Anniversary

I HAD to write today - but I'll get to that in a second…  

The other night in the bathtub, K asked for easily the 15th time, "Will I always have diabetes?" I gave her my standard answer, "Yes honey, until there's a cure." The previous 14 times she's asked, her response to my answer has been a sigh, moan, or silence. But this time, on the eve of her fifth birthday, she asked, "What's a cure?" It was actually hard to explain without using the words "disease" or "healthy" because I view her as perfectly healthy - except, as I have said to her before, her stupid ass pancreas. I probably use different language with her…

Without a doubt, as I have mentioned other times on this blog, K handles her diabetes amazingly well!! Even yesterday at school, they served muffins as snack for her birthday. And since my boys were in the same class, they have started a tradition of letting the kids decorate their muffins with frosting. I don't think this is necessary, but I'm not going to rock the boat. She was dosed accordingly. Well, when her blood sugar sank to 55 mg/dl later in the morning, we learned that a teacher didn't let her have the frosting. So, from a health perspective, this wasn't good because we accounted for the frosting in the amount of insulin she was given, but I was actually more concerned about her socially. It was her freaking birthday - and all the other kids got frosting but her??!! 
But, she just rolled with it. She didn't make a fuss. When I picked her up after school, she said, "I didn't get frosting, but it's okay." Broke MY heart, but again, she's cool with it!! (as a side note, the school has been awesome with her and we've had very few issues - so I'm not trying to bad mouth. I'm using this as a recent example of her being mellow with her "differences".)

So the main reason I felt the need to write TODAY, is today marks the anniversary of one joyous and one sad event. On January 10, 2011, the day after K's fourth birthday, were beginning our pump training at CHLA. K began wearing her insulin pump before lunch and we've never looked back. It has made our life --HER life--so much easier. She NEVER got used to injections; it was a brutal nearly 6 months. It has not been easy for the last year, but so much easier!! Not only can we dose her without injecting her, we can dose her remotely (up to 10 yards).  Her control is better and she can eat more freely (not "freely", but more so J ). Best of all, she doesn't mind wearing it at all. At almost the same time I'm writing this, one year ago while we were in our class, I got a call from my sister that our step-dad, who had been on hospice care for about 10 days, had just passed (in Sacramento). It was a relief because he hadn't been conscious for a few days, so I was so thankful he didn't linger, but it was incredibly sad because he was gone - my first parent (I'm a lucky one with 3) to die - and he'd never live to see K be carefree with her insulin pump.  We were thankful too, that we got to see him right as his health took a wretched turn at Christmas time.  So, needless to say, January 10, will always hold a special place in my heart.