I have been thinking about starting a blog for some time now to share my thoughts and experiences with type 1 diabetes. I have read quite a few stories and even though everyone has the same disease, everyone's experience is different. I have gained a lot of knowledge from others and it is my hope that others will find knowledge, comfort and hope in my experience with my son, Nathanael.
My son, Nathanael, is 12 years old. On April 11, 2013, our life was forever changed. Our journey started in the Spring of 2013 when my son was complaining each day that his stomach hurt. (Actually, he has been telling me this most of his life.) There were days that he would tell me that he was really dizzy. My son can be very dramatic when it comes to not feeling well. I just passed most of his complaints off and sent him off to school. I started noticing that his grades were really starting to slip. He would be working on projects then end up getting a very low grade. When I asked him about it, he would say that the kids were very distracting in class. He would also tell me that the teachers weren't teaching or explaining things. I didn't really know what to think. My husband and I were thinking that maybe he had attention deficit disorder (ADD). Some of the symptoms he was describing sounded like ADD.
One day in March, he complained yet again that his stomach hurt. So I asked him point blank, what is going on at school that you don't want to be there. He told me that there were some kids picking on him. Great! That we could deal with. So we went to the school and talked to the principal. We got his schedule changed so he wasn't in class with these boys. Next, to be on the safe side, I decided to make him an appointment with a doctor just to make sure nothing was seriously wrong. The doctor asked him some questions and thought that maybe he had some acid reflux. So he gave us a prescription and off we went.
I started noticing almost immediately him drinking a large amount of water. I tried getting him to stop drinking so much water. Because then the next natural event started happening. He starting having accidents during the night. I tried to get him to stop drinking so much water. But he said he was so thirsty. I was curious why the medication for acid reflux was causing him to be thirsty. That was the only change we had made so it made sense to me that it was the medication. I asked a nurse in the office where I work about the effects of the medication he was on. She said that this particular medication would cause low blood sugar. I still didn't make any connection to what he was experiencing was diabetes. Diabetes doesn't run in the family so this was the furthest thought from my mind.
After 3 weeks of washing bed sheets everyday, I took Nathanael off the medication and made an appointment with the doctor. I was going to have proof that the medication was the cause of him being so thirsty. Friday April 11 came and we went to the doctor. As I described to the nurse what we had been experiencing, she then took out a tester to test his blood. Her comment was "Your mom probably knows what's coming." The only thing I knew was they were going to test his blood. I had NO clue why. The doctor came to get us and as we went to his exam room, he asked Nathanael how he was feeling and doing. As soon as the door was closed, he said Nathanael has Type 1 Diabetes. WHAT? I had no clue what it really was, what it was all about, nothing. His blood sugar was 540. Nathanael instantly said, well, I had a cinnamon roll and orange juice for breakfast. The doctor said, this isn't because of your breakfast. He said that we would need to go to the hospital and get checked in and he just went on and on with what we needed to do. We needed to get more comprehensive blood work done. I was thinking, I don't have time for all of this. How long will all of this take, we have state bowling tournament out of town this weekend. We have to bowl. This can't take too long to get started on medication and still be able to go.
The doctor called the pediatric clinic to have another doctor take over care. Luckily I have a friend from high school who was his doctor before. We are now back under her care. We then went over to the hospital and got blood work done. While we were waiting for test results, I took Nathanael to school. While I was waiting at the school, the doctor called. She told me that we needed to go to her office and wait there. We were going to get set up with diabetic educator and get started. The wait wasn't very long and she came in and said yes, he has diabetes. His blood sugar was 586 and his A1C was 12.2. A1C measures blood sugar levels over the previous 3 months. 12.2 is bad. It equals blood sugar of over 300. She said that all his other labs came back pretty good so we did not have to go into the hospital. THANK YOU!
Our journey then began with an amazing diabetic educator. My first thoughts were what am I going to feed this kid? He is going to starve if I have to cut a bunch of food out of his diet. The first thing the educator told us was that he doesn't have to cut anything he just needs to count carbs and take enough insulin to cover the amount of carbs. We had a quick lesson is nutrition, counting, & diabetes. We met with her numerous times within the next week. I'm sure glad about that. Because I wasn't remembering much from the first visit, or the second visit.
That first weekend was tough! We had no clue what we were doing. His sugars were high, we would give him a shot. I was getting up at 2 AM checking his blood sugar and giving him shots. It just wouldn't go down. Then came school. I am thankful for the school nurse. She, and all the fill in nurses, were amazing with him. He spent many hours in the nurses room trying to deal with his stomach aches and high blood sugar. We tried hard for weeks to break the 200 barrier. It was a slow and painful process. I know it was painful for him and his body and it was painful for me to watch him.
He has been such a trooper! From day one, he said I don't like needles. He took the bull by the horns and jumped right in. He has given himself all of his own shots. The only shots I give him are during the night. The first couple of times I checked his blood sugar was interesting. I had no idea where the needle went in. I had to wake him up to have him help me. I am getting much better. Now the hardest part is when he pulls his finger away when I'm squeezing it.
I'm so very proud of him. At his 3 month check up in July, his A1C was 6.7. His 6 month check up was up a little to 7.2. That is a huge difference from where we started. One theme that is found in everything that I have read about diabetes is that everyday is different than the year before. That is so very true! Today was different than yesterday and tomorrow will not be like today.
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