With the removal of a chat feature, I feel like I’ve lost touch with many/most of my TuD friends. Where are you folks? How are you doing? What are you up to?
I very much miss our regular real-time encounters…
I’m doing OK. Still struggling with some of the same things: insulin-induced weight I gained and haven’t lost, difficult weekend meal boluses/corrections, ups and downs of medical devices, and stress. Lately, my diabetes has been more volatile than before, and my sleep has been impacted, which hasn’t helped, plus I’ve found very little time to properly exercise, which has to be fixed. My recent A1c, though still good at 5.8, was the highest I’ve seen in 6.5 years - reflecting some of the difficulties I’ve had lately. Fun times, eh?
I’d like to hear from all - especially the former “chatroom regulars!” Miss the connection, I really do. Need chat back, heh.
Hey, @Thas. Since I rarely used chat, I wasn’t aware that it’s now gone. Sorry you’re feeling disconnected due to this.
I think regularly participating in a diabetes support group helps, whether it’s live or the online format. I think it helps me to make good on the personal intentions I commit to.
Making efforts and failing to accrue expected results can be disheartening. I’ve been educating myself about hypothyroidism lately. It’s a diagnosis I’ve lived with for 32 years but I’m learning that it has a huge effect on my overall health. One of the symptoms people with a low thyroid report is stalled or stubborn weight loss.
I’ve also learned that doctors take an overly simplistic view of hypothyroidism and are happy with thyroid labs that fall into the lab normal range. Unfortunately, people feel best when their thyroid labs are optimal, not just in range.
Compounding this narrow and limited physician interest is most doctors’ only wanting to measure TSH or thyroid stimulating hormone. This the the hormone secreted by the pituitary gland to prompt a release of hormone from the thyroid.
Anyhow, I think your interest in doing a reset is healthy. Good luck.
I remember the chat, it was nice although I didn’t use it much. People talked me through a low when I took basal instead of fast acting once or vice versa. This site changed for the worse imo and became less personal. No friends or posting on friends pages now either.
Sorry you are having more volatility. My last was 5.8, up from 5.6 was great imo. So if that is high for you you are doing very well overall imo.
Hope it is ok to comment on your thyroid comments. I couldn’t agree more. Being hypothyroid for many years, I couldn’t get my levels stabilized until I convinced my doctor to test my Free T3 and Free T4. I have now been fortunate to find doctors who will ignore my extremely low TSH numbers. My TSH barely registers because I take Armour thyroid. My T3 and T4 levels are now both where they should be and I feel good. It took at least a decade to accomplish this.
I do also miss the extras that we had when we were on the Ning platform.
The Chat feature was discontinued for technical reasons, the creators of the Chat app we were using were not updating it and that was causing problems. Hopefully Chat can return if a suitable new app is found.
@Thas It’s good to hear from you. Odd, I was just wondering where you were at and what you were doing! I’m sorry to hear of your recent struggles, but your A1C is wonderful, despite all of that! You may or may not remember me, I used chat more when it was on the Ning platform, in the days of pup, who talked me through how to extend my bolus for Thanksgiving dinner. Other people I recall are Shosh, Swiss chocolate, Rick, Lloyd, curlysarah, Doris,… Marie and Emily were on often; in those days we had guided (for the lack of a better term) chats, with frequent events.
I’d stop in now and again with the new setup, but rarely was there conversation like the earlier years. I figured it was because of my time difference; with Ning I was on during the day hours mainly and now I find myself on late evening.
Edited to add: I should mention why I was wondering about @Thas and a lot of other chatters. I came across Melissa Lee’s youtube videos the other night and went into a bit of nostalgia, remembering times gone by!
I hope something useable is found, soon. Chat was certainly useful for this who used it. I know that I have been personally helped on this journey with diabetes by folks in chat who, among other things, helped me thru my first injections, carb counting, pump and cgm decisions, to list just a few. Sure, the forum is still there, as is BT1, but there is something much more personal about live chat.
Sone other diabetes communities that I’ve used had, and removed, their chat rooms some time ago. Tud’s chat was a haven for me, and others that frequented it. I hope it returns soon, somehow.
I didn’t participate in chat due to accessibility issues, mostly, but hope it comes back for those who used it. I do miss many of the features of the old platform…having a personal page that people could write messages on, being able to post members-only blog posts, private groups for special interests, the section to share photos and videos, community activities… I still come onto TuD daily, but the content was much more diverse 10 years ago compared to now.
I would like the photos and videos back on pages, friends and friend comments as well as live interviews with questions in chat. Stopping all of those things led to a lack of community. Instead I have a site telling me not to post more comments on my own posts and others🤷🏼♀️
After graduation, we walked around in the city in our crazy costumes and let people point and laugh at us. Even most of the homeless guys congratulated us, although some of them told us that our dresses were ugly. They sure were.
I wanted smoke bombs and sparlker magic wands, but there was some concern that our outfits would start on fire and lead to terrible catastrophe. Safety first!
Hi to everyone! (with lots of nostalgia) I didn’t participate that much on the site but it was MY site and I followed everyone every day. I enjoyed looking into Thas’ posts each morning and was so impressed with Pup’s bienfaisance and everyone’s kindness!
Hi Thas it’s good to hear from you. I too miss the chat. I met so many amazing people there and learned a bunch. I’m still riding my bike regularly and did the 5 Boros NYC ride through the city on May 5. I play tennis in a couple of leagues and am heading to tennis camp with some of my teammates this weekend. I started Looping with my Omnipod in April and have been thrilled with straight Dex lines and little effort. The Looped FB group is extremely helpful. I’ll be in Chicago again in late September if you want to meet up.
It’s so good to hear from all of you! Add I said in the beginning, I’ve really felt disconnected from everyone with chat gone (and with it having been so quiet for a long time before that). It was really a community-building tool, in my opinion.
And yea, Clare, I’d love to get together when you’re in Chicago again. BTW, I finally tried an “ankle site” for my Dexcom - it lasted 81 days!
Been considering Omnipod loop, but my endo is busy trying to get me on a Tandem pump… we’ll see…
See I told you ankle was a great Dex site it is still one of my favorites, although with the G6 I tend to stick to the more traditional sites - back of arm and side of thigh. But 81 days is a great run ! My longest is 53 with the G4. But now with Loop relying on accurate Dexcom readings to keep me in range, I am a lot more likely to change it before it gets sensor errors or signal loss. Dexcom has been very good about replacing sensors that don’t last at least 10 days so it doesn’t really owe me anything.
A bunch of my friends are Tandem users and many rave about the Basal IQ but I’m not a tubed pump user and never will be. Looping with Omnipod offers the tubeless option and all the benefits of a bionic pancreas that can be configured to my own targets. I can’t wait until Insulet, Tidepool and the DIY Looping community can convince the FDA to allow us to all start looping. Being able to access everything on my phone - to bolus, adjust for exercise, change pods, see how much insulin is really left in my pod, and avoid all the annoying PDM beeps is so liberating.
The DS leadership conference is the last weekend in Sept. Just before the start of Rosh Hashanah - hopefully we can get together again.
it is still one of my favorites, although with the G6 I tend to stick to the more traditional sites - back of arm and side of thigh. But 81 days is a great run ! My longest is 53 with the G4. But now with Loop relying on accurate Dexcom readings to keep me in range, I am a lot more likely to change it before it gets sensor errors or signal loss. Dexcom has been very good about replacing sensors that don’t last at least 10 days so it doesn’t really owe me anything.