Hi…DD left the world of MDI yesterday. She is wearing a pink ping using the Contact Detach infusion set. She put in the set herself! (she’s 8…so that’s huge). It was a long night last night checking her bg #s and just giving mommy love. The infusion site is a big discomfort for her, she didn’t want to do the belly, but we were sent the shortest tubing so for now…the belly is the only site option. Curious where others wear their sites? Are there other CWD wearing the contact D in the belly…is that working out? Thanks for the advice. Tomorrow will be 6 months since dx…starting pump brought back all the fears and anxiety when we left hospital back in August. Thankfully DD is keeping a positive attitude so that just pushes all the fears and anxiety to the back! (:
I hope your daughter loves her pump as much as my son loves his. He’s been using the Ping since July and liked it immediately. He was thrilled to be able to dose in small increments that better match his needs and doesn’t have regular lows like he did on Lantus. He also doesn’t miss all the shots.
As for sites, we use the belly and the lower back/love handle area. I’d like to try his upper buttocks area, as the endo said that’s the site most kids like best, but he isn’t willing yet. He disconnects for sports and doesn’t want to be reaching in his underwear in the locker room - can’t say I blame him. He uses the 23" tubing and can place his site anywhere on his front or back abdomen with no problem - he just clips his pump where he needs it. If he’s dressing up and has to wear a tucked in shirt, he puts his pump in his pocket - we’ve cut little slits in all his pants/shorts pockets, so he can thread the tubing from his pocket to his site without tubes hanging out or his tucked shirt getting all bunched up. He’s 13 and 5’8", so he’s the size of a small man.
It’s not unusual for my son to say a site stings for the first few minutes after we insert it. If it continues to be painful or causes pain with bolusing, it could be in a bad place. For instance, we did a site change this week that he said really hurt going in. After about an hour, he told me it was still really hurting, so we took it out and did another site. When we pulled out the canula, the little spot bled quite a bit beyond the normal little drop he gets. I’m guessing we must have hit a blood vessel rather than fat tissue.
Good luck and great job by your daughter for having such a positive attitude. It makes a world of difference both for her and for a worried mom!
Hi Sweet Ivy's Mom. Congratulations on your daughter's Ping! I use a pink ping too, as well as the contact-d sets. Does she use these because she is teflon sensitive (I am)? And is she thin or well padded? Since these sets are steel. I know they can really hurt when you bump them. I wish they made a shorter needle on them, say 5mm, and mid-range tubing length - 31". Maybe we should launch a request to Animas from this group?
I intentionally stay a little pudgy in the belly area so the sets don't poke and irritate my underlying muscle. Another thing you can do to prevent inadvertent bumps to the set is stick a Dr. Scholl's callous protector circle over where the needle goes in. This also helps if the set is near or under a waistband.
When I'm inserting a new set, I've found that if I touch the tip of the needle gently here and there in the area I intend to put it, I can choose a spot with less feeling, and that such spots tend to have less vessels as well as less nerves in them. The sets are more comfortable and last well that way.
-Not sure if her experience will be the same, but I figured I'd share in case it might help. She sounds really brave. So do you.
-All the best!
Linda
I rotate my sites around - belly, upper butt, side butt, love handles. I actually like my side butt sites the best. They are easy to get to, but don't interfere as much with clothing. I know some folks use their arms, and I may try that at some point too. The important part is ROTATION. This is what prevents the build up of scar tissue and will ensure that she can pump for years to come. Experiment with different sites if you can. I really didn't think I'd like anything OTHER than my tummy, but was shocked when I discovered I loved the side butt!
Some sites do hurt or cause discomfort, especially immediately after they are inserted. I find that if I, say, put a site in on my right hip before going to bed, I can't sleep on that side because it's too sore. But it is usually fine by the next evening. I use the Mio infusion sets (the canula is flexible). There have been times where I insert a site and it causes such pain (either just sitting in there or when bolusing) that I have to remove it. There's usually blood when this happens.
The vast majority of the time, the pain dissipates within a few hours and most sites work just fine (in my experience, at least).
How have her BGs been? The first few weeks pumping can be rough. Expect some wild BGs. But once you get those basal rates (more or less) figured out, they should settle down.
good luck pumping, i know what you mean about renewed fears, and also the experiece of drawing inspiration from your child, i was just reminding myself to draw strength from my son and his generally happy attitude, live in the moment style, kind of like the way we are all ga ga over our dog, dogs have no burden to carry around so they make us feel lighter, good luck with everything the next few weeks might be a bit tricky but things should improve, i think you made a good choice, jacob is on the omnipod although he wouldnt choose another pump i'm not sure if it the most reliable.. anways happy pumping ask away if you need anything. all the best amy
thanks Linda for the advice! Livy isn’t allergic to teflon, but she tried the demo contact detach a few months ago in her arm and was pleased. The belly site is a huge deal as we didn’t do a lot of belly shots prior to the pump. Tomorrow we are supposed to switch sites, but if she is still complaining I might have do it sooner. I will definitely look into the callous protectors. Thanks for the tip!
