#781 Mama Wants Her Happy
Sabena’s conversation got adult out of nowhere.
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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 to episode 781 of the Juicebox Podcast
this was going to be one of those episodes where I got on here and told you had a great conversation with Sabina. She's really interesting. You're gonna have a lot of fun. She's from New Zealand, where do you see, but here we are in an after dark episode, and I did not expect that. And I have to tell you, it's just because the it's because of the shift of the conversation talking like the last 20 minutes, maybe were just kind of very adult all of a sudden, I mean, it was adult but then it just got. Anyway, we said penis a lot. So this is an after dark episode with subida. While you're listening, please remember 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 healthcare plan. Or becoming bold with insulin. You don't have to ask a doctor before you say penis on a podcast or hear someone say penis on a podcast that is completely up to you. If you're a US resident who has type one diabetes, where he's the caregiver of someone with type one, please go to T one D exchange.org. Forward slash use box fill out the survey completely and join the registry so I'm asking you to do it should take you about 10 minutes T one D exchange.org forward slash juicebox. This show is sponsored today by the glucagon that my daughter carries. G voc hypo Penn Find out more at G voc glucagon.com. Forward slash juicebox. today's podcast is also sponsored by touched by type one their annual dancing for diabetes event coming up very soon it touched by type one. So you're going to want to get to the website right quick and get yourself some tickets touched by type one.org. Today's podcast is also sponsored by Omni pod five. On the pod five of course, is the only tubeless automated insulin delivery system that integrates with Dexcom G six in layman's terms, that means it uses the data from your CGM to make decisions about insulin. Learn more and get started today at Omni pod.com forward slash juicebox. Before we start, I just want to tell you that the first like four minutes, the audio is weird, but we fix it very quickly. But I left it in because it sort of helped start the episode. I couldn't just cut it out. It wouldn't have made sense that we're TWICE I'm sorry. I'll say a couple words in a row.
Sabena 2:43
Yes, is like four o'clock in the morning. So I do probably just sound like it's four o'clock in the morning.
Scott Benner 2:49
Is it really? Yeah. We could have done this later.
Sabena 2:53
No, no, no, my child is asleep.
Scott Benner 2:55
Oh, you wanted to do this at four o'clock in the morning? Well, I
Sabena 2:58
actually booked in and didn't realize the time, but that's fine. I don't sleep anymore. Anyway. My son has diabetes.
Scott Benner 3:04
Sabina, can we just start talking? Do you mind if we just start here?
Sabena 3:08
No, that's fine. Is it? This is the sound cafe. Is it fine?
Scott Benner 3:12
I think I mean, I think so. You you're living on a small island in the corner of the planet. So I mean, I'm amazed I can hear you at all. Right. I think you're fine. I think you're absolutely fine. Okay. So usually I ask people to introduce themselves before they come on. But why don't you go ahead and do that and we'll keep talking.
Sabena 3:31
Okay, I'm Sabina from New Zealand and my son has my three. He's four now and he was three when he was diagnosed with type one diabetes.
Scott Benner 3:41
Okay. What is the noise behind you? wombat?
Sabena 3:49
No, that was just me moving in. My child's couched it. I'm hiding in the playroom.
Scott Benner 3:57
Okay, trying to stay still because the couch is noisy. I will watch like that right there. That's not something growling at you.
Sabena 4:08
Is it the actual computer? Like? I don't know. I'm an old
Scott Benner 4:12
computer or using the one from the television show last?
Sabena 4:18
Almost it's it's pretty old.
Scott Benner 4:21
It might be is there a way to get away from it a little bit or no? Like this? I don't know. I can't see you. Oh, maybe so I'm hearing the computer writing to the hard drive. Is that correct?
Sabena 4:37
Yeah, but I've moved as far as like, I'm pretty far away now.
Scott Benner 4:41
All right, good. Okay, well then let's let's go ahead and get comfortable. Do you guys not get modern technology in New Zealand or gaming? Can I send you something?
Sabena 4:51
Well, it would be great but no, I have to buy dates times every month so I can't get a new laptop.
Scott Benner 4:58
I used to you're buying data Sometimes you can't afford a laptop I got Yeah, exactly. Is that? Is that can you hear it? Or is it just me? You feel like it's just whack. Whack. Whack whack going. It's happening right now. There's nothing take your take your headphones off for a second and tell me if you hear anything.
Sabena 5:21
No, I can't. I can't hear anything. I could hang up and ring off my phone. Let's.
Scott Benner 5:27
Let's try that because at the moment, it sounds like a baby chewing on a hard rubber like passing. Okay, okay, I'm gonna kick you and then you can come right back. Okay. Hey, hi.
Sabena 5:41
Okay, is it? Is it better?
Scott Benner 5:43
Oh my God, it is so much better.
Sabena 5:46
I'm just gonna shut the laptop. Now.
Scott Benner 5:50
Yeah. And don't throw it but you know, moving far away from it's just the case. That was it. Sabina, do you want us to we get started like a GoFundMe and get you a laptop or something? Is that something you'd be? It was, it was going like this ready for an amp or an amp or an amp or an amp? Was if you could imagine like, a hard piece of rubber. And then it just felt like you were like, like trying to like grind it through your teeth and then your phone sounds so much better. So thank you appreciate it. Alright,
Sabena 6:21
so funny because I thought my crappy Samsung phone wasn't going to be good enough.
Scott Benner 6:25
Well, thank you Samsung. It sounds terrific. Yeah. So okay. So let's start over again. You're Sabine. You live in New Zealand. Your four year old has had diabetes for about a year diagnosed when they were three. And that's a son. Am I right?
Sabena 6:46
Yeah, my son. Joey.
Scott Benner 6:47
Look at me go. And Joey was diagnosed with threes for now. Joey have any brothers or sisters?
Sabena 6:57
He had as well. He still has a sister. And she was three months when he was diagnosed.
Scott Benner 7:02
Okay. So she's just a little over a year old now. Okay, yeah. And you were like he had a sister. You were gonna say he had a sister who was three months old. And then you stopped yourself? Because you're like, I don't want to characterize my baby as being not here any longer. So let me rephrase.
Sabena 7:24
We didn't tell her.
Scott Benner 7:27
I was just think she'd be snatched by something. But I don't know. We'll get to that later. Married. Not married,
Sabena 7:34
yet. married yet? Okay.
Scott Benner 7:37
Cool. So I love that you came on the podcast. There are so many people living in New Zealand and Australia. who listen to the podcast. It's just bizarre to me. So I'm always excited to hear from you guys. I am so sorry. So you got Ken, what happened? What time? Did you think you were doing this when you set it up?
Sabena 7:58
I have no idea. I don't I just move forward with my life. I don't really pay that much attention, because I've just got to keep going. So I have no idea what time I booked.
Scott Benner 8:09
Because you said earlier when the connection wasn't good. It's 4am. Where
Sabena 8:14
you are? Yeah, it's 435. Now
Scott Benner 8:17
Oh, my goodness. Did you go to sleep before doing this?
Sabena 8:22
Yeah, I went to sleep. I don't really sleep that much anymore. Because I because I still breastfeed my, my baby. And then, you know, getting up in the middle of the night to check numbers and stuff. So sleep is overrated.
Scott Benner 8:35
It's not something that you really need sleep. You have to sleep. Could we get the husband to breastfeed? Like I mean, can you put the milk in like a bag in the refrigerator or something
Sabena 8:45
like that? No, no, no. There has been can't go without sleep.
Scott Benner 8:49
What happens to him if that happens?
Sabena 8:52
I don't even think he would survive. I think you'd probably die.
Scott Benner 8:56
What happens to you without sleep?
Sabena 8:59
Without sleep? I just drink coffee and I'm fine.
Scott Benner 9:02
I think you're giving the coffee too much credit but okay, we're gonna get you through this part of your life. And then you're going to sleep again. Does that sound fair? Absolutely. Okay, good. So what made you want to come on the podcast?
Sabena 9:17
A little bit because like, this has been my main community. Like you, I'm so grateful for you. I remember when so someone that I know was type one. She recommended the podcast and I didn't listen to her and then she recommended it again. And I was like, oh my god I set when I first found you. I set for a whole day listening to the episodes and finally, FINALLY found like the community and people telling stories and people feeling as sad and confused as me.
Scott Benner 9:48
Are you in the Facebook group? Yes. Excellent. Are you so your friend tried to get you to listen once? What was your reaction when she said it?
Sabena 9:59
Was she well Isn't my friend She's my friend now. Hey, Tasha, because I know to be listening. She was just someone that I knew through my sister. And when my son got diagnosed, I thought the world was going to end. So I was desperately like going through the world trying to find people that were type one that were normal, as awful as it sounds.
Scott Benner 10:22
What do you mean? Like you were like for people who were doing well, or you were looking at you? Were you in Mensa people? They weren't didn't seem normal. So you kept moving to your?
Sabena 10:33
Well, like, because he was my baby, obviously, he was three. And I've never hit my baby. I've never like I try and do conscious parenting. And so it was really hard transition, suddenly having to pin him down and stab him with needles. You know, all of that, that I thought he was going to hate me forever. And it was going to be hard for either, because it's really hard in the beginning. And it's not hard anymore. Like it's still sometimes. Sad. It's not like it was.
Scott Benner 11:10
I understand. Okay, so, okay. What is how did you characterize your parenting?
Sabena 11:17
Um, conscious parenting does that mean? It's kind of like respectful parenting that you your first goal is to be like in a relationship with your child, you're not. You see them as equal humans. And like when they're having a tantrum, you don't just say, Oh, we're having a tantrum you, you might be like, I can see you're really tired. And you just kind of do the all the mushy stuff.
Scott Benner 11:44
And you somehow saw that taking care of the diabetes is getting you away from that.
Sabena 11:49
Yeah, so like, I would never hit my children. And I was literally inflicting pain on him multiple times a day, like doing the preps and doing the needles. And like he would hide from me under the table. And it was like, he looked at me like, Man, why you hurting me? And then he told me, he hated me. And he'd never told me he hated Me before. And I was, it was like, you're meant to do this when you're a teenager, not now.
Scott Benner 12:15
The first time your kids tell you, they hate you. It's a special moment for you. How did you stand very still and try to push it all back inside? No, I cry. Did you just cry? I describe. Yeah, there's not anyone. It's funny. When you have kids, isn't it? What you expect is going to happen versus what happens is very different. Absolutely. Yeah. No kidding.
Sabena 12:41
I was. I was the best parent in the world before I had kids.
Scott Benner 12:48
You really thought you had it all figured out? Right? What What surprised you?
Sabena 12:53
So I'm an early childhood teacher? I've got a degree. Child Development.
Scott Benner 12:58
Yeah. That's worse, isn't it?
Sabena 13:04
Because you know, when you're being a bed,
Scott Benner 13:07
not only that, but you read it. So you think, Well, this must be right. It was written in a book.
Sabena 13:12
Oh, absolutely. Yeah. And then you
Scott Benner 13:15
have a baby and you find out like, so do you ever? Do you ever listen to the episodes? I'm sorry. I don't know how much you listen to the show. But if you ever heard any of the episodes, like I do with Erica, the therapist.
Sabena 13:28
I've listened to some of them. Okay. It kinda depends. Like how said, like, I want, I want to get some time. Because
Scott Benner 13:38
my podcasts are supposed to make you sad Is it me said?
Sabena 13:43
No, it's like therapy. For me. It's finally finding people that understand, like, where I'm at. And so my my husband's family actually have type one diabetes has sustained has it,
Scott Benner 13:56
okay.
Sabena 13:58
And, like, I never understood, like the depth of it. And they, they are a little bit emotionally constipated. And they didn't kind of show up for us in a way that if someone that I knew got type one diabetes, I would probably help them in a way different way to them, that your show helped me in the ways that like, I had a poet like, they didn't come and see us when we were in the hospital. And in one time, Joey was really low when I tried to ring them to say like, Hey, what's like, helped me and she said, I'm sorry, I'm putting my child to sleep. And I just thought this is life or death, but okay, ignore my call.
Scott Benner 14:42
So your extended family, the one that knows about the diabetes isn't like emotionally available to you.
Sabena 14:51
And also not practically available, like there was a couple of times when, like Joey had a tummy bug, and so I didn't know what to do. So I posted on the Facebook group. And people immediately told me what to do. Like, you know, in that moment of panic because tummy bugs are really scary when, like you're newly diagnosed, and the Facebook community got me through them, not actual people that are my family.
Scott Benner 15:19
Yeah. It's funny, I'm enjoying talking to you. But we've gotten so far away of why I brought up Eric, I don't even know if I want to go back or not. I was just gonna, but let me do it. Because it's in my head. I'll get rid of it that way. I was going to say that we were talking about how things aren't sometimes the way they're supposed to be right? That you read something, you read something in a book that you went to apply it in real life and you you're like, oh, this doesn't actually work. And in practice, I always think that about I don't always think it, but I wondered about therapy, like when somebody says, you know, oh, I have anger issues. And a therapist says, Well, you should do X, Y, and Z. I think, well, that sounds great. But does that really work? And you know, like, is it a thing that people would really do? Would you really think to stop and do that thing in the moment? And is it actually you don't? I mean, is that is it? Is it functionally? Is it functionally something I can count on and sound? Or is it just something that sounds good when we say it to each other?
Sabena 16:21
I think you don't even know the magic you have. So like the way you talk and unpack things, is very therapeutic. But I also enter like all the woowoo stuff in these, uh, not related to diabetes. There's a lady called the holistic psychologist and lots of her stuff does work in the moment because you start becoming conscious of your triggers. And you realize, like how you're behaving, when you take a step away from the emotion even in the moment.
Scott Benner 16:55
Three, and I should have married you. Because no, no, no, you get well your husband.
Sabena 16:59
My husband thinks I am married to because I'll do the dishes with you on in the kitchen. He goes, Oh, that guy again.
Scott Benner 17:08
Well tell him if you say if your sister would answer the phone. Not with time I wouldn't never found the podcast. I just mean that the people in my family are less like me Arden's the most like me. But still, when it comes to like, the diabetes side of being in touch, she's still not like, she doesn't love it. You can talk to her about other things. And she can be more psychologically, like deep and available. But I appreciate what you just said about the way I unpack things. It's nice. I thought that was lovely. Thank you
Sabena 17:44
know, you really, you really do. And it's like, I am obviously because diabetes is such a journey in the numbers fluctuate so much like I've really listened to the protests multiple times, because you know, how you finally think everything's sorted out. And then hello, Grossberg. Even the way you able to unpack all of that is amazing. Like, I keep trying to tell people to listen to it. And I even told my sister in law to try and I said, Listen to the Juicebox Podcast, and she won't, and it makes me so angry.
Scott Benner 18:18
Don't be angry. Um, Listen, can I get we can be even right now. You can pay me back. Can you do me a favor? Yeah, say fluctuate again.
Sabena 18:29
That numbers all the people
Scott Benner 18:31
know the word. fluctuate. Oh, the first time you said it, it sounds like you said actuate. And I was having fun. It might have just been my dishes bit of thing. Because Oh, hold on. I have to just write down where I have to edit out where I said. Yeah. Where I said it again. There we go. Anyway, I love your accent. It's terrific. I like it when you say bitter instead of better. And a couple of other things. So it's a lot of fun. Have you Are you born and raised in? In New Zealand? New Zealand? Yeah. Yeah. That's amazing. Do you like it there? Would you or have you never been off the island.
Sabena 19:09
I've been to Australia. We lived in Australia for a little bit. I like it here. I like that. I don't have to pay $600 for my insulin. I'm so grateful for that. And we got Joey's pump for free. Well, like funded and stuff like that.
Scott Benner 19:26
So I'm on there right now.
Sabena 19:30
Yeah, we have Dick's home, but we have to pay for it. We're trying to like, get that funded as a like a community.
Scott Benner 19:38
What do you what do you pay for when you pay out of pocket for it?
Sabena 19:43
$400 a month. And that's
Scott Benner 19:46
is that three? Three sensors?
Sabena 19:49
Yeah, yeah. Spray sensors and then the transmitter every we never they seem to
Scott Benner 19:54
1600 a year basically. You know, compared to the cash price here, that's inexpensive.
Sabena 20:05
Is it 1600? A year? Was it two and a half? 1000?
Scott Benner 20:08
Well, I don't know. Is it $400? Oh, is it $400 A month? Excuse me. I was thinking, that's my fault. I apologize. Okay, so times 12. Okay. Yeah, that's a lot.
Sabena 20:24
But it's worth it. It's so worth it.
Scott Benner 20:26
And do you think that at some point, the I guess it's the government health system, right, you're waiting for them to avert? Is it happening? Do you think it'll happen?
Sabena 20:35
So, we are quite similar to Australia, and Australia has just started funding it. And so hopefully, we use a lot of the data. So hopefully, they will follow suit.
Scott Benner 20:47
Okay. Oh, good luck. I hope that happens. For sure. Yeah, that'd be a big deal. I
Sabena 20:51
hope it happens. I really hope it happens for the kids whose parents don't aren't able to afford it.
Scott Benner 20:57
Yeah. No, it's I mean, that's, uh, if you think about it, right. It's $100 a week. It's it's a lot. I mean, a day, what does that make it? Like? Hold on a second. Sorry. That's fine. I'm gonna use the calculator. Because I want to know,
Sabena 21:13
and I'm just desperately waiting for Omnipod to come here because we don't have Omnipod yet. What are you using? I'm on a T slim and we really liked the algorithm. But that the tubing,
Scott Benner 21:28
Ah, okay, but you'd like to get rid of the tubing. That makes Yeah,
Sabena 21:32
cuz he's, like a really active little boy. And, and also, not that it matters. But as he gets older, it would be really nice to be able to hide it if he wants to. Just because it's hard to be different sometimes as a kid.
Scott Benner 21:47
Yeah, I understand. So anyway, I've broken it down and you're using Dexcom at a cost of about $14 a day.
Sabena 21:54
Well, that's nothing when you look at it like that. I just wanted to
Scott Benner 21:57
bring it I wanted to make I wanted to make it feel easier for you here. How about this? It's only like 50 cents an hour. We go out even you're fine.
Sabena 22:10
My son has over 100 Hot Wheels, monster trucks because I used to have to bribe him for everything. So you know.
Scott Benner 22:22
Everything has its price. Do you? Were you bribing him for just anything? Or you were bribing him for diabetes stuff?
Sabena 22:29
No, it was just for diabetes. Like when he because he started on the library. So it used to be a Hot Wheels for like the big pack is what we used to call it. Quite a staple. Like it's like we only have the libre one here. Yeah, so he I used to have to bribe him for everything. But now I can do his site changes in his Dexcom in asleep.
Scott Benner 22:54
Let me just make it give me a second. I want to make a note to myself get hot wheels. Yeah, for Kelly are e big prick. Okay, got it. Thank you. If that works, I'm gonna give that a
Sabena 23:06
try. That has to be monster trucks. You can't just be
Scott Benner 23:09
what you want. That's fine. Monster Truck. Thank you for him actually worth that down. So. Okay, so you are you're you're like thinking about coming on the podcast was pretty simple. You're like, I just want to say how good the podcast is and how much it's helped me.
Sabena 23:27
I think I'm done. Now, I think that makes you sleep. Sleep.
Scott Benner 23:30
But you also talked about a couple of other things. So let me ask you about them. So I think the first thing is fairly centered to newer diagnose people? I don't know. But it seems to bother a lot of people that the rest of the world can't tell how hard diabetes is. Is that what you mean when you say invisible?
Sabena 23:55
Yeah, and, and it's the people thinking, Oh, you just do this. And that's fine. And it's also the misconception about type one and type two. And literally, it was only two weeks ago that my brother in law said, Ah, just as Joey not got it from eating too much lollies and I'm like, if my family can't even understand it, how can you expect the world to?
