Hospital visit

I have gone back and forth all week on whether or not to post about a situation that occurred last weekend. However, I felt that to help me get final closure, it would be beneficial to post about it and give people more of a glimpse in to life with Diabetes.

As most people know, I have had Diabetes for 27 years. Yes, I am 28, meaning I was diagnosed at 14 months old. My day to day life is very normal. I can eat everything your average person can eat. I am on an insulin pump, so the only added things are I need to check my blood sugar often, count how many carbohydrates I'm eating, and give insulin for all the carbs I eat. It can become a struggle sometimes when I get low blood sugars, such as when I add exercise to my schedule. It because very difficult to regulate the exercise and blood sugars. Otherwise, life with Diabetes is usually very easy and simple in my opinion. (Thank the Lord!)

Last Friday evening, December 21, we had some friends over for dinner. We had a great evening, enjoying some wine, clam chowder, popcorn and games. We had about 3-4 drinks over the course of the whole evening, so not a huge amount spread out. It ended up getting really late, and we somehow convinced our friends to just spend the night. (This is very surprisingly for them, but we now know the Holy Spirit was working.) We went to bed around 3am. At 3am, I gave insulin to cover the alcohol and snacks we'd been eating, letting my pump do the calculations and not paying attention to how much was actually being calculated. This is very normal for me. My pump is programmed to do the math.

About 5 am, my husband noticed me shaking. He tried to wake me up, thinking it was a bad dream. He quickly realized it was a seizure and grabbed a glucagon shot (Shot of sugar basically that works in about 2 minutes.) He ran down the hall to get some sugar to give me, and told our friend to call the local emergency number. Both our friends were awake, and helping. Jon rubbed honey on my gums because my teeth were clinched shut and I bit both his finger and my tongue. He told me that while he's seen me have seizures before, none were to this extent. My head was thrown back, I was foaming at the mouth, and my whole body was stiff. That's why he felt it was necessary to call emergency. When I did come too, I was very confused. I did not remember them being there or spending the night and was a bit freaked out and she was trying to keep me calm and reassure me.

The military police were here in about 2 minutes, followed by the American fire department in about 5. It took the German ambulance about 20 minutes to get here, and they were zero help. All they basically did was transport me to the American hospital and did not know what a seizure was when Jon told them. I guess we need to add the word "Anfall" to our vocabulary. At least "Diabetes" is the same in both languages. I was in my room for close to twenty minutes until we left to go to the hospital. I don't remember anything except walking out of the den and trying to smile at my friend, but not knowing what to say. Thankfully they'd spent the night and were able to stay with our kids while Jon followed the ambulance.

Upon arrival at the American hospital, I had a horrible headache and was throwing up like crazy. (I went through about 10 vomit bags!) Jon had told them we'd been drinking, so upon my discharge, the 3rd point was "Acute alcohol intoxication". However, a Blood Alcohol Content was never taken to prove this. Glucagon shot has side effects, which include nausea and headaches. My mom has told me in the past that hypoglycemic reactions (seizures) have made me very sick as well. So between the seizure and the glucagon it's no surprise I was throwing up so much. It bothers me a great deal that I got "Acute alcohol intoxication" as one of my 3 diagnoses. Around noon, they decided they were going to go ahead and admit me for the night. Overall, the whole hospital experience was excellent and I have nothing negative other than the 3rd diagnoses.

I remember very little from about 5am until noon. I did happen to look at my pump and discover why I had the seizure. I had given a large amount of insulin at that time. While in the hospital, I thought it was just me being stupid, tired, and having been drinking. When I got home from the hospital, I realized that my settings for that time of morning were incredibly low, much lower than I needed them. Therefore it wasn't *me* that gave that much, but the pump. Yes, I did confirm it, but I was trusting the pump to do the right calculations, just like I do a thousand times a year. I did meet with my doctor this past week and we changed those dosages to prevent it from happening again. Because I never eat or give insulin at that time of morning, we never realized how dangerously low those settings were.

