#604 Is Kate Winslet Right?

Linda is the mother of a child with 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 604 of the Juicebox Podcast.

This one's fun. Linda is the mom of a child with type one diabetes. And she lives like almost exactly where I grew up. And we figured that out very quickly the beginning of the episode. It follows suit. I'd love to tell you what else we talked about. But I edited this program many weeks ago and I no longer remember. That's as honest as I can be. 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 health care plan, or becoming bold with insulin. If you're new to the podcast, you should check out the Facebook page Juicebox Podcast type one diabetes, it is private and has over 18,000 people in it just like you are all talking about taking care of type one. If you're looking for the diabetes pro tip episodes or the defining diabetes series, they can be found at Juicebox Podcast comm quorate. Di just forgot what the link Oh, I got it. Boy or a diabetes pro tip.com. It's been a long year, I made a lot of podcasts. This episode of The Juicebox Podcast isn't sponsored by anybody. I made more podcasts than I had ads for. That's okay, though. I do want to take a moment to thank the advertisers. And seriously for you to understand that the podcast just doesn't exist without the advertisers. I know, I'm not kidding. This is the end of December, it's between Christmas and New Year most people have offered at the very least they're not doing stuff like I'm doing right now. I keep putting out the podcast for you because that's what I do. And that's what I do. Because I can afford to do that because I have advertisers. And because you guys support them, you know, you support the show. You listen, you share it. That's why advertisers are interested. That's why I'm sitting here today. And every advertiser we had from 2021 is coming back for 2022. I think we're adding one more. And that's a testament to many things. But a large part of it is due to you and your support. And I really appreciate it because I just I couldn't make the podcast. I mean, I'm just being honest, I'm an adult, I can't make this podcast if I don't make money while I do it. So thank you very much for listening and sharing it with other people and supporting the sponsors. You know, you need an omni pod, you get an omni pod from my link, it's a big deal for me. Same with Dexcom contour, G vote, voc touch by type one, if you support the T one D exchange by taking their survey trial to try this out this year a little bit. Maybe there'll be back next year. Everything I mean, it's just it's common sense. But when you support those things, it allows the podcast to go on. So there are links in your show notes and links at Juicebox Podcast comm to all the sponsors, and if you should need them, I really appreciate it if you use my link.

Linda 3:31
Hi, my name is Linda. And I have a son Dylan, who's six. He was diagnosed almost a year ago now. And we live in Pennsylvania.

Scott Benner 3:41
I was born in Pennsylvania.

Linda 3:44
I live outside of Philadelphia.

Scott Benner 3:49
Alright, hold on a second. Linda will bleep this part out. I'm sorry. No, no, that's not over. No, no, no, no, don't we're not starting over. What do you think this podcast is some like well, like, like edited thing. I'll just think I'm gonna ask you a question. Then I'm gonna bleep out your answer my answer. Okay. Where do you live outside of Philly? I live in. Okay, I grew up in

Linda 4:13
oh my gosh, what a small world. I can throw a stone they're

Scott Benner 4:17
saying you started saying outside of Philly. And I was like, only people in the Northeast say that is like outside the Northeast. Like nobody says they live outside of Philly. If they live out, you know, on another side of the city. It's that it's very, it's a specific colloquialism to.

Linda 4:34
And I'm not originally from here, so I think I picked it up just by being here.

Scott Benner 4:37
Yeah, I have to bleep all that out. But no, don't be Stop saying you're sorry. So I don't sound weird to you do I

Linda 4:45
know not at all.

Scott Benner 4:47
For the rest of you. Suck it. That's amazing. Finally, somebody thinks I sound normal. Excellent. We're gonna have to say water. Oprah Winfrey, and all kinds of things while we're talking so we can hear our accent. better.

Linda 5:00
I see now that's funny. I don't have this accent. I'm from Boston. So I parked my car and I go to the bar and order a beer.

Scott Benner 5:07
Well, fine. We'll just just try really hard for me not to say water. Then while this is happening, my kids are like, it's water. I'm like, I don't think it is.

Linda 5:18
Let's see, when I go back home to Boston, they say I have a Philly accent. But when I'm in Philly every once in a while, they say you've got to Boston. So I don't know what my accent is for Goodman anymore.

Scott Benner 5:27
Anyway. So you were just asking me a second ago? You said the use the term the podcast is blowing up? Yes. And it's funny because it is. And yet I don't think of it that way. Because I've been working so hard on it for so long, like to me, I can see the slow progression of getting to this spot. But when it starts doubling on itself, then I can see where from the outside like, look, it's blowing. It is like I'm not arguing with Thank you. Let me start with that. I'm not arguing with the sentiment. It's just that I see it from, in my mind as an idea in 2014. And I see the first month, getting as many downloads as we going to say that the show is going to get the next hour and a half. Wow, you don't I mean, amazing. Yeah.

Linda 6:19
Well, you're doing great things. And I found you a little bit late. I didn't find you till a couple months into diagnosis.

Scott Benner 6:25
Okay. Well, that's, I mean, that's not I have to say something. So to give you some perspective, that's really early. And I'd be if the podcast is helpful for you, I'd be really grateful about that. Because a couple months in is still enough time. You're not cemented and any of the ideas that anybody's given you. You haven't been, you know, suffering for years or anything like that. So I think for you and your timeline, this is it's great timing. I mean, if it worked out unless you're on the show to tell me how much it sucks. And then No, it's

Linda 6:57
it's been, I found that it just the right time. We were four months in. I mean, I wish I had found it earlier. But we had just the first three months, no one really talked about Pre-Bolus thing.

Scott Benner 7:09
Yeah, no, it's not something commonly gets brought up. I don't think

Linda 7:13
No, on my three month appointment, they're like so have you started to Pre-Bolus and I was like, what? What's that? No one mentioned it.

Scott Benner 7:20
Were you gonna bring it up? Cuz? Yeah.

Linda 7:24
But I just started it like the week before. And then I you know, I started listening to the podcast and everything. So it's yeah, it came at just the right time for me to I had kind of settled into the diagnosis. I know that sounds weird to say, but, you know, just accepted it and said it started sort of getting on solid ground a little bit thick. And we were starting to know what we were doing. But we were still in honeymoon, obviously. So it was easy. And then we found the podcast as things started to change, and we had to adjust and he was still MDI them.

Scott Benner 7:58
What did not What did unsettled mean? Were you online looking for cures were like, what was what did not feeling accepting look like?

Linda 8:10
Um, I wasn't online looking for cures, I'm a type A. So I just want to I want to get in there, get my hands dirty and figure it all out. But because of the pandemic, so that's kind of why we're talking because he was diagnosed during a pandemic. So there aren't a lot of live resources, like somebody that I could go to and ask or see. I mean, our doctor's appointments after we left the hospital were telehealth. The JDRF wasn't hosting any events. There's a local chapter here, near me, of parents that put something together, they're not hosting live events. So it was really, I was looking for a tribe kind of online and didn't know where to go. So I was kind of unsettled that way. There weren't many resources in person that I could go to or someone that I could speak to. And the two tribers moms that I found that were the most help. I just found online through my local on Facebook, my local town, I just kind of posted about how to get rid of sharps and needles in our town does anyone know? And the other mom of a diabetic in our school happen to reach out to me. So and that was pretty neat because my son was diagnosed August 8, which was about two weeks before he started kindergarten. And we already started to meet at first it was crazy. Two weeks.

Scott Benner 9:39
He started virtual kindergarten. Yes. Got in person diabetes. Yeah. And can I ask did you post about the sharps just to find out about the sharps or were you hoping kind of quietly that someone would be like, like it as diabetes to where I have You, did you have any underlying thoughts? When you said that sent out that message?

Linda 10:04
Absolutely. I was looking for, you know, for some help. And I found it. And then the other time I posted online was, I've got a Cricut machine that people talk about, and the overlay patches, I wanted to see if I could, you know, create his favorite characters on them. So I had posted in a group on Facebook for that. And I found a mom out of Florida, believe it or not, which is not where I'm from. And she connected with me. And she actually told me about children with diabetes, and the friends for life conference, and all that. So

Scott Benner 10:41
you learn as you go, you take a little bits from people, okay, I don't want to get too far away without asking what Cricut machine is?

Linda 10:48
Oh, I'm sorry. So I actually have a silhouette, which is similar to a Cricut. So you cut vinyl, you make decals, and T shirts, and all sorts of customized things. So I was looking to make customized overlay patches.

Scott Benner 11:00
Gotcha. I just You said it like, like you were saying my left hand and I was like, she really knows what that thing is. But I don't understand what it is at all. Hey, yeah, I have to tell you, I'm now calling clock. Now setting up need for me to bleep myself more. But you know, my wife went to art.

Linda 11:23
That's in my backyard.

Scott Benner 11:24
That's literally right by where you live. I have a I have a fantastic story about this school that has nothing to do with my wife. I was dating a girl who went there when I was much younger. And they were going away on some senior like trip. And I was a little older than her. So I was out of high school. And I also did not go to that school. And I drove her to the school to drop her off for the trip. So we drove up, the parking was atrocious, he had to park across the street at this shopping center. Right. And I walked her over and spent I don't know, like 15 or 20 minutes milling around and saying goodbye and stuff like that. And I think with that he's saying goodbye means you kiss. And so we're saying goodbye. And you know, she gets on the bus. And I walk back across the property across the street through a parking lot to get to my car, you know, thinking I wonder what I'm gonna do with my one week of not being like a dating person. And then I get to my car and realize my keys are in her pocketbook. So I am now sprinting down the road, waving my hands at Subway. And the bus finally comes to a stop and I just look her in the face. And I go, you have my keys and the windows are shut and she gets this look of like shocked horror surprise on her face and starts rooting around in her stuff. And then I continue to run to the bus until it stops at another light when she puts the window down and Chuck's the keys out the window at me. Without saying anything to the bus driver. Nobody ever knew what was that I couldn't. I couldn't like overtake. I'm not that quick. I couldn't overtake the bus. You're lucky there's so many lights on. Oh 100% I could just keep up and then like, catch my breath and then keep up again. And then I took what ended up being like a 15 minute like sad walk back to my car. Anyway, she cheated on me eventually. Lovely girl, though, in case she's listening. I'm sorry. So I just don't There's nowhere else for me to ever tell anyone that. Yeah, you're the only one that has context for the space and everything like that. Anyway, that's that's kind of stupid. Well, what were some of the signs? Are we saying your son's name? Yes. What's his name has been stolen. All right, Don, what were some of the signs like how did you? I mean, like, did everybody in your family have type one? And you were just like, oh, it's his turn? Or how did you figure it out?

Linda 14:15
No, nobody at all had type one. So he was just going to the bathroom a lot. And he went to bed which he had never done since he was potty trained. Like he was never one to wear pull ups or anything like that. And yeah, and that was it. And so we caught him pretty early is able to see a diagnosis was 8.3. So I think that's coming up super early. But if you don't mind, I'm gonna go a little bit back because we kind of had it in our minds a little bit from, like 10 months before. So 10 months before diagnosis. He was going to the bathroom a lot. He wasn't drinking a lot, but he was going to the bathroom. And we took him to the doctor thinking he may have an infection or something weird for a boy, but let's take them. And they tested and everything was fine. And the doctor said, sometimes this happens. It only lasts, it can last up to six months, but it might only last a month. Let's just keep an eye on it. So they had this big, long, confusing name for whatever the diagnosis was. Said, Okay. So then the that was in an October the following March, so six months before diagnosis, he woke up one morning and he couldn't walk. And he said, his legs really hurt. And I called out of work, it was March 2, and took him to the doctor. And he had a lot of muscle breakdown in his legs. And she we had ended up going to the hospital to get some blood work done. Because if your muscle breaks down too fast, it can damage your kidneys. So they needed to see if he had kidney damage from whatever was going on. And he didn't. So we took him home and she just called follow up the next few days. And he was kind of shuffling around like an old man by the end of the first day that he went to bed and he couldn't walk again the second day. And it was really scary. And they just said it was a virus and we had to just feed him up to water and He'll get over it.

Scott Benner 16:19
Can I ask you right in that space? Do you? Are you thinking there's something seriously wrong with my kid? Or are you hoping it's just the virus? Like which way does your brain take you?

Linda 16:28
I'm an eternal optimist. I'm just thinking it's a virus. Okay. Um, but I do want to say this is two weeks before the Coronavirus was announced.

Scott Benner 16:37
Oh, oh. Oh, so we should play like old timey Dumb Dumb Dumb music like scary music. So go ahead, keep talking. Sorry. Go ahead.

Linda 16:49
That's okay. Um, so that was it. It just lasted two days. And a week later, they checked his numbers again, to make sure that he didn't have kidney damage from it. And we moved on, and everything was fine and great. We had a great summer. And then August came now because COVID Two weeks later, they were saying kids don't get it. So couldn't have been that right. Um, and but then right before diagnosis, they were saying, Oh, no, it's an inflammatory disease that they're seeing in kids that might get corona. So I start sort of thinking, Oh, well, maybe. So when he did get diagnosed, because he was drinking a lot into the bathroom, you broke the bed once. I asked the doctors I said, hey, could this be? And they said, Oh, no, no, definitely not. But I don't know. I kind of think my mom's intuition. So now there's studies coming out that it might be linked. But back when he had the virus in his legs, we didn't know about Corona. There were no tests for antibodies. And by the time six months later, that I tried to put it together. The antibodies would never wouldn't show up on a test if they took it. Okay, so we will never know.

Scott Benner 17:58
Yeah, so Okay, so the atrophy, I guess, in his legs, with was it accompanied by anything else, there are other symptoms. Nothing, nothing else. Just

Linda 18:11
he just couldn't walk. And I noticed that because I thought he just had a charley horse because he woke up in the morning with it. So I carried him down to the couch. And when he sat on the couch, he had his legs like straight out, like kids wrap their legs underneath them and go in all these crazy positions, because he was five. But he had his legs like straight up in front of them and just looked awkward. Uncomfortable. Something's not right.

Scott Benner 18:38
It's just odd that you went to a hospital twice for something that was serious enough that they were like, Let's make sure his kidneys haven't been damaged. But then head home, like and then was there any instruction and head home

Linda 18:51
water? Just give him lots of water. That's it.

Scott Benner 18:57
That's just water. Catchy, doesn't it?

Linda 19:00
Yeah, well, and I got really nervous the second day, cuz he's gonna shuffle it around at the end of the first day. So I'm like, Okay, well, we're gonna get over this. And then the second day when he woke up, he couldn't walk again. And the doctors got nervous, then maybe take them in for a consult for a second time. Just to kind of look them over.

Scott Benner 19:18
Did you ever come close to you going to chop?

Linda 19:21
No, not until diagnosis in August? Well, no, we went to a different hospital to get the blood work done. Okay.

Scott Benner 19:30
Well, that's really weird. Did you you don't have a diagnosis for the leg thing? No, it's a viral spiral. But do you think he was do you think that diabetes was present at that time?

Linda 19:47
I don't know. I'm trying to figure it out. Because like I said six months before that he had been paying a lot for one month. Yeah. So I don't know if it may be just exacerbated it and brought on The diagnosis maybe sooner, maybe? I don't know.

Scott Benner 20:04
Yeah. I mean, so, listen, we all know that. And if you don't know, welcome to the show that you know, you, if you end up with type one diabetes, you have these genetic markers that, that make it predispose you to having type one at some point. And the more of these markers you have, the more likely it is you're going to get it right. I forget the exact number of them. But I think there's five if you've got three, like you're getting it at some point, it's happening. So how it ends up happening, you know, a lot of people have stories about I got sick, my son got sick. And then this thing happened. Arden had coxsackievirus then she had diabetes, like, you know, and I think the confusing thing is in the terminology, where people will say like, oh, I, I had a, I had Coxsackie. And that causes type one diabetes, it's like, well, it didn't, didn't give you diabetes. It's not like, I don't know how to put it. If you're walking down the street, and you have a coin in your pocket, and someone walks up to you and tells you there's a coin in your pocket. They didn't give you the coin, right? They just made it they made it aware you made you made you aware of it, and so that you can get a virus that will then make your body go, oh, geez, I'm super sick. I'm gonna go attack this virus, I got really confused and attacked my pancreas instead. Like there's something in obviously, I'm not a scientist. And but there's something in that I just always want to be sure that people don't talk about it like a made B happen out of thin air, like a might have put things into motion that caused B to happen. It's an important distinction, but

Linda 21:42
I'm sorry. And I believe that because I'm listening to your podcasts. I found out that it's autoimmune. And my mother and my husband. Both have thyroid issues.

Scott Benner 21:52
These bastards. I knew it was someone's fault, Linda, we figured it out. Yes. What else do your pasty family members? Are they from Ireland? or England or something like that? Yes. Do a podcast where everybody's from Ireland or England at some point in their family life and they have like, autoimmune stuff wrong with them. Ah, it's just it's a good bet. You don't have to be from there, obviously. But it's just

Linda 22:20
my grandmother's from Cook County or county coke. I don't know how that's yeah, Ireland.

Scott Benner 22:25
Well, you live in Boston. So you know, it was hard to put together. But, but any other autoimmune stuff for them? Or is it just thyroid? Just die? Right? Do you know if they have Hashimotos? Or if they have hypothyroidism?

Linda 22:42
Find out. I don't know, my husband would know which one he has. But I think it's Hashimotos. But I'm not sure.

Scott Benner 22:48
And that's the auto immune version of it.

Linda 22:51
Not There you go. You can hear my mom actually had half her thyroid removed.

Scott Benner 22:56
Ah, interesting. Any other kids? Linda?

Linda 23:00
My husband has a daughter, who's 20. And but we have no kids. No other kids together. Gotcha. Gotcha. Gotcha. Gotcha. Gotcha. And they told me she didn't need to get tested. Because it's not the same parents.

Scott Benner 23:13
People don't know. Talking about. If you do try

Linda 23:16
on it. They I asked if we should test her. They said no.

Scott Benner 23:19
Yeah, trial net needs more funding so that they don't have to say stuff like that. I it just doesn't fall in the parameters of how they do it. I would imagine. There's there's an there's other tests you can use that you'd have to pay for. But you know, it's up to her obviously. Does your husband have any brothers or sisters? He has a brother. Does that brother have an autoimmune issue? Endor children?

Linda 23:46
No, no.

Scott Benner 23:47
Oh, interesting. Yeah, like there's a whole lot. Yeah,

Linda 23:50
well, and here's another interesting fact, when we were at CHOP with the diagnosis, they had told us that the last 30 families that had been through chop in August, there was no genetic link.

Scott Benner 24:06
Yeah, but people always say is their diabetes and your history? They don't. They don't ask about did your great grandmother have celiac? Because you know, or something like that, which in my mind is a genetic link, but I hear what you're saying.

Linda 24:18
Now that you say that I had a cousin who had celiac course,

Scott Benner 24:21
it you shouldn't start a podcast about something you'd become like a like a savant. And I think I'd be an idiot savant, an idiot savant. So right before COVID, like strikes and hits, your kid gets diabetes, everything is virtual. Was this your first experience with virtual like doctoring?

Linda 24:41
Yes. And actually, they did a telehealth to diagnose them and then they said no, I need to come in because they wanted to check his sugars. So wanted to telehealth and it turned into no come into the office park in the parking lot milk amount get you

Scott Benner 24:57
right now. They say he has diabetes. What do they do now? Do you live in your car in the parking?

Unknown Speaker 25:04
They sent me down to chop.

Unknown Speaker 25:04
Okay.

Linda 25:06
They said no, it's a job. I could I tell a kind of a funny story.

Scott Benner 25:09
So we go absolutely not with a don't

Linda 25:12
say test his blood sugar and he had a granola bar for breakfast that morning. I'm just gonna say that, okay, because granola bars spiked us like crazy. We know now. So he went in and they took his blood and it was 536. But too bad. But my eyes got super wide. I didn't know what the right number was supposed to be. But I knew it wasn't supposed to be in the five hundreds. And I had promised myself that he was good because he spied during this appointment, knowing that they would probably participant her. I said, well go to the Lego store and we'll get you some Legos. If you're a good boy. Well, the doctor says you need to go right down to children's hospital right away. And I said, okay, and I get in my car. And I'm like, I promise this kid like, I cannot take him to this big Children's Hospital knowing we're going to be there for days. And like not going to miss Legos and not going to miss Blinky. Literally went to the Lego store, grab something real quick came home, grab his blankie before we went to the hospital, so that's my dad mom moment, but

Scott Benner 26:11
it's not law. Everyone has some sort of story like that, where they're just like, Ah, so we waited till tomorrow, you know, like, I mean, it wasn't that it you don't have context like, let me ask you right now, if in that exact same situation, another child was diagnosed, would you go to the Lego store first?

Linda 26:31
I went, but I had the insulin so I can get an insulin first.

Scott Benner 26:34
I guess I I guess I should ask differently. If you had if you knew about diabetes, what you do now? Right?

