7 Years and Counting

 
Happy Anniversary to me!

Today marks 7 whole years since I was diagnosed with Diabetes and it has flown by. Previous years I have made Instagram posts about it and I will again, but I get to share this day and everything around it on my blog now. 

This year has been odd to say the least. Since last August I have changed sensors and I have changed the types of insulin that I am taking for my day to day life, the short acting insulin. Firstly, I changed sensors because the Libre 2 would disconnect on me before even lasting a week on me, which at the time was super frustrating. It would make me upset at times because no matter what anyone says, getting a new sensor on and having to take it off hurts like hell. I just have to remember that the pain and discomfort is worth it as it means I no longer need to finger prick my finger. Even now, being on the Dexcom G7, it isn't always going swimmingly. At first, the Dexcom was not working well for me, for the same reasons as my Libre 2 was. The sensor did not want to work with me. It likes to disconnect and certainly while I am at work and trust me, that is a nightmare. Recently, my mum wondered if not having the extra sticky stuff (I do not know what it is called!) that goes on to support the sensor, would actually help. She was right about that and my sensor behaves way, way better than having it on. Before I didn't have much sensors that lasted the full duration before needing a new one, but now after making that change, the majority of my sensors now last the full duration of 10 days like it should. This is such a relief for me and I am less stressed about my Diabetes in this regard.

Secondly, I changed insulin. I will be honest and say that I cannot remember for the life of me why! But it is still a big change as our bodies react differently to the types of insulin. By "our" I mean us Diabetics. Such a change is only made for the benefit of myself and my blood has been in decent numbers since last august. Definitely not where I would like them to be because my blood has been higher than average, but not high enough or for long enough to cause me harm and I have had perfect days and weeks, so hopefully in this next year, my blood levels are a little lower. 

Thirdly, Becky the psychologist, at the Diabetic team helped me tremendously in this last year. With Diabetes problems and mainly my Anxiety. I still have a long way to go in terms of dealing with my Anxiety, however, Becky gave me the support and initial steps to start to deal and address my mental health and I will always be thankful of her and what she has done for me.

On another note, as I have turned 20 I am now moving to the young adults clinic and my first appointment is in a couple of weeks. The nurses and doctors I have seen in the last 7 years have been nothing short of incredible for me and I have a good feeling the ones I will now deal with are too. Thank you to the team who have looked after me over the years.

My goal at the moment is to figure out why my blood is going low so much at work. It is annoying for me to deal with and obviously scary for me. However, I can imagine it scares my colleagues in case my body did go into a Diabetic coma. I do get asked quite a lot at work "What would happen if you collapsed?" and then i explain what to do for both a Hypo and a Hyper, when I am unconscious and I do not mind explaining to them these things, it helps them understand what they can do if they ever needed to help.

I want to say like I have done before, Diabetes is awful. I just have keep going every single day and be thankful that each day I have won the battle. I still get upset when it gets tough. I still hate carb counting. I still hate injecting and especially when they hurt. I still hate having to deal with people who simply do not understand what it is like to deal with Diabetes. I cannot stand waking up during the night having a hypo and being soaking wet. The same goes to waking up Hyper and feeling sick and groggy, doing insulin and waiting slowly for my blood sugar levels to go down. I can honestly go on and on about what I hate but I won't bother. I am going to end this blog on one last note.

I get sad and cry a lot and some days I would happily give up at times, but something keeps me going. I have amazing support from so many people and I cannot thank them enough for everything in this last year. So, let's celebrate the 7th year of me and my toxic relationship with Type 1 Diabetes!