Real People, Real Life, and CDES

September 15th, 2011 by Amy Gonsalves Leave a reply »

My talk to the CDEs (Certified Diabetes Educators) yesterday about Diabetes & Exercise was kind of interesting.  I mean, I spent a long time talking about myself so of course it was the most riveting talk anyone has ever attended.  (HA!)

What I found interesting was how many people there were (1) used to discussing type 2 diabetes and very excited to switch over to a discussion of type 1 and (2) had no idea how exercise works in real life when it comes to diabetes.

Real life.

Yep.  Hard to escape it!

One lady started asking me my background as I was setting up; she assumed I was another CDE and seemed surprised I am not.  I assured her I was plenty qualified to discuss diabetes—24 years of constant experience will do that!

As we got into it, I got some great questions from the group.  Some wanted to know if I eat before I work out. (not really)  Some couldn’t figure out how I can check as I run. (very carefully, or I’ll walk)  Some wondered if I take my meter with me on every run.  (nope)

Real life.

I ended up checking during the talk, as I was standing at the front of the room.  I didn’t notice I don’t think that I was checking so much, but omg one of them apparently timed me from start to finish (I did take a correction bolus).  She was
excited that it took me 40 seconds to do it all.  (I was a little weirded out that someone timed me.)

I am now that person that she’s going to tell a future patient about.  She’ll be sitting with someone complaining about how much time diabetes takes and she’s going to say “no; it takes 40 seconds.”  (Sorry about that one, if you’re the patient on that one!  That seems so annoying when others do it to me and I truly apologize.)

They all seemed flabbergasted that I could check and continue with my activities simultaneously.

Um, I do it all the time.

Real life.

When they were warmed up, they started firing questions at me about more specific types of exercise.  It was fun to fire questions right back at them about other factors I involve in my decisions before/during/after I work out: heat, workout intensity, food today, food yesterday, elevation changes, insulin on board, temporary basals, etc.  Then I’d tell them what I would do and I’d tell them about what I would expect.

Real life.

I told them about one of my clients whose blood glucose wasn’t what I expected at the end of a workout.  (I expected 110  and she was 155.)  I asked her if she had set the temp basal for 30 minutes like we had discussed.  She said she had set it instead for an hour.

Timing affects a lot.

These are the kinds of things it takes a lot of experience to manage.  It takes that constant vigilance.  It takes a lot of trial and error and a load of strips.

But the funny thing is, it is all so worth it for what you get in return.

Real life.  LIVING with diabetes.  Life.

Awesome.

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