Linda 26:39
I would not have absolutely not. You just didn't? Absolutely not. That's all I didn't realize how sick he was. Yeah. And they didn't say anything, either. I mean, they told me to go to the hospital. And they told me to go to the Children's Hospital, not the hospital. That's closer. So that was kind of a you know, but I knew we were going to be staying for days. And my husband actually was working. He works weekends, that happened to be weekend. And he was already down in the city. So there was no way that he would be able to come home and pick everything up. Yeah, I kind of felt like we had one shot. And the doctors like a mile from my house too. And so was the Lego store. I mean, it's all sort of on the way and I'm making excuses for

Scott Benner 27:18
why you are it's I think that's the thing where if you retold that story in five years, you would not feel like you had to defend yourself. You don't mean like it's just one of those things he didn't know. So he did what made sense.

Linda 27:31
And he was back in the 300. So I say that like it's nothing. When we got him to the hospital. It was just that granola bar just really spiked him up. But I know he was sick. And he wasn't a dk, I just ketones for God, I think within five hours.

Scott Benner 27:48
Okay, so he's got some function from his pancreas. They'll work and helping them out at that point. Yes,

Linda 27:54
yes. But we knew he was sick, because obviously we want to take him to the doctor. We didn't think he was sick.

Scott Benner 27:58
What was it like at that point going into a major hospital? I mean, Corona was in effect, at that point, know where it was. They just talked, it was Yeah, we were six months into it. Okay, so what was that like being admitted?

Linda 28:14
Scary, because you hear all these stories about people contracting Corona while they're there. And if I know he's already sick, and I was going along, because my husband was working. I mean, he ended up meeting us there within, you know, an hour or two as soon as he could get someone to cover for him. But it was scary going alone. And my son knows about hospitals. He was a preemie. So he's been. He was born three months early. So he's been followed a lot and Benza hospitals kind of throughout his life. And so it was nerve racking. It was like, here we go again. Take just one more thing.

Scott Benner 28:53
So the virus the Coronavirus thing wasn't at the top of your mind, really?

Linda 28:57
Not at that point. It was just, I was afraid that we could get it if he went there.

Scott Benner 29:03
You're afraid for yourself to

Linda 29:06
you know, I didn't even think about that, then. It's it was all about him. It really was.

Scott Benner 29:12
So now do you see I asked you that question. So you can realize you're not a bad mom, are you? How do you like it? Of course you weren't worried about yourself? Right? You would have gone anywhere. Like if they told you that the the only Children's Hospital that helped people with diabetes was the bottom of an active volcano, you would have been like, Okay, let's go. You know, like, it's just kind of, you keep making you get new information, and then you make the best decision you can make, and then you get new information. You just like he was

Linda 29:38
500 Today, man, you know, I can't even imagine he would be would be on our way to the hospital,

Scott Benner 29:44
where you would think you didn't like something would be really out of whack can absolutely be seen.

Linda 29:49
Yes. So we'd be checking ketones and calling ahead and making sure they had a bed ready.

Scott Benner 29:54
How long did they keep them for days? Okay.

Linda 29:59
And I think That was more of our training for the parents training.

Scott Benner 30:04
Yeah, like the third and fourth day, you're like, we should leave this hotel box. Yeah, no breakfast is dry, and there's nothing to do in the afternoon.

Linda 30:17
That's the other thing while we're in the hospital, and they hand you the menu to order his his meals. And they tell me he can eat whatever he wants. Okay, so I know nothing about diabetes, except for everybody always thinks type two. So like, What do you mean, he can eat? And I thought that they were just going to tell me that like, while we were at the hospital while he was in a controlled environment, and I thought when we went home, that he was going to have to stop eating everything.

Scott Benner 30:42
Oh, really? Yeah,

Linda 30:43
I had no idea. Like, I wasn't believing that when they told me he could eat anything he wants. As I'm looking at the menu that has the carb counts. I thought they were just going to maybe easily back it off. And, you know, slowly make a lifestyle change or something.

Scott Benner 30:56
Later, we're gonna take a detour for a second because you just said home. And I just finished watching the mayor of East town on HBO.

Linda 31:04
Did you watch three C three episodes, and

Scott Benner 31:07
I won't ruin anything for you. But what's the Titanic girl's name? This the lead? Oh my god. I mean, Kate Winslet Kate Winslet. So she's obviously not from around here. And someone gave her some diction, lessons for Philly. And as that thing goes on, you'll realize they they seem to work in a couple of the words so that you can hear the Philly accent except it's way off and it to me to my ear. And she's when she says home she just home. Like it's just she's not even from the United States. No, no, she's from the island I believe. So it's it's whom she has him and you just and I was been making fun of it for seven or six episodes of the movies town, but then you just sort of did a little bit. I was like, Oh my God. I was like, was Kate Winslet right. I told you my exits from all over the place. Yeah, you're a little so that makes more sense. Because there's, anyway, it's a depressing series, but it's well done. And, but it's a big issue just like it's him. And I'm like, whom? I don't think we talk like that. But then again, I don't know. I say water. So what the hell you don't even no idea really. Anyway. I'm sorry. It's okay. Okay, so you're super new at this still then? Like a year?

Linda 32:36
Now? 10 months? Yeah. August will be a one year.

Scott Benner 32:40
Do you feel new at it still?

Linda 32:43
I do. I get really nervous because obviously he's still in honeymoon. But he's, we've had to double his Basal twice. But because they were so small. When we started to me, I'm like, Oh, my gosh, I'm doubling. But it's still only small increments. And they still say he's in honeymoon. So when I have to mess with Basal and carbery issues. I get nervous,

Scott Benner 33:05
too. Why? Yeah. You sent me pictures. Oh, yeah. I guess is he 60 pounds.

Linda 33:11
You know what? He's a lot when he's 51. Now, he lost a lot of weight after diagnosis, because he's, he's always been a good eater, but he's not snacking as often. And that's his choice. Not ours. Okay, you know, yeah. eating healthier. So he was I think he was 51 pounds a diagnosis but before that he was close to 60.

Scott Benner 33:33
Is he MDI or pump?

Linda 33:36
We got the Omni pod a couple months back. So we are potting are so excited.

Scott Benner 33:41
Oh, cool. And he, but he's not snacking as much. There's before. Do you think it's a decision about diabetes? Do you think he's trying to not intersect with the diabetes decision? What do you think he's just not hungry?

Linda 33:54
He's just not hungry. Because it is, but it's so kids are funny. So he'll ask for non carb snacks. Like he'll ask for a cheese stick sometimes to like, if he's hungry, then he doesn't really want to deal. I think what the diabetes, he'll ask for a cheese stick. Or he knows we know that's a healthier snacks. And we knows we might say no to cookies, but okay, go ahead. Have a cheese stick. Okay.

Scott Benner 34:18
Um, were you limiting and I don't mean limiting in a bad way. But like were you avoiding foods when he was on MDI? Just so you wouldn't have to inject or was that not happening?

Linda 34:28
No, we didn't avoid anything. The everything is I want to say he was getting a little bit. Wait, just to say this for five years. He was getting a little chunky. Okay. The January before diagnosis. So eight months before diagnosis as a family. We changed the snacks he was eating. So we went from goldfish and things like that to we gave him a drawer in the fridge with his name on it. He was all excited and it would have cheesed x would have pudding was the one thing that he could think that he was getting something you know really good, but it would have fruit cups and applesauce and yogurt, the yogurt, go, go go Gurt sticks. So the January before diagnosis, we started giving him healthier snacks to sort of keep him healthy as a kid. And he's a good eater, like I said, so that's another reason why we didn't notice the weight loss before diagnosis because we were like, Oh, this is working great. You know these healthy snacks. You changed it eight months before diagnosis the way he snack.

Scott Benner 35:36
So you just thought you were a genius.

Unknown Speaker 35:38
You're like,

Scott Benner 35:39
I got this thing other people complain about it. But look how easily I handled this. Rescue suckers don't know what you're doing. I put a name on a Georgia kids out of his mind eaten all kinds of stuff that isn't junky anymore. And I when look at me, you're probably getting ready to buy yourself a crown in the scepter walk around town. I was ready. I was ready. Go let the other ladies know how you've conquered having children. I bet you don't feel like that anymore. Oh my gosh. So what what are 10 months in 10 months in how long? Have you had a pump?

Linda 36:21
Oh, gosh. I wrote it down. So I would know too. We got to march 1, so we've had a pump. Three months.

Scott Benner 36:30
Okay. Alright, so and CGM using any kind of CGM Dexcom. Okay. Had you had that before the pump?

Linda 36:37
Yes, we got that. Three months and, and the Omnipod. They said we could have gotten it five months, but it took two months to get it through, you know,

Scott Benner 36:46
all this. You know, the truth is for people listening, Linda, if you get on the phone about every 48 hours with your insurance company, you'll get a lot faster than that.

Linda 36:57
So even know what the issue was, it was a crazy issue. So in order to get it, we needed notes from two different doctor visits. But because we were at the five month mark, we only had one visit with the actual endocrinologist. So they kept saying we need to we do do and that's what saying, we sent you everything. I had to get on the phone eventually. And you know, tear it up for 48 hours and say he's only seen the endo one time.

Scott Benner 37:24
Two things. I don't know why in this day and age. Medical facilities can't figure out communication, but they're terrible at it still and your phone ringer just made me realize how much I unnaturally love a Devil Wears Prada. The Devil Wears Prada. I love that movie.

Unknown Speaker 37:46
I think I've always seen it like once. Oh my God once a year.

Linda 37:53
Now I'm gonna go back and I'm gonna watch

Scott Benner 37:54
it. I don't know why. Honestly, it's maybe it's something to do with Arden watching it or something. But I've seen that movie like a dozen times, I think. And that ring is her. Is her cell phone ring. In the movie.

Linda 38:08
I'm trying to find the connection. I was like, I don't get it. Yeah, no,

Scott Benner 38:10
no, that's what just happened that I was like, oh my god, Miranda. Oh my gosh, I'm this close. I'm holding my fingers about two inches apart. I'm this close from being a lady at this point for being for being a stay at home dad for 20 years. I if I had two ovaries, I could probably make a baby.

Linda 38:32
I'm jealous. I wish I could have ever stayed home.

Scott Benner 38:34
Oh, yeah. It's fantastic. Not working. I mean, being home with your kids is a wonderful thing. I mean, I mean, oddly, both of those things, not having to go to a job every day is wonderful. And I

Linda 38:50
did it for the first couple years. Did you like it? Well, I did it for the first year. And then I went part time for about three years. I did. I loved it.

Scott Benner 38:59
Yeah, I have a, I think I have an understanding of my kids that you can't get from being around them intermittently. So and it's sort of like, this is odd to but maybe not unlike the podcast and having. I mean, I don't even know at this point, you're probably like close to the 600th conversation I've had, right. And just being around other people, and getting to kind of absorb how they feel about things and how they see things and getting to watch them from afar a little bit and have personal conversations with them. You just get a feeling for things that it's not possible another way. And so being with the kids every day and having that same interaction with them, you know, I might know things about them that they don't know and yet the bigger impact is how the way other people see the world changes me. Like that's the that's that's the real value for me. Like I don't think anybody would listen. But everybody should have a podcast, you know, or, or just call people on the phone, I guess you want to record it if you don't want to. But you know, like having those real. And I'm in an interesting situation. Whereas if you were to call a friend on the phone, right, a friend would feel a little guarded. You would feel like contemporaries. Right, you know, and so I'm in a really unique situation right now, where you feel like, on some level, you need to answer my questions, which is, of course not true. You could say no to anything. But you, when people come on, they're very agreeable to having an honest conversation. So then I get to hear more of what they're really thinking and less of what they're willing to tell people, if that makes sense. Yes, yeah. So I mean, you've you've already said a bunch of things that, I don't think you would tell somebody in a regular course of a conversation. Yeah, right. So I when I do, I get to have that, like, I get to have that experience. And you get to share it with a bunch of other people, which is really cool. So what success look like today, what are your like? What are your goals? For like variability? Where do you have your high alarm set your low alarms? What's your a one seagull? How do you think about all that?

Linda 41:19
Sure. So I want to be sub six right now. We're six one and six to what our last two appointments. So I keep telling my diabetes educator, we're going to be sub six. But I feel like we're struggling with that. Because there we go.

Scott Benner 41:37
What's the highlight of that?

Linda 41:40
mindset at 152? So I can do something with it. Right? Yeah. And he had waffles this morning, so yeah, we just hit 158 Geez, I know.

Scott Benner 41:53
Oh, you make the waffle by hand was it from a restaurant? It was a frozen? Was LEGGO

Linda 41:58
my Eggo toffee 20 minutes before I had to jump on with you.

Unknown Speaker 42:04
Later,

Linda 42:06
no. sugar free syrup.

Scott Benner 42:08
Yeah, but those Eggo waffles are hard to Bolus for? Yes, yeah.

Linda 42:13
You got it. He hasn't had one in probably two months. But he was asking me for the special breakfast that I make him on weekends, which happens to be cinnamon rolls. So we're like you, we don't shy away from food just because of diabetes. We just try and stay on top of it.

Scott Benner 42:30
I have a great waffle recipe. But man, it's a lot to make it

Linda 42:33
do not have a waffle maker. You have to send it to me.

Scott Benner 42:36
Yeah, it's a it's a great recipe. But I mean, there's buttermilk in it. And you're you're fluffing egg whites, and but it works out really well. When you're done. You're like I shouldn't be eating this.

Linda 42:47
Feeling everything in moderation. Yeah, well,

Scott Benner 42:49
waffles pretty big. And you went all the trouble taking out the waffle maker. See, then you're like, well, I'll just have a little more. And actually, they freeze Well, oddly, but they're hard to warm back up. You have to microwave them a little and then toast them to get them back to anyway, this is a rabbit hole. Absolutely. Yeah. Okay, so you're looking for sub six, you're just above it right? Now, when you tell the educator you want sub six? Do they say no, you're doing great? Or do they say Sure go for it.

Linda 43:18
They're kind of funny, because they know on site that they're like, go for it. They said their average is eight. So they told me Don't Don't try and push myself. But they're totally open about it. You know, they said a site an hour for telehealth, and after 20 minutes, they're like, Oh, we looked at all your charts here. Good. You're doing great. So we're really lucky because I hear some other stories. We're lucky.

Scott Benner 43:41
Yeah. Though, sometimes people will start doing better and better and they get yelled at by their doctors, which is fascinating. I also think it's interesting to tell somebody, oh, you have a six one, whatever it is. The average for the practice is eight. So you're doing great. I guess I don't feel that way. I feel like what they should be saying is, oh, you're six one, the average for the practice is eight. We're not doing a very good job. Like why are they using other like, do you mean by that? Like, that's a weird thing. Like if you if we were all running a race together, and the average time to finish the race was an hour and you finished it in 30 minutes, and they were the trainer. Why would they not think hmm, apparently you can finish this race in a lot less time. Like why

Linda 44:23
he was diagnosed in 8.3.

Scott Benner 44:26
Right? Well, and he also probably is you're saying he's still honeymooning Tuesday do you think you're getting but I'm just

Linda 44:32
saying you're telling me where I have to be in the hospital for four days because I'm an 8.3 Your patient tell me Oh, the average is eight.

Scott Benner 44:43
Well, yeah, I mean, listen, there's a lot of people have different financial situations. They have different technology they have different abilities and levels of understanding so I get why I get why people's they want these could be easily like that makes sense to me. I also understand Then like for adults listening, like I guess I was saying that more around children. But for adults listening like I can also get how you could get burned out or just like, go through a number of months really like a, you know, me I'll Pre-Bolus After I eat, we'll call it pretty post Bolus, like you can see where you could get beat up by it. But I'm just saying like from the doctor's point of view, why is the thought not? I wonder how we get everybody closer to six, instead of just treating you like you're special for being at six? I mean, not that you're not I'm just saying I don't know why they don't go deeper into their own. You know, you are special. I don't think you are. Well, also, let me get my pen. I think you might have just named the episode a different kind of special Good job. I leave it up to you guys. to name your episodes. You don't realize it's happening. But it is.

Linda 45:59
Yeah. So the only other thing if you don't mind, the only other thing I wanted to talk about with the whole diagnosis during the pandemic is I told you I found my tribe. You know, I found moms that I can connect with. Through friends for life. They do mom's for life, like every other Monday, they do a zoom so I can talk and ask questions, and they've been absolutely amazing. But Dylan hasn't had anyone really to connect with. Because we've been virtual for school. And that's just been we went virtual to hybrid virtual to hybrid to full time by the end of the year. So that was that's interesting, too, by the way, trying to get sugar's under control. Where school is very different settings than home. I feel. Yeah. To go from home to hybrid to home to full time has just been a crazy roller coaster ride for us to

Scott Benner 46:55
use at home again. So it's just a bonus for me really.

Linda 46:59
Yeah. And now we've got the pool and the neighbor's trampoline, that's always fun.

Scott Benner 47:04
You got a lot of stuff going on. A lot of stuff going

Linda 47:07
on. But but my problem is he doesn't have any other kids that have it that he can, there's 1/4 grader in his school, but it's not really his peer, because she's four years ahead of him. Yeah. Um, so we haven't been able to see anyone his age except we are going to, in two weeks, we're going to go to the friends for life. So that I can meet the moms that I've been talking with online, and he gets to meet kids his age,

Scott Benner 47:33
you're going to go to Florida. Yes. Okay, they're doing it again.

Linda 47:40
And we're gonna do the parks for two days. He's a big Star Wars fan. So he's excited. Sounds great. I mean, I'm just, I just want him to feel like he fits in. And he, he gets involved a little bit with his care. I mean, he can look at a number know if it's good or bad or things like that. But I want him to maybe take a little more independent, I don't want him to be in charge of it at all. But I want him to feel more normalized and sort of maybe be able to ask questions to people other than us. Maybe someone else can explain it to him differently than I could. Yeah,

Scott Benner 48:15
I think it's there's, you're going to see a lot of people who have his experience, at least it'll be a shared experience. And that I would imagine would make them feel part of a group, which

Linda 48:27
I'm hoping maybe if he sees an eight year olds, that he can kind of look up to doing something on his level that he might want to

Scott Benner 48:36
think about how to get that. It's, I have a couple of episodes with younger kids. But not many, although somebody just put up a list yesterday on the are you in my Facebook group? Yes. There's one in there, I put it up with a picture. Somebody made a list of episodes that had people on who are 18 and under. And I was surprised it's 23456. I was like 14 or 15 of them so far on the list. Which i i Even I didn't think I'd spoken to that many kids. But I guess over the years they pile up and I don't I don't realize but I mean a six year olds not listening for a podcast like I mean, if you were listening in the background, and there was a kid on, maybe there'd be like a fleeting moment where he's like, oh, there's a kid who has diabetes, you know, but they're not, you know, he's not looking to listen to some of these conversation I wouldn't imagine.

Linda 49:32
So that's kind of been a little bit of our struggle, I think, not really a big struggle, because he doesn't have to know but I would just like him to have it a little more normalized.

Scott Benner 49:43
Do you think it's not?

Linda 49:47
Well, it's not so much with the PA but when we were MDI he would be embarrassed like out at the restaurant. If we had to, you would want to go to the bathroom. And I would kind of say no, we're just no one's gonna watch. It's okay, we could do it right You know, we'll put you on the inside of the booth and we would kind of work on that. So I think he's a little bit shy about it.

Scott Benner 50:10
It's really helped. You're from Boston and Philly and you said, don't worry. No one's gonna look you didn't say them.

Linda 50:18
But this is a clean podcast.

Scott Benner 50:20
Yeah, I know. But I want to know what you were thinking. When you were talking to that kid. We can bleep out the rest. I was thinking I was speaking slowly. Honey, how about Mommy gets up and kicks everyone's ass and then we'll inject how's that sound? Shot beat it some heads and then we'll do it. Anybody looks your ways getting one right now.

Linda 50:42
Right. I am definitely that kind of mama tell. So I understand. Yeah. I just want he's actually not gonna Vizor right now. Let him say hello. Real quick. Of course. Hold

Scott Benner 50:55
on be great if he said

Unknown Speaker 51:02
we're talking about re diabetes. Can you hear me? Hi, Scott. Hey, Dylan,

Scott Benner 51:07
can you hear me? Alright. Hey, Dylan, how are you? Okay, cool. How old are you man? 16. Wow, I do not remember being that young. That is really cool. Do you enjoy any sports? Or what's your favorite TV show? Oh, golf. Yeah, do you guys don't watch the Eagles? No, no football. That's great. You can see. What about I heard you're going to Florida? What are you going to do while you're there? Oh, one rides. Yeah. There's a really cool ride of the Millennium Falcon. That you should check out in the Star Wars Park. And while you're there, so many characters from the movie are going to be walking around. It's really great. Awesome. Yeah, it sounds fun. Cool. Hey, I heard you have an omni pod and a Dexcom. My daughter has that stuff, too. Oh. Yes. Yeah. My daughter does too. She's older than your she's 17. But she's had diabetes since she was two years old when she was a baby. I heard you just got it recently. Wow. Yeah. How are you doing? Yeah, things are okay. Well, that's cool. I want you to know that I know so many people who have diabetes, and they're all cool people. So you must be cool, too. You think you are? Yeah. I think you are too. Alright, Dylan. Well, thank you for talking. Let me say goodbye to your mom. And then I you can have her okay. Okay, all right, man. Have a good day. I stopped by Dylan. Thanks for being with us. Are you kidding me? Finally getting some people on my intellectual level to speak though? I was tired of feeling like you were smarter than me. He's adorable. Good for you. Congratulations. You're not making more babies. Right. Are you? Are you an older mom? Not like, Yeah, I know everything I can really read through people.

