I’ve decided to take a break from continuous glucose monitoring. This means that for an undefined period of time – maybe 3-4 days, a week, or a few weeks – I’m not going to wear my Dexcom G6 CGM.
Initially, I wanted to give myself a break because I was just burnt out from wearing it all the time and feeling so dependent on it. But as I started thinking about more, I realized that there were some other really great reasons for me to take a break from my CGM:
1 – I wanted to wear one less device. It can be tough to wear two medical devices 24/7. Sometimes I get super self-conscious of them. Other times they just aren’t comfortable to wear, such as when I roll over one the wrong way when I’m sleeping at night. So it’s nice to feel a little more free with one less device stuck to my body at all times.
2 – I was sick of the constant data feed. All those alarms going off whenever I cross my high or low threshold are straight up annoying!!! I know I could just turn them off on my CGM receivers, but the point of them (for me) is to try to maintain as tight of a control on my numbers as possible. But now that I’m intentionally not wearing my CGM, I’m realizing how much I appreciate the reprieve from all that buzzing and beeping.
There’s lots of reasons to take a break from continuous glucose monitoring, but sometimes one is enough.
3 – I have some new blood glucose meters to try. The only way that I can really put my new meters to the *test* (lol) is to use them – and goodness knows that I have very little desire to do manual finger stick checks when I’m wearing my CGM.
4 – I’d like to hold myself more accountable. I rely on my Dexcom heavily at all times. I look to it before I start exercising, before I eat something, before I do anything, really. I bolus using the data it provides and trust it implicitly. But I’ve recognized that by developing this habit, I’ve become lazy. I don’t measure out food as much because I figure that if I bolus too much or too little for it, I can just watch what my Dexcom tells me and treat from there. It’s kinda sloppy, in my humble opinion, so I’m trying to put more of the trust back in myself for my diabetes monitoring.
5 – I’m trying to reacquaint myself with my body’s cues. Before CGM technology, I was really good at recognizing high and low blood sugar symptoms…but then I started using a CGM and found myself reacting to highs and lows (e.g., treating them prematurely), even if I didn’t feel those high/low symptoms. So I want to retrain myself so I can make sure I never lose that ability, because I think it’s important to know exactly how my body alerts me to various blood sugars, rather than depending solely on a piece of technology to do it for me.
I’m re-upping this post that I initially published on February 5, 2018, because…it’s happened again. I have another broken bone! This time, it’s a chauffeur’s fracture, which is just a fancy way of saying that I have a break along my radius due to falling on my outstretched hand. Fortunately, the X-ray process went much smoother this time around – I actually referred to this blog post so I could remember exactly what I was told about insulin pumps and X-rays! Hopefully, this helps other people who had the same questions as me.
“You have to remove your insulin pump before we can take your X-rays,” the technician said to me. I stared at him, and responded point-blank, “What? No, I can’t take it off.” I tried to hide the panic in my voice, but it quavered as tears stung my eyes.
“Well, let me check our insulin pump protocol…” his voice trailed off as he left me in the dark room with my right arm held up in the air in an attempt to mitigate the throbbing sensation going up and down my forearm.
Here you can see an X-ray that shows where the break is (follow the yellow arrow), me looking miserable in the doctor’s office but still rocking my #insulin4all face mask, and my lovely new brace which I get to wear for 3-6 weeks.
When I fell and broke my ulna a couple weeks ago, my insulin pump was one of the last things to cross my mind as I was shuffled from doctor to doctor and one medical facility after the other. All I could concentrate on was the injury – how severe was it? Would I be able to work? Could I keep up my exercise regimen? Was I going to need surgery? My diabetes, for once, was far from my thoughts.
But this instantly changed when I went to get an X-ray. When the technician told me that I’d have to remove my pump, I wanted to shout at him, “No! If I do that, my blood sugar will skyrocket! You can’t expect me to do that!” It was hard to keep calm, and my emotions were already running amok due to the chaos of the morning so far. So even as I tried to fight the tears, a couple escaped and ran down my cheeks. When he came back into the room, the X-ray technician’s expression changed. He looked at me empathetically.
“It’ll be okay. Come on, let’s call your endocrinologist. We’ll see what she has to say and get this all figured out.”
