I was at a Diabetic Youth Foundation event this weekend and my brain is so full of ideas and experiences I’m struggling to write today because they all want to dash out!
There are so many families out there who are doing great things for their kids with diabetes. Great job, everyone, in learning what it takes to make diabetes work in your family!
One mom shared that, although her 11 year old daughter is beginning to assert her independence, there are times she asks her daughter if she checked her blood sugar. When her daughter, laying on the couch, sighs and says “no” sometimes she also says “will you do it?” and sticks out her hand.
How great is that?!
Of course, the mom is thrilled to help her daughter with this “little” thing that, when added together over the course of several times every day for the rest of our lives, is in actuality a humungous thing.
And the best part is the daughter gets a break from the job.
Cool deal for all involved.
So then I started to think about what it would feel like if I asked my husband to check my blood sugar. He worked up at camp and did midnight checks on the campers all the time, so I know he knows what to do. He’s also seen me do it maybe a kazillion times in the twelve years we’ve been together.
But I still think his eyes would bug out and his eyebrows would hit his hairline if I randomly went to him and said “you know, I’m tired of this; can you do it for me?” It’s a pretty entertaining mental picture.
And, I’d have to get over the assumption that he’d do it completely wrong. 
He’d probably do just fine! But it would really be weird.
When I donate platelets (not whole blood anymore; it took too many days for me to recover when I lost that much fluid through donating so I only do platelets now) they do a finger stick to check my iron levels. I always want to grab the lancet and just use mine instead. They never let me—I’ll never understand why not! And they always jab me in the middle of the pad of my finger so it hurts more (I’m an edge kind of girl). AND they put a band-aid on the spot! For someone who does a finger stick multiple times a day they are doing nearly every part of that process plain old WRONG.
But maybe next time it feels like too much, I’ll ask my husband to check me. Or maybe I’ll ask him to do one or two before that so we can talk about how to do it the “right” way.
It’s good to have him as a backup every now and then.
My boyfriend checks mine, occasionally. He’s been through it all with me, and sometimes, I’ll lance and he’ll do the rest, or he’ll just do the whole darn thing…
It’s pretty nice, if you ask me!