Scott Benner 24:22
And this is your side of the family?
Sabena 24:25
That's my sister's husband. I'm not claiming him.
Scott Benner 24:29
We are not married but we're not related by blood. Yeah. We're related by my sisters questionable decisions.
Sabena 24:38
Very Christian.
Scott Benner 24:40
I'm sure he's the lightful. What do you say? So I have a question. I have a question about this idea. So this is one of the one of the bigger things that I'm still unpacking about living in the diabetes space. And my daughter has had it now for Oh god. 16 years. I think yes, 16 years. I don't understand why that stuff matters. I don't. So let's go through it step by step, tell me why it matters to you. If someone doesn't understand what goes into managing diabetes?
Sabena 25:19
I don't know, I suppose it does matter less and less. I think because you do know that your child has a slightly harder life. And you want to hope that they're going to give them grace when they need it. But that's a really good question. Yes, really? It shouldn't matter
Scott Benner 25:40
what, it's just interesting. Because think about it, like just pick something else out in your life. It's difficult for you that none of us know about. Like, are you mad that people don't know about that thing?
Sabena 25:52
No, I think I'm just made because why did it have to happen to my baby? Yeah, you know?
Scott Benner 25:59
Yeah, Sabina, that's what I'm getting at it. I think people are just mad because they have diabetes, or their kid has it? Yeah, yeah. You know what I mean? And then you come up against some stupidity, which isn't even stupidly, it's, I mean, I've said it, I used to say it a lot in the past that I mean, the number of things I don't understand, you know, could fill up could fill an encyclopedia. And so, if everybody who had a thing that I didn't understand, expected me to understand it, I don't know what my life would be, then what would my life just be making sure I understand everybody else's life? And then if that's the case, are you gonna get to have a life? Because Won't you be busy understanding my life? And then isn't it just crazy that we're asking everybody to understand everything?
Sabena 26:45
Well, absolutely. But then I suppose you can also take it in and go through life, having a higher level of grace for people knowing that everyone is going through something.
Scott Benner 26:55
Yeah, that's I mean, to me, that's obvious. The if people aren't. If, if when somebody says something to you, that sounds like I have this thing I'm dealing with, and it's difficult, and you don't respond with Oh, I'm sorry to hear that. Is there anything I can do to help not? I'm sure you did something wrong to make it happen, you know, or some other crappy response. I know that, Sabina, if you want to get together and make T shirts and start a group about being mad about something, I'll, I'll jump right on board with you there. You know, people's inability to be human, in obvious situations, is upsetting. But I don't expect anybody to understand diabetes,
Sabena 27:38
I suppose to the flip side of it. And this is just being human. And sometimes it's annoying to when you see, like, because obviously we all have our moments, but we pull out like we put our big girl pants on and we get on with our day. And it can be really frustrating to see other people not just suck it up other things and just get on with it, too.
Scott Benner 28:01
Oh, this is an interesting one. So let's see, we're gonna talk about something fun. So when you know how hard it is to live with diabetes, and have a newborn baby, by the way, who's attached to you literally. And then you see someone crumbling at the slightest thing. It's hard to fathom. Like, how they can't push through this this thing? Was that right?
Sabena 28:26
I feel like awful person. But yeah, sometimes there are people and you just want to be like, Okay, that's really sad. Let's have a cry about it. But yeah, let's, let's move on.
Scott Benner 28:36
We got to keep going here. Yeah, I am fascinated by that to actually the other day, because this happened recently. I brought this up on another episode. So I won't retell it here. Because for people listening six months from now, they'll hear it in succession. But Arden just started college, and a kid came into her room, just kind of panicking. And she's texting me and she's like, I don't know what's wrong with this kid. You know, like, like, we think the thing that they are out of their mind about she's like, it's so small. And, you know, we talked about it both ways, while we were texting. And I first of all, I said, Listen, it's terrible for them, be grateful that you're not overwhelmed by something of this size. And at the same time, I take your point, because you're in there trying to learn and this kids spinning in circles over. I mean, I guess to them, it's something big, but I mean, honestly, it's, it's a very, very, very trivial thing. And not an insurmountable task, not, you know, something life changing. And you just realize that there's, I mean, the kids got some issue. I don't know what it is. But it's, you know, it's burdened by it. And so in the end, we said, you know, I hope he gets help, I said, is a teacher helping him and then we made a terrible joke to each other And to like to lighten the mood, and then we moved on and I really genuinely hope but what I remember now from that is that I hope the kids okay, and I hope the teacher moved him in the right direction and got them help. You know, but it was it was, by most accounts, it was silly.
Sabena 30:19
I do think too, it's like what you've I don't know what episode you said it, but you were like, if there's a zombie apocalypse, you think you would survive? I would survive too. Yeah.
Scott Benner 30:29
Yeah. The only thing we can't get me is my knee. If my knee gave out I'd be in trouble. But other than that, I understand how to do things. Why are you What did you grow up having to get through?
Sabena 30:41
Oh, I think it's just a disposition thing. My oldest sister. Yeah, my oldest sister's really similar. Like we both just fake it till we make it. And like, keep moving. Have a cry, eat some chocolate and then figure it out.
Scott Benner 30:59
Sounds like a good plan. Yeah, dark chocolate. Milk chocolate. Sabina, which do you prefer?
Sabena 31:05
Milk chocolate? I don't want your yucky dark chocolate.
Scott Benner 31:08
Okay. Well, then, okay, I'm sorry. I will not I will definitely not. I was gonna put a piece of chocolate in with the new computer you were getting but now I'm not doing anything. Now that you've taken this harsh stance against dark chocolate, how much is your husband involved in the the diabetes stuff?
Sabena 31:30
Um, I would say maybe 5%.
Scott Benner 31:38
Why is that? Do you want him to be more involved?
Sabena 31:41
I'm probably a control freak. And especially once I heard the podcast about the don't die advice. He was quite happy to listen to the doctors. And we didn't have the best advice. It was the don't die advice. And I wanted to be bold with insulin and I wanted to fully like I just deep dived into everything and became a semi expert as much as you can when you're newly diagnosed. And he literally is only just now starting to listen.
Scott Benner 32:16
Are you bringing him along with the idea now? Is he I guess you're showing it to him right? You're showing him a difference and he sees it?
Sabena 32:24
No, I'm really bad for because there was a little bit of tension because I wanted to correct and I wanted better. And he trusted the doctors. I had to just do it myself.
Scott Benner 32:38
Did you do it? Oh, so did you decide that you would just take over the the management so that you guys didn't have to talk about it and there wasn't that tension, or did you do it behind his back? What are you saying?
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Sabena 35:40
He just kind of throw it at me and let me do it. He was easier. Like, okay, put it he was like, This is too hard. I can't understand this. You do it. So do I understood?
Scott Benner 35:53
So do you think that? Do you think that he really was okay with the advice from the doctor or the advice from the doctor was manageable for him?
Sabena 36:05
I think it was just easy. And I think when it has mum when his sister got diagnosed, his mom refuse to take on any of the care from her sister and just buried her head in the sand. And I think he just buried his head in the sand because he knew I would do it.
Scott Benner 36:24
But you don't. Okay, and you're comfortable with the arrangement or you wish he was more involved?
Sabena 36:31
I don't think he'd do it as well as me. So I would rather do it myself.
Scott Benner 36:35
We it sounds awful. No, it doesn't. We've just heard at its core boys and girls. That was great. He's like, it'll be fine. And you were like, No, it's not do it like this. And he's like, I don't want to and I said why don't you teach him you're like, well, he wouldn't do it as well as me anyway.
Sabena 36:53
But you'll be exception to the role. Got you. All for Adam.
Scott Benner 36:58
Yeah, I'm the exception to the rule. Because I was at home? Well, I don't know, I was at home by myself whether I didn't want her to be. I don't want her blood sugar to be high. You know?
Sabena 37:07
Yeah, absolutely.
Scott Benner 37:09
I don't know. I'll tell you what that story is why boobs exist? wasn't for that. I don't think we get anything accomplished at all. Seriously, really. And I wish I was making this up. I really think this, I really believe that if you don't have anything to entice a guy with it's hard to get them to go beyond the way their brain thinks you know what I mean?
Sabena 37:35
And it actually is absolutely true boys brain is so different to a girl's brain. It's unfair
Scott Benner 37:39
that we don't have boobs, because maybe he could maybe he could get you to be a little less controlling. Because, because, because think of it from his side, is it possible? And I have no idea, obviously. But is it possible he doesn't want to be involved? Because he knows that no matter what he does, it's not going to be good enough for you? And then he's going to fail in your eyes.
Sabena 38:04
Um, possibly, possibly.
Scott Benner 38:07
Do you think that right now there's like a large portion of the women listening who are like, Oh, geez, that might be true. So because I have that feeling, like when my wife when I do something, and it's not right for her, or it doesn't, whatever, I'm using the wrong words when it lets her down somehow, I feel terrible. And then sometimes when she asks me to do something that I know is going to inevitably lead to me doing something that she's not going to find, okay, I get mad at her for asking me to do it. Not because I don't want to do it. But because it feels like that her ask is eventually going to make me sad. And I don't and I am mad at her for making me sad. Does that make sense?
Sabena 38:55
Yeah, I think that you're gonna you're just converting him to want to listen to your podcast. Can you sell right your team husband?
Scott Benner 39:03
I can do I can do the other side of the arguments have been no trouble. No, no, no. Yeah. Good. Valid. Yeah. And so I don't know, obviously, maybe let me just say this. Maybe your husband's just a deck. I have no idea. But, but you know, seriously, like, it's just, we all feel the way we feel. And I think we all feel the way we feel partially because that's how we feel. And partially because we're having a response or a defense against what's happening across from us.
Sabena 39:35
That's, I definitely, I definitely think you're right. But I also think, and this isn't PSA, I definitely love our kids more than he loves them. So I think maybe I care just a little bit more.
Scott Benner 39:49
So you know, you think you love your children more than your husband?
Sabena 39:55
I think so.
Scott Benner 39:58
To revert back to what I said a few minutes to go, if it wasn't for boobs, we wouldn't even we wouldn't even know each other. You know what I mean? Like, we just we wouldn't even know we'd be off. There'd be like a collection of men on one side and a collection of women on the other side. That'd be it. Then we die off slowly, because no boobs. That's it. Whoever made the boobs knew what they were doing. I'll tell you that much. It's holding the whole thing together. It's the glue. Yeah. Isn't it fascinating? That it doesn't matter if they're good boobs or bad boobs or small boobs or stretchy boobs or tiny big boobs? Nobody cares. Doesn't matter.
Sabena 40:36
Well, that's what makes sense why he keeps telling my daughter. Those are my toys You're ruining then.
Scott Benner 40:42
Stop, stop. Stop chewing on my toys and leave it on there in that sweatshirt. Yeah. Did you breastfeed your older one?
Sabena 40:54
Yeah, I received I breastfeed him till he was two and a half.
Scott Benner 40:58
Oh my god. Really? Yeah, that's amazing. Good for you.
Sabena 41:03
I want to kick this baby off, but she won't leave me.
Scott Benner 41:10
I don't know. I think it takes a in a world where there are other options where you can go to manmade options. I think it takes a lot of stick to itiveness to continue to breastfeed I'm I'm very enamored of of the effort that it takes. I think it's amazing.
Sabena 41:26
I also think so Joey was always like the sick, a really sick kid. He always had bronchitis and all sorts of stuff. And I really think because I breastfeed him so long, that their diabetes didn't trigger it until it did. I really think I shouldn't say this, but that's how I felt because he was so sick, but it never triggered and then once he was weaned, and he was beggar, the natural good. I have all sorts of crazy theories, though. So I'm probably wrong
Scott Benner 41:53
against the being of boobs saved the day. They do. That could be the episode title boobs save the day. I think it has to be the episode to think about it and get back to it. Okay, so what have we established? So far? Your husband doesn't love your children isn't? What do you mean, your husband doesn't love your children as much as you do? What do you mean by that?
Sabena 42:16
I think we all have different capacities for stuff. And no, I just think it and I feel it's
Scott Benner 42:26
do you? Do you think my wife thinks she loves my kids more than I do?
Sabena 42:32
I don't know your wife and I just listened to the way you talk about Adam. And I just think God, you're such a fabulous dad. He must really love.
Scott Benner 42:42
What if my wife just has great boobs and she's holding them over my head? She's like, you have to love these kids. Alright, put these away. What is it that? You know, for the record? Can I say my wife does have terrific boobs. I just want to put that out there. But that's that's not why I brought him up. I see because I'm I was trying to lead you to the idea that I bet if you asked her who loves the kids more you or me she'd say her? Because she thinks she has that mom connection. And the dad thing can look disconnected at times.
Sabena 43:18
I'm saying to though we grow them in our body. They always else and especially if you breastfeed them I don't know. I think this might get too political. I just think I love them more than
Scott Benner 43:32
Sabina. I had to live with her while she was growing that baby. I should get points for that. Don't you think?
Sabena 43:40
No barking up the wrong tree. Oh, no, no.
Scott Benner 43:44
I've gone to the wrong side of the argument for you now.
Sabena 43:49
So you can go on an island was my husband.
Scott Benner 43:52
Thought you already live on an island. Those true little islands next year Island. Um, yeah. Did you see that about my Rolland? Did you say they were thinking? I don't know what a kiwi is. Is that a that's a bit Oh, that was like I don't know if that's an animal or racist reference the people. I couldn't tell what was happening. But did you? Did you see that? I think a couple of years ago some major map was made that completely omitted New Zealand and it really did you did you see that in the news?
Sabena 44:32
I did. But if if the world like ended, we have so many resources down here. People out people are building bunkers. They want to be in New Zealand without clean water.
Scott Benner 44:41
I do like the idea of the clean water. So you said can I come there and live or do you have all those deadly animals like the Australians have?
Sabena 44:50
No we have no yucky deadly animals. We have no snakes, no poisonous spiders. New Zealand is actually really lovely.
Scott Benner 44:58
How is that possible? That's amazing, but how is that possible? Not that you would know. But does that mean somebody introduced them on on Australia at some point? And then
Sabena 45:14
I don't know I we've, we've got quite different environments like the quite deserty and we're, I don't know.
Scott Benner 45:22
Listen. I don't know what you know exactly, Sabina, because I'm googling here New Zealand soul venomous spider is the stuff of legends.
Sabena 45:32
Well, what spider is this,
Scott Benner 45:34
I'm looking for Hold on a second. Well, almost free because the Legendary Cat tipo is the sole native venomous species living in New Zealand. It's a small but mighty critter with a bite that can pack a serious punch. Now I don't want to subscribe to your newsletter. Oh, a second. With just a few 1000 left in roughly 50 areas of northern of the on the North Island, and eight on the South Island. These dangerous little beauties are rare, rare than a kiwi or the Kiwis where
Sabena 46:11
I think they're endangered. But that's probably just shows how good the education system is. Because I didn't know about.
Scott Benner 46:18
Maybe your mom just told you don't worry. There's no dangerous spiders here. There's no white snakes. Oh, I hate snakes. But spiders too. I don't know. I'm sure there's spiders here that'll kill me. I just you know, America. So I think it's better.
Sabena 46:36
Or even your guys. Big gun control? Probably more likely to.
Scott Benner 46:42
Oh, my God. Sabina, do you want to hear a story that has nothing to do with diabetes? Absolutely. Right. So let me sit up. So we I sat back, I was getting so comfortable with you. We took Arden to college. We're driving home. My wife has her car, I have my car. My son's with me. It is midnight as we're driving home, and my car breaks down. And I'm able to get it off the highway. But when I get off the highway, this is in Virginia. There's nothing like just no place to pull over. So I just I kind of inch along while the cars just kind of inching along until I see these motels right across the street from one another. Now imagine a motel from an Quentin Tarantino movie where they're going to like a hooker is going to kill a drug dealer. Okay, like that kind of a hotel situation. One level, probably the kind of thing where people live and you know, it's not it's not the, it's not the Holiday Inn is what I'm saying. Okay, so I they're literally directly across the street from one another. I take the one on the right side because I'm on the right side and it seems easier to pull in. I come to a stop. And within 30 seconds, I see a drug deal happened in front of me outside of a lovely BMW. Now the rest of this place does not look like it supports BMW. It's very rundown and dirty and scary. I know I have a tow truck coming but it's going to take 90 minutes. My son has a friend who lives like 40 miles from there. So I we had already contacted him. I was like look, just call your friend have him come get you I don't want you to stay here with me. I'll stay and wait for the tow truck. So I don't know 10 or 15 minutes later, my son's friend comes. takes him away. As I drive away we we joke I you know if I live through this, I'll see you later. And you know about an hour or so later the tow truck arrives and I flashed my high beams like so he can see where I'm at. He flashes them back and as he's making his way over to me, and I'm not kidding. Sabina pop three gunshots I'm like what is happening? Right? So I look up and the crazy thing is is that prior to my son leaving I said do you think we should go across the street it looks more lit up over there. And we decided to stay where we weren't the gunshots came from across the street. So now cars are pulling off in all directions. People are running into the woods and I swear to you a pregnant woman waddle runs across the street to where I am. And I'm trying not to laugh but she looks ridiculous. So it's so it's a very serious situation obviously, because people are shooting each other. And in the middle of it. I'm giggling because she is just not in the condition to run but she is just and she's wearing slippers and she's just going as fast as she can. So then the tow truck driver pulls up completely oblivious. He gets out of the car. He goes Hey, are you Scott? His name was Alex I go not now Alex. Like well I said, there was just a shooting across the street. And he goes when I went. Now, it just happened now. And he's like, Oh, he puts the gate down on the back of the trailer. And we like together, jam my car up on it. And, and like go flying out of there. And that was it. So anyway, gun control. Yeah. I'm okay, obviously. But seriously, an hour before that I had given serious consideration to crossing the street and going and staying over there instead. So it is,
Sabena 50:38
what would all of the diabetics do if you had died? Scott, we can't have that
Scott Benner 50:44
you wouldn't have been you would have just thought I was at a drug deal or something? Probably you would have been like, Oh, my God, I've been following this guy's podcast forever. And it turns out, he's a heroin addict. Because you wouldn't have known about the brokedown car and all that stuff. You would have been like, Where was he killed? What motel Oh, that's shameful. Anyway, cars fixed and everything's fine. That's neither here nor there. Why the hell are you on the podcast? Besides to be delightful? You want to talk about things? You said you were having some trouble and you want to talk about them? Do you still have those issues?
Sabena 51:17
I'm not not so much like we, it just ebbs and flows. So right now we're in a good place, but I essentially had to double like all of his basals Okay, and it took me like a month to figure it out. And it made me feel really stupid, because I was like, of course, if we continuously going high after the meals, like in between the meals, of course, it's the basil, but sometimes it's just hard to remember that.
Scott Benner 51:46
Okay, and so what happened? He was honeymooning, do you think, and then he wasn't?
Sabena 51:53
I'm not I think there was some honeymooning. And then when we transition to our pump, we had a couple of bad batches of the insulin that we got. So we changed insulins. And also it was really hard to transition from a pager. Because we were manually injecting a pager for meals. And we had to get rid of that because you can't have that and the T slim and transition to the human log and it just doesn't work the way the pager works.
Scott Benner 52:19
Okay. And you're using a pager now?
Sabena 52:23
No, we can't have it in the T slim.
Scott Benner 52:27
subpoena why? I think that what they say? I don't think you're supposed to. I don't think you're supposed to use it. Omnipod either.
Sabena 52:40
Oh, okay. Um, I'm picking out what you're putting down. That's the truth.
Scott Benner 52:46
I think what happens is that people make devices, which is very cool. I think they then put them through the different health authorities. And they do testing so they can say, hey, we did you know, we use the Nova log and this pump and it worked fine. They probably picked Nova log because it's used by more people. And then they say, you can only use they don't say you can only use Nova log and the pump. They say we've tested the pump with Nova log. That makes sense.
