The devil is in the detail… or lack of it!

Right here goes, another long one but it’s quite funny honest…

I love design and art and crafts! Anyone who knows me knows this…
Clothes (though my style is ultimately quite scruffy it is unique), furniture, soft furnishings, art, Shoooooes even wallpaper!! As a design diva, if I can imagine it I’ll sketch it and try to make it.

Can you imagine how I feel about my own particular medical appliances?

It’s a love hate thing.

I love my pump, in spite of the heinous allergy I developed to the RapidD infusion sets, which left me looking like the loser in a fight with a giant Octopus, the panicked boop beep booping as it cries that I have a kink or am running low on battery or insulin, the 60cm of tubing which is, despite always being the same length, either too short or too long, my cat’s inability to leave the afore mentioned alone (imagine the wide eyed joy of a springy, coily thing that you mustn’t touch and springs into a different shape when tapped with a deliciously naughty paw?). The fact that it’s also magnetically attracted to doorhandles, and the pump itself comes to life and jumps out of my pocket/bra/waistband at the most in-opportune times, swinging wildly like a lassooed animal trying to escape, or dropping down the leg of my trousers making it almost impossible to retrieve, yes in spite of all of these minor hiccups, I love it, love it, love it and wouldn’t be without it even if I had to look at it’s ugly little blue face forever.

Now ‘the Loathing’ (a collective name for my own peculiar dislikes).

I dislike the way it looks, not exactly slick really, bit of a 2” blue plastic, perfunctory, life giving, style horror. My inner Design Diva especially loathes the accoutrements which come as standard with the spirit, which are black or black or black or rubberised (colours but attaching them is limiting and renders the more useful but ugly clip unuseable), they look like the b*stard offspring from a wetsuit factory and an army surplus shop. I don’t want it on a string around my neck, looking more like a soap on a rope than anything else and the ‘secret’ waistband now don’t even get me started…

Now I’m aware that this, to some, may sound ungrateful to this life changing (quite) little gadget, BELIEEEEVE me I love the bones of it as it were, but everyone can benefit from a make over now and then, and seriously it’s no Ipod.

To a woman who loves the beautifully really crafted designs of Marcel Bruer’s ‘Wassily’ chair or saaaay a Marc Jacobs handbag, Christian Laboutin shoes or even the exquisitely carved ebony hand mirror that I found in a thrift shop, the list goes on, this indifference to the aesthetics of what essentially is a unit that spends 24/7 with me is a bit of a bug bear (as my post may have given you a clue to).

I want it to be ‘me’ (no not borg stylie) or at the very least not ‘medical looking’.
Why, oh why is it so hard to find any stuff that is vaguely stylish for all the diabetic guff we have to lug around, as if it’s not bad enough that we have to carry it in the first place, but for it to look like it came straight from the ward?

Personally, and I acknowledge that some people may be, I am NOT into black webbing or neoprene. The stuff I found that doesn’t ‘look’ home-made (like a half blind house elf made it from stuff left over from a crafting day) is either ‘just’ like a plain pager case or very beautiful but prohibitively expensive like some fabulous, rather designer handbags/kit bags, which I admit are lush but also not entirely what I’m looking for?
I have found a website for meter/kit bags ( stickmedesigns.com ) which are fab-U-lous but as yet there are no pump type accessories there either.
Dammit you can get 50 million skins, pouches, sleeves and attachments for an Ipod. So… what to do?

Well being the designer that I am (no really I am), and not bad at it either if I say so myself, I shall be undertaking the task personally, of designing (and making) some aesthetically pleasing pump-wear for myself, today my flat, tomorrow the world!!!. I am actually quite excited by it, currently I am focusing on designs for my Spirit (as thats the only one I have any experience of). My first forays are quite successful but there is loads more room for improvement to perfection.

Question: Why should these things in our lives not be as beautiful as the clothes we wear? Why should they not be an extension of us, they are after all attached to our bodies? Why must they look like medical equipment and not a fabulous accessory, I mean they cost enough? Why do we have to use infants socks pinned to our undies?
Answer… there isn’t a reason, except that the marvellous ingenious ought to be sainted engineers who make our life changing equipment, don’t really care about the form, just the function and given their phenominal creations I think thats fair, so it’s up to us the community using them, to make them our own.

Or maybe it’s just me, my own private crusade, sounding more like it by the second isn’t it?..

Now you’ve got me wanting to make up something for my pump - to make it look more in style with my Fashionista style (okay - maybe in my mind I think I dress like one). I’m going to go check out the Stickmedesigns website that you wrote about above - just to get an idea.

Anna … The Devil Who Wears Prada

:o) LMAO, Glad you liked it he he we shall become fashionistas of the pump/D world before you know it wah ha ha haa ;o) x

Just take a look around you (from parking lots to kitchen cabinets, etc.) and you shouldt get a clue why D stuff looks like it does. They were designed by men!!! I am not bashing men but the cold, cruel facts are what they are. You go ladies, we definitely need some style in our lives!

Actually, Caselogic makes some really fashionable neoprene pockets that fit pumps (basically, if it’ll hold an mp3 player, it’ll hold a pump). Or you could use a designer cell phone case. Etc. Get creative. I carry all my supplies in a Coach zippered clutch. I wear the Pod now, but with my last pump, I made sure to clip it or slip it where it was not an issue. Have you tried it in a baby sock pinned to your bra? That works well, too.