are we done with dinner yet? Because I got stuff to do, right? So she's antsy. She's like, can I clear the table yet? Can I clear this table yet? She's hanging out long and like, she'd stand up and then she'd sit back down. It's almost like she's waiting for Avery to leave. So Avery leaves eventually, and Hadley goes, I gotta tell you something, that kid who got hit, I think I caused it. Whoa, what? And she goes, yeah, so he's the guy who's been picking on my friend that I told you about, and I wished that something bad would happen to him, and so I'm pretty sure I caused this. And I was like, whoa, whoa, whoa. I'm like, that's not how these things work. And then she goes, Yeah, it kind of reminded me of the time that some other kid was saying something about God, like you don't believe in God, or she goes, I am God. And then Avery got diabetes, so I'm pretty sure I offended God, and that's what happened. And then you guys stopped

Scott Benner 1:14:57
going to church because you realized it was screwing up your.

Erin 1:15:00
Hands because I was like, Wow, do you have this Catholic guilt, and I didn't even raise you Catholic. What's happening here?

Scott Benner 1:15:08
It's in the either of them, redheads.

Erin 1:15:11
No, they both. I got the complexions I wanted for both of them. They're both dark hair, dark skin, lovely. All worked out the way I expected. That's right, they don't need as much sunscreen as I do. I am

Scott Benner 1:15:23
saving a ton of money on sunscreen right now. So she thought she had those magical thinking ideas. She thought,

Erin 1:15:30
yeah, yeah. She thought I and so we had a good talk about it, and then she's like, I mean, I know, I didn't, you know, but the fact that she hung out, she wanted to talk about this, it did worry her a bit.

Scott Benner 1:15:41
Yeah, I thought you were gonna say she actually did something like two. Because, no, I know, I know how you just said no, except in 1976 in kindergarten, I think we tripped a kid on the monkey bars and he fell and hit his head. Oh, but not on purpose, like we weren't trying to make him fall. Sure. Listen, I am 53 is one of my enduring memories, that some kid fell off the monkey bars, and I feel like the group of people I was with was somehow, somehow involved in it, yeah, oh, I can't shake it. So it must have

Erin 1:16:10
happened anyway, or you just have some Catholic guilt.

Scott Benner 1:16:13
I mean, I definitely don't have that. I made 1,000,000% I don't have that. I don't really have guilt about anything, as you know, has been shown six or seven times during this last hour, and I've said things I definitely shouldn't be recording. So I don't care. I just, I like having the conversations. I think this is how you have conversations. Yeah, you know, is there anything we haven't talked about that we should have?

Erin 1:16:39
No, I think we've, we've gone all over the place, and, you know, the the one thing I actually almost canceled a few times, and Avery asked me why, and I was like, because I feel like this is your story, not my story, and I just, and I just really want to do it justice, and I don't feel like I did, like, I feel like we just kind of touched on A couple things. But, you know, like her whole diagnosis story, there was a there was a lot to that, and then I'm realizing it's not that important for this podcast that I share all

Scott Benner 1:17:09
of that, right? If you want to dig deep in that and record that, I guarantee you no one's going to listen to it first of all, exactly, right? I think you'd listen back to it and you realize, oh, I could just go to therapy if I want

Erin 1:17:21
that, right? And, you know, there's those pieces that, yeah, it's, it's our story, and it can just be our story. The world doesn't need to know it.

Scott Benner 1:17:31
I think it's more fun like this, and I think it's more helpful this way, like, I mean, you've shared a lot of things that people will be helped by. I know it's hard to like imagine that in the moment, but I've gotten a time back in my life because Rob is doing all the editing now, which has been like a blessing. And that's not a word I even use, but trust me, it has been, and one of the things that's given back to me is the opportunity to listen to the podcast. So what happens is, like, you know, you and I have this conversation again. Like, I can't really, like, you guys can all out there Listen, try it right now. When the podcast ends, stop and try to talk two minutes to yourself and tell yourself what the podcast is about. You're gonna miss most of it, right? And yet, I know that everything works out because of the response I get from the listeners. And the one thing I used to do that I lost track of was I used to listen to the show once in a while, and, like, after it was done, to hear what you guys are hearing, and I wasn't able to do that anymore. I'd gotten so busy that I just couldn't accomplish it. And lately I've been, like, making sure to listen to an episode or two a week. And I usually kind of let, I mean, I don't want to give away all the secrets, but like, I usually just let Isabelle Tell me. She's like, she'll be like, re listen to this one, like, and I'm like, Okay. Or sometimes I, like, I listened to today's episode last night, like, before I went to bed, it's called rub some dirt on it. It was really good. Like, she did such a great job. I found myself, thank God. I hope people hear this, you know, so this will be the same thing. I have a vibe. I may be not able to like articulate it right now, but this went really well. It's going to help a lot of

Erin 1:19:07
people. I hope it does. And you just reminded me that, truthfully, all the episodes I've listened to, what did I really get from them? A couple of snippets, and just like, Oh, someone else out there is going through this too.

Scott Benner 1:19:20
Yeah, you get community out of it, and it's really valuable. And listen to

Erin 1:19:24
God, Oh, I was gonna tell you I just texted Avery to that. Scott Benner says to Pre Bolus,

Scott Benner 1:19:30
awesome. We'll see if that works. Let her hate me. Yeah, I don't mind, by the way. I'm used to it. I'm accustomed to

Erin 1:19:38
everybody not liking me. Well, she wants to come on, so I'll figure that out. Yeah,

Scott Benner 1:19:42
she wants to do it like this summer. She can jump on and do it. Yeah? Is she gonna talk?

Erin 1:19:47
Oh yeah. She said, when I said I'm gonna cancel, she goes, I'll do

Scott Benner 1:19:51
it. Oh, awesome. Yeah, get her on here. I'll let her talk you for an hour. That'll be

Erin 1:19:55
awesome. She's like, I need to tell my side of the story. Okay, did

Scott Benner 1:19:59
she tell you that story? Worry about how she threw my dad out of the bedroom.

She put that weirdo in charge of babysitting me because she had diabetes,

Erin 1:20:14
just like but now she lets me stay home alone. It's amazing.

Scott Benner 1:20:17
Yeah, much better. Oh, well, I still listen. If you want to tell her anything, tell her I still want her traveling with a Juicebox. I don't care. Yeah, I don't care if there's one in the house or not. Like, I don't want you, like, in a panic looking for it in his house or, great. I don't want something happening in the car on the way over. By the way, you guys all have already

Erin 1:20:35
had it in the car. And that did happen. Actually, she started to drop a little, and she goes, Man, guess I'm glad this Gatorade is here. I swear

Scott Benner 1:20:43
to God. Were you able not to say anything because I'm not good enough of a person? I would have been like, We both laughed. We both laughed 1112, I wouldn't have cared. I've been like, hey, look what just happened you. I told you, I win.

Erin 1:21:00
She and that's the thing she knows. She knows. She just wants to, you know, be in charge of it, but she should. That's why I'm doing it the way I'm doing it, because she needs to take it over and want to own it. So listen, I

Scott Benner 1:21:13
don't, I don't want to give away all the secrets here, but I gotta tell you, that's what today's episode is about. It's about the honesty and your level, I think of emotional intelligence. That really is what I think you shared today, if I'm being honest, like that's what I think this is about. So you might not see it that way, but I really think you, being an older parent has been really valuable. A lot of your insights were valuable too

Erin 1:21:36
All right. Well, hopefully I won't die too soon. Then keep her Oh, I see what you're saying, because I'm an older parent. Oh, hold on, 56 Oh, you'll be because I also promised her day two, she's like, What if I can't afford insulin? I was like, you never have to worry about that. I'll always make sure you have insulin.

Scott Benner 1:21:54
And I'm like, oh, one day I will be dead, yeah. How are you gonna make sure that I don't know, I don't know. Do you have, like, a million dollars in the bank or anything? No, well, what are you doing on this podcast? Go make some

Erin 1:22:04
money. I know I better. I'm sure work is like, where? Why isn't she answering our team's messages like

Scott Benner 1:22:10
she said, By the way, the COVID thing, it helped me so much make the podcast. People used to be like, well, I need to do it exactly this time. Now. People are like, Oh, whenever it's fine. I'm like, like, you guys don't work at all anymore. Do you My God? All right. Well, thank you

Erin 1:22:24
very much. Thank you. Thank you so much. Hold on one second.