Sabena 53:19
Sort of like I thought that someone said that the pager like clocks or something or goes away.
Scott Benner 53:26
I've heard people say that too. I don't know. Arden's been using a pager with Omni pod for like, a decade probably.
Sabena 53:34
Suppose like, we knew how the pager worked. It worked fast. So if he's going high, sometimes we'll just do a manual shot of the pager? Because it's just so much faster. Yes, to bring him down.
Scott Benner 53:46
It's a good plan. It works for sure. Look, I don't know if it'll work in your pump. Maybe the heat is different, where you are, etc. I don't know. But I mean, I've heard people say to I tried to use it in a pump, and it didn't work. And I've heard him say that about other saying other things, and I don't know, I do what works. And this works for us.
Sabena 54:07
I might try that. Yeah.
Scott Benner 54:11
You know, it's very similar, like in the US, where a device will come out. And they're like, it's been FDA cleared for children like six and above, for instance. And then people like, Well, my kids five I wanted to use that they're all mad, but a doctor in the United States can write a prescription for anything they want off label. So if a pump, you know, says six and above and your kids for the doctor has autonomy to just write you the script anyway. As a matter of fact, there are drugs that are I mean, I think a good example would be Metformin, right? People use that a lot for type two diabetes and insulin resistance and stuff like that. But there are diet doctors who write Metformin for weight loss. So you know what I mean? I actually think an erection medication that does something else. I don't know what it is. Right now. I don't use erection medications. I will be your next. Sabina married. I don't need an erection. Let's see, hold on a second
do other things. Good? What do you want to say?
Sabena 55:23
isn't really good? These are the little tips not the erection tip.
Scott Benner 55:29
Little tip after I made a penis jokes, what's wrong with you? Oh my God. You are from New Zealand. I should know but I listen. I can't tell you if it's going to work or it's not going to work. But I can tell you. It works for some people. Okay, I can't tell you to try it. I mean, nothing you hear on the pod?
Sabena 56:00
I know. I know.
Scott Benner 56:01
Okay. So yeah, see what you can do. Okay, so you, you made big changes to insulin, that fixed your problem. So where where do you see stability at when his blood
Sabena 56:16
we sit between? Because it's quite hard because I have to fight the algorithm, because it's he's got the Basal IQ. So he sits between four and eight and a half usually, if I can, you know, if I've got him if other people he's not usually with other people, but with other people. They don't know how to. It's really hard to articulate because I do I try and do what you do, where you say you look like a plate of food. And you know how much more based on the how much units you'd need rather than carb counting? Yeah. So like, because carb counting doesn't work in the sense that if you had 15 grams of juice or 15 grams of potato chips, that's hard to quantify. Rather than looking at it unit wise. Yeah,
Scott Benner 57:14
I understand. So you have trouble explaining to other people?
Sabena 57:18
Yeah, I do actually. Okay.
Scott Benner 57:22
Between, by the way, between four and eight for people listening is between 72 and 144. In America,
Sabena 57:29
yeah. That's our main goal in these times. So if we're at daycare, because he comes to daycare with me. If there's say an icebox, I won't make him Pre-Bolus at daycare in a time like that, because I don't want him to like, feel different. Thinking about the mental health side of it, as well as the physical health. Yeah.
Scott Benner 57:54
What do you mean he comes to daycare with you do work at a daycare?
Sabena 57:57
Yeah, I'm, I'm qualified ACA teacher. So luckily, he got to come back to work with me. So the control freak keeps to I get to keep being controlling at work as well. That's nice. There's
Scott Benner 58:08
the baby come with you as well. Yeah, yeah, we all go. Nice. Oh, that's a good, that's a nice setup for you. How do you think he'll do when he moves on to school?
Sabena 58:19
So he could technically go to school in December, but in New Zealand, you can stay in early childhood till you're six. So he's going to stay with me for another year. Just because boys don't need to go into formal education. There's lots of research that their brains just need to go on Play. So I don't know what that's gonna look like. I'm really anxious about that. And it's a whole year away.
Scott Benner 58:43
Well, your husband with the school younger and it didn't help him at all right? How long do you think you're getting until you're getting divorced? Exactly. Do you think it'd be five years? Oh, no. Well, I, I'm so interested. I know your husband is probably not the kind of guy that wants to come on a podcast, but I would love to spend 15 minutes with him. Explain to me how he feels about your kids. I bet you ever asked him? Don't you think his love is just different than yours?
Sabena 59:23
Don't you think some people love some things more than other people?
Scott Benner 59:28
I don't think so. I just think it's different. I mean, I mean, a person who doesn't love another person. Yeah, that would be a bad comparison. If I asked somebody like do I love my daughter more than a stranger does? I would love her more. But I just I don't know. I just always think that people either show or don't show things differently. What they think of his love can sometimes be different, but I don't know the amount that they love. I don't know how anybody would measure that besides them, if that makes sense.
Sabena 1:00:04
It does make sense.
Scott Benner 1:00:05
Okay. I know you're joking a little bit too. But I also think you're serious. So
Sabena 1:00:11
you, you actually have lots of sage advice you should go. And if you don't want to do diabetes anymore, you should go become a therapist.
Scott Benner 1:00:17
I don't know Do you really is I don't want to disregard what people understand when they become licensed therapists. But it just seems to me that I bet your husband just feels differently, but equally as strong. I mean, here's an example. Sometimes I don't hold eye contact when I'm talking to people, even people in my family, and I feel bad about it all the time. And I will sometimes imagine a day when my son moves out for good that I will look back and think of all the times that he was in the same room with me that I wasn't looking at him. And I It makes me feel like I'm wasting time. So that's, that's me. Being sad about like, love that I have that I feel like I'm not giving properly.
Sabena 1:01:11
Yeah, that makes sense. Right.
Scott Benner 1:01:13
And so I mean, it's a little idea, but you but my wife would not know that. I feel that way. There'd be no way for me to explain that to her.
Sabena 1:01:24
That makes lots of sense.
Scott Benner 1:01:26
I don't know. I'm just thinking he's probably like, is he at work right now? Look, let me but let's make sure I understand this. He's not at a bar face down. Is he right now? He's getting ready to go to work. No, he's asleep and beard. But is he gonna go to work?
Sabena 1:01:41
Eventually, yeah, it's only 530. I know.
Scott Benner 1:01:43
But he'll he'll you're fighting me on this Sabine. I'm not sure why he's gonna go to work and make money and come home and all that stuff, right.
Sabena 1:01:50
He sure is gonna go to work and make money and come home.
Scott Benner 1:01:54
Maybe sometimes. I think that's how men show love to.
Sabena 1:01:59
Yes, I think you're very
Scott Benner 1:02:00
right. Right, Sabina. Look at me. No, I
Sabena 1:02:03
really think you're right. I just, if you ask anyone in my family, I'm not good at admitting when I'm wrong.
Scott Benner 1:02:09
Oh, well, that's fine. You don't have to we're not here to fix everything. So also, I think in a not for nothing situation, you have just had a baby, and you're still breastfeeding it. And you're probably as far away from feeling romantic at this moment. As a person could be. Am I right about that? Absolutely. Right. He looks better when you're corny. Right, Sabina?
Sabena 1:02:37
No, because it just gets us more kids.
Scott Benner 1:02:41
There's ways to do without kids, you know? Do you need me to explain them to you? Or do you? Do you know that?
Sabena 1:02:48
I think I think I've gotten
Scott Benner 1:02:52
all right, because I mean, I'll go over them with you if you want. But I'm gonna have to bleep out a lot. There's ways Yeah, I mean, there's tons of ways around it, actually. How long have you guys been together?
Sabena 1:03:08
I'm, like, 17 years. 14.
Scott Benner 1:03:12
Just sick of him. I understand. Now I just understand now you're just sick of each other? How old? Are you?
Sabena 1:03:21
- So maybe it's even time maybe it's like 15 years? That's 18. Yeah, that
Scott Benner 1:03:29
seems like a long time. It is a long time. They say if you can make it past 20, you'll be okay.
Sabena 1:03:37
We go. I think also when you have diabetes in your life, it does take away from being able to do other things and send a light in terms of checking at night and doing site changes at night. And we've had a really hard winter in New Zealand where there was so much sickness, and both of my kids have pretty much been sick for like three months.
Scott Benner 1:04:05
How cold does it get there in the winter?
Sabena 1:04:08
Oh, it's not super cold. It's just that there's that whole theory that we were in lockdown with COVID and so we haven't really had sicknesses for the last couple of years because we were quite lucky. We did a lot of lock downs and didn't didn't have COVID the way America had COVID I don't think
Scott Benner 1:04:30
I've never had COVID I'm bragging
Sabena 1:04:32
I've I've had COVID But I was fully vaccinated. It was the most recent recent strain
Scott Benner 1:04:39
Okay, so kind of a light cold went away in a couple days.
Sabena 1:04:44
Yeah, it wasn't too bad but who's to say like, weapons now? Next and options played and stuff. Do
Scott Benner 1:04:51
you think it do you think it rewired your brain into thinking that some people love people more than other people?
Sabena 1:04:58
Maybe Do you think that's what Big Pharma want to be your thing?
Scott Benner 1:05:02
I think if your husband had boobs, we wouldn't be having this conversation. What do you think of that? You just be like, boobs make me happy. And that'd be the end of it. And that's what happens to me. I can't. There's nothing you could say to me that you couldn't fix with with Kelly's boobs. I can't even think of anything. I mean, like World War, I still think well, if we're gonna die soon. We should probably say those boobs well. I don't know. Just make sense to me. But that's fine. Yep. Isn't it interesting, Sabina? I must be crazy for you. I'm actually a boy. And I have all these feelings that you don't attribute with men.
Sabena 1:05:47
You do. I think you're a unicorn, though.
Scott Benner 1:05:49
You think so?
Sabena 1:05:51
I think so. I work. My boss is also male. And he's a unicorn too. He often cries at work.
Scott Benner 1:06:00
You're sure he's sure he likes girls. The whole thing?
Sabena 1:06:04
It was quite excited about the fire. I mean, coming to visit us the other day. So maybe, you know, boats?
Scott Benner 1:06:11
Oh, I don't mind. I'm just saying like I was I was trying to make the point that I'm incredibly heterosexual. And at the same time, I have. I have a lot of what I think most people would attribute as like, feminine feelings and thoughts.
Sabena 1:06:29
I think it's more you just a conscious you have consciousness?
Scott Benner 1:06:32
Maybe? I don't know. Boobs are terrific. We start talking about it. I'll get lost in it. I really will. I got theories about all kinds of things. Seriously, when we're done here, if you want I can tell you what's great about boobs can probably give you like a 10 minutes a little way about them.
Sabena 1:06:52
I think my toddler could tell you what was great about Yeah,
Scott Benner 1:06:55
it's mostly Sabina. It's mostly the it's mostly the weight of them.
Sabena 1:07:05
Say she would say the milk. It's about the milk. Yeah, I
Scott Benner 1:07:08
don't have that experience. So I don't know what to say there. Also, she can't talk. We have no idea what she would say. What if she said I don't know. It's the weight. I love the weight of them.
Sabena 1:07:19
I think she says the milk, milky glitter in the face.
Scott Benner 1:07:25
So do you think you'll have more kids?
Sabena 1:07:28
Um, I don't know what's really scary to think that I'd have to do the diabetes again. You know, I don't know if there's other people that feel like that. I mean,
Scott Benner 1:07:39
diabetes stopped us the two kids. So I understand.
Sabena 1:07:45
Because it's just like now we're at this point with Joey, where it's not a big deal. But it was really heartbreaking having to train his body to hold all that trauma and all those needles and all of that stuff.
Scott Benner 1:07:59
Ya know, especially for the way you were planning on raising him, it must have been tough for you to to kind of have to feel like you were giving up on your idea before you ever got it started. Really?
Sabena 1:08:10
Yeah, like a girl that I worked with. She said it first when I said I think Jody has diabetes, everyone laughed at me and said, You're crazy. And then after it, she said, You're the worst person to do this. Because it's really hard for me to be firm. I'm always trying to find like a way around or like a compromise, but you can't compromise with insulin, injections and stuff. Do you
Scott Benner 1:08:37
know why that is? Are you were you raised by somebody who was kind of firm and you didn't like it?
Sabena 1:08:44
Um, I don't know. I think it's just like, in my job, we do a lot of like woowoo stuff in our training, we do lots of reflection and just thinking about the main thing comes from how you would want to be treated. And when you start thinking, even the way people view children and how they speak to them or don't speak to them. Being able to have empathy and put yourself in someone else's shoes, it automatically shifts the way you would do something.
Scott Benner 1:09:15
Well, let me ask you this. If you had diabetes, and you weren't able to help yourself with it, would you not find it loving for someone to help you?
Sabena 1:09:24
Absolutely. I am. There's a lady that I listened to her podcast. She's a parenting person. Her name is Janet Lansbury. And she actually had a podcast about diabetes. I couldn't believe it. And she gave me some language and the language mainly helped me I would say, Joey, Mommy has to take the best care of your body. I have to keep you healthy and just having a little mantra like that. When I did it to him, helped me and then it helped him.
Scott Benner 1:09:52
It's good. That's excellent. Yeah, I listen, I agree with you about the way children are treated or not treated and And that, you know, your goals. I think your goals are terrific. I just don't think you having to take care of the diabetes means you're not being empathetic.
Sabena 1:10:09
I think it was just that for a little while. I he couldn't comprehend why I was inflicting pain on him. Yeah. And at what pain and he wasn't really really sick. When he got diagnosed, we knew that we knew the signs and we got him tested. Like we checked in his HP once he was only like eight.
Scott Benner 1:10:31
But you knew because your husband's family? Yeah,
Sabena 1:10:34
we saw the like frequent urination. And that was probably the only thing that we saw.
Scott Benner 1:10:41
Is there any other autoimmune stuff and either side of the family
Sabena 1:10:46
has sister that's type one is also gluten, celiac, but nothing else.
Scott Benner 1:10:52
Okay, no thyroid stuff. No. Yeah, well, are you gonna get your daughter tested to see if she has antibodies?
Sabena 1:11:04
The doctor said that actually, we don't have a right to test her because she can't consent to it.
Scott Benner 1:11:14
That's hilarious. Does she have consent that anything happens to her?
Sabena 1:11:18
Well, it was just like, it's a medical decision, but they won't lead us to stew.
Scott Benner 1:11:25
All right now might be a weird Island thing.
Sabena 1:11:29
I think it was a we got a really bad doctor. He was very weird.
Scott Benner 1:11:33
Okay, yeah. Try it again. That doesn't make sense. Like what do you mean? Like your kids can't consent anything there? He's she's a year old.
Sabena 1:11:43
Right? Well, he, he said that these like ethical ramifications and blah, blah, blah. But I just thought but what if she gets sick? And we could prevent, like the dka sickness?
Scott Benner 1:11:56
Well, that sounds like bullshit, Sabina what he said. So I'd go to a different doctor and ask again, if that's what you want to do. You know what I mean? What ethical problems are there?
Sabena 1:12:08
Oh, he just said that. It's not my decision. And what if she doesn't want to know? What
Scott Benner 1:12:16
was he? Hi, when he said that?
Sabena 1:12:21
I think he was one of those doctors that it was really intelligent, but not emotionally intelligent.
Scott Benner 1:12:28
He looked like he was on a pill or anything like that. Maybe just taking a little pain pill. Like to get through the day? Anything? No.
Sabena 1:12:35
You never know. Yeah, even though
Scott Benner 1:12:37
just maybe an oxy. Just one. Just to I have to take away the takeaway how long the day feels or something? He didn't look a little glassy eyed or anything like that. I mean, listen, can I say something, Sabina? I mean this in the absolute worst? Possible sense of the word. But that's some woke bullshit right there.
Sabena 1:13:01
But we've just we've got a new doctor, and I will ask the new doctor. Yeah, but even they they don't want me correcting even now. They're like, they don't really want me correcting until he's 14. Like, I don't know what that is for you.
Scott Benner 1:13:15
I will look for you. Because I have on my website, juicebox podcast.com, a beautiful conversion chart where people can use it. I hear, you know, people send me notes something and they're like, hey, when you're making the podcast and somebody says, you know, one measurement, could you then repeat that measurement? In the other for us? Listen, and I hear that I go, Oh, no, I can't do that. That's I mean, the whole podcast would just be me doing like, you know, translations. A 14 is 250. They don't want you. They don't want you correct until 250. No,
Sabena 1:13:55
I just don't listen to them. Yeah, well,
Scott Benner 1:13:57
listen, I can't imagine you're listening to anybody.
Sabena 1:14:04
It's a little bit true. Now. I need to go do some work on myself. So no,
Scott Benner 1:14:08
no, no. I feel like yes, I mean, is the marching to the beat of her own drum over here. You've never told your husband that you think he loves the children less than you have you? I'm not sure. Oh, God, Sabina, have you said that to him? Maybe. No, you can't do that. That's not okay. You can't do that. There's like a few things you can't do. One of them is infer that his penis might be small. You can't say that. Okay, you can't. I knew that one. Yeah, you can't tell him like that. He might not love the kids as much as you. That's definitely what you can't do. And I don't think he's supposed to say anything bad about his mother.
Sabena 1:14:55
Oh, I do that. Oh, no, I am gonna get divorced.
Scott Benner 1:15:00
So when we get a few things you're not supposed to do your your mom's crazy not doing the first one. So wait the penis one. Was that during the penis? Was that it? Was that a humble brag about your husband's penis?
Sabena 1:15:18
Yeah, I'll put that in there a mason brownie.
Scott Benner 1:15:24
Well, then I take everything else back. He doesn't care what you say about his mom, if he's got a nice sized penis, he's okay. That used to be you know, what else are you doing that you need my help with? Me? Should we take a couple extra minutes? I thought we were at the end but I mean, do you need help with anything else? You're locking the doors? are you locking the doors at night? Right when you go to bed? Oh my god this morning. And the front door was unlocked have been Come on. You I haven't
Sabena 1:15:56
put them let's okay. She tells someone
Scott Benner 1:16:00
to make a list of things you're supposed to do.
Sabena 1:16:02
When you're done doesn't sound like I'm adulting very well does it when
Scott Benner 1:16:06
you're done at the stove. You turn the heat off all the time. Yes, I got that one down. That's good. You don't leave children near like bodies of water.
Sabena 1:16:15
Not my children's. The new year how much I love my children.
Scott Benner 1:16:19
Those kids. Nothing bad's happening to them all day. Okay, we do we drink and drive. We don't drink and drive. Right? These are simple ones.
Sabena 1:16:27
No, we do not drink and drive. That's nice. Great.
Scott Benner 1:16:35
What else to say? Like I now wonder what it is? You don't know. You don't even need to be worried for me. I mean, a little bit. Yeah. Especially now because it's early in the morning. And you're obviously sleep deprived, where you wouldn't have said half the thing. By the way. Everyone has to come on at four in the morning from now on, because they're way more honest at four in the morning.
Sabena 1:16:56
I'm always sleep deprived though. So that's neither here nor there.
Scott Benner 1:17:00
I just want to say legally if you email me later and say that you don't want me to air this. I don't have to listen to you. But, I mean, I would but please don't. Please don't change your mind about this. Fantastic.
Sabena 1:17:17
All right. No, I think this might convert my husband to listening to the podcast. Yeah, it's okay.
Scott Benner 1:17:23
Yeah, Jesus while him and his big penis. What's he worried about? How big is it? Is it like, is it just satisfying? Or is it like do you look at it and like have to take a minute to get ready. You don't have to answer that if you don't want to.