Linda 53:33
Well, I kind of gave a hint when we said you did 20 year olds. But yeah, I'm an older mom.

Scott Benner 53:38
I don't know your husband didn't meet a girl in fourth grade and make a mistake. I don't I wasn't sure. You can't get pregnant when you're in fourth grade right now. That's physiologically impossible. I boy.

Linda 53:51
I think I take things a little bit more in stride, I think.

Scott Benner 53:55
Yeah, right. You have a little more life experience.

Unknown Speaker 53:59
Yeah, just different. Yeah,

Scott Benner 54:01
I know. Right. I mean, I was so young when we had kids. And Kelly was, you know, I basically stole Kelly from her family. So she was like, young. And we didn't know what the hell we were doing ever. Like nothing. We never had any kind of like life experience to draw on for the next life experience. Like you were making everything up as it was happening. The diabetes thing was

Linda 54:26
one of the first things we were an adult a little bit more of a perspective. Like, I think if I were when I was younger, I would it would have been the end of the world for me. You know, I would? I don't know. I think I just would have taken it a lot harder. When I'm when I was older and could say okay, you know what, we'll meet this head on and we can do this and we'll make it work.

Scott Benner 54:50
All right. Well, listen, I don't usually end so abruptly. But Dylan clearly needs you. So sorry. You have apologized to me five times you have way more Life and somebody from where you're at where you live and where you came from should be should just tell me to shut up. I gotta talk to my kid now. But I really do appreciate you doing this and talking about it. It was a it's interesting to hear. I mean, your story's fairly unique. The thing with the legs is I've never heard that before. So that was a, that was really something else.

Linda 55:23
Yeah, it confused the doctor too. Great. That's that's always

Scott Benner 55:27
that's always comforting. All my years I have great. Thanks a lot, buddy. Back to Google. All right. Well, thank

Linda 55:36
you so much for taking the time to talk with me. You have a great

Scott Benner 55:38
day. It's my pleasure. I'll talk to you. I'll let you know when it comes out. I'll do my best to let you know. That'd be great. Thanks. Bye, bye. All right. But I don't

want to thank Linda for coming on the show today in doing such a great job telling your story. And they like to thank you, of course, for all the support and love that I've received from you throughout 2021. There's going to be one short episode coming up before the end of the year. And then we are starting strong strong, my friend. Don't don't even pretend that you don't believe me, because I have got a great week of podcasts coming for you right away, right out of the gate right out of the chute. Right in the beginning. May old acquaintance be forgot. I don't know what that means. Honestly, I mean, what does that mean? Why would you want to forget your old acquaintances? Nevertheless, there's going to be some great episodes coming up for you right away in the new year. So don't drink too much because I need you wide awake on that Monday, downloading some podcasts

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#603 Grandma Heidi

Heidi was diagnosed with type 1 diabetes over forty years ago.

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

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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 603 of the Juicebox Podcast.

today's podcast brings us a 40 year veteran of the fight with type one diabetes. Heidi was diagnosed when she was nine years old. And she's here today to tell you all about it. While Heidi is talking, and I'm being delightful, I need you to 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 health care plan, or becoming bold with insulin. Are you looking for the diabetes pro tip episodes? At the moment? They started episode 210. Go back in your podcast episodes machine, the podcast app and take a look. They're also available at juicebox podcast.com. And diabetes pro tip.com. I said at the moment because I'm toying with re releasing them still trying to figure out if it's a good idea or not. But they're always they'll always be where they're at now, Episode 210 is where they start. You'll see there's a list at diabetes pro tip.com. You you'll you'll figure it out. And if you're interested in community, check out the private Facebook group Juicebox Podcast type one diabetes.

Oh, this is my last ad for 2021. Oh, I'm so excited. I'm finished. You don't know what it's like to get a well maybe know what it's like but an assignment on January 1, to make over 300 live ads for seven companies, six or seven. There's a lot of them. And I'm done. This is it like I've not done like Oh, I'm glad I'm done with that. But like I actually completed it. It's a big deal. For me, I'm the kind of person who you would have you know, give it a book report to an 11th grade and they never would have done it. So I'm proud of myself. So we put a real good effort into this one. Not that they all don't get a good effort. This episode of The Juicebox Podcast is sponsored by touched by type one, please go find them on Instagram, Facebook, and it touched by type one.org touched by type one's mission is to elevate awareness of type one diabetes, raise funds to find a cure and inspire those with diabetes to thrive. You really should check out what they're doing at touched by type one.org. And let me thank them personally for being longtime sponsors of the podcast. Okay, here comes Heidi. By the way, there's gonna be two more episodes this week. These are just the last of the ads. Let's try this again. Hi, how are you? Hi. Oh, everyone your name?

Heidi Wickstrom 2:53
Heidi Wickstrom.

Scott Benner 2:56
Heidi, what makes you want to be on the podcast?

Heidi Wickstrom 3:00
Wow. Well, I guess 40 years of being a diabetic and knowing lots of moms that have little ones that have always come to me and ask questions. And I felt like maybe I could give some advice to others or just some knowledge. Experience.

Scott Benner 3:18
I like it. Yeah. So 40 years ago, you're held now 49 Okay, so when you're nine years old, in

Heidi Wickstrom 3:28
1980 ish. Anyone? Yeah.

Scott Benner 3:31
Wow. Now that was to me. That's that's that's still Dark Ages, right? That's yeah, cloudy. Yeah. No meat or stuff like that? No. Do you remember much of it? Do I do? What sticks out in your mind when I say what's it like growing up a diabetes?

Heidi Wickstrom 3:51
Well, I mean, I have a vivid memory of when I found out. Do you want to hear that story? Tell me more. So Well, first, let me preface that with my dad was also type one from the age of seven. Okay. So my mom was kind of always on the lookout, I guess for one of us to get it possibly. But I remember sitting at a park with my family drinking a coke or soda of some kind. And my mom's next thing I know, I'm at the doctor's office, getting blood work done. And they sit me down like literally in the office like she's behind a desk, the doctor and tells us this news like it's, you know, like you have diabetes, like it's this big announcement. You know, it's very serious. And immediately I had to go home, pack my bags and go to the hospital. Like it was that fast. And just because of my dad I knew that meant shots and so I was devastated because I wanted nothing to do with needles, like every nine year old and then I was in the hospital for either A week. You know, being poked and prodded and get my blood drawn every gosh, I felt like it was every hour.

Scott Benner 5:10
You're in the hospital for a week when you're nine before iPads existed where the? Yes, yes. Would you do? Yeah. Yeah. stare at a wall. Is that what you do? Just stare at the wall?

Heidi Wickstrom 5:22
Yeah, no, I just remember being constantly like poked like people were always coming in and you know, drawing blood giving insulin. You know? I remember seeing my dad on the floor fainting. Weight in the hospital room. Yeah, he would faint when they come draw my blood.

Scott Benner 5:41
Your father a lifelong type one couldn't watch you get blood draws? Yes, he's still with us. He is not Oh, cuz if he was gonna listen to this, I was gonna make fun of them so I could hear it. Sorry,

Heidi Wickstrom 5:53
but you can make fun of me too. I have to lay down and I get my blood taken. I'm a danger. Oh, no kidding. Yeah, no, I always have to lay down that my feet have to be up and otherwise I'm down on the ground.

Scott Benner 6:02
Is it when you see the blood? I know cuz

Heidi Wickstrom 6:05
I don't watch. I never watch it just it's just literally I don't know. They'd say it's psychological. I feel like it's more like the blood leaving my body but

Scott Benner 6:14
I definitely feel that's wrong. Do you get faint when anything else poke show?

Heidi Wickstrom 6:20
Ah, no. It's just about losing blood.

Scott Benner 6:24
Gotcha. So it's the dual blood. Gotcha. Yeah. Yeah. Wow. Okay, so your dad's passing out hospital? Yes. Passing

Heidi Wickstrom 6:31
out. And then I gotta remember, they couldn't find veins on me. So they were like putting IVs like up, like in my upper forearm?

Scott Benner 6:41
Yeah, like awful places. Yeah, that doesn't seem fun at all. Now, I'm gonna ask a tough question. If you don't have an answer, it's fine. If you don't want to answer it's fine. Okay. Do you find yourself feeling resentful towards your father? No, no. You ever feel like that's the guy that gave me diabetes? No, never. I wouldn't think so. I just wanted to ask. Yeah, no, no. Okay. It's cool. Because I always wonder that when? When we're having I think I've never asked anybody before.

Heidi Wickstrom 7:10
Yeah, I think he felt that way. But I literally remembering one day actually saying it to him. Like, just so you know, I don't blame you. Well, yeah. I don't know what made me say that. But I do remember vividly saying that to him.

Scott Benner 7:22
You could feel his his guilt.

Heidi Wickstrom 7:24
Yeah, I think so. It's interesting, isn't it? Yeah. Yeah.

Scott Benner 7:29
I think parents feel like that about almost everything. Oh, I'm sure. Yeah. Any little thing you can see in your kids that they don't seem to be happy about, or you wish they didn't have? And you're like, Oh, I did that which is right. Right. But it's hard not to feel that way. It's true. Okay. So you're now taking the shots. You wait. And so giving yourself shots? No problem.

Heidi Wickstrom 7:51
Well, okay, so I was nine. So my mom, another thing I remember. She had to be taught how to give me shots. And the very first time ever, we're in the hospital, and she sticks the needle in my like, inner thigh. And, and then says, Now what, and then pulls it back out, which

Scott Benner 8:13
we'll try again in a second. I should have thought through before we win.

Heidi Wickstrom 8:17
I'm like, Oh my god. So anyway, so my mom gave me shots till I was 12. And I started doing it myself.

Scott Benner 8:24
I got better at it, I imagine.

Heidi Wickstrom 8:26
Yeah. And you practice on oranges. You know, the whole week. You're there,

Scott Benner 8:31
right? Yeah, yeah, we had to practice on bananas. But yeah, I felt bad for the banana every time we threw it. Seriously, that's how broke I was growing up. Every time we threw the banana away. I was like, Oh, well did the hospital visit cost? Like, you know, 50 grand, and I didn't think anything of that. I was like, Well, look, you wasted a lot of bananas in this situation. We just cut a part off of it. And here's that it just seems unfair to the banana consent. Well, your mom haggis had never given your father an injection. No, I guess not. I never asked. But I bet your dad gave your nevermind. Stop it. So but um, Tom? Yeah. How many how do you have any brothers or sisters?

Heidi Wickstrom 9:12
I have a yes. An older brother. Five years older. Okay.

Scott Benner 9:15
Any diabetes there? Nope. Interest nowhere else. Any autoimmune stuff anywhere?

Heidi Wickstrom 9:23
Um, I mean, I also have asthma. We call it autoimmune. But, but now me my brother's totally healthy. We had more we had like, type two on my dad's side, but no other type ones.

Scott Benner 9:38
Are you? Do you think your brother feels guilty? No. You don't think so? He's like, Yeah, whatever. Oh, no. In fact, he'll

Heidi Wickstrom 9:46
say to me now he's Oh my god. He'll say to me like, I'm totally healthy. There's nothing wrong with me. Like good for you.

Scott Benner 9:56
Hey, you want to hear something from the NIH asthma and autoimmune diseases both result from a dysregulated immune system and have been conventionally considered to have mutually exclusive pathogens. autoimmunity is believed to be an exaggerated th one response while asthma with a th two underpinning is congruent with the well accepted th one th two paradigm. Well, there's a lot

Heidi Wickstrom 10:21
of words. Yeah, that's that's exactly what I was gonna tell you. But I didn't think you'd understand.

Scott Benner 10:24
Yeah, I appreciate you trying to save me on that one. But I, I was just gonna say that. I think they're kind of connected somehow. Yeah, me too. Yeah. There's a lot of things people come on here and talk about that are starting to repeat. And I realized it's sort of anecdotal still, because, yeah, just talking to people. But I don't know how many people have to tell you they have type one and they're bipolar before you start thinking like, Hmm, that's interesting. You mean or type? Yeah. And I have really bad allergies, or I have

Heidi Wickstrom 10:51
Crohn's disease and brains,

Scott Benner 10:53
etc, etc. Before you start. I got this. I see what's happening here. Yeah. Okay. So your brother treated you like any older brother would have treated you in any situation? Do you? Did you ever have any anger at him that he wasn't sick? Or

Heidi Wickstrom 11:08
now? Remember that? No. Okay.

Scott Benner 11:11
So then what was management? like day to day? Was it just really just shooting twice a day?

Heidi Wickstrom 11:16
Yeah, no. So it was like mph in the morning? And at night, I believe. And then regular before every meal. Okay, it was literally like, I mean, it was, you know, you had to eat breakfast at seven. You had to have lunch at noon, and you had to have dinner at six or whatever. Or your blood sugar would go at Nana's Right. which I hated. Because what if I wasn't hungry? Right?

Scott Benner 11:40
Shoot on a scale. And you know, choice. Just everything. Shoot, schedule, eat schedule. Yeah, yeah, my

Heidi Wickstrom 11:47
mom, I guess in your Sunday, I don't remember is that I assume she'd had to come to school and give me shots because the nurses there were no nurses giving me shots. So I don't remember that. So I'm kind of surprised.

Scott Benner 11:58
Maybe she shot in the morning before you left?

Heidi Wickstrom 12:01
Maybe But what about lunch? I don't know. I don't remember. I have to ask her that she only worked like a mile from school.

Scott Benner 12:07
Yeah, but you're thinking about how you probably managed now. Like I think in the beginning, you just put in a bunch a breakfast made sure to eat lunch. Yeah, I'm then shot again before dinner. Right?

Heidi Wickstrom 12:16
Yeah. Because I mean, you couldn't check your blood sugar. I had to go get my blood drawn to know my blood sugar. Yeah, and just check your ketones, right. I mean, that's really all you could do

Scott Benner 12:26
you do that frequently?

Heidi Wickstrom 12:28
I feel like I did. Yeah. Wow. Yeah.

Scott Benner 12:31
Do you know what the result of that kind of care pattern was like, did you take a onesies? Do you know what they were?

Heidi Wickstrom 12:37
Oh, yeah. That was awful. It was awful. It was like in the teens.

Scott Benner 12:41
Wow. Really? Yeah. Yeah. Oh, yeah. I don't know if everybody understands how numbers work but teens started 13. Yeah, okay. Yeah, like there's no 1213 or 17 or anything up there. And and did you know you didn't feel well? Or did you feel okay,

Heidi Wickstrom 13:01
you know, I don't remember thinking I didn't feel well. Which is weird to me. Because now when I see I have a friend whose daughter is eight and she'll tell me the craziest stories she's going through their blood sugar's and I'm like, God, she must feel awful. Because I am I know how I feel. Now. If I'm high. Yeah, but I don't remember feeling I felt like high was my norm. Then when I was younger, well that's why

Scott Benner 13:26
it felt okay. Because your body does Yeah, little adjustments the vessels and things so that you don't you feel normal at that blood sugar, but still all the all the bad long term stuff is going Did you have any short term problems?

Heidi Wickstrom 13:37
No knock on wood. And I've made one DKA when I was probably somewhere in my teens again.

Scott Benner 13:47
I was gonna say like, 17 about about it. Yeah,

Heidi Wickstrom 13:50
no, I was younger, because I remember just I think my mom thought I had the flu because I was like vomiting. But I remember vividly having a lot of stomach pain and had like laboring to breathe. Yeah. And obviously, eventually I went to the hospital. That's what it was.

Scott Benner 14:07
You should never get that far when you were diagnosed because your mom saw some.

Heidi Wickstrom 14:10
No, no. That makes sense. None of the weight loss none of that stuff. Yeah, she

Scott Benner 14:15
she saw it really early because she was probably Yeah, she's watching for Iraq. Yeah, she

Heidi Wickstrom 14:19
said it was the thirst and urination. You know, having to go the bathroom really thirsty, having another bathroom? And I'm like, yep.

Scott Benner 14:25
So can we jump over for a second? Yeah, they're probably managed similarly. Say guys again. Your father. He probably managed himself similar to? Yes. Yeah. For his entire life. He never switched. No. How old? Was he when he passed? 66. Interesting. Yeah, how old were you when you switched over to a faster acting insulin?

Heidi Wickstrom 14:48
Oh, faster. Gosh, that I couldn't tell you. I just remember when I switched to a pump. Probably like, I don't remember.

Scott Benner 14:54
So did you do two shots a day until the pump?

Heidi Wickstrom 14:58
I didn't know I was doing like five or six. Next. Oh, so

Scott Benner 15:01
you started doing multiple daily injections in there? Yeah. Yeah. You know how old you were when that happened ish? Yeah, I

Heidi Wickstrom 15:07
was like, 30 Wow,

Scott Benner 15:09
I'm gonna do some more math. That's 21 years of doing it the other way.

Heidi Wickstrom 15:13
You're sorry. We're sorry. I was like, 30 When I went to a pump, so sorry. Um, so I was probably 20.

Scott Benner 15:21
See, that's my guess is if you were nine, yeah, one, then by 88 or so. I got to feel like you're, that's when those insulin started coming up. Hey, I'm sorry. I'm following a woman. Blood sugar right now. Give me a second to look at it. Yeah, she's saying, Okay, it's Taco Time. But I gotta change my site. I'm gonna take a full four years. I've left it and then the other one, I changed it in five minutes. But it's hard to be a little more aggressive because of the change because of the slight change and being in exercise mode. Do not everybody sent me an email and asked me to help you with your blood sugar just because I did this while I was recording. This woman hit all my good heartstrings. All right, and she's been very cool. She's also listens, by the way, okay. Not like some of you who I help and you're like, Are you sure? Like, I'm more sure than you are? I might not be sure. But I saw your graph and you called and you don't know what you're doing. So why don't we give it a shot? What I'm saying. Anyway, yeah. So your father never switches you probably around your late teens early 20s start doing MDI you do MDI for 10 years.

Heidi Wickstrom 16:49
So age nine till I was 30.

Scott Benner 16:52
Yeah, well, I mean, you know, it's funny isn't that funny? I think multiple Oh, you mean

Heidi Wickstrom 16:56
multiple daily inject? Got

Scott Benner 16:57
it? Yeah. No,

Heidi Wickstrom 16:59
I mean, to me, they're always multiple right?

Scott Benner 17:02
To is multiple so. So you've done multiple daily injections the whole time? You started with a faster acting mealtime insulin, right around 20 years old. Did that for 10 years. Did you ever have a CGM in those 10 years? No. Do you now? Yes. Interesting. So you got a pump when you were 30? Yeah. And that was a couple of years ago. Isn't it suck when you think of your life like this? Oh my god, I can't I hate this. I hate talking like this. I'm going to be 50 next month. I'm like, oh, yeah,

Heidi Wickstrom 17:31
so you're worse. So we're, yeah, so we're close in age. Yeah.

Scott Benner 17:33
But it sucks. Like, you know, does suck talking about the 80s like it was 30 years ago.

Heidi Wickstrom 17:38
I know. And I have a teenager who's dressing like it's the 90s the 90s like okay, this is all coming back. I said did you buy a toe ring yet? Or an anklet?

Scott Benner 17:48
We don't post yourself Heather Locklear come back. Okay, that's gonna be a problem, Benoit. That might that might not the modern that's not gonna happen. might not like that. Yeah, they like their naked ladies on the screen, not hung up on a wall. I tried to explain to my son one time that I worked in a sheetmetal shop when I was a kid. And yeah, there were posters of half naked or naked women everywhere in that place. And he's like, and no one said anything. I said Cole, it was so incredibly common. I don't think anyone thought anything of it. And no, to watch him not be able to wrap his head around that. And then I realized now at then being, you know, removed from it for quite some time. I was like, wow, that was so incredibly wrong. Like it's just, like, so inappropriate and wrong and crazy. And, like Mike, like, there was a woman that worked there in the office and she had to walk. You know what I mean? And none of it

Heidi Wickstrom 18:46
was just like my, my brother having posters in his bedroom, right? Look, what what would it be Christie Brinkley or? Yeah, Paulina Porizkova. Not he has a sister who wasn't getting care care or a mother

Scott Benner 18:57
and people who have never seen these posters. These girls were wearing nothing. They barely Yeah,

Heidi Wickstrom 19:02
it was strange. Let me see no Sports Illustrated Swimsuit cover sheets.