Twenty minutes later, after a series of phone calls and a few accidental hang-ups, we received confirmation that I could, indeed, wear my pump for the X-ray. The nurse practitioner who I spoke with at my endo’s office said that it was safe as long as I wore the protective vest. “It’s really only a problem if you’re going in for an MRI or a CAT scan, because those involve magnets,” he told me.
Once I got off the phone, I ran over to the X-ray technician and explained it to him. He smiled at me and said, “Got it. Let’s get these pictures over with – you’ve already had quite a day so far.”
I nodded and thanked him for his patience. He was right, I was overwhelmed from the events of the day – it wasn’t even noon yet – but in hindsight, I’m glad that the technician didn’t try to fight me when I said I couldn’t remove my pump. His willingness to hear me out was huge. It’s not easy to be your own advocate in a high-stress situation like that. But I’m proud of myself for speaking up and getting the answers we needed. Everything worked out in the end – well, except for that pesky broken-bone bit.
I shared that my company is offering a sweet new benefit for its associates with diabetes: a free blood sugar meter with free refills on test strips and lancets as the need arises.
While I waited for my new meter to come in the mail, I did some research on it. I was excited to learn that it would be a back-lit, full-color touchscreen. It looked sleek and modern, and I was impressed that it seemed to have a lot more features compared to my blood sugar meters of yore (I still remember having to use a giant droplet of blood and waiting an entire minute for my blood sugar results to appear on a very clunky screen…oh, the 90s). I couldn’t remember the last time I was so pumped about a new piece of diabetes equipment – my anticipation for this Livongo meter was hiiiiiiiigh.
Here she is – my new Livongo meter which I’ve dubbed Livi. Because what else would you call it?!
So when it arrived, I eagerly checked out all of its features. It is, indeed, a well-designed meter – though a bit heftier than I was expecting. Maybe I’m too used to the lightweight nature of my Verio IQ, but this Livongo meter almost feels like a chunky smartphone. It’s not as big as my OmniPod PDM, but it’s in that neighborhood.
I was more so surprised by the test strips – they looked and felt huge compared to my Verio strips! They reminded me of the test strips I used in the first few years of my diabetes diagnosis.
I admit that I didn’t have the patience to read through the instruction manual, I just jumped right into my first blood sugar check. After all, once you’ve used any one type of meter, it’s pretty easy to figure out how the rest of ’em work: insert a test strip, prick a finger, swipe blood onto the strip, and wait for results.
That’s exactly how this meter works, with one caveat. Once I inserted the test strip into the machine, I got a message that notified me the machine was “checking” the test strip. Uhh…checking for what, exactly? I’m not really sure, but the “check” took about 3 seconds before a soft-pitched beep let me know that I could put my blood onto the test strip.
So I did, but I was mildly bemused by the actual amount of blood the strip needed – it felt like it needed more than my Verio strips. I have no idea if this is truly the case, but there is distinct design difference between the strips beyond the hardiness of the Livongo strips, which are not only at least double the size of Verio strips but also feature a vertical line for the blood sample rather than a horizontal. It’s slightly trickier to get just the right amount of blood onto the strip, and I admit that I’ve wasted 2-3 test strips at a time with the Livongo machine so far because I was unsuccessful in getting enough blood on the strips.
Anyways, once I applied blood to the strip, I noticed that the machine didn’t countdown to my results – it merely informed me it was processing them. My very first check with the Livongo was high, in the 250s, and I was yet again surprised when I received an actual message along with my results.
“Your blood sugar is high. Did you know that exercising after meals can help lower blood sugar?”
(I should note that the meter knew I’d just eaten dinner because once it makes the blood sugar result available, you notify the machine whether or not this result was before/after a meal/snack, and then you let it know how you feel – you can select from a handful of pre-loaded options.)
I was taken aback by the message because, well, of course I knew that my number wasn’t great, and I’ve always known that exercising after meals can help bring blood sugar down. This meter is kind of funny, because as I continue to use it, it populates a bunch of different messages depending on my blood sugar in a given moment. Sometimes I get a “kudos”, other times I get random facts about nutrition like, “did you know that spinach is a great source of potassium?” Maybe if I was a newly diagnosed person with diabetes who didn’t know much about nutrition or ways to improve blood sugar levels, I’d find these tidbits of advice more helpful, but for someone as experienced as me they come across as both funny and judge-y.
