#409 Fort Matthias

November 20, 2020Scott Benner

3 year old Matthias has type 1 diabetes

Chad is a young father of a newly diagnosed type 1.

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DISCLAIMER: This text is the output of AI based transcribing from an audio recording. Although the transcription is largely accurate, in some cases it is incomplete or inaccurate due to inaudible passages or transcription errors and should not be treated as an authoritative record. Nothing that you read here constitutes advice medical or otherwise. Always consult with a healthcare professional before making changes to a healthcare plan.

Scott Benner 0:10
Hello, everyone and welcome to Episode 409 of the Juicebox Podcast. Today's show is with Chad and Chad is the father of a young boy who has recently been diagnosed with Type One Diabetes. Today we're going to find out about Matthias his diagnosis, some type one in the extended family and where was his mom when he was diagnosed? Hmm. intrigue. Please remember, as you're listening that nothing you hear on the Juicebox Podcast should be considered advice, medical or otherwise, please always consult a physician before making any changes to your health care plan. We're becoming bold with insulin. If you're enjoying the Juicebox Podcast, please leave a five star rating and a wonderful review on Apple podcasts and consider telling a friend about the show. Do you have a great doctor? Or are you looking for one around your type one care, check out juice box docs.com. It's a list of listener approved physicians. Got a lot of music left here.

Gonna get the ads out of the way up front today. Today's episode of The Juicebox Podcast is sponsored by the Dexcom g six continuous glucose monitor. Every decision that my daughter makes about her insulin, when to use it. How much to use comes from the information that we get back from the dexcom g six continuous glucose monitor absolutely an indispensable device that you can learn more about@dexcom.com Ford slash juice box. When you get there, you're going to find out about zero finger sticks, glucose readings that are right there on your smart device. customizable alerts and alarms. You'll read about Siri integration and how you can share your data with up to 10 followers. Once you're there, and you've decided you'd like to learn more you take the next step with Dexcom by giving them a tiny bit of information about yourself. That includes what kind of diabetes you have type one type two or other. And who does your insurance come from? This is interesting because many of us have commercial insurance. Some people have Medicaid or Medicare. Some people pay cash, and others get their health care through the VA. And just recently, the VA has started covering Dexcom 100% dexcom.com forward slash juice box. Check it out. Now be able to do this I've swiped up on my phone. And I know that my daughter's blood sugar is 107 that easy. If Arden's blood sugar goes over 120 we're under 70. My phone will let me know why 70 and 120. That's where we set the levels that you could set them somewhere different. It's up to you. As a matter of fact, my wife gets alerted at 130. And at she likes to know different numbers. So you can go to dexcom.com Ford slash juice box where you can find those links at Juicebox podcast.com, or right there in the show notes of your podcast player. And while you're there, you're also going to find links to the Contour Next One blood glucose meter. Don't make the mistake of thinking that in this world of CGM, it's not important to have an accurate, reliable and easy to carry blood glucose meter because it absolutely is. And that's why my daughter carries the Contour Next One meter Contour Next one.com forward slash juice box small easy to handle bright light, easy to read screen test strips that give you a second chance meaning if you touch the blood strip and it doesn't go well you can go back in again without affecting the accuracy of the test. And hey, how about that accuracy? It's gold standard top of the heap. Contour next Next one.com forward slash juice box. you absolutely want to take a look at your blood glucose meter. Don't just use the first crappy one the doctor gave you the one they keep in the drawer, the one the salesperson left in the closet. You don't know how good that one is or isn't. Find out about the Contour Next One blood glucose meter. You deserve accurate. You deserve easy. This one is both. It is absolutely without a doubt the best most accurate blood glucose meter that my daughter has ever used in her now. My gosh long time with Type One Diabetes she was to and she's 16 It seems like 14 years long time best meter no bull I swear to you. They are advertisers because I went and got them. They didn't come to me, a different meter came to me. And I went back to contour and said, Listen, I'm getting a good offer here for an advertisement from a reputable meter company. But I'd rather be you because you're the one we use, and you're the one we trust. It's a true story. Check them out. dexcom.com forward slash juice box. Contour Next one.com forward slash juice box links in your show notes, links at Juicebox podcast.com. please consider supporting the sponsors. Now. Let's get the chat.

Unknown Speaker 5:33
And

Scott Benner 5:36
it's rolling. But you know, we'll we'll take a second before we get going. I have to say you're one of the ones I was like, we're never gonna get this done.

Chad Caudill 5:43
Yeah, right. This guy do this forever ago. And I had to push it off like three times.

Scott Benner 5:48
Although it's interesting, because I do definitely know your name now. Because there's times and I'll have people on them. And I'll think of them as like, Oh, it's the lady that wrote the note about the thing or the guy that said this, you know, but I know your name. Now. As a matter of fact, when I think of a spy in any kind of a situation, you know, like James Bond type of a person. I now think of your name. It feels very elusive to me. So

Unknown Speaker 6:16
Oh, man, you've ever

Scott Benner 6:19
you've ever thought about the illiteration of Chad Caudill? It just feels very. I might be pronouncing it wrong, too. But don't don't correct me. Well, how do you say you nailed it? Oh, did I

Chad Caudill 6:29
like it? Yeah, I first person ever given the last name or first try?

Scott Benner 6:32
Well, it's not that hard. The letters spelt right out. lack of a better way of thinking, you know,

Chad Caudill 6:38
you would think that you would think that what do they do?

Scott Benner 6:40
Do they put an H in it after the day?

Unknown Speaker 6:43
Um, yeah, I

Chad Caudill 6:44
get a lot of names Caldwell, Cordell, which isn't the worst. But you know, it's an I know he.

Scott Benner 6:49
Yeah. They just they just they say the word they they think they see and they want to see in front of them instead of the one that's there. Precisely. Yeah. Okay. Well, listen, I gotta be honest with you. I'm normally that guy too. But

Unknown Speaker 7:06
well, you know, the days. Well,

Scott Benner 7:07
this time I had enough practice. Hold on one second. I have one setting on my side for me. I

Chad Caudill 7:13
wanna play guys. You.

Scott Benner 7:15
Can you hear me? Okay. So,

Chad Caudill 7:17
yeah. All right. Great. All right, my name is Chad Caudill. I am the dead of Mathias. He is my three year old type one. He was diagnosed on Valentine's Day of 2019. So this a little over a year now. And yeah, I think we're doing pretty good for for the first year, but

Unknown Speaker 7:52
I just don't know.

Chad Caudill 7:53
It's hard to tell. Matthias Matthias Yes. Where

Unknown Speaker 7:57
did you get that name?

Chad Caudill 7:59
is actually my wife came up with it. And I figured she had to go through the hassle of giving birth she'd come up with the names of the children.

Unknown Speaker 8:08
Gonna give her that one.

Unknown Speaker 8:09
I'll give her that.

Scott Benner 8:11
How very benevolent. Have you chat plus, your name's Chad. So you were probably looking for something a little more exciting than I know. My feel like my name is just the noise. Not really a name.

Unknown Speaker 8:23
scam. You know,

Chad Caudill 8:24
I'm with you. Chad's pretty bland. There's not much power behind that. So but it sounds way better.