Sabena 1:17:41
It was just write
Scott Benner 1:17:43
perfect. Everything else about him socks, but that penis works. Really makes really cute kid. So you realize that inadvertently you've given a bad message to men just now. Right? Like, do you know what the message is here? Doesn't matter what they don't do? As long as they can lay it down when you need it. That's what you basically just said like, Look, you don't want to love the kids. Whatever. You don't want to take care of diabetes. I got it. Want to live in a house with the door unlocked? Nobody checks. It's no big deal. But when Mama wants her mama wants her happy. You just get over here. Everything else will be fine.
Sabena 1:18:34
I also have to have a job. Okay.
Scott Benner 1:18:36
Oh, please. That goes without saying sabina I didn't think that you were gonna let the penis anywhere near you without money and you girls that are having sex with guys that don't have any money. What are you doing? What are you doing? Jesus nature gave you all the things you need to be happy we have to change the name of the podcast the mama wants her happy by the way
Yeah, I very strongly believe that's gonna be the title. Yeah, cuz mama wants her happy is hilarious. And it won't come till the end and they'll have to listen all the way to the end to find out what it means. And by the way, this is an after dark now
Well, this was an unexpected treat for me today, Sabina. I hope you enjoyed it as well. If you didn't, I mean, I don't care honestly. I had a great time so but, but I really do appreciate you doing this. Is there anything we didn't talk about that you wanted to?
Sabena 1:19:45
Um, the only thing that I tell everyone newly diagnosed is usual ELO four finger pricks. It sounds really minut but there's no nerve endings in your ear lobe the way there is in your fingers.
Scott Benner 1:20:00
Hmm, that's a good one and heels. Do people use heels and toes but I don't know they they have nerve endings, though. But you're saying there's no nerve endings in your ear lobes.
Sabena 1:20:10
Always least like because it's just a piece of fit.
Scott Benner 1:20:13
Okay. Well, everything we've talked about today has been a piece of fat, but I understand what you're saying. It's always, I've never tested anyone's here low, but I take your word for it.
Sabena 1:20:25
Yeah, it's much easier and especially with little kids. They can't actually see what you're doing in terms of like the blood because it's on the yellow.
Scott Benner 1:20:34
Okay. I got you. I'm with you. That was it. By the way. Is there anything we talked about that you meant to talk about? The campy right? We didn't say anything you wanted to talk about? Right?
Sabena 1:20:46
No, but I got my free therapy session with you. And maybe I won't get divorced because I was such a
Scott Benner 1:20:53
never said that. I never said I didn't infer that. I don't I don't mean I don't think that. I'm just saying. Men and women see things differently. And often they don't see each other side is all I'm saying.
Sabena 1:21:08
And maybe I should bring my husband and kids as much as I do.
Scott Benner 1:21:19
Just tell him get your big penis over here and hug these kids. Really bad. Yeah, I'm gonna edit that out All right, hold on one second. I'm gonna stop the recording. But first I have to leave a note for myself. Definitely call this when Mama wants her happy. Okay, hold on. I'm gonna hit stop.
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#780 Bold Beginnings: Treating Low Blood Glucose
Bold Beginnings will answer the questions that most people have after a type 1 diabetes diagnosis.
You can always listen to the Juicebox Podcast here but the cool kids use: Apple Podcasts/iOS - Spotify - Amazon Music - Google Play/Android - iHeart Radio - Radio Public, Amazon Alexa or wherever they get audio.
+ Click for EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
DISCLAIMER: This text is the output of AI based transcribing from an audio recording. Although the transcription is largely accurate, in some cases it is incomplete or inaccurate due to inaudible passages or transcription errors and should not be treated as an authoritative record. Nothing that you read here constitutes advice medical or otherwise. Always consult with a healthcare professional before making changes to a healthcare plan.
Scott Benner 0:00
Hello friends, and welcome to episode 780 of the Juicebox Podcast.
Welcome back everyone to the bold beginning series today Jennifer Smith and I are going to be talking about treating low blood glucose levels. At some point, in this episode, you're going to hear me tell Jenny that oh, this is the last one we're recording, but I might have made a mistake, so there's more coming. Anyway, you'll see 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. Remember that while you're listening, please. If you have type one diabetes and are a US resident, or you're a US resident, who is the caregiver of someone with type one, can you please go to T one D exchange.org. Forward slash juicebox and complete the survey. Just join the registry complete the survey takes fewer than 10 minutes. Absolutely HIPAA compliant, completely anonymous. Super simple answers to type one diabetes questions you already know the answer to your feedback helps other people living with type one, t one D exchange.org, forward slash juicebox.
Omnipod five is the first tubeless automated insulin delivery system to integrate with the Dexcom G six. And now it's available for people with type one diabetes ages six years and older. Wait till you see smart adjust technology in the Omni pod five. It adjusts insulin delivery based on your customized target glucose helping to protect against highs and lows both day and night. Anecdotally, I am seeing so many people in our private Facebook group using Omni pod five and loving it. If you're interested in automated insulin delivery, I'm talking about a system that adjusts with your blood sugar, blood sugar tries to go up, it adjusts tries to go down. It adjusts automatically. If that's something you're interested in, head to Omni pod.com forward slash juice box and learn more about the Omni pod five. If you're not looking for automation, right now, you're probably going to love the Omni pod dash and you may actually be eligible for a free 30 day trial of that dash. Again, head to Omni pod.com forward slash juicebox to find out if you are now if you'd love that, but you don't have a Dexcom this is easy to fix dexcom.com forward slash juice box head there now click the link get started with Dexcom G six today. What are you going to get with Dexcom? G six? How about glucose readings right on your smart device your Apple or Android phones don't want to use a smartphone no problem, use the Dexcom receiver along with those devices comes customizable alerts and alarms. So you can set your optimal range and then get notified when your glucose levels go too high or too low. You can even share that data with up to 10 followers. That's pretty crazy. Think about it like your, your mom could like you could be like 40 years old be like Mom, will you watch my blood sugar because at night I don't wake up. If you're planning on moving to an algorithm based system, you should really look at Dexcom or if you just want to be able to see your blood sugar, speed, direction and number again, Dexcom I can look right now. Boom, my daughter's blood sugar is 77. It's steady right now. I saw it that fast. Right on my iPhone, you could do that to Dex comm.com forward slash juice box, head to my link right now fill out a little bit of information and you're on your way. Thank you so much for listening to the ads. There are links in the show notes of your podcast player or links at juicebox podcast.com. If you're unable to remember Omni pod.com Ford slash juice box and dexcom.com Ford slash juice box. Now we're gonna get you to Jenny and I talking about how to treat low blood sugars. And there's no ads the rest of the way
I'm gonna hit record Jenny to tell you this little preamble bit that I normally would have said ahead of time, but what we're done, you and
Jennifer Smith, CDE 4:28
this is the last one we not yay, I should say, Oh no, we're done.
Scott Benner 4:32
We're done with the bold beginnings, then we will move on to the long list of things that I have to do with you for next year. So but I'm gonna throw a little curveball in here. So you and I were going to talk about insurance. And then we were finished but I'm going to bring somebody else in to talk about insurance. Cool. So because otherwise it would just be you and I you know talking about our experiences with insurance which might not have answer some of the people's questions.
Jennifer Smith, CDE 5:01
No, I think that's great. Because I think there are quite a number of people that definitely know more about the navigation. And I think in terms of this topic, it's more how to really nudge yourself into insurance and get what you need and get to be able to talk to the right person about it. Yeah. So I think that's great.
Scott Benner 5:24
Yeah. So you and I would have done, we would have had fun. And I would have told stories about yelling the F word into phones to get art and things. I can do that with someone else who can also hit the technical sides of it for us a little awesome. So instead, you and I are going to add our very last episode to the bowl beginnings series together about how to treat low blood sugars. Oh, right. Because you get diabetes. And nobody says to you, hey, you might get low. And the low might be slow. And it might be fast, and it might be harsh, and you might be dizzy. They just say if your blood sugar gets low, eat 15 carbs, wait 15 minutes. And then it
Jennifer Smith, CDE 6:07
might respond really fast. Or it might not resolve for a couple of hours. And you're thinking, Where did the food go? So,
Scott Benner 6:17
so I so I want to kind of talk through a number of scenarios. And I know, I know, I'm dropping this on you out of nowhere. And of course, is that is that anything new? No. But I don't have any notes whatsoever. Like we've been doing bold beginnings off of people's questions. So, you know, we might have gotten lazy because we're like, oh, we don't have to drive this conversation. I'll just wait and see what this person said.
Jennifer Smith, CDE 6:37
Well, I'm sure there are probably lots of questions that have come in about low blood sugars.
Scott Benner 6:42
There may have been but they were not. They were not called together for me for the situation. So we're just going to fly by the seat of our pants, which I think will be fine. Not like before. Alright, so let's think about this. Your newly diagnosed, and I guess the first thing we can consider is that you might be honeymooning, still true. All right. So if that's happening, if you're getting help from your pancreas that you don't expect, you might see protracted I saw somebody online the other day whose kids blood sugar was like low all day. And she's like, this has to be a honeymoon because like we're not doing anything different than we've done in the past. So I guess if you're MDI, and you start experiencing low blood sugars, that seem like they're being I guess, impacted by your pancreas, still, you can't cut off your your Basal insulin, because you've probably shot it already that day. Correct. But you could start limiting. I don't know, would you
Jennifer Smith, CDE 7:47
limit your Bolus insulin? Right? Right, or you could look at for that day, making your insulin to carb ratio, more conservative, you know, if you're floating around at a ratio of an in honeymoon, when kids and even some teens might be a one to 30 ratio, right? You could suggest one to 45 or one to 50. Or right if you know that you're floating, pretty stable when there's not food introduced, but the stable is low and you're having to give it a little bit of carb to keep it from like dipping, then it would be the Bolus is that would be the easiest to adjust in that day. And in looking forward into the next day thinking, this might be what it is. You could downplay your basil that day. Whether it's morning or evening time dose, you could take it down a little bit, and see if then the next day floats just slightly higher, and leaves you without having to add so much extra carb
Scott Benner 8:55
to treat. And on the day that you get surprised by it and your basil is already in. You can kind of feed the basil a little bit for the day. Yeah, right and bred out and spread out carbs to cover the timeline. But so this is where you need to understand the difference between like a faster acting car but a more sustainable impact, right. And so if you're being drugged down constantly over hours and hours and hours, a couple of skittles might stop it for a minute. But the minute you bounce back up again, and this extra Basil is there that you don't need you're gonna get drugged back down again. So you need foods that are slower to digest. Right? You start you start reverse engineering your problems from diabetes and using your problems as solutions right like, right if you ate pizza that might take that might sit in your system for hours and hours and hours impact you so what a great opportunity to have pizza a little bit of pizza or what are
Jennifer Smith, CDE 9:54
pleading some proteins with some carbs. Right. You might want to treat if you're done hoping or lower already. If you do, then knowing what you just said, you want some sustaining power after that to not drop yet again, you could do something that incorporates some fat and protein in it to hold things level because again, the other consideration that if if it is a honeymoon based, like drop in blood sugar, it could be that anytime your blood sugar does nudge up from what you treated with simple sugar, it could be that your betas are also like, Oh, look at that. There's a rise in blood sugar. Let's give some help. And it doesn't really know that you've got Basal injected, that's also there.
Scott Benner 10:39
That's C you know, isn't that interesting that you brought that up? It didn't occur to me that I've always just thought of it is like you're getting help from your pancreas, but your pancreas seeds the carbs and attacks them while the insulin you've learned the manmade insulin you've put in is also drawing your blood sugar there. Oh, wow. So you have dumb insulin and smart insulin working at the same time.
Jennifer Smith, CDE 11:01
Correct. And common time for that in honeymoon is overnight for a lot of people actually, where they may have corrections that work pretty well in the daytime, despite them being really tiny, you know, miniscule amounts of correction. But I've got person after person that says I can't correct unless my blood sugar's 300 At night, because if I correct with just a minor half unit of insulin, I'm sitting at like a 60 blood sugar.
Scott Benner 11:30
In this reason we're newly diagnosed people.
Jennifer Smith, CDE 11:33
Correct. It's specifically more honeymooning. I mean, you can even see it on nights where blood sugar is going up. You don't correct the high blood sugar because you have the hindsight to know what's coming. Blood sugar could hit 202 20. And it downplays in your wake up in a beautiful number. That's, that's not injected Basal that did that. Your body helped you?
Scott Benner 11:57
Yeah. Okay. So that's one kind of low, you could experience now another one might be activity, right? I'm trying to think of I'm trying to put myself in a newly diagnosed person's situation, right? Like, they go back to their life, like I have diabetes, diabetes isn't gonna stop me. And then they go play tennis, and then their blood sugar falls really quickly. There we need fast working sugar, correct something that's gonna hit you very quickly, and stop this freefall. So if you're in a freefall, for whatever reason, you can't eat. That's not the time to have a slice of pizza.
Jennifer Smith, CDE 12:36
That's not the time to have peanut butter cups, the slice of pizza, the nacho meal breaks, not
Scott Benner 12:41
because that's because you're going to keep crashing before it has an opportunity to start digesting and to stop you. You're looking for simple sugars. I mean, in emergency situations, I know, I know, people don't seem to talk about glucose tablets anymore. Like they've become persona non grata, right. Because they taste achy,
Jennifer Smith, CDE 13:01
they're not the greatest. I mean, they are they are okay. I think the greatest thing about them for me personally, is that I am never going to over treat with glucose tablets. Right? I mean, they do their job. They're doing the job that I want them to do. But they're not like a bag of I don't know, licorice, like licorice. I like black licorice.
Scott Benner 13:23
So you might be like,
Jennifer Smith, CDE 13:25
easy to keep eating with a low blood sugar.
Scott Benner 13:27
Well, that is one interesting thing that there's a plus for for glucose tablets, you will you won't eat them for fun, that's for sure. No. Gel. I mean, I don't even know Do people carry that still, they should write it,
Jennifer Smith, CDE 13:40
we should and or it's easy, especially if somebody needs to help you. Because you can just get it into kind of the gum line and sort of massage it in it. It does work really quickly. So if you don't love the taste of glucose tablets, the glucose gels might work really great. There's a nice liquid glucose that I just heard about two that I really liked. Okay, so
Scott Benner 14:04
but, but in general juice boxes, people are gonna use Skittles gummy bears stuff like that. Right? Correct.
Jennifer Smith, CDE 14:11
Exactly. But the another good thing as you bring up glucose tablets, glucose, or dextrose is the simplest form of sugar, right? So your body doesn't have to go through this breakdown of the structure of of sugar if you will. And so it gets absorbed really fast. So if you're looking for candy specifically, you really want to look for candy that has glucose or dextrose as one of the first two or three ingredients because it's going to have the fastest impact on a low or a really quick drop that you want to stop.
Scott Benner 14:45
Yeah, the timing so super important because I know a story about a person. I won't say their name, but they're an adult. And diabetes for a long time felt themselves getting low knew it. ate a bunch of carbs passed out And then just turned back on when the carbs hit them. They were just like, hey, I'm back. And so so there's an it's an example of having the timing wrong. Like you're falling at a certain degree of speed or rate of speed. And you need that sugar to come in, and to slow like a parachute almost to parachute that that number fall down and to stop it, you know, what a nice level sponsor don't go too low. So things need to work the way you need. I mean, that really is the message of this episode, right? Like if you're one if you're 120, and you're wearing a CGM, and you see this gradual fall, and you look back over at 90 minutes going down, oh, geez, like I Bolus for this meal, it clearly looks like it's too much insulin, I'm going to get low a half an hour from now. Well, there, you could just add some more carbs to your meal or have a couple more bites. Correct, you might stop that. But if that same 120 was falling quickly, you're in a different scenario, you need to use different carbs,
Jennifer Smith, CDE 16:02
you need to use quicker, exactly the simple carbs on a quick drop. If you've got a gentle sort of glide down something that's a little more complex, like crack, you know, something like peanut butter crackers, I hear a lot kind of get used, because there's a little bit more to the cracker with the peanut butter added to it, right. So something like that could use it down. But if you're really, really dropping, then sugar,
Scott Benner 16:30
yeah. And you have to, in the beginning, it'll be hard not to over treat a low. But that is a skill you need to learn. Because otherwise, the bounce comes and then you're like, I don't know what to do. I wish you have that fear from you've just been low. You don't want to Bolus like you get caught in that, that balancing rhythm. You don't want to be in that. So maybe you'll learn at some point to look at your situation and say, half a juice box here. Or, you know, take a couple of sips just have two Skittles, you know, I say to people all the time, just because you open the bag, doesn't mean you have to eat all of them. Right? Yeah, just eat what you need.
Jennifer Smith, CDE 17:07
All right, which is also why those little tiny bags, I mean, this is a popular time of the year for a lot of people to end up stocking up on simple car, because we have Halloween coming up. Whether you celebrate it or not, it's a great time of the year to find really little packets of somewhere between eight and maybe 15 grams of carb, simple sugar, Candy really prepackaged. So the whole bag of Skittles versus the tiny little packet helps you to contain things a little more.
Scott Benner 17:40
And if you're not lucky enough to have a CGM in the moment and you're just leaning on your, your finger sticks. How frequently do you tell people to after they think after they've identified a low or felt it and treated it? How often do you stick your finger and look, I find myself. You know what I mean? I use a lot more test strips in that moment than you do sometimes for the whole week
Jennifer Smith, CDE 18:05
you do but you can expect that even simple sugars going to take a little bit of time for digestion, right? So you're really not going to see much shift. If you do a finger stick, confirm your low, treat the low and five minutes later you're doing another fingerstick you're probably not going to see much of a difference, right? So that's where old school was that 1515 rule. 15 grams, 15 minutes while you might not need or take 15 grams to treat this low that you have. Waiting about 15 minutes to retest will give you enough information to say well I treated it. It doesn't look like it's come up but it hasn't also fallen. So that should give you enough to say it's not dropping. Clearly, digestion is happening. Well, let's give it another 15 minutes and test again.
Scott Benner 18:56
Yeah, you know, I have two thoughts. So one of them I'm going to make a note about and then the other one I'm going to say if you are wearing a CGM. Sometimes it will not register as quickly so you can see like a like, Oh my God, my blood sugar is 50 You know what I mean? And you take a bunch of carbs and and then there's this way to look at the arrow with the Dexcom at least I don't know how it works with libre, you'll you're stopping a low blood sugar, let's just say it's 60. And it's the arrows diagonal down and you take some carbs in and the next reading is 55 and the arrows still down. And then all of a sudden, the arrow will like sometimes disappear. Like almost like the algorithms like I don't know what's happening right now. But the number stays the same. Or sometimes the number or the number will get lower, but the arrow changes. And do you know what I mean by that? Yeah. And so your
Jennifer Smith, CDE 19:56
whereas if you were testing in a look then it said 55 with an eight Build arrow down, you've treated it. And now you can see it has a horizontal arrow, but the number is reading like 51 or 50. And you're thinking, Well, what that really indicates is the system has found a stability, even though the number has slightly nudged down yet, it's not dropping, what you've done is actually making some impact overall. So it's not really time to treat with yet another like whole box of juice.
