#456 So Many Issues

This is a story of resilience

Caitlin's daughter has type 1 diabetes and much more.

You can always listen to the Juicebox Podcast here but the cool kids use: Apple Podcasts/iOS - Spotify - Amazon Music - Google Play/Android - iHeart Radio -  Radio Public, Amazon Alexa or their favorite podcast app.

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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 456 of the Juicebox Podcast. Yes, that's right. Episode 456 is here for your pleasure. Today we speak with Caitlin. I don't want to tell you too much about this because the notes I made for this show just said, Let me find it for you real quick. Like I make a little note for myself after I do the Edit, it said Caitlin. edited, meaning I'm done with it. So many issues. Please remember while you're listening to those issues 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, or becoming bold with insulin.

This show is sponsored today by the glucagon that my daughter carries g vo hypo Penn Find out more at Gvokeglucagon.com/juicebox. This episode is also sponsored by the Contour Next One blood glucose meter. And you can find out more about that meter and much much more at ContourNextone.com/juicebox. And please don't forget to check out the T one D exchange T one d exchange.org. forward slash juice box. I use the word more. I almost said more. I use the word more and more than I wanted to while I was talking about the Contour Next One, but it's a really great meter. So don't let my horrible alliteration stop you from going to Contour Next one.com forward slash juicebox.

Caitlin 2:14
My name is Cate. And I'm the mother of three kids. My oldest of whom is type one diabetic, amongst other things, but I don't really know what else to say I'm you know, typical busy mom in this super crazy time trying to, you know, figure out how to keep everyone healthy and alive.

Scott Benner 2:35
That seems like all of our lives pretty much.

Unknown Speaker 2:37
Yeah, pretty much. Hi, I'm

Scott Benner 2:38
Caitlin. And I'm just like all of you.

Caitlin 2:41
Yeah, exactly. I mean, I don't really know, I listened to the podcast, and I wasn't. I kind of felt like intrigued and I wanted to talk to you because I mean, everyone's story is a little bit different. And I know in our case, it was it obviously flipped our world upside down. But it wasn't as much as I've heard from other parents because I guess we'd already had moments where our world was completely flipped upside down before. And I thought that's what was interesting to me. Okay. And I kind of wanted to share.

Scott Benner 3:16
Do you have any autoimmune issues or your your? Is it your husband or sperm donor? I don't know who that guy is. Is he? You know, are you married? I guess?

Caitlin 3:25
Yes. I'm married. Okay, gotcha. Almost, almost 12 years, or 13. I've lost track at this point after 10. It's like what?

Scott Benner 3:33
I got you a card for our anniversary. Wait, why?

Caitlin 3:37
I don't even think honestly, last last time. Last anniversary. It was like Happy anniversary. I made I made a cake.

Unknown Speaker 3:43
Did you That was nice.

Caitlin 3:45
And that was it? Because we were just both too tired to do anything.

Scott Benner 3:50
That's totally not romantic. My last anniversary was Hold on a second. I think 24 years. It was, by the way, it was two months ago. And I'm not I'm not 100 I guess definitely 24 years. Let's just say it was definitely 24 years. And my anniversary gift from my wife was I came downstairs and she said she goes hey, I'm like yeah, she goes. I really did want to get you a card. I said what's that just, I just didn't have time. I was like, Oh, can I actually found that to be sweet? I was like, Oh, she was considering getting a card out my sister. So the cake will disappear soon too. But But my point is, is that any Is there any autoimmune at all in the history of your family line? either side that you're aware of?

Caitlin 4:42
Um, I guess the only thing I know of is my sister who has a thyroid issues. Okay. And other than that, there was nothing.

Scott Benner 4:51
That's a yes. So was your sister. Do you know much about it? Was she hyper thyroid? hypo?

Caitlin 4:57
Yeah, and she was diagnosed in her Mid 20s,

Unknown Speaker 5:01
gotcha.