Scott Benner 19:06
I don't think they do anymore either, by the way. No, they don't. Yeah. And I'm not saying there's no right or like, well, maybe I am saying maybe we were wrong back then. But I think it's easier to say that it's interesting to watch people progress, right? Or to notice things that were like you know what, that wasn't a good idea. We'll stop doing that. Or technology changes so you move along like I mean, honestly magazines with scantily clad women. There used to be an unlimited supply of them. There must have been 40 of them on a news Oh, yeah. And people listening don't even know what a newsstand is. And you know and and my point I guess it was a weird segue but yeah, you went through the cloudy and the all that stuff into the you know into the fast track the meal insulin then to a pump, then eventually to a CGM, but your father never came along with it. It missed it

Heidi Wickstrom 19:56
now. Well, you know what he also whenever Think of my dad I think of he was literally if you looked up diabetes and everything that could go wrong, it was my dad. Okay. Like he, you know, his vision, he lost a leg he lost toes. He, you know, I mean everything, you know, eventually kidney failure heart, you know all that stuff. Well, it didn't take care of himself.

Scott Benner 20:22
So that was he not doing what the minimum of what they were asking him to do.

Heidi Wickstrom 20:28
I literally just think he took ish the same amount of insulin every every time and just ate and drank and, you know, he liked his beer.

Scott Benner 20:39
He was just gonna write this out like I got diabetes. Let's see how far how long I can stay on this ball is that

Heidi Wickstrom 20:45
yeah, it was I don't know. I just think stubborn. You know, some some men are stubborn.

Scott Benner 20:49
Okay, some women are stubborn. There's one of them below me on another floor, the structure. I think some people can be stubborn, but

Heidi Wickstrom 21:00
But I remember when it by the time I started mentioning like a pump. Like when I had mine. He was already like his fingers. He wouldn't even be able to like, I don't think he could do it. Like he you know, he had lots of trigger finger, which I've had too. But so he has a lot of you know, his fingers like cramping. And I don't know, I just felt like it was too late. When just sad to say how old

Scott Benner 21:24
were you when you realized he could be doing a different thing?

Heidi Wickstrom 21:31
I guess when he started having stuff go wrong. So like he lost his leg at 50? The year 2000. So Wow. 57 I think he was

Scott Benner 21:42
did that frighten you? Person? Oh,

Heidi Wickstrom 21:44
yeah. Oh, yeah. No, he's the one that made me go. You know, this is not, you know, this is serious business. I've got it, you know, really take care of myself.

Scott Benner 21:55
Good for you. I'm just working now on getting a behavioral scientist to come on and talk about something called sunk cost fallacy. You know what that is? No. It describes I'm going to read right off the internet for you. A sunk cost fallacy describes our tendency to follow through on an endeavor, if we have already invested time, effort or money into it, whether or not the current costs outweigh the benefits. It's an economic idea that also comes into psychology a little bit. Yeah, I think it's, I think it relates significantly to people who were diagnosed in the 80s, or before. Yeah, with type one. And I'm concerned, why I'm going to talk about now on the podcast, that one day, as hard as it might be to believe at this moment, there may be a better way than what we're doing now. And that people might feel so invested in what they've already done, that they feel like there's just no reason to try. And so I'm going to have someone come on and talk about it. Because I think it's a I think it's a paralysis that you kind of get right, you know, well, I'm sorry, I'm sorry for you. You know, for that, I can tell you that. I think what happened to him is fairly common for people diagnosed when he was oh, yeah, lifespan, etc.

Heidi Wickstrom 23:12
So like, 1950 Yeah, yeah.

Scott Benner 23:14
Was it a heart attack in the end? You know,

Heidi Wickstrom 23:17
it and he just, it was systemic, like just systemic infection everywhere. Like, everything just shut down. Yeah.

Scott Benner 23:25
So he has an amputation. And then you think, tell me again, with this insulin pump is is that was it about it?

Heidi Wickstrom 23:33
Yeah, I don't. I'm trying to think if I had it at that time, maybe I hadn't had it yet.

Scott Benner 23:38
But something about his health push.

Heidi Wickstrom 23:40
Yeah, that was Yeah, because I mean, long story short, I mean, this leg amputation started with an a blister on his heel. Wow. Yeah. Yeah. And by the time he called me, we weren't, you know, my parents. Sorry. My parents were divorced when I was an infant. Okay, so, so we weren't close. We were close. We weren't super close. But anyway, he's the kind of guy that like, I got a phone call. And he says, I know we had a sore spot, but he's like, by the way, I'm having surgery tomorrow. They're taking my leg. He says, and they gave me 50% chance of making it through surgery. I'm like, I'm sorry. What?

Scott Benner 24:21
How far from you? Did you live?

Heidi Wickstrom 24:24
Well, he's in Palm Springs and I'm in Orange County so hour and a half.

Scott Benner 24:26
I love men born in that time in the in the world in the in that?

Heidi Wickstrom 24:34
What's the funny thing is I don't even think he called me I think I called to check in on him and he happened to tell me that's

Scott Benner 24:40
exactly what I'm talking about. Hey, Dad. Oh, we're gonna get on a plane and go kill some Nazis. What? Yeah, I'll be back or I won't. Don't worry about it. You know, just a real like,

Unknown Speaker 24:51
I don't even matter of fact.

Scott Benner 24:53
Oh my gosh, no big deal. We're in a world war. You stay with your mom. I'll see you later. Yeah,

Heidi Wickstrom 24:58
so I'm at work and so I rushing into my boss's office crying say I gotta

Scott Benner 25:03
go. cutting my dad's leg off. He didn't even want to tell me any, you might

Heidi Wickstrom 25:06
not make it. Yeah. You know what I mean, it was the craziest phone call ever. So you know, I drive to Palm Springs. But the crazy what I was getting to is, you know, I'm in there visiting my dad, the the wound care guy comes in and he says to me, you might want to leave when I change this bandage. And I'm like, okay, and he's like, the smell is pretty bad. He's or at least put a mask on. So put a mask on. And he literally took this bandage off and a half of my dad's butt was gone. Wow. Just from bacteria. Yeah. And high blood sugars. That's crazy.

Scott Benner 25:41
And it was crazy. And it was it was clear to you in that moment. I mean, I'm sure it was. But why why he was having this problem. Oh, yeah.

Heidi Wickstrom 25:48
I was like, oh my god, this is why you can't just take whatever shot you want and eat whatever you want. And just

Scott Benner 25:53
call it a day. Did you? Did you chastise them a little bit? Or were you able to hold it in?

Heidi Wickstrom 25:57
No, I mean, I, I just, you know, knew He was who He was. And yeah, yeah. Yeah. That's that was that interesting time anyway, he obviously he didn't pass that you made it through surgery. Everything was great. But I do have a funny story. So do you think you'd like funny stories,

Scott Benner 26:11
I have to tell you something it as weird as it might sound so that you can see into my brain a little bit. The preposterous nature of your father not calling you before that surgery is funny to me. The rest of the details are hard, you're like this, you're like this. Go ahead.

Heidi Wickstrom 26:25
So he's in pre op, he's about to go into surgery, you know, me and his, my step mom's there and my brother. And we're saying, Okay, you're gonna be great, you know, you're gonna do fine. And he's saying, Well, you know, just in case I don't make it goodbye, and I go, dad, you know, come on, have a good attitude, blah, blah. The next thing I swear to God, we hear a saw going on. I'm like, Oh, my God, what is that? I go around out of the curtain. And there's somebody literally signing something in the hallway of the hospital. And I look at him I go, my dad is about to get his leg amputated. Do you mind doing that later?

Scott Benner 27:05
Can you wait till I go out to like the waiting area before you start running a circular saw, please. It's literally I was like, we're just I mean, also for people a nice look back into the past. They're doing construction in an operating wing of the hospital. Like where it's people are still going and moving around. And no one no one would think twice about that

Heidi Wickstrom 27:26
you saw on some under the sink in the hallway, like a pipe or something. And I'm like, Oh, my God.

Scott Benner 27:31
Yeah. There's a time probably not 20 years before that, where the doctor would have stood there smoking a cigarette change in your file for sure. For sure. We really have it together, don't we?

Heidi Wickstrom 27:41
Oh, my God. We're not even that long ago, my senior trip to Cancun, we could smoke on the plane.

Scott Benner 27:47
Your high school your high school senior trip? Yes. Yes.

Heidi Wickstrom 27:51
I didn't smoke. But they were smoking

Scott Benner 27:53
it? Of course you didn't. You would never. But is that something? We wouldn't a school trip one time? I'm going to say no lie. We were in ninth grade. I don't know how old that makes you. But maybe 14 were the same. Yeah. Okay. And we go into Manhattan. Now, not the Manhattan of today, post COVID. And not the Manhattan of pre COVID where, you know, The Lion King runs around and there's that half naked guy and a cowboy hat playing a guitar and it's all fun. And you can go to Fuddruckers? Like not like that. Manhattan, like where you were there. And you're like, someone's gonna sell me drugs. You're trying to kill me? Like, let that level of Manhattan right. And we're gonna go to, you know, you think Oh, it's a school trip. They'll take you they'll have a you know, itinerary setup, you'll do thing we pull up three buses full of kids, boom, boom, boom, everybody gets out. We're standing on the sidewalk and the teacher goes, break up into groups be back here at 5pm. Can you imagine?

Heidi Wickstrom 28:56
Do you remember being scared? Were you scared? No. We

Scott Benner 28:58
were like, amazing. Let's go. Like, it was just like, you looked around for your four best friends and you're like, This is great. We're just free in New York City. And we had money in our pockets. And we were like, some kids came back high as a kite. One one kid came back had so many fireworks. I think he was trying to start a fireworks like Emporium when he got home. Kids were drunk. People like it was in sane and completely common and and realistic for the time period. Yes. I just told Arden the other day that when I was in elementary school, my entire school about 700 kids went to see I think The Empire Strikes Back in a movie theater.

Heidi Wickstrom 29:44
Oh my gosh,

Scott Benner 29:44
there was a movie theater. A five. Let's call it a five minute drive from the school. Okay, we all just went out in the front parking lot of the school got into a tandem line and walk they're like down round corners across streets like like Baby, Baby ducks, just, you know, that went on forever. And I said that to her and she goes, my school would never do that. They'd never let us do that. I was like, I know. And her friend goes, and we don't have any fun at all. And I was like, yeah, no. So different world, obviously different time for your father, he probably, I'm gonna guess, did what he was told what he was told wasn't that helpful. At some point, you get like, I guess this is what it is. I'm just gonna, like I said, get on this bowl and see how long I can stay on. Yeah, then things change over. But not in a way where anybody ever reached back to people they never, like, that's the, to me, that's the message of this this hour is that management comes in waves. And you can very easily get stuck in the wave that you were brought up in. And that that might be a great idea. Yeah. So alright, so how did you find having a pump

this is going to be short and sweet. Touched by type one.org. Go type it into a browser, and then look around, check out their programs, like their annual conference awareness campaign, both for cause dance program dancing for diabetes, their D box program, type one at school. There's a little link there for their upcoming events. And you can find out how to support them through donations, shopping, or becoming a volunteer touched by type one.org. That was that we're done.

Heidi Wickstrom 31:45
We loved it. I think the thing I love the most about it was so I went through, you know, stages of weight gain with shots, like and I finally figured out okay, like while I'm eating and I'm going hungry, right? Because I had to eat. And so when I got on the pump, I was like, wow, so I don't feel like I want a huge lunch at noon. I don't have to have it. Yeah. And if I want to just snack all day I can and that that was the part I liked the most about it.

Scott Benner 32:10
Just being able to eat like something like walk

Heidi Wickstrom 32:13
if you wanted to eat and you didn't have to eat or you could skip whatever. You know, I like I'm a snacker I like to snack. I don't like huge meals and I never really have. So that was the best part of it for me. Yeah, and of course my blood sugar's were awesome once I was on it,

Scott Benner 32:28
right? No one, no one puts a slice of pepperoni on a Ritz cracker if they've got to pull a needle out for it. Right? You're just like, I'll skip it. I'll wait on the bigger meal literally. Yeah. So that and and that's those are early pumps to so they were just kind of more efficient delivery systems that you didn't have to poke yourself for. Yeah, yeah. Right. You didn't use any kind of like, you weren't thinking about like extending boluses or that didn't even exist. I

Heidi Wickstrom 32:54
don't I feel like I did. But I don't know how long into it. I did. It was like a mini med. I think I had a mini med first and then I had like a paradigm and then I had a I had a few of them.

Scott Benner 33:04
Can you imagine people listening right now? We're like there's T slim and on the pod and Medtronic. What are you talking about? Me? Yeah, paradigm. You know what did that

Heidi Wickstrom 33:12
I think Medtronic was mini med. I believe that. Okay? Yeah.

Scott Benner 33:15
It's just interesting how the wording the word I know. I know. At what point in this does the CGM pop up?

Heidi Wickstrom 33:25
You know what that was? That was only probably let me think in the last seven years, really? Okay. So I don't know how long it's been around. How long have we had Dexcom? Okay, so

Scott Benner 33:42
if you're on a Dexcom, and it started with

Heidi Wickstrom 33:45
a four I think even five.

Scott Benner 33:48
Okay. Arden started with like the is the original Yeah, they whatever the original what they had their numbering system was messed up for a while, like there was for like a something plus I forget now they're in a in a numerical Dexcom four or five, six at sevens kind of be out. Your sevens coming? Yeah, yeah. Actually, by the time this comes out, I bet seven exists. Well,

Unknown Speaker 34:11
I'm excited. Yeah.

Scott Benner 34:13
Also, don't say that out loud to anybody, because I believe I've signed an NDA, but as long as you okay. So anyway, yes, I

Heidi Wickstrom 34:22
think I started with a four, but nothing earlier than that. Okay.

Scott Benner 34:25
Yeah. So you've had it? Probably seven, eight years, then that's probably in that space. It's funny, because now people who have them probably don't imagine they ever didn't exist, but they're still fairly new. I call under 10 years new, honestly. Yeah. Yeah. What did you notice first when you had a CGM on

Heidi Wickstrom 34:45
I guess just not pricking my finger 10 times a day.

Scott Benner 34:48
So that was the big that was the big thing for you is just not having to test your blood sugar. Yeah, right.

Heidi Wickstrom 34:54
Did it wasn't good? Yeah. I mean, I guess, obviously, it was watching the trends too. But I really wasn't doing that it was more, more just having the not having to test as much.

Scott Benner 35:09
Do you use it for more than that now?

Heidi Wickstrom 35:12
Well, and then, you know, and then I went through a phase of being overly obsessed with it. Were over cracking and stuff cuz like, Oh no, I'm going up like, oh, no, you know, I mean, and then you overcorrect. And so now I'm just kind of just let it be. And I'm also looping to

Scott Benner 35:26
Okay. Oh, you are now. That's cool. Yeah.

Heidi Wickstrom 35:28
I've been doing that for like two years. Well,

Scott Benner 35:31
I think Arden's probably coming up on a couple of years now with

Heidi Wickstrom 35:33
that. Yeah, whenever it well, not when it first started. But yeah, it's like it's been two years.

Scott Benner 35:38
What you mentioned the, the kind of like, obsessing over the CGM. Yeah, that was such a big concern slash issue when they first came out. Because, because just nothing like that ever existed. It's hard to imagine, right? Like, and then suddenly, this whole, you know, group family of people who had lived some of them exactly the way you're describing, or, you know, the way my daughter came up with, you know, just multiple daily injections and a meter, and I didn't know what was going on. And like that whole thing. Some people saw that, and they couldn't stop looking at it. Well, yeah, it really gripped them. But I think it's better now. Like, I think now that it's become more common. It's, you know, kind of mixing the zeitgeist a little bit people understand it better. Hopefully. Yeah, they're not as gripped by it.

Heidi Wickstrom 36:25
And I had to just adjust my alarms and stuff to like, I, I mean, I know a lot of people say they have a alarm go off, like, I don't know, like, 100. And something. I'm like, Oh, my God, I don't want to hear I don't want to hear a thing out of my pump. Unless I'm like, 250.

Scott Benner 36:40
So you're old school. You're older with diabetes? Well,

Heidi Wickstrom 36:43
yeah. And you know, it's funny, the only thing that scares me for people, I don't want to say scares, but I do think about it, is if What if you didn't have any of this stuff? And you do have to go back to like, shots, or and I don't know why you would. But I always feel like everybody should really have a grip on shots and pricking your finger.

Scott Benner 37:03
I'm going to call this episode, grandma. Heidi, what do you think?

Heidi Wickstrom 37:10
But no, don't you understand what I mean, though? You just have a grip on it. Like, what if you lose your insurance? Right? God forbid.

Scott Benner 37:18
So here's what I think I understand. So this is really common. I'm not making fun of you about it. I know, I think that people who grew up the way you did with diabetes, that is every time this comes up, that's their their concern. But, and I and back, when I first heard that concern, I thought, okay, that makes sense. Get good at it with like, the basic tools, and then blah, blah, blah, but it's hard to get good at it with the basic tools. So why not get really good at it with the great tools, and if something should befall me, and I lose my insurance. I have all that knowledge about how to do things, and then I can apply the more basic tools to my advanced knowledge. I think you have it exactly backwards. Okay, okay. I think that hopefully, that will never happen. But if it does, you'll have so much information in your head from using a CGM and a pump, that you'd then be able to do it. Like I see it as like, you know, the zombies come you flee your home, you grab the basics, and but you still remember how it used to be so you, you can shoot for that with your basic tools. Right. And I don't I don't even I don't judge anybody who has that thought. Because that thought occurred to me as well back then. It's only through the process of making the podcast that I think it's backwards. I think it's just a scared idea from people who came up a different way. That makes sense. That makes sense. Yeah, yeah. Why don't have to agree with me. You could just say I completely disagree. Actually, it would make it more fun. We could argue.

Heidi Wickstrom 38:48
I'm gonna make my own podcast and call you a different name.

Scott Benner 38:50
Go ahead. I'll tell you what, if you can figure out how to get a podcast on the air. I'll be your first guest. What do you think about? A lot? I heard you tried to get on this zoom this morning. You're never gonna do it?

Heidi Wickstrom 39:04
No, it was literally I don't know what it was. It was my ear. It was my air pods. I don't know what's happened

Scott Benner 39:08
signal air pods, something like that. Not your fault completely. No, but I'm being serious about that. Like, I think. I think it's, I think there's a lot of value in having a deeper understanding. Yeah, and I also think that you want to talk deeply for a second about things. Yeah, I think that as humans, we've we create fixes to problems that then need fixes. So you know, you, you know, from the first time Man, you know, set a fire, then they burned something down, they had to learn to put it out. You know, we keep moving forward. There has been no time in our history, where we have gone backwards with technology. As a matter of fact, I think that technology always requires more technology. At some point at some point humanity's job We'll just be to keep humanity moving like like everyone's it's a weird thought but but if what you're describing would either have to be a decimation of finances which I think is possible for people obviously. Yeah, or you know World War where they just aren't things aren't being made anymore and then I don't want to break it to you too harshly. Heidi, but, you know, you and my daughter, you're sure you're in trouble. So, you know, like, that's that that's gonna be I wouldn't plan for that kind of devastation I guess. Okay, the partial we learn how to get insulin from cows. I think it's pigs isn't it? bovine Oh isn't bovine cows isn't a bovine a pig. Oh god. Alrighty, this is gonna be really embarrass my zoom there. Oh, great. Now you found the name of the podcast either both. Oh bovine a biological sub family includes a diverse group of 10 medium to large size undulates including domestic cattle bison African buffalo for horn and spark your right so then what the hell

Heidi Wickstrom 41:09
hold a look at you. I know what I was injecting in myself

Scott Benner 41:12
so excited. Yeah, hold on a second a pig. Is pig not a bovine? Yeah, it is. There may be bovine is a term relating to cattle there may be exceptions to this term uses our cattle horses asses swine. Oh, Vine is a term related to sheep. Pork poor sign is a term related to swine. Okay, so a hog is por sign. bovine is cattle. You are right. And I got to say SS without blurring it out. Because it means donkey. So that's true. Yeah, you go.

Heidi Wickstrom 41:49
Well, I I seriously feel like I remember a picture of a cow on my insulin box.

Scott Benner 41:55
Really? I swear, hold on a second. We're looking for that.

Heidi Wickstrom 42:00
Look up mph regular 1980. Something we

Scott Benner 42:03
could you tell me how to Google Hold on a second. Definitely somebody is Mother. How many children do everything? Yeah. How many children do you have? Two? How old? Are they?

Heidi Wickstrom 42:16
14 and 10?

Scott Benner 42:20
It's when a cow on it?

Unknown Speaker 42:25
I swear. Swear there was a cow.

Scott Benner 42:28
Oh, no. All right. That's up to you to find. Or I'll find it and make it the cover of your episode.

Heidi Wickstrom 42:33
Alright, thanks.

Scott Benner 42:36
That's crazy. Any concern about your children? Do you think about

Heidi Wickstrom 42:39
it? I mean, sometimes when not really. I mean, like where I live. And I don't know if it's everywhere. But most of the people here have their kids on all those trials to see if they carry the trial machine. Yeah, they're do it all the time. And I'm like, I just don't want to obsess over it. I'm just like, you know, but they're like, but if they do have it, then you can kind of prevent it or put it off. And I'm like, I I just know.