Scott Benner 8:31
This is gonna be interesting this talk because I like you. And yet I've known so many chats that I've disliked. So I get that a lot. We'll see if that rubs off on. Really?

Unknown Speaker 8:43
Yeah,

Chad Caudill 8:44
yeah. Like I have a bunch of friends that tagged me in you know, memes on on the internet. Every time you see a Chad meme saying how much of a unlikable person they are, and put it that way.

Scott Benner 8:55
Well, listen, Chad's out there, check yourself. It could be a bad guy, or at least someone people think is a Chad. Chad, you know what later, I'll bleep out. And then everyone listening will spend forever thinking like, what's Chad? Yeah, right. So if you ever make it, I can't even say what I want to say. But you know what? Then I'll bleep the whole thing out. Do you ever take off your pants and say, Look, hanging Chad?

Chad Caudill 9:25
not thought about that before, but that's hilarious.

Scott Benner 9:27
If you no pun intended whip that out. Would you please send me a note later and tell me how it went over?

Unknown Speaker 9:33
Absolutely.

Scott Benner 9:35
Try to imagine that whole conversation with the Bleep so people are just like, Wait, what? It's gonna be great. Anyway. Okay. So Matthias is is three now or was three when he was diagnosed.

Chad Caudill 9:49
He was amongst shy of turning two and he was diagnosed. So

Scott Benner 9:52
you're really right, where Arden was age wise, but many, many years later. So this is going to be Very interesting for me, hopefully for other people too, but I'll at least have a good time talking to you. What was the process like? So first of all, how did you guys figure it out?

Chad Caudill 10:11
So, you know, when it happened, I thought it was this crazy story. But looking back and hearing some more of your other podcasts, I realize it's not all that crazy. Um, so the very first thing I noticed that now knowing what I know now, um, we were on a road trip has actually taken my wife back to work, she was gone for an extended period of time, so it was really just me and him. He had wet himself, I thought he just spilled a drink on on himself, though, because it was just soaking wet. Um, so that was kind of the first sign that looking back on it. The excessive thirst was never really a thing for me. That notice goes, he's like me, he's always drinking something. Um, and then yeah, so around November of 2018, we enrolled him in daycare. And so you know how that goes, you know, how to trade and all the germs around getting sick and everything. So he had been sick off and on since November. And so, you know, I was getting pretty good that like, he's running the fever. Yeah, I can handle fevers. He an ear infection that can handle here, infections. And then early February, he is starting to slip to those same symptoms, ear infection, fever, and whatnot. And it just, it just never went away. And then he started getting really, really lethargic. Like, he was still happy at first, but he was just not really moving around not being himself. Eventually, he just could not keep solid foods down. I took him to his primary doctor. They didn't know what it was. They just gave me some stuff. They're like, try to keep this fever down. I have written the primary doctor, that's when he started throwing up. So it took them to the urgent care. That's down, not too far from my house. And they raised some test, he did a chest x rays on him. They didn't know what it was. They just gave him some suffered nausea. We came back that same night and the primary care. And this kid was just up all night Sleeping Bear with me. He's up all night. Going up on and off.

Scott Benner 12:11
He was so well into DK.

Chad Caudill 12:13
Oh, yeah, absolutely. Yeah. I got up the next morning. And that was pretty. Pretty sad. We like we were going to go to the hospital anyway. But I got up with them. And I remember, like I said, ingrained in my memory now of holding him and looking in the mirror. And this kid was just staring back at me in the mirror just like scared for his life. Like I didn't see it until they know how skinny he had gotten, like his eyes or something. And so,

Scott Benner 12:39
ya know, maybe you had a tough time. Was your wife not home at that point?

Chad Caudill 12:45
Uh, yeah, she wasn't home. So my wife left.

Scott Benner 12:48
Tell me why I just really want to feel like she's, you know, like off murdering people for the CIA or something like that, because I'm sure whatever she's really doing is not as exciting as what I'm Anyway, what does she tell me about? Like, it's just interesting that she's gone for extended periods.

Chad Caudill 13:04
Oh, yeah. She was gone from November of 2018. until June of 2019.

Scott Benner 13:09
Wow, what does she like? Can you tell me what she does without being too specific?

Chad Caudill 13:14
So yes, she was in basic training for military. Yeah, that's not as exciting as what I was thinking.

Scott Benner 13:20
Okay. But it does make more sense than when I was thinking. Like, it would be weird if you came on a podcast to tell people that your wife was a hitman for the CIA. Yeah.

Chad Caudill 13:28
International spy.

Unknown Speaker 13:30
Exactly.

Scott Benner 13:33
Oh, my gosh, Chad, you're touching something on the table. Stop yourself. Okay. Oh, no, don't worry about it. You're doing great. Sometimes in the beginning, the first 15 minutes are interesting. People get a little nervous and you can feel them fidgeting or touching things or stuff like that. But it's no big deal. It takes me out of it more than anything. It breaks my It breaks my Bob. Yeah, don't worry. I really appreciate what so your story is crazy. Like that's and crazy because it with the exception of the vomiting. You pretty much just told my experience of art and being diagnosed. Really, from age two. We were on a trip. all wet in a car seat thought they spilled something that literally all happened to me. And I did see Arden's primary care who thought well, didn't think but was confused by the fact that Arden had coxsackievirus. And so, you know, symptoms mimic that well enough being sick, that nobody looked any farther. And we didn't have the like you did better than we did. I didn't know how skinny she was looking at her until hindsight. But it you know, I do remember. I do remember bringing it up once to Kelly and just saying I forget how I put it. It would be nice if I was ever serious. I guess In my life, I said something. I said something Kelly, like, are we training her to be a runway model or something? And eat? No, because she was just like, you could see her ribs. And instead of like, you know, instead of me thinking, that's probably a bad thing we should pay attention to um, yeah, I was making funny about it. So, but I know what you mean that when you know, I only know through pictures, but when you look and you think I am looking at a person who's about to die, and I don't I didn't realize it till just now.

Chad Caudill 15:27
It's scary, man.

Scott Benner 15:28
Yeah, no kidding. Well, you did a great job. Are you a younger guy? How old are you?

Chad Caudill 15:33
I'm 29.

Scott Benner 15:34
You did a good job like this. I mean, by the time you're in your late 20s, you, you're almost a fully formed person. So I I know I sort of trusted myself around 30 ish. But would you say I'm sorry? What do you think?

Chad Caudill 15:46
So I don't know if I go that far. I was.

Scott Benner 15:49
Ellison 10 more years, man, you're really gonna have it?

Chad Caudill 15:52
That's what I got you

Scott Benner 15:55
really pull it together? How do you handle your wife being away during that? what's the what's the Is it a communication thing? Does she come back? How do you do that?

Chad Caudill 16:06
So when he was initially diagnosed, the first few weeks, um, oddly enough, she she got the call me the day that we were in the hospital, and that being diagnosed. So it's like, Hey, I haven't talked to you in weeks, I love you, by the way, your son is diagnosed type one diabetic. After that, she graduated basic training, she goes off to her job training, we get to talk a little more. So she's like in the loop. But I mean, she doesn't have the experience. So I mean, I'm telling her I'm trying to teach her about it. Um, I got on the Dexcom pretty early. So introduce her to the follow ups, as you can see sugars. And, yeah, it's kind of how we handled the first few months.

