Under the pump!

Now the little device many think is a iPod, part of my phone, a pacemaker or even a pager. Now when I get the question about if it is a pager I have to think to myself, and sometimes say to the individual, how old and out of touch with reality do I look and since when is a pager hard wired? One of the funniest is the iPod though because even if they have seen where my pump connects to me they think I am hard core because I have bypassed the headphones and gone straight to the middle ear. As funny as it sounds some people actually believe that for a split second and then they realise how crazy that sounds.

Anyway this device that I obtained in 2006 was the device that would change my life from being a constant battle, full of pain, blood, needles and anxiety. To a life of constant management, occasional pain, less needles, still plenty of blood and yes anxiety but it gave me my freedom back. It allowed me to feel slightly normal again. It allowed me to be able to sleep in, it allowed me to miss a meal if I wasn't feeling well, it allowed me to have a salad and only a salad if I wanted and it allowed me to feel good. The device was my insulin infusion pump.

This pump was to take the 5 injections per day that I was having and change it to 1 injection every 3 days. After 16 years of 5 injections a day I was getting tired and to tell you the truth the regime wasn't working. Every night my BSL would go haywire and protaphane was no longer giving me the control I wanted and needed.

12 months earlier I had investigated to find out what process had to be taken to be able to get one of these pumps. I found out that they cost between 10,000 to 12,000 thousand dollars and had to be replaced every 4 years as the warranty period was just that 4 years and you could not extend it. Understanding that the insulin pump becomes you literal lifeline without warranty if it breaks or malfunctions then there better be a good plan to manage things and quick to be implemented.

Now seeing that price tag I first thought "not a hope in hell" there would be no way that I could afford it now let alone every 4 years. I then was told that the pump companies along with the government had managed to get them covered by private health insurance for the full amount. Seeing as it was a per existing illness and there was no way around it once the health insurance was obtained I had to wait 12 months to use it. It would be a long 12 months as I needed a change and had read up on the possibilities with the pump.

The day came where I went to the endocrinologist and his educator to pick the pump. There were 3 or 4 on the market but I was told the one with the proven track record, reliability and the manageability was the Medtronic. I am sure the other pump now have caught up but I like what I know and the Medtronic does everything I need. The order was placed and from here all that stood between me and flexibility was a trip to a dietitian, and a call from Medtronic to tell me my pump had arrived.

The next learning curve was set around my visit to the dietitian and carbohydrate counting. I knew of the DAFNE program which was calculating your insulin dose from the carbohydrates that are to be eaten but I had never been pushed down that track and to tell you the truth I didn't want the complication of addition process and calculations into an already busy and hectic life. But to go onto the pump it was exactly what had to happen however all my calculations and ratio's, instead of being calculated and stored in my head would be done in my pump.

The day I had been waiting for for over 12 months had arrived and all that stood in my way was a 1/2 day training session on how to operate the pump and warnings that this was not a cure but only a method of management. 

Now everything I have written about this device has been what was going to change my life for the good but as with all things in this modern world there are always warnings and to tell you the truth management of T1D on a pump can be more difficult and even more dangerous cause being only on a short acting insulin things can change and change rapidly if your not paying attention.

This has never been as evident as very recently. For some reason I must have been overly active in my sleep as during the night my pump line disconnected. It must have happened in the early hours of the morning as by the time I woke up around 7am my world have may as well stopped. My blood felt like mud flowing through veins. The pain stretching from the top most hair on my head all the way to my little toe and everywhere in between was intense and I just wanted to yell and scream for it to stop. The nausea was also all encompassing, on the verge of dry reaching I knew there was a big problem. My first thing to do was to check to see if my pump was working and as I reached down to grab it I noticed that there was no line cloning from my belly. The connection site was there but the line was hanging from the pump. I quickly reconnected and went to see what damage had been done. As I hobbled, trying not to vomit, to the other end of the house to get my Blood Glucose machine I knew my BSL was going to be high.

I was right my BSL was 30.7. My pain and sickness was justified. My body was yelling at me to fix the problem or it was going to go into protest mode and send me to hospital with ketoacidosis. Basically sugar and ketone poisoning. Ketones are created in your liver and is an acid that is created when your body burns its own fat. When the body doesn't have enough insulin it can't get glucose from the blood into the bodies cells to use for energy and instead will begin to burn fat. When the body is burning too much fat the acid is produced and hence ketones. This may seem like a cool way to loose unwanted fat but I tell you what my health is way to important to have this acid running through my body causing irreparable damage and if that isn't enough it makes you feel like shit inside and out.

My pump was in and I was under no unrealistic impression that this was going to be easy but I was confident that it was going to make my life better. 

The idea of having to now count the carbohydrates I was eating seemed daunting in the beginning however that quickly subsided when I made sure I saw it the same way that I saw my control. To always do my best and know that there will be times when I don't get it right. I needed to make sure I learnt from my miscalculations and continue to strive to do the best I could....

This may seem irresponsible however I wanted to test out my new companion so the fist thing I ate and bolused for was a small mars bar. I knew the carb count and I knew the effect it would usually have. I did my BSL and entered the carbs into my machine and pressed go. It was a happy moment as I continued to check my BSL every 30 mins for the next 2 hours cause yes it did rise due to the sugar but it also went back to the my original BSL after everything was done. I was amazed and I was hooked.