Scott Benner 5:03
any real issues managing it? Like, is she in a puddle on the floor somewhere? Are she

Caitlin 5:08
functioning? Well, she's functional. You know, she has two kids of her own. And I know that time was rough because your thyroid is just very different when you're pregnant. But other than that, I think, you know, a few adjustments here and there, but everything usually works. Okay.

Scott Benner 5:23
Well, she had two kids. So she really one of those kids, where she's incredibly careful, one of the other but

Caitlin 5:30
she wanted those kids she definitely did. She worked sounds like she worked for them. Like to I like to say that. You know, if I pushed her a bit, maybe,

Scott Benner 5:39
would you do you had a kid? And she's like, Oh, I didn't know we were in a race.

Caitlin 5:44
Well, you know, a little sibling rivalry. I like to joke about that. But no, I mean, I'm the younger one. Now by two and a half years, and I had all three of my kids before she had one. Oh, so maybe there was a little pressure, but I don't think it was that. I mean, you know, her husband was in school, and he wanted to finish school before starting a family. And I was just like, why would I wait?

Scott Benner 6:06
Well, you don't have to wait for her to go first. Do you

Caitlin 6:08
know exactly. Why would I wait, like I couldn't go to school and be pregnant? What are you talking about?

Unknown Speaker 6:13
Well, you did it. Congratulations.

Caitlin 6:16
But why? That's the question. Yeah.

Scott Benner 6:18
I mean, what did you really win? Honestly, you won this story. So here we go. So what was your daughter? Right? Yeah. And how old is she now?

Caitlin 6:31
She is 11. Almost 12.

Scott Benner 6:33
Okay. Real quick. Before we start, you have the thing Jenny has sometimes when you're making a point, you're tapping something, which is cool for you, but don't do it for me. Okay. I'm not tapping. You're not having anything you're not doing like though. No, no. Okay. All right. Well, then I'm having a stroke. Call 911. This is my address.

Caitlin 6:52
It might be my microphone. I tested it yesterday, but I don't think there's any noise on it.

Scott Benner 6:56
Or you're super clear. I'm sorry. It just felt like you were tapping something. But okay, but Jenny's gonna stay more still. I

Caitlin 7:01
was picking my fingernail. I'd have it.

Scott Benner 7:04
Wouldn't it be amazing if that was it? I cracked my knuckles the other day. And then when I went back to edit, it was there. It was just like, click like, like, give us a call. Geez, I'm gonna stop doing that.

Caitlin 7:14
range was sounds that the microphone picks up?

Unknown Speaker 7:16
Yeah, Yeah, no kidding. I'm sorry. There it was, again, you're not moving or anything's happening?

Unknown Speaker 7:22
No. All right.

Scott Benner 7:23
Okay. Don't worry about it. I'll stop thinking about it. We'll keep going. Because your kids got 8 million issues, and we need to get through all of them. We don't have enough time for me to be dilly dallying about other stuff. So what was the first thing to come up? And how old was she?

Caitlin 7:37
Well, the first thing was at four months old.

Scott Benner 7:41
Holy crap. You didn't choose your first one.

Caitlin 7:45
Yeah, I just waste any time on that one. I mean, they everyone likes to say I didn't waste any time, you know, getting married and having kids either. But no, I was feeding her her cereal. The first time I fed her the cereal that you know, just add water and you mix it and it's got whatever. And she was doing what any baby would do dribbling it mostly over her chin. But some of it got in her mouth, I assume. And after I fed her, I was cleaning her up because they make a total mess. And I was noticing like something was weird. And she was looking kind of read. And she wasn't happy. And like something in the back of my head said there's something wrong here. And you should maybe take her to the doctor. And I was like, No, no, I don't have to do that. There's nothing wrong. It's like it's just cereal. And like maybe five minutes later, she was getting cranky. And I'm like, No, what, you know, I'm going to be the Paranoid parent. First kid, I'm going to go to the ER, yeah. And I put her in the car and I drove to the ER. And that was like, maybe 10 minutes away from my house. And I picked her up by park the car, picked her up in my arms and walked into the emergency room. And as I walked in, she was what she was screaming at that point. And as I walked in, she went gray, pale and lost consciousness. Oh, kidding. And I went up to the nurse. I'm like, I know, I'm supposed to take a number but like there's something wrong. And she's like, what happened? I'm like, I fed her cereal. And now she's like, there's just like, that's not normal coming here and they call the code. Wow. And they rushed her into the back and stuck her with a ton of needles and put an IV in and I was like in total shock. And so that was my first like, brush with death moment with her.

