Gifts and gratitude

It's the day before Christmas, and all through the house are the sounds of preparations - butternut being chopped, presents being wrapped, letters being written.  We are an industrious family!  Tomorrow 26 of us will be gathered here in a chaotic celebration of togetherness. We are lucky this year to have the London relatives visiting (J of the sugar story in the introduction blog if you have been reading them all, her husband and sweetest seven year old girl who believes in the magic of Christmas, and our son, home for a bit from Cambridge.)  It will be loud.  It will be messy.  It will be indulgent.  And it will be a relief.  Three years ago, TD was in hospital on this day - still in ICU hooked up to drips, being monitored constantly by kindly nurses.  We were at the hospital all the time - there is a parents' rest room attached to the paediatric unit, where we made endless cups of tea, and went when we needed a moment to collect ourselves and muster courage.  Occasionally we popped home one at a time and somehow in that "pop" time I managed to do some Christmas food prep for the family gathering.

On Christmas Day, the doctors decided TD could attend the celebration for an hour.  So (for insurance purposes) she was discharged and then re-admitted to hospital on December 25.  I was terrified.  The dietician had given us a list of dos and don'ts, and TD was already injecting insulin herself, but the What Ifs loomed large in my head.  For me, it was a terrifying Christmas. Luckily I was too tired to do anything but put on a smile and cope.

So this Christmas will be a relief that we have all survived, and are stronger and more resilient.  Anniversaries can be tricky times for me - I get sad, my mind wanders off into places that can be gloomy.  My attempts at mindfulness (living in the moment) slip and slide down memory lane.  This is how I was feeling a few days ago on the anniversary of TD's diagnosis.  But, you will be pleased to know, TD handles this time with grace and serenity.

 The Christmas tree is twinkling in the corner of the lounge.  The presents beneath look enticingly intriguing. The smell of gingerbread stars and trees ( Gingerbread people presented too many gender issues for TD!) is wafting from the kitchen.  Gratitude is coursing through my veins.

Wishing you all a very happy Christmas.

Magical Science

The Science fiction author, Arthur C Clarke famously wrote :"Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic." I think I know what he meant.  There is a specific blood test that - magically/ scientifically - can give a measure of the average blood glucose level during the last three months. The science part is that it measures how much glucose binds to the red blood cells, and red blood cells circulate around your body for about three months.  The magic part is that you can prick your finger, take a blood sample and three minutes later a magic box prints the information for you on a sticker.  This is called the HbA1c test.

TD visits her endocrinologist about every three months and this is one of the tests and checks that keep her safe.  People like me who are lucky enough to have a functioning pancreas, should have a three month average of  of blood glucose of between 4.5 -6.5 mmol/l. And that is a yardstick for diabetic control too.  But it is not that simple.  TD's last HbA1c result was 6.6.  This is good - it means that high sugars are not doing long term damage to kidneys, eyes and nerves.  But the endocrinologist was a bit nervous, as some of TD's daily readings had been quite high (exams, feeling ill, teenage hormones - the usual culprits of high sugars!!), so where were the lows to give such a satisfactory average?  Because TD is not wearing a CGM, we only have the information from her finger prick tests to work from - all the times inbetween are a blank page.  Undetected lows are a problem.  They are scary.  Could TD be going low in the middle of the night, and if so - how low is she going?  We need to know.

The options were either to wear a CGM for a few weeks, or for us parents to do the 2am tests for a while.  TD chose the latter.  So far, so good - no middle of the night lows (a 5.6 last night which meant she could have nighttime chocolate to see her through to morning...).  But this method of testing does not give the full picture.  For that, TD will have to let go of her fear and dislike of technology and wear a monitor for a while.  

Science and magic is not such a strange combination.  I think one sparks the other, creating an environment where imagination triumphs.  We need both in our lives - solid facts to ground us and tell us our boundaries, and a little magic to enable us to dream of different futures and keep us company on the 2am shifts.  



PS: Arthur C Clarke also said  "The only way to discover the limits of the possible is to go beyond them into the impossible".  Doesn't that sound like a T1 journey?