Scott Benner 1:22:31
For me, this episode of The Juicebox Podcast was sponsored by us Med, US med.com/juicebox, or call 888-721-1514, get started today with us. Med links in the show notes. Links at Juicebox podcast.com, today's episode of The Juicebox Podcast was sponsored by the new tandem Moby system and control iq plus technology. Learn more and get started today at tandem diabetes.com/juicebox check it out. I can't thank you enough for listening. Please make sure you're subscribed or following in your audio app. I'll be back tomorrow with another episode of The Juicebox Podcast. When I created the defining diabetes series, I pictured a dictionary in my mind to help you understand key terms that shape type one diabetes management. Along with Jenny Smith, who, of course, is an experienced diabetes educator, we break down concepts like basal, time and range, insulin on board and much more. This series must have 70 short episodes in it, we have to take the jargon out of the jargon so that you can focus on what really matters, living confidently and staying healthy. You can't do these things if you don't know what they mean. Go get your diabetes to find Juicebox podcast.com go up in the menu and click on series. The episode you just heard was professionally edited by wrong way recording, wrong wayrecording.com. You.

Please support the sponsors


The Juicebox Podcast is a free show, but if you'd like to support the podcast directly, you can make a gift here. Recent donations were used to pay for podcast hosting fees. Thank you to all who have sent 5, 10 and 20 dollars!

Donate
Read More

#1576 Low and Behold

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

Brenda shares her powerful journey through type 1 diabetes, cancer, RA, thyroid issues, and lifelong resilience against autoimmune challenges.

+ Click for EPISODE TRANSCRIPT


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.

Brenda 0:14
Hi. My name is Brenda. I am a 56 year old grandmother, and I'm excited and overly joy to be speaking to all of you today. If

Scott Benner 0:28
this is your first time listening to the Juicebox Podcast and you'd like to hear more, download Apple podcasts or Spotify, really, any audio app at all, look for the Juicebox Podcast and follow or subscribe. We put out new content every day that you'll enjoy. Want to learn more about your diabetes management. Go to Juicebox podcast.com up in the menu and look for bold beginnings, the diabetes Pro Tip series and much more. This podcast is full of collections and series of information that will help you to live better with insulin. 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 the contour next gen blood glucose meter. Learn more and get started today at contour next.com/juicebox 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 twist a ID system powered by tide pool that features the twist loop algorithm, which you can target to a glucose level as low as 87 Learn more at twist.com/juicebox, that's twist with two eyes.com/juicebox. Get precision insulin delivery with a target range that you choose at twist.com/juicebox, that's t, w, i, i s t.com/juicebox,

Brenda 2:25
hi. My name is Brenda. I am a 56 year old grandmother, and I'm excited and overly joy to be speaking to all of you today.

Scott Benner 2:38
Brenda, I appreciate you doing this. Thank you very much. You are so welcome. You're very kind. Let me ask you a question right out of the gate. It's got nothing to do with anything. How old were you when you had your first kid?

Brenda 2:49
I had my first child at 17. He was born November 10, and I turned 18 on November 16. The reason I did that is because I thought I was going to die. By the age of 50, I was going to be dead and buried, because being a diabetic, I didn't think I was going to live a long life. So I got married at 17. I wanted to have a family. I come from a huge family of seven, and I just wanted to be able to, you know, be a wife, be a mom, and enjoy life. Wow,

Scott Benner 3:33
how many kids are brothers and sisters with you?

Brenda 3:36
I'm of one of seven. So I have six siblings. You know, I was

Scott Benner 3:40
going to say, after I said it all like, garbled, like that. There's another way to say that. Scott, you could have just said, How many siblings do you have? Again, but Okay, so you're, you're one of seven. Is it a pretty even mix? Boys? Girls?

Brenda 3:52
No, five girls and two boys, okay, which in turn we have three Anthonys. Well, Antoinette, they wanted a boy so bad, and, you know, and they waited, and I think Martha attributed onto number four is Antoinette, because they wanted a boy so bad. And then after number four, I was number five, and they still wanted a boy. So we have Antoinette and Anthony both named after my father.

Scott Benner 4:21
Very nice. How old were you when you were diagnosed type one? I was eight years old. You were eight, Brenda. You have to give me a second, because you sound so incredibly like a woman I know named Brenda that I my brain has to keep telling me you're not her. It's that. It's Oh,

Brenda 4:39
that's a little bit scary. I may know you,

Scott Benner 4:42
it's crazy. Is there any chance you're from the Indiana area, Chicago? That's pretty close

Brenda 4:48
to there, isn't it? What grade school did you go to? I'm

Scott Benner 4:51
just kidding. I'm not from there, but you have type one at eight years old. Do you have any other autoimmune issues

Brenda 4:59
at eight? But it was just the diabetes through the years. I have had cancer, breast cancer. Five years ago, just hit the five year mark, and you know, rheumatoid arthritis, thyroid, I've had surgery on basically every one of my fingers and both of my wrists for carpal tunnel, trigger finger, frozen shoulder, tore, meniscus, arthritic feet. But life goes on and you live and you're happy for tomorrow, and you just push yourself through it. So

Scott Benner 5:38
you have a pretty mixed bag of of autoimmune stuff going on and issues. How about your sisters and your brothers?

Brenda 5:45
Actually, everybody's relatively healthy. There's rheumatoid in one one sister, one sibling, but my brother, I actually diagnosed him. I was about maybe six months into being a diabetic. You know, back then, you would get a little test tube with an eyedropper, and you'd have to put a little pill, and you would test your urine, and you would have to check the color, yeah. And, you know, back in the day, there was just everything seems so complicated, and I was testing everybody's urine in the house, and my brother's urine changed to color, and I was like, he's sick, he's sick, and nobody believed me. And I went to the doctor, and my next appointment, I was like, my brother's pee changed to color, and nobody understood, and they checked him, and to this day, he's like, You made me a diabetic.

Scott Benner 6:48
No one knew he had told them. Wait, were you born exactly? You Born in the mid 60s? Yes, 67 Okay, so in like 19, I don't know, 70 something, you're running around telling your family. I figured out the kids got the bees and nobody would listen to you.

Brenda 7:04
Well, yeah, they were just like, oh, no, he's and I was like, No, I'm telling you, like, it changed colors. So sure enough, they took him in. And I was like, wow, he had a simple just go in check him. He's a diabetic. Me, I ended up, I used to spend the summers with my grandmother and I apparently urinated all over her, as she would call it, Davenport, which is a sofa. She used to call it a Davenport.

Scott Benner 7:32
You don't have to tell me. My grandmom had a Davenport. I know what you're talking about. Yeah,

Brenda 7:37
they were the best. I would go there, I would actually take three busses to get to her house. I make it sound like they put an eight year old on the bus by themselves. But back in those days, it was different, you know, it was safe,

Scott Benner 7:53
you know, I don't know how safe it was, but you know, it was different. That's for sure. It was

Brenda 7:57
different. So I, you know, my grandmother didn't drive, my mom didn't drive, but I would go spend the summers with my grandmother, and my mom didn't see me for like, a month, and I came home and I was extremely underweight. My face was all sunken in. I think I was 60 pounds or 40 pounds back then, I think it was 60. I actually have a picture of myself, and I looked I was like, Oh, my goodness. I cannot believe that none of you guys saw that I was sick. Like, this was okay. I

Scott Benner 8:33
can't I can't believe you had to take three busses to get to diabetes. That's terrible. Oh, let me tell you. So there's a lot going on here that people don't understand. I would imagine, if you're younger, like, you got on three busses to go visit your grandmom. You weren't coming back a day or so later. You hung out for a few weeks, right? Like my dad, oh yeah, yeah. Used to take me to my grandmother's house on a Saturday, and he'd be like, yeah, I'll see you next week and come back and get me next Saturday. It was like, during the summer, like, this is all very common. I think I don't know that people understand how great a modern vehicle is still. And I know this makes me sound like super old, which I'm not that old, but cars used to suck, like now that the cheapest car you can buy is awesome. You know what I mean Exactly, yeah, yeah. It's quiet inside and warm or cool and comfortable. And when you steer it, it goes where you mean for it to it stops like these are not things we these are things we would have taken, you know, for granted today, that cars didn't just do in the 70s and 80s. Sometimes

Brenda 9:35
my mother would put me on the bus. I'd have to sit at the front, and she would tell the bus driver, she needs to get off at a certain stop, which was Milwaukee, and I would have to get on, and then I would have to take the bus down to the Statue of Liberty. Thus the reason I'm still a landmark person. So I would then have to take the Statue of Liberty to the drugstore, and then I'd have to take the drugstore to the meat market, and that's how I got to my grandmother's house. Did

Scott Benner 9:59
you walk to your grandma? Other center, was she meeting you? No, that was on the bus. You know, I'm saying once you got off at Meat Market. Was she their mother was waiting for me? Yeah, they weren't, yeah, and they weren't irresponsible. No,

Brenda 10:11
no, she was standing, she was standing at the bus stop waiting for me. But yeah,

Scott Benner 10:16
it was like, how long of a ride do you think that was that whole trip?

