I went to Auckland’s first Laneway Festival yesterday (review: good line-up; dreadful organisation; lost a bit of momentum somewhere along the way; would go again though in the hope that it’s organised better next time).
My pump had been showing one bar of battery left for a few days, then about five mins after I walked in to the festival, decided to click over to the empty battery screen. Thankfully I am a nerd on the supplies organisation front and all of my glucose meters have spare pump batteries in them – so it was pretty seamless getting the new one in there while walking through the crowd.
However this just reminded me of how bloody organised we all need to be in order to have all the things we need with us for our diabetes. It’s so easy to get caught short. It also made me realise how good it is to have a pump which takes batteries you can buy in any shop (I have a Cozmo which takes AAA batteries). Although there were officially no pass-outs at the festival yesterday I’m sure I could have found an official who would have made an exception for a T1 to go and get a single battery to keep her ‘artificial pancreas’ going.
Posted in Insulin Pumps, Slice of Life
Tagged as Cozmo
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Karen wrote
I’m having troubles with being disorganised today! I’ll have to go home for lunch because I used the last of my humulin with breakfast and forgot to get a new vial out of the fridge before I left for work. Duh!
I’m also having heaps of lows lately, so I’ve been chewing through my sugar pills. I had to make an emergency dash to the dairy during work yesterday, because I went low and had no sugar pills left. Must get myself more organised!
Nic wrote
We all have days like that, Karen! I was horrified one time when Aaron recounted a story from when he was still on MDI which was something like him attaching a needle to the end of a vial of insulin and pushing it out using a pencil because he’d left his insulin pen at home – arrrrgh! Aaron you can tell the story better than I can!
I’m interested in what you refer to as your ’sugar pills’, pray tell!
Aaron Nolan wrote
Those were the days!
That happened several times if I’m honest – not something I would repeat to be sure but it did the trick at the time! I used to do it when I’d ran out of insulin and was trying to get the last drop that the pen couldn’t squeeze out. I did make a reasonable guess as to the amount I was injecting too by dividing the vial into 300 (3ml vial) and marking it off with a vivid to get the right dose.
The things we (read ‘I’) used to do…
Karen wrote
Wow Aaron, I wouldn’t be game enough to try that. Sounds pretty rustic! I’ve had a few times where I’ve completely run out of insulin which have involved an emergency dash to the doctors to get a prescription. The doctors are usually pretty good at giving me an appointment if I explain what I’ve done.
Nic, I usually just have stashes of barley sugars everywhere, but I still call them sugar pills becuase I’m sure I used to have these sugar tablets that came in a tube when I was younger. Haven’t seen them around for a very long time though. What do you normally have when you’re low? Lots of people seem to have jellybeans, but I like that barley sugars are individually wrapped so its easy to grab a handful and just shove them in your bag or your pocket.
Also made a mistake in the last post, forgot my humulog, not humulin, I haven’t taken humulin in years! Duh!
Nic wrote
Ahhh, I see Karen – funny how we all get these phrases we use for all this stuff!
Andy wrote
If you are in NZ Karen you might be talking about glucodin? I loved those things so much I used to just eat them (mum caught me once when I was about 10).
They went off the market I think…
Nic wrote
I know those ones Andy, we used to have them in the house and have them before gymnastics (before I was a T1). They were yummy! I might start a ‘bring back Glucodin’ campaign like ‘Bring back Georgie Pie’.
Karen wrote
Yep Glucodin, thats right! Those were really tasty.