Scott Benner 16:48
So were you getting settled around diabetes? before? We keep calling her your wife? What's her name? I'm sorry, Tara, Tara, before Tara gets home. Like, do you? Is it weird to have a, like a novice walk into the house and be, you know, your child's parents? So they get an equal say, but you have all this extra? I guess, intuition that she doesn't have at the moment. I

Chad Caudill 17:15
yeah, it was a bit weird, because that, like you said, I was definitely starting to get a little bit of a handle on it, like by no means an expert, but a little bit of a handle on it. And so when she came back, we obviously we took my thighs at a daycare, and she took over his primary care while I was at work. Yeah. And I told her before I went back to work, like the first day I left them with her is like, Hey, I'm not gonna mean to be intrusive. But we're texting you a lot.

Scott Benner 17:43
We're not really leaving you in technically charge of anything. Just so you know. This is a very interesting role reversal. Because most of the people that I speak to and I think most of the people overall, generally, the roles are reversed. Usually, it's it's normally the mother, you know, saying, like making you hear them, when they come on. They're like, they'll they'll make those sideways jokes about their, their husbands, and we don't really let him do anything. You know, he's just he feels like he's helping is that vibe all the time? Or? Or he doesn't really get it? But I'm guessing I want to know how quickly did she come up to speed and then turn and then turn to you and go, okay, you're not in charge anymore. It's me

Chad Caudill 18:24
really, really quickly. Within a few weeks, like she was, she was right there I was at was it at that point, he had already got him on Dexcom. And so we don't do any finger sticks and worry about that. So that really helped. And then we had just started on the pod to write when she came back. So she didn't have to go through all that the beginning pain steak of all these different finger sticks throughout a day and having to stick a needle in your kids. So I say she got off easy. She won't say that she won't say

Scott Benner 18:56
Well, I think you're making a valid point. Honestly, there's the the learning curve around just getting bazel set up on a pump is it's a month of like, agile, you're just like, uh, you know, constantly I'm never gonna get this right. Or, you know, that's really something else. How did he make out in that gear? Did he keep thriving, gaining weight? or How long did it take you to? I mean, I guess my question would be, are you in a comfortable place with this house right now? Do you feel good about where you're at? Oh, yeah, I

Chad Caudill 19:27
think I think we're doing pretty good. I said, a little over a year into this. And he's doing great. He's been a champ throughout this whole process. It didn't matter if we were no MDI, or when we switch over to Omni pod like he'd never minded getting the shot. He never cried about it. He's he hated a lot better than I would have. That would know it. tough kid.

Scott Benner 19:49
I mean, listen, his mom didn't live with him for a number of months early in his life. He was probably like, it's just me and this guy. I better pull out other quick

Chad Caudill 19:59
right? It's gotta be, shall we? This

Scott Benner 20:02
guy doesn't know I'm watching. He's playing PlayStation and watching really stupid stuff on television. I'm not certain I can count on him. Okay, I felt, you know, obviously I was, I've been a stay at home dad for an incredibly long time and over 20 years, and that feeling that you have in the hospital, you know, in the hands of the baby and you think, yo, you're making a mistake, like we're gonna kill this thing like you don't know yet. You don't know us. But this is probably against the law to get, give us this baby. That feeling as crazy as that was in the hospital that day. And I do remember really vividly. The day I took my wife to the train station, dropped her off for work, and drove home and walked back into a condominium. That was just me and Cole. And the stillness was really still and I thought, oh, what am I doing? Like, you know, I don't have no, I don't really know what I'm doing. You know what I mean? Like, there's, you know, just like you said, with your wife, Tara, she comes back and boom, she falls right into it, you know, put you back in your place. She's taken over, you know, like, I don't have any of that built into me that's wired into me. Like, I'm just I just for a year tried to keep him from, you know, getting hurt and making sure he ate he was clean. Like it was so basic how I handled it being a dad instead of a mom. I figured it out eventually. But I was wondering when she when Tara came back and sort of you go back to work and she's doing you know, she's doing the home stuff with with Matthias was that hard for you? Had you fallen into a spot where you thought this is my job? I want to keep doing this? Or was there part of you that got in the car. The first thing was like, who dodged a bullet there? And then went to work? How does that and she doesn't know that she'll never know, just be honest.

Unknown Speaker 21:56
Right? Um,

Chad Caudill 21:58
I would honestly say a little bit of both. Um, I I was really controlling of his care. Obviously, I was I was the primary one doing it. However, I'm, I must preferred her watching him versus him being stuck in daycare, because bless their hearts, they did the best he could. But they have 30 other kids to watch as well. They couldn't really give him the attention that he really needed to kind of control blood sugar. Yeah. So that's what I was really thankful for is like, even though she didn't know exactly what she was doing at the time, she was just a text away the correct the issue. mersa is watching my son's blood sugar go to 400 and hasn't gotten a shot in an hour since.

Scott Benner 22:40
Gotcha. So when she was in basic training, you were using daycare with him and going to work still. And so you were just running kind of like a single dad life.

Chad Caudill 22:49
Yeah, it was a it was nine months of being a single dad. It definitely, uh, definitely respect single parents a lot more.

Scott Benner 22:55
It's, it doesn't it feel like so my obviously I've never been a single father, but my wife had a, an intense job. She still does, but she's older now. So she, she does not just dive into it the way she used to quite as she did intense job that she had to travel far for. So my wife's commute was 20 minutes in a car. hour 15 on a train, 15 minute walk one way. Oh, wow. And then back again. So she would do three hours or so of just commuting and then work very full days, not just eight hours. So there, it was not uncommon for Kelly to leave the house at six in the morning and get home at 10 o'clock at night. And I always talk about there's this spot right around parents, I'll know this or in that situation, there's a spot right around dinnertime around five or six in the afternoon, where it feels like you've been with the baby for a whole day. And it's starting over without sleeping like nobody came in and, you know, just held them for a minute or you know, gave you a break. And it felt like two days in one day. And so I imagine you had that same feeling right? Like, how, how was How were your days broken up during that nine months?

Chad Caudill 24:16
Um, yeah, exactly kind of what you're saying. I mean, they were very, very long. But I mean, the key to me was getting a routine going. Um, so we'd have certain things we did every day and I just kind of we were having fun together and everything but that just kind of kept my mind in check. like, Alright, we got to make this checkpoint, it's going to give it to the day and then that's going to get me through the week, and so on and so forth. Until you know my relief finally came

Scott Benner 24:42
What did the weekends look like that just you and and the baby laying on the carpet next to each other?