Scott Benner 9:31
Your first one. Yeah, there gonna be more. Oh, there's more because that almost killed me. I just

Caitlin 9:38
Well, honestly, I thought like I was super paranoid. It ended up that she has an antibiotic allergy to dairy. Okay, and because the cereal had milk powder in it, that she had a reaction to it. And it was really bad. So I was given an epi pen for my four month old baby and told that here's a console for an allergist Don't give her anything with dairy in it, and you can go home.

Scott Benner 10:04
Wow. Okay, listen, let's take a short pause here because I don't do this often but let me just get a piece of clean paper on my notepad and put this off to the side where I can get to it because I have a feeling I'm gonna lose track. So hold on a second. Dairy for months. First almost died. Got it. All right now. You, you call your husband from the hospital or how does that go?

Caitlin 10:31
Well, he was there when I was feeding her. So he knew I was going

Scott Benner 10:35
Oh, did but did he come to the hospital?

Caitlin 10:37
No, he wasn't there that time. He is he watching sports going to work? Or? I'm not sure. Anyway, I called him I think he came right afterwards. Because you know, even when I left I'm like, I'm probably just being paranoid, but I'm gonna go take it just to be just to be sure. And I'm glad that I left at that moment. Because had that happened when I was in the car. I don't know if I would have arrived to the hospital with a baby that was alive in time. That's because her blood pressure went just it bottomed out. Wow, her her heart, like almost stopped basically. And, I mean, they brought her back really quickly. And it seemed like okay, that wasn't so bad. You know, she's fine now. I mean, I left like, that night from the hospital. They watched us for the whole day and put her on monitors and everything. And then once everything was finally sent her home, so it was like okay, no, I have an epi pen. I know how to use it. I used to teach first aid and CPR. So I know how to do this. I got this like no dairy. What's you know how hard to find?

Scott Benner 11:35
Yeah, by the way, I would have never had another baby If I was you. Like that would have been it. Um, but

Caitlin 11:40
actually, that did come into the conversation. Yeah, when we found another one. But the other one happens so fast.

Scott Benner 11:47
So you know what I'm really, you'll never know for sure. But I think after you left for the hospital, your husband immediately called his mother and said, Mom, I don't know what to do. I think Caitlin's crazy. She took the baby to the hospital because she gives the baby cereal. The Baby got a little red. And now she's gone. And yeah, he'll never admit that to you. If he ever had that thought in between the time you left for the hospital and when he found out what happened. But but that's well listen. Good for you. I mean, a lot of this podcast is talking about trusting your instincts. Right? So Exactly. You really did save her life. Do you hold that overhead? Now she's she's getting older.

Caitlin 12:27
Oh, I have a lot more to hold over her head. So that that's like the minor thing though.

Scott Benner 12:31
Okay, so seriously, so then you go home, you just avoid dairy. Does that go well? Or did you? I mean, did you run into more problems?

Caitlin 12:37
I mean, it's so hard at first because you don't realize like everything that has dairy in it. And it's not just like everyone's like, Oh, you know, you can't eat lactose? No, but it's the protein and dairy. And it's an everything like all those whey protein powder shakes, that's dairy powder, that's dairy protein. They put whey powder in hotdogs to increase the protein content. They put it as a preservative in some meats, like it's everywhere. So it was kind of like, wow, I have to go back to relearning how to read labels and calling companies and figuring out what's in their food. And did it come in contact with something because like it, it was so nerve racking. It's to begin with, and I had to find the what we'd like to call the hippie store that has all the green organic everything. Yeah, because the cereal that the baby cereal that I used for her could only be bought at those stores. No regular grocery store had it.