Brenda 10:19
Oh, goodness, who knows? I don't know if it was very long or not, but it was, it seemed like forever, but it was so exciting to go spend the time with my grandmother.

Scott Benner 10:29
Yeah, that's awesome. Okay, so your grandmother gave you diabetes. You gave diabetes to your brother. That's all very nice.

Brenda 10:34
And my brother gave it to his son. And actually then, and this is through the years, well, but going back, I came home and they saw me, and, you know, I have four older sisters, they had to trick me into going to the hospital. My sister was like, oh, you know, can you come with me? I have to go see, you know, I have an appointment. And I was like, Yeah, you know, I'm gonna go with you. And then she's like, I love you so much, but this is for you, which, you know, I say I was eight years old, which I was, but apparently I was, like, a very strong eight year old, or at that point going on, you know, eight and a half going on to nine. I was admitted into the hospital through the emergency room with my sister. I'm like, why am I in the emergency room. I was in the hospital for a month, a month, wow, yeah, they, they says, If I would have waited a day more, I would have went into a coma. And I was admitted into the hospital. Was in ICU, and I remember looking there, and it was near, you know, I looked out the window and there was, like, this huge building with a swimming pool next on top of it, and I'm just laying there, like, Are you kidding me? And the nurses would come in and she would if the blood flowed back, these are the things I remembered into my tube from IV. She would wrap it around the pen so it would go the other way. And I just hated that. I was like, oh, here this nurse comes again.

Scott Benner 12:08
Were you like, an incredibly strong willed kid? Like, why did they have to fool you into going,

Brenda 12:13
yes, and that hasn't changed. Okay, it's interesting

Scott Benner 12:17
because you're like, you're mild monitored when you're speaking. But the incongruous. Oh yeah,

Brenda 12:22
no, I the youngest of five. I cried and basically got everything I wanted. I was spoiled. They all loved me. Yeah, that's

Scott Benner 12:30
what they told you. Huh? That's what they told me. So let's kind of like zip around a little bit here for a second, because we'll get back to the diabetes diagnosis in a second. But what about those next nine years made you feel like I need to get married the second it's okay make babies and live a whole life, because I'm out of here fast. Did they tell you that the brand new twist insulin pump offers peace of mind with unmatched personalization and allows you to target a glucose level as low as 87 there are more reasons why you might be interested in checking out twist, but just in case, that one got you twist.com/juicebox, that's twist with two eyes.com/juicebox. You can target glucose levels between 87 and 180 it's completely up to you. In addition to precision insulin delivery that's made possible by twist design, twist also offers you the ability to edit your carb entries even after you've bolused. This gives the twist loop algorithm the best information to make its decisions with, and the twist loop algorithm lives on the pump, so you don't have to stay next to your phone for it to do its job. Twist is coming very soon, so if you'd like to learn more or get on the wait list, go to twist.com/juicebox that's twist with two eyes.com/juicebox. Links in the show notes. Links at Juicebox podcast.com Today's episode is sponsored by Medtronic diabetes, who is making life with diabetes easier with the mini med 780 G system, the mini med 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. Tronic diabetes.com/juicebox,

Brenda 15:03
no, that was just me. You know, that's that's why I'm so incredibly just thankful for everything that you do, everything that technology and medicine has done. Because I didn't know anybody who had diabetes. I didn't know anything about it. No one in my family had it back then. I was like, wow, I have this. And I just thought this was going to be the end of my life, like I didn't want to tell anybody. I hid it when I was in school, and it was just like this black shadow that was over me. And, I mean, I look back at it now and think that, wow, I was, like, in a really bad state of depression, and didn't even know

Scott Benner 15:50
it as a little kid. Yes, yeah, it was just what you could imagine was that this is gonna shorten and ruin my life.

Brenda 15:58
Oh, most definitely. Okay.

Scott Benner 16:00
Okay. Did you ever tell anybody to your recollection that that's how you felt? I had

Brenda 16:06
a best friend. I had obviously told her, and she was with me a lot, but I just didn't want anybody to know. I didn't want them not to like me. I didn't want to be different. I just wanted to fit in and lo and behold. Thank goodness my mom actually did, and my dad, they talked about it. They sent me to a diabetic camp, I think, when I was 12, and that, I wish they would have sent me sooner. And I told tell everybody. Now, if your child becomes a diabetic, the first opportunity they have to send them to a diabetic camp, send

Scott Benner 16:49
them. Why? Tell people what it did.

Brenda 16:53
Oh, my God, it was amazing. There was, I was not the only one. There's other people out there, and it was so nice to actually meet other kids and, you know, learn how to counter cards and learn how to weigh your food. And back then, it wasn't, you know, all this technology, and it was more manual. You had to, you know, do everything pee on a stick, you know. I mean, they have that too, but it's just, it was just such an amazing experience that I was not this just individual that was the only one on the face of the earth.

Scott Benner 17:30
So you felt isolated or alone for four years, pretty much okay. And was that a 24/7 feeling, or did it come and go,

Brenda 17:40
you know, I think it probably just came and went. You know, every time you would get a low or every time you had to test your blood or take a shot. Because, you know, when you're on four shots a day, you have to test your blood before breakfast. You're doing breakfast, lunch and dinner. It wasn't like, you know, one shot a day, yeah, and it was a lot, or every time you ate, and it was just like, oh, I can't do this. I was just like, I just can't do this for the rest of my life. How am I ever going to

Scott Benner 18:11
do this? Right? And then I guess, growing up in a world where people would put an eight year old on a bus to go to a bus, to go to a bus, they weren't helping you with all this diabetes stuff, my imagining,

Brenda 18:21
oh, you know what? My mom, she in order for me, I'll never forget this, in order for me to leave the hospital, she had to be able to learn how to give me a shot. She actually took the needle out and accidentally jabbed herself, and they rushed her down to the emergency room to give her a tetanus shot. And I told the doctors. I was like, my mom is amazing. Such my mother was such a strong, amazing, beautiful woman with seven kids. And, you know, my dad worked all the time, so it was a lot. I think for her, it was just a lot, yeah, and I was like, You guys have to let me go. Like, look, I know how to do this. If I'm passed out, she can give me the shot. I don't care, but please don't let her give me a shot. We were practicing on oranges, and, you know, we were doing things, and she was just, she was so heartbroken and destroyed that I was sick. It just, I think, really, really devastated

Scott Benner 19:26
her. Yeah, did it hit her again when your brother was diagnosed? Or,

Brenda 19:30
oh yes, it was a double, I think it was a double whammy for her, and he was the youngest. He was number seven, okay, so at that time, you know, probably 12 years between my brother and myself from being diagnosed, she, he was mama's boy. He,

Scott Benner 19:51
you know, was he older when he was diagnosed, then

Brenda 19:55
he was older, yeah, and it was hard for the teenage boy because. He just, you know, teenage boy. He didn't have time for that.

