Scott Benner 8/28/24 Scott Benner 8/28/24

#1291 I Don't Understand... Jenny Two

I don't understand… Why the type 1 guest from episode 1230 doesn't need insulin anymore. What did the GLP do?

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

Scott Benner 0:00
Hello friends and welcome back to the juicebox podcast. Ready to have some fun?

Jenny's back for another episode of I don't understand. Did you like the last one? I hope you did, because there's gonna be more of Jenny and me and other people not understanding things and us figuring it out. 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 Eversense CGM, an implantable six month sensor. Is what you get with ever since, but you get so much more exceptional and consistent accuracy over six months and distinct on body vibe alerts when you're high or low on body vibe alerts. You don't even know what that means. Do you ever sense cgm.com/juicebox, go find out this episode of The juicebox podcast is sponsored by us med. US med.com/juice box, or call 888-721-1514, US med is where my daughter gets her diabetes supplies from, and you could too use the link or number to get your free benefits check and get started today with us. Med

Today's episode is sponsored by Medtronic diabetes, a company that's bringing together people who are redefining what it means to live with diabetes. Later in this episode, I'll be speaking with Mark. He was diagnosed with type one diabetes at 28 he's 47 now he's going to tell you a little bit about his story, and then at the very end of the episode, you can hear my entire mini interview with Mark. To hear more stories from the Medtronic champion community, or to share your own story, visit Medtronic diabetes.com/juicebox and check out the Medtronic champion hashtag on social media. We're gonna do something here today. We're gonna try to figure this out together. Because I don't understand this, and I don't know if you do either. Okay. Now this is actually coming from a listener, so I'm gonna read, I'm gonna read their their question. But okay, truth be told, I don't understand this the way I should. I don't think you do either, and let's see if we can figure it out together. Did you hear episode 1230 with the gentleman who had type one diabetes diagnosed at age 50, and now at age 58 on Manjaro is not taking any insulin at all

Jennifer Smith, CDE 2:40
I did. I listened actually. I did listen to that episode. That's perfect, because

Scott Benner 2:44
this gentleman says, with regard to podcast number 1230 where the T 1d guest says he has been completely off of insulin for two years due to being on a GLP one medication. How does his body get nutrients without insulin? Does insulin only Shepherd glucose to muscles and cells. So now this person right here, their confusion is where my I don't understand, comes in, because what they think is, well, that guy's not making insulin anymore, because that's what I was told about. Type one. Type one means don't make insulin, which we all agree about. But then, if this guy was type one, how is he not taking man made insulin, and if he's not, how come all this stuff isn't happening to him? So my question is, Jenny, I don't understand how this happened to that guest on that episode. Do you understand why he doesn't need insulin anymore,

Jennifer Smith, CDE 3:33
not at an in depth way, but I think one, his diagnosis was at age 50, correct. So he was diagnosed as an adult. So Lata, what we do know about diagnosis as adults, and it differs adult to adult, is that they have a tendency to actually have more beta cell reserve. And the expectation is that, and if I remember correctly, he still wears a CGM, even though he just uses the GLP one right now, right? So he did say that he can see excursions in his blood sugar, but his body fixes those excursions like his blood sugar might go up to 171 80. It does it on its own and brings it back down to the goal, target for the most part. Again, generalizing people without type one that have fully functioning beta cells, their blood sugar is not going to go up to 180 it is not it takes a lot of excessive, really simple carb to get it to nudge above target, yes, right? So he's having excursions. He doesn't technically have to take insulin, but I also expect that most of the time he's not eating, you know, six plates of sushi. He's probably eating a really well balanced diet. He exercises, if I remember correctly, from the episode and. So his beta cells that were in reserve, along with the impact of the monjaro, which is the only dual hormone, right? It's a GLP one and it's a GI P, yes, so it's the one on the market that has the heaviest impact on insulin sensitivity and weight loss and glucose management. So when we consider the kind of GLP one he's on, the fact that he was diagnosed as an adult, likely has a beta cell reserve, that would be my again, tip of the iceberg, understanding as to why he's not having to inject or pump insulin at this point. Yeah,

Scott Benner 5:41
okay. So that that is exactly my expectation, that, in truth, the poor guy might very well need his insulin again at some at some point. Yeah, right, but it is not so the so the story gets confusing, like it's confusing to this person, because, you know, I'm confused as to why this guy isn't starving because he's not taking insulin. He's on a GLP medication that suppresses appetite. Everything about it is confusing. It's exciting to see someone needing only one dose a week of GLP and that he's off insulin. I just want to understand how this works. So this guy is being very reasonable. I've seen people not be reasonable around this conversation, right? I

Jennifer Smith, CDE 6:21
have seen that as well. And I also think, in terms of the gentleman's question, the idea that type one totally and completely destroys every single little, teeny, tiny beta cell that you have in your body. It's not really the case, right? I mean, the only true measure of that would be a C peptide. And I don't know that he commented on his C peptides. I don't remember in the conversation if he did or not, but I would expect that with this down shift in delay in digestion, the body's ability to not have these major excursions in blood sugar, I would expect that again, those betas that are in reserve for him. He probably has still diagnostic of type one, but he probably has more C peptide visible than other people. Again, his time of type one has been very short, comparative to other people as well. So he it's not that he's not getting insulin. He is his betas that are there are still making it. And so to answer the guy's question about, How is he getting nutrients, his body is shuttling it in because his insulin receptors are working better. His cells are responding better to glucose and metabolizing the glucose better with this GLP one assisting with all of that, right? Right now

Scott Benner 7:44
we're going to hear from a member of the Medtronic champion community. This episode of The juicebox podcast is sponsored by Medtronic diabetes, and this is Mark.

David 7:53
I use injections for about six months, and then my endocrinologist in the Navy recommended a pump.

Scott Benner 7:59
How long had you been in the Navy eight years up to that point, I've interviewed a number of people who have been diagnosed during service, and most of the time they're discharged. What happened to you? I

David 8:09
was medically discharged, yeah, six months after my diagnosis, was it

Scott Benner 8:13
your goal to stay in the Navy for your whole life, your career? It was, yeah,

David 8:16
yeah. In fact, I think a few months before my diagnosis, my wife and I had that discussion about, you know, staying in for the long term. And you know, we'd made the decision despite all the hardships and time away from home. That was what we

Scott Benner 8:30
loved the most, was the Navy like a lifetime goal of yours. Lifetime goal.

David 8:34
I mean, as my earliest childhood memories were flying, being a fighter pilot,

Scott Benner 8:39
how did your diagnosis impact your lifelong dream.

David 8:42
It was devastating. Everything I had done in life, everything I'd worked up to, up to that point, was just taken away in an instant. I was not prepared for that at all. What does your support system look like? Friends, your family caregivers, you know, for me, the Medtronic champions community, you know, all those resources that are out there and help guide the way, but then help keep abreast on you know, the new things that are coming down the pipe, and to give you hope for eventually, that we can find a cure.

Scott Benner 9:07
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, US 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 order's ready. Order's 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/juice, box. Or call 888-721-1514, get your free benefits checked 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/juice, box. Or by calling 888-721-1514, there are links in the show notes of your podcast player and links at juicebox podcast.com to us, med and all the sponsors. Right? So my, my kind of layman's expectation is he's lotta. So latas typically develops in individuals over 30, often between the ages of 30 and 50 symptoms, initial symptoms of lot of may resemble those of type two diabetes, and include, you know, everything, etc, but diagnosis, lot of can be challenging to diagnose and listen. We've had people on the podcast talking about this forever. There's always people diagnosed type two and there are lot of lot of meaning a very slow onset of type one diabetes. Wasted diagnosis. Auto antibodies, presence of auto antibodies, such as the GAD go, God ready, glutamic acid, Jesus, can you say that mic acid? What's the decarbolus thing?

Unknown Speaker 11:15
That's pretty good

Scott Benner 11:18
antibodies. These are typically found in type ones and indicate an auto immune response. That's really what I think most people stick to. If you have auto antibodies. This is auto immune. Your type one like it gets into the

Jennifer Smith, CDE 11:32
and then there are several more. I think there are four or five that are typically they this is a insulin antibody or auto antibody. There's a zinc transport there. There are a couple of them that have specifics to type one, not only the GAD, yeah. So again, regardless, he clearly was diagnosed with type one. At least one of these was positive, right, right? And

Scott Benner 11:56
your C peptide level is an indicator of your insulin production. Is that? Right? Right,

Jennifer Smith, CDE 12:01
correct. So when insulin is made in the beta cells, sort of the there's a piece of protein that's attached to, kind of move it out, and it's shaped, kind of like a C shape, is my understanding. So when it gets cleaved off and it enters circulation, that C shape remains there as an indicator of your own pancreatic insulin production, which is why, when you start injecting insulin, you can still get a C peptide level tested, because the insulin that you take via injection or pump doesn't ever put that C peptide into your body,

Scott Benner 12:33
right? And that can lower and decline over time. And that's our expectation when somebody comes with Yes, with Lada, because that's exactly what you know. What I'm looking at here is over time, individuals with LADA will typically require insulin therapy as their beta cells are gradually now, this says destroyed and and their ability to produce insulin decreases. I do. I believe in the destroyed word there, because there are definitely people you could, you know, they could drink GLP in their ears, and they're not. They're still going to need all their insulin, right, correct, like, so. So for the guy in episode, in the episode that we're talking about, I guess I should have it here, 1230 he was diagnosed at 50. He was using all the insulin by six years in like, he was really he was using a lot of insulin, which indicated to him and to his physician, I have type one diabetes, like I just do, they end up putting him on Manjaro for weight, and he suddenly doesn't need insulin. But he's also, to Jenny's point earlier, having excursions at meals that are higher than a person without diabetes would have, right

Jennifer Smith, CDE 13:40
and higher than somebody who was taking insulin to cover or clear some of that carbohydrate or food, right? That his betas are clearly not doing everything, but enough to clear it so that he's not sitting high for eight hours, right? I'm assuming that his excursions, along with his endocrine they look okay, if

Scott Benner 14:04
I remember, possibly it's only over an hour, an hour and a half, he pops 180 and comes right back, doesn't get low. And that's that. So what he's saying is, is that for however long this is going to work for me, this is magical, you know, and everyone would type one, and who's listening to this, I would assume would trade one shot a week for that situation over, over what they're in right now. Agreed, the confusion becomes, and you can tell by this gentleman's question is that, what is it? It's the um, it's older type ones, really, who think of it this way, right? Like, because, what is it? Do you think it's that argument between type one and you're old enough to know this. You're not old Jenny, but you're old enough to know this, like, okay, old head type, type ones, they don't want to be thought of as type twos,

Jennifer Smith, CDE 14:51
right? I guess in in general, yeah,

Scott Benner 14:53
because back in the day, if you have type two diabetes, you don't control yourself. You're overweight. That's your fault, right? That was the narrative. And type one defense of that was, I can't help this. This is auto immune. This just happened to me, and Don't lump me in with people who aren't taking good care of themselves, right? When that gets into the zeitgeist, and that's how people think my concern has been, and I'm using this episode to clear it up. I hope is that now that we're in the future and we're learning new things, we don't want to jump on this poor guy and say, because I saw him take it after the episode, you know, you're not a type one prove to me that you had auto antibodies. Blah, blah, blah. I'm like, just listen to the guy's story and like, I don't understand how nobody listens to type to episode 1230 and thinks, wow, there's a lot to learn about this. GLP, well,

Jennifer Smith, CDE 15:43
and I think to go right along with it, while it wasn't a complete loss of insulin use, I know that you've It was either an episode or you've talked to somebody who has a teenager whose insulin needs have come down like 90% of what this person was using now, being on a GLP one, so again, not completely off of insulin. But you can see, even in this person with, I don't know if she has longer diabetes than this gentleman or whatever, but diagnosed as a as a child, she probably had more B to cell initial destruction, and so has enough left to assist, along with what the GLP one is contributing, but still needs some insulin. And if

Scott Benner 16:31
she gets years like that, then good for her, then good for her, yeah, not just good for her, like her happiness, but her health and her longevity. It's going to help a lot of different things. So let's go into this gentleman's question a little deeper. The guy we're talking about needs insulin. He's taking a basal insulin and a meal time insulin. He's got type one diabetes. Obviously, it's going to be a very slow onset, like, probably what he was taking six years in, wouldn't have managed him well, 10 years from now, even you know, as possibly as his possibly as his beta cells continue to degrade,

Jennifer Smith, CDE 17:04
especially considering he was already having a weight management issue, and that was the reason you said the mole jar was started given to

Scott Benner 17:13
him to begin with, right? So, so, so then my question is, what changed? What did the GLP do? Like, I know it increases insulin sensitivity, but, but how? Like, what does that mean? Do we even know that part, or do we just know it happens

Jennifer Smith, CDE 17:27
the insulin sensitivity part? Yeah. Like, how

Scott Benner 17:30
does the GLP, like, magically? Because it feels magic, like you need insulin and now you don't, or you need even when you need less. Like, forget this guy for a second, right? My daughter takes a GLP medication. She's using significantly less insulin than she was without it. Okay, right? Why? What

Jennifer Smith, CDE 17:47
happened? Well, I mean, the GLP ones work several ways. One is for those who do still have some beta cells, or essentially, you know, type twos who have beta cells, but it's really the use of insulin and whatnot. That's the problem. These GLP ones do help with release of insulin. So for him, if his insulin resistance was cleared up because his weight came down and he had enough beta cell response then that his body wasn't having to overcome the resistance, then that could be a piece of it, in terms of the GLP ones helping to trigger the insulin release actually, and maybe more in the correct way, and usability improves. Obviously, GLP ones obviously also block glucagon release from the liver, and so, you know our response, it's a big reason that we actually have the idea of pre bolusing and understanding insulin use around meal times, because we do have this release of like stored gluco so to speak, and output of the liver. And if we block that, we are going to have lower post meal blood sugars, which is, again, probably a piece of why. Maybe his blood sugar goes up, but he responds very well. And now that he's had enough insulin release and his body is sensitized to the insulin, we have to remember that these meds also slow gastric emptying or delayed digestion, so the slower the things kind of sneak into with somebody who may have better insulin sensitivity. Now it allows the insulin that their betas are producing to actually gain traction right to work. And then, of course, you know whether this is helping him or not, and I can't remember whether he spoke much about it, but obviously the satiety factor with all of the GLP ones, most people, that's a big thing they talk about is, gosh, I feel like my head is clear from not considering food all day long anymore, like I can eat when I want to eat, or I choose to eat, but I'm no longer. I. I no longer so hungry, so to speak. Yeah,

Scott Benner 20:04
the episode that went up today I told you about before we started recording, so it's not on here. It's called, I'm getting the name for it. But this one is with a mom of a young type one daughter, and it's called Ken, GLP, meds, impact mental health. Oh, episode 1254 because this little girl is bipolar, and a mixture of lithium and GLP medications took away so many of her issues, it's like it's almost insane. But during one of the during a part of the conversation, the mom said that you could not keep packaged food around the house, because she would just attack it and just eat it. And she's like, what the GLP med has done just specifically to that kid's desire for sugar is amazing. But I want to say this sincerely. It's going to sound like I'm joking. If I had a private plane when we got done recording it, I'd get on it. I'd fly to where you are. I drive to your house, I'd give you a big hug. I'd tell you you are a national treasure. Have lunch with you. Let you give me some of that weird food you eat. And then I would drive home and let me tell you why. Let me tell everyone why. While Jenny was just saying what she said, and she is looking at me in the camera, she is not reading. She right, you know. Okay,

Jennifer Smith, CDE 21:19
I have nothing because I know that podcasts get recorded. Well, when nothing else is open on the computer screen, I have learned so. Scott, thank you. Jen. Jay is

Scott Benner 21:29
like, it doesn't open anything because I don't want anything to crash. Well, while, while Jenny was doing that dummy over here, went to chat GPT, and I said this, how do GLP meds remove the need for man made insulin be technical, but at a fifth grade level, that was so that I could understand it. And it said, and I am not kidding everything, you just no more or no less. You just pulled that right out of your ass, okay? And it was exactly Jenny is as smart as chat GPT when it comes to diabetes. That's all I wanted to say, boosting insulin production, lowering other hormones like glucagon, slowing down digestion, helping you feel full. And the wrap up was, GLP, one meds help your body make more of its own insulin, lower extra sugar, slow down sugar spikes and reduce how much you can eat. Your blood sugar stays more stable because your own insulin and these other effects are working better. You might not need as much man made insulin to keep your blood sugar in check. God, damn, you're a fcking brilliant person. I love to

Jennifer Smith, CDE 22:30
know the medication, because it's I mean, thank you very much for

Scott Benner 22:34
Oh, seriously, Jenny, I could have lined up 1000 people and asked that question. I would have got no

Jennifer Smith, CDE 22:43
well, thanks. Seriously, it's such the new I mean, honestly, this

Scott Benner 22:48
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Jennifer Smith, CDE 24:13
I've also, you know, GOP ones have been on the market for a long time, despite them really gaining ground because of the new formulations that really do have a lot more power than the older versions had, but the older versions still worked. I mean, they were, they were what we had initially, that we, you know, the victos and the by durians and those types of things. They they did a good job, just not what our current day does.