Chad Caudill 24:49
We did a bit more than that once. That was a good amount of it. But once once he got the film better, we definitely made trips out to the parks and everything. So we made sure we stayed busy and By the day, which we're just entirely with Google,

Scott Benner 25:02
I had this one sort of rule that I used while I was doing it, where if during the winter months, the weather broke for any reason, meaning, you know, you got one of those, like, 52 degree days, you know, for the young people before global warming, it got cold for a long stretch of time. Maybe I'm explaining this wrong, and you'd get trapped inside for months at a time. And every once in a while, out of nowhere, it would just be 55 degrees one day, maybe you don't, I mean, like, for no reason. And I would just make it a rule if I woke up that day. And it didn't matter what we had to do, if the weather broke like that, we left the house and we did something all the time, like, we were frequently one of 10 people, you know, in the Philadelphia zoo in October, or November, you know, because it just got warm out of nowhere, you know, February, that kind of thing. So some of my favorite memories are, you don't realize, but when you're, you know, at a zoo, for example, there's so many people streaming by, you can't really stop. But when there's quite literally 30 people at the zoo, you can just make sure you're there when they feed the lions and sit there, like you own those lions and enjoy that, like watch that happen. So I have like memories of coal and different places where we just sat and, you know, witness things together. And I watched him see so many things for the first time, but not in a rushed way. That was I love that. I mean, that was a real, I don't really use this word. But I felt like a blessing to me like to be able to see that. Whereas with art in the first couple of you know, after she was to those next couple of years, three and four, and, you know, leading into kindergarten, even, I felt like I was just learning about diabetes like that my whole day was either being overwhelmed by getting my ass kicked by it or figuring something out. And constantly feeling like I was about to kill her somehow, that feeling stuck with me for such a long time. And I still don't know that it's completely gone. I might have gotten it ingrained in me by mistake. I don't feel that way anymore. Like I don't constantly feel like I'm going to kill her. I just walked away from her, you know, a half an hour ago to come talk to you. And her blood sugar 77. And it's good number. Yeah. And I was just like, she'll be fine. Like, I looked for a second. I was like, you know, I said to her, like, do you want food before I go up like really don't have a lot of time. And so we looked at her options. And she just thought, I don't care. You know what I mean? Like, I don't I don't want what you're offering me quickly. So no, and now I look her blood sugar's 103. And she genuinely I wish I made this up. She just texted me, I'm gonna squeeze in a workout while I wait. And I'm not worried about that. But still, I'm sort of like a skittish animal. You don't I mean, who's been like, you know, when you when you rescue a dog and forever, you're like, something's not quite right about Billy. You know, like, there's still I think that's in me a tiny little bit. Because there just was No, I did not tell this long story to say something like this, but I just, there was nothing like this podcast, I just was by myself trying to figure out diabetes with a meter that looked like it came out of a bubblegum machine and a handful of syringes. You know, so? I don't know, it was just it was an interesting world. How did you figure things out? What was your pathway to getting it straight? doctor's advice, internet, what do you do?

Chad Caudill 28:39
Um, doctors advises, as you said, many times I says rules to have your kid not die. So I didn't strictly go off that I'm lucky enough. I have a really great support system in my family. So my mother in law, and my wife's grandmother actually came and stayed with me for about a month after he was diagnosed. So my mother in law is type one as well. So her experience was phenomenal. And then my wife's grandmother is a retired registered nurse. So that kind of helped. So I had a great support system going on there. For fun that I just dived right into to the online community, you know, doing several different pages, just the job, all the knowledge I could. There wasn't long, a couple of weeks into being on the online community that, you know, obviously, I got the hint to listen to the podcast. And it gave me what you're doing is really helped a lot of people. I mean, it definitely revitalize the way I take care of my son. So that's that's kind of been the way our way forward with it.

Scott Benner 29:44
Oh, thank you. That's, that's nice to hear. So I wish I was the kind of person who would say plot twist, because I would have said it, just that and so your mother in law has type one as well.

Unknown Speaker 29:55
Yes, she does.

Scott Benner 29:56
So you told Tara that the baby had diabetes when she sort of like the alpha that might

Chad Caudill 30:01
Oh no, honestly, neither one of us ever really expected it. I mean, we figured if it was going to be passed on the family, I mean, somewhere on her side, we've seen it other than just her, her mother. And it never really registered.

Scott Benner 30:16
I wonder if it, I don't want to say something like, it's a rule, but I do see generation skipping sometimes, which makes me I was like, look at my son. And I'm like, you know, be careful. Like, when you make a baby. I don't know what to say, go find a girl who's got no endocrine issues in her life. Like, write your first AP, like anybody in your extended family have bigger problems with their thyroid, anything like that at all. Make some notes off to the side, like you're pretty and all and I like talking to you. But let me just ask you for a second about your thyroid health. Now, it's that's interesting. So your mother in law, but your mother in law, I'm assuming, you know, is in her 50s at least. Right? So she got How old was she when she was diagnosed them when I take a U turn here for a second?

Chad Caudill 31:12
thing around five. She said diabetes by 50 years.

Scott Benner 31:15
Okay, so she's had diabetes back before. Like, my meter wouldn't look good to her the one they gave me for Arden when we were leaving the hospital. So how did her experience help? And how does your experience look different than how she manages?

Chad Caudill 31:38
I'm really hurt. Her experience is just kind of been helping me keep my head on my shoulder. So she definitely let me let me take charge of his care. I wish he would advise me if I had questions. Um, but really what helped was he helped me the most with his, uh, you know, those late night conversations who would have just explained the different questions that I would have? I would ask her. Um, so that's how she really helped me through it.

Scott Benner 32:07
has, has her management changed any since you found the podcast?

Unknown Speaker 32:13
So

Chad Caudill 32:14
yeah, a little bit. When I first met her, and relatively diabetic, she was, you know, traditional MDI finger sticks and pins. Um, she has now moved up to she's on the library. Mm hmm. And she's still doing pins while she's on pins now, instead of syringes. This is her like intern Teresa said she did that.

Scott Benner 32:37
She should check out that in pen.

Chad Caudill 32:40
You know, I tried to talk with her about that. Um, I just don't think she's there yet.

Scott Benner 32:44
Yeah, that's it. Well, I, you know, I know, people who have had diabetes for a really very long time. And I always use my friend who's passed now Mike, as an example. But his ability to be flexible around diabetes was non existent. It was I think those poor people who were diagnosed at a certain time, you know, it's almost like, it's almost like the friend you have from the war, you know what I mean? Like, there's he sees the world differently than everybody else. And there's a good reason for it. I think, I think that when people have had type one for a very long time find this podcast and make an adjustment. That's an amazing accomplishment for them to break free of what ends up being years and decades of, like fear and, and the safeguards, I should put quotes around safeguards that they put in place. Because they were coming from a completely different angle, like, all the stuff that you and I can see was completely it didn't exist for them. None of that data, none of that understanding. When you hear them talk about diabetes, they just say things like, you know, I get dizzy sometimes. Or I try not to drive unless I've eaten like, it's this such vague. It's terrible that that is the the perspective they got stuck in, you know, that time in history with diabetes that that they had to come up through. But yeah, when they break free of that, it's amazing. I bet your mother in law continues on because she if she got some gear show, she might keep going. You also she might one day look at Matthias as a one say and be like, Hey, wait a minute. What's the range? All right, tell me again, what you're doing. You know. It's really cool. He's still really young. So what do you feel like his understanding of his situation? Isn't How do you you talk to him about it?

Chad Caudill 34:35
Uh, yeah, it's really been amazing. It's been like the last month or two that he's starting to get little pieces of it. Um, so we'll tell him before you eat like, Hey, we have to, we have to Pre-Bolus you have to give your medicine before you eat. And he's like, Okay, and then he'll look at from that time and be like, I want snack. Can you Pre-Bolus me. That's excellent. So he's starting to get there. But I mean, again, he's three years old, so he doesn't have a full comprehension of what's going on yet.