Scott Benner 20:05
Do you have a feeling for how old your mom was when you were diagnosed? Late maybe

Brenda 20:10
early 50s? So she had kids earlier as well, late 40s. Oh, yeah, she had, she had kids early, okay, okay, even maybe late 40s. Yeah, she, you know, figure she

Scott Benner 20:19
had seven of us. What kind of insulin did you start with

Brenda 20:23
pork insulin, which I was allergic to, and I broke out in hives all over my body. They we figured that out. Then they had put me on beef insulin, and that was back in the day. That goes to show you how long ago this was, yeah, and that was a scene within itself. I'm like, Oh, my, it was just like everything. It was like, Really, now I'm allergic to this medicine. Yeah, this medicine is supposed to save my life, and now you're telling me I can't take this, and they have to figure out a different one. And you know,

Scott Benner 20:56
how did the the other things stack up? Did they come slowly over time, the thyroid, ra, stuff like that. Oh

Brenda 21:03
yeah, all of that was, you know, over time, throughout the duration of me getting older, I can tell you, I'm, like, the healthiest person around

Scott Benner 21:13
you. Just have these issues. Yes, that's how you think

Brenda 21:17
about I have these issues. Yeah, they're like, they're issues. But you know what, I'm here. I'm strong. I think the minute that you allow you have to welcome anything that, whatever you believe in, you know, gives you, you just have to welcome it, because the last thing you want to do is be against whatever you have, because it's not going to work. You can't you can't fight it. Don't fight it. I hate to

Scott Benner 21:48
say it is just what it is, right? Like, this is your reality. You're either going to, like, find a way to exist with it, or you're going to be fighting against it forever. Yeah,

Brenda 21:56
and, you know, I think it was until I went to the diabetic camp that really, really, really made me strong. No kidding, that I think that was

Scott Benner 22:09
huge. Do you still have friends from camp? No, no. Okay, so All right, now I'm gonna take what's gonna seem like a weird pivot for a second, but that boy who you snooker to end up making you pregnant when you were 17 or you 17. Are you still with

Brenda 22:24
him? We were in love, got married, had an amazing life, had two children. He is currently my ex

Scott Benner 22:31
husband. Currently, are you thinking of letting him back?

Brenda 22:35
Yeah, oh, no, never. You have to understand. And it's it's hard for people when you get divorced, we have a mutual bond. We have two grown adult children. We have grandchildren. You have to be a good human. You know, this person, we were together, and it didn't work out over the years. I mean, we were together for a lot of years, and we everybody's like, Oh, because you were young, and it was like, No, it just no longer worked, yeah.

Scott Benner 23:06
How long did you make it 14 years? Okay, wow. So you were 31 when you got divorced, yeah.

Brenda 23:13
Then I was a single mom, okay?

Scott Benner 23:15
And you had two kids at that point. Did you ever get remarried?

Brenda 23:18
No, but I'm been with the same individual for almost 30 years now. No kidding. Oh, that's interesting, yeah, literally, like, maybe six months later, I was very, very fortunate, and I met another gentleman, and he's just spectacular. And, you

Scott Benner 23:39
know, not lovely How about that? Well, okay, and you and your ex have kept a close relationship this entire time because of the connection

Brenda 23:48
in mutual my, my children's graduations, it's like, high, high, you know, weddings or parties, you can't be be like, oh, you know, they're terrible. They're wonderful. I was in love with this person at one point in my life, yeah, I have children with them, you know? So it's like, it's it Life is life. He's remarried. Has an amazing, beautiful wife. They have children. You know? It's life is good. You have to, to accept whatever, whatever comes your way. Okay? And you don't wish, I don't wish ill on anyone?

Scott Benner 24:21
Do your children have any issues? You said your brother's son has type one, but what about your kids? The contour next gen blood glucose meter is sponsoring this episode of The Juicebox Podcast, and it's entirely possible that it is less expensive in cash than you're paying right now for your meter through your insurance company. That's right. If you go to my link, contour, next.com/juicebox, you're going to find links to Walmart, Amazon, Walgreens, CVS, Rite, aid, Kroger and Meijer. You could be paying more right now through your insurance for your test strips and meter. Meter, then you would pay through my link for the contour next gen and contour next test strips in cash. What am I saying? My link may be cheaper out of your pocket than you're paying right now, even with your insurance, and I don't know what meter you have right now. I can't say that, but what I can say for sure is that the contour next gen meter is accurate, it is reliable, and it is the meter that we've been using for years. Contour next.com/juicebox and if you already have a contour meter and you're buying test strips, doing so through the Juicebox Podcast link will help to support the show.

Brenda 25:39
I pray every day. Neither one of my children have diabetes nor my grandchildren. Okay, my son has two teenage daughters, and my daughter has a three year old and a two month old every day. You know they. Everybody knows the signs and my niece, which is my sister's sons, his son, two years ago, became a diabetic. Okay, you know, so we have, I have a nephew. I have, and my brother's son became one. So we have two boys on our side. So right now,

Scott Benner 26:16
yeah, yeah, when your kids were getting Do you have, I'm sorry, do you have girls or a mix. I have a I have One boy, one girl, okay, when they're dating. Do you find yourself thinking like, hey, ask about that person's background. Let's see if they've got any autoimmune over there. And you know, maybe we'll avoid that if we

Brenda 26:32
know. Well, my kids are grown. My son is Chicago firemen, and my daughter lives in California, and it has an amazing job. And, you know they No, I never, I never did that. But I have to tell you, two days ago, I was at a graduation open house, and I was sitting down, and I overheard my niece talking to this boy, and he was like, his like, he went to go get a soda. And she's like, No, that's a regular he needs a regular one because his sugar is low. And of course, right away I jump up and I walk over. I was like, Hi. I was like, and I was like, Leah, what's what's going on? And she said, Oh, you know, my boyfriend's a diabetic. And I was like, I didn't know that. And then I had showed I was giving him an experience, and I was like, oh, you know, I'm her aunt, and I've been diabetic, and so we just start talking, and this young boy has only been a diabetic for two years. He was, what, 16. There's so many kids nowadays that are being diagnosed with diabetes. I thought

Scott Benner 27:39
you're gonna say everybody has diabetes now, yes, it's

Brenda 27:44
a little bit scary, but also, I think about everything that they have, and all the tools, all the resources, like I wish, I wish I would have had half of the amount of information that is out there now and support. I mean, I look at myself and I'm like, Wow, I'm 57 and I've lived an amazing life. Yes, I've had all of these things happen to me, but I am so thankful I'm still here.

Scott Benner 28:19
It's funny, at one point you called your life the duration of my life. And then you said, just now you're like, I've lived an amazing life. You say it like you're older. You're really not very old. Is it that background feeling that you thought you weren't going to live very long that makes you feel like you've been around a long time? I

Brenda 28:35
look at it this way, you have a car. What you have to do your regular maintenance. You have to change the oil, and you have to take it to the mechanic and check it out. But eventually, you know, after 100 and something 1000 miles that car is, you're gonna have to get a new car. I just tell people you have your body, use the resources that you have. Don't blame your doctor if you don't feel good. There is not one body that is the same. Obviously, you know, you go to your doctor and they're they're gonna do what they were taught. But everybody reacts different, and everybody's body is so different. What works for one. May not work for the other, but you have to be your own advocate, and you have to take care of yourself. You have to take care of your body. I mean, you have to, I wish, I wish I would have eaten a little healthier back in the day. You know that I started doing that, what in my 40s, you know? And it was like, I shouldn't maybe have done that in my 20s. Did you have to be your own advocate? Take care of yourself. Take your medicine. When your pump is going off, if you wear a pump, eat. Don't put it off like, you know, you have these settings. You have all these tools and resources, use it because you will enhance your life and live longer.

Scott Benner 30:06
Brenda, have you always been like that? Or is it a thing you came to because all you've really described right now, which, by the way, it's basically my job to say over and over again, don't people listen? But like you're just doing the things you're supposed to do, and you're having good outcomes because of it. Is what I'm hearing. So like, but were you always that person? Oh,

Brenda 30:26
absolutely not. Okay, absolutely not. As a teenager, I would walk around and I mean, oh, there was, I know, I had passed out. I have like, a mark on my tooth, and I'm like, Oh yeah, that was my mother, because she thought I was going to swallow my tongue, and I just passed out. And she thought I was having a seizure, and I wasn't having a seizure. I just passed out from low blood sugar. She thought. She was like, you know, something

Scott Benner 30:51
in your mouth, yeah, awesome. I was

Brenda 30:56
like, oh yeah. I came to, you know, I have, I have stories of me passing out on a CTA bus because I wanted to go shopping, and I was with, you know, a friend, and I was like, in such a great mood, and I wanted to go shopping and I didn't want, you know, I passed out and I woke up and I was in The hospital, and I was like, oh my goodness, what happened?

Scott Benner 31:24
Wait, go back. You didn't want what Brenda. You wanted to go shopping, and you didn't want what to be I didn't want

Brenda 31:30
my friend to know that my blood sugar was going down. So I was just like, trying to push through a low. I was like, I'm going to be okay. I'm going to be okay. And lo and behold, I won't wake up, and I was in an ambulance and they took me to the hospital.

Scott Benner 31:44
If only you could just push through a low blood sugar. That would be awesome for everybody. I know, I know, but you knew that, right?

