Diabetes Free Week

When my daughter had one of those nasty stomach bugs and the nurse called from school asking that I'd pick her up, I was mostly worried by her numbers.The first sign of illness in a diabetic person as we know it is sky high blood sugar numbers regardless of what they ate or the amount of insulin last taken, and so not only that you have to deal with the fever, and any other nasty symptom, you also need to make sure the blood sugar is not crazier than crazy.
Now stomach bugs is a completely different story. Usually you can't keep anything down, not even fluids, and even the slightest thought of food makes you want to throw up. That might lead to some dehydration but when you add diabetes on top of that, the next thing that happens when you don't consume any source of carbs is the drop in blood sugar. "Have you checked her blood sugar?" I asked when I came in and the nurse said it was in a perfect range, which is already unusual by itself. "But she had already bolused (a short for taking insulin by shot or via pump, in our case it's an insulin pump) for her lunch but she couldn't finish it" she added. That would mean that we should expect a hypoglycemia episode within about half an hour unless she eats some carbs. Any carbs would do so I suggested she'd have some candies but she couldn't even get near her favorite gummy candies (Fruit Snacks), and that alone was a sign she was sick.
So I rushed to school to pick her up and my immediate mission was to keep her blood sugar up. We got back home and like I thought, her blood sugar was dropping. No luck with food and so that was the first time in almost 4 years that I had to take her pump off and not because she was going to the shower or to a gymnastics class. But even when she got back to eating; a bowl of pasta and a chocolate chip cookie (which luckily she had forgot to bolus for), her blood sugar remained in the perfect range without any insulin. I know that type 1 diabetes is not a relapsing/remitting condition but for a full week there my daughter was almost diabetes free.
As a scientist I know that this is not something you can grow out of and that there has to be a reasonable explanation for the sudden magical ability of a type 1 diabetic to deal with sugars; like reduced absorption in the intestine to name the most straightforward one. But as a mom I believe that miracles happen, I have to, otherwise life would practically be impossible. "Maybe I don't have diabetes anymore" she said after checking her blood sugar on one of these miraculous days, a bit serious and a bit joking but mostly hoping. For about a week we could get away with anything, her blood sugar levels were the best ever regardless of what she ate, even better than the honey moon phase (a topic worth discussion by itself), we were starting to fantasize on perfect A1Cs... But after a week, exactly when she started feeling well again (digestive system wise) her first number over 200 showed up and shortly after the numbers we had gotten used to seeing in the last 4 years came back as well. So the vacation was over, of course. As a scientist I was left wondering about the mechanism but as a mom, even though I should know better, I couldn't avoid the disappointment.

OBGYNs 2

So eventually I found my match. An OBGYN who doesn't add his share to my already preexisting amount of stress, who can live in peace with me not wanting any kind of medications if there isn't a medical justification to taking them, who can appreciate the fact that i had delivered two babies without epidural and that I am planning to do the same thing this time again, without trying to talk me out of it. He even added few words of encouragement! So, now I could finally start to enjoy being pregnant and trust my instincts , instead of feeling like I am being managed by a battery of physicians and nurses. Well, these people will still be part of my follow up appointments but they will be on my side and I get to play the lead.