Scott Benner 24:42
I was having this thought this morning because it became so popular for weight loss, we ended up and listen, there was a lot of bitching in the media and everywhere else about it. But in the end, it ended up being a good thing, because instead of target, using it for one thing and finding a lot of very similar. Are people. There are people with all different kinds of health implications across the world who needed to lose weight. So we basically spread it out over everybody. And that's why you're getting back these like, Hey, um, I'm getting pregnant on this. Or my again, more I'm hearing about people saying their airs danlers syndrome is, like, I know I never say that correctly, but like, like, they're having lessening facts. Now, I got a girl here that says that, you know, a significant amount of her bipolar issues are cleared up. I mean, come on, right and then, and the guy from the episode we're talking about, he's gonna listen, if you want my opinion about what happened to the gentleman episode 1230 which you should really listen to, is that he is going to get a much longer honeymoon than he was going to and need less insulin during it than he was doing fantastic right

Jennifer Smith, CDE 25:51
on so many fronts, you know, glucose, glucose management ties into so much in terms of long term health. It does a cardiovascular health, brain health, I mean, all the things that are now being studied and understand, understood about true glucose management, whether you have diabetes or not, it's tied into a lot of body function. So you know, if we can sensitize our bodies in multiple ways, this doesn't necessarily mean you throw out all of the good lifestyle habits that you've been trying to put into action keeping them. In fact, exercise, by far, is the top the tip of the pyramid of anything good that you can do for your body, for like an ongoing health into your later years, even as little as walking every single day, right? But if we keep those things in the picture, along with something that could help when those lifestyle things aren't doing enough for us, then great. Yeah.

Scott Benner 27:00
I mean, listen, you say lower your inflammation prior to GLP, if you tell somebody, you would tell them to eat low inflammatory foods and blah, blah, you can't eat enough of that goddamn food to help you if you have a real problem. I mean, come on, you know, use fermented. Okay, great. Like sauerkraut and myself. You think if I ate sauerkraut, I'd have lost 50 pounds? No, okay, you know, I don't have diabetes. I have no my doctor told me all the time, like I actually was told by my endocrinologist, I don't foresee you ever getting Type Two Diabetes, like at your age, where you're fasting glucose is and everything I see from you, you just don't present as somebody who's gonna end up with type two and I'm like, Oh, great. I'm still significantly overweight, unhealthy, etc, and so on. But I wasn't doing any of the things that classically people would say, oh, it's because he's doing this. Like, I really don't live a much different life right now than I did before. While we're looking for, like, spreading out over people who needed to lose weight and learning things. I was getting iron infusions yearly, maybe twice a year. Some years or I would fall apart and die. My ferritin level was going down into the single digits, right? That doesn't happen anymore. My body is absorbing iron now, and I'm fine. I haven't needed an infusion in a year and a half, and

Jennifer Smith, CDE 28:19
I wonder there, you know, just in in that small, little, narrow, I wonder if it has to do something with the way that these meds slow digestion. I wonder if it's your body now has enough time to completely absorb what it needs to and so you don't have to medically manage your irons, yours,

Scott Benner 28:39
yeah, and keep in mind that, prior to that, my fartin drops, and the doctor, so first of all, they think you have cancer right away, because if you're of a young enough age, and it looks like you're losing, you know, iron, they just so I gotta go through all that. I scope one way I get scope, the other way, well, Oh, you don't have cancer. Good, good. Congratulations, thanks. I'm still having all these problems, right? Maybe have celiac don't eat gluten for a month. A month later, nothing changes. I'm like, Look that that wasn't it. You know what they said after that, take an iron supplement with vitamin C. It helps it uptake it faster. So I did that. You know what? That did? Not a lot, nothing. Yeah, right. And so I was going to be one of those people that they were like, Hmm, don't understand. Bye, bye. Like, you know, like, that was it? Like, we did all the things that we understand. We go off and think I took the GLP because I went to when my kids, my second kid, went off to college. I went to my kids endocrinologist, and I said, Hey, yo, I did it. I raised those kids. They're good people. They're not going to murder anybody. Now, I

Jennifer Smith, CDE 29:42
have time for me. I

Scott Benner 29:42
need to stay alive, right, right, right, like and, and she looks at me. She knows me. She'd been helping me with things, right? And she didn't know what was happening still. And I said, I need to lose weight. And she looked at me and said, why? And we were standing face to face. See, and I said, and she goes, I said, you don't see. And she goes, No. She goes, Scott. She's like, you could lose weight, but you don't look like that's your problem. And I said, Well, that's very nice. And I stood up. I don't know if I've told this in the podcast, I stood up, I took off my sweatshirt, and I said, I'm gonna get on a scale in a minute. You guessed my weight? And she guessed my weight at about 175 pounds, which, by the way, is well under, yes, is eight pounds less than I weigh right now, and I've already lost 48 pounds like so when I told her my weight, she goes, Oh God, we'll get you a GLP medication. And the stuff that came after it, she didn't say, I'll get you the GLP medication. And, by the way, you won't need iron infusions anymore because this, she didn't know that was going to happen. No, yeah, right.

Jennifer Smith, CDE 30:42
I think that's, I mean, you bring up a good point there. I think that again, despite GLP ones having been around for a while, this new generation of them being so much more impactful, there are so many things being discovered and found that are, let's call them positives, yeah, or other health related things. Now, I do think that longer term, we need a lot of evaluation and study and everything, because you know, you're putting something in your body that technically, while, while it is a hormone that your body would normally make for whatever reason, environmental, food system, whatever's happening in our today's life, body, there's something that's not working the right way. Otherwise people wouldn't be responding. I think people like you, as an example, would it really be responding if your body was actually doing what it should be doing? That's my

Scott Benner 31:46
only point. Is that for me and for many other people, your body's not doing something, and this medication is is covering for it, somehow covering what do we care? Like, like, I Why do you like? Just listen, I know this isn't like. I'd spread it on everybody. I'd sprinkle it over top of us and be like, let's see what else it fixes. We're gonna figure that out. Like, it's the baseline stuff. Like, Oh, I lost weight so my knees don't hurt anymore, and I'm not gonna have to have a hip surgery or something. Like, that's nice and all. And don't get me wrong, it's amazing. But listen, this is new. Recent studies have highlighted the potential of GLP one agonists such as ozempic and reducing the risk of dementia, particularly Alzheimer's disease and people with type two diabetes. A large study involving 88,000 participants showed that those treated with GLP one agonists had a significantly lower risk of developing dementia compared to those using other diabetes medications like sulfonylureas and DPP four inhibitors, the reduction in risk was 30% compared to sulfonylureas at 23% compared to DPP four inhibitors. Come on. Like,

Unknown Speaker 32:53
yay. Like,

Scott Benner 32:55
you know what I mean? Like, you mean I don't have to be overweight, and when I'm 85 I'm not gonna be like, banging my head on a wall, like, you know what I mean? Like, this is wonderful. Jenny, for 20 years, I heard people say inflammation is the problem, but they didn't know what to do with it. After that, it feels like we know what to do. Now a little better, a little better. Yeah.

Jennifer Smith, CDE 33:18
I mean, they're only, I think the biggest thing that I'd like to see with these medications is the right kind of education in use of them. You know, in terms of prescribing, as a prescriber, you're a caregiver, and you should really be checking in with your patients. You should really be checking in and saying, How are things going? You know, you start them on this a weekend, there should be a follow up, even a quick message, right? They How are things going? Let's see, how are you feeling, etc, because some people may respond better to one than another, yeah, you know. And if there's not enough information given up front about how you might feel, is this normal? When should I call if it's not feeling back to normal or whatever? I think on the case of clinicians, they really need to do a lot of self educating about these to know what's appropriate and how to help people use them to their advantage. Yeah, they

Scott Benner 34:19
also have to understand what they're what they're actually doing for people. Because right one of the bigger problems with the glps right now, as it's being reported, is that the dropout rate is like around two years. So you know, my opinion of that is that this medication may be doing a lot more for you than you understand, and just because you didn't continue to lose weight or didn't get to your goal weight might it might

Jennifer Smith, CDE 34:41
not be, might not be. The only thing that it was helping Exactly, right? And doctors

Scott Benner 34:47
need to understand, like, Listen, if you are one of the people who takes it and you're nauseous and vomiting constantly, it's not for you, obviously, like, but I'm not talking about just force yourself through it. But right? I made it through some side effects, like. There was, there was a a fair amount of time in there where I was like, I'm never gonna have a solid bowel movement ever again in my entire life. And like, but I was losing weight to the point where I was like, You know what I actually thought? And this is nothing technical, obviously, this was my thought. I'll let you go. Yeah, it took me this many years to get this fat. I wonder what horrible things were happening inside of me then that I never, like, I never batted an eye against I didn't, I didn't go out and, you know, eat greasy food, because I used to eat greasy food, I don't anymore. I didn't go out eat greasy food, come home, have distress in the bathroom, and then go, Well, I'm never gonna eat greasy food again. Like, like, I'm like, I struggled through that to get to my next french fry. I better, like, I'll try this, you know what I mean, right? And I stuck with it. Now I don't have that problem anymore. But I mean, if you're really impacted by it in a way that you just can't function, I understand it's not for you that's fine, but for everyone else, like, we gotta keep paying attention to this, I think. Yeah, so, to answer the gentleman's initial question, I don't understand why this guy doesn't need insulin. He does need insulin, and his body is making it right now. Yes,

Jennifer Smith, CDE 36:03
that's it. That's the bottom line, without all the biochemistry and physiology and all the stuff, yes, that's the bottom line. I mean, we

Scott Benner 36:13
made a good podcast episode here. I'm

Speaker 1 36:14
gonna let you go. Thank you. Of course, you I

Scott Benner 36:23
want to thank the ever since CGM for sponsoring this episode of The juicebox podcast, and invite you to go to ever sense cgm.com/juicebox to learn more about this terrific device, you can head over now and just absorb everything that the website has to offer, and that way you'll know if ever since feels right for you, ever since cgm.com/juice box, Arden has been getting her diabetes supplies from us med for three years, you can As well us med.com/juice box, or call 888-721-1514, my thanks to us, med for sponsoring this episode and for being long time sponsors of the juicebox podcast. There are links in the show notes and links at juicebox podcast. Com to us, med and all of the sponsors. Mark is an incredible example of what so many experience living with diabetes. You show up for yourself and others every day, never letting diabetes define you, and that is what the Medtronic champion community is all about. Each of us is strong, and together, we're even stronger. To hear more stories from the Medtronic champion community or to share your own story, visit Medtronic diabetes.com/juicebox Once, there was a time when I just told people, if you want a low and stable a 1c just listen to the juicebox podcast. But as the years went on and the podcast episodes grew, it became more and more difficult for people to listen to everyone. So I made the diabetes Pro Tip series. This series is with me and Jenny Smith. Jenny is a Certified Diabetes Care and Education Specialist. She's also a registered and licensed dietitian and a type one herself for over 30 years. And I, of course, am the father of a child who was diagnosed at age two in 2006 head now to juicebox podcast com, go up in the menu at the top and click on diabetes pro tip. Or if you're in the private Facebook group, there's a list of these episodes right in the featured tab. Find out how I help keep my daughters A, 1c, between five, two and six, two for the last 10 years without diet restrictions. Juicebox podcast.com start listening today. It's absolutely free. 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? Uh, 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. Tik, Tok. 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 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, 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?

#1290 Hello, It's Me

Adelle has type 1 diabetes.

+ Click for EPISODE TRANSCRIPT

Scott Benner 0:00
Hello friends and welcome back to the juicebox podcast.

On today's show, I'll be speaking with Adele. She is 12 years old and has had type one diabetes for a little under two years. At the time of this recording, Adele has some Hashimotos and eczema in her family, and we're going to talk about that as well as how type one diabetes impacts her life. Please don't forget that 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. Don't forget to save 40% off of your entire order at cozy earth.com All you have to do is use the offer code juicebox at checkout. That's juicebox at checkout to save 40% at cozy earth.com when you place your first order for AG, one with my link, you'll get five free travel packs and a free year supply of vitamin D drink, ag one.com/juice box. If you'd like to save 40% off of your first purchase@hungryroot.com use this link. Hungryroot.com/juice box. That's all you have to do. Hungryroot.com get your food there, let them make it for you. What do you bother them with cooking for what are you a chef, yes. Chef, does anybody watch the bear on Hulu? Thank you? Chef, no. Chef, thank you. Chef, this show is sponsored today by the glucagon that my daughter carries. Jeevo hypo pen. Find out more at gvoke, glucagon.com, forward slash juice box. This episode of the juice box podcast is sponsored by us. Med, us. Med.com/juice, box, or call 888-721-1514, get your supplies the same way we do from us. Med, this episode of the juice box podcast is sponsored by the Eversense CGM, an implantable six month sensor. Is what you get with Eversense, but you get so much more exceptional and consistent accuracy over six months and distinct on body vibe alerts when you're high or low on body vibe alerts. You don't even know what that means. Do you ever sense cgm.com/juice? Cgm.com/juicebox, go find out. Hi, I'm Adele. Adele. How old are you? 1212? You have type one, yes. For how long

Adele 2:34
I've had it since May 20, 2022, so that would have been one year and nine months.

Scott Benner 2:41
Wow. A year and nine months. Were you 10 when you got it? Or had you? Yes, yes. What? Wait, yeah, yeah, okay,

Adele 2:50
oh, yeah. 10 years old, it says

Scott Benner 2:53
you have notes. Yeah,

Adele 2:55
you think of some important information. That's

Scott Benner 2:58
okay. That's good. You, uh, brothers and sisters, yes,

Adele 3:01
I have a sister. Um, she's 10 right now.

Scott Benner 3:04
Does she have any autoimmune stuff? Um, no. Do you have any other autoimmune stuff besides type one?

Adele 3:10
I don't think so. But I know my grandpa and my uncle on my mom's side have eczema, and then my grandma on my dad's side has this thing that I can't present, um, like a pronounce spell it, H, A, S, H, Hashimotos.

Scott Benner 3:27
Yeah, that's, that's an autoimmune issue. That's a thyroid, okay? And who was that? Oh, yeah,

Adele 3:32
my grandma on my dad's side,

Scott Benner 3:34
grandma. Oh, wait a minute, your grandma on your dad's side has Hashimotos, and someone on your mom's side has eczema.

Adele 3:39
Yeah, my grandpa and my uncle. Interesting,

Scott Benner 3:42
interesting not to you, interesting to me, to you. You're just like, I don't want diabetes tell me about so you're old enough to kind of remember this. So did you start feeling sick? Did someone say something to you? How did you get diagnosed?

Adele 3:55
Well, like, I, I went to, like, the bathroom, like, in the middle of the night, like a lot. And my mom, like, was, like, noticing that kind of as, like, one of the symptoms. And she also noticed some other things. I didn't really notice a bunch.

Scott Benner 4:07
So what else did she notice that? You didn't notice that

Adele 4:10
I was, like, eating a lot, very hungry. Yeah. And I losing weight,

Scott Benner 4:17
lost weight, peeing in the middle of the night, a bunch. How long do you think this all went on for before she was like, Hey, we should go talk to a doctor.

Speaker 1 4:25
I'm not really sure you don't remember, like, for maybe, like, a few weeks. Okay,

Scott Benner 4:31
okay, did your teachers notice anything? My

Adele 4:34
I feel I'm not sure if I was diagnosed yet, but my t my fifth grade teacher, she kind of noticed that I was like, kind of like, I think moody ish, but I don't remember if I was that like, if I've diagnosed that time, or if it was before my diagnosis. So

Scott Benner 4:48
if people thought I had diabetes every time I was moody, that would be something, moody ish. I don't know what that means, but it's funny. What makes you want to come on the podcast. So

Adele 4:58
I'm like, very. Way out, like, with my diabetes, I'm not like, kind of like, shy, so I kind of thought like, hey, this seems fun. I want to try it. Okay, so you just

Scott Benner 5:09
want to give it a shot. You want to talk to other people about type one and be open about your diabetes. Yeah, okay, oh, let's do that then. So your mom sees all these issues. Do you go to a doctor, hospital. Where do you head? So we

Adele 5:22
did go to the doctor, but then after that, I went to the hospital, like, I immediately went home, grabbed my stuff, and went to the hospital, like, emergency, and then I stayed for one night. That

Scott Benner 5:34
was it. Yes, do you remember what your blood sugar was do? What do you remember about? Yeah,

Adele 5:38
I have that written down when I went to the hospital, my blood sugar was 407, okay.

Scott Benner 5:44
Do you remember a lot about that time in the hospital? I know it's only a day, but were you scared? Was it confusing?