Brenda 31:51
I knew that, yeah, of course. Well, the terrible thing was, the ambulance driver told me, I'm like, I can't go to the hospital. I'm gonna get in trouble. Like, just, please let me go home. And they're like, No, you, since I passed out on a CTA bus, they were like, there was all these legality things. And they're like, No, we have to take you. I'm at the hospital, and I'm like, please, I gotta get out of here. Like, I can't be here. I'm like, did you tell them? I know I was

Scott Benner 32:20
on my way to Woolworths. It

Brenda 32:24
was actually learner,

Scott Benner 32:26
no, I almost said Montgomery Ward, just in case you're wondering. No, there you go, scouring my brain for the names of old retail stores that I could find. When does it get easier for you? Like, is it technology? Is it insulin improving? Or what do you remember as the first, like, step up

Brenda 32:42
an insulin pump? Pump was the pump was just a miracle worker. It was just unbelievable that. Well, I mean, I had my fair share too. I just had the pump put on, and I was excited. I was sitting down, and I forgot I had it on. I picked it up, and I, like, threw some blankets, and I had it in my hand, and it went flying out of my body. And I'm like, oh yeah, this isn't going to work. I'm not going to stick myself again. You know, I look at, you know, different things on Facebook, and I see all these infants with diabetes, and I'm like, Oh my goodness. Like, how would a parent ever take care of a child without a sensor, without a pump? Like, how is that even possible? I just it's crazy. My nephew, my sister's grandson, his mom's name is Rachel, and I every day, I just look at her, and I'm like, You are an angel. You have given your son all the tools, all the resources you've you've given him everything that he needs to be the best diabetic he can be. And she's supported him. She looks things up. She was the one who actually told me about your podcast. And I was like, Oh my goodness. Like she just, there's, there's so much out there. And she, he is a teenager, and he plays sports, and he's like, the head of everything. He's on this traveling soccer team. He's been, I just look at him, and I was like, wow. Like he

Scott Benner 34:27
is successful, yeah. But Brenda, hold on, don't you think of you, your life as a success.

Brenda 34:31
I look at is this success as, don't want to say a warrior, because I fought so much through my life, of kind of sometimes feeling like I was out there on my own, even though I had older sisters, everybody was busy with their own stuff, and my mom was busy with so many things, and everybody had so much, and I just felt like I was there on my own. So for me, I was successful. So when I got older and when I got a pump, I mean, I was successful, that I made it through all of my lows that I bought and all that. And I'm like, Yeah, I'm good. I don't need anything, you know,

Scott Benner 35:12
so you so you live through the first terrible part, and then you got to the pump, and things got better. But I still wonder, though, like, listen, I understand, but like, and I'm, I'm trying to figure out how you're going from saying, My life's been a very big success, I'm doing really well, to, I can't believe it, you know, how would these people live nowadays without this thing? Like, why do you have that dual feeling?

Brenda 35:32
Because there were times and points where I was working, I actually worked and passed out. I worked a double I passed out, and I woke up in an ambulance, and I was like, Oh, my God, I gotta get up. I gotta they're like, oh, we gotta take you to the hospital. I'm like, No, I gotta get in. I open tomorrow, you know. And if I had all of this technology when I was younger, it would have, I just think, made me even stronger, more better to control

Scott Benner 36:06
myself. You think easier is easier, a word that you would put to this, or it would

Brenda 36:10
have been so much easier. All right, it would have been so much easier.

Scott Benner 36:16
But as far as health outcomes go, like diabetes wise, do you have any issues. I mean, you had trigger finger and, like, was that from, like, higher a one CS, vacillating blood sugars?

Brenda 36:28
No, that was just from work. I worked for a company that was very manual labor, and all of that was from that the frozen shoulders was from the diabetes. That was a given. That's what was told to me from that. And the cancer was just breast cancer, you know. And I walked in, I was like, I really don't have time for this. So can we just do what we got to do? Because I just don't have time for this to go on. And the woman, the nurse, was like, Do you need to see a counselor. I said, No, and I'm laughing at her, and she goes, You're like the happiest cancer patient I ever met. I said, Well, you know what? I either knew I was going to die of diabetes or cancer from all the artificial stuff I've put in my body throughout my whole life. I said, So what choice do I have? Did you

Scott Benner 37:20
think because you were taking insulin, something else was gonna happen? No, all the artificial sweeteners. Oh, that's what you're talking about. Oh, okay, like

Brenda 37:29
the saccharines the Sweet and Low. I mean, I used to put 10 Sweet and Low in my coffee, you know, because it wasn't sweet enough. And I would always have, you know, sugar free gum, diet soda and all of this is like, Oh, if you drink this, you're gonna end up with cancer. Well, you know, I don't believe that that was the reason I got this. I was definitely genetics. But back in the days, you know, I'm thinking all of that,

Scott Benner 37:58
yeah, no, I understand. It's been a bit of a whirlwind for you, really, you know, a lot has happened to you in, I mean, what I would consider to be still a short amount of time, you know, like, I mean, 50 years, it's half a lifetime or more, maybe, right? But still, like, the diagnosis at eight and being like, drugged to the hospital because you're hard headed, and then launching into a life that you know goes on for 14 years. Then you get divorced, but you're, you know, you're still friendly with people, and you meet somebody else, and you keep going and like, there's a lot has like, Does it ever occur to you that you've been through a great deal sometimes, yeah, do you think that you're okay. Ready for a difficult question? Brenda, hi. Let me have it. Do you really think you're happy, or do you think you're covering? You know

Brenda 38:49
what, happy in life, or happy with diabetes?

Scott Benner 38:53
Your overall presentation is really upbeat, which is awesome. But are you actually upbeat, or are you projecting upbeat? I'm actually upbeat. No kidding, that's awesome. Anybody ever in your family line experience any depression or anything like that?

Brenda 39:08
I think my father, I would say my father, okay, went through

Scott Benner 39:13
depression, diagnosed and treated or something. He

Brenda 39:17
now, you know, back in the days, I don't think they ever really diagnosed anything? Yeah,

Scott Benner 39:23
okay, all right. I've asked that question before, and people are like, I am really just pretending. So I just wanted to make sure. I just went to double check

Brenda 39:30
I truly, you know what I look at myself, and I'm like, wow, I think back. I'm like, I really didn't think I was going to be here past 50. And I'm like, I am, and I'm so I'm so fortunate and so blessed that I can garden or work, and, you know, I just recently retired, and I just I enjoy my life, I enjoy my family, I enjoy my friends. I'm very. Very, very, very, very happy and very blessed to be able to do all that I do. You're living. I'm living now, probably the last five years, I'm living. And I think it changed a little bit after I got cancer. How? Because I had when I was first in my brain, I was like, okay, no matter what they do, this is here. It's gonna get me. Let's just do whatever I can do, and this is it. And I was like, okay, like, I didn't let it overtake me. And I was like, Okay. And I actually have a video of myself, and I looked at it the other day because I was telling somebody, oh, yeah, whatever, I had cancer. And she's like, what? And I'm like, Yeah, I would go down to my treatments, and I'm like, the tunnel of death, because you would walk it's in the basement for treatments, and it's all dark and dreary until you get to the cancer part, where they are, like, doing the treatments, then it's all lively and beautiful. And I'm like, why would you not have this from the minute you get off the elevator? Why would you just have it at the down at the end of the hall? Yes, and I actually told one of the nurses, so I video recorded myself coming out of the elevator, and I was like, the tunnel of death, and I was just cracking up. So I keep thinking that to myself, like, wow, you know,

Scott Benner 41:29
put a light out there. Brenda. Are you telling me that you were so convinced that you were going to die because of diabetes that you looked up and you're like, Ah, I have cancer. And then you were just like, I guess maybe I'm not gonna die. Did the cancer snap you out of feeling like your life was short? And is this a weird story where I think, yeah,

Brenda 41:49
in a in a crazy way, yeah, like the diabetes was there, and it was like, Oh, that was like, always like, oh, okay, I have diabetes. I'm good. I'm gonna live. I'm gonna die. What's going on with me? And like, uh, and then once I got the cancer, I was like, Oh, I think this is a little bit worse than having the diabetes.

Scott Benner 42:09
Like, Wait, did cancer give you perspective?

Brenda 42:13
Slightly, okay, slightly. And then I was like, Okay, well, I said I'm gonna die of either one of the two. I beat the one. You should stop saying that, living with the other one well, but I this is in my head. This is what you know my whole life. So I says, Well, wow, you know, and, and I'm still living. So let's just go with this, like I'm living this. Let's keep living.