I think the last time I had a seizure that required emergency, with no hospital stay, was in 1997. The only time I think I've required a hospital stay, aside from diagnoses, was in about 1990 or so, so it has been a very, very long time. I was surprised to find the impact it had on me. I've had a very difficult time going to sleep this week, fearful it'd happen again, until I went to the doctor on Thursday. I've also had some other fears that I've had to work through with my husband and God. It was interesting, we went to mass on Friday as a family, and the priest, in the homily, talked about how we shouldn't have fear when we have God. I can't explain it perfectly, but it was just the thing I needed to hear, that I needed to give my fears to God. In addition to that, I've had a lot of body soreness this week, as my body was stiff for a good 2 minutes, so my neck, stomach and back have been in a lot of pain. The pain has finally started to subside this weekend.

But God is good. I can see how He was there and protected me the whole time, from our friends happening to spend the night, to Jon remaining completely calm and handling the situation perfectly. He said he was basically just on autopilot, doing the things he knew he had to do. When all was said and done, he was shaking like crazy. And... our friends admitted that they'd seen a new side of him running around working like crazy... in his boxers hahaha! After about 20 minutes, he realized he was still only walking around in his underwear, and decided to get dressed.

This week, we took it pretty easy, especially with Christmas. And this Christmas, I found I was much more thankful for the many blessings in my life, especially my life itself, and my amazing husband who saved my life.

Struggles of Diabetes

I don't talk much about my life with diabetes. It's not that I dislike talking about it. After having it for 27 years, there's usually not much to talk about. It's just "normal". However, today I had an incident that I thought I would share. I will start by saying it was very, very scary and has made us decide we need to make a plan, and educate our 5 year old son more.

Ever since moving here, the thought has crossed my mind "What would happen if something happened to me?" I had it all planned, I'd tell Zach to call the number on the board for daddy's job, and go get one of our 5 neighbors. Today, we put that in to practice, but it did not go like I had planned.

I woke up sick, spending the whole morning in the bathroom and bed. Around 11am, I was feeling mostly better and had a bowl of cereal. Around 1pm, I started feeling so nauseas. I took an anti-nausea pill, and threw up the cereal I'd eaten 2 minutes later. I knew that I had insulin in me for that cereal, and without it, I was going to crash. But at the same time, I knew that if I tried to eat or drink anything, it'd likely come back up. And I was sooo tired and exhausted. So I drank some juice, turned my insulin pump off (to get no insulin) and laid down for a nap. After a bit, I woke back up knowing my blood sugar was very low.

I yelled to Zach to bring me some juice. I have something called a glucagon pen. It's a prescription shot that is suppose to get your blood sugar up SUPER fast. Growing up, mom said they didn't help, but I have used 1 or 2 since having kids, when sick and pregnant, and they help. I had one, but it was expired a year ago (I know! Bad me, but with the struggles I've had getting good diabetes care here, it wasn't a top priority unfortunately.) So I called my mom to see if it was ok to use it, while checking my blood sugar. It was 39! (Normal is 80-120 usually) My mom told me to get my neighbor up here and husband home.

Thirty-nine is the type of low that I would send Jon to get me juice for. Yet, I had to do it. I sent Zach to get a neighbor, mainly because if I went in to a seizure, I needed someone to be able to call emergency, or to help get me stuff, etc. NONE of my five neighbors were home! I called Jon multiple times (Later found out it was 8 times!) and he wasn't at his desk. I was hoping calling that many times, the person at the desk would pick up, but the officers didn't. I was able to give the glucagon shot. A very short time later, I was trying to check my blood sugar again. I couldn't see. My hands were shaking, everything was blurry, and I was praying. I was seriously probably just a few seconds from going in to a seizure and felt like I was going to black out. I was about to call emergency myself, not knowing what would happen to my kids, how they'd notify Jon, etc. when the glucagon shot kicked in and started working. Jon called me about 30 min later and came home.

Thankfully, I'm doing fine tonight. But I don't think I've ever been so scared. I informed Jon that I need a way to be able to reach him if he's not at his desk, to get someone in the building to track him down. We're going to be teaching Zach more about my diabetes and what to do if mommy is having a serious issue, like today. Tonight, we're just thanking the Lord that I am okay, and praying nothing like this happens again any time soon.