Scott Benner 43:03
So. So let me ask you a question. First of all, I people come from two different categories on that. I understand both sides, I don't want to think about it. And I know how to take care of diabetes if it should happen. And I want to know cuz I want to try to do something. So they have this drug now people are using called to miss a blob, or something like that. And yeah, it's like a please, all these details. I have a great episode on it. Go listen to that if you want to. But But um, but they it's like this infusion that you do like a certain amount of days in a row and then it's over. And it like really slows down the progression of type one in their in their studies. And I think that's why they're doing it, but I don't think it's, they're getting through the FDA, it's moving along. So, so forget, like, my how things really work if I told you, if you did trial that you'd be able to find out if your kid was getting diabetes, and then they could stop it that you would do. Yeah, right. Okay, obviously. That's that one company's goal is to, I guess, put beta cells back in. And it's just a really interesting conversation beta cells back in and protect your, your immune system from going back against you again, they're also talking about long term inoculating people, for many of the viruses that end up kicking type one in so the idea is maybe you'll have the genetic predisposition to it. But if you never get Coxsackie virus or you never get this virus or that virus, then you might have a chance of never getting type one. It's interesting like prevent like preventative type one by preventing other things that aren't type one, which I thought was kind of interesting anyway it's a really cool this is cool,

Heidi Wickstrom 44:53
but yeah, so anyway, I you know, I keep my eye on them, but I, you know, I watch for having to use the bathroom too much or

Scott Benner 45:00
Be honest with me. Be honest with me. They crested the age that you and your father were diagnosed that so you feel better about it?

Heidi Wickstrom 45:09
Well, my son's not well, he's 10. Yeah, he's right. Yeah, I mean, I guess I do. I probably do. Yeah, I definitely remember them being that age and thinking, No, this was when, you know, I probably said it

Scott Benner 45:20
to them. You're about to get diabetes for your birthday congratulate. And

Heidi Wickstrom 45:24
I just, you know, your mom was going through at this time, and you're complaining about whatever?

Scott Benner 45:31
Yeah, I think parenting magazine says not to guilt your children like that about. Right. But I have described there was, there was a couple of times where my wife was like, you know, the fact that your dad would hit you for saying that and you haven't hit our children for it's not something you're supposed to tell them. Okay. But I just wanted to know that if they would have said that to my dad, they'd be, they'd be across the room behind the sofa, wondering what happened to them. Right. So, and again, I realized that's wrong. Don't get me wrong.

Heidi Wickstrom 46:01
Yeah, no, no, of course. Oh, my gosh.

Scott Benner 46:05
But yeah, I don't do that anymore. But I had to do it a couple of times. I was like, because it's hard not to feel like you have no idea what would have happened to me if I would have said that to somebody.

Heidi Wickstrom 46:16
No, I I've definitely said that myself to my, to my son, for sure.

Scott Benner 46:20
Again, I don't think you're supposed to but whatever. Now who knows really? What's your care like today? What are your outcomes like today?

Heidi Wickstrom 46:30
Well, okay, so, since I started the pump, I've never Okay, so since I started the pump, I have never been lower than the sixes from a onesies. Okay, so 20 years, but since I started the Riley, I'm in the fives.

Scott Benner 46:45
Okay, so you're looping and you're in the fives now? Yeah. How often do you think you're low that needs intervention? Under 5050? And under like that kind of low?

Heidi Wickstrom 46:56
Oh, that needs intervention. You mean like, besides me just eating a sugar pill? Or what do you mean? No,

Scott Benner 47:01
that's what I mean. Like you having a long thing. Like where the loop doesn't catch.

Heidi Wickstrom 47:05
Oh, last night was the cluster. I had a real bad night last night. Because of I don't have my glucose tabs, because I have glucose tabs I dialed in. Like, I know exactly how many I need depending on the number and if I have any insulin on board, or whatever. But last night, I went for the orange juice, which was a mistake. Because I never really know how much I need and I just kind of you know into middle the night so drink down and then loop sees my sugar spiking and then gives me insulin and then I ended up crashing. And I did take have some more and then I crashed. It literally happened. I feel like all night last night.

Scott Benner 47:39
Particularly couple minutes picking insulin, orange juice. Can we pick through this for the last couple minutes? Do you mind? Well, no, he wouldn't be insulted by a person who doesn't have diabetes talking to you about All right. Thank you. Okay, so how often do you get over 200? Daily? No, weekly. Maybe do you Pre-Bolus Now, you know what the problem is? No, you don't Pre-Bolus You have to prove off.

Heidi Wickstrom 48:13
If I bet if I Pre-Bolus and I'm already 75 I'm going to crash

Scott Benner 48:17
because your settings are wrong. You're probably too strong. What am I guessing here? Your Basal maybe is too strong trying to make up for the fact that you don't Pre-Bolus and that you're higher during the day than you want to be because you're not Pre-Bolus thing so if you had your so if your Basal was right and your insulin sensitivity was right, you would not get low over and over again at night. Unless you were busy. unbalancing your meal insulin by not Pre-Bolus Singh. Do you listen to this podcast at all? Yeah, no, I

Heidi Wickstrom 48:50
do I not religiously. I'll be honest. I listened to that's fine. Everyone. Oh, yes, they do. That's fine. You Jenny I listened to I see.

Scott Benner 48:57
Okay, so. Oh, it's interesting.

Heidi Wickstrom 49:02
Okay, so can I tell you something though? I

Scott Benner 49:04
am your thing. Yeah. I'm sorry. Yeah, go please.

Heidi Wickstrom 49:09
Okay, um, every night like I have a bedtime snack. I just do. So if I decide to try something different, which I did last night, it can go to hell. So like I had a you can bar ever heard of a you can bar? No. It's supposed to be a long. It's a carb stabilizing starch. It's literally meant for like long term blood stabilization. Okay, and I remember last time I had one, that it didn't work the way it's supposed to right is supposed to be long absorption, right? So we Okay, well eat this. It was 20 grams. My pump went to give me 1.4 And I said, Nope, I know that's too much. I gave myself one unit. And I gave it a long acting I just put four hours because literally it was kind of like a cuz I hadn't had it and gosh, couple years. So I'm like, I'm just gonna give it a you know, see what happens. So what happened was just like I assumed it would I crashed and right away like it will actually sorry, it absorbed right away. And so I got high and then I went really low because it corrected while I was sleeping. And then that's what I had the orange juice, I had too much orange juice and then went high. And that's the thing with that link the Riley I don't really understand or is when I tell it, I've had the orange juice, then it doesn't work out. But if I ignore that I corrected my low.

Scott Benner 50:42
Yes. So I will tell you that if Arden is you know I'm saying if Arden's getting low or low, and I use some fast acting sugar to fix it. I do No, I do not put those carbs in the loop. Okay, so if she's 60, diagonal down, and I'm like, Here drink a juice, and the juice is 12 or 15 carbs. I don't I tell it nothing. Okay, then if she reaches the threshold, which I think on her pump is like 95. So she gets like 95 diagnose, it'll make like small bonuses or, you know, it'll jack up your Basal depending on what version you're using. Yeah, and but yeah, I would never like it's 65 Diagonal down, say Bolus 12 units for this juice. Not right, because because we've made a mistake in the past. And she has too much insulin. Yeah, we need to balance that back out again. But But what I'm saying is this is like so on a good night. Where did you? Where does your blood sugar sit? Stable? Oh, at? Cool. And am I allowed to ask how much? Why? Yeah. 120. Okay, what's your Basal right an hour?

Heidi Wickstrom 51:51
My wait an hour, your Basal rate? Oh, you want to know all of them? I mean, they're all different. See? A lot of them. Why do you

Scott Benner 51:57
have so many? I don't like that. Well, what

Heidi Wickstrom 52:02
can I tell you and I pretty much a creature of habit, which you kind of have to be right. But um, so I'm gonna open this up. Um, so, okay, so I wake up at 7am I have a cup of coffee. And then I work out I literally fast. And I don't probably eat till 10 or 11. Okay. So and that's the norm for me. So, um, so I workout fasted, I'm fine. And then I eat. And that's just the way it is. So anyway, so I do feel like sometimes that doesn't happen. Obviously, it affects my day, but so my rate starting it, where you need to start. Oh, started midnight. Okay, so midnight, point two. And then I start to get that Dawn phenomenon three, and I go to point four. And then by the time I'm awake, I go up to point four or five. And then by the time I'm ready for food, and I've exercised, it goes to point five, five at 10. And then I'm point five, five till five o'clock. Okay. And then at five o'clock, I'm point six. And then at nine, I'm point four, five. And then I go back to point two at 930. When I go to sleep, we're very low at night.

Scott Benner 53:20
Were you getting you get low overnight when you go to sleep? Well,

Heidi Wickstrom 53:24
um, no, I don't anymore. But I was I've had to, in the past. Say, I've never had a horrible low where I needed intervention from someone else. But it's happened twice in the last four years.

Scott Benner 53:38
Okay. So you've waited night to kind of get in front of that?

Heidi Wickstrom 53:43
Yeah, so my doctor and I just kind of in he's very, he always says, like, you know, more than I do. Right? You know, and so we'll talk about it. He's like, Yeah, just adjust this and that and, you know, or whenever, you know, I basically adjusted on my own. Right. But um, yeah, so nine, I'm very low.

Scott Benner 54:02
Gotcha. So I wouldn't listen, if whatever works, works for everyone listening, but there, you have to, in my opinion, you have to be careful that you're not setting Basal rates that are meant to stop problems that can be stopped in other ways. Okay. Does that make sense? So, yeah, you know, like, already, like, I'm

Heidi Wickstrom 54:21
not taking enough at for a meal or I'm taking too much for a meal. Yeah, right. Or,

Scott Benner 54:25
or you're, I mean, in your case with loop if your insulin sensitivity is too strong in the afternoon, or in the evening, and you're having to dial everything back because you've got too much insulin coming into when you digest your dinner and lay down to go to bed. Then, you know, you don't I mean, like if you're too strong in one place. The way I think of it is that everything you do with insulin right now is for later, but kind of more importantly, think about it like this. Everything you did before with insulin is for now Right. So if you're getting low at midnight? I don't I mean, the common, the common idea would be if you're getting low at midnight to make your Basal lower, maybe at 11pm, right to try to stop that. But but before you do that, I would look at what happens at dinner and the hours before that, like, is there something we can be doing in there better, like more balanced carbs against insulin that would stop a low at midnight, like that's not to say that it wouldn't end up being an 11pm Basal decrease in that situation. But I'd want to really like rip apart the rest of it before I did that, like Ardens, a Ardens. Basal rate is just basically one Basal rate 24 hours day, and then, you know, it's a little lower overnight. And by that, I mean, like 1.2 to one or 1.1 2.9, depending on if she's got her period, or she doesn't like that. Yeah. But whatever works works, but I don't, I would hate to see you. Having all these like Basal fixes all over the place to catch problems that maybe you wouldn't have to have to begin with. And also if your Basal was, if your Basal and your insulin sensitivity was stable, like that you could because you can fast in the morning, you're saying Where does your blood sugar sit in the morning when you're fasting? Right now? I'm

Heidi Wickstrom 56:24
fasting. I'm at 85.

Scott Benner 56:25
That's amazing, right? Like, if you could achieve that throughout the day, then you wouldn't have to be so segmented with what like you said, you said something interesting earlier, that you said like, it was like it was gospel. You have to be regimented. Yeah, but my daughter's day is never the same twice.

Heidi Wickstrom 56:43
Yeah, what's her age two? I think I'm just you know, what? When I was her age, I was a mess.

Scott Benner 56:50
You were Yeah, but I'm saying her blood sugar super stable all the time. If she gets up in the morning and doesn't eat, it's fine. If she gets up in the morning and eats it's fine. Yesterday, yesterday, she had most for lunch. You know, which is terrible. Oh, no bones. Oh my god. It's like text. I don't even know what it is like it was like some bowl with like, beef and tortilla and like cola. Like it's a lot of food. Yeah. But she very easily could have said to me at lunchtime, I'm going to cut up a bunch of carrots. Like she's all over the place without sheets. Yeah. And she's always super stable. But I think it's because their settings are like rock solid. That's good. You don't I mean, I think yeah. See, this is interesting. Because you've had diabetes for a while. Is there is a party who's like, yeah, that's you, not me. You think that right?

Heidi Wickstrom 57:39
Um, no, I just think it's a different. I don't know, like, if I had a pump when I was younger, I don't you know, I don't know. You know, I mean, I just I don't know.

Scott Benner 57:51
No, I don't mean for you to like, go back in time and re

Heidi Wickstrom 57:55
know that. I'm trying to think like when I was that age. And I ate that way. I mean, like, if I ate that way now. Right? ate whatever I wanted. Whenever I wanted, I would definitely that would have to be all dialed in. But because I'm very, like, regimented and scheduled. And you know, I'm saying like, I don't have to dial it in as much because I don't really go off my path very much. Oh, no,

Scott Benner 58:19
absolutely. Yeah. And if that, by the way, if that works, I think that's amazing. You know, I'm not I'm not saying otherwise. I'm just saying for people who are listening. I think there's you don't have to eat, you know, very specifically like that. Yeah, for sure. It's one or the other. But I again, I firmly believe in whatever works is what Yeah, yeah. 100%. And now you're a one season five. That's amazing.

Heidi Wickstrom 58:42
Yeah, it was like five five and my daughter thought that was a little low. Especially because I had a problem. We don't listen to them. Yeah, I like got up one night and hit my head really hard on the dresser and like, it could have been really bad because

Scott Benner 58:57
you were low. Yeah. Oh my gosh, that's Oh, yeah.

Heidi Wickstrom 59:01
I would know is really bad. i And it's funny because I got God. God bless my husband, but he he gets panicky, which I don't blame him, but I can see it even though I can't say anything that inside my head even though I'm really low. I think to myself, like do just calm down. It's fine, but at least

Scott Benner 59:23
you're not thinking I could have chosen better.

Heidi Wickstrom 59:27
Like can you at least make me feel a little better? That'll be okay, cuz you look like you're crazy right now.

Scott Benner 59:32
He just doesn't want to raise those kids by himself. That's all

Heidi Wickstrom 59:34
but no, the next thing I know, I was sitting up on the edge of the bed. I guess I had already fallen. I didn't know I fell, right. And he's trying to shove orange juice down my throat. I'm like, oh, you know, and then I see him struggling with the glucagon and all I could say was back see me. I'm like back see me and I kept pointing to my bedroom, my my bedside table drawer, right? That's the only word that came out my mouth because I saw him like trying to do the glucose I was like, this is not going to happen.

Scott Benner 1:00:02
So you're gonna inject you with glucagon?

Heidi Wickstrom 1:00:05
Yeah. Because I was like, yeah, it was it was bad. And it definitely was From what I recall even though I was like, couldn't speak or anything. I saw what was happening. Does that make sense?

Scott Benner 1:00:16
Heidi? Either you're great at sex make a lot of money or he really loves you. I don't know what but he was in a pack.

Unknown Speaker 1:00:24
Maybe all three, yo, hey,

Scott Benner 1:00:26
nothing to say couldn't be all three.

Heidi Wickstrom 1:00:29
Anyway, he does he gets the vaccine. Yeah. And literally, like within, you know, 10 seconds. It's in my nose. And he felt better. And yeah, but he goes, you fell and I looked, and by the time I came back, oh, and then I was shivering and I was sweating. It was a whole thing. But by the time I could look in the mirror, I'm like, Oh, shit, like, oh, sorry to swear. Um, but I had a huge like, contusion on my head. Yeah, it was pretty easy. Yeah, you fell right there and hit your head on the dresser. And I'm like,

Scott Benner 1:00:57
oh, looking back. Do you have any idea what caused the low?

Heidi Wickstrom 1:01:01
I don't remember now. But I remembered then.

Scott Benner 1:01:07
Some short term memory loss. My memory,

Heidi Wickstrom 1:01:08
by the way is horrible. Like it used to be solid gold. Now it is horrible. There's

Scott Benner 1:01:14
going to be a guy comes on next month and record with me. It's got a lot of a lot of long term issues from diabetes probably grew up a lot like you did. And one of them he wants to talk about is like memory fog and memory loss he has.

Heidi Wickstrom 1:01:29
Yeah, that's the only thing I have not gone when Yeah, that's really someone. Well, besides No, I had an issue. I was pregnant, but I know we probably are done, but I have a lot of other stuff.

Scott Benner 1:01:39
I have a lot of other stuff. Alright, well, listen, we're already over on time a little bit because it's 20 minutes to get on. But what give me What's one more fun problem, you know, seriously, what did you what happened?

Unknown Speaker 1:01:51
What negative stuff?

Scott Benner 1:01:53
Yeah, maybe we should ask you Does anything good happen to you? You live a nice life. You're You're happy, right? You have good family? Like you're? You're doing hockey? I?

Heidi Wickstrom 1:02:02
Yeah, I can exercise. I mean, I have all my limbs.

Scott Benner 1:02:07
What did you? Well, listen, that's a real perspective. When you watched your father lose a leg, right?

Heidi Wickstrom 1:02:12
I know. Yeah.

Scott Benner 1:02:14
Is there? Are you more of I guess, what am I trying to ask you like his attitude? A big part of it for you? You seem like you have a good attitude about it.

Heidi Wickstrom 1:02:27
Yeah, I mean, I don't, I've never gone. I mean, I think maybe I've had a couple of breakdowns in 40 years, where I'm like, this just isn't fair. And you know, but that's usually when I'm high. You know, like, it feels awful. And it won't come down and I'm hungry. You know, like one of those moments. Yeah. You're like, Why me? I just wanted to eat and I feel, you know, but no, otherwise, I'm like, it's really not that bad.

Scott Benner 1:02:52
diabetes, not that bad. Really not

Heidi Wickstrom 1:02:54
that bad. It's a t shirt. And I really keep most of it to myself. I mean, I you know, it's like a hidden disease. What do they call that? Like, no one sees it. So besides stuff on your body now, but

Scott Benner 1:03:06
well, your dad wasn't your dad wasn't telling anybody about it really wrote, right?

Heidi Wickstrom 1:03:10
No, yeah. No. So it's kind of it's just something you deal with personally. And? And then when really was

Scott Benner 1:03:16
no. And you said earlier? We never got around to it. But there's a lot of people in your life like that. Those kids have type one and you talk.

Heidi Wickstrom 1:03:23
Yeah, yeah. In fact, I feel like in the last few years, I I've gotten phone calls from friends will say you'll never believe it. My daughter was just diagnosed or my son was just diagnosed, and I'm the first person they call.

Scott Benner 1:03:35
What's the first thing you think to tell them? Oh, it's a great question. Oh, my questions have been great. Heidi, this one? There's no reason to just go out this one.

Heidi Wickstrom 1:03:51
I mean, I think they usually do all the talking. But

Scott Benner 1:03:53
Oh, so you're sort of like you listen, and then you say things like, look for a POM. Try to get a CGM. Don't worry.

Heidi Wickstrom 1:04:01
And they're usually already on top of that, you know, like there. Yeah. Because the chalk hospital here is really good. Okay. Children's Hospital.

Scott Benner 1:04:10
So I think they're looking for more like, community connection. Like people. Sure.

Heidi Wickstrom 1:04:15
Yeah. We have a big type one Facebook group and just in my, my city here. Really? Yeah. How many people kids we have parties. We hang out. We you know, it's fun.

Scott Benner 1:04:27
Yeah, I tried to rival my Facebook group it what's going on here? It's just for locals. All right. But the weather's nice there. Right? It's yeah, Southern California. Yeah, you might want to have like a diabetes celebrity at one time to talk at one of the events. Great. Or maybe if you can't find one of them, and that's coming. I just want to go somewhere warm or it's not here. But that's pretty much all like, Yeah, you

Heidi Wickstrom 1:04:52
should probably come here. Pretty nice. It's I just got back from Hawaii, so I can't complain.

Scott Benner 1:04:56
Wow, it's June 21. here and I walked outside and that's it. Go Okay, the humidity is here already great.

Heidi Wickstrom 1:05:02
Terrible. Like Scott, you'll never believe it. But it's June 21. Here too.

Scott Benner 1:05:05
I know. But this is not for you. It's for the people listening when they hear it. And it's like, oh, sorry, November and they're like, why is he talking about it humid?

Heidi Wickstrom 1:05:14
Yeah, I'm talking to Hawaii. She's like, why is she going to Hawaii and Christmas? Yeah,

Scott Benner 1:05:17
exactly. That's it. I look at you just waiting around like a lion tries to pounce on me. If you make a mistake. I'm going to call this grandma Heidi, if you don't watch it. Oh, I don't even know what to call this episode.

Heidi Wickstrom 1:05:32
You'll find some tidbit that you like, move on. It's not a pig bovine

Scott Benner 1:05:36
is not a pig. That's pretty good. Right? Look if you're producing good job. Well, I do really appreciate you doing. I enjoyed your note when you said, when you filled out the thing and it says, you know, tell me a little bit about why you want to come on the show. And you're just like, Oh, no. Like, I can almost hear you mumbling and you're writing and it's gonna it'll be good, like, people diabetes will help somebody like, right? You'll make it work. I actually think there's a sentence in there. That is like, Scott, I'll make it work. Don't worry, it'll be fine. That's like, Okay. And then I had to put you off once, which I want to apologize for

Heidi Wickstrom 1:06:16
now. It's fine. I'm sure there was someone bigger and better.

