BeingDiabetic.co.nz » Aaron

Aaron: Giving the nod

Aaron — Wed, 22 Dec 2010 21:31:42 +0000

Outside of the Drs and nurses, dieticians and podiatrists and everyone else involved in our healthcare there is a hugely important role played by those people in our lives that might not have formal health training but nevertheless have a role just as important (more in my opinion) than the aforementioned professionals – our friends and families.

That said, since this will be one of my last posts on the blog, I wanted to properly take a moment to acknowledge the people in my life, our lives, who make living with Diabetes that much easier, who listen when we need to bitch about it, laugh about it when we do and strategise when it comes to that too!

My partner…

Aaron: Ice Age

Aaron — Mon, 20 Dec 2010 21:30:38 +0000

One of the things that I was intrigued about diabetes wise when I was getting ready to come to Canada was whether the weather (more specifically the seriously cold weather) would effect my diabetes beyond the normal stuff which I knew about already like don’t freeze insulin and keep the tester warm enough to do tests etc. Well, it’s -15 degrees out today and so I’ve been getting a little practise at this diabetes in the extreme cold thing but it’s nowhere near as bad as I thought to be honest. There are a couple of tricks like having to keep your fingers warm to bleed well enough which is a problem when testing outside for example and keeping

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Thursday Poll: Does injection site make a difference?

Aaron — Wed, 15 Dec 2010 22:35:16 +0000

I don’t know about you guys put personally, I’m starting to discover that the site of my cannula might be making a difference to my BGs. The question I’m asking today, then, is whether you have noticed:

- Aaron

Aaron: The statistics

Aaron — Mon, 13 Dec 2010 22:02:12 +0000

As I approach my 20th anniversary of diagnosis started thinking about how much diabetes I must have ‘done’ during that time so I’ve done a rough calculation based on what I have at hand and here it is.

I think it makes for an interesting read!

38,764 x injections
36,400 x fingerpricks
100+ bloodtests
185 x cannula changes
5000+ hypos
5000+ highs
200+ Dr visits
50+ hospital trips
2 x hospitalisations
756,864,000 x heartbeats

I’m not even going to try and start to calculate the amount of hypo treatments I’ve eaten in it’s various forms in KGs sorry!

- Aaron

Aaron: Beer, bear and bare.

Aaron — Thu, 09 Dec 2010 21:10:20 +0000

Being essentially on holiday, I have found myself doing a lot of things in Canada that normally just wouldn’t be a part of my life in New Zealand.

Generally speaking I’ve been getting a lot more exercise than previously by walking and biking all over the city (no car you see), I’ve been going and doing decent hikes of 4 hours plus at least once every three weeks and I’ve also been drinking a lot more alcohol too to take just three examples.

All of these can be attributed to still being in a tourist mindset and as such, walking around this amazing city with ‘tourist goggles’ on as I like to call it – getting out to a…

Aaron: My favourite diabetic resources.

Aaron — Tue, 07 Dec 2010 22:11:23 +0000

Now that I’m out of NZ, I’ve been going through somewhat of a shift in my appreciation of the ease with which I used to be able to get healthcare, support, medication and diabetes paraphernalia. The effect has been though I’ve started using a whole new set of tools which I didn’t pay that much attention to in New Zealand or didn’t have occasion to appreciate as much as I do now.

Some of these Nic and I have talked about heaps but some of them might be new:

Log for Life

Everything that you want to know about this is in this post by Nic and at the Log For Life website. Now that have an…

Aaron: It’s Dad’s fault.

Aaron — Tue, 09 Nov 2010 21:00:10 +0000

I was perusing the annals of the internet last week and saw this article on Stuff.co.nz about how scientists have research indicating that fathers with high fat diets may be a cause of diabetes in their daughters?

You can read the full article here.

Seriously, I am all for research and understanding the causes and contributing factors behind T1 but come on, isn’t this a little ridiculous? It feels like there are all sorts of links between so many different conditions (white bread and cancer is one I hear often) and they just keep coming. Certainly, there are links between food and lifestyle which it is essential to know about for preventative measures but I can’t help…

Aaron: Travel, great. What about emigrating?

Aaron — Sun, 07 Nov 2010 20:00:03 +0000

A good friend of mine is a GP who has fairly recently emigrated to the UK and I got to talking to her recently about the logistics of moving countries as it relates to those with health issues like diabetes, HIV/AIDS, cancer, mental illness and everything else that occasionally plagues us.

For those of us lucky enough to live in relatively wealthy and developed countries like New Zealand we wouldn’t necessarily stop to think about how damn lucky we are to receive such outstanding healthcare compared to the billions of people in the work that simply don’t, often resulting in death from simple infections let alone chronic illness like diabetes.

Now imagine that for whatever reason you have immigrated somewhere for whatever reason be…

Thursday Poll: Are we behind the eight ball?

Aaron — Wed, 03 Nov 2010 20:00:05 +0000

I dunno about you guys but when I was a kid (less so as an adult now) I got the distinct feeling that here in NZ, we were very, very behind in the treatments, technologies and knowledge from a diabetes perspective.

Lantus has only just been subsidized in NZ compared to at least 6 years ago in Europe, we didn’t seem to get blood testers anywhere near as fast as North America or even Australia did and Analog insulins had to be fought hard for back in the 1990’s so that we had the luxury of not having to wait for 30 minutes after taking a dose of Actrapid which along with monotard was pretty much the only choice of treatment I…

Aaron: 20th Birthday

Aaron — Tue, 02 Nov 2010 20:15:00 +0000

In my search for Canadian experiences with which to fill my days and ensure that I make the most of our time here, I have been looking at several cultural activities and trips which are must see and must dos in and near Montréal.

On the list so far are:

New York baby! Hiking in the Laurentides mountain ranges Cirque Du Soleil (which comes from Montréal) See an Ice Hockey game live Go Ice Skating on a frozen lake/river Jump the boarder to the states and see Vermont Go to Niagara falls Check out the great lakes Ski at night (under lights) Stay in a cosy wood cabin on the side of a lake in all 4 seasons Eat as much

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