Adele 5:52
I remember not getting to eat for like a while. Eventually, they offered me ice chips, and I thought it was gonna be like something that was just ice cubes. And I was kind of disappointed. You thought you were getting

Scott Benner 6:02
something fancy and you got ice in a cup. Yeah, they didn't do the thing. They let you drink with a straw, though, right? Eventually, have you ever had the the sponge, the wet sponge, at the hospital when they won't? Oh, my God, all right. Well, here, listen, I hope this never happens to you, but if you're in the hospital and they want to restrict your fluids, they won't let you drink. They'll put a cup and a sponge on a stick, and you're allowed to wet the sponge and rub it inside of your teeth and your gums to wet your mouth, huh? Not good. Okay. You don't want that. It's not even a fun sponge. It's like, I don't know what a fun sponge would be, but it feels it's not comfortable, and the sticks plastic. It's all very strange. So what you remember about the hospital is more about not being able to eat and stuff like that. You weren't like, Oh, my God, I have diabetes or, well, like,

Adele 6:47
at first when I was in the doctor's office, I was like, Wait, why are you guys talking about this? And then, like, I just started crying. I was very like, sad at the moment,

Scott Benner 6:56
sad because you knew something was wrong, or sad because you were scared. Do you remember,

Adele 7:02
I think it was like, more or less like me being like, kind of like, kind of a bit of both,

Scott Benner 7:07
okay, yeah, just overwhelming,

Unknown Speaker 7:10
yeah. Did

Scott Benner 7:12
your mom cry when you cried? No,

Adele 7:14
she was, like, talking to the doctor. I was kind of just sitting like next to her, like, why are you guys talking about diabetes like I was just hearing a bunch of words being like, thrown around

Scott Benner 7:24
Adele. I know you guys grew up being on camera, so you're very accustomed to it, but I find when I'm looking at you, I wonder what I look like. Do you ever have that feeling you're like, I'm looking at him, he can see me. But what do I look like right now? Do you ever think that? Because then when you look at you, that's not what you look like anymore. Does that make sense? Kind of right? Because if you like, watch, I'm looking at you, but now, if I look at me, you're not seeing me the same way as when I'm looking at you. But I'll never know what. I guess I could take a screenshot. In my mind, I look very different when my head's turned a half an inch one way or the other. I'm sure that's not even true. Did you go to school on camera during covid?

Adele 8:00
Yes, we, I know we did, like, two days at school, and then the other days, like the other group of kids would go in and we would, like,

Speaker 1 8:08
I think we were on Zoom, I don't remember. Yeah, was this before or after your diabetes?

Adele 8:15
Way before that was like, that was like, covid. So, like, two years before, I think, like, 2020, so, yeah,

Scott Benner 8:21
do you remember? Were you sick at all before you were diagnosed? How many viruses? Or,

Adele 8:27
yeah, I didn't have covid. I

Unknown Speaker 8:29
believe you think you had covid. I'm

Adele 8:31
pretty sure I had covid. Like, when, like, part of that stuff was, like, going on,

Scott Benner 8:35
how was it for you? Did you Was it hard on you? Or was it pretty gentle covid, yeah, it was like, more like a cold, or were you like, wow, I'm really sick. I think it

Adele 8:45
was kind of more like a cold. It wasn't super bad. Okay, okay, so

Scott Benner 8:49
you get diagnosed, and it's scary, and you go to the hospital, you're not there too long. You come home, and is it up to you? Do your parents say? Like, are your parents married? Yes, yeah. So are your parents? Like, well, you, you're a big girl. Adele, like, let's get going. Or were they, like, we'll help you. Like, how much, what was the division of work

Adele 9:08
they like, helped me a lot.

Scott Benner 9:09
Do they still, yeah, okay. Do you want them to? Need them to like them to I do kind

Adele 9:17
of like the help. Like, I could do like those stuff on my own, but it's nice to like have some help, yeah.

Scott Benner 9:23
So what do you use? What kind of gear Do you have? So I

Adele 9:29
have the Dexcom g6 and the OmniPod five.

Scott Benner 9:32
OmniPod five, Dexcom g6 you can change your sensor by yourself on your Dexcom. Yes or no, yes, yes.

Adele 9:41
I've had to do my OmniPod a lot of times, because sometimes it was, like, before dance and stuff. So I had to, like, change it real quick, because my mom wasn't

Scott Benner 9:50
home, right? You know how to change your pod. No problem with that. Yeah, counting carbs. Where are you with that? Yeah, I'm pretty good at it. Okay, like, when you're gonna have a meal, do you like slide the control? Or towards your mom and be like, Here, take care of this. Or do you just do it? Sometimes, nice?

Adele 10:04
Yeah? Because sometimes, like, it's kind of annoying to, like, find the carbs, because, like, and I have to wait and stuff and, like, the worst part, honestly, is, like, waiting the 15 minutes, though, yeah, because I

Scott Benner 10:15
know it's next. How do you eat? Do you have, like, a certain style of, like, eating something you like more than other you're a vegetarian, eat a lot of meat? No, I don't think so. Just kind of eat what mom gives you got you, yeah, what's an average, uh, meal at dinner time? Like, what do you have a lot in the house?

Adele 10:33
You like, my mom, like, makes all these like different things. So there's not really, like an average thing, okay, so she's

Scott Benner 10:39
she makes a lot of different variable things. So you give vegetables good cook too nice. That's good. Sometimes people grow up thinking their parents are good cooks. Then they meet somebody who actually is good at cooking, and they go, Oh my god, I thought like this was here. I'll tell you a secret. My wife thought salt and pepper were spices like that was, like, the how exciting food was in her house, you know what I mean? And it wasn't one year at Thanksgiving, their Turkey was so, like, it was so disgusting. And I was like, Oh, it's great, thanks. I picked around it. Then the next year, I said, Can I bring my own Turkey to Thanksgiving? She was like, No, that'll be insulting. I was like, oh, okay, it's terrible. She didn't know the difference until she got moved out. I think it happens to a lot of people. How about your friends? So you weren't in the hospital very long for friends to come visit. But what's it like afterwards? Now, do you have, like, a close group of friends? How would you describe your friendships. This episode of The juicebox podcast is sponsored by the ever since CGM, ever since cgm.com/juicebox, the Eversense CGM is the only long term CGM with six months of real time glucose readings giving you more convenience, confidence and flexibility. And you didn't hear me wrong. I didn't say 14 days, I said six months. So if you're tired of changing your CGM sensor every week, you're tired of it falling off, or the adhesive not lasting as long as it should, or the sensor failing before the time is up. If you're tired of all that, you really owe it to yourself to try the Eversense CGM, ever since cgm.com/juicebox I'm here to tell you that if the hassle of changing your sensors multiple times a month is just more than you want to deal with, if you're tired of things falling off and not sticking, or sticking too much, or having to carry around a whole bunch of extra supplies in case something does fall off, then taking a few minutes to check out. Ever since cgm.com/juicebox might be the right thing for you. When you use my link, you're supporting the production of the podcast and helping to keep it free and plentiful. Ever since cgm.com/ dot com, slash juicebox. If you take insulin or so faucinyas, you are at risk for your blood sugar going too low. You need a safety net when it matters most, be ready with G vo hypo pen. My daughter carries G vo hypo pen everywhere she goes, because it's a ready to use rescue pen for treating very low blood sugar in people with diabetes ages two and above that, I trust low blood sugar emergencies can happen unexpectedly and they demand quick action. Luckily, jivo hypo pen can be administered in two simple steps, even by yourself in certain situations. Show those around you where you store GEVO kypo pen and how to use it. They need to know how to use jivo kypo pen before an emergency situation happens. Learn more about why GEVO kypo Pen is in Arden's diabetes toolkit at gevok, glucagon.com/juicebox, gvoke shouldn't be used if you have a tumor in the gland on the top of your kidneys called a pheochromocytoma, or if you have a tumor in your pancreas called an insulin OMA, visit gvoke, glucagon, com slash, risk for safety information. Diabetes comes with a lot of things to remember, so it's nice when someone takes something off of your plate, us, med has done that for us. When it's time for Arden supplies to be refreshed, we get an email rolls up and in your inbox says, Hi, Arden. This is your friendly reorder email from us. Med. You open up the email, it's a big button that says, Click here to reorder, and you're done. Finally, somebody taking away a responsibility instead of adding one. US med has done that for us. An email arrives, we click on a link, and the next thing you know, your products are at the front door. That simple, US med.com/juice, box, or call 8887211, 514, I never have to wonder if Arden has enough supplies. I click on one link, I open up a box, I put this stuff in the drawer, and we're done. Us. Med carries everything from insulin pumps and diabetes testing supplies to the latest CGM like the libre three and the Dexcom g7 they accept Medicare nationwide, over 800 private insurers, and all you have to do to get started is call 888-721-1514, or go to my link, us, med.com/juicebox, using that number or my link helps to support the production of the juicebox podcast.

Adele 15:39
Yeah, like, a lot of people, like, are always asking, but they're very, like, helpful. Like, they always like, like, I know that I have the nasal like, the best, best squimmy,

Scott Benner 15:52
I don't know. Yeah,

Adele 15:53
they're like, very, like, open to helping me and stuff. And like, if my like, phone beeps, they're like, are you okay? Like, do you need sugar or something? So

Scott Benner 16:02
did you explain it to them, or do you think they're learning it as you go along? You did. Yeah, if you asked me to describe my daughter's friend group, it's these four girls. Like, I know who they are, right off top my head, right? It's always the same girls. Like, do you have that situation?

Adele 16:15
I actually, like, I have a, like, a variety of friends. Like, I'd say I have a pretty big friend group. Okay,

Scott Benner 16:21
so there's some people who are closer in your circle, and some people are a little more on the outside, and they know, they know. Okay, so you tell the close up ones the stuff they need to know

Adele 16:31
really, like, I'll tell, like, anyone, like, a lot of people in my school are, like, always asking me questions. And they're like, they're always asking about, like, why I have two phones,

Scott Benner 16:39
yeah, what do they think? You're like, a drug dealer or something? What do they think?

Adele 16:43
No, no, they're just like, confused. I try to explain my best.

Scott Benner 16:47
Okay, so some your friends have varying understandings of diabetes, but do they know enough? Like, if I looked over and Adele was like, Oh, I don't want to hold on. I just don't want to say this and upset you. You know what could happen if your blood sugar gets really low, right? Yeah, okay, all right. So if your friends looked over and you were on the ground flipping around like a fish, you think they would take out that back swimming and shove it up your nose and give it a tug? Yeah? No kidding, I think so. Yeah, cool. Oh, that's really neat. It's nice that friends like that. You know, do you go to the nurse's office for your adjustments at school? Or do you handle them on your own?

Adele 17:20
I handled them on my own. Last year I did on go to the nurse to, like, pre bolus, but I'm a big girl now. Yeah,

Scott Benner 17:26
you don't need that, right? Yeah, whatever. What would you like people to know like, Okay, I know you've talked to your friends, but do you have a feeling like, when you said you wanted to be open about diabetes? What did that mean to you? Being

Adele 17:39
like, open about, like, diabetes is like, to not be afraid to, like, kind of, like, explain it to people and like, not being, like, trying to hide it or anything,

Scott Benner 17:47
so that that really is, then more about how you feel about it and how you interact with it, like you don't care so much if, if I know about it, you want to make sure that you're comfortable being open about it and talking about it, yeah, okay, why do you not want to hide it? Because, like, I

Adele 18:06
feel like there's really no reason. Like, I feel like, if I hit it, like, it would be like, really weird. Because like, I'd be like, like, people would be like, Hey, why is there a bump in your shirt? And I'd be like, um, no reason, right? So it's like, just easier also to be out about it,

Scott Benner 18:19
yeah. Like, so instead of just changing the subject and walking away or something, you want to be able to say, yeah, it doesn't bother you when somebody says, hey, what's under your shirt there? Yeah, no, no.

Adele 18:32
Like, I'll be fine to be like, Oh, this is my like.

Unknown Speaker 18:35
So are

Scott Benner 18:36
you normally open, or are you, like, willfully trying to make sure that you're not hiding diabetes. Honestly, I'm normally open. Okay, so this goes along with your personality to begin with. All right, gotcha Do I seem very old to you? No, not really, not really excellent. That's good news. I saw somebody recently that said I looked very young, and I've been clinging to that all week, like I just bumped into somebody I hadn't seen in a while. They're like, Oh my God, you look so young. And I was like, thank you. So excited, very, very excited. Actually, you play any sports?

Adele 19:10
Yes, I did do swim team, but that ended like at the February I do dance class, and I'm doing a ballet and I do three clubs, Art Club, International Club, and Baking Club,

Speaker 2 19:22
ooh, I went to baking school, like, I worked in a bakery. I know how to do that. Like, I could make, like, you know, you can make a loaf of bread. I could make 200 loaves of bread, like, literally, all at the same time. I don't know if that's a skill or not.

Adele 19:38
The thing about Baking Club is, though my friends actually, like, started it with, like, our home ec teacher. So that was pretty cool. Like, they kind of started their

Scott Benner 19:46
own club. Yeah, you went to a teacher and said, hey, we'd like to have an after school club. Can you be the person that does it with us? And that teacher said, Yes,

Adele 19:54
yeah. They, um, I wasn't completely part of it, but I did, like, join it after but they, like, they went through like, a lot. But like, I think they started working on it last get it set up.

Scott Benner 20:04
See, you're kind of young, so I'm gonna say something cynical for a second. Does it worry you that teacher didn't have anything better to do after school that they were allowed to? They were able to hang out? No, no, you're so nice. Kind of fun. You're so nice. No, no, I think it's a nice idea. Only adults are laughing at what I just said now, like, like, can you stay after school for free and bake with us some more? I'd be like, I'm busy. But it was, it was very nice of her to her, him, him, him, him. It was very nice of him to do that. That's excellent. Is he younger?

Adele 20:34
He's like, kind of mediocre.

Scott Benner 20:36
Everybody look old to you when you're 12. Not really, I don't think I love this. This is great because sometimes I ask questions you don't know the answers to. It's fun to watch you kind of like, think about it for a second. Adults will just they've been asked the same question so many times that you ask them and they just blurt out the answer that their brain already knows. You're actually thinking about it, which I'm enjoying OmniPod five with dance class. How's that doing for you? Is it keeping your blood sugar pretty stable?

Adele 21:05
Yes, because, like, we use like, activity mode, um, most of the like the time. I believe I know my Anana turns it on. I don't know if my mom turns it on, though, interesting. Like, I'd never, like thought about it. You don't

Scott Benner 21:17
make an adjustment. You're not the one who worries about that adjustment. It's the adult that's with you that does it? Yeah, a

Adele 21:23
little bit more, because I'm not sure if I'm supposed to use it or not. Got it. Okay? Sometimes the OmniPod does, like, get in the way, like, for stretching and stuff. But like, usually it's in a good spot,

Speaker 1 21:34
because, like, sometimes, like, it would just feel weird. Okay, where do you prefer for it to be? Usually, like, on

Adele 21:39
my stomach or legs sometimes, like my arm, like I have my OmniPod on, like this arm right now, sometimes it's a bit weird.

Scott Benner 21:46
So stranger on your arms. For you, a little

Adele 21:49
bit like, I just put this, like a new OmniPod on my arm last night. So

Scott Benner 21:54
okay, how long did you do injections for?

Adele 21:58
Not very long. We got the OmniPod after seven weeks after diagnosis.

Scott Benner 22:04
Oh, okay, so you had, you didn't do injections long at all. Okay, no, did you dislike the injections? Why did you move to a pump so quickly? Because,

Adele 22:14
like, it was, like, available, and it's like, kind of like, like, I think, I think we thought of it as, like, an upgrade. Injections really weren't that bad, though, just like a little poke.

Scott Benner 22:24
Do you know what your a 1c is? Yes,

Adele 22:27
I have the A one history. Oh, yeah. Do you want to know the most? Do you want to know the most recent one? Because there's a lot?

Scott Benner 22:35
Well, tell me the most recent one, then tell me, like, go back like four or five and tell me what it was like a half a year ago or something

Adele 22:43
like that. Okay, so the most recent one is 220, 24 6.3 1128, 2020 2023 6.388 2023 6.85 2320 23 7.0 7.0 so like most of them, were like in the low um, like six points on things. But like that was like one seven and then the two 228 2023 6.2 11, 120, 22 6.37 2020 22 8.25 2020 2216 point zero. So that's actually all of them, yeah,

Scott Benner 23:25
so there was basically an elevated one at your diagnosis. And it looks like you maybe had a honeymoon for a little while, and now you've been figuring out how to use insulin, and you're in the mid sixes.

Adele 23:38
Oh, my, my, A, 1c, I found something that said, March 2024, now, 12 year old, 6/7, grade, A, 1c, 6.3 and then my total total daily insulin, 775, units.

Scott Benner 23:50
So you've been at 6.3 pretty steadily for like, the last nine months. Yeah, that's great. Do you remember having a honeymoon? Was there a time when you all of a sudden needed less insulin? Or is that not a thing that not a thing that you would have known about and your parents

Speaker 1 24:02
would have handled? I feel like my parents would have known that more. Okay, all right,

Scott Benner 24:07
what should adults know about how it feels to have diabetes?

Adele 24:15
Like, if, like, adults were to have diabetes, or just like, kind of what they should know to help me,

Scott Benner 24:19
yeah, as parents, I guess I'm asking you, like, what experiences are you having, or feelings are you having that you're pretty sure your parents don't know about. Sometimes,

Adele 24:30
like, when I'm dizzy or My head hurts, like when my blood sugar is, like, high or low, sometimes I don't, like, always tell them, like,

Scott Benner 24:37
yeah, so you'll keep it to yourself if you're dizzy, sometimes, sometimes,

Adele 24:41
like, if they ask me, I'll tell them, but like,

Scott Benner 24:44
I don't know. Do you know? Why not?

Adele 24:47
Not really any reason. I just like

Scott Benner 24:51
not trying to avoid a conversation about it. No, just you feel dizzy, and it's something you keep to yourself. Yeah. How often does that happen to you?

Adele 24:59
Yeah, well, I know, like, I used to kind of just, like, think, like, if I was dizzy and my blood sugar like, wasn't like, low, I just, like, kind of like, ignore it. But now, like, my mom, like, kind of recently told me that, like, if I am feeling dizzy and my blood sugar is not low, I should still have candy. Is that helping you? Because, like, the um, the Dexcom doesn't catch up to like, um, just like a finger prick.

