Jacob woke up 376 (339 on retest) today, due to change pod tonight, 200’s are not unussual lately in the am but 376 with .4 blood ketones is not. Sometimes he runs high in the am because he was running low at bedtime snack and i underbolus. last night he was in the mid 200’s so a gave him a good size bolus and expected him to be around 100 this am. jacob and i went back and forth over changing the pod immediately which is what i wanted to do. he was upset as usual when things don’t go picture perfect with his diabetes… we retested in 35 minutes after water and he was 328 he decided to just change his pod but at this point I assumed he might come down but we changed and by an hour he was 286, bolus starting to kick in i let him eat and we will see where he is in two hours. i hate second guessing my decisions, just wanted to see what you all thought. one issue is he is heavy on his belly with 4 rotations sites can’t wait for the smaller pod! any thoughts would be appreciated. ok also moms and dads how do you help keep your head and help your child from overreacting when things go wrong!
That’s got to be hard! I have a teenager who’s “straight” (so far, although whenever she says “I’m thirsty” I’m like “EEEEEK”) who is quite argumentative about everything. From my own D experience, when I get a bonkers high, I try to take a CB and maybe “augment” it with some stray carbs if there are any I might’ve overlooked. Water is a great start. Then I go for a walk. We have a great neighborhood w/ like a .25 mile loop around our neighborhood out to 3-5-7+ mile loops (I run too, but not when my BG is that high, most of the time, although I’ve had some issues there too…) so I can sort of pick a distance and hit the road. It gives me a short and manageable activity that gives me some “flow” and usually gets the CB working faster. Plus endorphins are good. The dog likes it, etc.
I have an MM pump and can’t say I’ve had issues w/ the site changes. I didn’t do any research beforehand but would probably avoid that product because of the stories, even though a lot of people seem to really love them? A lot of people complain about the tubes but I can always belay mine with my belt and it doesn’t bug me at all. If the sites from your pod are being bothersome it may be worth looking into?
I am not sure about your decision, but I do know about the second guessing your decisions. I think we can only do what we feel is best at the time, we are not perfect and this disease is constantly throwing new things at us. I have two children with this and they are both so different. I never know the exact thing to do, but I think if you tell your child that this is an uncertain disease and let him know you are doing the best you can perhaps he will see that. I know this isn’t much help but I wish you all the best. Take Care
I try to stay focused on the forest and not the trees - easier said than done, though. What I mean is that I try to keep in perspective that overall, we’re doing really well with managing my son’s diabetes - the forest. If we don’t handle an individual event in a textbook perfect way - the trees - it’s just one event and we make note, with hindsight, of how we might have done it differently now that we know the outcome. I do second guess myself sometimes, but I try not to let my son see that. I want him to feel confident that I can take care of him, and if it’s a situation where I truly don’t know what to do, I will ask for help (either from the endo, our CDE or others with diabetes or experience - depending on how immediate the issue is). Fortunately, we haven’t really had any cases where my son is distraught or overreacts, so we haven’t had to deal with that - at least not yet.
As for what to actually do in your situation last night, our CDE gave us the rule that if we have two unexplained (that’s key - unexplained) highs, correct with a shot, and change the site. I don’t know how long Jacob has been on the omnipod, but we chose a different route after hearing from a lot of people, including our CDE, that the omnipod doesn’t work well for a lot of children. I know there are people who love it, and I can certainly see the appeal of it, but maybe, at some point, you might see if another pump style would work better for you? We’ve only been using the Ping for about 4 months, but we’ve not had any delivery problems at all, and the tubing is not a problem for my very active son, which still surprises me.
Good luck and hang in there - you’re doing a great job!
P.s. - My daughter is not diabetic, and, like acidrock, I’ve been known to freak out a little when she’s ravenously thirsty - like after a basketball game when she should be thirsty. I’ll admit to poking her finger a time or two just because she was on the hunt for water!
I would have changed it, although having said that I am really stubborn and, unless I have obvious ketones or feel like crap, will usually try a few corrections before changing sites. I’m trying to make myself change them sooner.
Even though 0.4 ketones is technically normal, I find that my ketones are usually 0.0 or 0.1 if my blood sugar is normal, and at most 0.2 if I’m running high sometimes. Anything above about 0.3 (for me) tends to indicate that something is up with my pump site, even if it’s not a full-blown bad site. So if I had 0.4 ketones and woke up really high, I’d probably go ahead and change the site right away.
The same way you NEVER buy into a “temper tantrum”. Step back, take a breath and handle the number in front of you. Do not buy into the emotions, do not engage too much. It is a math game… you keep hitting it until it behaves.
Do not let it become emotional… The second you let it become emotional IT wins… sometimes you do nothing wrong and it does not work. Step back and take another swing. It’ll behave at some point…
good ideas! just to update, upon closer inspection of his pod from this morning it looked like it was kinked and he is slowly coming down. i know i know about the omnipod but that is what he wanted and we have had fairly good success in the 7 months he has been using it probably 3 kinks, afew occlusions during bolus and afew pods that failed to prime it just seems like there is more worry with the pump than MDI (just concern over failures, i’m sure other pumps have failures too) someday he may have to consider another pump but for now we are sticking with it and looking forward to the smaller model. my cranky teen turned around as usual i was worrying about leaving him to teach a yoga class rushing to teach others to slow down where is the irony in that! he swept the floor for me and said don’t worry mom i’m fine go live your dream! there is hope!