Scott Benner 20:30
It's so weird. It's a weird moment because the CGM is a little behind. And what you did with the carbs is maybe more in the now, but you can't see it. And so there's like, there's like multiple things happening at once that the technology has, has difficulty showing you. But you can see that something's happening. And so that's when that's when I say to myself, Okay, now this thing looks stable. And we've gotten to, you know, readings in a row that say 50. But I want to know what's really going on, because either the CGM seems confused, and I didn't do well. And we're lower than we think. Or we're higher than we think. And I don't want to treat more, that's the perfect time to do a finger stick to me absolutely have to write
Jennifer Smith, CDE 21:14
Absolutely, especially for those. Those numbers where you're treating I say at a number less than 60. Honestly, if you're varying at all and decision about whether I should do a finger stick or not. If you're less than 60, and you've treated it and the numbers on the CGM just don't necessarily add up. Or you're mentally not quite like with it enough with a low blood sugar like that. Just do a confirmatory finger stick, because at least that's going to show you real time right now. Where is your number? Yeah,
Scott Benner 21:53
yeah. And I know we're trying not to over treat. But if you get caught and you don't know, like, this is the time you're going to hear me say I'd rather I'd rather just Hi. Yeah. Because Because what you're saving yourself from or saving another person from. We don't talk about very much like in diabetes in general, even on the podcast very much like it just doesn't get talked about very much. You're talking about becoming incapacitated. You're talking about having a seizure. You're talking about death, like you're talking about. There's a lot that happens between 40 and then I don't know how low anybody's ever been right. You know, but while they were still alive, I saw Arden's blood sugar. I saw Arden's blood sugar 22 once on a finger stick when she was really little, and she was okay still. And I was just like, keep eating, eat. Yeah, II keep going. And then all of a sudden, it was 30. And I was like, Oh, I might have tested moving, I might have tested her blood sugar 10 times in seven minutes. I was like, but But I mean, it's the truth, right? Like you, you have to learn to do this because you use manmade insulin and your blood sugar is going to get low. I just don't care who you are, it's gonna happen. So you need to know how to handle it or how to handle it for somebody else. And you need to know how to handle it without causing a problem in the future. Whether that problem is a high blood sugar, or calling an ambulance, like right, you're it's not. I guess we don't talk. It sounds scary. It's probably why people don't talk about it, huh? Yeah, yeah. So
Jennifer Smith, CDE 23:27
it's absolutely it's it's more around how to treat. There's not even an emphasis on like the overtreatment. It's just treat it. But why, right? Why is it so important to recognize a low sooner than later or deal with it sooner than later? Or stop it from happening? sooner than later? Because there is that scary factor of? I don't know. I don't know why some people can have a blood sugar. I might the lowest I was ever was 26. Yeah, I don't, I was fine. My mom actually thought the number had to be bad. I mean, it was really old. I mean, this was like 1988. So clearly, the meters were not what they are today. But she's like, that's got to be wrong. You feel good, right? We were camping. Did it again, it was like it was pretty much the same. Just like you need to eat. Here's the juice. Where's it? Where's the regular soda? You know, why could I be there? And fine when somebody else could be passed out, have a seizure, need an ambulance need assistance? When their blood sugar is 61 and low. Right? Right.
Scott Benner 24:36
Yeah, everybody's going to be different. And so so let me let me say a couple things here. I use a football analogy because it's football season, right? You can't like the reason the offensive linemen are these giant blobs of people is because they're trying to stop this insane force that's coming at them. Right? Correct. You can sometimes put carbs in and you I made such a mistake earlier in the day with insulin or, you know, there's just so much power on the side of the insulin. It's like the carbs aren't there, like you might as well not have anybody blocking because it runs right through them. Right? That's a panicky situation, the first time that happens to you, where you take in a juice box, and realize that it's, it's like you didn't drink it. If you're enjoying the Juicebox Podcast, and you would like it to remain free. Please support the sponsors. Today's sponsors are Dexcom G six dexcom.com, forward slash juice box, and Omni pod. Both the Omni pod five and the Omni pod dash are available at Omni pod.com. Forward slash juicebox. It's a hard moment, you know what I mean? Because this is what you know is going to work. And now suddenly, it's not working for some reason. And you're like, Oh, God, what do I do? You can't find yourself in those scenarios. Wondering what's in the cabinets? Or what's in my bag? Or what do we have in the car, like you have to be prepared? Correct all the time. Just, you know, anywhere you are. There are fast acting carbs. I don't give a crap. If you don't use them for six months. I don't care if they get stale, throw them out and replace them. If the juice, you know, in the juice box, get some spongy from being in the car in the heat. Throw it away, put another one in there. Like just don't. Don't ever find yourself in a situation where you're like, it'll be okay.
Jennifer Smith, CDE 26:30
Right? Yeah, right. I mean, It's fall now. and I were just like rotating through. We don't really have summer jackets, but like into fall into the winter jackets, we're kind of rotating them into the mix, right? So I bring up my winter stuff. And absolutely in at least like one, if not two of my like fall into winter jackets. Their old, nasty bad glucose tablets, like they've gotten the like crystallized sugar like dots. And like, if I had to, I would still use this. So like that juice box that's like nasty and squishy. If that's all you got, you use the squishy juice that
Scott Benner 27:09
spread them around your life, like your grandma's spreads around her reading glasses, do you know what I mean? There's just a pair in this room and over here, you need to be less ready, you can't be it's a weird scenario, you can't be scared, you can't live your life scared. You don't want to live your life with a 200 blood sugar because you don't want this to happen. Because also, that's not any safety from not being low. Right? As a matter of fact, that might put you in a situation where you're a little more frequently, but but I like to say about diabetes, that you don't learn these things. You don't prepare for these things so that you can stop a problem. The problem is always going to sneak through somewhere, it's never going to be where you think it's you know, because if it was where you think then you'd get ahead of it. Right. So you have to be ready for when it happens. And then the last bit of this is, if all else fails. I mean, please be carrying glucagon, you know, with you like not, it's in the cabinet in the kitchen. But we don't take it, you know, anywhere I left it in the car when I went pumpkin picking like it needs to be with you. Right. Yeah, exactly. So well, this is a fun conversation.
Jennifer Smith, CDE 28:14
Yeah, it's a harder, I think it's a harder conversation than you think about before. Because there's a lot of there's a lot more on the back end of not taking care of a low well enough. That is actually scary. Yeah, and it doesn't get talked about. We always try to like smooth it out like not to worry about it so much and whatnot. But in order to not really worry about it. Preparation is needed to have to have things in your purse or your car or your backpack or, you know, at your friend's your friend's house that you go to all the time or whatever it is. I guess it's like being a girl scout or a Boy Scout. Be prepared how
Scott Benner 28:57
to be prepared. Yeah. You know, when Artem was younger, she spent her whole day in one classroom, right where she went to art or something like that. So she had a bag and she took it with her when she hit middle school in high school, and she started having English in one room and math in another room and that started happening. We put supplies in each room. Like we didn't say to ourselves like she should be humping this stuff all over the place constantly. Let's put a little here there was a couple of juice boxes in every room. You know, it's interesting when you learn about your management to how come we're always restocking the English class. And never the math class. What's the time Yeah, it's the time of day we're doing something that's making a low around this time of day. It's actually an interesting way to learn a little bit about your management is where am I grabbing my supplies from? You know, do you think that do you think that every load is different? Because there's there are questions here from people that are like you know, after I stop a load with a fast acting, should I put a protein in every time time afterwards, but not necessarily.
Jennifer Smith, CDE 30:02
Yeah, no, I mean, the idea. Again, it's kind of an older concept. It's sort of like the 1515 rule, it's 15 grams, 15 minutes, and then you essentially may need to follow that up with a snack. But again, there's lack of enough information about why the idea really was simple carb will typically help keep your blood sugar up for about 90 minutes, give or take. Now, again, a variable in the picture is why was the low there, if it's excess insulin, you may actually need to treat with more than what you thought you would need. But the other idea is that the simple carb to keep your blood sugar up is it's meant to sustain you for that time period, before you might eat again. So if you treat a low blood sugar at, let's call it three o'clock in the afternoon, but you don't typically eat dinner until seven or eight o'clock at night. Lows can bring on another low they can. So if you treat the low, but there's something in the picture that's keeping you lower, could be honeymoon, it could be excess insulin, it could be more movement in the day, whatever. You may actually for longer than two hours before your next meal, it may be beneficial to have a handful of nuts a spoonful of peanut butter a piece of string cheese boiled egg, whatever it may be. The the idea there is that that's a little bit more sustaining and or a snack that might have a little bit more complex carbs to it long with some protein to sustain things. So you're right every low is not the same right?
Scott Benner 31:44
Art in tried art is a college right now. She tried to use a following blood sugar as a Pre-Bolus for her lunch. But it just didn't like she didn't time it well enough. So like at 60. But so listen, for anybody who's listening. Here's how I did it. Arden's in another state, she's 13 hours away. I'm able to look at her phone and see where it is. Right. So I use Find My Phone to see. Okay, she's in the cafeteria, so at least I know she's right. So now where she should be near food. I text her, Hey, what are we doing about this? Because she's got this like 70 that became 65 pretty quick. And then I looked at the arrow. And then I looked at the line and I thought this isn't stopping. Like this is not a low that's going to stop right like this is this is going to be negative 15 If we don't do something about it, right. What are you doing? I'm trying to like Miss like, you don't I mean, I don't want to be up harass Johnny. And at the same time, I don't need her dropping dead. It's College. Like I'm trying to find the middle. I'm like, Hey, what's up at nothing. Now I know she's with the food. So I'm like, you see this? Nothing. Art and I really need to know you're okay. I'm eating now. I'm like, okay, like the food's going in your mouth. Yes. But Jenny 6060 560-560-5550 5540. I'm like, Are you eating now? Yes, I'm eating. I told you. I was eating
Jennifer Smith, CDE 33:12
what are you eating lettuce leaves?
Scott Benner 33:17
What's happening? Like, you're eating like handfuls of sugar, right? Like, and so, but so I texted or test her. So then I sent a text to test her cognitive, like where she was cognitively. Right. And I'm just like, how do you feel? And she's like, I feel fine. And I'm like, Okay, have you been eating for a while? She said yes. So I said, Okay, I got it. There's food in there. It's working. The CGM hasn't caught up yet, but I had to stand there. for like three go rounds. That CGM watching that 42 Just sit there knowing she's not really 42. She's in the mid 60s already. I know. I know this. But I only know this from
Jennifer Smith, CDE 33:59
you. Because you've lived with her. You've dealt with it long enough. You knew the questions to ask. You knew how to get her to respond and whether or not she was going to answer you the right way. And that it takes learning
Scott Benner 34:12
Oh, it's yours. Because otherwise I would have been like drinking juice. I don't care if you don't drink the juice. I'm bringing you home. I'm not paying for college. Like I don't you know, like, you know, because the number because we've done everything's over come home and live in this room for the rest of your life. Because the because the number was so scary, right? But I was able to pick together enough information. I swear to God, that CGM. One more time went from 42 to 66. And I was like, Okay, I was right. But I'll tell you, you're like, oh my god, what if I'm wrong? You know what I mean? Like, I don't want to be wrong, but I might be the next thing I think we should bring up about Lowe's. Because we're in a we're in an algorithm world now right control like you on the pod five that thing that Medtronic makes i What is it? Which one is that? Let me learn the number Medtronic, don't they have an algorithm right now?
Jennifer Smith, CDE 35:03
They do. They've I mean, they've had an algorithm for a long time I use as a their CGM. Right. And I don't know that their, to their algorithm have a name likes me pod five, six. So their new their new one in the ISC. The number is what you're looking for 770 G. And I know someplace I don't know if it's here. I don't think it's here yet. 780 G, I know is available in some places in Europe already. But seven, seven D 780. Yes,
Scott Benner 35:34
I just I feel like they buy they buy ads for in pen. So I figure I, I owe it to them to learn the name. I just can't keep saying the thing that Medtronic has they're gonna be like, How about how about if you're not the podcast that we sell the embed on anymore? Like? Alright, so the 770 G, right. So yeah, so whether it's one of those algorithms, we all live in a new space now, where the algorithm sees a low coming, and it takes away and takes away and takes away your basil and takes it away. But it doesn't, it isn't always going to get it right. And so you might end up treating a low after a prolonged amount of time of not having any insulin. And then your blood sugar shoots back up very quickly, because there's nothing to stop it. And what does the algorithm do when it sees the higher number gives you more, it gives you more insulin, sometimes sometimes can happen. That's what I'm saying. It can happen that's a better way to and when that happens, here's what I know, for certain, yeah, gonna be low again later. Because because, you know, the, you know, when you're taking, you know, sugar in for a low, if you take in the right amount, you've been getting on a regular, you know, on a regular pump or on an MDI, you've still been getting your Basal the whole time. So you're, you're correcting that low more in real time. When you do it right algorithm, the algorithm thought it was going to stop you, it does not expect these carbs. And now you jump up and it Bolus is the number or it's pushing basil at the number that the other night. I guess I should have listed lupus one of those Arden had Jenny, I think it was around her period, and she was tired. She's rundown. And she's getting her period. At the same time, we had this whole day where she was a little too low. And it persisted into overnight. And so around eight or nine o'clock, we fixed the low and I said listen, take these carbs, go into the settings and shut off micro bolusing without carbs. I was like where this thing is gonna hit your your correction. And it's gonna push it back again. And she did that we went through the night really nicely. It was a nice learning experience for her because then she brought it up the next day. She's like, should I put the microbuses back on again? And I was like, Yeah, everything looks good now. So but anyway, you have to be aware of that. So I mean, I don't know what you do. Me.
Jennifer Smith, CDE 37:53
I mean, there are other you know, for other systems, you can certainly also navigate something like that. If you've treated a low, you know that you've overtreated it, but the system is going to give back eventually, and you know that it's going to be too heavy, similar to your scenario there. The other systems do have, I guess, adjustable targets or different targets that would be higher. So then it would adjust less, if you adjust the target up and say, Hey, I'm aiming for this now. So as my blood sugar is going up, it's okay. You don't have to give me as much because I want to be higher
Scott Benner 38:30
anyway. So like an example with Omnipod five, you might tell it to shoot for the higher range and that's correct. And yes, with I'll tell you what, in that exact scenario with Arden I said, I asked her what did you take for the low? And she's like, Oh, I had gummy bears. They hit her really hard. So I was like, Oh, crap, she's gonna jump straight up. But they don't hit her and hold her. They hit her and then they disappeared on her. So I was like, oh, no, no, don't let that thing Bolus again. Yeah, anyway, this probably all sounds much more confusing than it will be you have diabetes for a few months. It's all gonna make sense. Don't
Jennifer Smith, CDE 39:05
maybe know they will. Yeah. There's still some things I throw my hands up. And I'm like, oh, clearly, like Venus is not in the right place in the orbit of something because I I just I don't know right now.
Scott Benner 39:21
You're maybe just said Good. Luck is what I heard.
Jennifer Smith, CDE 39:25
That is so not the case. Not the beginning of this is what you want to hear. Yes. Forget the maybe. I shouldn't say maybe should be like the point 1% of the time. You know, it doesn't take much to learn, especially with CGM is in the mix. These days. It doesn't take much to learn how much is needed. And as you were sort of, you know, talking into the effective algorithms, you'll see, well, gosh, I was used to using this much. I probably need to use a quarter to a third of what I used to use to treat it when I didn't have system that was helping me You know,
Scott Benner 40:01
I saw a woman yesterday say, I don't know the exact numbers, but the gist of it was on control IQ I needed 14 or 15, carbs stop below and on Omnipod five, I don't need four or five carbs to stop below. So interesting that interesting. I found that incredibly interesting actually. So
Jennifer Smith, CDE 40:16
especially system to system, given the fact that they're both doing a given take of insulin, but they are, they are very different algorithms. Yeah. So that it does make sense.
Scott Benner 40:27
Alright, so check me on this. You need to know how to stop a low they're going to happen. You're not going to stop a low from ever happening. You need to understand the different impacts that these different carbs are going to have on your low blood sugars. After a while teaching yourself to stop a low without creating a high is a great tool to have. Yes,
Jennifer Smith, CDE 40:46
if you it will happen. Yeah, yeah.
Scott Benner 40:49
Oh no, you're gonna rebound high until you until you learn how to do it in a real panic situation. Screw everything else save your life. Correct. And that's it right? Have glucagon with you have snacks with you. Don't go anywhere without ways to treat Lowe's, the people who love you and are around you should understand how to help you if you're unconscious or unable to help yourself.
Jennifer Smith, CDE 41:13
And I think another thing as you mentioned, caregivers or loved ones or you know, whoever. I think within that for Lowe's is recognizing the like what you mentioned about cognitive when you're doing kind of a check with Arden the people that are around you enough, should be able to tell whether you're responding or or talking or whatnot, the way that you normally would. And in the case that your CGM is off, or you aren't using a CGM or technology, somebody who knows you well should be able to kind of chime in and say, Hey, are you okay? You know, and don't be angry at them for that. It's just a, it's a checkpoint to be able to keep you safe. So
Scott Benner 42:02
yeah, also for I guess, caregivers, low blood sugars could leave you with people who are difficult to YES to help, right? They could become combative, or and that's a real concern, especially as they become adults. And I There's one story that sticks out in my head all the time of this woman whose husband got low, and she just wasn't big enough to overwhelm him to do what he needed, you know. And she had to call 911 because of that. But yeah, I mean, the people around you just need to know. And people should be following you. If you have CGM. Like I don't know if liberi has follow like Dexcom does, but yeah, it does it. Okay. Arden is in a suite with girls. And the girl in the next room follows her on Dexcom Oh, wow, that's awesome. He only has a 55 alarm and nothing else. But we explained to her I'm like, if this thing's beeping, please go find Arden. And make sure she's okay. That's all. Yep. And it just, I don't know, especially for adults living by themselves or kids off at college, like somebody, you know, has your back because it also not everybody hears the alarms to like I had a low last night. It was only like 65. But I was sleeping. And in my sleep. I thought did I hear something? Like that was all I thought, right? And then I'm like, I woke up and I looked, and I was like, huh, yeah, I'm gonna watch that for a second. Because to be honest with you, it was a real slow drift. The loop had been taken basil away. I'm like, I think this is gonna bounce. Like, I think it's okay. I don't want to wake her if it's not going to be okay. And it waited and waited and waited. And then I was like, Oh, it is gonna be okay. It went back up again. But I talked to her this morning. And I was like, you know, you're a little last night. She has no idea. But since she had that seizure more recently, if you listen to her last episode, she will tell you about it. If she has a she experiences any kind of a quick fall while she's sleeping now. I don't know. I don't know how that rewired her brain but she's boom. I'm up. I drank juice. I'm good. Hey, Dad. I did this. Do you think this is enough? Like she never used to wake up. And now I know she's feeling the fall while she's sleeping right now. Which has only happened twice since she's been away. But anyway. Alright, Jenny. Did we know it? We did it? I think so. Yeah. Yeah. For us then. Yay for us.
Unknown Speaker 44:24
Awesome. Thank you. Oh,
Scott Benner 44:25
I guess we should say something like thank you for listening to the bold beginning series and I hope you found it like helpful.
Jennifer Smith, CDE 44:31
Absolutely. Especially in the beginning when everything is so new. So
Scott Benner 44:35
let us know if you want us to add to this series. If you go back and listen to it and find something that should have been in there that wasn't please send me a note. And Jenny and I will we'll add it if we think it needs to be added. Absolutely. Thank you. What are we doing? What are we best here so I
Jennifer Smith, CDE 44:53
got nothing else to know right? But just hang around
Scott Benner 45:02
Well, as I mentioned at the beginning, we've already found more stuff for bowl beginning. So this was not the last episode. Let me thank Omni pod and Dexcom. While I have your attention on the pod.com forward slash juice box, see if you're eligible for a free 30 day trial of the Omni pod dash, or if you're interested in the Omnipod, five, for full safety, risk information and free trial terms and conditions, you can also visit omnipod.com forward slash juicebox. And of course, thank you to Dexcom for being a longtime sponsor to the podcast dexcom.com forward slash juice box see blood sugar in real time, the speed direction and the number right there on your iPhone, Android, or on your Dexcom receiver. There's so much more I want to tell you but I'm on about day seven of this illness that I have and to be perfectly honest, editing the show together almost killed me. So I'm gonna go take nappy, and I'll see you next week with another episode of The Juicebox Podcast.
