I have now seen my new doctor twice and I’m not sure I will get over this one thing they do at the office. It’s completely threatening to me.
As soon as I arrive to check in, someone I do not know takes my meter. (LOL, the woman yesterday asked me if I use a glucometer and I just stared at her, blankly, trying to figure out what she was talking about. First, what on earth is a “glucometer” and second, WHAT DO YOU THINK I DO, DIABETES DOCTOR’S OFFICE.)
Well, deep breath, that’s okay. I have a lot of meters. (I guess I mean: I have a lot of ‘meters.)
So I go through the check in process just fine, they check my weight, temperature and blood pressure, and put me in a room.
But then, OMG, then they take my pump. And they leave the room. With my pump. And I’m not going wherever they are going. I’m in the room. Without my pump.
And, if you can’t tell, by now I’ve started to mildly hyperventilate a bit. Because, um, excuse me? My pump is not attached to me. My pump. Not attached. To me. And I don’t know where they’re going with it. In their (I’m sure not) grubby little hands.
And then they take I am not kidding you FIFTEEN MINUTES to do whatever they’re doing before they come back into the room and return my pump. And it isn’t like I can check my blood glucose on my meter to see how I’m doing…
…probably wise they checked my blood pressure before they stole my pump.
Yesterday my doctor came in while my pump was wherever it was (missing me, I am sure, while downloading all kinds of information my doctor could review with me). I almost couldn’t talk to her! She chuckled and said many of us are like that about our pumps. She pointed out I disconnect every day when I take a shower. I brilliantly countered that I still have it in the room when I take a shower. (By this point my brain may have been a little deprived of oxygen as I was still hyperventilating a little.)
Short story long, then I got my pump and meter back and immediately reconnected and checked and was back in my happy place, so my day could continue.
But I’m not sure that I shouldn’t be bothered by my inability to disconnect from my pump and relax.
With fast acting insulin, if I need to disconnect for more than 45-60 minutes, I need to take insulin to cover the basal insulin I will miss. This means swimming and spa treatments (who am I kidding I never swim– I’m only talking about the rare trip to the spa or hot tub or even a long bath) will always include for me a quick reconnect and small bolus.
Yes, I’m always aware of the clock. The nice part of pump life is that I don’t need to stay connected to a watch to time my insulin shots, but I do need to be aware of the time I spend away from my pump because that is time without insulin delivery.
And really, that fifteen minutes had zero effect on my blood glucose. That isn’t what it was about. It was about me not attached. (Did I mention I couldn’t even see my pump??)
So you know what? I’m going to ease up on myself. I’m okay with the fact I am more comfortable when my pump is around: it has been an amazing tool for my management of my disease and I have to do more work when it’s not connected to me. I am going to be okay with the fact that when someone else takes an extension of my body into a different room I’m going to be anxious until I get it back.
But I don’t think I am ever going to call that thing a “glucometer”. It’s my meter. My pretty little currently blue meter.
I think tomorrow I’ll switch to my purple one. Maybe my green one, for Spring.
LOVE it! I’m the same way with my pump. When I had my c-section with Aubrey, my endo had me leave it on through the whole surgery and hospital stay. I assumed it would be the same with Jordan but I switched OBs and hospitals . I was waiting to be taken to the OR right before my c-section with Jordan and the anesthesiologist came into the room and told me they had a policy that you couldn’t wear insulin pumps in the OR (something about some of their machines might damage it-whatever!) and said I’d have to take it off. I tried convincing him to let me leave it on but they insisted I take it off. I tested and was 105 (had been low when I got to the hospital to check in and made them give me D5 since I wasn’t allowed to eat anything) so I took it off-very reluctantly! He promised me I could have it back in the recovery room after I delivered. My sister was going into the OR to take pictures of Jordan so she had to take off her pump too. We handed or iPhones, machines and pumps over to our brother and told him to guard them with his life!
As soon as they wheeled me into recovery, I asked to check my blood sugar-I was 185 (not bad considering once they took my pump, my surgery was then bumped back 1 hour and they had given me a bit of Epi in the OR due to some low blood pressure) and they wanted to give me a shot of Regular. I refused and instead asked for a phone and called my brother on his cell-he was standing outside the nursery with all the family looking at Jordan. I told him someone had to stop looking at the baby and bring me my pump, machine (ok and my iPhone
) right away 
I felt an immense feeling of relief when my mom walked into the recovery room with my pump! It was a long 2 hours without it 
It’s kind of bizarre… I was reluctant to hook myself up to a machine 15 years ago and now I freak out when I have to be without it for 15 minutes!!
I think us long time pumpers must all be the same!! I would have had a fit if someone took my pump into another room!
1 point for the OmniPod! They can’t take it away! (I guess they could, but that would be like saying “can I have your pump…oh and don’t forget your infusion set!”)
Honestly I’d have freaked out too!
Eariler this week I wound up falling out of a raft (on a totally flat section of river) & not even losing my sunglasses, but crawling back in the raft only to see that my OmniPod is nowhere in sight, without a spare, and no insulin for the next 2 hours…not to mention my PDM & cellphone were soaked due to a faulty dry-bag. I couldn’t even stress over my BG! I finally got back to my parent’s house (which is about 3 hours from where I live) and wound up taking a shot an hour to keep my sugars down until I got home.
I would have been freaking out if I had been able to test my blood glucose. Since I couldn’t, I drank a beer (to lower my sugar, of course!) and floated on home. Incidentally, I never went over 300, probably because I was so darn relaxed. After my initial freak-out, and a long swim to keep my sugars from skyrocketing, I let it be and may as well have had a functioning pancreas.
And it was freaking awesome.