Scott Benner 25:22
Yeah, I would tell you, if you feel dizzy and your Dexcom doesn't say you're low, you should get your meter out and check your blood sugar. Yeah, okay, and then, but I take what she's saying. She's worried about when you're by yourself, she doesn't want you to ignore

Adele 25:35
sometimes, like I'm sometimes I'm at like, school or dance, so I don't have it. Yeah.

Scott Benner 25:39
I mean, better safe than sorry, right? That I get what I think that's like, I

Adele 25:43
think that's what it's like kind of going for,

Scott Benner 25:45
yeah, yeah. How frequently do you think you're low

Adele 25:48
sometimes, like, some, like, some days, like, not as frequently, but like, recently, it's kind of been a bit frequently. More definitely. Know why? Maybe, like, maybe because of, like, all the exercise or something.

Speaker 1 26:02
What number do you feel low at it differs, like, sometimes

Adele 26:07
under 70, like, maybe like 68 and like under that, I'll feel like a little bit more dizzier, but like a little bit dizzy. But then, like, if it's more in the 50s, I'll feel like, really dizzy. Have you

Scott Benner 26:20
ever gotten to the point where you can't help yourself? Like, been so low,

Adele 26:24
kind of like, yeah. Like, I was like, Oh my gosh, when will the Disney dizziness be over? Yeah?

Scott Benner 26:30
And then somebody was helping you, yeah. Okay, swimming. You swam with OmniPod five and Dexcom, yeah. G6 so there's an opportunity that even people who you don't know are now going to see your stuff. Did you find yourself talking to them about it? Did you find that people cared or did they not even mention

Adele 26:50
it? People didn't really mention it much, but like, Yeah,

Scott Benner 26:54
more conversations or not. Not really, not really. Have you ever been bullied or picked on about it.

Adele 27:00
No, no. Sometimes, like, people would kind of make jokes about diabetes, like, even if it's just on, like, YouTube, Pinterest, or, like, just people saying it, I'll get a little bit offended, even though, like, they say, like, kind of you shouldn't be, like, getting offended that.

Scott Benner 27:16
Well, that's interesting. So if, if you see somebody joking about it, it feels offensive to you. Do you, are you actually bothered by it, or do you think you're supposed to be bothered by it?

Adele 27:25
It's like, in between, like, I'm it's not like, I'm gonna like, it's like, I'm a bit bothered by it,

Scott Benner 27:31
kind of, but you don't hold on to it, like you're not mad about it a day later, or something

Adele 27:36
like that. Like, some of the jokes kind of would be like, kind of, like, when people say I'm eating too much sugar, I'm gonna get diabetes. Yeah, like, I sometimes, like, I'm like, I don't think that's how diabetes works, not

Scott Benner 27:49
how I got diabetes. I got it the old fashioned way. My pancreas stopped working. Well, okay, but not upsetting. Like, you know, oh my gosh, I need help, or, like, you're not overwhelmed by it or anything like that. Yeah. Okay. How is it with you have a sister, right? Yes. Okay. Do you guys talk about your diabetes at all? Does it come up? Like, what's the interaction between the two of you? Like, regarding that sometimes, like,

Adele 28:18
she can't it's like, kind of like, annoying. But, like, not really, like, any conversations. Like, she used to, like, kind of ask my mom and me about it, but I think she knows more now,

Scott Benner 28:31
annoying because she's asking questions.

Adele 28:34
No, like, more or less, kind of, like, I It's like, kind of weird, like, it's kind of like, like, sort of embarrassing to me. Like, like, when I'm, like, taking care of my diabetes, like, with my mom, or, like, my sister, but like, then, like, I'm, it's less embarrassing when it's like, it's kind of cool for me, like, when it's people, like, who are not my family, and like,

Scott Benner 28:59
okay, embarrassing because it's taking up time, and everybody's just sort of standing around waiting for this park to be over. Like, do you feel like you're the center of attention?

Adele 29:09
Not necessarily. I don't know. It's kind of hard to explain.

Scott Benner 29:12
Yeah, no, I understand. That's why I'm that's why I'm asking. Because I don't think people would think about stuff like this as frequently you think your sister feels like you get more attention than she does?

Adele 29:22
She has said that before, yeah. She was like, um, you're it's also because, like, I'm the older sister. She's like, she's like, Adele's the older sister. She has diabetes, like, she's spoiled or whatever, but I'm like, I'm really not

Scott Benner 29:37
just have diabetes. Do you Do you ever say anything to her, like, I don't know. Like, why don't you get diabetes, and then you can have all the attention too, and then see, that wouldn't be good, right? Do you feel badly that she feels badly? Or do you feel annoyed that she's I'm

Unknown Speaker 29:53
kind of annoyed

Adele 29:54
because, like, I feel like she's kind of overreacting. I. She doesn't really fully understand either. And to

Scott Benner 30:02
her, it doesn't seem that way. No, no. To you, I'm

Adele 30:07
not totally sure, like, what my sister thinks, like all like about all of it. So you're

Scott Benner 30:11
not totally sure what she I don't I'm not sure what anybody thinks. So you have any questions for me?

Adele 30:16
Not necessarily, like any questions. I don't think,

Scott Benner 30:19
do you know, like, the podcast, I would

Adele 30:22
I, like, I wanted to start listening to it, but, like, I haven't yet, because I, because I went on the app to, like, do it, and then I kind of, like, got confused. Like, I don't know it's a kind of setup, weird.

Scott Benner 30:34
Yeah, I'm not in charge of that part. But do you want to talk about, um, like, what do you want to listen to? Like, management stuff, about, stuff about, stuff about, like, taking care of diabetes. Do you have questions, or did you want to hear people's stories? People's stories, yeah, you don't want to listen to, like, how to bolus for a meal and stuff like that. Sounds kind of boring, right? Yeah, it is a little boring. People's stories. Well, some of them are not age appropriate, and some of them are, some of them are really very much. So that's interesting. Yeah, those podcast apps are, I don't know why they're set up the way they are, but it's just what we're stuck with. If you ever get interested and you want to listen to conversations about managing basal insulin and your diabetes and stuff like that that you might be, you know, looking for more information. There's lists of like the Pro Tip series and and stuff like that that you could listen to. So that should make it a little easier to find the episodes. Okay, all right. What else do we have going on? Do you have worries about the thing on what happened are you? Are you quacking? What is that? Oh, it

Adele 31:35
was just one of my pre so I have these pre bolus alarms for school, and I forgot to turn them off for today?

Scott Benner 31:40
Do you not have school today?

Adele 31:41
No, how come? Because it's parent teacher conferences. Oh,

Scott Benner 31:46
that day where they pretend they're doing something and you get a day off. That's nice. Who cares? They should do that all the time. Do you ever, yeah, exactly. Do you ever think about the future with your diabetes, like, as you get older? Do you have concerns or thoughts about that?

Adele 31:59
I'm just like, a little bit scared to start taking care of all the by myself, because, like, some locations it's hard for me to, like, put on, like, my arms, like, I'd have to be like, and like, I'd be like, struggling, yeah,

Scott Benner 32:11
you'll figure it out. It'll really be okay. It really will be so worried about placement of pods, stuff like that, you're too young to you're not thinking about, like, dating, right? No, no, no, really, are there kids you think are cute? Or are we up to that yet? Or no, maybe, maybe, oh, I see, yeah, don't say their name. It's fine. I think we know who you're talking about. Okay, so, okay, so that's the thing, but not for now. You're more worried about where to put the devices

Adele 32:41
I have, like, seen, like diabetes, like YouTubers. So I know there's like, um, so there's this young, like, young like, so there's a toddler on, like, a middle like, um, um, like, a teenager, I think. And then there's like, an adult. And like the toddler, like her mom, like does, like her stuff, and then the teenager, like her dad helps her. And then like the like, grown adult, like,

Unknown Speaker 33:09
so do you kind of, like,

Adele 33:11
interesting for me to watch?

Scott Benner 33:13
Do you search out diabetes content on social media? Yeah, sometimes,

what are you looking for

Speaker 1 33:19
when you're doing that, kind of just like, just seeing other people like and how they handle it.

Scott Benner 33:25
Does it make you feel comfortable that they're okay? Or are you looking for suggestions? Just sometimes,

Adele 33:31
just kind of like, hey, like, they have diabetes too. That's kind of neat. Just looking

Scott Benner 33:35
for somebody who's similar. Do you know anybody in real life who has diabetes? Actually,

Adele 33:39
yes. Fun story. I actually just meant, like, the my crew. Teacher, so crew is, like, this like thing we have, like, in our school. It's pretty new, unique, I think. But like, basically, just like a bunch of kids, and we kind of, like, circle up and talk about stuff. Oh, I thought it was growing teacher, um,

Scott Benner 33:57
I'm sorry, when you row, when you row, it's also called crew. And I thought, Wow, you look young to row, but that's okay. Okay. Now, okay, so tell me more about this. You guys get together and talk, sorry. And

Adele 34:08
then, like, my crew teacher, her, um, her, like, friend, like, so she's a Spanish teacher. And then there's like, a Spanish teacher in the high school. He's a dad also, and he, like, came in one day and like, I told my teacher about like, this podcast. Because, like, I was excited. She was, like, telling him about it. And he was like, um, like, they called me over. And he was like, hey, my my daughter actually just got diagnosed with diabetes, so she's in eighth grade, and I got her like, phone number, and like, kind of started talking. Because, like, I'm like, if she wants to talk about anything, yeah.

Scott Benner 34:41
Oh, that's fantastic. Isn't that nice that you could could meet each other like that? Do you think you'll meet in person one day?

Adele 34:47
Yeah, we were actually just texting her, like, how we should meet someday. Nice. That's

Scott Benner 34:51
excellent. How old is she And how old are you?

Adele 34:53
She's like, in eighth grade, so probably, like, 1314, Oh, you

Scott Benner 34:56
guys are the same age. Then, okay, what do you like doing? In, like, in your free time, not like school, not act, not like planned activities, like dance. But what do you enjoy with your free time?

Adele 35:07
So I like plan stuff with my friends. I go on call with my friends. I play, like, video games, watch stuff. I also hang out with, like my neighbors, because I have some neighbors that are like, kind of like my age, a little bit younger, and then my sister. We all, like, hang out all the time. Do video like, right down the road for me, do video

Scott Benner 35:25
games make your blood sugar go up? No, I don't think so. You don't get that like, crazy excitement.

Adele 35:32
No, no. Sometimes, like, when, when I'm with my friends, like, I was hanging out with my two, like, two of my best friends, and my Nana was like, You guys are making her blood sugar go hide because you guys are, like, so excited, yeah,

Scott Benner 35:44
adrenaline can make it go up this. So what kind of games do you play when you play video games?

Unknown Speaker 35:48
So I

Adele 35:49
play, um, this, like Roblox. It's like an app, like, on my phone. So

Scott Benner 35:54
I know, yeah, I know what it is. That's what you are. Yeah. Are you jealous that I can sit back and go and sit up because my microphone moves, or no, because you're like, all having to sit up. And I'm like, sometimes I sit back. I got a comfy chair. All right, nice. What are your favorite subjects in school? Do you think about college?

Adele 36:14
So like, I do, like, I like Spanish and then science, but I actually do want to be a diabetes educator when I grow up.

Unknown Speaker 36:21
When did you start thinking about that

Adele 36:23
a little bit after I got diagnosed, and, like, more or less last year? Okay, so, yeah, I, like, always talked about it kind of, were

Scott Benner 36:34
you science oriented before that? But like, good at science,

Adele 36:38
and I wasn't really thinking at first, like, I wanted to be, like some sort of Doctor, vet, but, yeah,

Speaker 1 36:44
okay, so it's still in like, the same field,

Scott Benner 36:47
yeah, no, that's great. Well, that's excellent. So you're, you'll be working and thinking about that as you, as you make your way through school, things could change. Maybe they won't. But I was just talking to, I think my interview with a doctor goes up next week. He has type one diabetes, and he's an endocrinologist. And I asked him, would you be an endocrinologist if you didn't have type one diabetes? And he said, I don't think I would be so pretty interesting. You don't know how it'll shape your life. You know, all kinds of different things that could happen along the way.

Adele 37:18
Oh, yeah. I just thought of a question. Oh, um, when we did like, when we were, like, in Florida for the type, like, the touched by type one conference, you know, like the, like, the podcast that was recorded at the end. Yes,

Scott Benner 37:29
what did I ever do with that? Oh, Adele, I did not like the way that audio sounded. So I'm sitting on it. I don't know. You see the room didn't sound very good. I apologize, Yeah, makes sense, yeah. Did you enjoy that day at touch by type one? Yeah,

Adele 37:44
it was kind of like the first taste of, kind of doing a podcast thing.

Scott Benner 37:48
Oh, okay. Did you like it, like when we sat and talked, and even now, like you're, you're enjoying this, yeah? So you were telling somebody you were excited about it, what? What made you like? What? What makes this an exciting thing? Because I do it every day, so I'm not that excited, right? Excited right now. So, like, what? What makes it exciting? Like,

Adele 38:06
a lot of people see it, and how I could kind of like, share, like, my story, and, yeah, kind of like, it's like being it's like a new experience for me.

Scott Benner 38:15
Yeah, oh, I like that. Is it going well? Like, are you having a good time? Yes, yeah. I

Adele 38:21
kind of like, just being, like, ask questions, getting to talk about it and stuff, nice.

Scott Benner 38:25
What if I made this your podcast? What would you ask me? Like, just flip it around for a second. I'm a guy. I make a podcast. I have a daughter. She has diabetes. I have a son. I have a wife. Like, what would you ask me if you had to, like, if you had to drive the conversation,

Adele 38:42
I would probably like, just like, ask, like, about, like, how, like, you take care of her, like,

Scott Benner 38:47
like, kind of, yeah, when she was 12, or now, like, just, like, throughout everything, throughout everything. Well, that's a big question, isn't it? Gosh, we, we've had so many different changes about how things have worked over the years, different technologies. She's a different person. As she grows up, I've got more knowledge, and hopefully as I go on, I get better at it and calm her. I used to be more like, like, I didn't know what I was doing, and then I had to figure out what I was doing, and I would have, like, these big feelings when stuff would happen, like, if a blood sugar, like, was like, crazy, I they said you could see it on my face, like, and I don't do that anymore. Like, I don't get like, oh, like, you know what I mean? Like, like, irritated or annoyed or sad, when you see a number, it's not right. But I used to do that. I don't do that anymore. Nowadays, she's in college. I have not looked at Arden's blood sugar yet today. So it's noon. I haven't looked at it. Let me see it's Oh. Do you want to guess what it is?

Adele 39:51
I'm gonna say like 141, 50 1060,

Scott Benner 39:59
i. This is here. That's the last 12 hours of her blood sugar. Oh, that's pretty good. Top line is 120 and the bottom line is 70. That's pretty cool, huh? She was up late working. She stayed up till at least three o'clock in the morning working on a project at school. And it looks like, looks like she got up to 169 and then got it back down pretty quickly, like 169 is the highest blood sugar she's had in the last 24 hours. She's doing well. I have talked to her this week about her diabetes. Not much. To be perfectly honest, I helped more with saying stuff like, Hey, did you go grocery shopping? Do you have food in the house? Like, you know, I know you're busy, but have you checked on this? Like that. That's kind of stuff I've you don't want to have to go out and get fast food, like that kind of stuff. Do you take your vitamins? Like stuff like that. I've been doing I do that stuff. You know, not as much involved anymore. She's very good at counting her own carbs and handling her highs and her lows. I did send her five pounds of gummy bears the other day. Did you know you can buy gummy bears in five pound bags? No, what do you treat your lows with? Like,

Adele 41:14
sometimes, like gummy patches. But the thing we use the most, but we ran out of, are these things called, like, high Chews. They're like, four carbs each, and they just like, they work well,

Scott Benner 41:23
you like those high Chews? Arden uses Albany. This is how you say it. I'm gonna, I'm gonna look it up real quickly so they don't say it wrong. She uses, yeah, Albany's world's best 12 flavored gummy bears. They come in five pound bags. You can get them on Amazon for $15 so she was, she left for college with so she's been gone now, January, February, she's been gone eight weeks since she left last time to go to college. I think, I think she left with half of a bag of these. So, like, probably, like, you know, two pounds of them. And she just uses them a couple at a time. And she also says her roommates hit them pretty hard too. So they get hit by, I think everybody in the there's four girls there. And like, a week ago, she just said, Hey, I'm almost out of gummy bears. That was, like, the most like, contact I had with diabetes for a while, so I sent her more, and I actually think they arrived today. So that was one of the things I've done this week. Yeah. I mean, that's about it. Like, you know, reminding her if she if she seems to forget, but she's pretty good at it by now. So, like, I will tell you this when she was 12, if I would have asked her, What are you worried about? She'd be like issue, I guarantee would have said, I don't know how to get something on the back of my arm by myself. I don't know how to like, you know, I don't know how to do this, I don't know how to do that, and none of that stuff is a problem anymore. So one day, you'll just know how to do all that too. I think I'm pretty sure. What do you understand about diabetes and your health, like, not just your health today, like, not not just not being dizzy, but like, long term, like, as you get older, what, what is your understanding of all this? I'm kind I'm kind of confused. Like, you know, if you eat junky food, you'll gain weight, right? Yeah, you know, if you don't exercise, you'll get stiff. What is it you understand or don't unders? Do you understand about your diabetes and your long term health, like why it's important that your a 1c is a certain number, why you don't want high blood sugars or super lows?

