It occurred to me today that I’ve only ever physically met two other people who wear an insulin pump! The first was a young man who was visiting Byron Bay and who showed me how his pump operated, not long before I got mine. His demo was a great experience for me. The second person was my Animas pump-start rep.

Now that I’ve moved to a more populated area, I’m hoping I’ll meet more pump users. While the Diabetes online community (DOC) is teaming with pump users, and I’ve come to know many of them over the past couple of years, talking face-to-face with others seems to be quite a different experience.

I was a bit worried about getting a new Diabetes Educator up here. I’ve known about one DE who is in private practice in this area. I wasn’t sure I could afford appointments with her, but since I’ve made further enquiries, it seems I can. I’m really excited to be seeing Deb Foskett from Insulin Pump Angels. She not only comes highly recommended but has won awards as a DE. I’m not sure when I’ll be seeing her yet, because I need to get some referrals from my family dcotor, but I’m hoping it will be soon.

So that’s one worry about being in a new area, organised and solved!

I’ve also had an endo recommended to me, so I’ll give him a go too. Apparently appointments take a while. No problem – I’m not so eager to see an endo right now.

Being up here has played some havoc with my diabetes. I have no idea why. I’ve had to increase my basal by a quarter of a unit for about three quarters of the day! Yet, I seem to be more active here! I’m still going to have to tweak the basal a tad. It’s not quite right yet.

I’ve been in the pool nearly every day, and I’m still working out how to avoid higher BGs when I get out, despite exercising in the pool. I must say that with all my aches and pains, I’m feeling ever so comfortable swimming and floating around weightless and cool. It’s hot here – so far, not as hot as it can get, but hot enough. (Read: too hot for me.) The pool is a godsend!

The winters here, like Byron Bay, will be glorious! Few more months before that though.

Annoyingly, I’m getting raised BGs after some very low-to-moderate exercise in the pool. Really, there’s hardly any effort at all in 30 minutes of swimming, floating and walking in the pool.

What usually happens to me is that the first lot of increased activity for the day raises my BG and the second lot (if there is one) lowers it.

I’ve not yet experienced this amount of swimming on a pump, so it’s an experiment in itself to see how I’m going to manage it. So far, I’ve only been in the pool once per day. It’s such a hassle to peel off that miracle suit (which doesn’t work because I still look like a beached whale), shower the salt water off (yes, it’s a salt water pool) and then wait for the swimsuit to dry again before wriggling and struggling my way back into it. A second swim will have to wait for a second swimsuit! Those suits are hard enough to get on when they’re the right size. I think mine is one size too small! Maybe time for two new ones?

I’ve tried eating a small amount of carb before I get in the pool, taking a bolus and then taking my pump off for the 30 minutes. It didn’t work so well. I’ve tried doing nothing. That didn’t work well either. Next experiment is just a small bolus without any carb. Two hours after swimming, I’m still not going any lower and I always have to bolus.

I’ve only just ordered replacement parts for my Animas that will ensure it is waterproof. They should arrive in the next couple of days, so I’m not worried about managing all this without the pump on for the swim-time. I will pay closer attention when I get the parts and I can wear the pump while swimming. That will mean no break in basal insulin and I’ll get a better idea of what my BGs are doing both in the pool and a couple of hours later.

I haven’t gone anywhere near the gym yet (which is right next to the pool). I’m hot and sweaty enough and that gym looks like pure torture! I’ll leave the gym to the cooler days/months.

A change in lifestyle often means a change in insulin regimes and a learning curve to figure out what’s right. That’s on top of seasonal changes in insulin needs. I’m hoping that Deb (the new DE) can give me some help as well.

As birthdays go, this year (08/08) mine was… well… there’s no other word for it…. it was crap. Oh wait, that’s right! I’m supposed to be grateful I’ve made it through another year. At fifty-something, it starts to get a tad more precarious as each year passes.

As this year goes, it’s been a pretty horrid one, culminating in an even more extremely blah birthday.

Yes, I had some calls from my wonderful friends who’ve been around me for 20 and 30 years. It’s always a delight that they remember. Most of them are 10 hours drive away. If I could afford to fly them all up and we could go out and do daft birthday things.

It was my 50th when we were all last together. A riot of a party with a Middle Eastern theme and I did a beached-whale-belly-dance in full (but modest) costume! It was more than fun and fabulous. It all went a bit downhill from there. I miss them but I know I could never live back in Sydney. Too busy, to crazy, too everything for me.

Of my other close friends, 1 died early this year and 3 more are overseas with only 1 returning later this week, 1 over there for a few years and 1 coming to visit for 3 months, but nowhere near me.

Birthdays have morphed into days that I take stock. The more psychologically challenging stock-taking is still being mulled over.

Of the more mundane stuff…  What fashion item, shoes or makeup do I now need to throw in the bin because it has ‘mutton dressed as lamb’ written all over it? When do I have to get my hair cut short because I’m over 50? When do I have to go to bed at 10pm, have an afternoon nap, and have a fibre-filled breakfast?

When will I accept that the wrinkles and sags are here to stay and that I’ll probably never fit into the kind of fabulous clothing my 21 year old daughter wears, let alone look ok in it? (Oh, how shallow! Right?)

As I write this, I’m channel surfing and happened to land on the Fashion Channel. It always makes me want to throw up or cry. Wow those girls look fantastic! I was probably never that reed-thin or that gorgeous, but 20 years and more ago, I could certainly wear almost anything out of my mother’s clothing boutiques and get away with it.

Now count me in with weight-gaining insulin, post menopausal pounds and a penchant for good food and you get beached-whale – almost. Not quite in the BMI obese category but hovering and at times, falling in.

These days, I can’t wear heels (sore feet and lack of balance), and designer clothing is made in one size either way of reed-thin and often priced out of my league, so that’s out too. In fact, this past week, I’ve been hobbling around with a fractured toe on my left foot (the middle one), wondering why I still don’t have a car with automatic transmission (because they’re always $2,000 more than I can afford) or special shoes for broken toes.

But there was one good thing amongst a few others today – cake!

I was going to makeanother Persian Love Cake, but yesterday, time got away from me. Here’s the one I made last year for my husband’s birthday.

Theoretically, if you have insulin, you can eat whatever you want. On the other hand, theoretically, if you have diabetes, if you keep the carbs down, you can control the diabetes much more easily and blood glucose spikes can be reduced. Both theories are true. I like a combination of the two.

If your diabetes is out of control, lower the carb intake to start with. It goes a long way to help the control.

On birthdays, all that flies out the window.

I have cake-eating with insulin-taking down to a fine art. And while a store-brought piece of cake doesn’t come with carb instructions, I’m pretty good a guestimating after the first bite.

So, tonight my fancy was taken by what was labelled as a Jaffa Chocolate Cake. Yes indeed – carbs multiplied by carbs!

The first bite was heaven. I could taste the dark chocolate, orange and the surprise of coconut. It was unexpectedly moist, with a measurable layer of thick chocolate ganache on top.  As cakes go, this one took the cake!

With an insulin pump, if you get the carb-guestimate right, it’s so much easier than trying to manage a fat-laden (read: long-absorbing), high carb slice of heaven with injections, although certainly it can be done.

A combo bolus over 2.5 hours did it. At 4 hours post ingestion, I was a tad high at 9.0 mmo/l (162 mg/dl), but all things considered and without an exact carb amount per slice, I think I did ok. A quick correction bolus and I was done.

Maybe it wasn’t such a bad birthday after all! Did the cake make up for the absence of close friends? Um.. I think the right answer is ‘no’, but my honest answer is… kinda… yeah it did, for a few scrumptious chewing and tasting minutes!