Scott Benner 1:06:19
And my son went on a trip that needed my attention. And I had to clear a week away. And it was during your time, so I was actually out on that coast at the time. Oh, well, up in Washington morn like Seattle ish. But yeah, yeah. I appreciate very much. I know it sucks to have something moved like that. No, it's fine. But you paid me back this morning with your technology. So sure. Did we're even now.

Heidi Wickstrom 1:06:42
Now I have to go for a walk. See?

Scott Benner 1:06:45
Yeah, I listened that people don't understand because it wasn't recorded that your idea was to go for a walk and talk at the same time, which I've done with people before. But you just I don't know. The cell service just wasn't what must be. Yeah, I missed your headphones. Maybe it was your headphones. Actually. I don't know. You. Listen, you could afford to go to Hawaii. Let's replace that stuff. Okay, did

Heidi Wickstrom 1:07:07
I just hop on my peloton. Now?

Scott Benner 1:07:10
Is this some like white lady like, brag what's going on here? I'm just trying to be funny. I love you guys.

Heidi Wickstrom 1:07:18
I think everybody can walk. If you have legs. Go for a walk people. That is my advice today.

Scott Benner 1:07:22
10 minutes that your heart rate up three times a week. Isn't that the vibe that they say? Just 10 minutes? at a very minimum, get your heart rate up for 10 minutes, three times a week. And that's the very minimum but and that's super easy to accomplish with

Heidi Wickstrom 1:07:35
walking. Yeah. Or if you're married anyway.

Scott Benner 1:07:38
Just yesterday. Oh, I think you were saying sex. I was thinking arguing.

Heidi Wickstrom 1:07:42
Sorry. I was being clean.

Scott Benner 1:07:46
I guess you could do that without being married to right.

Heidi Wickstrom 1:07:49
That's true. I'm sorry. I was just for the children out there.

Scott Benner 1:07:52
There are kids. Mary, I have to be reminded once in a while the children listen.

Heidi Wickstrom 1:07:57
Yeah. Well, especially when my mom friends. If I say I'm on here, guess who's gonna listen their children?

Scott Benner 1:08:03
Oh, are they really? Oh, so. So So and Heidi jumped on here to tell us our legs, you're gonna get your, like the Ghost of Christmas Future over? Ooh. No, no, that won't work. Not happening to me. It's not gonna you know what the truth is, is as really genuinely sad as what has happened, you know, to your father. Yeah, that outcome is going to be incredibly uncommon moving forward for people who have Yes, technology and the idea of how insulin really works. And it's just a it's a bygone era. Not that I guess it couldn't happen. No, it is, but it doesn't need to happen anymore. And it's it's certainly not going to happen as frequently as it used to. So

Heidi Wickstrom 1:08:44
and in fact, that's that's reminds me that's probably exactly what I tell people that are first diagnosis that Oh, my God, all this technology. They're going to be fine. You know?

Scott Benner 1:08:52
Yeah, I agree. I don't know why the serious episodes make me feel the most jokey. But obviously, it makes you uncomfortable. Probably. I'm not making light of.

Heidi Wickstrom 1:09:02
I'm like that too, though. I always use humor. Instead of

Scott Benner 1:09:05
Yeah, well, we were a real great match here because we were both doing the same thing. Like no one was being an adult. While we were talking about like the sound of circular saws and hospitals we've got that is really a great story. It is a good story. It's odd timing. All right.

Hold on. I'd like to thank Heidi for coming on the show and telling her story. And of course, thank touched by type one for sponsoring this episode of The Juicebox Podcast. I would like to remind you to check them out on Facebook, Instagram, and it touched by type one.org. Also, remember that I also want to remind you that I have a website juicebox podcast.com and a Facebook page with over 18,000 members Juicebox Podcast, type one diabetes, the Facebook page is completely free. I just reached And we've found out that people charge for that. There's no charge to be in the Facebook group. Just go use it, enjoy it, meet other people who have type one for adults and parents. There's a beautiful little hodgepodge in there. You might like it

I wish you could be in my head right now. I'm trying to decide if I'm going to go back and edit out where I went live bla bla in between those. I'm not I'm leaving then I don't care. I mean, it's not that I don't care. It's just, I don't know how to put it to you. It's not that I don't care. It's that I. I don't think it matters. Like I don't think you're right now going, Oh, how unprofessional of Scott. I just don't think you mind if you don't mind. Doesn't matter, mind over matter. I don't think that's what that means. But anyway,

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#602 Beth from Episode 23

Beth was recently diagnosed with type 1 diabetes, she is the mother of a T1 and a former podcast guest.

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

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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 602 of the Juicebox Podcast.

I don't normally like to date the episodes, but I am recording this for you on December 27 2001. By recording this I mean the ads I think the actual recording was made some months ago. But I'm telling you because today's guest is Beth. Beth is a newly diagnosed type one who is also the mother of a child with type one diabetes. I know that Beth is the mother of a child with type one, because on July 7 2015, she and her then husband were guests on the 23rd episode of my podcast. While that sinks in 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 health care plan or becoming bold with insulin.

This episode of The Juicebox Podcast is sponsored by touched by type one, please visit them at touched by type one.org. Or find them on Facebook and Instagram. Touched by type ones mission is to elevate awareness of type one diabetes, raise funds to find a cure and inspire those with diabetes to thrive, you should check out what they're doing at touched by type one.org.

Beth 1:56
I'm Beth and I have a son who was diagnosed with type one diabetes six and a half years ago when he was two years old. Four weeks before his sister was born. And I was diagnosed with type one diabetes six months ago when I was 38.

Scott Benner 2:14
Whose high alarm was that yours or his? That was mine. Are you nervous?

Beth 2:20
I'm a little bit.

Scott Benner 2:22
You shouldn't be though, right?

Beth 2:24
I shouldn't be because I've done this once before, but yeah, I don't know.

Scott Benner 2:30
Well, don't worry about that. Take care of your blood sugar if you need to. There's so much to ask here. Where do I start? Um, you're like one of daddy's friends before the divorce kind of thing. Like I You're like you were on the podcast in the very, very beginning. Am I wrong? Like

Beth 2:49
yeah, that's that is very accurate. I think I was. I don't know if they missed 30s I think I want to say, but I can't really remember.

Scott Benner 2:58
I think so too. It was far enough back that the naming system I had for it was different. And so I can't it's not even easy for me to figure.

Beth 3:10
We were we were Jack's mum and dad. I do remember that.

Scott Benner 3:13
Okay, hold on a second. Wait, no, hold on a second. Yours was 31. This is super interesting. Episode 31 was called PI attack. Because of you know, because your married name.

Beth 3:29
Nope, that's not me.

Scott Benner 3:31
Hold a second. That's not you. That's not me. Let me Google some more. All right, hold on a second. I'll find it. I'm so bad at searching my own blog. That's crazy. I should be better at this. I just did like your first name was like a pop right up. I was like, this is definitely it. What do you think the title was?

Beth 3:52
I think I think it was Jack's mom and dad. Jack's Dad and Mom. Because both me and my ex husband were on at the same time. We were still married at the time.

Scott Benner 4:03
I have it. I have it. 23 Oh my god.

Beth 4:08
Oh my gosh.

Scott Benner 4:10
I remember you. Oh, my Wow.

Unknown Speaker 4:15
This was hoping that's a good thing,

Scott Benner 4:17
of course is July 2015. And it's June 2021. Right now.

Beth 4:24
It's been a wild six years.

Scott Benner 4:26
I was gonna say that six years ago. You totally took away my my joy of knowing how many years it's been since 2015. Don't don't apologize, but even crazier. There are two people named Beth that were on the show in the beginning who I don't think are married anymore. Oh, do you think oh, it was bad luck for women named Beth.

Beth 4:50
Or good luck.

Scott Benner 4:51
Oh, never mind. Good riddance.

Beth 4:56
Well, I'm not gonna throw anybody under the bus. You can't stand up here and find themselves, but you know, I'm in a better place

Scott Benner 5:04
for you. Alright, well. So this is I hold on a second. This is completely fried my mind. But I'm together now because in my heart, you were the other Beth. Let me just say this before we move forward to the other bath. I'm glad you don't have diabetes. But in my mind for the last six months you have so I don't know if she still listens or not, but that that is absolutely crazy. Okay. All right. So a lot has happened since then. So when you came on six years ago, you had two fairly small children. Is that right?

Beth 5:39
Yeah. Yeah, cuz Jack Jack was two at the time, or two and a half by that point. And Abby was not even four months, I think.

Scott Benner 5:53
Okay. She's, I have a picture of her. She's super tiny in the photograph. So

Beth 5:58
yeah, yeah, that was her newborn picture. And so yeah, she was she was teeny tiny.

Scott Benner 6:03
So back then Jack was to tell me again, how old he was two and a half and how long he had he had diabetes at that point.

Beth 6:13
Six months? Wasn't even. Yeah, it was like, it might have even been five

Scott Benner 6:18
was like any good at the podcast back then. Oh, yeah. It was a really? Oh, thank you. That's nice. I was certain you would say no.

Beth 6:26
No, I absolutely. I absolutely love listening and had it not been for the divorce happening a year later. I would have continued to listen, but it just kind of got to be too much. But I have caught up on four years of podcasts in four months. So

Scott Benner 6:45
well. Thank you. I just announced today on the Facebook machine that the podcast is currently averaging three and a half downloads per minute. That is awesome. I want six bath. I just

Beth 7:00
I mean, you You are the constant overachiever. So

Scott Benner 7:03
I it's funny. I don't think I overachieving anything but this I think of myself more as competitive with myself. So every time I see the number, I'm like, Ah, but couldn't it be more? And, and then I get like, I think of ways to reach more people. And but it's least it's a nice thing that competitiveness gets used in a good way. Which is

Beth 7:23
Oh, absolutely, yeah. Cuz I can. I like, especially these last, like, since I've started re listening again, I'm like, Oh, this is like getting therapy on an extra day.

Scott Benner 7:35
Oh, thank you. I should charge for that. $40 a month Patreon. There you go. I'm definitely that sounds horrible to me. Although there was somebody who came to me the other day, you know, there are business people who see that you have a popular thing. And they'll come to you and say, here's how you can monetize your ideas. And I'm like, Thank you. No, thank you. Like, I have to say, No, thank you to a lot of people. Right. But one of them was one of them said, Imagine if you would charge 50 cents for a download, or $5 a month for each person listening. And I said, I can't imagine that. Because if I stop and think about that, that will make me want to do that. Because I would like to retire to someday. So I'm like, Please don't tell me about that. I'm like, I very badly want this show to remain free to the people who are listening to it. So no, thank you. And please, please, I can't hear you. I can't hear you.

Beth 8:27
But what I'm just I think I would speak for probably most of the people listening or or all of them wanted to say we can't thank you enough. I mean, it's just it's it's not just a management podcast. It's it's a humanitarian.

Scott Benner 8:54
Hey, we might get good. I'm almost like Nelson Mandela for diabetes, you're saying? I mean, you're like, No, I'm not.

Beth 9:02
Pro tide bit. I mean, that might be going at TED,

Scott Benner 9:06
Nelson Mandela's a little too much of a shining star in this scenario. Hold on a second,

Beth 9:10
maybe a hair's breadth too far. But it's, it's it's a welcome reminder that we're not alone. And that we all have struggles, and that we all have struggles outside of diabetes, right? It's just like, it adds to it. Right. It's, it's the one more thing that nobody really wants one more thing to be. Well,

Scott Benner 9:34
I'm super happy that it provides that for you. I'm going to ask you one difficult question so that we can leap forward and ask the rest of them was the dissolving of your marriage to do in any way with diabetes?

Beth 9:47
I had a feeling that would come up. Um, I can't say that it. It was specifically to that there were a number of other probably more more heavily contributing factors. But from my standpoint, there were I can't say that it wasn't, but not directly.

Scott Benner 10:10
Wow, you just talked all the way around that path. Okay, so I'm not asking your personal I don't want to like you understand I'm not asking for your personal details, like right about your divorce. I just want to know, did diabetes add? Is that what you're saying that it added stress on top of an already stressed issue? Yes. Okay, that's fair, I would think that it's added stress to all of us. And that there's like four people listening right now that like, my life is perfect. So diabetes wasn't that much worse, and everyone else feels that exact way. So I just didn't want to gloss over it. Because if I was listening, as a listener, I'd wonder the whole time. And I didn't want people to be wondering when I started asking you really other questions that I'm super interested in? So first of all, how is Jack doing?

Beth 10:57
Jack's doing good. We've, you know, we did struggle for a while and his agency to get up into the nines. Unfortunately, you know, there's all kinds of ways that I could talk around that, but life is distracting. And we were able to refocus, and he's now back down to 7.1. So hopefully, we'll get him under the sevens. And then within the within the year,

Scott Benner 11:27
did it become I don't want to, I don't want to attach it to something meaningless. But again, all of my examples that popped in my head are always stupid, but give me a second. So what I was thinking was, is it like when you want to do the laundry and mop the kitchen floor today, but the laundry ends up being slightly more important, so you don't mop the floor for six months? Kind of okay. So

Beth 11:52
so it's, it's, it's also one of those. You know, I acted as a single mom for, you know, a number of years. And and I, you know, I worked full time. Yeah, right. Around single, you know, single mom, me wasn't even two. It just kind of got lost in the mix. And I probably slept through more high alarms overnight than I had prior. Prior to

Scott Benner 12:29
Gotcha. And that's just the, the function of you need to get up and go to work in the next day, or you guys are gonna have bigger problems is that feels right.

Beth 12:37
Yeah. I mean, there's that.

Scott Benner 12:40
Any sadness on your part? After thing?

Beth 12:49
In regards to what

Scott Benner 12:50
did you did you go through a period of like, feeling down after the divorce? Or was it invigorating? My, I only have my mother's divorce to draw from my mom acted like she was okay, but seemed pretty sad, got thrust into a full time job that she didn't have prior to that, and then seemingly ignored everything around the house, because that was pretty much all she could handle. Right.

Beth 13:15
So I think, for me, it was just kind of, I threw myself into survival mode almost. And so there wasn't, I think any grieving that I did I did prior to the divorce. Okay. Because I had hit a point to where I I had done what I felt I could do, and I was, I was just done. And so that grieving process, for the most part happened up to the point to where the papers were signed, and then it was kind of a, you know, take a breath and

Scott Benner 13:59
move forward. It was kind of processed for you by then. Yeah, got it. Kids went, stayed. Did you have to change homes? Or did you get to stay where you were?

Beth 14:09
We did. So we sold the home that we were in and then I moved to a townhome for about a year. And then my current husband and I, we weren't married at the time, but we we went ahead and bought a house together. Yeah, and so yeah.

Scott Benner 14:31
I'm sorry. I know this is all incredibly difficult, but you must have known that when you reached out right.

Beth 14:36
Oh, yeah, no, I mean, I like I'm, I'm prepared. Like i i Don't you know, you can try to make me cry.

Scott Benner 14:45
Do you think I'm trying to make people cry? Most not to cry myself.

Beth 14:53
Although I'm sure it would do wonders for ratings. So

Scott Benner 14:55
I listen. We're not gonna make you cry. Just some where people will listen. But if that's gonna work, then we'll just, we'll pick a time in every episode and people cry together. It'll be nice. So, okay, so during this kind of transitional period would, would you say you lost focus on Jax diabetes? Or how do you describe what happened as you drifted away from where you were to where you ended up? And then what? What made you like kind of go? I gotta move this now that direction?

Beth 15:28
Yeah, so part of it was certain aspects had kind of been moved out of my realm of overseeing. Right. Like you probably should not text your ex husband at two in the afternoon and say, Hey, more insulin. That's not going to be taken. Well,

Scott Benner 15:55
does he respond back? You left me?

Beth 16:00
I never tried it. So I don't know. I

Scott Benner 16:03
see you weren't certain where it was gonna go see. So people who did not grow up in a divorce, like householder probably not going to see as much humor in this as I do. But so Jack spent time with his dad and he spent time with you. There was one set of management with you and one set of management with his father. Is that fair? Correct.

Beth 16:26
Correct. And then on top of that, he also started daycare about a month after we moved, and that took some adjusting on their part as well. Now they were they were super cooperative and very vigilant. But a lot of daycares use a lot of processed food. And then they also have snacks of things like you know, Pop Tarts or let's make fruit kebabs or you know, how many cards can we shove into your kid at three o'clock and then you're going to try and feed them dinner at 530

Scott Benner 17:07
we like to make him sleepy for the end of the day so they don't fight putting their coats back on. What we do is we pack them full of carbs and then they just kind of slow down a little bit they're less onry Yeah, I It's crazy knowing what daycare costs that that wouldn't at least come with like something that wasn't a pop tart. Terrible and you're stuck right like I think that's important for people to remember is that you're not like you're not the queen of like Wales or something I'm sure that Wales doesn't have a queen but they must have a princess or something like that. And like you're not like sitting on a pile of gold trying to decide what to do next with your fancy like you're you're out busting your ass you got a job you're trying to like keep all this stuff up in the air trying to have like a life for yourself like there's a lot going on in the tiny little space and time and so as it drifts up as a once he goes up and up are you thinking like how does it does it happen so incrementally that you don't feel it? Is it like gaining 10 pounds?

Beth 18:12
Oh no, no. Well, I mean for me gaining 10 pounds i i feel gaining 10 pounds. Um but there's there's a lot of self flagellation that goes along with it of like not doing a good job still not doing a good job Oh, I'm doing even worse job. And that I mean it doesn't really help anything right because it's still not solving the problem. Um, you know, and probably within the last two years is when we've really started to see his agency come back down so there was there was probably a two and a half year time period where it it went up and I just said That's That's enough. Like I just can't We can't keep doing this. And

Scott Benner 19:06
what's the fix then? How do you how do you jumpstart it

Beth 19:17
one meal at a time. Um, I mean really, it was just let me see if I can get one meal down. Let me just see if I can get a dinner and okay, well he's he's going to bed at a stable rate. Okay, let's see if we can get him to stay stable overnight. Which and

Scott Benner 19:44
I'm sorry, I didn't mean to cut you off. No, no, that's

Beth 19:47
fine. Um, it's just the the once you want once we got him in range, right. It's easier to keep him in rage. But the the problem was, it continues to be right. If something goes a little hinky.

His blood sugar's shoots up trying to get it back down and get it back down safely.

Because when he was diagnosed at two, you know, a half a unit is in is an insane amount of insulin at that age, right? And then, you know, fast forward a couple of years and half a unit is I mean, it's not nothing, but it doesn't do the same thing. Alright,

Scott Benner 20:45
I have to say something, and then I'm going to ask a question. And please, I am not making fun of you. It's just so worth pointing out a couple of minutes ago. You meant self flagellation, which you know, means to inflict, and you say, self flagellation, which I think is something about farting. So it's very possible, very possible that you may have inadvertently named your episode, self Angelus.

Beth 21:14
Hi, Dan, because I actually had a good one in the back of my head, you're

Scott Benner 21:18
gonna have to come up with something way better as we move forward to knock that out of my head. Now. Now, speaking of getting something knocked out of your head, it's occurring to me as I'm putting this timeline together, that you have a very young son diagnosed with type one diabetes, in that first year, we all know that time to be chaotic. And then you get divorced, which I'm assuming puts kind of a pause on your ability to dig into the type one. So is it almost like when your head comes up above water? Is it almost like he was just diagnosed? Or am I wrong about that? I mean, you still dealt with it day to day, but I mean, if we're being fair, and at the nines, there was some stuff being missed in there. So

Beth 22:03
Oh, absolutely. Yeah. It was going through some of the education again. Right, it was, you know, kind of reintroduction of like, looking at what we can, what I considered to be high, readjusting my expectations. Because, you know, when you're, you know, I guess I kind of only had so much bandwidth. And so then I was hitting that, like, Oh, it's just 180. It's okay. Oh, it's just 200? Well, it's, it's not it's still under 200. It's okay. Right, and then those creep away from you.

Scott Benner 22:48
Yeah, you just keep raising the ceiling.

Beth 22:51
And then I, you know, it was just kind of hitting this point of, you know, that's it, that his agency is not going any higher than this. And we're, we're gonna go about this the way that I was going about it at the beginning, and hopefully we see some more success.

Scott Benner 23:11
And how did that how were you able to impact the split household situation? Or has that changed since then?

Beth 23:17
It hasn't been but you know, my, my husband is really great. He actually helps me manage mine as well.

Scott Benner 23:30
wait to get to that part. Yeah. The only podcast in the world where people are super excited that you got diabetes, but go ahead.

Beth 23:38
Right. Yeah, so he he helps out because he, he's a stay at home step dad. So he helps out with school time, he helps out with after school. You know, he kind of takes care of the overnights for the most part. And so he was able to, you know, because Jack was still the last time that he was actually in a school was first grade. But he was able to call up to the nurse and say, Hey, go ahead and up his Basal and give him a Bolus of you know, point seven five

Scott Benner 24:24
are you supporting at this point? The four of us I've just I spent a lot of time being a stay at home dad feeling like I don't make any money. I always felt I felt very badly about it. But I'm just teasing. I don't think that law I think that stay at home parents do an amazing thing. Oh, yeah, absolutely. Okay, so you're getting help from from another person. Now. How long have you been remarried?