Since receiving the meter, I’ve used it to check my blood sugar dozens of times and I’m still formulating my opinion on it in terms of its accuracy, usability, design, and overall appeal. I’ll say this for now: I’m intrigued enough by the meter and its ability to immediately send blood sugar data to a cell phone/computer via Bluetooth. It’s definitely one of the most high-tech blood sugar meters I’ve ever used and the touchscreen does make it kind of fun to play around with.
I plan on making a video to better showcase the actual experience of doing a blood sugar check with the Livongo, and I’ll have a full review available in the coming weeks. Stay tuned!
I’ll never forget the first time I saw my mother’s bio in her high school yearbook: She’d listed “sleep” as one of her favorite past times. I though it was hysterically funny then, and I still do now, but I also think it makes her incredibly relatable. Who doesn’t love catching some z’s?
I may not be unique to others when I say that I love a good night of sleep, but only people with diabetes know the real struggles that we, without functioning pancreases, face virtually every night at bedtime.
Because that’s right, diabetes doesn’t just make life hard for us when we’re awake, it also disrupts our precious slumbers. How dare you, diabetes!
Here’s four ways in which diabetes can make it difficult to sleep:
1 – Beeping and buzzing devices. Nobody actually likes waking up to a blaring alarm clock. Imagine not only having to contend with that, but also the possibility of low and/or high alarms going off at any hour of the night. The shrill alarms built into my Dexcom are very rude awakenings and definitely serve as an extra incentive to do everything possible to try to stay in range overnight, but we all know that diabetes can be unpredictable, so this isn’t always possible.
2 – Rolling over on uncomfortable sites. I toss and turn throughout the night: Usually, I fall asleep on my back, then switch to my side, and roll over on my stomach…multiple times throughout the night. And I never seem to be able to do it without rubbing up on a site. It doesn’t matter where it is – my arms, legs, stomach, or back – any rockin’ and rollin’ I do in my sleep is almost always bound to push my CGM sensor or pod uncomfortably harder into my body, and it can be the reason why I wake up in the middle of the night to make yet another adjustment in how I’m sleeping.
At least my diabetes has zero impact on Clarence’s ability to sleep. Was this another excuse to use my adorable dog as a good photo for this post? I shall neither confirm nor deny.
3 – Waiting for a high to come down. There have been a handful of occasions in the last year of life with diabetes ALONE in which I’ve been so, very tired but too afraid to go to sleep until my blood sugar has come down to a “safe” level. It doesn’t matter if the high was caused by incorrect carb calculations or a site that I’m not sure is working properly – I just want to avoid sleeping knowing that I have a hyperglycemic blood sugar because waking up to one in the morning is bound to start my day off on the wrong foot. And it even resulted in a trip to the ER one time, which I don’t want to experience again.
4 – Waking up to a low. Just like high blood sugar, low blood sugar can also delay and/or interrupt sleep. Whether the low happens just after brushing my teeth and I’m forced to ruin my fresh breath with something sugary (just thinking about the orange juice and mint flavor combination makes me wanna yak) or if it wakes me up from a sound slumber and I proceed down the stairs to eat the entire kitchen because I’ve run out of low supplies on the nightstand next to my bed…you get the picture. It’s downright annoying and honestly I bet that I’ve had at least a couple hundred nights of sleep in my 22+ years of diabetes disrupted to a low.
So you see, as much as a person with diabetes like me enjoys a full night of sleep, I’m always aware of the fact that my diabetes doesn’t sleep…and instead keeps me on toes.
Today’s blog post is taking a personal turn because I’m using it to wish an extra-special birthday to my big brother!
It’s a milestone birthday – let’s call it age 29.999999 – and as such, I wish that I could celebrate it with my brother in person. But seeing as he lives about a thousand miles away from me (no exaggeration), coupled with the fact that travel isn’t exactly something that I personally feel is a smart idea right now, we’ll have to settle for a virtual celebration at the moment.
A sunshine-y birthday graphic for the kind of guy that is FAR from dull!
So before I continue with this birthday post, one thing you should know about my brother is that he’s just about the polar opposite of me in every sense of the word – I’m 5’3, he’s over 6 feet tall. I have blue eyes, blonde-ish hair, and fair coloring, whereas he has brown eyes and hair, and a much tanner complexion. And I choose to share my life pretty freely on the Internet (case in point: this blog), but he’s much more private in comparison. (As a result, my bro shall be known as “my brother” to help maintain his privacy.)