Scott Benner 42:38
I might not die. I should probably just feel

Brenda 42:44
like to travel now. I just travel. I just enjoy life. I want

Scott Benner 42:49
to try to go backwards and walk forwards as best you can with your outcomes, like year after year. Do you know what your a one, Cs were, or what your goals were?

Brenda 42:57
Oh, my goal was always to be whatever the doctor told me what was back in the day? It was back in the day, it was always to be a six, really. That was back then. Now it's a five. Of course, they lowered it. What years ago they would always tell you, like you should be around here.

Scott Benner 43:16
Well, that's not what Ada was saying, though, like when my daughter was diagnosed, it was an eight, and then they moved it to a seven. I think it's still at a seven now, like through ADA or something, so like, your doctors were more aggressive about

Brenda 43:27
it, yeah, more aggressive, yeah.

Scott Benner 43:30
And did they give you tools to reach those numbers, or did they just give you the goal and say, good luck. Figure it out. Oh,

Brenda 43:36
a sliding scale. You know, if your sugars are here, you have to, you know, if it's in between this, I was, I would hate to have to have my I'd have my little paper sliding scale in my little couch with my needles and my, you know, everything. And it was like, Oh, heck. Was this ever gonna stop? And when I would go and not get the A, 1c, that I would want, I'm like, Well, I'm following the sliding scale. Like, what do you mean? I'm not wearing back or, you

Scott Benner 44:04
know, two things here. I have been doing this for such a long time, and I know, pragmatically, what the sliding scale is, but I don't think it ever occurred to me that somebody had a piece of paper in their pocket where they slid something back and forth to line up some lines to make a decision with. But that's what you had. Yeah, wow. I know what sliding scale is. I just never put it together like that. There'd be a card in your so you're like, an outfielder shifting. We like, you pull it out and see which batter is coming up, and then you make your decision.

Brenda 44:32
That's bad, you know? And I look at it, and that's what I said, is I, I see all the technology now, and I'm just go back and I'm like, wow, I didn't have it really. I didn't have it that easy. Who anybody who is not a successful diabetic? Shame on you. Shame on you, because you could be. You just need the support of other people. But the technology is there.

Scott Benner 44:57
It's so much more advanced than what. You had it feels like to you, if you're not taking advantage of it, like, through your lens, it's just, it's a shame,

Brenda 45:06
yes, Yeah, most definitely, most definitely.

Scott Benner 45:10
So your goals were lower, but were your outcomes there? Or, like, Do you know what your a one Cs were through your lifetime? Oh,

Brenda 45:16
no. I mean, now I'm at like a six, and which is too high. I should be lower. But the thing that I have a retina specialist, and I have my regular eye doctor, and whenever I go to the eye doctor, they're like, Wow, I cannot believe that your eyes are so great. I wish you could talk to some of our diabetic patients that are in their 20s, that are like, going to lose their eyesight because they haven't taken care of themselves, yeah? But

Scott Benner 45:47
what would you tell them? You use the piece of paper, slide it back and forth, and then get a pump when they're available,

Brenda 45:52
yeah? You know, it's in just told the eye doctor. I was like, You know what it truly is, just you have to do the best you can do, which with whatever available to you at that time. Yeah, I mean, I in there, and you know what, it is a shame, because some people cannot afford a pump. And you know the way the insurance is, some people can't afford even insulin. And it's, it's our system is with any anything in the health care. We do need health but it's a shame that every time you go pick up your medicine, you know, they're like, Oh, how many times you test your blood sugar? And I'm like, don't ask me that at the pharmacy. Give me whatever the doctor wrote the prescription for. I'm like, you know, I test my blood six times a day, so I know how much insulin to take. Like, what do you want from me? You know, you

Scott Benner 46:48
test your blood sugar. Who are you exactly? Give me the bottle? Yes,

Brenda 46:53
and it's the go through these different things in life, and you're just like, like, I don't want to sit there and explain my whole everything again to a new doctor, because back in the day, they didn't have their technology, of their computers, you wouldn't you press a button and you get your whole life history, you would have to sit there and tell everybody everything, and it's like, oh, technology. I

Scott Benner 47:16
feel like I've heard you tell me a handful of times here, whatever you have at your disposal, use it and do your best. And that's what you should be doing with diabetes. If it's a pump, if it's a piece of paper in your pocket, if it's a CGM, take advantage of what you have the opportunity to take advantage of. Do the things you're supposed to do. Take care of yourself. Your body's the most important thing,

Brenda 47:38
and do not feel sorry for yourself, okay?

Scott Benner 47:42
Meaning, this is what it is. Make the best of it. Keep going.

Brenda 47:47
Yes. I mean, you, you, everybody has their moment, and you know, you talk about depression, you're going to be sad. You're going to do that, and that's okay. Take an hour, let yourself feel that way, and then get up, wipe off your knees and start going like, you know, if you allow yourself to be in that mode of poor me, you will never succeed in life or in diabetes or in anything.

Scott Benner 48:16
How many times do you think you've had to sit down and take your hour.

Brenda 48:21
Oh, lots. Okay, even, you know, and I am upbeat and I am happy, but back when I was younger, before I became strong, and before I was like, hey, you know, do this. And that's one of the great things about you with your podcast, that if anyone out there is listening? It is okay. You are going to feel sad diabetic Awareness month in November, and then I have cancer awareness month in October. So October and November, thank goodness we weren't talking, because I'm not as chirpy during those two months. You know, because I do have my moments, I'll take my hour, but now it's maybe once a month.

Scott Benner 49:04
Do you literally just sit and wallow for a half a second and then tell yourself to get back up

Brenda 49:09
again? Pretty much? Yeah, it depends on what it is like when my sensor, if I put it in, it doesn't

Scott Benner 49:16
work, and it's, you know, and you're like, this thing

Brenda 49:19
exactly. And so I'll have my moment, and I'll be like, You know what? I'm just done. I'm just done. So yeah, you have, you have to have those

Scott Benner 49:28
No, no, of course. But talk about for a second, why? How come when this, you know, when your CGM doesn't do what you wanted to do for a second, why isn't your next thought? I used to have a piece of paper in my pocket, and this thing is awesome, and, yeah, technology is not great, so I'm just gonna put

Brenda 49:45
this when it breaks, it's it's not supposed to break so flustered, or it happens at the wrong time, or if I'm at work and I go around the corner and it bumps off my shoulder and it's now. Yeah. Like, really, can you tell me when

Scott Benner 50:01
would a good time be? Never, yeah. Why? Because I hear people say that all the time. It always happens at the worst time. Like, well, when would a good time be for your CGM to expire? Randomly. This might be in an episode somewhere, but Martin got tonsillitis, really, really badly, and she they put her on antibiotic didn't work. They put on another antibiotic didn't work. They moved her a thick and we were like, oh, like, she's, she's on her way, like, it was really bad, and we ended up because, you know how the timing always goes right, like it's always, it's always the weekend when you figure out you're screwed, and then, like, you know, so we're in the emergency room getting an IV antibiotic, and we don't even go till nine o'clock on a Sunday night. So 330 in the morning, we're driving home, and she says, any food? Anything? Just anything. And I'm like, Okay, there's a Burger King, like an oasis out in front of us, all lit up and nothing else, like it was dark food. We go through the drive through, it's so late that the lady the drive through looks at you like, Yo, I'm mopping the floors. Like, you want one of these burgers. You know, we grab food. And I said to her, well, let's just sit here in the parking lot and eat it, because, you know, if this cools off, we're gonna remember that it's not food. Like, let's just try to get it in while we can pretend it tastes good. And she's like, Okay, so we're off to the side. And she's like, What? This is horrible. And I was like, I know. Like, she's like, but we're eating it and we're happy. Like, you know what I mean? Like, everyone's been drunk in a we weren't drunk, but drunk in a parking lot, eating crappy food at some point,

Brenda 51:31
right exactly at some points. Thank God it's not a White Castle. Okay, so we're