Test your knowledge of episode 780
1. What is the significance of blood sugar monitoring before exercise?
- It helps in preventing hypo- and hyperglycemia
- It has no impact
- It should be avoided
- It is only relevant for type 2 diabetes
2. How does physical activity affect insulin sensitivity?
- It decreases insulin sensitivity
- It has no effect
- It increases insulin sensitivity
- It should be avoided
3. What should be done if blood sugar levels drop during exercise?
- Stop exercising and consume fast-acting carbs
- Ignore it and continue exercising
- Increase insulin dosage
- Drink water
4. Why is it important to adjust insulin doses based on the type and duration of exercise?
- To maintain stable blood sugar levels
- To avoid taking insulin
- To increase blood sugar levels
- It is not important
5. What types of exercise are beneficial for people with diabetes?
- Only aerobic exercises
- Only anaerobic exercises
- Both aerobic and anaerobic exercises
- No exercises are beneficial
6. How often should a person with diabetes exercise to see benefits?
- Once a month
- Once a week
- Regularly, several times a week
- Every day, without rest
7. What should be considered when planning an exercise routine for a person with diabetes?
- The type and intensity of exercise
- The duration of exercise
- Blood sugar levels before, during, and after exercise
- All of the above
8. How does regular exercise contribute to diabetes management?
- It helps maintain stable blood sugar levels
- It has no impact
- It should be avoided
- It complicates diabetes management
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#779 Lady In The Closet
Barbara has type 1 diabetes..
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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 to episode 779 of the Juicebox Podcast.
On this episode of The Juicebox Podcast, I'll be speaking with Barbara, she's an adult living with type one diabetes who I had on the show because of what she did for a living. I of course, then almost exclusively didn't talk to her about that. I don't know, I don't know what's wrong with me. While you're listening, please remember 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 healthcare plan, or becoming bold with insulin. Are you sitting there right now thinking Yes, Scott, I am a US resident who has type one diabetes, or perhaps you're thinking I am a US resident, and I'm the caregiver of someone with type one. If these are things that you think about yourself, I need you to go to T one D exchange.org. Forward slash juicebox. Join the registry, fill out the survey completely. That's what I need. That's it. Take you 10 minutes. If you're fast taking nine minutes if you're slow 12 I'm not with you. I don't know exactly how well your type says a quick survey helps people with type one diabetes. Nothing's hard or confusing about it won't take you long supports people with type one might help you out. Definitely helps me out T one D exchange.org. Forward slash juicebox. This episode of The Juicebox Podcast is sponsored by touched by type one and touched by type ones dancing for diabetes show is coming up quickly. Head over right now to touched by type one.org. To learn more about it and buy yourself some tickets. today's podcast is also sponsored by the Contour Next One blood glucose meter. You can learn more about the Contour Next One, and even buy it online. At contour next one.com forward slash juice box get the accurate blood glucose meter that my daughter uses at contour next one.com forward slash juice box. This show is sponsored today by the glucagon that my daughter carries G voc hypo pen. Find out more at G voc glucagon.com. Forward slash juicebox. Said Barbara I'm gonna start the recording. I don't want to. So I'm sorry. Say that again using a suitcase as a desk and
Barbara Westberg 2:31
and a stepladder as a chair. So I'm I'm good and comfortable here
Scott Benner 2:37
and in in your closet. In my closet. Yes. And earlier when we weren't recording. And I knew magically that there was no carpeting in your room for a second. Were you impressed?
Barbara Westberg 2:49
Slightly slightly. Barbara. Yeah.
Scott Benner 2:52
Give it to me a little bit. I mean, you don't I mean, like.
Barbara Westberg 2:55
I mean, this isn't your first podcast. So you've probably had guests on, who have been in all kinds of wild situations. Alright,
Scott Benner 3:05
I see. You're not gonna let me have that. That's fine. We'll move forward.
Barbara Westberg 3:11
Let's see who am I? I am Barbara Westberg. As long as you spell it with two E's and no use someone who understood that you were looking for people who have interesting careers, and I have had a multitude of those. I graduated from Arizona State University with a degree that people have actually made fun of in comedy routines.
Scott Benner 3:38
is an English degree.
Barbara Westberg 3:41
No, no, no. I, my degree from ASU is Recreation and Tourism Management.
Scott Benner 3:50
Oh, I didn't know that was the degree. I didn't
Barbara Westberg 3:53
either. And then I met someone who gave me my campus tour. And I was contemplating telecommunications, management. And he told me what he did and he was like, You got to do this greatest thing ever. And I did and it was the greatest thing ever. Best advice ever.
Scott Benner 4:13
What's the what did it prepare you to do?
Barbara Westberg 4:17
Um, pretty much anything except for you know, brain surgery, things like that, or be a diabetic educator. You know, life gave me those skills. But there's a lot of management involved in Recreation and Tourism Management. So anywhere where I put your mouse around, I've got this educational foundation. And also, I can take an event that is falling to pieces and somehow make the people who bought tickets to it not understand that everything is falling into place. says,
Scott Benner 5:02
are you telling me you know how to shine up a turd, Barbara?
Barbara Westberg 5:05
I do. I certainly do. Thank you for that that phrasing I'm going to add that to my resume
Scott Benner 5:10
that writing your CV. Barbara Westberg can shine up your turd? I'll tell you what, that might get you a lot of work honestly.
Barbara Westberg 5:20
Maybe not the industry I'm in fine.
Scott Benner 5:23
So So you come out of college and like, what's your first job?
Barbara Westberg 5:27
Um, actually, my first job in the industry was while I was still in school, I had an internship for Well, the way I decided that I wanted to be in events was I was volunteering at a fundraising event that my aunt had helped orchestrate. And I thought it was so much fun and so inspiring. And she said, you know, a lot of the people here are getting paid to do this, and my jaw dropped. What do you mean? I thought everybody here was a volunteer? Oh, no, there are people who have to actually be responsible for things who actually work for nonprofit organizations. And my whole life shifted. And that's when I knew that I wanted to be a fundraiser. And what I wanted to the way I wanted to do that was through events. So as a student, I had to have an internship. And it was with, you know, the, the rubber ducky races.
Scott Benner 6:38
No, but what what is that?
Barbara Westberg 6:40
They dump a whole bunch of ducks into a body of water. And the rubber duck that floats across the finish line first wins, whatever the organization has come up with as a prize. Okay.
Scott Benner 6:52
Who gets a rubber duckies? Back? That was my thought. Have you gotten back at the end?
Barbara Westberg 7:00
There? You would have to read the manual. There's all kinds of ways. But yeah, basically, it's a bunch of floating devices that make the ducks go into one lane, and then they're scooped up and put in things like shopping carts to drain them. I'm sure every Duck Race has a different retrieval method. But,
Scott Benner 7:20
Barbara, I want to tell you right now that I would wear a t shirt that said, every Duck Race has a different retrieval method. Because I've never heard those words strung together before my entire life.
Barbara Westberg 7:36
And see, this is what you missed out by not majoring in Recreation and Tourism Management. When you went to school.
Scott Benner 7:43
I didn't even go to college. Barbara. I missed out on everything. i There's no shot. There's still a shot. Can you imagine if I I'm so old, I wouldn't. I graduated from high school, went home. My mom gave me a cake. I had to go to bed because the next morning I started my job. And I well, I worked in a sheetmetal shop making $5.50 an hour at that time. So there was no there was no, I did not grow up in a way where higher education was something that anybody thought of. It was a it's just not it was not my family. But so. So wait a minute. So you have type one diabetes, When were you diagnosed?
Barbara Westberg 8:25
It was diagnosed in 1976.
Scott Benner 8:28
Wow, I was five in 1976. How old? Were you? Six? Oh, look at us.
Barbara Westberg 8:35
Yes, I'm one of those dinosaurs. You know, the back in my day, there was no way to test your blood sugar.
Scott Benner 8:42
Yeah. Then what did you do? I said, Well hold on a second 76. Is that like 45 years ago? Wow, that made me feel bad about myself. Give me a second. Let me breathe through that. I just found out yesterday, I have to have knee surgery. So I was like, Well, that sounds like a thing that happens to old people. So well. I mean, what was What's your early I don't want to jump around too much. But I'm going to what was management like 45 years ago?
Barbara Westberg 9:17
45 years ago, my mother was a registered nurse and was told that diabetes only especially type one only ran in families. So there was something wrong with me that was not diabetes. And finally she carried me into our family physician's office, and he said, drive her to the hospital don't wait for an ambulance and actually died in the emergency room. And it was something That was incredibly stressful, because every time my mother would share this news, I remember hearing, oh, she must have got that from the other side of the family. Well, no, I, I actually didn't need another diabetic until I was in high school. Didn't know anyone who had it was lucky enough to have a trained medical professional as a mother. But she was completely unprepared to for having a child diagnosed with type one. And I was hospitalized. And it was maybe five days. And I fully expected to leave the hospital and leave all of these injections and things behind me. However, the injections followed me because that was the way we managed one shot a day, there were two different types of insulin. They were I believe they were pork derived insulin that she mixed together in one syringe. And I needed to urinate into a cup and use an eyedropper to put drops on this little like, looked like a as, or something like a little piece of candy. But drop that into a glass test two, and then put drops of urine on top of that and see what color it turned, which basically was telling me nothing useful.
Scott Benner 11:42
I was gonna say, then you got all that information and did nothing with it, right?
Barbara Westberg 11:46
Yep, didn't change anything. So we were given a diabetic diet that we probably adhered to for about 15 minutes. And then two working parents with two kids. And it just management was inject your child with insulin in the morning, cross your fingers and hope. Yeah.
Scott Benner 12:12
But But can I ask you Are you do you have any weird, like complications? Or how are you doing?
Barbara Westberg 12:20
I, I actually met a diabetic researcher, who said, I don't mean this to sound weird, but I would love to study your body after you die. You're incredibly healthy. What's your secret? And I was actually honored by that. I do have some diabetic retinopathy. That actually came on during my pregnancy. But aside from that, I'm super healthy. That's crazy.
Scott Benner 12:51
Do you find that now looking like understanding? I don't even know how you manage right now. We'll get to it. But understanding how management exists now, looking backwards. Are you amazed by that?
Barbara Westberg 13:03
Oh, I don't know how I lived through my teenage years that rebelling the even as a small child like the rebellion and means strong. And doing things like sneaking Halloween candy. So Oh, so you know, as a child in the 70s. Basically, one of the other things they told us was just stop eating sugar altogether. Okay, you know, the the thought of eating a cup of rice was no problem. But having one piece of hard candy. No, you can't do that. So we've come so far. And yeah,
Scott Benner 13:49
I wonder if you're like me, when I hear that story, just that simple story. I think there's no way that people didn't understand carbohydrates, and that they would be broken down to your body and stored as glucose like, great. That had to have been a thing we understood in the 70s. So when I hear stuff like that, but I always think of is that how, as a as a society, how uninformed we are about things because somebody knew that that was not an unknowable fact that rice would turn into glucose when you ate it. Right? Like so. How do we put people? I don't know why I'm asking you this. But I'm always fascinated about why we put people who are unprepared for their job into that job. And I don't know if I'm making sense. I'm left down by people very often. And these are the kinds of stories that make it really bubble up inside of me. I'm sorry, I know you just you just made me feel like why can't this be understood and universally? Like it shouldn't take more than five minutes for everybody to get that? I guess? I don't know. It's, it seems insane to me.
Barbara Westberg 14:55
And for me what this really bring comes to light is that every diabetic is responsible for their own care. Or to have a great team of of parents or caregivers, and doctors and nurses and health care professionals. There's a lot to know. And you're in your, what number episode of this podcast, and I'm sure you learn something new or have a different take every time you talk to someone new on your podcast. Sure, yeah. It's a lifetime of learning when it comes to diabetes. And I'm, I'm still getting it wrong sometimes. Yeah. And the thought that someone who, like, I never saw an endocrinologist until I was in my teens. So my family doctor is supposed to know how to manage diabetes. That was an unrealistic expectation,
Scott Benner 16:03
right? No, I agree with you. I know. And I like intellectually, I understand. But I just, I'm thinking of a little girl like Horkan down rice, like it's nothing. And then somebody's like, Would you like a root beer barrel and someone flies across from us, Barbara cannot have a root beer barrel, you know, or whatever. And by the way, that was my favorite candy growing up.
Barbara Westberg 16:23
Oh, yeah, to have a birthday party where we ate pizza. And then the cake, there'd be candles on the cake. And I'd blow out the candles. And then everyone else ate the cake. And I didn't
Scott Benner 16:35
write the Gen three. Right? Yeah. You know, most of what I remember from the 70s, the mid 70s. Is the bicentennial. And gas lines. Those are two like enduring images in my head of the mid 70s. I don't know. I don't know why that is. I don't know. Maybe my life was super boring. Was that could that have been the only thing that happened in 76? Is that? Oh, I don't know. All right. Um, this whole thing is making me feel very old. I need to move on from your life. We need to move on from your early life. So when does I mean? Are you using? You're using beef and pork at that point, right? Insulin, right? Yeah. How long did you do that for? Do you know?
Barbara Westberg 17:25
What probably. Now, I actually I don't know. Like, my mom was responsible for filling the prescriptions. But I know that when I attempted to donate blood, they said, Oh, no, thank you.
Scott Benner 17:42
Because of that, right?
Barbara Westberg 17:43
Yeah, because of the actually, I think it's the beef insulin that I took. So I can never give blood, which is a interesting side effect of being a diabetic from the 70s.
Scott Benner 17:56
Well, I just talked to somebody today today, because I guess I'm doubling up my episodes trying to make up for my my foolhardiness of going away for a week and 25 years ago diagnosed. So 25 years ago, it's nine 2022. That's only like 97 Maybe. And they used to beef and pork for a little bit. You might have used it for a long time. Right.
Barbara Westberg 18:22
Right. I moved when I was 18. And, and was introduced to my very first endocrinologist. So that's probably the pivotal point. So that would have been 1988 is when I probably switched to a lab created insulin. Yeah, I was gonna
Scott Benner 18:39
say like mid mid 80s was probably well, more than a decade likely. And then you were just using cloudy and like, regular and mph. Right. Right. Yeah. And then you probably did that for another decade.
Barbara Westberg 18:54
Oh, yeah. Okay. And then they said they suggested multiple daily injections. And I said, No, I'm not doing that. It's not how I believe this far. I'm fine. There's no way. Oh, the one thing you should know about me is I am a diabetic who has a wild fear of needles and blood. And so the thought of me injecting insulin into myself twice a day, it didn't matter. You could not talk me into that. Until I was responsible for another life that was growing inside me and knew it was time to take responsibility and, and do the things that they were telling me to do.
Scott Benner 19:40
I'm trying to paint a picture between I mean, the the tight management that we use now, versus I'm just going to inject some of this. I mean, you're probably only doing it once a day at some points, right. Maybe twice. Yes. Yeah. So you know, and you're so like, I don't know, though, like do you think if we went got I found 100 people who were diagnosed the year you were that we wouldn't be hearing like, all these great health outcomes, like Could it be that you're just randomly lucky.
Barbara Westberg 20:11
Um, I actually have a network of diabetics that I talked to, and many of the marmite age or older. And it's really interesting. There are a lot of us who are doing very well, considering what we've put ourselves through. So, I wonder course, I'm not a research scientist, but I wonder if it's kind of like when you quit smoking, you can undo some of the damage that you were doing, and recover in some ways. I mean, it's, I don't know, miraculous, it's absolutely miraculous. I should not be alive. really shouldn't
Scott Benner 20:57
talk to me, tell me something that happened in your life that makes you feel like that should have got me that day.
Barbara Westberg 21:07
That should have got me that day. I was in Las Vegas. So a lot, a lot of walking a lot of food I was unfamiliar with sitting at a table and I felt a little woozy and I walked away and tested my blood sugar. And it was 33. And if you've ever been in a casino in Las Vegas, there's nothing close by you. You're surrounded by gambling options. But the idea of me then trekking back to my room, because for some reason, I didn't have candy on me. Yes, I should not have lived through that. Being 33 My blood sugar 33 in Las Vegas. I don't know how it was upright.
Scott Benner 21:59
Yeah, ironically, you had a big bag of rice in your purse. So you actually felt poorly tested your blood sugar and then went and then trekked back to another building to help yourself.
Barbara Westberg 22:16
Yes, yeah. Yes, you know, your mind is is thinking so clearly at that point.
Scott Benner 22:23
You're only focused and not paying attention like to big picture stuff because you can't because you're so low and you're just thinking like get to candy, get the sugar get the food do that.
Barbara Westberg 22:32
Right and somehow passing you know,
Scott Benner 22:35
every restaurant and bar on the way to
Barbara Westberg 22:39
places that have things like juice and yeah,
Scott Benner 22:43
wow, that's crazy. Also, I can't believe I skipped over this but I'm sorry your mom took you from the doctor to the hospital when you were diagnosed and you died in the hospital
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Barbara Westberg 25:31
died in the emergency room.
Scott Benner 25:32
How does that happen?
Barbara Westberg 25:34
I don't know exactly. I, I was so far gone like someone else would have been diagnosed much, much earlier than I. But her medical training taught her there was no way I was a diabetic so they weren't looking for it. So there was nothing wrong with me. You know, they couldn't find anything wrong with me. And I'm tired all the time I started wetting the bed again. I was ravenously hungry, but was losing weight. I was skin and bones. And
Scott Benner 26:12
but just based on the belief that if if you're, if you have diabetes, then your mom has it. That's basically how they thought, right? And since your mom didn't have it, then you couldn't have it. And that was it.
Barbara Westberg 26:24
Or at least someone in the family. My mom was one of nine, one of them. Clearly would have had to have been a diabetic. You don't have OGS like that, or my grandmother was one of 13 Somebody so that was should have had diabetes. That was
Scott Benner 26:39
the conventional thinking back then. Yes. How about that? I wonder Do you know if any of those people had other autoimmune issues?
Barbara Westberg 26:46
Oh, yes, definitely. There's a lot of paper in hypothyroidism and
Scott Benner 26:55
self anatomy celiac. With even thought of it that way back then, or was it just like grandma runs to the bathroom after dinner? Like, you know what I mean? Like, I wonder if they even paid attention to celiac in the 70s? Good question. Isn't it? Wonderful? I mean, I'm looking at this photo, I pulled up of gas lines, and all I'm telling you is that cars are way better now than they used to be. Some of them were so big and like, just unruly, just really large. You see, there's a Cadillac here that looks like a small boat. Anyway, yeah, that's just very interesting to me that, I wonder. I wonder if that was, like prevailing wisdom medically, or if it was just like, a thing that people thought it's a I mean, because you hear it all the time, like, oh, it runs in families. I'm like, Yeah, can eat you know, doesn't mean it has to, but they were willing to kill you over that belief, basically, you know,
Barbara Westberg 27:56
I have a medical book that my my in laws are moving. So they're downsizing. What they have, and this book is from, I think it was maybe the 60s, like one of those home diagnosis things before WebMD even existed. So you can look up, you know, hives or whatever. Yeah. So first thing I do is look up diabetes. clearly states, it runs in families. It was it was being trained that way. That's what they thought
Scott Benner 28:33
that makes sense. So you just you were in DK like significantly. Yes. Yeah. Gotcha. But do you remember? Does anybody ever talk about uh, how long were you in the hospital before you left?
Barbara Westberg 28:45
I think it was five days. My mother's passed away. So there's really no nobody has a clear focus on you know, what she went through and, and what she did to get me home, so. But yes, then arriving home, even though they had set the expectation that I would have injections. I was not having that. I'm not in the hospital. I'm at home home is not where you get shots. Absolutely not. This poor woman battled me. It. It had to be a year or two that she would have to chase me around. I refuse to give myself injections. And finally, on my I think it was my 11th birthday. She said here it is. I've, we've trained you, we've given you all the skills that you need. You've practiced you're gonna do it today or you're gonna die. Hi. Because I'm not chasing you around anymore. She had enough stability.