Adele 43:34
Not really understand the a 1c really, but I know most of the stuff. I think so

Scott Benner 43:41
for you, the A 1c is just this idea of a target, and we're trying to get it lower, but somebody doesn't tell you, like, hey, we want your a 1c to be lower, because they don't do that, right? No, it's just a thing you're supposed to do. Okay? Well, Oh, that's interesting. What would happen if you got way too much insulin? Do you know my

Adele 44:03
blood sugar would be going lower because, like, too like, too much insulin, too

Scott Benner 44:09
much insulin. What? What would happen if you didn't stop it from going lower? Do you know

Adele 44:12
I would, like, eventually, like, pass out because, like, yeah,

Scott Benner 44:17
like, you'd have a seizure eventually. What happens if your blood sugars are high for years? I don't really know. That's interesting. Okay, all right, so I'm not your mom, so it's not my job, although your mom's probably gonna send me a note and be like, hey, but they're real. They're real important, long term reasons why you wouldn't want higher or bouncing around up and down, blood sugars, and if, I mean, I'm not your uncle, so I'm not going to tell you, but there is an amount of insulin that could kill you. You know that? No, no, am I the one telling you this? All right, hold on a second. Don't forget. Say it again. Okay, say it so. Oh. Gosh, I'm sorry. All right, hold on. If you had, like, I don't know how much insulin you get during you said, like, 70 units, right? And that's spread out over your entire day. Some of it's basal, some of it covering meals, etc and so on. You get low blood sugar if you have too much insulin. So if you have too much insulin, and you don't have enough like, either like, you know, stress or food to, like, push it back up again. Your blood sugar keeps getting lower. You get dizzy. You eat some food, it goes back up. You understand that. But if you gave yourself, if you gave yourself way too much insulin, and didn't do anything about it, you would get dizzy, pass out. And if somebody didn't do something about it, you're not that would be the end of it. No one's ever told

Adele 45:44
you that before. Um, nobody ever told me that, but I kind of knew it.

Scott Benner 45:48
You knew it. Okay. Well, thank God, because I felt like an Can I curse you're only 12. I felt like for saying that right now. And I was like, Oh my God. But then I could see on your face you were like, I think I know what he's saying. So, so, like, is that a thing you've, like, ever consciously thought about? Like, like, I know why this is important, or is it just the thing you used to kind of out of sight, out of mind? I've

Adele 46:10
never really thought about it because, like, I know how to, like, treat low blood sugars, like, and like, I know like that. I need to have candy. Like, if it's low, yeah, going low, or too much insulin, like, my mom, like, my mom or nana will be like, oh, like, I over, like, I put in too much, like, insulin Here, eat this.

Scott Benner 46:27
Do you think they know? They do, right? Like, you're probably, probably, yeah, I hope so. All right, so it's a story I just know about this kid who had diabetes for a few years and, all right, well, you know this, so it's okay to tell you the story. So there's this kid, right? And he's got diabetes for a few years, and one day, his mom has to, like, leave the house, and she leaves her the kid's older brother in charge, and they had just given the kid a bunch of insulin, and he was eating. So the mom leaves, and the the slightly older brother is in charge, and the kid doesn't want to finish eating his food. And the and the brother, the other brothers, like, you have to eat this. And the kids like, I don't want it. I'm not hungry. And he's like, You have to eat this. And I guess the the older brother kind of panicked a little bit, and when the kid resisted eating the food one more time, he said, If you don't eat this, you're going to die. And the kid didn't, like no one had ever discussed with him, like, the ramifications of wildly using too much insulin and not, you know, covering it. The kid like, fell apart. Like, you handled it really well just now, but you knew already, like, you know what I mean. But this kid, like, was like having an existential crisis. Like, right? Like somebody just explained something to him that he had no idea about. Then they the family had to wrestle with the idea that the kid felt like they kept that from him. Do you know what I mean? Like that, it was like a important part about his life that nobody shared with him. I don't know you. Seemed like you knew what you were talking about, about diabetes and everything, and I was just like trying to pick around to see what you knew. I definitely regret saying this to you now, because you're not my kid, but I mean, your mom said you could come on, so whatever, you're okay, right? Yeah, yeah, you're not free. You look completely fine, like, I I'm upset now, and you're like, I don't know what you're upset about, but do you talk about your diabetes on social media?

Adele 48:19
I don't really have, like, a ton of social media. I have, like, Snapchat, but like, I don't really talk about that kind of stuff, a ton on there.

Scott Benner 48:28
So it's not like, you're not doing, like, like, here's a picture with my CGM like, you're not, you're just being yourself. You don't necessarily need to be a person who has diabetes. I like,

Adele 48:38
could do that. Like, look, look at this new patch. I could do that, but really, I don't do it much. Yeah. So like my mom, I think, I think, like, my mom has, like, diabetes, like social media stuff, though, does she like on Facebook?

Scott Benner 48:52
My daughter doesn't hide her stuff, but she doesn't, on purpose, share it either. Like, sometimes, like she's in fashion school, so she'll do a lot of, like, get dressed, get ready with me. Videos. You must know what those are, right? Where, like, people put clothes on. Yeah, yeah. I know you're like, yes, old person. I know what it is, but she does that kind of stuff, and she doesn't make any effort to hide her diabetes. She's never, never tries to hide it, actually. But she also wouldn't do that thing where she was like, here, look, this is my insulin pump. You know what I mean? Like, I don't think she wants to be, yeah, famous is the wrong word, but she doesn't want people to know her for her diabetes. She wants you know that is that kind of how you feel about it? Yeah, I'd say so. Like, it's okay if they see it, but you're not going to go out of your way to show it to them. That makes sense. Yeah, yeah. Here's a picture. I wonder if I can show you this. Can I screen share?

All right, ready?

Adele 49:55
I'm I'm not sure if that's a cap on here. Oh yeah, yeah. I see a button. Honestly. It.

Scott Benner 50:00
I'm going to show it to you. Okay, so can you see her? Yeah, okay, so you can see how her pods on her arm, so she's not making any effort not to show it off. It's just like she's not trying to hide it. And you can see that's an outfit she wore to class. So she's not trying to hide it, but she's also not, like, pushing it forward. Does that make sense? Okay? Well, I was like, I'm gonna stop sharing now. That's so weird, because it's like an Instagram thing, and it just keeps repeating over and over again as it repeated the third time. I was like, Oh, my God. All right. Any other questions for me? I don't think so. Have I not asked you anything that I should have is there anything that we should have talked about that I didn't bring up, like, what's on that list over there? I don't think there's really anything else we did. Okay, yeah, did you have fun? Yeah, yeah. Was it less fun than you thought it was gonna be? No, not really. No. That's cool. So it's about what you expected. Yeah. Do you know what I'm doing now? I am gonna go. I'm gonna go have a sandwich, and then I have to drive about two hours to this place where I'm gonna talk to a group of, like, 400 type ones all weekend. Oh, so I'm gonna do a talk this afternoon in about I should probably get going about three and a half hours. I'm gonna give a talk in about three and a half hours, and then do another one tonight, and then a couple tomorrow, and then one on Sunday morning, and then I'll head back home. So I'm there's an event for people with type one diabetes, and I'm one of the speakers. So I have to, I have my bag all packed. It's in my car already. The last thing I was doing today was talking to you before I left. So I appreciate you. Let me move the time. That was nice of you.

Unknown Speaker 51:42
Thank you. Yes, of course. Cool.

Scott Benner 51:45
So do you think you'll let your mom listen to this?

Unknown Speaker 51:47
Of course? Yeah, I

Adele 51:49
don't really think I could stop her either.

Scott Benner 51:51
I mean, you know, I It's a good point. What should we call this episode?

Unknown Speaker 51:54
I don't really know.

Scott Benner 51:56
Well, your name's Adele. We could just call it Hello, that would be good. Hello. It's me. That's not bad. Do you hate

Speaker 1 52:03
that? Honestly, no, no, that's actually kind of neat. You're good with this singer,

Scott Benner 52:08
yeah, your name, yeah, I like how you're like this singer, that woman who has my name,

Adele 52:15
yeah, when I search up my name on Google, that's what pops up.

Scott Benner 52:17
Oh yeah, when I search up my name on Google, nothing comes up. Nobody's name Scott, just nobody. It's like Name a famous Scott. Go ahead.

Speaker 1 52:25
I have an I have an uncle, Scott. He's not famous. Name a famous Scott.

Speaker 1 52:29
I don't know Scott terrible.

Scott Benner 52:32
That's why nobody famous has his name Scott, because it's just a terrible name. Adele, you were lovely. Thank you for doing this. I appreciate this very much. This is a nice chunk out of your your free day. What? What is the rest of Adele's day? Look like?

Adele 52:45
I think we're gonna go to the mall, and I might hang out with my neighbors.

Scott Benner 52:49
Big plans. I'm doing what I just told you. I don't like the food at the place I'm going, though, so the last thing I'm doing is taking food with me. My wife's like, you're gonna insult them. I'm like, I'll hide it in my room. I don't want their food. It's okay. If they hear it, they'll understand. Not you so much, because I'll tell you about it a second. Okay, we're done. I'm gonna stop. Okay, hold on one second, but you stay there.

This episode of the juice box podcast was sponsored by us. Med, us. Med.com/juice, box, or call 888-721-1514, get started today with us. Med, links in the show notes. Links at juicebox podcast. Com, I want to thank the ever since CGM for sponsoring this episode of The juicebox podcast, and invite you to go to Eversense cgm.com/juicebox to learn more about this terrific device. You can head over now and just absorb everything that the website has to offer. And that way you'll know if ever sense feels right for you ever sense cgm.com/juice box. A huge thank you to one of today's sponsors, G VO, glucagon. Find out more about G vo hypo pen at G VO, glucagon.com, forward slash juice box. You spell that, G, V, O, k, e, g, l, U, C, A, G O n.com forward slash juice box. If you're newly diagnosed, check out the bold beginnings series. Find it at juicebox podcast.com, up in the menu in the feature tab of the private Facebook group, or go into the audio app you're listening in right now and search for juicebox podcast, bold beginnings. Juicebox is one word. Juicebox podcast, bold beginnings. This series is perfect for newly diagnosed people. A diabetes diagnosis comes with a lot of new terms, and you're not going to understand most of them. That's why we made defining diabetes go to. Juicebox podcast.com. Up into the menu and click on defining diabetes to find the series that will tell you what all of those words mean, short, fun and informative that's defining diabetes. Thank you so much for listening. I'll be back very soon with another episode of The juicebox podcast. If you're not already subscribed or following the podcast in your favorite audio app, like Spotify or Apple podcasts. Please do that now. Seriously, just to hit follow or subscribe will really help the show. If you go a little further in Apple podcast and set it up so that it downloads all new episodes, I'll be your best friend, and if you leave a five star review, ooh, I'll probably send you a Christmas card. Would you like a Christmas card? The episode you just heard was professionally edited by wrong way, recording, wrong way, recording.com, do.

#1289 Shot in the Dark

Travis was diagnosed at five. He’s using the iLet pump now with a 6.5 A1c, but through most of his life his A1c‘s were in the 19s.

+ Click for EPISODE TRANSCRIPT

Scott Benner 0:00
Hello friends, and welcome back to the juicebox Podcast.

I'm speaking with Travis today. He's 40 years old. He has two kids, and he was diagnosed with type one diabetes when he was five. For much of his life, his a one Cs were in the nineteens, but today he's been using the eyelet insulin pump for over six months. Please don't forget that 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. When you place your first order for ag one, with my link, you'll get five free travel packs and a free year supply of vitamin D drink. Ag one.com/juicebox, don't forget to save 40% off of your entire order at cozy earth.com All you have to do is use the offer code juice box at checkout. That's juicebox at checkout to save 40% at cozy earth.com How would you like to make a difference for people living with type one diabetes, including maybe you or someone in your family, all you have to do is go to T 1d exchange.org/juice box and complete the survey you need to be a US resident who has type one diabetes or is the caregiver of someone with type 1t 1d exchange.org/juice box. This episode of the juice box podcast is sponsored by OmniPod five, and you can learn more right now at my special link, omnipod.com/juicebox, today's podcast is sponsored by touched by type one. Check them out on Facebook, Instagram and at touched by type one.org. If you're looking for an organization who's helping people with type one diabetes, you're looking for touch by type one. This episode of The juicebox podcast is sponsored by the Eversense CGM, an implantable six month sensor. Is what you get with Eversense, but you get so much more exceptional and consistent accuracy over six months and distinct on body vibe alerts when you're high or low on body vibe alerts. You don't even know what that means. Do you ever sense cgm.com/juicebox, go find out.

Travis 2:25
I'm Travis. I'm 40 years old. I was diagnosed with diabetes at the age of five. I'm married, I have two kids, and that's about it, all right? I diabetes for 35 years been a roller coaster ride, has it? Oh, it has, yeah.

Scott Benner 2:46
How did it start?

Travis 2:47
So at five I got diagnosed. Walked in to the doctor's office or Children's Hospital on the North Shore, my blood sugar was 896

so I was in the record book for being the highest awake patient to walk in, I should say. And then it's just been kind of figure it out from there, because that was the good old 80s of here's here's some insulin. Check your sugar, and here's a sliding scale, and have fun. Do you remember doing this while you were in school?

I do. I use diabetes to get out of school a lot. I would fake not feeling good, and then they would call my grandfather, and my grandfather would come and pick me up, and we would go to Denny's and have some lunch. And then I would have the rest of the school off until my mother figured that one out and gave the school a glucose meter, and then they would make me check my blood sugar to

Scott Benner 3:51
wow, it was that easy charge. You said you just kind of showed up in an office doing diabetes. Got to go, and then he just let you go home.

Travis 4:00
Pretty, pretty much. I said I didn't feel good. They said it was because my or I'd say it was because my diabetes. And they would call my grandfather yeah and let me go. Wouldn't check nothing, just ship me home.

Scott Benner 4:11
Hey, Mary the bee's got me I gotta get Yeah, no

Travis 4:15
problem. That's fantastic. Yeah. Then my mom caught on, and so they gave the school a glucose meter, and then they would make me check it, so that that that scheme, Scott stopped.

Scott Benner 4:28
I bet you she kicked your grandfather. And they asked once or twice too after that, no,

Travis 4:32
no, they just they, if they called my grandfather was to tell the school to check my blood sugar.

Scott Benner 4:39
Did he not know that you were being slick. No, he

Travis 4:43
did not catch dawn. Okay.

Scott Benner 4:45
How did you talk him into the Denny's? It

Travis 4:48
was, it was his idea. Oh, I

Scott Benner 4:50
see you were just shooting once or twice a day at that point.

Travis 4:56
Yeah, it was, I believe that. I don't. I lent us. It was the cloudy in the in the regular clear, yeah. So you would mix both of them at whatever you know, meal time,

Scott Benner 5:10
stick them in on your way about every 12 hours, like before breakfast, before dinner. Yeah, like breakfast,

Travis 5:15
breakfast and dinner time. Okay, so when I woke up, we would check my sugar, check the sliding scale, draw up insulin, and then off to school I would go. Then I'd get out of school, and it would be dinner time, and we'd check my sugar again.

Scott Benner 5:29
Do you know what your blood sugars were back then? Were they like, stable, low, high. I

Travis 5:35
don't remember they were. I know my a 1c, was a seven for the longest time, because I remember going into Jocelyn clinic and telling my mom numbers off of my machine, and then, like, faking some of them, she'd be like, Wow, these all really high. You're gonna, you know, you're gonna have to explain to the doctor why your your a 1c is out of whack. And then I would get my a 1c back, and it would say seven. So I figured I was doing pretty good, whatever I was doing.

Scott Benner 6:03
How old were you at that point when your mom's telling you, this is on you? You better figure it out.

Travis 6:07
Probably nine or 10, because this is when we were I couldn't drive so I was going to appointments with my parents still. Well, yeah, you How old are your kids? My oldest son is 21 and my youngest daughter is 1121.

Scott Benner 6:26
And 11 cars, you had a baby and you're 19 on purpose.

Travis 6:30
That was not on purpose. Okay, did they know that? My my son? Yes, he knows, yeah. I

Scott Benner 6:39
was gonna say he's kind of hard to hide, right? Yeah, no, no, I really wanted to start a family.