And now to tie everything together a bit – this blog about diabetes, this post for my brother, and my relationship with him – another thing you should know is that I don’t have a single memory in my lifetime of my brother treating me differently because of my diabetes.
I’ve never heard him complaining about living with two T1D women (my mom and I), not once.
I’ve never felt judged by him for any choices I’ve ever made about my diabetes.
I feel like he may be the only person that I’ve ever met (and possibly will ever meet) who is completely, 100% impartial to my diabetes…and that’s really cool to me, for a bunch of reasons. But mainly because I think he realizes that I have plenty of other sources in my life that will judge me, treat me differently, or react in some way to one or more facets of my life with diabetes, so he just stays out of it.
I’m thankful for that.
One final thing you should know about my brother (besides today being his birthday, how different he is from me, and how nonchalant he is about my diabetes) is that he’s pretty effing fearless – he goes beyond being chill about my diabetes, he is chill about errrrrythang. He moved to a brand-new state, met all sorts of new people, found a nice living situation, started a new job, and oh, he also got into the best shape of his damn life and has officially run a marathon and become a certified personal trainer, all in the last three years. And he’s acted borderline blasé about all of his achievements. Like, WTF!!! In contrast to my high-stress, always-anxious, and wound-up-tight self, he’s the coolest cucumber and I hope that he knows I’m proud of him and can’t wait to see what he does next.
Happy birthday, bro – please don’t be mad at me for telling the world (okay, the 7 people who read this blog) about how awesome you are.
You know that feeling you get in the pit of your stomach when you receive bad news? It’s like your heart falls to the floor and your stomach starts swirling from the perceived sensation.
That’s unpleasant enough on its own, but for me, it can also cause blood sugar issues.
The same thing can be said for when I’m on a literal roller coaster (which doesn’t happen often, but when it does, involves extreme coercion from family or friends) – I get that awful swooping sensation on top of some sort of blood sugar impact.
Do you know how difficult it is to find a picture depicting an adrenaline rush that isn’t a cliche shot of a roller coaster or skydiver? Hence…a slew of moody “smiley” faces.
Whether it’s anxiety, adrenaline, fear, or just a rush of unidentifiable feelings, there’s no doubt about it: Extreme emotions tend to make my blood sugar unhappy by causing it to spike.
I’ve always been somewhat aware of this phenomenon, but I started thinking about it more last week when I got some upsetting news. (I’m okay, please don’t start to speculate on what it was…just a personal matter that I don’t care to discuss in greater detail here. Love y’all for understanding and respecting that.)
Actually, it’s kind of interesting to think about how the sequence of events unfolded last Thursday. I received a message that caused me to instantly panic. I was going to learn the context behind the message about a half hour after I got it, so in the interim, I was pacing all around the house and trying to figure out what exactly was going on. My stomach was roiling, my palms were coated in a light sheen of sweat, and my already-unruly hair frizzed out even more….
…and my CGM trend started going up, up, up, ever so slowly but noticeably.
I didn’t do anything to correct my blood sugar – at least, not right away. I waited until after I heard the specific news that had gotten me so worked up to really pay attention to my rising levels. I probably could have made my high blood sugar less severe by running a temporary basal increase right after I initially freaked out, but obviously, I had other things on my mind than my diabetes at that moment in time.
The whole experience was a stark reminder that food and insulin are far from the only things that impact blood sugar levels. Raw human emotion did that to me, and it will do that to me again in the future.
It sucks, but isn’t it also fascinating to think about how diabetes is totally a physical and emotional chronic condition, in every possible way?
Anyone who has ever experienced low blood sugar knows that it’s an icky feeling.
The shakiness. The sweating. The desperate desire to eat the entire contents of your kitchen.
It’s an unpleasant experience, but the one thought that has always made low blood sugars slightly more bearable for me is that I have to consume fast-acting, sugary, yummy carbs that are medically necessary. I’ve had some fun with that medically necessary bit in situations over the years: “Hey, stay away from that cupcake, I need it for my blood sugar!”
In any case, I’ve come up with my 10 favorite low blood sugars treatments that I’ve discovered work best for me…and tend to also be pretty tasty (well, maybe not #3, but everything else is a winner for most people in the flavor department).
