Year Two

Yesterday was the one-year anniversary of this blog.

It was such a busy day, what with Joseph home for spring break (weird, because you know, it's not even spring yet... and we're expecting a snow storm here tonight... sigh). And Evan has been sick with a fever and a nasty, wet cough since Sunday night.

You get the picture. The day went by, and here I am this afternoon, posting my first entry for Year Two.

Wow.

So, where to begin?

How about if I give you the low-down on Monday's endo appointment?

We arrived for Joseph's visit exactly on time-- an amazing feat given our more typical difficulty just getting out of the house. Despite Evan's reluctance to leave the warm couch, and the warm glow of the television-- PBS Kids beckoning -- we made it out the door in record time.

And, before we could take a seat in the waiting room, a nurse with long gray hair, a broad smile, large clipboard in hand, called out:

"Joseph?"

"Yes."

"Don't sit down."

Immediately, she brought us to the "pre-" examining room. The room where his finger is pricked for the A1c. The room where height, weight, and blood pressure measurements are taken. Where I'm always craning to see the numbers on the scale. Only to be frustrated by those damn kilograms; I can never figure out the conversion.

Too nervous, I guess.

Then, off to the examining room. Where we waited for nearly 45 minutes.

Given last month's visit, you can understand my anxiety as we sat there-- Joseph reading Eragon; Evan insisting that I help her come up with names for the characters in her latest story.

And all the time, my mind racing.

I just couldn't relax. Because, despite knowing that all of those extra tests his endo ordered last time came back negative, I was afraid that again, he might not have grown.

That really, I was screwing up here. Because the only other explanation for a failure to thrive would be poor blood sugar control.

Well, I needn't have worried.

The very first thing Joseph's doctor said when she walked in (smiling, mind you), was:

"Wonderful to see you all again. Joseph's growth is beautiful, just beautiful. He's between the 50th and 75th percentile in weight and about 75th percentile in height. Back on his normal curve. "

Upon hearing these wonderful, wonderful words, a tremendous wave of relief swept over me.

Until, that is, I remembered the A1c.

"Well, it's gone up slightly-- from 7.3 to 7.5. After looking at his logs, I think an increase in his basal rate from 8 am to 10 am should smooth out that spike he seems to experience between 10 and 11 am. That should help bring his A1c down to 7, which is really our target for high school kids. Joseph is actually right where we want him to be for elementary kids."

Hmmm.

"Well," I began, "I'm not sure that changing the basal rate during those hours is such a good idea." Then I pulled out the logs, flipping to the Saturday and Sunday entries.

"If you look here, there's no spike on the weekends-- when Joseph sleeps in. His bg stays steady, in the low 100s, all the way until as late as 11am. If we increase the basal in the morning, he's bound to go low."

The doc agreed.

Instead, we're going to give him more insulin for his breakfast bolus, and actually lower his basal between 10 and noon (to try to prevent the lows he's experienced when we've increased his food boluses in the past). We'll see...

So, it's all pretty good.

But still, I'm exhausted. Thinking about the never-ending bg checks, site changes, endo visits.

The endless worrying.

I'm just in a funk about all of it right now.

Maybe it's because we're seven months into Year Two with diabetes, and I'm surprised by the fact that our ability to integrate this condition so well into our lives makes me both proud and more than a little sad.

Maybe because I'm still fighting this new reality of ours.

Maybe because really, I just can't accept it.