Speaker 1 6:47
So okay, your kids with two different people are the same person, two different people. Yeah, it makes sense. My point in asking how old your kids were is that you had two children at nine years old. Would you put them in charge of anything? Yes, and no, okay. Would you put them in charge of the health and welfare of a nine year old? No? Oh, okay,

Travis 7:09
no. So like my daughter is is pretty, I mean, both, both my kids were pretty self sufficient, yeah, but I Yeah, no, I wouldn't. I wouldn't. I mean, my daughter has ADHD, and she has to take her medicine at eight o'clock at night, and we have to have an alarm set because she wouldn't remember if the ball the pill bottle hit her in the head, so we have a reminder set for but, yeah, no, I get,

Scott Benner 7:34
you know, I had a number of conversation I've had a number of conversations recently with Parents, and this is off Mike, and I get the idea of they need to understand it. It's going to be it's their diabetes, like we want them to be autonomous. I don't just understand it. I agree with all that, but you can't just make the announcement and then expect they're going to do it, and then when it doesn't get done, ignore that. That means poor health, and just go, Oh, you better figure it out. That part of thinking eludes me. It's a very like black and white way of considering things. Like, you know, they have to understand this. Yes, true, but that doesn't mean that they're going to randomly figure it out on their own. It's, it's such an interesting I don't know, interesting is the wrong word, because I'm trying to be polite, but I don't get it if you're doing that is what I'm saying. And so, you know, I don't know. How did that work out for you? Though, today's podcast is sponsored by the ever since CGM boasting a six month sensor. The Eversense CGM offers you these key advantages, distinct on body vibe alerts when high or low, a consistent and exceptional accuracy over a six month period, and you only need two sensors per year. No longer will you have to carry your CGM supplies with you. You won't have to be concerned about your adhesive not lasting, accidentally knocking off a sensor or wasting a sensor when you have to replace your transmitter. That's right, there's no more weekly or bi weekly hassles of sensor changes. Not the Eversense CGM. It's implantable and it's accurate. Ever since cgm.com/juicebox, the ever since CGM is the first and only long term CGM, ever since sits comfortably right under the skin in your upper arm, and it lasts way longer than any other CGM sensor. Never again will you have to worry about your sensor falling off before the end of its life. So if you want an incredibly accurate CGM that can't get knocked off and won't fall off, you're looking for the ever since CGM, ever since cgm.com/juicebox, cgm.com/juicebox, my daughter is 20 years old. I can't even believe it. She was diagnosed with type one diabetes when she was two, and she put her first insulin pump on when she was four. That insulin pump was an OmniPod, and it's been an OmniPod every day since then. That's six. 16 straight years of wearing OmniPod, it's been a friend to us, and I believe it could be a friend to you. Omnipod.com/juicebox, whether you get the OmniPod dash or the automation that's available with the OmniPod five, you are going to enjoy tubeless insulin pumping. You're going to be able to jump into a shower or a pool or a bathtub without taking off your pump. That's right, you will not have to disconnect to bathe with an OmniPod. You also won't have to disconnect to play a sport or to do anything where a regular tube pump has to come off. Arden has been wearing an OmniPod for 16 years. She knows other people that wear different pumps, and she has never once asked the question, should I be trying a different pump? Never once, omnipod.com/juicebox, get a pump that you'll be happy with forever.

Travis 10:52
It worked out fairly well. I would say I did what I needed to do. And then at 1819, I moved out,

Scott Benner 11:02
then you really did what you needed to

Travis 11:03
do. And then I

Scott Benner 11:07
Yeah, Travis.

Travis 11:10
And then once I was on my own, and I was doing my, you know, working, and had my own health insurance, I finally realized how expensive everything was, and that's kind of where the roller coaster really hit for diabetes. Well, did

Scott Benner 11:23
you ignore some of your care for costs? So

Travis 11:27
I definitely backed off of taking insulin as much as I should have for for costs. I was doing that. You know, I'll take a shot when my blood sugar is through the roof, and if I can maintain a good sugar level, like, keep it around 150 then I won't need to, you know, inject. I was super busy at work. I was running around so active to kind of help keep the my blood sugar a little bit stable, but then, you know, just out of control, not

Scott Benner 11:57
enough, without the right amount of insulin. Yeah, exercise is nice, and it'll make your insulin more sensitive, but yeah, not if you're not taking it. Did your parents know that you were making that concession?

Travis 12:07
They didn't until I split up with my son's mother and moved back in with my mother, and she was like, You are what are you doing? And I told her I couldn't afford everything, and, you know, I had other bills that were more important to pay, and I couldn't I don't think I saw an endocrinologist. I want to say when I was 19 was the last time I saw an endocrinologist, and then I the next time I saw one was when I was like, 23

Scott Benner 12:38
Travis. Can I? Can I get a little context here. Did you move out because your girlfriend was pregnant? You were trying to put a nuclear family together? Yes, okay, okay. And then that doesn't go well. I mean, surprise. And trying to imagine, if that happened to me when I was 19, how long I'd be able to hold that together, that doesn't go well, then you've got to move home because now you're paying for the baby, and you're, you're still very young, and that's how your mom sees. I mean, she probably was, you know, I'm not going to lie to you, she probably thought the whole thing was a train wreck. But, you know, like, that's when she finally see, yeah. Definitely did, yeah. And then she's, then she sees the health aspect of it. Does she step back in at that point,

Travis 13:21
yes and no, she stepped in to make sure that I could get all my bills straight straightened out, and then kind of get my life back in order. I got a job. Well, first thing I did is I, I've got a found a doctor, okay, endocrinologist, I'll say she put me on Lantis and Humalog, and she basically was like, this is the poor man's pump, because you can't afford a pump right now and your your sugars are so out of whack, we're not going to put you on a pump, so we're going to put you on what they call the poor man's pump. I ended up doing what she was saying and ended up having a low blood sugar behind the wheel of a work pickup truck. So I lost my license for I want to say it was like 15 days until I could prove that it was, you know, a fluke in the system, yeah,

Scott Benner 14:13
that's a lot at a young age, Travis, yeah, what was the poor man's pump?

Travis 14:18
So it was Lantis, which is the the long acting and then Humalog. I would take multiple times a day, like four or five times a day. I would take Humalog insulin to well, but through a pump, no, no, no. Just through, through MDI, yeah. Okay,

Scott Benner 14:39
I see so. So this is kind of a, almost a cultural thing at that point, like this is kind of the time where they were moving from regular and mph to faster acting insulins. They didn't really even know what to call some of this stuff at the at that point, I guess, yeah,

Travis 14:55
and this is when I leave the first kind of insulin pump. Was starting to just coming out. Yeah, all right,

Scott Benner 15:02
I see I get it now. So yeah, it's just kind of like colloquial, the way they put it, I guess, yeah, wow. You

Travis 15:10
able to get your license back. I got my license back. I do have to say the paramedics and the police officers were very surprised that I was conscious and talking to them when they pulled up, because I was able to I had no accident. I had no crashes. I pulled into a parking lot. I was on the wrong side of the road, so the cops were following me, and when the paramedics came and did a sugar I was 14, they were both like, you should be dead right now. And I was like, Ah, it's all right, yeah,

Scott Benner 15:41
I got to get back to work. Yeah, I

Travis 15:43
have lunch here. I'll take 20 minutes to eat my lunch and then continue on. I promise I won't move from here. But they made me take the ambulance ride, and I had to pay that one off. Yeah, everything's

Scott Benner 15:54
when, when you're broke, it seems like everything is out to get you. And you know what I mean? Oh yeah, yeah. I lived through it for sure. I used to tell people, there's a time in my life that if you asked me for $50 you might as well have asked me for a million dollars. I didn't have the, you know, I couldn't have come up with 50 any easier than I couldn't come up with a million. It was just, just what it was. All right, so, okay, so you have some chowder or a lobster roll and a beer, and you get back to work, I understand. And then, like, from there, how do, how do things progress? Because your intake form is very interesting. You like, I just want to talk about, like, how things have changed. And so,

Travis 16:34
yeah, you know, because, yeah, so I, I progressed. I went from, you know, the old school knowing, in the 80s, very, I would say very little. It was a, you know, shot in the dark, you know, to do this, and hopefully you'll stay alive. Yeah, to, I ended up getting a job at the state and was able to finally switch over and get a pump. So that was the newer pump. I don't know if the the Medtronic mini Med, maybe, or Yeah, it was the mini med. You could get, like, a clear body of a black or a blue fan. I want to say, did someone

Scott Benner 17:12
try to make that feel important during a doctor? So I was like, you could choose your color. You'd be like, oh, I

Travis 17:17
want to say, I want to say it was the Medtronic rep, right? It was like, What color do you want? Like, this is. And I was like, I don't care. As long as it keeps as long as it keeps me alive, that's all that matters.

Scott Benner 17:29
Unless you have, I don't have diabetes in that, that wish list in there, I'm good,

Travis 17:35
exactly. Yeah, I got on the pump. Life was, you know, pretty, pretty smooth going. I want to say my a 1c went from I want to say, like a 19 down to maybe a 13 with a pump. So I was pretty impressed. And I was happy with bringing it down and kind of fighting to bring it down even more I did the Dexcom, the original Dex sensors that were like a syringe at an angle that you stabbed in yourself, and you had to keep in the fridge, yeah,

Scott Benner 18:08
oh, you had to keep in the refrigerator. Back then the sensor

Travis 18:12
piece, you had to keep in the in the refrigerator, yeah, you had to keep them

Scott Benner 18:16
cool. I don't even remember that. How What year do you think that was the very first one,

Travis 18:21
I want to say it was, they were just like, brand new. They're like, try these. See how they work. It's supposed to be, you know, you don't have to take a blood sugar as often. You have to do it, like twice a day to calibrate. I tried it, and then my insurance said, No, we're not paying for it. You'll have to pay the $1,000 a month for it. And I said, Well, I guess these can. I'll use them up, and I'll, I'll go back to what I was doing. Oh,

Scott Benner 18:47
just 1000 Sure. Can I pay for the whole year, please?

Travis 18:50
Yeah.

Scott Benner 18:51
Can I get a 10% discount for but that's crazy. Here's the thing I'm really focused on. You're diagnosed in your five we're talking about a time when you're in your early 20s and your a one season 19, in your early 20s.

Travis 19:05
Yeah, it was bad. I didn't control it at all. I went out. I would go out drinking and partying and, you know, while taking care of family, while doing everything. And, yeah, I was refusing to believe I was the diabetic. You could say, at that point,

Scott Benner 19:21
okay, how long did that park go on

Travis 19:23
for where you were? Just like, um, about five, maybe six years. And then I, you know, was like, I gotta, I gotta change. Is

Scott Benner 19:32
that when you got to the 13 with the pump? Or no,

Travis 19:35
not yet, yeah, that's when I got to the 13 with the pump. Okay, so

Scott Benner 19:39
I gotta change, grab a pump. Go from 19 to 13. Do you stay at 13 long, or do you start to figure it out and see a decrease at that point,

Travis 19:48
I started to see a decrease. I want to say. I went from 13 down to and I kind of hovered at 10 for a long time.

Scott Benner 19:58
Give me some context. What are you. C right now.

Travis 20:00
My a 1c right now is a 6.5 not good for you. Now.

Scott Benner 20:06
What's the difference between a 6.5 and a 10? What's the difference in your effort and what you were doing?

Travis 20:11
So there's a there's a lot of effort put into that. Actually found a very a new endocrinologist, because I was trying to get my CDL, so I needed to go and get all this paperwork done. And she was basically like, I'm not signing this paperwork unless you can get your a 1c down to a seven. Here's what you need to do, and I will help you. And she actually saw me for the very first time and didn't even charge me for an appointment fee. So absolutely love my endocrinologist. Now I still see her. Okay, so I, you know, she kind of kicked me in the butt, and I worked. I started, you know, checking my sugars more. I started, you know, bolusing more, because I think that's the biggest thing I never did, was bolus for meals I would always, oh, I ate. Let me just give myself a bolus later.

Scott Benner 21:02
Did you ever even do it later? Or was it just,

Travis 21:05
were you it was probably 5050, sometimes I did it later. Sometimes I was like, well, it's too late now. Let the pump, you know, let me let it, let it run its course and catch up. This

Scott Benner 21:17
is not an uncommon story from people who've had diabetes for a long time. And I think what I mean by that is for people who, at one point, were just doing regular and mph like, just shoot it. Shoot it again. Don't think about it. Don't test Don't worry. It is what it is. Are you telling me that you were doing your Atlantis and nothing else most of the time, or even that you if you had a pump on you would let it run your basal insulin, but then very frequently, or coin flip, whether you would bolus for your meals or not. So

Travis 21:48
with the pump, I would very frequently. I would, I would not frequently, bolus for meals. I would just let it run the basal, and then if my sugar, you know, if I was up in the three hundreds and it wasn't coming down with the basal, I would then kind of mess around with the bolus number and see how I could, you know where I how much I needed to get down,

Scott Benner 22:11
and what was your understanding of the impact that was having on your health.

Travis 22:15
I knew it wasn't good because I had a doctor that told me that I was going to lose my arms and my legs and body parts, and I would never see my kids grow up, but I was, you know, still in my early 20s, and I was like, whatever. I'll, you know, I've lived this long. I'll, I'll continue to live. My understanding is that it was absolutely terrible. Thankfully, I don't have any side effects, except for retinopathy in my in my eyes, which isn't bad, and they're keeping, you know, tabs on it. So,

Scott Benner 22:50
so going back to that time, hey, you're gonna lose your losing your arms, losing your legs, maybe think of a Metallica song when you said the way you said it. There's something about that, but that's being told you, and you're like, whatever? Do you mean, whatever? Like, nah, that's not gonna happen to me. Or I'm okay so far. So I won't think about, like, why would I'm trying to understand why,

Travis 23:10
when it was a whatever, you know, I'll never live to see that kind of kind of thing. Like, Oh, okay. I was told I only you know if you live to, you know, if you live to 25 you know, you you've hit a milestone. So, you know, I was, you know, Bunk. If I hit 25 that's a milestone, and I probably don't have much longer after that. But

Scott Benner 23:32
no Travis, no feeling of like, I'll beat this or I'll do better than that, like, just you took, you took what they told you to heart, like I'm not going to live a very long life.

Travis 23:41
I kind of took it to heart, but I was like, You know what? I'm we all gotta die at some point, so I'm gonna, I'm gonna live it up and have fun. I'm not gonna let the diabetes hold me back and not be able to have fun like all my other friends are doing, and do what they're doing. So especially if I'm not gonna live very long. Yeah, so if I'm gonna die, I'm going to die having fun with a smile on my face, is how I looked at it. And I made it to 40, so I'm doing pretty good. I

Scott Benner 24:06
think, I think you're doing well, let me ask you a question. If this hall happened and you were 40, you're the person you are right now. And I came in and I said to you, Travis, you're not going to live very long. Don't even bother trying. Blah, blah. Do you think you'd still accept that, or do you think now, as a more mature person, you'd be like, Well, are you sure maybe I should talk to somebody else, or are you sure,

Travis 24:25
as a more mature person, I am definitely taking way better care of it, and I have to say, listening to the juicebox podcast, I understand a lot more of what the harms I have done to myself and why I'm trying to do way better than what I used to do. How long have you been listening? So I haven't been listening that long. I want to say maybe a year. In a year, has your A once he gotten better? There's kind of a odd story in there. I have the eyelet pump now. Oh, good. I was on the trial. I was in the trial for it, and. Then once i i was able to receive it early, because I was in the trial and spoke to the creator of the islet when I was getting hooked up and doing my setup process. And he kind of mentioned, oh, have you heard about this podcast? And I was like, I so I, you know, kind of looked at him up and listened to his his podcast with you first. And then I was like, this is pretty interesting. And then started going through him, and I now listen to him every day. Oh, wow, I subscribe now too, so I get to listen to him early. Oh, thank

Scott Benner 25:35
you. Hey, that's not a thing I usually bring up, but yeah, if you pay like, a few bucks a month, you'll get the episodes a day early, and there's no ads in the Pro Tip series or the bowl beginning series. But that's neither here nor there. That's a little ad for myself, Travis, but no, but I don't want to get off track, because this is incredibly interesting. So in 35 years, you went through this process, but still, in all a year ago, you were pretty lost,

Travis 26:00
I would say so, except for my endocrinologist, who would yell at me, will not really yell at me, but just be like, listen, I can't help you if you don't help yourself, right? And you know, if you want to keep your your CDL and I have to continue to sign this paperwork, then you need to figure this out and make and show me that you actually want to keep your CDL license, oh,

Scott Benner 26:22
I was gonna say, like your first major health improvement. It was for money. You you need to keep your job and upgrade your job with a different license. That's why you really got your a one scene down to seven, right?

Yes, yeah,

that's what I thought. Okay, all right. But I mean, so you met Ed? Is it ed that you met, he was on the podcast, right? Yes, yeah. And so, well, that's interesting. So, so are you in the islet trial? Because how did they find you?

Travis 26:52
So I'm in the islet trial because my my endocrinologist knows knew the doctor that was running it, and she gave my name, and they reached out, and then I reached out, and I took I got into the trial. My a 1c when I started the trial, was at a seven. And then after three months of being on it, my a 1c came down to a 6.6 Wow. And they gave me all the, all the paperwork in, you know, basically the breakdown of what, what the islet pump was doing in, what it was giving me for breakfast, lunch and dinner, bolus, yeah, I have to say how amazing my endocrinologist is. Is that she had my pump, my Medtronic, 760 or whatever it is, set up pretty close to what the islet was doing, minus the basal rates. I mean, minus the boluses. Okay, so I basically took what I was bolusing for breakfast, lunch and dinner on average, and when I started back onto my Medtronic pump, I would, you know, that's what I would give myself as a bolus. Unless I ate a little bit more than I would kind of bump it up a little bit. If I ate a little bit less, I would bump it down. So I was basically doing what the eyelet did, but in a manual mode. Yeah. So

Scott Benner 28:16
Wow. Do you think it's possible that your doctor rep said, Hey, I think I have somebody for this study, because you fit the bill of what they were looking for, which was people who are looking to not really be involved very much.