Beth 24:52
Since February. Oh, so coming up on four months here.

Scott Benner 24:57
Oh, wow. It's very new. Congratulations. Thank you. Should we book six months from now? You can tell me about your third husband are there six years?

Beth 25:05
Let's say six years. I want to give this one.

Scott Benner 25:08
Good rule first. Now, that's really wonderful. Congratulations. How did you guys meet? I'm interested in how how you meet during a pandemic and get married.

Beth 25:19
Um, well, we actually, were sort of college sweethearts we did in college for a few months. Kind of sorta kept in touch with each other. Off and on. And as I was going through the divorce, we reconnected and yeah, so we've we've actually been together. Yeah, since later on in in 2016.

Scott Benner 25:51
I see. Oh, yeah. You didn't meet on like, Grindr? Tinder? I don't know. I'm not sure which ones are appropriate for you. But I think there's one now called hinge if I'm not mistaken. Oh, actually interesting. Yeah. Yeah, I should never get divorced as I will not be able to find another human being through an app. That would be a horrifying thing. Can you imagine? Yeah. Is it? Is it hard as an adult with two kids to say to somebody like, Hey, look at me, I'm a package like, is that scary or not with the right person? That doesn't?

Beth 26:23
Um, I don't think with the right person a you know, with with Jordan, it was, you know, all cards are out on the table from the get go. And I was like, Look, dude, I got a kid with a chronic illness that's not going away. So, you know, you want to continue this, you just need to know what you're signing up for. And, you know, I sent him I think like a pancreas and sugar surfing in the mail. Cuz he actually was living two hours away from here as well.

Scott Benner 27:04
Anything in your life easy?

Beth 27:07
No, no, because, you know, when you also second thinking about it, My diagnosis was in the height of the pandemic. Yeah,

Scott Benner 27:14
I just want to know, I was getting ready to jump into that. I felt the vibe. But I want to know is did he? Did you get married? And then you got type one, or did you get type one right before you got married?

Beth 27:29
So I got type one. And when I was in the ICU, and they were asking for next of kin, I tried to put him down. And they were like, What's your relationship? He's my life partner. Yeah, no, that doesn't work. What's your mother's name?

Scott Benner 27:46
We dated in high school.

Beth 27:49
Oh, it's just like, Ah, okay. And, you know, I let him know that and we had kind of been talking about getting married, but then that was kind of the impetus of like, Alright, let's go down to the courthouse.

Scott Benner 28:06
Oh, so wait, so this isn't a good guy. He thought he was gonna get your stuff. I know. I guess that's not it. You wouldn't trade taking care of a kid with diabetes for like a DVD player and 20 movies? Probably I don't think. Yeah. So okay, so how did you alright, I guess how did you figure out you I type one what happened?

Beth 28:26
Um, well, and we actually think that I may have had lotta that I ignored for years. But it kind of started with a yeast infection,

Scott Benner 28:41
as every good story does,

Beth 28:43
right. And I am not prone to yeast infections. I think I've had to my entire life. And this one came on and was not going away. I mean, I think I struggled with this for four months. Wow. And I was seeing doctors, I was I was getting, you know, I was getting antifungal oral medic medicine. I was getting topical medicine. I was getting internal creams. And it just would not go away. And the lab results were not coming back positive for ease. So we kept thinking, I've got cancer. Right? Yeah. And then they re ran the yeast culture. And it came back positive. And my immediate thought was, oh, shoot. sugar feeds east.

Scott Benner 29:55
Did you did you say it out loud. You're like, Hey, I've diabetes. Did you tell somebody or did they figure it out on their own?

Beth 30:04
Well, I, I figured it out. I called Jordan into my office, because I've been working from home. And I said, I, I think this might be diabetes.

Here, he's looked at me and said, Okay, well now like I said, Well, let me test my blood sugar after lunch.

So I had a salad and the world's tiniest cookie. And an hour later, check my blood sugar was over 300. Right? Yeah, check it again. Oh, still over 300

Scott Benner 30:43
Try different finger. Maybe all the sugars in this one finger.

Beth 30:51
Ah. So I call my mom and I'm like, hey, my blood sugar's over 300 I think I have diabetes. And she's like, No, that could be that could be any, any number of things. I'm in a meeting, I got to go by. Okay. So then I call my doctor. I'm like, Hey, ah, so I checked my blood sugar. I had a salad and a small cookie, he's like, You can't check your blood sugar after you've had a cookie. Like

Scott Benner 31:25
cookies, don't make your blood sugar 300. If your pancreas works, I hope everyone understands that even though your doctors and your mother don't seem to.

Beth 31:36
So, so he said, Well, send me a fasting blood sugar in the morning. And this is an empirical question. And I'm a very logical person. Normally, um, and so I'm like, Okay, there's like some facts around this. And he wants to. He wants to measure that he knows his control. So okay. So I struggled through the rest of the day, send him have blood sugar in the morning. And it's 257. I want to say, somewhere around there. And he's like, Okay, well, I'm going to send in a prescription for Metformin for you. And we'll have a consultation tomorrow,

Scott Benner 32:22
even though your kid has type one,

Beth 32:25
if that was what he and I said, so you don't think you so you don't think this is type one. He said no, it nor type one normally presents with higher with a higher blood sugar.

Scott Benner 32:36
Now, if you catch it sooner, right? Well, and

Beth 32:39
the other thing too, which retrospectively, I think had I not already been in? In DKA. I would have thought through this a little bit more. But I had checked my ketones as well. And they were 5.6 on a blood meter. Oh, my God,

Scott Benner 32:58
this guy's sending you Metformin. Where do these? Do they just hand these license out? Now, at this point, are there too many hot colleges making doctors what's happening? I'm an idiot, Beth, let's be clear about that. And I could have diagnosed you off the things you just say. I mean, my goodness, that's terrible.

Beth 33:19
And here's the funny thing. So that was that was a Tuesday. And so I had an appointment with my therapist who happened to have been, who have who did a research project on exercise in diabetes at the Joslin Institute, um, when she was younger, and so I kind of, you know, she had been aware that we were concerned about cancer, and I said, Well, I'm 99.9% sure that I don't have cancer. And she was like, Well, that's good. And I said that I'm 99.9% sure that I have diabetes. And I think if she could have crawled through the computer screen, she probably would have. Because I mean, she was totally floored. And then I told her what was going on. And she said, you don't have type two. She said that this is type two. I'll eat my hat.

Scott Benner 34:17
Yeah, honestly, how long did it take your poor vagina bounce back after?

Beth 34:23
By that time I had been through, I think eight rounds of an oral antifungal in three rounds of creams. And by that time it finally had healed up thankfully.

Scott Benner 34:37
Yeah, I mean, I don't have one but that seemed horrible. So

Beth 34:42
it was it was pretty awful. Like it was I mean, actually it to totally TMI or graphic here but again on my legs that was starting to not be skin anymore.

Scott Benner 34:52
Oh my god. Yeah, it's not like if you break your wrist, you can just put it in a cast and let it heal. You still got to use that thing. Right away. least what basic stuff and hopefully the other stuff

boy, you're quite a catch. I can see how you guys ended up married. This is something,

Beth 35:13
right? I just come with all the bells and whistles.

Scott Benner 35:16
You're like, listen, here's what I have to offer. I got two kids, one of them has type one diabetes. I think I have diabetes. My my hooch is pretty busted up. And. And I'm in a townhouse. So come on over, sign the papers. We must really love you.

Beth 35:34
He's a pretty stand up guy. Yeah, sorry.

Scott Benner 35:37
That's excellent. All right. So you do you even end up in the hospital over this? Or do you even make it the Metformin guy?

Beth 35:43
I do. So I don't make it to that for my guy. Because this is, this is Tuesday. This is 10 days before Christmas, too. Because we don't you think simple here. And I'm, I'm trying to avoid going to the hospital because there's a pandemic going on? Yeah. And I just don't know how much insulin to give myself is really where I'm at. Right? You know, cuz I've got to, at this point, I have an eight year old and I know what works on an eight year old isn't going to work on 38 year old. So I don't really know.

Scott Benner 36:23
Did you just try? Like, I feel like I would try.

Beth 36:27
I probably in retrospect, should I have this hearing what I dealt with at the hospital? Oddly enough, my brother in law three, my husband, his my my husband's sister? Husband has type one diabetes.

Scott Benner 36:47
Brother in law. You said brother in law, which I understood, and then you described it a different way. Right? Yeah. Like my brother in law than you like my husband's sister. Yeah, your brother.

Beth 37:01
There's no blood relation? Like, no, right. Yeah. Um, but yeah, so he has type one. And so my husband is messaging back and forth with his brother in law saying, Hey, he's like, Well, you could always try just give it her five units and see if it drops. And I'm just, you know, and I'm thinking about what five units says to Jack and I'm thinking you're not getting near me with five units. Insulin, I don't know what that's gonna do. And I don't have a continuous glucose monitor. So there's no way.

Scott Benner 37:32
That's funny. That's interesting. I was wondering like, where you would fall? Like, like, how it would feel? That's the part of your story. I think that's, that's we haven't tapped into yet that I'm super excited to talk about, which is did any of what you understood for your son translate to you? Oh, absolutely. Just scaled up. Just Not That day, when you were like, hey, what's great here? Okay, so you end up in the hospital then?

Beth 37:58
So I do, because, you know, it, I had hit a point to where we'd realize that I was, I was too far gone to mess with it at home, I say. Because at that point, we really, I had also dropped about 35 pounds in three months. You know, and I had thought I had been being super healthy by drinking all this water. And that was what was making me pee so much, right? All the classic signs finally kind of clicked. And that was the point to where I just, you know it and I think I'd had a low carb dinner for I'd had a low carb dinner that night, and passed out on the couch. And Jordan just kind of looked at me and was like, you were gonna go to the hospital one way or the other. Even if I had to toss you in the car and then throw you out of it. Into the

Scott Benner 38:58
horn. Come get this one. I'll take the other two. Oh, diabetes and checker which just drove Yeah, fix all the stuff I need and make sure she doesn't die. And they just drove away. Because of the COVID again, yeah, right. Yeah. Okay. So you go into the car.

Beth 39:19
Okay. Yeah. Yeah. So and we had, you know, we're, we're in North Dallas. And so there's a number of hospitals to choose from, right. And so we, we saw one that had an endo attached to it. Is that okay, we'll go we'll go to this one because they have a specialty available, that will probably mean and so I go into the ER, and like I have, I have diabetes, but I don't know what type and I needed diagnosis. Which is probably not the right thing to say but it was really what my brain Get out at that point. And so they're like, Yeah, okay. And the ER comes in. He was like, So what's going on? And I said, Well, I have I tested my blood sugar at home, I have diabetes, but I don't know what type. My son has type one. I'm pretty sure it's type one. But if we could run the antibody tests, that would be great. And, obviously everything else that you guys need to do. And he just kind of looks at me, he's good. Okay, well, we're going to verify that we're gonna run your ad and see like, Okay, sure. And then, you know, they draw blood and have you piano cap and all of this. My agency was 11. So they're like, yeah, you've got diabetes. Okay, thank you. And, you know, and there was, you know, there was glucose in my urine. And I think when they did a finger stick, it was 287.

Scott Benner 41:05
Okay, well, yeah, you had the low carb meal. Right, right. Yeah.

Beth 41:12
And so they, they start getting me hooked up to stuff and I'm still asking for the antibody test. Oh, they'll pull that for you in the ICU. Okay. But you probably have taped to like, and I'm just, I'm sitting there going. Like, I know, I need to lose a few pounds here. But you haven't taken my medical history. Right?

Scott Benner 41:38
It's, you know, it happens to everybody right path, like, I know, just like they go, Hey, you have weight to lose, you have type two diabetes, Hey, you don't have weight to lose. Just can't be type two diabetes, that people are just like, I mean, it must be. Here's what I'm saying. Medical school must be super easy. That's what I mean. I what I'm figuring is I'm a six hour course away from being able to take out your spleen. That's all.

Beth 42:04
That would not surprise me. Yeah,

Scott Benner 42:05
I just need to learn online. Apparently, kids don't even have to go to college anymore. I'm just sitting in this chair away from being a surgeon as well. I'm thinking I don't, I don't know how, with something as prevalent as diabetes, there couldn't be an extra 20 minutes worth of education about it for doctors. I just like put them all on the same page. Like how hard would it be to put everyone on the same page about type one and type two diabetes? Hey, don't judge people by their body shape. Here's how you figure it out. Like I don't know. I don't understand why we can't fix little problems in the world. You know, I'm sorry. I'm sorry, it happened to you. But still,

Beth 42:44
I mean, it. I knew I knew when I went in there. I was like, This is gonna be I didn't think it would be as much of a fight. As it ended up being. Yeah. But I knew that I would have to try and convince somebody. Right. And so they sent me from the ER to the ICU. Because, I mean, I was I was pretty far gone into DK at that point. And my electrolytes were totally out of balance. So they're hooking me up to all kinds of bags. And I asked for the antibody test again. Oh, no, no, we're not going to do that here that that would happen in your regular room. But you've got type two diabetes. Okay, why are you? Well, you're 38. Okay, you can get type one any age and they're like, Yeah, but this this isn't type one, you can get DK and in type two. So I'm just, you know, I'm like, Alright, pick and choose my battles. I'm not going to get anywhere these people find I'll wait until I get down to the regular room get moved down to the regular room. And the overnight doctor was the first one who actually said hey, all of that sounds reasonable. You have a very close relative with type one. You're not overly obese. Um, um, you know that I would be considered obese. Anyway.

Scott Benner 44:21
Knock out the other title with not overly obese.

Beth 44:25
I mean, I'm overweight, but I'm not. I'm also not the picture of a couch potato either, right? Like I I go hiking, I go walking. I am not an inactive person. And so she seemed totally fine. ordered the test. The morning doctor the daytime doctor, remove the orders from my chart. Really, really? That's fine. Top. Yeah, I

Scott Benner 45:01
hate to have to edit that out. But that's really great. So you got to the right. You did. By the way, I appreciate how you handle this. You ask everybody, then you assess who are the decision makers in the room. Recognize that this isn't going to go anywhere. Keep moving. Keep asking find the person who finally makes sense. And then the next chucklehead comes in and takes it off again. Yeah, so your 344 Bed doctor so far. You've er, I see you overnight. Morning. And you found one. Yeah. And the other ones that knocked that one right out of the convention? Yeah. Interesting. Go ahead.

Beth 45:42
So, um, then we move about the day and these they've switched me off, you know, cuz they've moved me out of ICU. I'm no longer on insulin direction. I'm not on pins. So, um, you know, I think the first meal that I ate was a dinner. And I, you know, I said, Okay, how many carbs? Because I'm thinking, I don't know how much you guys are shooting me up with and you guys aren't checking my blood sugar as often as I'd like anyway. So I'm definitely not going to under eat this first go around. And they said 40 to 60. Well, okay, so I'm gonna order 60 carbs because I don't trust a single person in here.

Scott Benner 46:26
Except the guy and he's gone now. Or the way she was the overnight doc, a woman or a man. I'm sorry. It was it was a woman. Okay. She's gone now. Right?

Beth 46:35
Yeah. And so then my, so my blood sugar went high overnight. And they're like, Okay, you know, how much how much did you ask them? Well, you told me to cover, you know, up to 60 carbs. So I ordered 60 carbs. Oh, let's try and knock that down to 40. Okay, so I had an omelette and a bagel for breakfast. And by lunch, my blood sugar went up to 400 something.

Scott Benner 46:59
Yeah, hospital bagels are not even like grocery store bagels. Which are not even bagels. And for those of you who don't live on the east coast, you have no idea what a bagel is. And that's a judgment straight from I really probably

Beth 47:13
don't. It's thinking Siri like, my exposure has been Texas April's Yeah, so

Scott Benner 47:19
it's not even a thing. You don't even understand what you're doing. Right? So it's great. So when my brother tells me he's getting pizza, you're not getting pizza, you're in Wisconsin. Stop it so okay. So they've successfully jacked your blood sugar back up again.

Beth 47:38
I'm blaming me because I shouldn't be eating a bagel. I'm nevermind that they're they're giving me insulin. So I don't think the bagel is the problem. I think it's the lack of insulin. But you know, that's fine. And at this point is when the arguments with the daytime Doctor really start? Because I was very insistent on getting this test. And she just refused to put it. And I hadn't realized that she had removed it from my chart. Or from my orders.

Scott Benner 48:14
Yeah, how would you know?

Beth 48:16
And so, um, I'm, relatively speaking, a fairly mild mannered person. But it hit a point around four o'clock that afternoon during shift change, where there were two nurses, and both of the techs in my room as I was shouting, that if only there was some way to figure out which type of diabetes I have. Oh, right. There's a king test. Why don't you order it?

Scott Benner 48:56
You were yelling this?

Beth 48:57
Yes, with the door open. So I'm sure I was like, very well looked upon by the rest of the hospital staff at that point, but I didn't care. I wanted my test I wanted. The only reason I walked into the ER was to get a diagnosis and to get my blood sugar down. Right. Right. And they weren't really doing either one of those things.

Scott Benner 49:20
They were they still charging you though? I imagine you were getting billed every day. $10,000 a day to be there. Oh,

Beth 49:26
thankfully, I have pretty good insurance. But I did see what the original amount was. And I was like, There's no way your guys are getting that money out of me.

Scott Benner 49:36
No one's paying that for your scattershot help. What what what ends up being like, do you figure it out in the hospital like this somebody save you or how does this end up at an endo?

Beth 49:50
So pretty much what ended up happening was the overnight doctor came in and I'd made so much noise the nurse actually asked her about the The test and she said, Well, I ordered that last night, why wasn't it drawn? So they drew the they put the order back on, and made sure to have the blood drawn before the daytime doctor came in. And she was super thrilled when she found out that I had done this, that I worked my way around. Um, and then I was out of the hospital, I think two days after that. And somehow and during this time, you know, my husband was calling in those around town trying to get me in somewhere. And there was a doctor who could see me first thing in January, I think, I was like, You know what, they're gonna give me enough insulin to get me through January will be fine.

And got out of the hospital on a Saturday. Monday, I got a call from the endo office saying, Hey, we had a cancellation. So tomorrow, can you come in? Oh, heck, yes, I can.

Scott Benner 51:10
You might, by the way, I'm sorry. Are we gonna get to the end of this office and find out that these people are inept, too, or is this somebody?

Beth 51:18
A good story? This is Yeah, no, the end was great. And it was fantastic. Excellent. And so I go in and, you know, I'm explaining to him the situation. He was like, they didn't do any diagnostic tests. And I said, Well, I had to beg and plead for the antibody tests, but it hasn't come back yet. He just kind of sighs he said, Okay, well, we'll order a C peptide. And we'll order an in antibody test. And I got the results from the endo before I got the results from the hospital.

Scott Benner 51:52
I want to jump ahead a little bit, but I do have to ask you, did you ever go to the doctor that cancelled the orders have you sent them like, like a card that says I have type one diabetes, you suck or something like that?

Beth 52:04
I know what I did file a formal complaint against her with the hospital, and I let them know that she misdiagnosed me. Fun times.

Scott Benner 52:11
Good for her. Yeah, try harder. So now, how long ago was this? Six months?

Beth 52:18
Yeah, a little less than six months. But yeah.

Scott Benner 52:21
How is it going for you? What how are you finding the transition for yourself versus what your experience was with your son?

Beth 52:30
So it's been a little, it's had both it's seamless parts, and it's less seamless parts. So you know, once I got the official diagnosis, I was able to go into my endo and say, and actually, when I had gone into him the first time he I said I want to I came in here for two things. I want a diagnosis and a Dexcom. And I left with the Dexcom. Yeah. So that was pretty awesome.

Scott Benner 53:00
Did they give you the whole setup, or did they give you that Hello? Dexcom thing?

Beth 53:04
No, no, they gave me a transmitter and sensor.

Scott Benner 53:07
Yeah, but did it did the box say hello? Dexcom on it. Do you remember? So? Yeah, that's a new program. They have were doctors or have those in their offices? Yeah, that's interesting. Cool.

Beth 53:19
It was it was pretty awesome. I have to say like it was. I was like Christmas came early. I'm

Scott Benner 53:26
actually late because then this all happened six months. Like right but right at Christmas.

Beth 53:30
Right? It did. The Endo. I had my first very first appointment with the Endo, I think two or three days before Christmas.

Scott Benner 53:41
Oh, well. Oh, so that whole story happened very quickly, then. Yeah, gotcha. Okay. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. Well, then Christmas did indeed come early.

Beth 53:49
It is awesome. Like, hey, I can actually eat on Christmas because I can feel my blood sugar is doing it. Now I have an insulin to carb ratio. So I can actually figure out how much insulin I need for stuff.

Scott Benner 53:59
Yeah. Are you using pens though?

