Twice in one month

I should have known better. After all, I dealt with hot insulin once this month already. But no.. I have a thick skull.

This past weekend, and through this week, my area of the world has been super hot. I know there are other areas that are a lot hotter than here, Phoenix for example. Yes.. yes.. "it's a dry heat". I will agree that dry and hot is better than humid and hot, but 115 is hot no matter how you look at it.

This was taken at about 4pm

Saturday morning, while getting ready for the day, I debated preparing my Frio pouch for my insulin pump. I knew I would be in and out of buildings, but figured I would be fine.

My post church lunch was delayed due to an extra sermon (very good sermon..totally worth the extended time), so instead of eating at the park with friends my hubby and I stopped by my office to eat. It was already hot outside, and I figured the coolness of my office would be good. We ate a quick lunch, and headed to a funeral for the dad of a dear friend.

The service was good, hugs were given, and tears were shed, then we were off to the cemetery. This dear gentleman had served in the Army during the Korean war and therefore had a full military burial. I truly felt for the honor guard as they were in full uniform. Those uniforms are not cool by any means. Talking with one of them afterwards I found out that ours was their third of the day.

The graveside service took maybe 15-20 minutes. There was a little bit of wait time, but not bad. All in all, I was outside for maybe 30 minutes. I made sure my pump was on my shaded side, and kept it covered with my clothes. When we got back in our car I checked my CGM and noticed I was climbing, two arrows straight up. That's when I knew I should have brought, and used, my Frio. We went back to my office for me to switch out everything. Thank heavens for spare supplies at work, right? I corrected, even with a syringe, and it still took a few hours to come back down.



Yup.. it was a rough day.

Needless to say, I've been using my Frio every day since.  It is a little bulky, but workable...  especially when compared to cooking insulin.

UGH!! One of those days.

Yesterday was horrid.  Absolutely horrid.  I (re)learned a valuable lesson, or two, but it was still a horrid day.

Let me explain. 

Tuesday evening I was by myself.  I love those times.  I have the opportunity to pop in the ear buds and sing off key with no one rolling their eyes at me.  My daughter was at work and my husband was at his second job.  It was me time.  So you know what I did?  I cleaned.  Scrubbed litter boxes (four cats can be messy), kitchen floor, bathroom floor, and rugs.  Yup.. I'm a party animal.

I think I might have over done it outside.  It is so much easier to hose down the box with the garden hose, than to finagle it in the bathtub.  It had cooled off a little from earlier in the day.  I think it was down to 94f or 95f, so I wasn't too worried.  It gets a lot hotter than that so I didn't think anything of it.

I didn't run low while scrubbing.  In fact I did really well.  I popped a couple peanut butter cups between doing the kitchen and bathroom, and all was good.  Bedtime came and I test and was a bit higher than where I wanted to be.. around 150ish, so I corrected and was sound asleep by 12:45am.  I woke up about 5am extremely thirsty.  Daryl (my CGM) was saying I was in the upper 200's.. ok.. closer to 300.  So I check with Charlie (my meter) and he said 396.  WHAT THE CRAP?!?!  I was not happy, but was also super tired.  So I corrected and went back to sleep.  My alarm goes off at 6am and I check Daryl.  I was mid 200's and dropping.  Whew.  Ok.. Time to make the coffee and breakfast.

Breakfast was normal.. two eggs over medium, piece of homemade toast, and a cup of coffee.. not necessarily in that order.  I bolused.  I ate.  I did dishes.  I hopped in the car to go to work.  Here is well it all fell apart.  I KNOW I should have extra supplies and insulin at work, but I don't.. well I didn't (that's fixed now).  I got to work and checked Daryl again...

It was not looking pretty.  We were having a birthday celebration for the CEO in the morning.  No treat for me today.  Afterwards, I corrected.. and went for a mile and a half walk.  It was 10:30 and it was already warming up outside.  When I got back...

Whew again.. Ok.. I can do this!  I waited, and waited.. and ended up around 216 with southeast arrow.  I was really hungry by now... it was coming up on 1pm and my sandwich was calling my  name!  I skipped most of my lunch and just had the sandwich. 

It was half a chicken sandwich with lettuce on homemade bread.  It was good.  I was feeling good.  Two hours later....

UGH!!  Logically the insulin wasn't working and I should have just changed it all out.  I only had 8 units left by this point.  Problem was, I didn't have any insulin or infusion sets with me.  I would have gone home.. but I was the only one in my department, everyone else had appointments they had to go to.  I only had an hour and half left so I stuck it out. 

I felt miserable when I did get home.. and GRUMPY!!  Oh man was I grumpy.. just ask my daughter.. poor thing got the brunt of it.  I did a complete change; new site, new cartridge, even new insulin vial.  A couple hours later, I was coming down, and saw my first lower than 200 all day.  It was a relief.  In fact, at bedtime I was 106 (I missed that picture.. I was tired).  I couldn't have asked for better.

So, what were my lessons of the day?  Lesson 1: Keep supplies at work, you never know when insulin will go yucky on you.  I now have three complete change out sets and an unopened vial of insulin in the fridge.  Lesson 2:  Heat is not a friend to your insulin.  Wouldn't it be nice if the insulin changed colors when it went bad?  Think how nice that would be.  It could change to fushia if overheated or frosty blue if it got too cold.  Hmmm....