BeingDiabetic.co.nz » Slice of Life

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: 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…

Diabetes on a dartboard.

Nic — Thu, 02 Dec 2010 22:14:57 +0000

Some days it feels like diabetes is Public Enemy Number 1. It’s days like these I would be tempted to sketch out what my diabetes would look like if it were a person, stick it on a dartboard and take aim at it with a nice sharp dart (or perhaps a syringe, just to make a point).

I had a night like this last week. Had one of those hypos which you know is going to be bad news. I took a reasonably large amount of insulin to go with my dinner, and by only 40 minutes in I was already at a 3.4. Ran to the kitchen and started loading up on glucose. In the meantime I felt the…

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…

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

…

Aaron: #bgnow

Aaron — Mon, 01 Nov 2010 20:01:06 +0000

This last week has been a mixture of diabetes good and diabetes hell with a whole heap of random highs and lows plaguing me at various points day and night inciting more than one moment of cursing diabetes to hell I have to admit even though I’m not really one to sit around feeling sorry for myself (which I hope comes across!).

Moaning aside though, I’ve put the spikes and troughs down to the change in seasons again, me fighting a tickly throat for the last two days and a little bit of stress chucked in with too little sleep and the odd bottle of beer as I’ve transitioned out of my current job into a new one which is…

Aaron: The trick to trick-or-treating

Aaron — Sun, 31 Oct 2010 20:00:38 +0000

HAPPY HALLOWEEN!

Today is Halloween in Canada and man do they get into it!

Every shop you look at is full of displays with pumpkins and ghouls and decorations, supermarkets are selling autumn wares, huge pumpkins, tiny pumpkins and gourds are filling the shelves and streets outside shops. Party invites are being sent out left right and centre and people are all a flutter talking non stop about what their costumes are going to be. At times I honestly feel like I’m back at high school listening to the girls talking about their ball dresses!

Seriously though, it seems to me that after Christmas, this holiday is the biggest in Canada and people absolutely love getting into it in…

Stickler for the rules.

Nic — Thu, 28 Oct 2010 21:33:39 +0000

Maaaan I dislike people who stick to all the rules for no good reason. I’ve just moved house and thus moved pharmacies. I knew my old pharmacist was good and really helpful but it never actually struck me just how easy things were (apart from the fact that said pharmacy had very short opening hours).

Now, I’ve moved to an area where there’s even a pharmacy which is open til 10pm – perfect for someone who works nearly full time like me. However it seems the new pharmacist is a stickler for the rules. He would not – very clearly not – provide me with my full script at once. I mean, SERIOUSLY. What am I going to do with…

Summertime.

Nic — Mon, 25 Oct 2010 21:45:57 +0000

Ahhhh – after that weekend I think it’s fair to say summer is definitely on the way. With this comes summer wardrobes and new challenges for us diabetics (mainly the girls, although boys I know you have your own wardrobe challenges).

For me, it’s all about being able to wear nice floaty dresses. I had a little dream the other day about buying one of the two pumps in the NZ market which are remote control-operated, so I could just throw on a dress and not worry about having to wear my pump in a leg garter/down my top, plus the added hassle of needing to retrieve it without looking completely brazen/inappropriate. (for example, I was in a meeting with…