Scott Benner 51:35
eating and eating, and we're just complaining the whole way, it's not good. I don't want this blah, blah, but we ate it, and then we kind of settled for a second. We were talking, and she's very sick, like, really beat up, and plus the last six hours, and I swear to God, she goes, Oh my God, my CGM just tired. We started laughing. We're like, oh my god, yeah, that makes total sense. So I was like, All right, well, we'll just go home. You can swap it before we go to bed. So we drive the next 10 minutes and we get home, it's quarter 410, or four in the morning. Now, like we didn't get up in the morning thinking we were going to the hospital. So now you know exactly, yeah, right. And I don't know if any of you've ever had this where Dexcom had issues, I feels like with g7 off and on, where you like, sometimes you go to inject it, and the like, the little wire, instead of going into you, pops out at the top of the CGM, right? I mean, it's, it's almost four o'clock in the morning. We're standing in our kitchen. We're still disgusted with ourselves that we ate whatever that thing was, they told us was chicken nuggets, and she clicks it. You know, she's her pants are down, she clicks it on Dexcom is gonna be like, you're supposed to put it on your arm. Well, guess what? And the wire pops out. You ever seen a marionette like when somebody lets go with the strings? Oh, my goodness. She just was like, and she sat there, and I went, it's okay, take it off and put on another one. Like it's okay,

Brenda 53:06
but it's just that thought of having to put on another one well, and this is terrible, but luckily, you were able to see it. I was unaware that that actually happens, until it happened, and until I pulled it off, and until I seen that it didn't go in, and then it happened again. So knowing that that happened, and you were able to do it, instead of having to wait

Scott Benner 53:33
the process to find out it's not going to turn off. Oh, poor thing. I do want to be clear like Arden's been using g7 since the very beginning, I'm big fan of it, and she is as well. But that's probably happened to her four times in those like, I mean, it's probably been over two years now, there's an argument to be made for like, maybe we should make it so that doesn't happen. And maybe there's an argument through me that it's a thing that's going to happen with the design. Like, I have

Brenda 53:56
absolutely no idea. I do use the g7 as well. So it is a thing. It does happen, and it does happen at the worst times. But

Scott Benner 54:04
also, my perspective is she doesn't have a piece of paper in her pocket that she's sliding back and forth. Like, like, I could go on a different tangent, like, I know that for most of you have been diagnosed more recently. You know you were given the thing. The thing's supposed to do something. It doesn't do it. You get very upset about it. I would always ask you to put yourself in Brenda's shoes and remember that at one point she was using insulin that they called beef, and the she couldn't use the pork because it gave her hives. Just shut up and put on another Dexcom, exactly. But it's not lost on me how, like, horrible it is when it happens. And the thing that I really want to, like, dig into is that in that moment, I hope Arden is never gonna know how much it breaks my heart to just say to her, like, It's okay, just put on another one, because I want to look at her and go, this is fcking terrible, isn't it? Like this whole goddamn fcking thing that happened to you is just terrible. That's not what that moment. Needs, you know what I mean, like, so I say it's okay. Just grab another one, put it on. We'll call them. We'll get them to send us a new one. Like, you go through that whole thing. But I know in her head she's just like, thinking, this is terrible, this whole goddamn thing that

Brenda 55:14
happened is she a teenager. She's 2020,

Scott Benner 55:18
yeah, so, and she's not wrong, by the way, that's the irony. This whole thing is, I'm not wrong and she's not wrong, but

Brenda 55:27
no, it's it just sucks. Yeah, it just sucks. And there are moments like that where it just sucks. No, just 1,000,000%

Scott Benner 55:35
you know, it's funny, but it makes me feel I was watching a Star Wars TV show last night before I went to bed. I don't want to bore everybody with which one it was, but it was everybody which one it was, but it was andor. And there's this guy that finds himself in the middle of a like in a town square in a revolution that he didn't know was about to happen. And there's this interesting moment on his face when he realizes that five seconds before he did not mean to be here in this fight, but that he was and is now, and now he has to react according to the reality he's been given, and he doesn't take time to wallow in the fact that if he would have made seven left turns instead of seven right turns, he'd be somewhere else, and this wouldn't be happening to him right now. Like there's something about when there's a shift in your life, like you said it earlier, like you can, like, stand there and fight with the reality that you're in, or you can just, I don't know if it's go with it or do the best you can with it. I'm not sure exactly what the verbiage is around it, but I'm that's what I'm taking from you, which is just like, get on the surfboard and go where the wave takes you.

Brenda 56:41
That is definitely a true, true statement. I mean, I look at myself, I got married really young, had my children because, you know, I wanted to have a family. Did the whole thing was a general manager did everything like you can lead an amazing, wonderful, productive life having diabetes, as long as you work with it and not against it. And everything that falls, like I said, everything that still fell on my lap, you just have to keep pushing yourself. Is is terrible in there. There were many, many, many terrible incidences. I mean, I totaled my car. My son was away in the Navy, and he was home for the weekend, and he had to come and find me, you know, and it's there. There were just so many different incidences before I was on a pump that, you know, I had, it's, it's a wonder I'm still alive.

Scott Benner 57:56
But you choose to remember life differently, though. Yes,

Brenda 57:59
yeah. Well, I, you know, I have to remember everything that I did. And yes, it was a struggle. I mean, I remember telling my children, which, this is not a bad thing to do. Well, now, you know a lot of people that have technology, but I remember having candy in my son's pocket and telling him, honey, if Mommy doesn't feel good, and she tells you, give mommy the candy. Okay? Because, yeah, I remember, and going back to Burger King, walking in there with my son, and I'm like, Excuse me. I'm like, I'm I need to order, but I know what I want to order, but it will like it won't come out. You don't feel well, can you please give me food? Yeah, I'll pay for I need food. Now, you know there were those incidences where, yeah, I've had lows and I can't even speak like I want, I know what I want to say, and it's just won't come out of my mouth because I was so

Scott Benner 59:01
low. And does that happen to you any longer with all this technology? Oh, no,

Brenda 59:05
no, no, no, no, but, but back in the day, when we didn't have this stuff, and you have to have something on you all the time, or, you know, you're at work and you're going to get off in 20 minutes, and you don't want to have to ask your supervisor, you know I need something, or, you know, you've already used all the candy in your pocket, and you just want to push through. I used to push through everything. That's a bad thing. That's definitely a bad thing. Don't push through it. Take care of yourself.

Scott Benner 59:35
Brenda, I do understand the desire, right? Like, like, to try to, like, find control. Like, I'm not gonna let this low happen, right? I like, I know you can't do that. Like, but like, I understand the desire to want to take control of your body and to say to yourself, like, I'm gonna do this, like, I can make this happen, and then, you know it's not gonna work. I swear, I sent Arden a text. She's like, cleaning her room and doing laundry. She's hustling. All over the place in the middle of the night, and I sent her a text. I'm like, You are totally gonna be low in 20 minutes. And she just ignored that. And then 20 minutes later, she's 65 diagonal down, and I hear her walk past my room to go downstairs. And then in the morning, there's a Juicebox and like, gummy bears on a chair that where she was, like, sitting. I'm past the part where I go, why didn't she listen? Because now it's funny, Brent, is that people would tell me, you know, you can't keep making this podcast forever. Your daughter's gonna get older. You're gonna stop learning stuff about diabetes. I'm just learning stuff about different stuff now. Now it's more about people. She's not hard headed, she's not dumb, she's not ignoring her diabetes. She's doing that thing you're describing. She's trying to find power over something that she's powerless

Brenda 1:00:46
with exactly. And you know what? It took me a very long time. And the crazier thing is, you have that, and you're looking at it, and you know,

Scott Benner 1:00:59
back in the day, they didn't have that, no, it just was gonna happen to you. I don't know you're it's just gonna happen to

Brenda 1:01:04
me, and I was just gonna be sick. And, you know, there was nobody that was gonna tell me, like, Hey, you're getting low. You know it was, it was just happening. How did

Scott Benner 1:01:16
it start? Like you felt a little hungry, and then before you could figure out if you were hungry or not, you felt a little woozy.