1. Marshmallows. Even though I feel like I’m playing chubby bunny (you know, that pointless game when you see how many marshmallows you can fit inside your mouth at once and your cheeks puff out like an adorably plump rabbit munching on carrots) any time I consume a marshmallow, I can’t deny that they work incredibly well for low blood sugars. While I don’t mind the flavor of marshmallows, I definitely don’t love it, so I can always resist the temptation to over-correct a low blood sugar when I use marshmallows to treat it.
2. Mini boxes of yogurt-covered raisins. This has been my go-to for almost 10 years now because they’re just so convenient. The mini boxes are highly portable and contain about 11 grams of carbohydrates, which is perfect for not-so-bad lows that just need a little boost.
3. Glucose tablets (or gummies). They’re the old standby for a good reason: They were specifically made for treatment of low blood sugars, and they’re also extremely quick and easy to consume whenever, wherever (cue Shakira and her hips that don’t lie).
4. Frosting. So bad for you, but so good to eat by the spoonful when dealing with low lows. I don’t often have frosting on hand, but if I have some leftover from baking, I’ll throw it in the fridge and try to forget that it exists until I need it for a low blood sugar.
5. Orange juice (or a juice box). I feel like juice was a signature treatment for lows in my childhood: Since small children often drink juice boxes, it made a lot of sense. But back when I was working in an office full-time (sigh), I had a couple of juice boxes stashed away in my desk drawer because I got a kick out of feeling like a little kid with her juice boxes while sitting her grown-ass adult woman’s work cubicle (yes, I know I’m kind of weird. Embrace it.)
These are a few of my favorite things! (drastic shift from Shakira voice to Julie-Andrews-from-The-Sound-of-Music voice)
6. Starbursts. In college, I met a fellow type 1 in my social psychology lecture hall who swore by carrying starbursts for low blood sugars. She explained that four of them had the exact same amount of carbs as four glucose tablets, but they were far superior in taste because, well, starbursts are candy. I’ve kept this in mind over the years and its come in handy: More than once, I’ve been in a situation where I’ve had to get carbs fast but didn’t have glucose tablets on me, so I bought a sleeve of starburst to treat oncoming lows. They work well and they’re especially delicious when using the pink or the orange starbursts (not the yellow or red…fight me on it).
7. Skittles. What I love about using Skittles for low blood sugars is the 1:1 rule. One Skittle has one carbohydrate, so it’s extremely easy to figure out how many will bring up blood sugar, depending on how low the low is. 10 works well for when I’m in the 70s, whereas I might have 15 when I’m in the 60s. All bets are off when I fall below 60, though, and I’ll settle for a large, uncounted handful – maybe the whole dang bag – instead.
8. A piece of fruit. Ooooh, a genuinely healthy option on this list! The horror! But it’s a fact that fruit works just as well as any piece of candy or sugary treat for bringing up a low. I’m not talking about a single blueberry or strawberry, though: I’m talking either an apple or a banana – something that has some genuine carb content to it in a single serving.
9. A couple handfuls of cereal. This is a riskier choice because the lack of restraint I have around cereal when I’m low, but who else can relate to waking up at 2 A.M. to treat a low and being too tired to measure something out, so out comes the cereal box and handful after handful of Lucky Charms or Cookie Crisp are consumed in a very short span of time?! There’s no questioning cereal’s efficacy in a hypoglycemic situation, but when it comes to controlling the amount eaten…well, that’s a hard thing for me to do.
10. Fruit snacks/gushers. Embarrassing story from my childhood: Remember those commercials in which kids who ate gushers had their heads turn into giant pieces of fruit? Well…I was convinced that eating gushers would lead me to the same fate, so I avoided them until one day I finally realized it was just a stupid commercial (albeit with very freaky graphics) and it was totally safe to consume gushers. And thank goodness, because they’re delicious and great for lows! So are fruit snacks of just about any variety, though I’ve had the most luck with Mott’s and Welch’s fruit snacks.
Do you have any low blood sugar treatments that I didn’t mention here but should consider trying? Drop a comment to let me know what it is and why it’s your favorite!
Unexpectedly, I just obtained two brand-new blood sugar meters.
I’ve been a fairly loyal user of my OneTouch Verio IQ meter for about a decade now – that’s a longer relationship than the one I’ve had with Dexcom or OmniPod. It’s been mostly a loving relationship: From the beginning, I was a big fan of its sleek design, back-lit screen, and overall portability/usability. It grew a little more tumultuous over the years, though, as I noticed occasional, unprompted system shutdowns and questioned the overall accuracy of the device.