Scott Benner 35:09
Yeah, he hasn't pulled you aside yet and said that I don't like my time and range here between three and 6am. Can you work on my bazel? Push?

Chad Caudill 35:17
Exactly. He just knows more than routine. But we have what we have to go through that. How

Scott Benner 35:21
much does the way?

Chad Caudill 35:23
I use about 37 pounds right now.

Scott Benner 35:26
Wow, what is what does he get for bazel? Is it like around point two or point three an hour?

Chad Caudill 35:31
Yeah, I got him on point to an hour from 6am to 8pm. And then it goes down. 2.15 from 8pm to 6pm.

Scott Benner 35:40
Okay. Would you mind sharing? How do you where's this a one c falling right now.

Chad Caudill 35:46
So we didn't get to go to our actual endo appointment last month. Right. everything going on? Um, but the last time it did get his actual agency done. It was 6610. Wow, that's excellent.

Scott Benner 35:58
That's great. He's He's growing and gaining weight and all that. Oh, yeah. He's definitely good for you, man. Congratulations. That's really that's well done in a year with a three year old. Me came a long way. I, I just keep imagining that moment when your mother in law and thairis grandmother must have gotten in a room together and been like, Alright, listen. We weren't thrilled when she married him. But now we got to do something. Because what are you gonna leave this guy alone with the baby with it? I know, I know, man. I could see it on people's faces when Arden was diagnosed, you know, like, the guy who would look at his kid skinny and make a heroin model joke is now in charge of the child with type one. You know, like, I know, people looked at me for a while, like, wow, he's gonna mess this up. And they might not have been wrong, to be perfectly honest with you. But it's, you know, for anybody who's older in their 50s, you know, and has kids who are getting close to married age, and they know what I'm talking about. Their kids come home dating, and they leave and you inevitably turn to each other and go, Oh, I hope it doesn't. He doesn't end up with that one. She wasn't following the conversation. Even if you come off great. Even if you're like, Chad is great. He's terrific. He's blah, blah, blah, you add that health piece and suddenly, you know, you get distilled down into We can't leave that baby alone with that boy. Right. You know, and you know yourself. Reasonable right chat?

Chad Caudill 37:29
Yeah, that's pretty reasonable. agitation. Yeah.

Scott Benner 37:33
I didn't mind when those people looked at me like that. I was like, oh, they're paying attention. I'm not wrong. No, no, no, they're not wrong at all. I probably should not be in charge of this. So do you guys have now that, you know, the pendulum swung the other way? Although I guess I should ask this tower get deployed? Or how does? Like how does that all work?

Unknown Speaker 37:53
Um, no, she's

Chad Caudill 37:54
she's not got deployed or anything. She's in the Army Reserves. So she works one weekend, a month and two weeks out of the summer. That's great. So she's more more of a stay at home mom than anything.

Scott Benner 38:06
Could she kill you? Does she Do you ever worry about that, that they taught her something that one day you'll mouth off and you'll find yourself on the ground like wondering what happened?

Chad Caudill 38:15
She likes to think that she can do that. However, I'm in the army as well. Oh, and I've been in a bit longer. So I think I got the job.

Scott Benner 38:23
I didn't realize that. So are you are you in like now? Yeah,

Chad Caudill 38:28
I'm active duty.

Scott Benner 38:29
Okay. That's excellent. Are you guys in the Virginia ish area?

Chad Caudill 38:34
Um, so we're in Georgia, just outside of Atlanta. Okay. Yeah, I currently work as a as an army recruiter. So I get a pretty chill gig for a while. Oh, no

Scott Benner 38:44
kidding. You get to go. Uh, well, those kids must come in so enthusiastic to begin with. Right? Is it? Is it really that hard to get them to go? There

Chad Caudill 38:54
is definitely not the kids. The kids aren't the issues. Parents. Oh, convincing the parents love the kids. You on your music? Sorry.

Scott Benner 39:02
Ah, that that makes sense. Because I've heard my wife say how do we get him to Canada safely? Yes, she said that right after the last election actually. That's it. So that's really did you serve? How's your service gone so far? What's it? What's it been like?

Unknown Speaker 39:23
It's been great. I

Chad Caudill 39:24
mean, I'm loving it. I've been in for nine years now. I got a letter more to go. That'll be it. I'm not I'm not doing a day over 20. Where,

Unknown Speaker 39:33
where did you Where did you train initially.

Chad Caudill 39:37
So initially, I went to Fort Knox Kentucky was my initial trading. But I've been a little bit of everywhere since then. I mean, I've been to Korea, Japan, Hawaii, Egypt, Israel, Syria. I mean,

Scott Benner 39:50
any favorite places when you were moving around?

Chad Caudill 39:54
So we were in Hawaii for two and a half years. So that was a pretty good gig. Yeah, getting off work at 330. And going having a sense that day. In the beach, Katie,

Scott Benner 40:01
I'm gonna say that anybody who felt badly for you prior to that statement has just been like, whatever. And also, I'm assuming people listening. We're just like Fort Knox. I thought that was just a place out of old movies where they kept gold.

Chad Caudill 40:13
There, right?

Unknown Speaker 40:15
I know, we used that, that I was like, that's a real place.

Chad Caudill 40:17
It's a real place.

Scott Benner 40:19
I really don't nothing. I shouldn't be in charge of this podcast anyway, that's okay. So I guess what I want to understand now is are you Is it a 5050 split talking about diabetes now? Or has it swung more terrorists way? And if it has you mind that?

Chad Caudill 40:42
Um, so I definitely think it's swung more tears way at this point. Like, I'm still pretty involved. But he's gotten to the point that where she's really good at his care as well. Now, when I go to work, I don't stress looking at, you know, my, my Dexcom follow up every five minutes. She's got this.

Scott Benner 41:00
It's excellent. But does it hurt? Does it feel like you gave something away that you didn't want to?

Chad Caudill 41:07
Might not? Not really, I mean, that, just because I know that she's so good at it? Yeah. I mean, if if she wasn't able to keep his level of care to where I think I was able to do it, then yeah, at that point, it would hurt me a little more, but she's just as good at this as I am.

Scott Benner 41:24
Excellent. It's a it's an uncomfortable conversation. I'm glad you don't have to have it with I do hear a lot of a lot of the notes that I get are from are from parents who were just like, look what one of my you know, the spouse just don't understand or the people I really feel terrible for and I'm trying to get somebody to come on to talk about it, are divorced parents, when Try to imagine one of them has a great handle on the diabetes, the other one doesn't. And now the child's going back and forth, and they go from this amazing care to higher bouncing blowers, and the kid doesn't feel good. And you know, the spouse doesn't want to list it's it turns into it's a real nightmare. So it sounds like you guys have it together, though. That's really cool. Any plans for more children?

Chad Caudill 42:09
Yes, we're actually expecting our second child or no,

Scott Benner 42:12
it's like I knew that. But I didn't.

Chad Caudill 42:15
Yeah, we have or we don't know if it's a boy or girl yet, but maybe number two will be expected in December this year. So now when you

Scott Benner 42:25
have a first child whose first name is Matthias, and is there a shortening of Matthias, is there something you call him around the house?

Chad Caudill 42:32
Um, so we realize eventually, so we get shortened down to Matt. We just we haven't gotten there yet.

