@Lori31 - Congratulations on finding us here @ TuDiabetes.
I am impressed that you have decided to work on better control, AND that you had the courage to come on here to tell us about it.
Can you tell us some more about your struggles and where you think your major hurdles are?
For example, I struggle with carb counting for dinner. I almost always wing it (okay, maybe an educated guess) and then correct for the high/low later. I keep my dinners pretty small in part to lower the problems from getting out of hand.
As far as staying motivated overall, I think each of us approach it a bit differently. A couple of things work for me.
The first is just how much better I feel and how much more energy I have vs. my earlier, wing it everyday, all the time, days. I want to keep that high energy and good feeling, so it’s easy to stay on top of my care.
The second is to use the numbers that assault me with every CGM check and every finger-stick as informational only. No blame, no shame, no beating myself up … EVER!
For example, yesterday 3 hours after lunch I looked at my CGM and saw my BG @ 249 and rising. Okay, I can’t fix the past, so what do I do now? I tested for confirmation, gave a correction, plus I added an extended bolus over 3 hours. By the time the turkey was ready for carving, I was coming in for soft landing @ 93. Now, yes, I did pat myself on the back and told myself, “Nice Job!” Having positive self-talk does wonders, IMO.
To your original question regarding a mentor, check out our chat room sometime.