Scott Benner 30:06
She had absolutely had enough like that. Did you do it?
Barbara Westberg 30:12
Of course I did. I'm here to talking to you now. I
Scott Benner 30:15
mean, did you have to fight this you have to fight whether you just did you just kind of capitulate?
Barbara Westberg 30:19
Oh, she just left me there. She left me there at the kitchen table with the insulin and the syringes and walked away. And I have no idea how long I was there. But eventually I gave myself insulin.
Scott Benner 30:34
You know, it's not easy. Not the first time for sure. And you really fought even as a little kid. You're your principal?
Barbara Westberg 30:43
Yes, yes, very much. So this is this is not what happens in your home. This happens in the hospital or the doctor's office,
Scott Benner 30:51
we don't do hospital stuff in the house. And we don't do house stuff in the hospital. And that's the rule dammit.
Barbara Westberg 30:56
Yes. And go ahead and try and make it fun and cool and sciency that I get to take five drops of urine and put it on a little thing in a test tube. I was not having that either. And that, like that was when I decided science is not for me.
Scott Benner 31:16
Your poor mom, I get to see your mom like, Look, honey, it'll be fun. Your she doesn't believe it when she said, By the way, you know, and you're like, Miss not fun, leave me alone. But something else. That's a crazy story. So you say that you really turned to a tighter idea of management, when you were thinking of having a baby or when you found yourself pregnant, which wasn't
Barbara Westberg 31:40
what I found myself pregnant. Like, oh, I am responsible not just for what happens inside of me, but someone is residing inside me, and depending on me entirely. So let's take the crash course and how to be a good diabetic.
Scott Benner 31:57
Did you have to be told that by a doctor? Or was that a realization you had on your own?
Barbara Westberg 32:02
It was a realization I had on my own. So something
Scott Benner 32:04
that you're aware of, but just never allowed yourself to deal with prior to that?
Barbara Westberg 32:10
Um, well, it was. There were no negative outcomes. You know, I was completely horribly mismanaged. My a one C's were horrific. But I got up every day, I did everything I needed to do. I went to school, I graduated with honors, I had a job, I, you know, drove a car, I had a life. It didn't seem like I needed to do these crazy restrictive things. And in my head, actually managing my diabetes was crazy and restrictive. And then as you learn to manage your diabetes, it just opens up more and more freedom, your ability to do more things, go more places, eat whatever I want, where I know, there are some diabetics who still kind of sway away from that. But once you figure it out, it's like, oh, what else can I take on? This is a puzzle. What's next? Will I ever master pizza?
Scott Benner 33:23
This is always my contention. That it is once you understand, you know, once you have the tools, and you, you know, have some concepts, it's far easier to do a good job that it is to not, you know, it gets so much effort. Well, I think it's so much like mental effort of feeling like you're failing all the time and constantly worried about what your agency is going to be or what your blood sugar is right now. I just think it takes more time to do it in a way that's not beneficial than it does to do it in a way that is beneficial. But having said that, if you don't have the tools, if you don't know the steps to take that kind of presents a third prong to the problem. And that one is that you're putting in all this massive amount of effort with no no positive feedback at the end. You're not You're not reaching any any kind of a desired end to what you're doing. So it just feels like you're working, working working really hard, for no reason. But you put so how do you figure it out? Like what year is that that you're that you're pregnant?
Barbara Westberg 34:28
Oh, that was? So my daughter was born in 93. So I was pregnant. 92
Scott Benner 34:37
And what does it look like getting the information you needed? Like where does it come from?
Barbara Westberg 34:43
I'm my endocrinologist, okay, which was an interesting jumping through hoops. I had to be diagnosed as pregnant before. I could, like go to these prenatal visits with my endocrinologist. So learning to manage the health management system, the health insurance system was like, Oh, okay. I know I'm pregnant, but I need to officially be diagnosed as pregnant. So in the interim between me knowing I was pregnant, and me being allowed, or Yeah, being allowed to see a doctor and have it covered, I took a ride in an ambulance because in the first trimester, my insulin sensitivity skyrocketed. So I was giving myself these wild shots. And my body was very sensitive to these large injections that I had been taking to cover what I was used to. And so then, after taking a ride in an ambulance and being hospitalized for a short time, they finally figured out that I am, I was a type one diabetic who was also pregnant.
Scott Benner 36:07
Definitely pregnant. So are you saying that in the beginning of the pregnancy, you were using more insulin? And then at some point, maybe that fluctuation of hormones, like died down for a little bit, and then suddenly the amount you were taking was too much? Was that this? Is that how that went?
Barbara Westberg 36:23
Yes. And I don't know if this is still true, but when I was when I was pregnant, they told me your first trimester, you're going to be sensitive to insulin, your second trimester, pretty average, and then your third trimester, you're going to be wildly resistant to insulin. And turned out to be true in my case, and yeah, it was. So
Scott Benner 36:49
it sucks. But I mean, at least you I mean, you figured it out. Right baby was born well and all that stuff. Yep.
Barbara Westberg 36:57
Short time in the NICU, but then knock on wood has not seen the inside of the hospital since
Scott Benner 37:04
Wow. That's excellent. Good for and that's a shame. How old is that kid now?
Barbara Westberg 37:11
29.
Scott Benner 37:12
Wow. I'm sorry. Made you say that out loud.
Barbara Westberg 37:18
It is kind of shocking.
Scott Benner 37:19
Yeah. No, I know. i You're like an adult. Does she have her own kids? No, not yet. At least that'll keep you from feeling old for a little while. Yeah, that part is my kids. My oldest is 22. And it doesn't strike you yet. I'm thinking the age is going to be like 25. When I say that, I'm gonna think oh, God, like, I need a rocking chair. If he's 25, you know? So okay, so you you got that figured out for the pregnancy? But did it stick with you after the pregnancy? Like, did you like turn a corner, so to speak?
Barbara Westberg 37:56
A little bit multiple daily injections, but my monitoring of my insulin, like doing my blood sugar? I thought, Oh, I only need to do that if I don't feel well. Which is so wildly untrue. Because as you become adjusted to a higher blood sugar, you feel fine. Or? Well, that's an interesting thing to claim. Because I don't know what fine is I haven't been fine. So what fine would what a non diabetic person would feel like, versus what I wake up in the morning and feel like I have no concept if, if they're the same thing, because I haven't lived in a non diabetic body in so many years. But it wasn't something where I was like, oh, yeah, this is diabetes related. If there was something that I'm like, Oh, I feel like I have blood in my veins. And I am struggling getting out of bed in the morning. I would think Oh, is that that you haven't slept a full night since your child was born? Or is that actually your blood sugar's high? And I would test my blood sugar and correct then, but
Scott Benner 39:14
you had to feel almost crippled to pay attention to your blood sugar.
Barbara Westberg 39:17
Yes, yeah. And, and then I met a diabetic mentor. That that was the turning point.
Scott Benner 39:26
How does that happen? Um,
Barbara Westberg 39:28
she was a co worker. And she took me by the hand and said, What are you doing? I used to, we went to lunch, and she knew I was type one. We had bonded on that. And I got up to go hide in the bathroom and test my blood sugar and give myself an injection. And she said, whoa, whoa, whoa, wait a minute. What are you doing? And I had the first like, honest interaction in a restaurant with another diabetic, where she said Look, if the waitress has a problem with needles, that's her problem. My problem is, I'm a type one diabetic, and I need to eat lunch, I need to test my blood sugar and give myself an injection. And I have no apologies. And my hair blew back and rainbows and birds were singing. And this was the exact person I needed to walk into my life to show me that the, the hiding. So when I was diagnosed, one of the things I was coached on, was keeping this hidden. It's a secret, you could be discriminated against, you could like in a job interview, you would never reveal this because clearly they're not going to hire you. You keep this hidden. Whatever you do, don't tell people is how I was raised. And then I meet this person who is completely open. Yeah. And that's what shifted. Do you think 100% was shifted?
Scott Benner 41:06
Do you think I'm not? I'm not apologizing for this. But I'm trying to find out if you think was that accurate, though? I mean, as far as getting a job and not being discriminated against? Was it smart to to hide it in that regard? Or do you think it was a, it was a like a monster that didn't really exist? Something people said,
Barbara Westberg 41:26
um, I'm not clear. But I do know that the job that I have today, during my interview, we talked about it and my boss's daughter is also has type one of the job then. Yes. So having, having the openness, I think brings you what you need. If you're if you're not open about what you need, and where you are in your life. You know, people talk about you show up at an interview pretending to be something you're not. And then you you think you have this horrible job? Well, they hired somebody you weren't. If you're not authentically you at your interview, they're hiring somebody that wasn't right for the job, correct? Yeah. So now I'm authentically me, to the point where I have a diabetes tattoo on my wrist that, you know, it's, it's out there. Yeah, I do not hide it.
Scott Benner 42:31
I want to be clear, I don't think hiding is a good idea. And I would Moreover, say that if you can't get a job because you have diabetes, and that's not a job you want to begin with, just like I would say, you know, if you are dating a person who doesn't want to be with you, because you have type one, and that's not the right person to be with either. I was just wondering if like contextually at that time in the world, if it was a if it was a legitimate concern that you could you know what I mean? Probably, I mean, it probably was, I'm being
Barbara Westberg 43:00
honest with the Americans with Disabilities Act come into play. Oh, no.
Scott Benner 43:04
But window, When did people start paying attention to it and believing that they could be, you know, pressured over it? You know what I mean, like that, just, let's see Americans. Disabilities Act of 1990. I think it's called the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990, or the ADEA is a civil rights law that prohibits discrimination based on disability is July 26 1990. It was a factor.
Barbara Westberg 43:30
Oh, and there you have another thing, like, the, you know, my, my parents tried to empower me and say things like, you're not disabled.
Scott Benner 43:42
We call it the Americans with Disabilities Act. And you're like, I'm not but by by the way, if you watch online, that's a that's a sensitive argument. You know, am I disabled if I have diabetes? I think the most reasonable answer I've ever heard is, listen, there are rules and laws that protect you, if you have diabetes, just because they use the word disabled doesn't mean you need to think of yourself as disabled, but you should take advantage of the opportunities and protection if you need it. Exactly. Yeah. But I do get that not wanting to, there's no way my daughter thinks of herself as disabled. And at the same time, she obviously is, you don't I mean, like she takes insulin, if she has too much of it. She gets low. If she gets too low. She can't take care of herself. I mean, that's a mean letter of the law. That's, that's a disability. Do you agree? Yes. Yeah. Right. But so I think it's two different thoughts. I think it's a I think it's a legal distinction. Or, and it's a but it's also a way that people think of themselves I think you can I think you can agree with the legal distinction without thinking of yourself as disabled. That that's my thought, but I don't I you know, I don't have diabetes. So I'm not the right one to, to think that one through I don't think. Yeah.
Barbara Westberg 45:05
And I never went to school and had a meeting. And it just,
Scott Benner 45:15
you didn't have a 504 plan?
Barbara Westberg 45:17
504 plan? Yes. Never had one of those. No, not once.
Scott Benner 45:22
So. So if if you were a child, and you ran into something that was made more difficult by diabetes than what did you do if you weren't able to just raise your hand and go, Oh, I don't know if you remember. But I have a document that says, you need to give me 30 more minutes to take this test. Like, how was it handled before things like that existed?
Barbara Westberg 45:40
I either raised my hand and said, I need to go to the nurse. And if my blood sugar was low, we had juice boxes there. Or I didn't, there. There was, you know, just personally needing to go to the nurse for low blood sugar was the same as somebody else needing to go to the nurse because they had a stomach bug and or a fever.
Scott Benner 46:09
Yeah, so an illness you had in their mind? You had an illness? And that was that? Yep. Yeah. Listen, I know, there's a lot of things, right pressure makes diamonds, stuff like that. There's an argument to be made, that the world is not fair. And you have to learn how to live in it. And there's an argument to be made that you you shouldn't be able to just, you know, discriminate against people because they have issues that other people don't have. I mean, I I agree with the whole spectrum of that conversation. To be perfectly honest. I don't think there has to be a I don't think you have to pick a side on that one, I guess, is what I'm saying. Yeah, cool. So all right. So wait, and so your your job out of your event planners, you did event planning, right when you were first, like in college with that, that internship, and then everything like that, and then you've moved it towards, like charitable, that do you still work in the in the not for profit space,
Barbara Westberg 47:14
not any longer. But while I was getting my degree, I had to write a paper about an event. And the event that I was paired up with, was an outdoor music festival. And as a student, you know, I've got my all my thought process in line of what I'm going to do and say and write the paper. And I show up at this outdoor music festival. And I love music. And I was just so thrilled to be there. So happy when it started to rain. And then it started to rain more. And this outdoor music festival was canceled. And I learned more about planning and outdoor event based on this poor organization who had like their whole business on the line to pull this off. And so at the end of it, I volunteered to go back to the office and help them answer the phones as they're trying to figure out what they're going to do with this festival that is literally falling apart with every additional raindrop. And like this is a great learning experience. I'm more than happy to answer the phones. And I wrote the paper. And after I wrote it, I thought, hey, I should send it to them with a thank you note. And I sent them the paper and didn't hear from them didn't hear anything. And then another event came up that was in conflict with a annual event that they were responsible for and they needed more staff. So they called me up and I thought this is great. I'm patting my resume when I get out of school. I'm gonna have all of this to put on my resume. And they had me sit down and fill out tax paperwork because they were paying me. I'm sorry, you're paying me. I was gonna volunteer. So I became what was affectionately referred to as a weekend warrior when they had they had events, they, you know, they had a small core staff of people that worked in the office planning these festivals, and then they would bring the weekend warriors to, you know, round out the staff during major outdoor music festivals. So I've worked the festival Block Party. I've worked a now defunct music festival called the Tempe Music Festival. I've worked OCC Orange County Choppers, they did a festival in the Tempe area of Arizona. I was the very first female quadrant manager for the Rock and Roll Marathon series where I was responsible for an entire section of the marathon. Managing the stages and sound and lighting and all of that. And this came out of me needing to write a paper. And in addition to that, I was working for a nonprofit organization. Ooh, sorry, if you can hear the dog in the bathroom.
Scott Benner 50:38
Say, are you being attacked?
Barbara Westberg 50:40
Yeah. So
Scott Benner 50:43
dogs like ladies in the closet with with a ladder, something must be wrong. You're fine.
Barbara Westberg 50:50
So I'll try and talk over. So my day job was raising money for a nonprofit organization through events. So I've planned marathon training programs and let me see if I can actually convince her that we're not under attack. Yeah, okay. Sorry about that. No, you're fine. Dogs are gonna dog.
Scott Benner 51:25
Yeah. I mean, it's our fault. We put you in a closet. So there's no way she's not like, this isn't what happens usually. boss thinks something's going on. Where she's got to take a poo. And she's just like, lady, listen, I'm gonna do it on the floor. If you don't come talk.
Barbara Westberg 51:42
Unfortunately, our landscapers are here. So we are in full dog emergency mode, yo,
Scott Benner 51:48
oh, my god. Gutter Cleaning at my house. My dogs just run from window to window barking the entire time the gutters are being cleaned. They won't stop. They just I don't know something about the water splashing around in those little tin gutters or whatever they're made of it makes them crazy. Anyway, so let me leave. I'm trying to like wrap my head around, like all of what you've done in your life, like so you do end up just moving kind of from org to org? Or do you stay with a place for a very long time? Or are you kind of like a hired gun? How does that all work?
Barbara Westberg 52:25
So I am a independent contractor for these outdoor music festivals. But then I've always had a day job. There were a couple of times where, you know, I had some space between jobs. But I've worked for two nonprofit organizations. And now I, I picked I picked up and moved across country right before the pandemic and found a job that is absolutely fantastic. But I still plan events in this job. It's interesting. I'm a Marketing and Business Development Director for a mortgage company. And I'm planning an event for our clients a client appreciation event. So even those skills that I learned back in my days at ASU and but I was I worked as a contractor for this organization that did these outdoor music festivals. Gosh, probably 15 years. Well, they called me recently they were doing something here in Texas. And it was kind of at the height of the pandemic. So I said no, thank you, but love that they still
Scott Benner 53:56
thought of you. Yeah, you know, I was contacted once by a person who said that they wanted to put on an event where I was the speaker. And they had all these big ideas. And it was I mean, it was a little overwhelming all the stuff that they thought they were going to do. And I kept saying, like, I don't think I can attract that many people to an in person event. And they were like, No, you can you can I was like, I was like, I felt like I was being tucked into something you don't I mean, and I just thought like, I finally I said, Okay, well, you know, if you think we can get enough people together, that it'll pay for itself. You know, I don't want anybody to like I don't want anybody to work for free. I don't want you know, that kind of thing. And then I it became obvious that the person was like, look like this isn't totally out of the kindness of my heart, like I'll plan the event, but this is how much we're charging and I'm taking a piece of it. And I thought even like I was like well, that's fair that they you know, all that is obviously fair. But then the number they came up with was like shocking to me. And the conversation started going like I think people would pay this much and the I said, No, I'm not doing this. I was like, I'm not like you're not taking in my name, you're not taking hundreds of dollars from people to come to a thing. And it was interesting how they, they put it, I'm not saying this is you, I'm just saying, like, it's making me remember this whole like thing. They're like, Well, if we charge this much, and this many people come, here's how much money you're gonna get. I'm like, I don't care. I'm I'm not doing that. So I left the situation disappointed, because I thought the idea was solid. But I was not comfortable with people having to spend so much money to do something like that. Anyway, it's, uh, I think this is, I think this podcast is a much better way of reaching people to be perfectly honest. But, I mean, I would do it, you know, I mean, like, I can see where it would be fun. Like, I'm trying to imagine myself. And there's all these people that have been on the show that could come and speak as well. And I think it would be cool. And I think it would be helpful. And I would love to gather up a bunch of people with diabetes and let them all be in one place and meet each other that I think is that I think would be amazing. But you know, I don't know, it. It seemed like a lot of money to me. So anyway.
Barbara Westberg 56:11
Yes, I definitely the value of being in the community. That was the the difference for me between this is a secret, it's important that you don't tell people you'll be discriminated against. And actually seeing people in the diabetes community, being open about it and being helpful and being you know, it's, it's hard to talk to somebody about how do you manage your diabetes, when you're not saying the word diabetes? And you're pretending you don't have it?
Scott Benner 56:47
Yeah. No, I would love I mean, as you were talking earlier, about, like a music festival, I thought, how cool would it be to just have a, like, a thing where just people with diabetes showed up? And like nobody else? You know what I mean? Like you had, you know, this, this exists? Do I know them? I imagine there's, like, I know, connected in motion does like a camping thing. And I know, places that do stuff like that. But even at that, like, I shouldn't have brought up somebody by name, because now I'm gonna say something that sounds reductive. And I don't mean it that way. But like, I don't mean, like a couple 100 people. I mean, like, I don't know, like something massive, you don't, I mean, in my mind, like, things aren't worth doing until they're like, so many people like even the podcasts, like, if I didn't reach that many people, by now, I'd kind of feel like a failure, I'd be like, I'm not gonna do it. But it's that it reaches so many people that makes it seem it I don't know, it's how it's how the value of the scope of it is part of the value that I think about. Because I know, I mean, you you're a marketer, you know, to like the, the rule of 10s is, is so incredibly real. You have to say something to somebody 10 times before you can get one person to blah, blah, blah, and like, you know, so I always think about, like, if I'm going to help somebody, if I'm going to help somebody live a healthier, happier life, I have to reach this many people to help this many people. And I don't know why that that's how it always strikes me. But no, I know, there are events, and I know people love them, like I do. I'm not and I'm not minimizing any of them. I just like if I do it, I want it to be like, I don't know, I want it to be like a Rolling Stones concert in the 80s. You know?