Scott Benner 42:37
Gotcha. So it will the next child get like, I find this interesting. Well, they get like a super different name to or when you go the opposite direction. It'll be Hey, this is my son, Matthias and my daughter Jill did.

Chad Caudill 42:54
So definitely not. If it's a boy, we don't know what we'll name them yet. We haven't thought that far in events. But if it's a girl, my wife's had that name picked out since before we get together. So again, I don't have much say in it. But it'll be an Aveda

Scott Benner 43:08
debayer. Well, she's good at this.

Chad Caudill 43:10
Yeah, she's got this name thing down, Pat.

Scott Benner 43:12
No kidding. We use the book. It's a no, you flip through a name. But you're like, Hey, this is interesting.

Chad Caudill 43:19
People, we don't, we don't have much choice to change it now anyway, because my mother in law's already quilted a blanket with that name on it. So we're kind of stuck to it.

Scott Benner 43:29
We mentioned it, she made this blanket. You know, we changed our mind and about the seventh month of the pregnancy, but there was nothing we could do. So sorry. And it's funny how names no matter what usually people just very strongly either love their name or don't like it. It's It's interesting, how it how it breaks up. But yeah, that's amazing. Congratulations. You're building the whole little thing there. How is Atlanta right now? Because it went crazy there for a while a couple weeks ago. Is it settled in? Or? Oh,

Chad Caudill 44:01
yeah, things are starting to get back to a somewhat normal Um, so I try not to venture into the actual city as least as possible. Um, so I'm about 1520 miles out of it. It's still pretty decent city but no people are going about back about their lives. I just went to the park last night, they look around and kids are on the baseball field again and tossing baseballs back and forth. So it's kind of refreshing to see

Scott Benner 44:25
interesting Oh, that's great. It liked it. I hate to say this because if the answer is yes, I feel terrible that I don't know. Did we? Did you come to the jdrf event in Atlanta was when I was there.

Chad Caudill 44:35
I really wanted to but I was at school at the time first in my army training so was able to make it okay.

Scott Benner 44:40
Oh, that's okay. I mean, sorry if I guess it's all right.

Chad Caudill 44:46
Yeah, I mean, right.

Scott Benner 44:48
Under the army man like listen, I love you knows a guy from a podcast coming down. I really I need the day yesterday. Yeah, right. You imagine never leave the same.

Unknown Speaker 44:59
Excellent. Well,

Scott Benner 45:02
sorry, I just made myself laugh for reasons that I don't understand. So what are your concerns? Or like goals moving forward? Like what are the things you see as because you talked earlier about having a plan, meeting goals, and that got you to the next thing. And the next thing? How do you see the diabetes? Like, like, what do you think the next thing is for him?

Chad Caudill 45:23
Um, so right now just keep refining what we're doing. You know, within being so tiny, it's things change on a daily basis. So we're constantly having to dial in bazel and insulin to carb ratios. So right now, as you're finding that, eventually, once, you know, there's some more advances technology, like I'd definitely be interested in getting him on horizon when it becomes available. But I mean, I know when it first comes out, it's not gonna be approved for anyone lesson six, I think so. That's gonna be a minute.

Scott Benner 45:51
So, you know, I don't know, obviously, I don't know how this is gonna go. On. My wife is bothering me Hold on a second. I can't, she's got to go back to work. I gotta be.

Chad Caudill 46:08
Yeah, it was a, I was stuck at home for about two months. Before I go back to work. I was definitely going stir crazy.

Scott Benner 46:16
It's not even that it's just she's two together. So I can't just be like, wishy washy for five seconds with something or let something go for a day, because she's so well planned out and thought out that I don't know. It's just he can't be can't screw off for five minutes, because she notices, and then I get that look like why are you not handling this thing? And I'm like, if you weren't home, you wouldn't know this wasn't, you know? Yeah, right. Yeah. But I'm sorry. So I agree with you about horizon. I'm excited for Arden to be able to try it as well. I also what I was gonna say is, in the past, when stuff comes out, and it's not okayed for pediatric ages, your doctor can still write a prescription for it and use it off label technically. And that's not I don't that's not out of the realm of possibility. I don't know how it's gonna go in the beginning. I'm not sure, you know, house stringently, the doctors are gonna stick to that or if that's going to be possible, but it has happened with tech in the past. So maybe, maybe it won't be as long of a wait, as you imagine.

Chad Caudill 47:21
Hopefully,

Scott Benner 47:22
yeah. Are you excited about the algorithm idea? And?

Chad Caudill 47:26
Oh, yeah, I mean, I mean, right now, I mean, that seems like it's kind of the way forward to me. I mean, we're, we're not as a doctor save when you talk about time. We're not five years from here? I don't think so. Yeah. working, working with an algorithm and getting, you know, that whole closed loop system going on that? That seems fantastic to me.

Scott Benner 47:45
Yeah, I agree. I think you're gonna I think you'll really enjoy it. And I think you'll have it sooner than you think you think you will as well. I would think, in my mind, if I was in your situation, I just hope to have it on him. And working well before kindergarten. Like that's

Chad Caudill 47:59
that that's really my hope, right? There is a I want to make sure we can have some sort of system like that in place before he goes to school because I'm a trusting God. But I don't want strangers and charging my kids blood sugar, if there's something on the market that could stop that from happening. Yeah,

Scott Benner 48:14
I feel the same way about Arden in college, just you know, let this be running smoothly. before she leaves for school, you know, that that she talks about? I don't know what she's going to end up doing. But when Arden talks about going to college, she talks about like, she wants to learn about clothing and fashion. And, you know, so she throws around things like New York, and every once in a while she's like, could I go to school in France? And we were like, I don't know who's gonna pay for that. But we also don't want to tell her No, sir. Like, yeah, I mean, sure if it works out, you know, by works out. I mean, we dig up the floorboards and find a bunch of money that a pirate left here. Which probably won't happen because we built this house. And I don't remember there being a pirate around, I guess, snuck into the middle of the night? Or what if someone came from Fort Knox and left gold? That would be like,

Unknown Speaker 49:06
Hey, there, yep.

Scott Benner 49:06
You can't believe I didn't know that was a real place. It's very strong possibility that your episode is gonna be called Fort Knox is real. Just because I feel like this is really what I learned so far. But I was so it's interesting when when someone's so young, it's hard to like, look out that far into the future around diabetes, because the technology changes so quickly. And you don't know if Matthias is gonna end up being a kid who's super like, Yeah, I got this or if he's gonna be one of those kids who's like a, like, I don't want to be involved in this or rebels against it. This. I mean, is that crept into your thinking yet, or if I just added a concern to your life you didn't have?

Chad Caudill 49:48
Oh, no, it's definitely crept in my thinking. Um, I mean, obviously, I'm hoping it doesn't happen, but it's definitely something that like, for lack of better terms, I guess expecting to happen, because I hear far too often. People go through burnout, which I understand I mean, I, I'm not even one with type one diabetes, and it's mind numbing to me that the take care of him some days that things just go wrong constantly. So being the one actually having it. I mean, I can understand how it's pretty easy. It hasn't burned out.

