My diabetes intuition was blaring yesterday during my site change. When the new site went in, I just had a gut feeling that something was off. And I wondered, do I listen to my diabetes intuition or not? On one hand, I’d hate to pull a perfectly good site because I had a feeling but no proof. And if I had been wearing a sensor, I probably would’ve given the site a chance, knowing that my CGM would alert me if the site did indeed fail. But last week I decided to take that sensor break, and I wouldn’t be starting my new sensor until this morning. (I like to leave them in overnight before I put in my first calibration.) Of course, there is also the option of just checking my blood sugar frequently for a few hours to determine if the site is working or not. But I’ve been having a rough time lately, struggling with some major depression, and I just didn’t want to worry about increased sugar checking. So, I decided the best thing to do was to go with my gut. I pulled the minutes old site and inserted a new one.
It's times like these when I wish I had a diabetes crystal ball to rely on, instead of using diabetes intuition. That would really be useful in our diabetes management, wouldn’t it? Of course, even it it existed, our insurance probably wouldn’t cover it anyway . . . . So when has your diabetes intuition kicked in? And did you listen to what it said?
When I started my new pump this week... apparently, all of the adjustments to get more insulin I was making on my old pump were because the pump was failing. I'm now back to (for me) a more normal insulin-to-carb ratio, and not over-counting carbs to help bring my BGs back within range.
ReplyDeleteI listen sometimes... I ignore sometimes... Either way, it can be annoying...
ReplyDeleteHi Karen,
ReplyDeleteI see that you wrote this months ago so I'm not sure if you'll even see my comment, but I wanted to write just in case you do see this. I like the term, diabetes intuition. I definitely have it too. I recently ignored my intuition and I almost ended up in the Emergency Department! I put in a new site and went on with my day of unpacking from a recent move. I noticed my blood sugars creeping up but I assumed it was from the stress of moving 4 states away, being out of my normal routine, and having to unpack and organize our new home. I kept giving myself bolus corrections but my levels kept going up. My diabetes intuition said it was my site but I ignored it because I had put this site in 3 hours earlier and it didn't hurt or feel weird in my body. My sugar got up to over 500 which is the highest it's been since being diagnosed with T1D 12 years ago! So I used a syringe for my correction, changed my site, drank lots of water and monitored my glucose levels every 30-60 minutes to make sure I was coming down. I eventually started to drop which was a huge relief. Hours later, I remembered I needed to remove my old site. When I pulled it out, it was severely kinked because I had forgotten to remove the blue plastic piece that covers the needle. I was upset that I made such a costly mistake; my body suffered as well as my pocket book since infusion sets are so expensive. I struggle with trusting my diabetes intuition in situations like this because of the high costs of medical supplies, high insurance premiums and deductibles, etc. Thanks for sharing your insight!