I went to my final appointment at National Women’s today (they see you sometime after six weeks has gone by since the birth of your baby) and I thought it was about time I wrapped up my journey through this pregnancy on the blog as well. The appointment itself was pretty uneventful: the midwife just went through all my latest blood test results with me, and the physician just had a quick look at my latest blood sugars and discussed my plans going forward. It was really quite sad to be saying farewell to all of the lovely staff up there – for now. I have been in their care since August 2008 and have learnt more in that 15 months about my diabetes than I have in 15 years with the condition. Towards the end I was there more than anywhere else apart from home and work. And my midwife (Jo) may as well have been my wife as well (in fact she was telling me that the husbands of one of her girls referred to Jo as the girl’s wife whenever she rang the home phone).

I also stopped by Ward 96 (maternity ward) and dropped in some baking and a thank you card. And with that, I spun the buggy around, headed towards the carpark, and closed the door to that particular project in my life. As I got in my car, I realised I was feeling really, really happy. What a huge amount of work it was to have a pregnancy with Type 1. But it was worth every blood test, carb count, high, low, pump failure, cannula kink, dietary restriction plus all of the other hurdles pregnancy itself brings.

Anyway, enough of the soppy stuff. Hugo’s nearly eight weeks old now, so I’m starting to get my stroll on as a Mum. Stuff I’ve learnt along the way from a T1 perspective:

• You will get asked by approximately one in every four people what the chances are of your baby getting diabetes.
• You have to be very organised if you want to be able to weigh food, take BGs, write them down and actually eat the food before you’re being summonsed again for the next feed by the baby. Try to eat immediately after the baby goes down if you’re due for a meal. If you prioritise the washing or housework, chances are you’ll just be getting yourself a snack or meal and you’ll have to drop everything and tend to the baby.
• If you’re planning to eat, take your insulin after the meal. There were a couple of times I took my insulin, took a bite of my sandwich and then found myself running upstairs to tend to the baby, wondering why my BGs had crashed half an hour later when I was still feeding/rocking/changing the baby.
• It’s hard not to put the baby first all the time. But if you have a low BG you really need to at least eat some glucose before carrying on what you’re doing. I remember in about week two or three I was just trying to catch a bit more sleep after about four feeding sessions in the night. My husband went to have a shower. I realised I might be low and tested – 1.1!!! I called out to my husband to get me some glucose tablets (meanwhile the baby was screaming his lungs out for a feed). I necked a whole packet of glucose tablets and propped myself up in bed and started feeding while trying not to slump over. It was the diabetes equivalent of ’strap it up, I’ll play on’.
• I’ve not found that breastfeeding has had any effect on my blood sugars. I spoke to a number of T1 women when I was pregnant who had had babies who mentioned their BGs went crashing down whenever they breastfed their children, but I’ve not noticed it at all.
• Less so now, but certainly in the early days I would find I got very little warning before I needed to sit down and feed the baby. I learned quickly to have a little box which I grabbed before I got stuck wherever I sat with my little man. The box would contain my mobile phone, my iPod Touch (hey – I’m an online girl, it’s been great to be able to surf the web while feeding), my glucose meter and glucose tablets. I’d always try to have a bottle of water within reach as well.
• It will take a while to get used to the smaller amounts of insulin from what you were taking in your pregnancy. I kept racing to the fridge when my pump signalled only 20 units left (to get a vial of insulin out to warm up to room temperature) then realising that 20 units would last me a good part of a day compared to only a few hours with my pregnancy insulin needs.
• It is so liberating to get a high BG these days and just deal to it without worrying that you might have brought harm on your unborn baby.
• You will quickly learn how to do blood tests with one hand.
• You will probably have a few high BGs from either having a snack while breastfeeding but not being able to reach your pump/being able to give an injection, and forgetting when you’ve stopped feeding – or because you’re in the bath with your baby and have taken your pump off but straight after the bath you are dressing and settling the baby and forget all about putting your pump back on.
• Be careful of putting your pump anywhere near where milk leakages/spills might occur (bras and the like)

Anyway, that’s it from me for now – over to the rest of you who are pregnant or getting yourself ready for it – feel free to write to me and share your experiences!

NOTE – if you want to see a list of all of the posts I did about my T1 pregnancy, go here.