Barbara Westberg 58:31
Well, the greatest thing about your podcast is that even the offshoots of it, the Facebook page and the comments and things like that, it when I first kind of started tiptoeing into the online existence of diabetes, it was all darkness, and an anger and mismanagement. And there's, it's just so bright and empowering. And then just see other people say, Well, I did this and I did that. And none of it is, you know, nobody's ever showing up to say, this is was the worst day of my life as a diabetic. And you're probably as a newly diagnosed diabetic going to have all these horrible days. It's more of a you can have a great life. And here, here are the practical tips on how it's, you have it a joy around what you're doing and and I appreciate the passion and you're giving of this information to all of us out here who just you know, eat it up.
Scott Benner 59:56
I just like I Well, thank you. First of all, I think All I really do is I apply my attitude to everything. So I, you know, I hope I'm never in a terrible situation like this. But I think if I, if I had a car crash, and I was upside down in the weeds, I'd be joking about it while I was hanging there waiting for somebody to come get me up, I'd be like, Well, I've definitely screwed this up. And I just, I don't know a way to I don't see the value in in. I'm just gonna say what was me. But that seems like I don't mean that. I just mean like, I think what I mean is that good things happen and bad things happen. And I don't change who I am, depending on what's going on around me. So I just keep being me. And then I think that over time, that's, that's kind of permeated the podcast. And then when you collect people together, like as you know, using that Facebook group as an example, suddenly you have 22,000 people there who are all sort of reasonably like minded about attitude, or they see it, and they want to be part of it, they look and they go, You know what I would like to be happy. And I'd like to be able to joke around in a bad situation and not feel the way I feel right now. And in that way, I think it can look like I think this podcast and the community around it can look like hope, and something to kind of strive towards. And I don't know, like as you were talking, I thought, like, what if we could get like 510 1000 people on a fairground, and just get up on a stage and bring people up all day long. And talk to them, you know, just over and over again, just new people, bring them up, let them see each other. Let them be in a place where everyone has diabetes, and it's not weird, and everybody's injecting it dinner. And nobody thinks twice about it. And were like, I think if you could pull enough people together, because what is normalcy? Right, like, normalcy is just the it's the, it's, it's most people doing a similar thing. And so if you brought together 10,000 People with type one diabetes, then type one diabetes is normal. And then you could go back into your own life and not worry about it when you don't see it around you all the time. I do think kind of like virtually that is what this podcast is a little bit too. But I think it's a lot of things. I don't even know that I'm the best person to tell you what this podcast is. Which is kind of odd. That makes sense.
Barbara Westberg 1:02:31
Yeah, yeah. And I love that you've got things categorized so that you can kind of find your way through. Because there's a lot of content out there.
Scott Benner 1:02:42
It got too big. Yeah, I had to do something. It was because my answer just listen to the podcast that started not being so you know, so possible, you know, Episode 250 and 300. And even the other night, I was buttoning up an episode that'll go up soon. And you know, I mean, I start every podcast the same way for years. I'm like, Hello, friends, and welcome to episode and I did that the other night. I said, Hello friends and welcome to episode I tripped over my words. I was like 650 Like, I was like, wow, was there that many? You know, like, it took me by surprise. And and so I you know, thinking about that when people are coming in from the outside? I know they're going to see those numbers and think, Well, I don't know where to start. And so at some point, you know, we had to give them some idea of where to start. And to be perfectly honest, had a lovely woman named Isabel not contacted me once and said, Do you want help with this? Like, I would still be trying to do it on my own. And she's like, you know, these, she's like, these episodes go together. And these go together and these go together. And I was like, This is what I need. I need a woman I need somebody with some organizational skills to to look at it and not only organizational skills, barber but I'm so busy making the podcast. Like I don't even know what it is sometimes. Like there are times when people ask like the other day someone said online Has anyone been on who has Lada? And in my mind I thought yeah, probably like a dozen people. But if under penalty of death, I couldn't have come up with watch episode they were in like I did not I cannot. I'm the worst person to tell you about the podcast. I can make it I just I can't keep track of it. I hope one day that it gets big enough that I can put at least a tiny organization around it because I do think it would help it grow more. If there were some more people facilitating even little things like social media posts or understanding that episode 640 Whatever has, you know, someone in it with LADA? I don't know like that, that may be will never happen, but if you dropped a million dollars on me, I would definitely hire a couple of people. You know what I mean? Oh, yeah. Anyway, I don't know. So this thing helps you when did you find it?
Barbara Westberg 1:04:58
Um, Probably, it was definitely during the pandemic.
Scott Benner 1:05:05
What made you move during the pandemic? Were you moving towards freedom? You said, I heard you here to say, Texas, were you like, I don't want to be locked up or what made you move?
Barbara Westberg 1:05:15
Oh, my husband and I met and married in Dallas, and then move to Phoenix. And that's where I went to school. A little bit. Well, we, when we were in our 20s, the one thing we agreed on was Austin, Texas is the greatest place on earth. And it didn't seem like a practical thing for us to move there. And so we agreed we would retire to Austin one day. And then after my mom passed away, I kind of didn't have my mom around the corner. So it was like, Huh, I'm living here in Phoenix. I have a great life. But what I really want to do is retired Austin, maybe I should just move there and set myself up for success. So that when I retire, I'm already living there. Like, why would you put what you want most in your life on hold until you retire?
Scott Benner 1:06:22
Yeah, I think about that, when I'm saving money for my kids all the time. I always have that feeling in the back of my head, like, my wife and I are really hard workers. And we don't do much with whatever we have we make a pile you don't I mean, we try to keep it Keep it keep it because I think in our hearts we were like, like, even though this feels incredibly, I don't imagine this would happen is what I'm saying. But what if our ends up being like a near dwell? And like, I want to be able to leave like, like finances for to manage her diabetes with. And then once you have that thought you think but I also have another child, like how could I leave money to one kid not to the other kid. And so then my life becomes this like pursuit of making a pile as big as I can to give to my children. And always in the back of your head, you're like, Well, when we retire when we get this done, then we'll do this. And I realized what's going to happen is I'm gonna get so old, it's not going to matter to me anymore. And I'm not going to want to do those things. And then my whole life was me building an anthill to give to somebody else. And so I'm trying really hard to be more like you. And I'm very, very impressed that you did that. How old? Are you when you did that?
Barbara Westberg 1:07:31
Um, I was 49. Yeah,
Scott Benner 1:07:35
good for you. That's excellent.
Barbara Westberg 1:07:38
And then had a complete career change, and then the pandemic hit. And it was like, Oh, wonderful. I'm in the city of my dreams, and not leaving my house. I'm not making any friends. I'm not meeting new people. I'm not going to concerts, and you know, the greatest musical city in America. I'm just sitting at home listening to podcasts.
Scott Benner 1:08:08
Well, at least it's my also, would it have helped you to know while you were listening to my podcast that if I ever go to a live musical event again, the first one I want to go to is Gary Clark, Jr. and I know he he lives in Austin. So that's what made me think to say that to you. That would be the that'd be the that would be my dream. If I if the next time I go to see live music. So
Barbara Westberg 1:08:31
Well, there you go. Now we have the location for your
Scott Benner 1:08:34
I can come right come to it.
Barbara Westberg 1:08:37
And keynote speakers leading up to the Gary Clark Jr. Musical chairs on top of the days of education. So you're
Scott Benner 1:08:49
saying that because you've made these things before, and you're like, we could probably make that happen? And I'm thinking like it never happened. I do. I do think though. Like, I wouldn't do it in a in a classic way. Like if I had an event like that. I don't know that I wouldn't just keep bringing people up on stage and just keep talking. Like, there's a part of me that realizes that some of the best episodes that Jenny and I make are when Jenny and I just start philosophizing about diabetes. And even when we're not talking about something specific when we just sort of like, it's almost like, it's not really like, it's not flight of fancy but it's, you know, you start a conversation, you see where it goes, you don't worry so much about what the perceived topic of it is, but almost like what ideas can we mind from this conversation? Like new ways can we think of to do things or examples that might click in people's heads? Like, I don't know, like, in my mind, it would be like, I don't know, like a like a live Oprah Winfrey, except I'd be Oprah. And then and I wouldn't give you anything. And then people would just keep talking and talking and enjoying it. So musical breaks would be nice. But I don't know, I think that I guess that's actually what I'm doing with the podcast, if I'm being perfectly honest, it's just bringing people out having conversations, I got pitch somebody the other day, and I was like, I don't want to do this. Like, I don't want this person who's been in the diabetes space for so long that everything they say, sounds rehearsed, and they know what they think. And you try to like, you try to go down another pathway and have a different conversation, and they won't go with you because they're worried of who they're going to offend. Or I would just rather rather talk to you, and, you know, other people who have diabetes. To me, that makes more sense.
Barbara Westberg 1:10:41
It's, it's fun, it's fun to hear real live people who might be your neighbor. It's great to have people who are trained, as well as people who are actually living it. For me, one of the things that I, when I learned about the podcast, I was like, oh, it's not for me, I don't have a kid with diabetes. And then I, I thought to myself, do you have any idea how ridiculous that sounds? Course it's for you. So and honestly, I, I can't even imagine what it might be like for a parent of a newly diagnosed diabetic child. You know, when I was diagnosed, there wasn't much they could do. So you know, you got sent home with a couple of guidelines. And now you actually have choices and options and the pressure to research and find the right thing for that.
Scott Benner 1:11:46
It could be Yeah, yeah.
Barbara Westberg 1:11:51
I mean, even if your warranty is up on your insulin pump, and you're like, oh, do I just go with what I know, do I stick with that brand? Do I try something new? You could go down a rabbit hole for days before pulling a trigger, and then still not being completely sure that you made the right choice, right?
Scott Benner 1:12:11
No, I agree. It's, it's a wealth of possibilities. But if you don't have somebody to like, stand in front of you go, Look, here's this one. And here's this one. Here's the differences. You know, which makes more sense to you? What do you care about more? Okay, great. Well, then try this. And now the companies are finally doing like, like, they're doing free trials, which I don't know why they couldn't do that in the past. But I think that was more of a insurance thing. Or I'm not even sure like, how it's gotten better. But I know, Dexcom and Omnipod are both offering free trials now. Which I think is amazing. Because I would like the comfort of trying it and saying it's not for me, you know, not the feeling of like, I have to decide and then whether I like it or not. This is my insulin pump forever. You know, like, that's not fair. It just
Barbara Westberg 1:13:03
unless you have a million dollars and can just say, Oh, not for me right now go buy this other one completely out of pocket. Oh,
Scott Benner 1:13:11
whimsical, like, Oh, whatever. Yeah, I mean, most people can't do that. Even if they could, they shouldn't have to, you know, it's uh, but it's interesting, the way you put that, like, when you were when you were diagnosed, there was one option. It was this, do this pee on that. That's diabetes. At least there was nothing to worry about. You knew you were doing the only thing that existed. Right. Right. Right. Wow. I know that you came on because you have an interesting career. But and we didn't talk about it at all. But I don't you listen to bias, you know, I didn't care. Although I did recently, based off of that call for people with interesting careers, did a really cool episode that nobody's heard yet with a truck driver, which I thought was neat. A woman who was a backup singer for some pretty great bands years ago. And a stripper. So it was smart to ask for people with different jobs. But I found your conversation interesting for a completely different reason. I appreciate you doing this. Is there anything that you wanted to say that we haven't talked about that? I haven't gotten to?
Barbara Westberg 1:14:20
Um, well, we definitely didn't talk about my career at all. But again, it's been so great talking with you. I don't even care.
Scott Benner 1:14:32
I'm glad. Yeah, just I appreciate I want to make sure we didn't like leave anything out diabetes wise that that you wanted to bring up? I didn't even ask you a lot of things. I normally ask people about your kids. And if there's you know, did you end up being autoimmune with your children? No, no.
Barbara Westberg 1:14:53
I am. I am the lonely diabetic and in my family Like, I used to joke that everybody else had to wear glasses. I got diabetes, but now
Scott Benner 1:15:08
I have to go pick up my new reading glasses this afternoon, which by the way, I thought I last went and bought new ones and then found which
Barbara Westberg 1:15:18
which, oh, sorry, totally, I completely spaced that my sister had gestational diabetes. Okay. And she. She said, I don't know how you do this. Like, she knew there was going to be an endpoint to her diabetes? Yes. Like, I don't know how you put up
Scott Benner 1:15:38
with this. That's the alternative. That's a problem. Right? So
Barbara Westberg 1:15:42
yeah, well, there you go. Yeah. So I would rather deal with this and deal with it. Well, then to deal with the alternative, right.
Scott Benner 1:15:51
Okay. Hey, do you think that based on the years of how you grew up in knowing now how technology and insulin has changed everything like that? If you woke up one day to a complication? Would you be gobsmacked by it? Or do you think you'd be like, Oh, well, that makes sense.
Barbara Westberg 1:16:07
Um, you know, it's kind of like cancer, it doesn't matter if you've got family history or not, it would be shocking. Yes, yeah. So, um, am I aware that there are things like I, I'm always on top of my screenings, you know, even even my cancer screenings? You know, I'm on top of that. And I don't think anybody's ever prepared for a diagnosis. But it's, it's so common, that, that if you get out of this without some sort of diagnosis in your lifetime, that would be more shocking than, Oh, you you've survived this, or you survived that, are you treat this or you treat that? I don't want to add anything else to my list of diagnoses. But I feel as empowered as the next person in being able to handle it. And it might actually scare my health care providers, more than me to have diabetes as a complication that goes along with Does that make sense? Yeah, they
Scott Benner 1:17:33
even you, you're looking to them, like you're the, the the exception to the rule, right? Like it's just because it's going so incredibly well for you, honestly.
Barbara Westberg 1:17:46
One of my biggest fears was I would get COVID and be on event and nobody would know. What the heck to do to manage my diabetes.
Scott Benner 1:17:59
Yeah. Oh, wow. Yeah, and it definitely wouldn't go well. It really wouldn't. IT management and hospitals is is not not stellar. They're more worried about your emergent problems than the the diabetes takes a backseat for reasons that I don't completely understand. And yeah, and then you could feel incapacitated that that really did run through your head, huh.
Barbara Westberg 1:18:21
Oh, I was absolutely terrified. Terrified. I did not leave my house for a very long time. And my husband is a health care provider. So when he got home from work he would strip in the garage, walk through the garage door into the guest bathroom and shower and I would go nowhere near that bathroom and nowhere near his clothes.
Scott Benner 1:18:53
Barbie married a long time it's easier to get a guy naked than that. You know you don't
Barbara Westberg 1:19:01
Yeah, I have been married a long time.
Scott Benner 1:19:03
You didn't have to trick him you would he would have done it if he just asked. Actually, you know some guys that just do it if you don't ask so. But yeah, you were that worried about it? That's I makes 100% sense to me. I really I'm assuming you're double and triple Vax, you got your booster, got a booster and all that stuff?
Barbara Westberg 1:19:26
I absolutely did. I drove two hours to get my first vaccine. Wow. Because prayer weren't anything available in the area that I was in. So I was committed to that. And I'm just now coming out from under my rock crawling out from under it and going places and visiting family and and hugging people and seeing concerts and also being you know, cautious but no longer hyper cautious.
Scott Benner 1:19:59
I'm starting to feel a little better.
Barbara Westberg 1:20:03
Yeah, a lot better Good.
Scott Benner 1:20:04
I'm glad I just got back from Florida, I went to a baseball event where I was around a lot of people outside, we rented a house with some people. And I mean, not that my anecdotal like story is evidence, but I got on a plane. I went through an airport, I stayed in a house with 20 people, I watched a bunch of boys play baseball, you know, on a giant field where, if I'm, if I'm counting, right, there were six baseball fields. So there were people watching on all those fields, you know, etc. Back on another plane. Nobody got sick. So I, I'm hoping that things keep trending in that direction. But it would be really nice, because I don't want you or anybody else trapped in their house. Especially as you're trying to build, you're like this is it? Right? You're trying to build up a little bit? And then and then get yourself nice and retired and enjoy Austin and, you know, do your thing. So yeah, well, we should all knock on wood that this doesn't go back to the other way. Because if they they locked me in here, one more time, I'm gonna, I'm gonna be like, I lose my mind. I'm just starting to get like a rhythm to my life back again. You know what I mean? Like, it got so weird. We're just 24 hours, turned it into another 24 hours didn't even matter what day it was anymore. And something about that was not good. For certain. I'm starting to feel like, this is the weekend. These are the weak days. You know, these hours are when I work these hours. And when I don't like I'm finally getting that that kind of delineation back again. And I think it's really necessary. So anyway,
Barbara Westberg 1:21:46
I turned 50 during the pandemic, and you know, hit I'll always invent envisioned a big trip. And I joke with my husband that for every month, passed my 50th birthday, the trip is just getting more and more grounded. Honestly, yeah.
Scott Benner 1:22:08
He better be You better be saving money off, right? You're gonna go get go hop and across Europe and do something really amazing. All right. Well, I really appreciate you doing this. And taking the time, I had a wonderful time speaking with you. And I can't thank you enough for for telling me Elvis and sharing these things with me.
Barbara Westberg 1:22:26
Oh, thank you. I appreciate what you do. Big fan?
Scott Benner 1:22:31
Oh, are you? Does that actually feel like that? Like that I'm a fan know that you just don't like I am weirded out that we're just not two people talking that you see me as like something other than just like a guy.
Barbara Westberg 1:22:47
Oh, like I've elevated you to celebrity status,
Scott Benner 1:22:50
or you shouldn't do that is what I'm saying? You most assuredly should not do that. The rest of my day, you would not want to be involved in is very boring. So yeah, I'm
Barbara Westberg 1:23:02
just trying to get you to hire me to do this big juicebox event.
Scott Benner 1:23:07
Alright, if there was money? If there was money, I think I would I really do. I, I I'm so stuck between the idea that you can't make something grand without money, that I don't have the money to make something grand and that I would have to charge people to do it. Like there's I'm stuck in that space. I don't know how to push myself beyond that. But maybe one day, I'll figure it out. I don't know.
Barbara Westberg 1:23:32
And now that you've put this out there, I'm sure the answer will come back to
Scott Benner 1:23:39
you. It's possible. I've never said it out loud on here before I don't think. So. There were people sending me plans and breakdowns of how it would go. And I was like, ah, seems like a lot. I'm more comfortable just like, you know, jumping on Zoom and talking to a few 100 people and being done. But you know what I'm saying though, like you I mean, if you've been involved in these things, they start saying like, imagine if 1000 people came and they all paid $300 Like, that's how they start. And you're like, oh, that sounds like $300,000 You know, and you think like, well, that would pay for the event. I could pay speakers and people could make money and you know that that would be good. But then all in the back of my head all it feels like is taken $300 from somebody to tell them to Pre-Bolus and let them have a conversation with other people with diabetes. And that seems wrong to me. So, I don't know. We'll figure it out one day or not. Who knows? The podcast gets big enough. It won't even matter. Just keep doing it like that. Well thank you very much. I appreciate it.
A huge thank you to one of today's sponsors, G voc glucagon, find out more about Chivo Capo pen at G voc glucagon.com. Ford slash juice box. You spell that g v o KEGLUC AG o n.com forward slash juicebox. Don't forget to get yourself a Contour Next One blood glucose meter at contour next one.com forward slash juice box. And of course touched by type one.org is where you'll get those tickets to the upcoming dancing for diabetes show held in Orlando. Beautiful facility, head over and take a look
thank you so much for listening. I'll be back very soon with another episode of The Juicebox Podcast. If you're not listening in a podcast app, or an audio app like Spotify, Apple podcasts or Amazon music, you should head over to one of those apps right your phone and check it out. It's a great way to listen to a podcast, find the show Juicebox Podcast label and diabetes. Just hit subscribe or follow depending on which app you're in.
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