So I decided it was time to explore other options.
I brought this up to my endocrinologist during my very brief appointment with her a few weeks ago, and she let me know that a new Verio meter would be available soon. She said that she would set one aside for me when she received the shipments and that I could come and pick it up whenever I was back at the clinic.
Coincidentally, my gynecologist’s office is just down the hall from my endo, so I was able to pull double duty the other day and pick up the new meter right after my annual appointment with the lady doctor!
I was super excited to have a new meter, and even happier that it would take the same strips as my old meter. But there was one problem that I discovered when I got home…
…the meter I received isn’t the fancy-schmancy one just released by OneTouch.
My old Verio IQ (left) with my new Verio Flex (right)
Instead, it was a generation after my Verio IQ – so it’s still a new one – though it’s decidedly less impressive, technology-wise, compared to its counterpart. It’s the OneTouch Verio Flex, and it’s very compact, but lacking a charging port (it runs on a battery) and the back-light that I loved so much about my Verio IQ.
Before I could fret too much about this minor disappointment – I can’t get too upset over a meter that I didn’t have to pay for – I noticed a letter on the counter addressed to me from my company.
I opened it up and was pleased to discover that my company is partnering with Livongo to offer a free blood glucose testing kit, free lancets/strips, and free coaching to all qualified associates with diabetes.
Talk about a sick benefit, right?!
I followed the instructions enclosed with the letter and within five minutes, my information was submitted to the Livongo website and my kit was on its way to me.
I’m totally pumped about this meter and this new program that my company set up. I’ve never heard of them doing anything like this before, and it will be a huge relief to know that I won’t have to worry about ordering blood sugar testing strips (or the associated cost) any time soon. But the meter itself sounds so dang cool, too – it has a full-color touchscreen! The meter actually knows when you’re running out of test strips and will remind you to reorder them!!! I’ve never heard of anything like that before, so I’m eagerly awaiting its arrival and can’t wait to check out all the features.
The one thing you might be wondering about these two new meters is…why the heck would I need them since I already have a Dexcom G6 that monitors my blood sugars 24/7???
There are two reasons: It never hurts to have back-ups and my Dexcom isn’t always accurate.
Let’s say that tomorrow, my Dexcom transmitter fails. Suddenly, I’d be without any blood sugar readings and I’d have to rely solely on my meters for blood sugar checks.That’s why it’s incredibly important to have functioning meters at all times, because you just never know when you may have no choice but to use them.
To compound that, my Dexcom doesn’t always work the way it should. Sometimes, I receive sensor errors and it doesn’t work properly for hours. Other times, I feel symptomatic of low or high blood sugars and my Dexcom doesn’t report them, so I resort to doing a finger stick check to verify the accuracy of my Dexcom’s readings.
It’s easy to understand, then, why I think it’s crucial to have at least one spare blood sugar meter. I may have come across these two new ones suddenly and fortuitously, but I welcome their addition to my diabetes toolkit and can’t wait to “test” ’em out (and of course, blog about ’em).
This post was written by Quinn Leighton and it was originally published on the T1International blog on July 8, 2020. June may have been Pride Month, but it’s important every day to understand the challenges faced by the queer and trans communities on a daily basis and raise awareness. Thank you to Quinn for sharing your story, fighting for LGBTQ+ justice, and supporting efforts to make insulin available and affordable for all.
I remember stepping up to the counter to check into an appointment with a new medical provider, when the woman at the desk asked me to step to the person to her right saying to her colleague, “Can you help this…” I had to finish the sentence for her, “person. I’m a person.”
I have often felt fear and uncertainty as a person living with Type 1 Diabetes: when I wake up in the middle of the night confused, reaching for my glucose tablets because my blood sugar reads between 40-50; when my spouse is driving me to the ER because I can’t stop throwing up or get my ketones down while I’m home sick with the flu; and of course the overwhelming financial burden we face daily and monthly in order to stay alive and as healthy as possible.
All of this is assuming we don’t face additional barriers such as discrimination, bias or mistreatment the moment we walk through the front door of a pharmacy, or a provider’s office simply based on who we are and how we show up in the world. For people in the LGBTQ+ community, such as myself, this fear is real and based on lived experience. I am queer, non-binary and married. I’m also white, and acutely aware that while my experiences have filled me with anxiety and have led at times to delaying medical care, I recognize I have not experienced medical racism in the way an LGBTQ+ person of color likely has.
