Tuesday, August 30, 2011

So hubby isn't diabetic any more. . .

He had a one-on-one meeting with a "diabetes educator" and I'm so sorry I missed it.  I had a killer headache and just about any attempt to move would make me throw up, so I couldn't go.

He showed her his record of glucometer readings - all but one within the normal range.  The one that was high wasn't off by much.  And he has NOT been at all faithful with the dieting.  So he asked her, flat out:  "If I haven't been staying on the diet and my blood sugars have remained within the normal range, then how can I be diabetic?"  She replied archly, "Oh, you're diabetic, all right!"  He reworded the question several ways - the numbers all say NORMAL, despite eating anything that didn't bite back - so how does this back up the diagnosis.  She would never come back with a concrete answer, but she continued to insist that he is a diabetic.

It probably was a good thing I wasn't there.  I would have been in her face with the same question.  If it looks like a duck, waddles like a duck, and quacks like a duck, why do you persist in calling it a kitty-cat???

He takes no medicine, doesn't stay on the diet, and yet continues to have normal blood sugars.  So how, exactly, is the diagnosis of "diabetic" appropriate??

His highest-ever recorded blood sugar level, taken months ago, was 141.  It has never been anywhere near that high since that one time.  He is overweight, but has lost about 1/4 of what he needs to lose.  He is exercising often. Diabetes runs in his family, so I can see that it is a definite possibility.  But the circumstances seem to have changed.  What am I not seeing here???

Friday, August 19, 2011

Do Glucometers Keep Your Whole History?

I mean, stuff like how often you checked your blood levels, what dates, what times,  and not just the readings themselves?  I'm wondering if a diabetes counselor who has the meter-reading gizmo can determine all this, and see for herself/himself when hubby has had periods when he decides not to be diabetic any more and quits playing nice.

If there is such a thing, boy - will there ever be a day of reckoning!  I'm not sure I want to be there when it happens.

But as several people have pointed out, we are not their mothers or their jailers.

Saturday, August 13, 2011

So my husband informs me this morning. . .

he has a busy day ahead, no time for breakfast. . .and he may not get around to lunch, which means around three-thirty-to four, the Great All- American Pig-Out commences, and will go on until further notice.

We DID the diabetic thing LAST week, with blood sticks and counting carbs and all that, and now he's tired of it.

Should I call the AMA and tell them that these days, people are only diabetic when they FEEL like being diabetic???

News to me, but hey - I'm still just a rookie.  Can you tell I'm just a wee bit perturbed?

Friday, August 5, 2011

Another question for those with more experience:

Since my DH was issued his glucometer, he has been pretty good about checking his sugars.  One morning, it was at 147, but that is the highest it has been.  The pattern, every day, seems to start out high and then, no matter what he eats, his sugar level just goes downhill.  He had about two and a half normal meals for supper, plus lots of snacks, but 3 hours later, his sugar was around 74.

I'm not yet familiar enough with all of this to know - is this at all a reasonable pattern???

Tuesday, August 2, 2011

May I borrow a brick wall - for smacking my head on??

DH has been doing pretty well lately - dropping a few pounds, checking his blood sugars (he seems to run on the lowish side) and paying attention to what he eats.

But every once in a while, (like tonight) he will have a planned-for snack (which is fine) and then go berserk and start stuffing his face with everything that isn't nailed down.  And he will give me this look that says,  "Don't even think about saying anything!" What can you do??? He KNOWS he isn't supposed to be eating like that and he doesn't want to hear about it.

Just a few hours ago he was strutting around proudly in a shirt that he couldn't button a couple of months ago and now it fits nicely. . .and then he goes completely off the wall and starts eating like a vacuum cleaner.  I SOOOO don't get it.