Scott Benner 50:18
Yeah. It's tough when you have to think at 830. At night, when somebody is eating something, you have to think, Oh, god, this has to go right. I can't be up till two o'clock in the morning. You know, like that feeling? Like, I'm tired. I gotta get up in the morning. And people have jobs like, I'm, I'm up early. But the truth is, is that, you know, once I get up, and I get my kid, you know, my daughter off to school, and Kelly starts working. You know, I mean, if I'm exhausted from overnight, I move I'll send a note to somebody be like, hey, I need to move your podcast episode to a different day or something. It's not, it's not like I've got to go dig a ditch after that, you know? But for there are people you know, like you and plenty of other people that have to get up and have to go to work and it's a thing they've got to go do and commute and everything and I don't know, it's just that's the little stuff to me is is is mind numbing, you know, and could throw burnout for adults. That's always the side of it, I think about for parents is that they run out of time to rest and to relax, you know?

Chad Caudill 51:21
Yeah, I feel you mean that I had the exact same going, Zack same thing going last night. The sugar was being kind of stubborn high. So I was up from, like, 230 to five, trying to get him back to where it needed to be. I see terrorists

Scott Benner 51:35
in charge. Unless it's three o'clock in the morning. Hmm. Well,

Chad Caudill 51:41
I wake up to the alarms laser. And she does she's a pretty heavy sleeper. So I tend to do the nighttime, she'll take the daytime,

Scott Benner 51:47
nice. That's my life. Just so you know, like, you know, Kelly's like, it's always like, do it my way do it. Like I know better. Bob about four in the morning. She's like, whatever you want to do. Oh, my God. Now you don't have an opinion right? Now, I could barely wake up, I could use your opinion. Now. It's tough, because, you know, we did. It took me a number of years to figure out what I was doing completely. And the last piece that I got right, was overnight. I know that that seems strange, because how I talked about it. But and but I don't even mean all the way overnight, I mean, into those like midnight to two o'clock hours. Because I was trying to figure out how to stay so tight with tolerances, that the that at the end of the day of using insulin, sometimes it would go wrong on me. And it will always go wrong than when it did. And I've never been more grateful in my life to get that thing that part figured out. Because I think I was up against how long I was going to be able to exist like that. Like, I don't know how much longer it would have been until I just like made a weird noise and fell over. You know, it was tough. I actually was I don't know if I've ever talked about this or not on here. But I had a problem with my iron two that took like a year or two to figure out. So at some point, I was staying up, you know, sometimes a lot not getting a ton of sleep. And the level of ferritin in my blood was like, I don't want to get this wrong, but in the 20s like incredibly low. And so doctors all assumed my iron was low and I'm an adult so they just all assumed I had cancer. So I got an incredible battery of tests the entire time I'd look at every doctor going I really think I just need to iron you know like they'd be like no let's do this first let's do this. I had like a scope down my throat one that went the opposite direction I had to swallow a swallow a camera like literally like a pill with a camera in it. I did all of these things and at the end they were like you should probably just get this iron if you Why did we not try that first? Exactly. But they didn't. And so I I existed for like a year during that testing where every day by one o'clock in the afternoon I thought I was gonna pass out I was so tired I couldn't get rested I couldn't like if I walked up the steps I'd be out of breath because there was no no oxygen going around my body because anyway that because of the iron and so when I got that iron I was like I'm good now baby like it felt like somebody like turned my dimmer all the way up. I was like let's do it you know and I took that little bit of energy you know and fine tuned everything and now I sleep like a baby so and diabetes is not very frequently get in the way of sleep around here. Which is excellent because I almost 15 it was gonna kill me seriously

Chad Caudill 54:51
Yeah, I think I think we're, we're getting there to that point. I mean, we still have to make some minor adjustments um, but mean so long has nothing goes completely crazy man. His sugars usually stays pretty stable throughout the night last night. I think he just had an excess of protein on board, which is kind of causing him to say a little higher. Yeah. But for the most part, we got to doubt it for nighttime.

Scott Benner 55:13
Like it's exciting that people know to think about protein, because in the past, you know, what someone would have said in the past is, I don't know, just Hi. I couldn't figure it out. Like, you know, I don't know why, you know, diabetes, you tell that goes. And you're like, now there was some protein in there. What did to cause one of those, like, 180 rises? That was hard to impact?

Chad Caudill 55:33
Oh, yeah, it was one of those 151 50 to 155. And they're just trying to bump it down, but wasn't doing much. So yeah, he got up to about 180. before they start coming back down,

Scott Benner 55:46
the food gets thrown finally. You haven't hit any kind of real? Well, maybe you have, but have you had any growth spurts? And have you seen how that's changed things?

Chad Caudill 55:57
Yeah, we've definitely had a few growth spurts he's grown probably, I would say almost six inches since he was diagnosed. So we definitely do with that. And it's definitely cause some crazy numbers this year.

Scott Benner 56:11
Was there a lot of growth right after you started using insulin?

Chad Caudill 56:14
Yes, yes. Immediately after seven days, like you started growing like a weed. Like it was just a nine day difference.

Scott Benner 56:19
That's a That's very interesting. I don't know. Arden is going to come on the podcast at some point. But when Artem was diagnosed with hyper thyroidism hypothyroidism, excuse me. She was the tiniest person in the world. Arden was like five, one, she would like 80 pounds. And she's 571 30 now, and it was beyond when you would expect a girl to grow that much. As soon as she started taking her Synthroid, she just like, took off, but gave her all kinds of she's got all kinds of terrible, like knee and joint aches and everything from girl so much. But uh, it's, it's stunning. She's one of the taller girls in her school. And she was one of the smallest people. Like, I just thought she was gonna be like somebody, we could smuggle a piece of luggage if we needed to. You know, like she was that bad, tiny. And that was fascinating to watch. But I know that insulin hits you and your body starts operating the way it's supposed to again. And that's, that's always why when I see people with kids who are, you know, newly diagnosed to struggle a lot, you know, they don't have some sort of support system about information. And they're restricting food, because they don't know how to use the inside. I'm always like, Huh, I know why you're doing that. And it makes sense, with limited information. But that kid's got to eat, you know? Mm hmm. So yeah, I

Chad Caudill 57:42
mean, we're kind of guilty of that, too. At the beginning, there's definitely still some foods that we try to limit waffles for this kid or the devil. So we we try to live with some waffles. Bananas were the worst for the longest time. But we're just now starting to really reintroduce those. I'm just kind of doing one thing at a time. So we're gonna learn how to bolster that.

Scott Benner 58:02
Yeah, I talked about a lot but it at some point, in those dire situations around diabetes, we start creating a pecking order of who we are. And, and being a human and health sometimes falls below diabetes, you know, you see yourself as diabetes First, the amount of kids that sometimes I see online who are young, who are existing on, you know, hard boiled eggs and string cheese. And I'm like, Huh, would you give that to them? If we didn't have diabetes? Like, you know, would that be lunch? You know, I mean, maybe once in a while, but every day, like poor kids that get up every day and have eggs and bacon, and you know, like, there's no, not that there's anything wrong with that. But there's never any deviation from it. It's adding some bacon every day because I can handle that. And I get that. But at some point, I just think you have to say to yourself, you got to do something here. You know what I mean? Like, we can't just, I can't eat these eggs every damn day for the rest of my life. Just Oh, yeah.