Beth 54:01
I am not. That was another issue was that they sent me the hospital sent me home with with pens, but no needle caps. And when they sent the prescriptions in, they send a prescription in for pens which weren't covered by my insurance and did not send in any needle cap prescriptions. So they were super helpful. I ended up having to use Jack's insulin in leftover syringes when when he was still on MDI.

Scott Benner 54:31
I'm just laughing because you just imagined at some point his story, something would go right. And you're down into the nitty gritty now right of like, the the syringes they gave you and you still it's fascinating it really and and I want to bring this up. I've been thinking this for 30 minutes now. You're a younger person who has a child with type one diabetes. Imagine you're 55 years old, don't know anything Think about diabetes, this exact the health thing happens to you. You are in your house right now taking Metformin thinking you have type two diabetes? Oh, yeah. 100 Well,

Beth 55:09
or if I had gone to the hospital, because at that point, I would have been comatose. You know, I've been back in the hospital because they didn't send me home with insulin that I could use or anything to use it with

Scott Benner 55:23
right now. Yeah. You You basically are the, the source of all information in this scenario, right? No one else is helping you. Except the one doctor who apparently they only let work when the sun's not up for somebody.

Beth 55:39
Right? Yeah. Go on her actually talking to the patient. Yeah, right. Good idea.

Scott Benner 55:42
She might she might figure out what's wrong with them. Oh my gosh. Wow. So so you're sorry. Are you using a pump now?

Beth 55:55
I am I Yeah. So I got into an omni pod. I think two days before my wedding. So that would have been February 10.

Scott Benner 56:07
Wow. And your son uses which pump? Omnipod? Oh, you just have a big stack of them.

Beth 56:12
Right? We have interchangeable matching equipment. We use everything the same except for our insulin.

Scott Benner 56:18
Okay. Really? What insulin do you use? So I want Novolog. And

Beth 56:22
Jack, if I'm Hema luck,

Scott Benner 56:24
really? Is that?

Beth 56:26
It's yeah, it's insurance. Funny enough, we both have Blue Cross Blue Shield, but we have two different versions of BlueCross BlueShield.

Scott Benner 56:33
I say? I say Wow. Is it scary? Or giving yourself insulin? Or let me say that in English? Is it scarier? Giving yourself insulin or giving it to a kid?

Beth 56:49
To a kid? Okay.

Scott Benner 56:52
Do you know why? Um yeah,

Beth 57:02
I guess it's the idea of if a train is coming at you, and you can throw your kid out of the way first. That's what you're gonna do. Right?

Scott Benner 57:11
Right. So you feel like if there's the possibility, you're going to make a mistake. You feel less frightened about making it on yourself than on him? Yeah. Okay. Do you use a lot more insulin than he does? Are you honeymoon? Oh, yeah.

Beth 57:25
No, oh, no, no, I straight went to 30. When I was still on NDI, it was 30 units of love Amir. Like from the get go, okay. And, and

Scott Benner 57:40
was that hard for you? Like, because the number.

Beth 57:43
I mean, the first couple of times, I was just like, whoa, this better go right. And then it went right a couple of times. So I was like, okay, you know, I mean, height, weight, age. Here we are. And then it was, I think that also allowed Jordan and I to kind of reassess, like, Okay, this is where we're going like, this is where Jack's going to get to at some point. So we know that there's just going to be incremental increases along the way.

Scott Benner 58:13
Ah, oh, good. So it gave you some insight that because that's where people struggle a lot. Their kids get bigger, and they don't use any more insulin. And they're like, I don't understand his blood sugar's are going up now. Like, well, yeah, weighs 12 more pounds than he did last year. And you're still having 1.35 Basal rate, you know, like, that kind of thing. Oh, so that was helpful eye opening for you for that. Yeah, absolutely. I hear adults all the time. Tell people like with kids who have type one, they're like, Wait till you see how much insulin you use when you're older. It's gonna freak you out. And yeah, you know, what's the biggest Bolus? You've made it a meal? Um,

Beth 58:51
I think I've probably done 25 or 30 units for a meal before.

Scott Benner 58:57
Do you feel like are you like superior in that situation? You like Jack? Look at this.

Beth 59:01
I have shown him a couple of times because, like, he'll see a five unit Bolus. And like, that's a big meal for him. And I'll be like, hey, hey, come here. Look at this. See? Mommy's getting 25 units. I just, you know, big as pastors.

Scott Benner 59:17
We still little too, right. Like, what is he? 10? Ah,

Beth 59:21
he'll be nine in September actually.

Scott Benner 59:23
Yeah, I mean, that's the son still have like a little kid. How Yeah, was it? I just like stuttered through 18 sounds and didn't make one word. Everyone go back and listen that again. I was like, this felt stupid while I was doing it. How's his reaction been to you having type one.

Beth 59:47
So that that's kind of a funny thing in itself. As we were heading out the door to drop me off at the ER because it was a family adventure. I'm here says to me, honestly, Mom, I'm kind of scared. But I'm kind of excited to not be the only one in the house with diabetes anymore. I understand that. And there was sort of part of me that kind of wanted to go, well, Merry freaking Christmas kids.

Scott Benner 1:00:18
Listen, I gotta tell you something, I see where this would bring you comfort, but I'm really hoping it's not that.

Beth 1:00:25
Well, and that that was kind of the other thing, too is, is, I was kind of hoping it was type one. Because I didn't want to have to learn another disease.

Scott Benner 1:00:36
Right? Understand. I

Beth 1:00:38
mean, you know, I know that sounds kind of weird. Because everybody's like, no, no, shouldn't you hope that it takes you because you can make that go away? And I'm like, Oh, God, I've got to relearn everything. If it's that, like, if it's type one, just slap the stuff on me. And let me go. Yeah.

Scott Benner 1:00:53
At least you didn't need a coochie ectomy. Right, yeah, or whatever would have happened. The I don't obviously, know. I'm not an OBGYN. by trade. I have what you might call a tangential understanding of the area, but nothing medical. Yeah, no, I get that like, well, at least we'll have to learn something new is a reasonable like thought, honestly. And has it brought him comfort? Do you think?

Beth 1:01:22
I think so. Um, you know, we were going through some periods where he was screaming pretty loud with his car changes. And, um, you know, I had him do a couple not do my power changes, but I had him activate them. Yeah. And, you know, I would just look at them, I wouldn't make a sound. I was like, Alright, I'm doing this every three days. Why are you screaming? And it's kind of allowed us to kind of reframe some of that for him of, you know, this. It's, it's something that we just have to do. And there's times where it's sex. There's times where it definitely sex. And there are, there have been, I say, there are some days where I don't want to diabetes. And those are the days where, you know, I probably eat more cheese and nuts, and salami, that is really healthy. Um, because I just don't want to mess with my blood sugar. I just don't want to. I know, I'm going to have to eventually because of the protein and the way all of that works. But I don't have to mess with it the way that I would like eating a sandwich.

Scott Benner 1:03:00
Yeah. I mean, I've seen Arvind, do that. Like, just be like, I'm just having a salad for dinner? Because I just, I'm not up for this today. You know what I mean? Like, yeah, I can understand that. Do you ever see Jack do it.

Beth 1:03:16
Um, he hasn't really hit that point. And I think that's because we haven't really transferred any of the ownership of it over. You know, I mean, he's still eight. So we will have him Bolus himself sometimes. But we don't have him try to count off the carbs or anything. Although he did get really excited when I showed him the food library. Up in the dash, because he was like, Oh, I can show this to dad. And now when we get McDonald's, we can just go in here. And I can bring it up down the menu.

Scott Benner 1:03:53
You're like, what? Could you not go to McDonald's? Would that be easier? Please help me someone helped me. Anybody? Help me. It is a nice feature to have that do you find the food library comes pretty close for the carbs.

Beth 1:04:07
It comes relatively close. Usually what happens with us is almost without fail when we're doing this higher carb meals is it'll be on a day where we've had more activity. And so Jack and I will end up you know, snacking on something later. So we're still trying to figure that out. We've done a few family hikes and it took a couple of those for us to kind of really realize okay, we just need to cut the Basal like in half for the duration of this. So it is kind of one of the things where I feel like I'm helping him learn more quicker. Um, because he also sees me doing it.

Scott Benner 1:04:59
I have to be Be honest, I'm just thinking I joked earlier about it, because I was just being stupid. But now I definitely want to keep the podcast going for like six more years and have you back again, because I can't wait to figure out what you guys figure out together. Like as he heads off to college, and right, you know what I mean? And you're like, it's just, it's, it's gonna be like a strangely fascinating journey, especially that you're diagnosed after him. I don't know why I find that to be more like unique.

Beth 1:05:30
It's not super common is is what I've picked up on. It's happened. You know, there's a, there's a few people in a couple of Facebook groups, but it's not super common for whatever and and to have the ages be so spread, right? Because like, you don't have a ton of two year olds being diagnosed. And then you don't have a ton of 38 year olds being diagnosed either.

Scott Benner 1:05:57
Yeah, you guys got both?

Beth 1:05:59
Right. Yeah, I have actually said to people, I was like, Don't try and throw any kind of, you know, numbers or statistics at me because they just don't apply to this house.

Scott Benner 1:06:11
Do you guys have any other autoimmune stuff?

Beth 1:06:15
Well, that's actually why we thought that I might have ended up having lotta that I ignored because I also, within the last six years developed asthma and eczema.

Scott Benner 1:06:29
Yeah, those are both like autoimmune, right? Yeah. Yeah. Interesting. Look at this. Wow. Well, what a little train wreck this is, I enjoyed this conversation very much. Does the kid look nervous? The baby is she like, Hey, you dodged with your diet.

Beth 1:06:50
I mean, she, you know, she don't know.

Scott Benner 1:06:53
But I mean, are you gonna?

Beth 1:06:54
You guys know? She absolutely 100% Like, oh, to say so. So I'm, I've been in counseling for five years, right? And Jackson in counseling for three or four Emmys been in counseling for a couple of years. And I just part of that with me is, you know, I have on top of everything else, I have bipolar and EDD. And so mental health is something that is very important to me. And trying to set the kids up for success with that as well. Because it's, I mean, just the odds are one of them's going to end up with this other fun disease as well.

Scott Benner 1:07:41
Trying to be ahead of it. That's really good. I actually, hey, you know, you're, you've got to be like, I gotta be five or six people deep into type one and bipolar. People just bring like, they just comes up more and more. Have you heard the bipolar episodes?

Beth 1:07:58
I haven't caught up to those yet. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. No, I did. I did listen to Danny's on trauma and addiction. Yeah. Which was super cathartic. That was a really great one to hear. And then I have kind of said, oh, I need to get to these other ones, but I'm very particular and what and listening to everything chronologically.

Scott Benner 1:08:25
I don't want to get in the way your craziness you do whatever you need to do. That's fine.

Beth 1:08:30
We're all a little crazy. It's just which brand are you?

Scott Benner 1:08:33
Whatever works for you. I'm 100%. Okay, with as long as you're subscribed in a podcast app, downloading new episodes and listening, you can do it in any order you want. But and and if Daniel hear this, and he'll be very happy to know that the the episode was valuable for you. But But yeah, I mean, I'm. So what you'll hear me do when they're on is I'm googling you know, at points. And there are doctors who see bipolar as autoimmune kick, you're like why not?

Beth 1:09:09
You know, chunk it in there.

Scott Benner 1:09:11
One of the more recent discoveries in the study of bipolar disorder is that autoimmune disease may play a role in the conditions Development Studies have found that having an autoimmune disease or suffering a severe infection increases the risk of having bipolar disorder. That's all that's all I know. But I all I can tell you is that the number of people who are on the show, who mentioned bipolar, are starting to stack up. So it's sort of like it's not quite up to the speed of like, and I have hypothyroidism. Right. Yeah. Which is just like I bought this purse, and I got this great handbag. To put it in, like a that just seems like at this point, like one goes with the other for most people. Right? It's not quite up to that, but I am noticing people mentioning it. Yeah. Anyway, it's interesting. At the very least Not the people who are fighting with it to them. It's hard. But it's interesting.

Beth 1:10:04
It really is. And I'm actually coming off of this is my last week of a six week leave of absence due to a depressive depressive episode. So

Scott Benner 1:10:15
is it? Can you feel it? Like, I'll let you go after this? Because we're over time. But do you like notice it happening? Are you like, do you feel like warning signs coming? And you can get, like, at least make plans to be ahead of it a little bit? Or how does that work?

Beth 1:10:30
Yes, so some of them I can, um, this last one was pretty detrimental to the point where I, I have been able to sustain most of my mental health for about 10 to 13 years without medication. And the this last episode, I needed to go back on medication. And so that this last one really kind of hit me. I don't want to say out of nowhere, but it was. There wasn't a foreseeable trigger to it.

Scott Benner 1:11:16
Okay. Does the medication impact your blood sugar at all?

Beth 1:11:21
Um, oddly, if it does anything, it makes it easier to control and it drops it. Oh, okay. And that that might also be so I also got, so I'm on an anti psychotic, which I'm sure my exes would all say like, yeah, that fit. So I'm on anti psychotic and a stimulant for a DD. And so it's kind of hard to tell which one is doing, which. But my blood sugar has definitely been easier to get lower.

Scott Benner 1:11:55
Okay. Can I ask one question and then just preface it by saying you don't have to answer it. Like, we can just end up at like, I'll ask it. And if you want to answer it, you can. And if you don't want to answer it, I'll skip to saying goodbye to you. And I'll cut out the part where I asked it. Okay. Did you have some sort of a trauma earlier in your life?

Beth 1:12:14
I actually have complex post traumatic stress disorder. So

Scott Benner 1:12:19
got it. Yes, yes. I see. Alright, because Danny's episode was a weird one to call up for me like it you got that out of you pulled that one out of left field when I was talking while you were talking? And also, if bipolar can be triggered by an infection, you had bipolar before you had type one, which is what made me ask? Yeah, got it. Okay. Wow, Beth, you up for this again? In five or six more years? Sure. Just get you on the calendar right now.

Beth 1:12:52
It seems like we might have to as far out as your book,

Scott Benner 1:12:55
you know? Well, first of all, this won't go up for like six months. And that has nothing to do with you. But do you know that yesterday? Yesterday, June 8 2021. Someone booked a recording for June 6 2022? Oh my gosh. And I felt kind of like, proud when it happened. Oh, yeah. This thing is so busy. People are like, I can do it in a year. I'd love to no trouble at all, knowing full well that they're going to wait a year to say something that won't be heard for 18 for 18 months from the day that I was really touched by like, proud in a like a, again, a humbled way. Like I was really touched by the idea that someone that it would mean enough for someone to be on the podcast for them to go through those kind of machinations to do that is really cool. So I'm glad you reached back out again. I'm super sorry, you got diabetes. But great story.

Beth 1:13:53
Well, thanks. Yeah, no, I'm I did. I did say to my husband, you know, if there was gonna be one of us in the house, to get it to make Jack feel more included. I'm glad it was me.

Scott Benner 1:14:13
Yeah. No, I understand that. Well, you're going to provide a real great comfort for him that you might never fully appreciate. But yeah, he's like his mom. You know what I mean? Right. Yeah, it's pretty great actually, in a really strange way. Not like people talk about diabetes the way I do.

Beth 1:14:32
Hey, you know, I, I always said to dec, everybody's got something we found is out early, and we found out a few of mine a little bit later.

Scott Benner 1:14:42
You know, one day I'll get it and you'll just hear me go kicking and screaming like, when it happens to you. I'm like, you know, it's great that your son's got a it'll happen to me one day and I'll just be on here for three hours just mumbling into the microphone like him. It got me it got me You know, I won't, I won't handle it nearly as well as I talk about it. That's for certain.

Beth 1:15:05
Right? Well, I think if it happened in any year besides 2020, I would have had that same reaction. But given the entirety of 2020. Like, once it hit in December, I was just like, oh, this thing here is yeah, this is this is how 2020 And for me,

Scott Benner 1:15:20
why not? I thought a meteor was gonna hit the house, but this is just as good. Cheese. Wow. Well, you've got the most interesting story at Christmas dinner next year. That's for certain. I mean, oh, yeah. Virtual Christmas dinner? No. Oh, God, I hope that this Christmas, do you know, let me let me I do have to go in a second. Actually. I'm recording twice today. So I have to go collect myself before I do this again. But it's super boring story. I had to replace the pressure valve on our hot water heater yesterday. Those of you who think I'm famous, now realize I'm not. But I met the Home Depot. And I believe I was the only person wearing a mask in Home Depot. And that took me by surprise. I'm vaccinated. But I just like, I was like, I don't know. It's in the car. Like I put it on, you know what I mean? Like, just seemed right. Like I I'm super happy to have not had a cold for the last 18 months really sounds like, you know, Oh, yeah.

Beth 1:16:13
No, no, I mean, you know, there, there are things about the Northeast that I'm very, very much jealous of right now, because I am not. I'm originally from Wisconsin, when Wisconsin was a very blue state. And I currently live in Dallas, Texas.

Scott Benner 1:16:36
Do you think it's do you think it's politically motivated by people's mask wearing?

Beth 1:16:41
I think some of it is. And I think I think here, specifically, it has been okay.

Scott Benner 1:16:50
I have to admit, I pick it up. And I'm like, I don't know if this is really necessary or not at this point. But what the hell? I don't feel right forced to do it. I'm just like, why? I mean, it hasn't bothered me. I've been doing it for a while. It really doesn't bother me. And so, but I'm vaccinated. And I was like, yeah, like, I mean, I don't know. Like, it just didn't occur to me, I'm sure one day it won't. Having said that I was with my son somewhere a couple of weeks ago, in a place where it's like a private place. There weren't a ton of people in it. And you had to prove if you were vaccinated or not. And if you if you were good enough to where I'm asking if you weren't, you did, and I went in there without a mask, and I never thought twice about it. I know. It seems it's all kind of arbitrary. I don't really know how I feel about any of it to be honest.

Beth 1:17:35
Yeah, I mean, at this point, it's, you know, I think I'll feel better about it when I'm able to get the kids vaccinated. Cuz that that's always been, that's always been the leading factor for me is

Scott Benner 1:17:52
is their health right soon, right, though? By age. You can. They're eligible. Right?

Beth 1:17:57
I think. I think Well, Jack will be eligible before Eddie, because he'll be nine in September. But me still six.

Scott Benner 1:18:05
Really? It's Texas, I thought you're allowed to do whatever you wanted?

Beth 1:18:09
Well,

Scott Benner 1:18:10
the one thing you're not allowed to do.

Beth 1:18:12
That's the one thing you're not allowed to do, apparently? Well, I

Scott Benner 1:18:15
think if you could put the vaccine on a bullet, you would be allowed to shoot somebody with a go. That's thinking. I don't know if that would work how the vaccines work exactly. Again, not a doctor. So I'm not

Beth 1:18:26
here on the Juicebox Podcast is medical is should be considered advice, medical or otherwise fairly

Scott Benner 1:18:31
common sense is definitely not medical advice. Well, I really appreciate you doing this and taking the time. I want to thank you. No, thank you very much. It's been a joy. getting back together with you again, I can't believe you were on like, seven years ago. It's insane that I kept this going. But it's even more insane that you're like aware of it still. And that's crazy. Oh, oh, I'm so happy. It's just hard for me to fathom. Like, you have to put yourself in my shoes. Did I mean like, I'm like, I'll do a thing had seven years later. It's like oh, comes out three times a week and listen to like, constantly by like all over the world. And that was I didn't think all that was gonna happen. You know, I definitely didn't think like back then I was I probably was like, I can't believe I trick these people into coming on my podcast and nobody listens to and but but for you coming on you helped build it. But here's a great story. Great stories in the beginning that that helped build the podcast. So it it should be interesting for you to know and then I will let you go. That in the first 24 hours that your episode is out. It will it will be heard more than probably your first episodes entirety. Oh, wow. Isn't that weird? Yeah. The podcast gets more downloads a day now than it would have taken four months in the first year to get as many done I get a day now. That's bizarre, like I'm flabbergasted by it still, like I will never be accustomed to it.

Beth 1:20:08
And still, it's a testament to the good work you're doing.

Scott Benner 1:20:11
I just want more. That's nice you to say, but I just I want, I wanted to reach more people. I want to win. I don't even know what I'm trying to win. Whatever it is, I want to win it.

Beth 1:20:21
You're trying to win diabetes.

Scott Benner 1:20:22
It's probably an illness. that competitive nature is likely. I've probably bumped my head when I was a little kid. But but in honesty, I really if the podcast is helpful to people, then it feels incumbent to try to reach more people. So that's how it feels to me for real one, I'm not joking about it.

I'd like to thank touched by type one.org for being a longtime sponsor of the Juicebox Podcast, and reminds you to check them out on Facebook and Instagram, and go see what they're doing at touched by type one.org. Also want to thank Beth for being a returning guest after seven years, and sharing her story as it grows. Maybe I'm gonna have to have on some more return guests. This was really interesting. I like catching up with that. If you're enjoying the Juicebox Podcast, please leave a fantastic rating and review wherever you listen. And don't forget to subscribe and follow in the podcast app that you're listening in right now.

Thank you so much for listening. I'll be back soon with another episode of The Juicebox Podcast.

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