Travis 28:28
I think so, yeah. And that is, you know, I hate to say it, but I I want to be involved, but I don't want to be involved. I have, you know, I want life to be life, and diabetes is part of my life, but I don't want it to overwhelm and take over. You

Scott Benner 28:45
know, listen, I can't tell you that I think there's anything wrong with that desire. You know, I understand it. I think this pump is going to help a lot of people who feel that way as well. Has listening to the podcast made any difference for you on eyelet? Or is there not really any kind of adjustments you can make anyway, or is it more about bolus timing, stuff like that? Have you gotten from it?

Travis 29:05
It's more about bolus timing, because you really can't make any adjustments. The biggest thing I think you need to figure out is your meals, if it's a regular, if it's a usual meal, a bigger meal or less meal, yeah, is kind of and that's where you kind of need to know your carbs. And I definitely think the podcast has helped with the the protein spikes and all that, because we do like a pizza night at the house, I'll make homemade pizzas, and I know that I can bowl us for that pizza as a as a normal meal, but in an hour, I'm gonna spike up in about a half hour or 45 minutes after my initial bolus, or Yeah, bolus, I will then give myself a usual amount, and it will keep me right where I need to be.

Scott Benner 29:56
You figured out how to tell the eyelet two different meals? For something like pizza, correct? Yeah,

Travis 30:03
the islet, the islets, great, but it doesn't it trends your, your rises in in phrases, when you're going up and you're if you're getting too low, it'll figure that out. But if you're after you eat for like, a protein, you know, Spike, it doesn't really catch it quick enough, right?

Scott Benner 30:22
So that's how you're getting under a seven with eyelet. Uh, yes. You're kind of bolusing extra, not really extra. You're bullish in what you need, but you're filling in gaps where the pump wouldn't be as aggressive. I guess I should say yes.

Travis 30:35
Okay, okay, wow. But for for people that are just getting on it and figuring things out and don't really know, yeah, don't do that. What they're doing. Well, don't be like, it would be great for somebody. It would be great, I would say it would be great for somebody that doesn't quite understand carb counting, and because you could definitely maintain a seven just, you know, bolus for what you're eating, because it will catch it. You might, you might hit 200 and sit at 200 for a little bit longer than you would like, or I would like now, but it will definitely catch it and bring you back down. I see,

Scott Benner 31:18
yeah, no, I when he explained it to me, I really did think there's a great many people actually. You're, you're the kind of numbers I was thinking about when he was talking about this thing. There are people wandering around with 13, a one, CS, all over the place. And if you're telling me, you can put this device on them, and they can say, what is it? I'm having breakfast, lunch or dinner. It's usual, less than usual, more than usual amount of food. That's it, right? Yep, it's usual, more or less usual, more less breakfast, lunch, dinner. That's it. That's it, yeah? Well, that's not a lot, so, but you're doing it too big, you know? Because there's a world where 20 year old you wouldn't push the button even Well,

Travis 31:58
see, this is where I think a 20 year old me would push this button because it's easier, okay, less consuming than having to go in and calculate, okay, I have to put in, like, the Medtronic pump. You have to put in, you know, this meal is, you know, 40 carbs. Okay, I put in 40 carbs. Okay. And, you know, I just hit a button. Bing, bang, done. Do me?

Scott Benner 32:22
Do me a favor, because I think I have a good grasp of you already, as good as I can in a half an hour. But I want to make sure everyone else does too your regular life. You're a hard working guy. You're not lazy, right?

Travis 32:32
I'm not lazy. I I drive a truck for a living, a dump truck for a local trucking company. I coach rugby on the weekends. I used to play rugby. I try to stay as active as possible. My daughter ice skates. My daughter plays rugby.

Scott Benner 32:49
My wife works with animals, so we're you're involved. Personally, going, Yeah, you're involved. Parent, the whole thing, yes, yeah, it's just this aspect for whatever reason, whether it's your personality or the time you got diabetes and how it was first explained to you, or whatever it was that put you into this mindset. This is just the mindset you you have, and you're adapting to it with different technology.

Travis 33:14
And I have to say, I love the new technology. I have a, you know, the Dexcom. I'm on a Dexcom g6 right now. And I would, you know, I'd fight you over taking it away.

Scott Benner 33:27
I used to say that about TiVo. I used to say, if you came to my door and tried to take my TiVo back, I would, I would get a bat. Now, everybody doesn't even know what that is like all media is time shifted at this point. You know what I mean Exactly, right? Uh, but But I take your point, like, Listen, man, that's fantastic. And it's actually kind of big of you to come share this story, because this is not a story of like, Hey, I found the podcast right away. My a one season the fives, and I'm doing great. Like, that's easy to share. You know what I mean? Like, this is, I lived a long time. I wasn't doing the things I needed to do. I wasn't taking steps to change that I probably wasn't going to, you know, I got pushed into it a little bit because of a job situation, and then I got lucky with a good doctor who helped me stay as focused as possible. But then this technology is where I make my leap.

Unknown Speaker 34:15
Yeah, wait, can

Scott Benner 34:16
you imagine if someone would have slapped this on five year old Travis? I

Travis 34:20
would, I don't even know what I'd be doing now. I'd

Scott Benner 34:23
be, just be so exciting. Honestly, I would, yeah, be, also your attitude would be completely different. About diabetes.

Travis 34:30
I mean, my attitude thought bad. No, no, I just Travis.

Scott Benner 34:34
Let me stop you. I don't think you have a bad attitude. I just mean, I made your perspective would be different, I

Travis 34:39
guess. Oh, probably, definitely, yeah, yeah. But, you know, I don't let diabetes. I in. Anybody that lets diabetes hold them back from doing something they want to do is, is crazy. I mean, I didn't realize that I was supposed to take off my pump going on roller coasters. When I got the eyelet, they were like, don't forget to take that off if you go on roller coasters or jump out of a plane. I was like. What do you mean? I've done both those and I've never taken my pump off. And they're like, is your pumps? Your pump still worked after? And I was like, Well, yeah, why wouldn't it like,

Scott Benner 35:09
Oh no, my daughter wears omnipot on a roller coaster. Well, I

Travis 35:12
don't know if omnipot is different than the Medtronic one, but I was like, I sure, I guess. And all right, I'm super excited for for the technology that makes you know me being able to get my CDL a possibility, and maybe having a diabetic be a airline pilot, because that was never a possibility, and now they're looking into letting that be a possibility.

Scott Benner 35:37
A guy doing it, he was on the show already. Oh, perfect. Yeah, yeah, fantastic. So that's, that's the kind of stuff you're thinking about like you're thinking about everybody being able to have more opportunities.

Travis 35:48
Yeah, and there's, actually, there's a kid in my daughter's school who's in his in her class that I came I didn't have to work one day, so I went to breakfast with her, because her school serves breakfast. I saw him pull out his phone and look at it. And I was like, so I kind of looked at her, and I was like, is he a diabetic? And she was like, yeah. I was like, Huh, okay. And my daughter is so nonchalant with everything. It's It's amazing. She she knows where my all my insulin supplies are. She knows how to change my palm. Even the new one, she knows where the on. I can't even think of the name of it now, glucagon. The glucagon, Yep, yeah. She knows where that is. She knows how to use it. I've actually spoken to the other kids parents, because they're getting ready to go to nature's classroom, which is an overnight like camp for the the kids. And I said, you know, my, my daughter knows how to take care of everything she's she's quite aware of what a low blood sugar behavior is, what high blood sugar behavior is, um, even though it can be different in that anybody she she can, you know,

Scott Benner 36:57
she's aware of this kid needed help, right? Yeah. And I was like,

Travis 37:01
you know? And I said, she knows what a glucagon pen is and how to use one. And the mother was like, well, we have the nasal spray. And I was like, well, even easier, because I'm sure she can figure that out.

Scott Benner 37:13
And okay, hey, Travis, you ever growing up end up in DK in the hospital? So

Travis 37:19
I've been in DKA once, and it was, I want to say it was probably 1110, or 11 years ago, and it was because my pump, my pump, malfunctioned, and I actually had to get a new one from Medtronic. Those

Scott Benner 37:36
years when you had a 19, A, 1c, you never ended up in the hospital. Never ended up in the hospital. My god, that's interesting. What do you do? You have any feelings about why that is? I'm lucky. Yeah, I don't know. Were you just like, waiting until you got high and then crushing blood sugars, but you didn't have a ton of lows either? Well,

Travis 37:55
no, I did have a ton of lows. I was definitely roller coasting, roller coaster. Roller coaster was crashing

Scott Benner 38:01
at the end.

Travis 38:01
Yeah, oh, okay. So definitely going from like 500 down to, you know, down to 50, and then catching it

Scott Benner 38:13
and then catching it yourself, or did you need intervention from other people?

Travis 38:17
No, I would catch it myself, except for that one time I was behind the wheel, yeah, literally.

Scott Benner 38:22
So that one time is your one really scary low blood sugar incident?

Travis 38:25
Yeah, and that one is the reason why I started running my blood sugars at like 200 behind the wheel when I was driving for a living, because I didn't want to have a low behind the wheel again. That experience actually made you keep a higher blood sugar? Yeah, yeah, that starts to make sense too. Looking back now, like if you could go back and talk to yourself, What do you think you would try to convince yourself of I would try to convince myself to maintain it better when I was running reckless and not even thinking about being a diabetic five years? You said five six years? Yeah, like five or six years running rampant. Jeez,

Scott Benner 39:08
were you with a woman at that point? No, not living with some I'm just trying to wonder if there was another person in your life who saw that happening and didn't, did or didn't say anything to you.

Travis 39:18
So my my son's mother wouldn't have really recognized it, right? My wife, now would. She's pretty on top of it, but yeah, no. The only other person that would have recognized it would have been my mother, but I was out of the house by then, and I wouldn't go home at that time. So

Scott Benner 39:37
any other type one in your family line? No,

Travis 39:39
my grandmother, later in life, became a type two. There's thyroid problems. My mother, actually, I want to believe, has her had her thyroid removed or had something done? Maybe, yeah,

Scott Benner 39:54
okay, so she, she takes a replacement. Your thyroid is okay. My

Travis 39:59
thyroid. It is okay. My cholesterol was a little elevated. They put me on a statin, and then they took me off, so I'm not taking a statin anymore.

Scott Benner 40:08
How about in the family, celiac, eczema, bipolar, or anything like that. In the family,

Travis 40:16
there's definitely bipolar in the family, maybe my aunt. Okay,

Scott Benner 40:22
so any Alzheimer's with the older ones? Um, no, no. Okay, wow, man, it's crazy. This is the kind of story that just really interests me, because to me, it has so much to do with how you started. And, you know, listening, I don't know that we can blame anybody in the 80s, right for with today's standards like that. That would be a pretty big stretch, but still, like so much of where you are is where you started.

Travis 40:50
Yes, and the other thing too. I mean, my both, my my parents are separated now, but they were both in the service. They both got into drug use. So when I became a diabetic and my mom had to do shock draw up syringes, she said it was the hardest thing for because it would bring back flashbacks of when she was using. So that's they

Scott Benner 41:14
was that they were using in the military, in the military, or when they got out,

Travis 41:18
I believe it was the end of the military. I'm not too sure. Okay, my mom's been open and you know about all drug use that's been throughout her life. And you know, it's pretty an open it's a pretty open book.

Scott Benner 41:31
So she said, What age do you become aware of that?

Travis 41:34
When we were, like, 1617, she used to tell us, you know, because she was trying to keep us on the straight and narrow,

Scott Benner 41:40
did that work, or does, did part of that partying? I've

Travis 41:44
never done drugs. I mean, I've taken pain killers that probably weren't prescribed to me, but I don't do that, you know, it was, yeah, that was in

Scott Benner 41:52
the we're gonna count, though, but not in the same way

Travis 41:55
that was what I was, you know, in in my 20s, running crazy and doing things and partying with everybody, but I, you know, I mean, I still had my job, I still kept my responsibilities,

Scott Benner 42:06
but are you drinking? Mostly,

Travis 42:07
I do. I mean, I still drink. Now, I don't drink heavily.

I'll have, you know, a few drinks on the weekend, but back then you were pounding it right back then you could consider me a binge drinker. Yeah, okay, and throwing a pill once in a while. Yes, okay, wash that down with a little whiskey, maybe something like that. Yeah, wash it down. Yeah. And then you guys, would you just hang out? Were you like, roaming the streets of Boston, causing trouble?

No chasing girls, doing we would hang out, you know, either at a hotel or in the woods. The town woods. Hang out. The woods. Was there?

Scott Benner 42:41
Was there a sofa in those woods? Travis,

Travis 42:44
there could have been a sofa in those woods.

Scott Benner 42:50
I saw one of those sofas a couple of times.

Travis 42:54
You're not You're not that much older than me. I know you. Yeah, I'm

Scott Benner 42:57
not that much older than you. Oh, my God. Did you imagine that there was a time in your life when you were like, You know what makes sense to me? We're gonna get good loaded, climb out in the woods and sit on a dirty sofa that I'm 100% sure a squirrel on.

Travis 43:10
Yeah, yes,

Scott Benner 43:12
this will be great. We'll love this. So your mom did scare you out of doing drugs. You think it wasn't scare

Travis 43:18
me out of I never even I wasn't really for you. Yeah, it wasn't for me. I wasn't really interested. I was around it all my I mean, I've had friends Sure, did everything under the sun, but it just really wasn't for me. I have

Scott Benner 43:32
to tell you, I have the same story. I've every opportunity in the world. I just never cared, never really cared for it, or thought to try it. It's interesting. I didn't drink either, but that's I'm not I'm not bragging. I'm just saying, like, the drug thing never occurred to me. It's really interesting how it strikes some people and not others. Yeah,

Travis 43:51
I mean, it's, it's strange, I don't know, like, my really good friend still smokes pot to this day, and I'm like, I don't have a ton of trouble with smoking pot, I

Scott Benner 44:01
have to be honest. But like, I'm talking about, like my friends were doing cocaine and, you know,

Travis 44:05
yeah, well, my friends were too, and they actually, now they just all smoke pot. Now they kind of grew out of everything else. So

Scott Benner 44:12
they grew out of it. I grew out of cocaine. Don't you worry?

Travis 44:15
I Yeah, it's funny to say, but it's true. Yeah, no, I

Scott Benner 44:18
know. I know it is, how did you talk to your son, or your son about all this, about drugs, alcohol and and, like, how you were, I mean, because maybe you haven't, but, like, you're running around, you made a baby pretty young. Like, did you give him the like, I sent my son to school. And I was like, listen, just don't up the things you can on. And he was like, he was like, what? I'm like, You can't kill somebody and come back from it. You can't get somebody pregnant and come back from it. I'm like, Don't up the things. You can't un and he was like, okay, and I sent him on his bike. I'm like, did you have a conversation like that? I did have

Travis 44:55
a conversation with, like, with him like that. He's a very good kid. He's got. Good head on his shoulders. I love him dearly, but he sometimes isn't the brightest he, as he would say, at least I didn't make your mistake. I'm making my mistakes. You know, he's, he'll, he'll come to me and goes, and he says, you know, listen, I'm 21 I don't have a kid yet. I'm doing better than you already. And I was like,

Scott Benner 45:19
there you go. Hard to argue with also, yeah, nice that you guys can talk about it, because with that freedom, because he is talking it must be difficult on some level for him. He's talking about himself as a mistake, and that's that can't be easy, like psychologically, you know what I mean. But it sounds like you guys have a nice, open back and forth about it, and I think that probably is what makes it easy for him, you know, yeah, I

Travis 45:42
mean, I tell him all the time, you know, yes, I if I could go back, I would still do what I did, like I, you know, I wouldn't take anything from my past. You know, it wasn't a struggle to have a kid at 19. Oh, yeah. But, you know, I made it work. I made it happen. I, you know, supported him, you know, from day one. And yeah,

Scott Benner 46:00
I'm glad you're here, but I maybe should have owned a pot and a pillow before I did this. Like, yeah, exactly,

Travis 46:08
yeah. No, we, you know. I'm like, You're not a mistake. You were an oops. And he's like, Oh, thanks. Makes it so much better. It's like, oh no,

Scott Benner 46:16
it does a little actually, there's a lot of context in the word mistake, you know what I mean? Like, not on not on purpose, and something I wish I wouldn't have done is is very much different. So it's interesting. I'm thinking of calling your episode shot in the dark. That you said that earlier, and I thought, How come there's no episode called shot in the dark? It's like such a nice like, double entendre and everything. Anyway, I'm working towards that, unless I just call it Boston, that's gonna be that. How the hell do you live through the winters? I'm not lying. When the wind comes in off the water, why don't you all just scream, die and fall over.