Chad Caudill 58:58
I mean, we're definitely not that extreme. Like, yet ice cream cake for a birthday. It wasn't fun. Yeah. So we definitely don't try to limit finances as much as we can. Anyway,

Scott Benner 59:09
somebody messaged me the other day, and they said, I want to give my kid an AC. And she's like, how do I do that? I said, Well, I know your kid. But here's what I would do. And worked out pretty well for them is exciting. They were celebrating something and when to give the kid something that he just never had before. You know what I mean? So it doesn't get that very often. And I was just like, yeah, that's cool. Just put the insulin in here and watch for this and then re address it if you have to. Don't let it get above like this. That was pretty much it. She did a great job of it. So that's very cool. So just Tara, listen to the podcast. Oh, yeah, she listens. Well, when she listens, she's listening on a different device, right. I'm getting to download so I don't

Chad Caudill 59:53
Yeah, yeah, it's your device. You didn't you get more bang for your buck here. Yeah, don't

Scott Benner 59:56
don't don't listen on the same device. Even if you find that happening. Stop, be like, get out of here. Go listen on your own. Scott said he needs to download. But guys, is it? Is it I know we're gonna go in a second, I don't want to keep you longer than have to. But is it interesting? Have you ever found yourself move into a room together and say to her? Hey, did you hear how this is happening? What do you think of that? How do you guys use the podcast? Or is it something that's personal to both of you?

Chad Caudill 1:00:24
Um, yeah, we definitely have talked about it before. The we listened to it in two different order. So I started from your first episode number, and we have two new ones. And she started from the new ones working your way back. So we sit there and talk about the different things you've heard and kind of put together and it makes your interesting conversations and definitely helps raise care. The I mean, I mean, remember Episode 11, obviously, that's a big one for everybody that's talking about that one with her. And that was just like, life changing for both of us.

Scott Benner 1:00:55
That's cool. So she'll get to it. And eventually, you guys will meet in the middle one day, one day, like Episode 284, or something, or you know, 197, and you'll be like, Oh, my God, I'm on the same line. For one day, for one day, you'll be in the same place, then you'll start moving in a direction where each has heard what the other one? Oh, that's interesting. I like that. That's very cool. I'm glad for you. I really am i i think it's wonderful that it's helpful. I never know what to say when, like, I'll get a note. I always respond the same way. I'm like, I'm glad the podcast is valuable for you. I don't know what to say. Like, you know what I mean? So. But that's really cool. And you guys have that perspective of listening from two ends up in the car, like, how do you do it?

Chad Caudill 1:01:38
Yeah, so for me, it's typically I wasn't on my commute, don't work and back, so I get through about six episodes a week. Then, the wife, she listens, just throughout the day, whenever Matthias has taken a nap, stuff like that, it'll pop it on, listen to her. Well,

Scott Benner 1:01:55
I would like everyone to get at least six episodes a week. That's good chatter set up a nice baseline. Please try to keep up. That's very cool. I appreciate that. I really don't have Is there anything? We didn't say that, that you hope to talk about?

Chad Caudill 1:02:12
Okay, thank you for anything we did conversation. I mean, I'm just appreciate taking the time every day to talk to me. I know you're a busy man. And yeah, thanks. Thanks for all your not medical advice.

Scott Benner 1:02:25
It's my pleasure not to give you advice, Chad, I really, I really mean that. I and I have to be honest with you. It's, it's COVID-19 time, the rest of my day looks like this. I bought a grill, I have to put it together. Man, it's pretty much as I have to actually I'm going to edit a podcast that's gonna go up tomorrow. And that'll take a number of hours. The podcast is I got this message from somebody recently. And they're like, I'm starting a podcast, you know, could I pick your brain? And I said, Is it about diabetes? And she said, No, I was like, yeah, then I'd be happy to help you. And I don't need the competition. But No, but seriously, I got her on the phone. I was like, Listen, a lot of work way more than you expect time is, you know, and I went through, like, here's how long it takes to set up an interview, like you're in my, you know, experience is a great example. I mean, we've corresponded 1000 times moving this thing around and doing everything, I think we started talking in the fall of 2019. It's almost the summer of 2020. And, you know, that happens then the recording time, just this time, you and I are sitting here speaking, and I need to edit it, I have to put in the music, I've got to put in ads, I've got to support it with social media, every episode takes a day of my life, you know, in when it's, you know, kind of compacted down. And I said, you can't you can't just put one up every once in a while. I mean, you can but then that's a audio blog. It's not a podcast, like a podcast is the thing that happens and people can count on and, and she's like, okay, maybe I won't do it. Like I wasn't trying to talk you out of it. Just it's it this is a full time job. It's really crazy. I didn't I didn't expect that so i love it and I'm having a great time with it. But when I first started doing it, I was like oh, you know I made this easy. Yeah, sure. I don't have a blog it'll be fine. That's not really what happened so did I'm thrilled you wanted to do this not enough guys reach out. So it's very cool to see a father so involved and understanding of what's happening like you picked it up incredibly easily. You know your your time from diagnosis to finding the podcast to having a six a one C with a three year old. It's like nothing. It's like a snap of a finger. It's really impressive. I hope you can pass by congratulations on to your wife about the next baby. And I know you don't have a boy name picked out yet but nothing wrong with Scott. You don't

Chad Caudill 1:04:59
have to He said that

Scott Benner 1:05:01
if you name that kid Scott, I will come all the way to Georgia and smack you in the head because you know what you should do that to that job. Thank you very much, man. I really appreciate you doing this.

Chad Caudill 1:05:10
I appreciate it. Well, Scott, great, have a good day. Here's what, hey, I'm

Scott Benner 1:05:14
really grateful for Chad coming. Hey, huge thanks to Chad for coming on and sharing his story. And good luck to him. He's about to have that new baby in just a couple of weeks actually. Thank you also to dexcom makers of the G six continuous glucose monitor and the Contour Next One blood glucose meter. Learn more@dexcom.com forward slash juice box and Contour Next one.com forward slash juice box. Let me remind you as well to consider supporting the T one D exchange at T one d exchange.org. forward slash juice box. You fill out some very simple questions about type one diabetes. Here's how it goes. Look, give me one second to talk about it. If you're a US resident, and you have type one, or you're the parent of someone with Type One Diabetes, you fill out these very easy, simple questions about your type one, your data goes anonymously into the registry. And with that data, the T one D exchange is able to help big decisions about Type One Diabetes be made. The data has been used in the past to impact the American Diabetes associations, a one c recommendations to lower them for children. That's a big deal because doctors use those recommendations to help people the data has been used to help there be more coverage for test trips for CGM is to be better covered all kinds of stuff that helps people with type one diabetes and you can anonymously By the way, 100% HIPAA compliant help T one d exchange.org. forward slash juicebox. And in about 10 minutes, you can make a huge impact for other people living with Type One Diabetes. The T one D exchange is looking for up to 6,000% precipitants. Hmm, the T one D exchange is looking for up to 6000 participants. And so far, a lot of them have come from the Juicebox Podcast which I'm very grateful for way to represent. If you haven't done it yet, please do. It's very simple. You can do it from your phone, your iPad, your computer while you're sitting on your sofa. It does not take a lot of time. I think it actually took me about seven minutes to do it on behalf of Arden at T1dexchange.org/juicebox