“We must recognize LGBTQ+ people often do not receive the same level of treatment or care that non-LGBTQ+ do, and LGBTQ+ people of color – particularly transgender women of color – are at the highest risk of discrimination, mistreatment and fatal violence.”
Delaying care due to these fears as a queer or trans person is not uncommon in any medical setting, however if you delay care living with diabetes, it can lead to life-threatening complications or even worse. It’s imperative that LGBTQ+ people living with diabetes and other chronic illnesses have the security, affirmation and resources to access the care they need.
We also know that LGBTQ+ people, particularly transgender and non-binary people make less money, despite having the same, if not higher levels of education as their cisgender, heterosexual peers. Even with a patchwork system of employment protections across communities, states and now federally; discrimination in the workplace is still very real. Among LGBTQ+ people, cis-bisexual women and transgender people have particularly high rates of poverty at 29.4%.
Together we can work toward greater health equity, but collectively, we must recognize the disproportionately high impact of poverty, violence, prejudice, mental health issues, discrimination and fear that so many LGBTQ+ people face living with diabetes. We must recognize LGBTQ+ people often do not receive the same level of treatment or care that non-LGBTQ+ do, and LGBTQ+ people of color – particularly transgender women of color – are at the highest risk of discrimination, mistreatment and fatal violence.
Understanding these inequities is paramount in moving forward in advocacy for affordable and accessible insulin for everyone who needs it, particularly those most vulnerable to bias, mistreatment and discrimination. This includes healthcare policies protecting people with pre-existing conditions and protecting LGBTQ+ people from discrimination when accessing healthcare. Efforts to repeal or rollback protections put into place through plans such as the Affordable Care Act that seek to provide care to people who need it most, particularly during a pandemic, is simply cruel and will only result in more harm and negative health outcomes. Non-discrimination protections are critical in providing the care needed for so many LGBTQ+ people living with a pre-existing condition such as diabetes, who already face a gamut of uphill battles in other areas of daily life.
Queer and trans communities are formidable. They overcome extraordinary obstacles to gain economic self-sufficiency, put a roof over their heads, maintain their health in the best of conditions, and simply exist and live in this world. What I’ve really noticed most is the courage and resiliency to navigate these barriers while celebrating community and showing up as our true and whole selves.
I recognize structural and systemic change won’t happen easily or quickly; however, I am hopeful that the movements around us will support communities of color, particularly black and indigenous people fighting for their lives and Asian people under attack due to prejudice and misinformation surrounding the COVID-19 pandemic. I am hopeful people will elevate their support of LGBTQ+ people and those most vulnerable within our community while working to make insulin affordable so that no other person living with diabetes is forced to make life-threatening decisions. And it is my hope that this momentum of support will carry us forward toward justice.
August is just ’round the corner (!!!) and that…feeling is creeping up on me.
That uncomfortable feeling that’s intensified by hot and humid weather.
That annoying feeling that happens when my CGM sensors and insulin pods seem to fall off my body and wither in the summer heat – the adhesives are no match for the sun’s merciless rays.
That restless feeling that creeps up when it’s too damn muggy out for my daily afternoon walks…the walks I rely on to help regulate my blood sugars and my mental health.
That fed-up feeling that’s the result of me going outside for 15 minutes, hoping to get some fresh air, only for my blood sugar to drop rapidly thanks to the high temps.
That creeping feeling of needing some kind of relief: Relief from the hottest days of summer and from every facet of diabetes management becoming just a bit more complicated because of it.
Is this the picture associated with this post just because I wanted to show off my dog being cute on a boat? No! Never! Absolutely not…okay fine yes.
And now that I’m acknowledging how much I’m craving relief, it honestly just sounds like I’m going through some genuine diabetes burnout.
It’s not surprising: This year’s been a wild one for me (and let’s face it, the world) in multiple ways. Overall, my stress and anxiety levels are up and my motivation to do everything that I “should” do to manage my blood sugar levels is way down. I’m very aware of what’s good about my diabetes management lately (such as my daily exercise routines) and what’s maybe not so good (my constant desire to snack on carbs and not measure them out and/or bolus for them).
I’m hopeful, though: Maybe as I continue to cope with my seesawing emotions and blood sugars, they’ll find a way to balance out on their own and be a little less intense…just as the weather will become once Autumn rolls around.
Hugging the Cactus 