Brenda 1:01:22
Like, no, no. I could go all day without eating, and I would just be like, okay, whatever. Like, you know, I just,

Scott Benner 1:01:29
but no, no, Brenda. Does the does the onset of the low feel like hunger at first? No,

Brenda 1:01:34
my eyes twitch. It's not even feeling hungry. My eyes would like Twitch back a little bit, or I would get more energy. And I just wanted to, like, hurry up and do stuff before I just completely

Scott Benner 1:01:47
that's interesting. Wanted to drop Arden gets a little hungry right before it happens. And I think it's her body telling her, like, hey, get some carbs. Yeah. But then she just wants to react like a normal person. She's like, Oh, I'm hungry. And she starts thinking about, I'm like, and I look up and I'm like, like, it's the middle. Yeah, you're gonna get low. I've learned from talking to adults like you and others that she's going through a process that I can't speed her through. You just kind of be supportive during it. She is figuring things out as she goes. She's building on herself and getting better and better at taking care of herself, while maintaining some sort of a psychologically healthy balance around this whole thing. Brenda, it just occurred to me your oldest born is 40 years old. He will be 40 Yes, yeah. Is that interesting? Like, because, like you guys are. I know this is crazy, but if you were at 57 had a 40 year old friend, that wouldn't be crazy. I know you have almost similar life experiences. Is that, right

Brenda 1:02:49
when he went off to the Navy, and my daughter, what she was 16, she was going to go live with her dad, and she said it was just a lot for her, for me with the diabetes. And she's like, you know, I would always have to take care of, you know, you would always get sick and stuff. And I was like, You know what? He was buying a house. He was going to have a dog. It was going to be a wonderful, you know, little thing for her. I was like, You know what, honey. I go ahead, go enjoy, enjoy

Scott Benner 1:03:23
yourself. How hard was that? Oh, it

Brenda 1:03:26
was devastating and hard. Yeah, I think it was the best thing for her at that point, because I know it was hard for my kids when I were to get sick and, you know, they would see me and that that was rough with them growing up.

Scott Benner 1:03:43
I just made me think about my kids leaving. Great job. Brenda, good job.

Brenda 1:03:47
But you want them to, you know, grow their wings and fly. And it's, it was definitely rough. But my son, when he went away, he told a lot of his high school friends, you better take care of my mom. You know, I remember the first Mother's Day, his friends came and brought me stuff for Mother's Day. And he's like, we need angels. We need to make sure we check on you, you know, so you don't get sick. And if you're diabetic and you know, you need something, you call us

Scott Benner 1:04:14
that crazy. You're in your mid 30s at that point, and your kids are like, are older, and fly in the coop already. Wow. Yeah, no kidding, but you are with that guy at that point. Though, you're a guy you've been with for, for, oh

Brenda 1:04:26
yeah, but we were just not living together, sure? You know, dating, yep, and we're still, you know, still not married, still dating. I'm like, if it's not broke, don't fix it. It's 30 years. It's good.

Scott Benner 1:04:40
Can I ask you one last question? Sure. Do you do you think about getting older with diabetes and what that might mean? I

Brenda 1:04:46
think about it often. I look at some people and I I see them, and it's just like eyesight, so important. Go see a retina specialist. Yeah, it's so important to have your regular eye doctor, but your retina is the most important thing so you don't lose your eyesight. Walk every day. I actually, I'm not overweight or anything. I'm I'm like 155 pounds. So your weight, your the food you eat. You know you need to take care of yourself. Because even if you're sitting in your chair and you're raising your arms or you're doing some sort of exercise, you have to make sure that you oil your machine, change your oil. You know this is the car that you have. And if you do your regular oil changes and everything, it's going to ride a lot smoother. Will it eventually you need to buy a new car? Yes,

Scott Benner 1:05:49
yeah, they call that dead, but that's okay.

Brenda 1:05:53
It is what it is. But you know what? In the meantime, do your oil changes, change your windshield fluid, like make your car drive so you can get to work. Brenda,

Scott Benner 1:06:03
I appreciate you doing this. It's in my head, not lost on me, that like I don't know how to get the culmination of your experience and inject it back into younger people so that this doesn't need to be their experience. But I think that's pretty much the uphill battle of being human. Right is, how do you find a younger person and give them the perspective of an older person. And you're interesting because you're an older person in time, but not an older person in age. So much does that make sense? Yes, yeah. So anyway, listen to Brenda. She knows none of you are going to listen. I just want to say that now,

Brenda 1:06:36
learn from your own experience, but don't take too long. It's okay to learn. It's okay to clean your room and not listen to your dad. But if you did it yesterday, don't do it that way tomorrow. Don't get stuck because your dad does know

Scott Benner 1:06:53
better. Yes, you don't get stuck in the resistance, right? Yeah, yeah. Well, good luck. Good luck to all you about that. I don't know our we're very emotional. Obviously, human beings are very emotional, and emotions driven. And to watch people make decisions that they know are wrong but they still make is fascinating, you know. And, and I don't know how to stop it, but I do know that sharing stories like Brenda's hopefully will get somebody you know, over the finish line today, when they listen and on to that next part of their life that, uh, won't seem like such a fight against reality all the time. I don't know Anyway, this was very lovely of you to share like this. I appreciate it. Who made you come on here like you listen to this podcast.

Brenda 1:07:34
I do listen to this podcast, and it was my niece, which is my sister's daughter in law, her son who became a diabetic, and she just listens to you and she is she's amazing. She is such an advocate for diabetes. It's unbelievable. Her son, who is a teenager, he's play soccer. He is traveling all around the world. He's in high school. They're looking at colleges. They live in Michigan, and he has taken diabetes by the horns and has just will not let it do anything to him. He's just amazing. His name is Levi, and he is just strong and courageous. And his grandfather was diagnosed, and was diagnosed with he was very my my nephew was diagnosed with diabetes and was in the hospital, and his grandfather was in the hospital next door, passing away at the same point my nephew was diagnosed. And so not only did he struggle with just becoming a diabetic, but also losing his grandfather at the same time, a

Scott Benner 1:08:57
lot. So it really is a lot,

Brenda 1:08:59
and he is strong and courageous. And

Scott Benner 1:09:04
you know, I think everybody is honestly I think everybody, no matter what part of this journey they're on, you know, whether they've figured out the things you figured out, or they're still trying to figure them out, or if it takes them a week or a month or 10 years to figure these things out, I think everybody's courageous. I think getting up every morning and going is an act of courage. And you know,

Brenda 1:09:26
even it is, it is every day, every single day with diabetes, is a courageous

Scott Benner 1:09:34
day. Yeah, this ain't easy. Brenda,

Brenda 1:09:38
it's definitely not. But once again, if you have an opportunity anyone to send your child to a camp, do it. I don't advocate for any specific camp, but find one. Don't think there's not one near you. Go meet if you're do it, it's, it's, makes all the difference in a child.

Scott Benner 1:10:00
Held Awesome. All right. Well, I appreciate you sharing that. Thank you so much. Hold on one second for me. Okay,

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,

the episode you just enjoyed was sponsored by the twist a ID system powered by tide pool. If you want a commercially available insulin pump with twist loop that offers unmatched personalization and precision for peace of mind. You want twist, twist.com/juicebox,

I'd like to thank the blood glucose meter that my daughter carries, the contour next gen blood glucose meter. Learn more and get started today at contour next.com/juicebox and don't forget, you may be paying more through your insurance right now for the meter you have then you would pay for the contour next gen in cash. There are links in the show notes of the audio app you're listening in right now, and links at Juicebox podcast.com, to contour and all of the sponsors. Okay, well, here we are at the end of the episode. You're still with me. Thank you. I really do appreciate that. What else could you do for me? Why don't you tell a friend about the show or leave a five star review? Maybe you could make sure you're following or subscribed in your podcast app, go to YouTube and follow me, or Instagram. Tiktok. Oh gosh, here's one. Make sure you're following the podcast in the private Facebook group as well as the public Facebook page you don't want to miss. Please. Do you not know about the private group? You have to join the private group as of this recording, it has 51,000 members in it. They're active, talking about diabetes, whatever you need to know. There's a conversation happening in there right now, and I'm there all the time. Tag me. I'll say hi. The podcast contains so many different series and collections of information that it can be difficult to find them in your traditional podcast app. Sometimes. That's why they're also collected at Juicebox podcast.com go up to the top, there's a menu right there. Click on series, defining diabetes. Bold beginnings, the Pro Tip series, small sips, Omnipod, five ask Scott and Jenny. Mental wellness, fat and protein, defining thyroid. After Dark, diabetes, variables, Grand Rounds, cold, wind, pregnancy, type two, diabetes, GLP, meds, the math behind diabetes, diabetes myths and so much more, you have to go check it out. It's all there I'm waiting for you, and it's absolutely free, Juicebox podcast.com, the episode you just heard was professionally edited by wrong way recording, wrong wayrecording.com.

Please support the sponsors


The Juicebox Podcast is a free show, but if you'd like to support the podcast directly, you can make a gift here. Recent donations were used to pay for podcast hosting fees. Thank you to all who have sent 5, 10 and 20 dollars!

Donate
Read More