Rotation, rotation, rotation is glued in my head. I am hoping Livy will give her love handles and bum a try…but she never let me give shots in those areas, so I’m letting her lead the way with site locations. Her numbers so far a great, we had 1 high of 179, I gave small correction she came down to 105…so far no lows!! She biking now with her dad so I adjusted the temp basal to -20% for 1 hour. Not sure if 20% was enough or to much.???
Thanks Amy! We’re taking this pumping thing hour by hour. So much info, numbers, facts, emotions…trying really hard to not get overwhelmed. Thank goodness Livy is keeping positive and hasn’t said this sucks Im done! So much to learn from our sweet babes! ~Allison
You will have to just experiment with the basal adjustment for exercise. It's hard to tell and a lot of times, it's just a "gut" feeling. For example, if I head out for a run, I might turn down my basal by only 20% if I've already been running a little high. But if I've been in a sea of lows, I'll turn it down as much as 50-60% when I exercise.
Also, different kind of exercise have different effects on my BG. A long, sustained run will make me drop. BUT, anything that involves a lot of adrenaline (cycling, sprinting, running a road race) may actually require me to take MORE insulin.
Basically, it's all trial and error. The NICE thing about the pump, is those errors are usually far less severe and (for me, at least), easier to catch and deal with.
If 179 is the only high you've had so far, I'd say you're off to a great start!! Test a lot and encourage your daughter to take as much of a role as she can in making the adjustments (using the pump, decreasing basals, bolusing, etc). The more she understands, the more it should help her articulate what is happening with her body. I know that was always the case for me, anyway.
Yes, if she doesn't have to use a steel needle she may well find she doesn't at all like them - they can be uncomfortable.
In my case the usual soft cannula caused a lot of inflammation and itchiness, left a swollen red blotch that took weeks to heal. The steel needle does none of that - just a clean tiny hole. Also it gets around the common problem of kinking the cannula which can happen where the fat is too thin and the plastic cannula hits the muscle layer underneath and bends, slowing insulin delivery. Way more comfortable when it works right, though, most would say, I think.
Ok night 3 with pump…we moved site to arm. No more pain! 
but we did has a dooosy of a low just before bed…64!!! It might have been the shower…it took 34 carbs to bring her up to 130! I plan on checking her @ 12 am, 3 am, 5 am…who said a pancreas mama needs sleep?? 
Yes, I have found that I will sometimes go low after a hot shower. The heat from the shower makes any insulin under the skin absorb faster.
Yes a hot shower can lower BG but you would have also experienced this on MDI.
It could be the type of infusion set your using, you need one that is fully primed before insertion. Her insulin usage is very low and if your filling the cannula after insertion it's not a perfect science...But you already may be using the best one now?
?....;-)
we did see some lows after showering on MDI...but never a 64. Also when I treated lows on MDI they never really took so many carbs to bring her up. I made one major mistake last night. I treated with a slower release carb initially, then followed up with fast acting...bad pancreas mama! At DD's midnight check she was almost 200! So then I had to correct. Felt awful for making her numbers yo yo. She was a 105 at 530 am and then a 122 at 7am. I am asking her school to make sure she checks every couple of hours. Ideally, I would liked to have started DD on the pump last Monday because she was out of school for the full week. But really what is ideal in the world of diabetes??
hi allison, dont beat yourself up about that one, we all overtreat for lows at times, esp at bedtime, sounds like you are doing very well, her setting sound like they are working out, hope you got some rest while she was at school i feel guilty for having the day off and napping even with a good night sleep, a good snug with my dog is like therapy for me! sounds like you really have a handle on it and livy is probably excited no more shots! best of luck, get some rest! thinking of you, i like your style and attitude allison, attitude is everything, i struggle sometimes my latest mantra is less reactive! amy
As a parent of a young Type 1 (who is also a Ping user!) I would underscore Jacobs Mom advice about not beating yourself up. At all.
You clearly are a very good Mom who has learned the technical and mechanical end of managing diabetes as best she can for the short time she has had to learn. It is a steep learning curve sometimes, but from where I am sitting, I think you are going to do FINE.
There are times we all do a brain-fade like you did. Learn to laugh it off. You have way too many miles and yeaars ahead of you to get down on yourself. As long as nobody gets hurt, and you learn from your mistake, its all good. Really-really.