Travis 46:51
All honestly, I hate winter time now that I'm older. I used to love it as a kid. I would, I would love to get out of Boston and move down to Tennessee. All honestly, I have to convince the wife to do that, but she's been working for the same company for 25 years now. So that's that's where the struggle lies. Tennessee has become a very popular place for people to move. I would love to go out in my flip flops, in my shorts, and just leaf blow the snow away and

Scott Benner 47:18
the call that winter exactly. I have to be honest with you, I do not want to live in the cold, especially as I get older too. It gets it's hard sometimes even just the other day. I mean, you and I are close enough to each other. It got really windy and bitter the other day, and I had to run out for something and groceries. And I, you know, pushed the cart back to my car, and I put the stuff in, and I took the car to the return, because I'm not a piece of and if you don't take the car to the return, I'm judging you. And so I'm taking the car to the return. This me and this guy, like, make eye contact, and he looks at me, and I look at him, and I went so fucking cold. And he goes, me too. And he said, I think it's because I'm old. And I was like, I was thinking the same thing, and we ran back to our cars, and that was the end of it. I 25 years ago, I would have gone to the grocery store and shorts on that day. I wouldn't have thought twice about it. And it's just, I don't know what it is, but I don't want to. I don't want to feel like this anymore. So, yeah, no, I

Travis 48:15
don't want to. I mean, I shouldn't say too much, because I salt for the you needed the state. So I get, I get paid to be out in the cold, but I just, I don't, I don't want to do it anymore. Yeah, I

Scott Benner 48:27
don't. I'm with you, man,

Travis 48:28
I but I love the company I work for too now. So I hard to leave. You know it's hard to leave? Yeah, no, I

Scott Benner 48:35
see that. I'm watching my wife. My wife has a job offer this week, and I'm seeing how it pulls on her in both directions. It's actually kind of very interesting. All right, what else you got? Anything else you'd like to talk about, is anything we haven't talked about? I want to make sure I'm not missing anything from your perspective.

Travis 48:51
I don't think so. I just, you know, the new technology coming out, I mean, is amazing. Give it a try. Even the the g7 now, which is, is, is a plus. And

Scott Benner 49:02
how long have you been on g7

Travis 49:04
I haven't been on G I haven't switched yet because I haven't, oh, confirmed. I haven't confirmed with my doc, my insurance company, if they'll cover the g7 but islet is compatible, though, right? Eyelet is now compatible. If I open up my eyelet, it says, Please choose g6 or g7 when I switch my sensors. So nice. So you're thinking about it, that switch is definitely coming. Going to be coming to my only issue with eyelet is the length of the tubing is too short. So I think it's causing some tunneling, because when I roll around in my sleep, I think it's pulling the tube, because it's only a short tube. Have

Scott Benner 49:46
you given them that feedback? Because I imagine if that's happening to you, it's happening to others, they'd probably like to present people with more options. I would imagine I

Travis 49:54
have. There is another option. It's the steel set I'm not able to. At through my distribution yet. Okay, but they're working on it, and then I'm also in the works of maybe switching to the fast acting whether it's FIAs or the other one. They both work in that pump as well. Yeah, one of them is actually going to be pre filled cartridges. So you'll get pre filled vials all set. You just popped. Man, is it going to be loom, Jeff?

Scott Benner 50:23
I wonder if I'm trying to see I'm looking right now, hold on a second. I don't know that loom Jeff works for the island, and I don't know that it doesn't, but I don't know that it does either.

Travis 50:32
I think they did FIAs for the test.

Scott Benner 50:35
Okay, all right, you're hoping that makes a bit of a difference too, because now, yeah, I'm hoping tell me, Travis, you've you've sniffed the sixes now, now you're wondering what else you could do, right?

Travis 50:45
Well, I'm hoping just to stay in the sixes, we can get to the low sixes. So my other thing too, is I'm in discussions with my endo about maybe getting on we go V because I'm having trouble losing weight. And with everything I've heard on the podcast, it could help with my total daily dosage. Do

Scott Benner 51:06
you want to talk about it? Give me one. Yeah, let me say this first US based, diabetes focused medical technology company beta bionics has received FDA clearance, compatibility of the FIAs pump cart, pre filled insulin cartridge. So that's what you're talking about. Not, yes, not that I let providing users with a choice of three insulins, Novolog, Humalog, or the FIAs pump cart. So those are the three that'll work with it. And that's

Travis 51:30
really cool. The Novolog and the human log you have to fill yourself, yeah, but the fiasco will come pre filled, which, I mean, you might like, if it saves me a step, you know, save me five minutes. That's five minutes of my life. I

Scott Benner 51:43
get back. Yeah, you take it. Well, I'll tell you to the g7 where you're going to love that besides the size and the ease of the insertion is there's a shorter window for warm up down to 30 minutes. But there's also a, like, a grace period at the end of the sensor. So what I tell people all the time is, it's like, you put the new one on and live with the new one for an hour or two or three, or whatever, through the grace period, and then pop the old one off. And as soon as you pop the old one off, the new ones there and giving you numbers already fantastic, like, you know, so you don't have a especially with these algorithms, right? You're not gonna, you're not gonna have a gap of data at all. But tell me about, about wanting to lose weight. How

Travis 52:23
much do you think you have to lose? Probably about 50, maybe 60 pounds. I'm like 275, right now, at six one, and I just, I don't eat much anymore, yeah, but I try to maintain, you know, watch what I eat, not the greatest with, you know, nutrition, I know my lunch is like a little kid's lunch, because I'm sitting in a truck and I need to just have quick snacks that I can eat while I drive. Right? You know, me and the wife go out walking when we can with our dogs, and then, you know, we I coach rugby and run and chase the kids at Rugby. And what was your frame like in your 20s? What do you think you weighed back then? I weighed 220, back in my 20s. Did

Scott Benner 53:05
you have weight to lose then? Or were you solid?

Travis 53:08
I was, I was fairly solid. I mean, I probably should have lost weight, but it was all, you know, it was all that alcohol, yeah,

Scott Benner 53:15
because I'm telling I'm looking at the obesity chart right now. At six, one, you are considered obese. 227, to 295, so that puts you in that category. You'd have to get below 182, to get to moderate weight, which means and the reason, I think that's important is because that means that you qualify right now for a GLP medication for weight loss. If your insurance company covers it, it'll be free. Even you got to find out if your insurance company covers either we go V or zepbound. And I'll tell you, I'd try for zebound If I was you first. Okay, maybe fewer side effects and the hope of losing more weight than on we go V, but man, I thought like I'll tell you when I started this whole thing. I don't know if you've listened to my diary about losing weight, but I started at 236 and I thought I told my wife, like, boy, if I lost 20 pounds, like, I'd be great. And when I lost 20 pounds, and I looked, I was like, Oh, I'm still fat. I was like, Oh, why did I think I only had to lose 20 pounds? That's ridiculous. And then I said to her, I'm like, well, I'll just need to get under 200 that'll that'll be really great. Then I got under 200 and I was like, Nope, that's not the answer either. And now I'm this morning. Actually, this morning I am the lowest I've ever been, 187 187 is that right? 197 How much do I weigh?

Holy crap. Hold on a second. No, I

think it's 190 Oh,

Unknown Speaker 54:41
187 pause, this is embarrassing.

Scott Benner 54:47
I wait one Yeah, I think I'm 187 this morning. How about that? Isn't that crazy? The I've what I've learned over this last year Travis is the number is meaningless to me. It's about my health. How I feel and what my body is holding on to that it shouldn't be holding on to. I was 187 this morning. I've lost 46.4 pounds in total since I began this whole thing. I guess I started like two, 233, or something like that. I forget now, um, so I still have it around my my midsection. I still have what I would consider to be three handfuls of fat around my midsection. I'm trying to get rid of that. I just moved up on me. My wife

Travis 55:25
did Weight Watchers, and we lost weight on that. But I, you know, we stopped doing it, and then found the weight. Found the weight, yeah, and then I want to say right, right now my total daily dosage is like 8990 units per day, so I'd like to cut that down, because I'm, I'm burning through insulin like you wouldn't believe so have you heard some of the stories lately? The little girl, for instance, I did, yeah, and that's kind of the one that was like, Huh? I'm gonna, I'm gonna talk to the doctor about this. Now,

Scott Benner 55:55
this would not be forever. This is not gonna happen to everybody. I don't even know if it'll ever happen to anybody else but her mom texted me this morning. Her daughter hasn't had a bolus for a meal in 90 days. And impressive. Glucose average, 109 standard deviation, 23 GMI through the Dexcom is 5.9 and that's that kid has type one diabetes. So and I'll more personally, I'll tell you that we started Arden on point two five of ozempic watched her needs drop significantly. I would say six, maybe eight weeks into it, it stopped working as well. So we moved her to point five, and right back again to the the lower insulin needs. But Arden's basal went down from 1.1 an hour to point eight. So there, what is that? That's point three an hour times 24 and then her insulin sensitivity basically doubled from like one unit moves her 42 to one unit moves her 83 now I think, I think that's our setting, and then her carb ratio went from one to four to one to eight, maybe seven and a half. But still, who cares? Like, that's a lot less insulin.

Travis 57:15
Yeah,

Scott Benner 57:17
you know what I mean, and that you know nothing. I think you know me. I think everybody should take the amount of insulin they need. I'm not. I'm never advocate, advocating for people to think of insulin as too much or too little, because I really do think that runs the risk, then, of people not caring for themselves well. But these glps For Type ones, I know they're not, they're not covered at the moment, but it can't be much longer, like it's gonna have to be. They're studying it now, and these conversations are probably gonna help, you know, at some point, you know, and it's not like my daughter lost like, 50 pounds, or something like that. That's why she's using less insulin, like she lost a little bit of weight, but maybe, like, you know, 810, pounds, something like that. It's not just because of that, because now the weights down, and when her body got used to that level, at point two, five, the insulin needs started to go back up again. Yeah, so she had a little more now she's back in. I don't know where she'll settle in at man, but if you could get that, it'd be a big deal for you. I

Travis 58:13
think, yeah, that's, that's my hope. I know, I know FiOS isn't covered by my insurance. But I reached out to them, and I, you know, kind of let them know my my dilemma, and they said that they're gonna, you know, they'll look into it. So I'm hoping they change formats, and it's not a level four whatever prescription. Well, I have to play full pliers for it, so get it

Speaker 1 58:39
covered under your formulary. To give it a try. Well, listen, I mean, do you think they'd cover the weight loss medication? Because you might not matter. The insult may not matter after that. I think so. I have to call that was going to be one of the things I do today was call and see about what they cover for ozempic, or we go V or whatever the other one was, I gave a talk this weekend, and I then there are hundreds of people with diabetes there, and everybody walked up to me at some point and said, Can you explain how the GLP medication works to me, like, you know, it's and everybody had the same story. I use a lot more insulin than I used to, or that I want to, or I, I think I have PCOS or, you know, like, I can't lose this weight no matter what I do. And then, listen, there's some people like you said, like I did Weight Watchers, I could lose weight, but you didn't lose 70 pounds, right? I think I lost 15 pounds. And how long, three months. Okay, well, that's, by the way, that's great, good job, but you just couldn't keep it going. So we stopped going to Weight Watchers, and I kind of ate the same, maybe a little bit worse, here and there, but yeah, no, it. What do you think was keeping the weight down versus not doing it? You just started taking in more calories at some point,

Travis 59:55
I think so. Well, my job changed too. I started driving. Oh, so we stopped going to Weight Watchers. Then I got my CDL, so I stopped, I started driving, which means I wasn't moving as much anymore, right? Yeah, man, listen, from, from for me,

Scott Benner 20:00:11
I don't think there's no shame in it at all. Like, I'll tell you what I've learned over the last year. One of the most important things I've learned over the last year is that my life is finite, and I am not going to sit around thinking, Oh, well, maybe if I could have just worked out and ate better for a couple of years, I probably would have lost the same thing. Like I've lost 45 pounds, 46 now in in the last year, and I don't feel like I cheated. I my body clearly needed this, because as soon as I had it, I was okay. I don't eat wildly differently than I did a year ago. And the medication is not this magic stuff that if you eat a bunch of junk, you'll still lose weight. Like, that's not how it works either. So you have to make adjustments to how you eat, you know. But the medication helps you, you know, like, keeps it out of your mind. A little bit keeps it, you know, keeps you from your stomach rumbling and thinking, like, oh, maybe I got to eat something. So you got to be a little more meaningful about how you eat. And you know, I never, like, I made myself two eggs this morning. I put a piece of sausage and some mushrooms with it, and I got to the end, and there were sausage and some eggs left. And I was like, I can't finish this. Like, I just can't and so, and so I said, so I stopped. I'm not hungry now, but my wife was like, Hey, I think I'm gonna she texted me a little while ago. She's like, I think I'm gonna get a slice of pizza at um, at lunch. And I thought, Oh, I might eat a slice of pizza at lunch. That's fine, but I won't eat three of them. You know what I mean, somewhere between the hunger being tamp down and the other things that that medication is doing. I mean, it's amazing. It just, it just really is so go for it. That'd be, you know, my personal advice, but nothing you hear on the juicebox podcast should be considered advice medical otherwise. But you know, if you were you and I were standing around together, I would tell you to give it a shot. I

Travis 20:01:58
told my, one of my best friends, to do it. He just saw his dendone. We were talking. He's like, supposedly I'm pre diabetic, so they're gonna the doctor was trying to put me on ozempic, but said he couldn't get it cleared. So changed his mind. Said, we go, V Yep, and they cleared it. I was like, it's the same drug. And he goes, Yeah, that's what he said, Yeah.

Scott Benner 20:02:17
It's how it works. Man. I just have a, I just had a family member got raked over the coals. They were. They're like, point one away from having diabetes, and they will not give her the medication. Just lazy. Won't give it to her and and does she qualify for weight? She does, but her insurance won't cover it, so now she has to wait till she gets diabetes, then they're going to give it to her. No problem. America makes no sense. Actually, hey, it's not America. That's money. But you know what I mean, in Massachusetts, I

Travis 20:02:46
can, I can get disability for being a diabetic. So really, yeah, how? Where

Scott Benner 20:02:52
would that come in handy?

Travis 20:02:53
I have not a clue. I have never done it, but I know I worked with a guy whose wife was on disability because she was a diabetic. And I was like, that was like, I don't want to hear that. That's awful. Travis is like, I

Scott Benner 20:03:04
want to work. I got to keep moving trying to get to Tennessee. Yeah,

Travis 20:03:10
I need to work. I couldn't be home all day. You know, it's

Scott Benner 20:03:14
funny, I'm watching my son get older, and he's like, you know, you guys work too much. And I was like, yeah, that's how it works. Man, I don't know what to tell you. He's like, the end of the day is the end of the day. And I was like, I don't know what you're talking about. I gotta get these podcasts out. I gotta do this. I have to do that. Like I gotta, I thinks I gotta get done. I don't want to be working all the time. But in this is it, like, it's a successful entity like this, is what it takes to support it. If you don't want to have something this successful, you could probably work less and still be perfectly happy, but you're not going to do something like this. And so I can, I'm watching him figure the whole thing out right now. It's pretty interesting.

Travis 20:03:55
It is I'm watching, I'm watching my son do that. So, yeah, yeah.

Scott Benner 20:04:00
I said, One day you'll understand. Like, you know, you will. He's like, when will I understand? And I said, Oh, as soon as you have a bill to pay, and it's for another human being, you'll, you'll get it pretty quickly. And, you know, you hit you pretty hard in your life. Well, oh yeah, yeah, Travis, I can't thank you enough for doing this. We should tell people that in order to have a quiet place, you drove to a parking lot and you're doing this from your car, which I very much appreciate. I am, yeah, very cool of you to do. I'm gonna say thank you and wish you well, and thank you so much for doing this. I really appreciate

Travis 20:04:31
it. No problem. Thank you. And please keep doing what you're doing, because it's a wealth of knowledge to everybody. Well, if

Scott Benner 20:04:37
I listen to my son, I'll be taking off the afternoon and just flitting around. But don't, don't worry. I'm not listening to them. I appreciate that. I certainly will. I have great plans for the rest of this year. Like I said, I like I always say, as long as we can get people to advertise in the show that covers my financial need, and then I can put my entire effort into this. It's great to hear you. That someone told you, go check out the podcast and then to hear then how much it helped you is, uh, is very encouraging for me. Definitely gives me all the motivation I need to keep doing it. So I appreciate it, and

Travis 20:05:13
I've, I've spread the word of your your podcast too. So

Scott Benner 20:05:15
hey, everyone should be doing that, not just Travis. Don't put it on Travis. Everybody get out there. I You should be finding two new listeners a day. Can I incentivize people? How would I do that? Exactly?

Travis 20:05:28
I don't even know. Do you know

Scott Benner 20:05:30
one time I thought of having a drawing every year, every month, like, like, Amazon gift cards, and you just like, I don't know, the honor system. Tell me how many people you've like gotten to listen to the podcast, and then you get a drawing. I don't know, I don't know how to do it. I wish I could walk around and and have lunch with everybody, or say thank you personally. You know what I mean. But I just, I can't figure out how to accomplish it. So anyway, yeah, that's, that's too much. Yeah, it's a big ask. I don't know how to reach the people and like, how to do all that. But nevertheless, all right, man. Thank you so much. Hold on one second for me, a huge thanks to OmniPod, not just my longest sponsor, but my first one. Omnipod.com/juice box. If you love the podcast and you love tubeless insulin pumps, this link is for you. Omnipod.com/juicebox a huge thanks to touched by type one for sponsoring this episode of The juicebox podcast. Check them out on their website, touched by type one.org or on Facebook and Instagram. I want to thank the ever since CGM for sponsoring this episode of The juicebox podcast, and invite you to go to Eversense cgm.com/juicebox to learn more about this terrific device, you can head over now and just absorb everything that the website has to offer. And that way you'll know if ever sense feels right for you. Ever sense cgm.com/juice, box, if you're not already subscribed or following in your favorite audio app, please take the time now to do that. It really helps the show and get those automatic downloads set up so you never miss an episode. Thank you so much for listening. I'll be back very soon with another episode of The juicebox podcast. The episode you just heard was professionally edited by wrong way recording, wrong way recording.com, you.