Unknown Speaker 13:34
Oh my god. And so our learning curve, how old you are at that moment.

Caitlin 13:39
I was I guess 23

Scott Benner 13:42
Oh, holy. I didn't expect to curse. But that's crazy. 23

Caitlin 13:49
Yeah. Yeah. I said why wait? Yeah, but you have a little background. My husband's 13 years older than me. So there was a son of like,

Scott Benner 14:01
a second. Caitlin. How do you work this out? What's going on? How long did you date? Alright, hold on a second. Everybody.

Unknown Speaker 14:06
Going back.

Unknown Speaker 14:09
We get to come up.

Unknown Speaker 14:10
I knew it would come up. You

Scott Benner 14:11
brought it up. Caitlin. By the way, Caitlin said in one of her emails to me, I'm craving adult interaction. I thought oh, she's gonna be great on the podcast. So you're good spill. How did this happen?

Caitlin 14:22
And I'm craving adult interaction so much, so much more since COVID. Exactly. To specify. Well, I met I met him at a friend's birthday party. And, you know, at that time, I was like, 21 and he was 34. So I

Scott Benner 14:41
just thought it'd be fun.

Caitlin 14:44
As matures women, I don't know if you've noticed that. Oh, we kind of hit it off.

Scott Benner 14:48
You let me take another sideline with you for a second standing in my yard. The other day, I see my neighbor who's like 63 and we're talking and out of I don't know where the conversation went. But I said it was like, you know, I really think I'm turning into a person. He goes, what I said, long, I just turned 49. I said, I feel like I'm, I'm starting to mature, like I really do. I think in the last five years, I'm really pulling it together. And I wasn't kidding. I really meant that, like, I think I'm finally forming into a human being. So I take your point, so you had to reach up into the 30s to find somebody who could talk to you like they were 21.

Caitlin 15:23
Yeah, pretty much. But also, I mean, I had a lot of life experience at that point, probably more than most.

Unknown Speaker 15:29
So what does that mean?

Caitlin 15:32
I was in the system for a bit before I turned 18. And then, you know, I'd gone to foster homes and such, and I'd had jobs and I got into a car accident that kind of made me realize that I had to do something important with my life and kind of grow up. And I'd actually met him like four months after my car accident. It wasn't a huge car accident. But still, it made me think

Scott Benner 15:57
this episode is gonna be two hours long. So my car basically, in the system, you met the foster system?

Unknown Speaker 16:04
Yeah. Did you? Well,

Unknown Speaker 16:06
I mentioned your parents,

Caitlin 16:07
Dad near the end of it, but was followed by a social worker for like three years.

Scott Benner 16:13
Because something someone did to you or because something you did to something else. Do you end up with

Caitlin 16:20
a hard time describing it really, I don't know. I just, I didn't get along with my mother who I lived with. And so we had some issues with running away because she just didn't get me. And then I ended up like, my dad wasn't sure he could take me. So I ended up in a group home, doing a little bit of time in juvie, but mostly because they just didn't know what to do with me. Yeah. And every time they put me somewhere, I would do something bad and get kicked out. So they're like, well, you're going in there because they can keep you locked up in there.

Scott Benner 16:51
Well, part of the country.

Caitlin 16:53
I'm in Canada.

Scott Benner 16:55
Oh, my goodness, this is so wrong. Canadians are supposed to be nice. Let me write that. Well, wait, I'm just saying that those people were nice. But you're apparently you and your mom didn't get along? Well, I thought if there was a fight in Canada, that it just devolved into. Eating maple syrup with a spoon and everybody laughing. That's not what happens.

Caitlin 17:14
No. And I didn't take out my dueling glove either.

Scott Benner 17:18
I've never seen a Mountie

Caitlin 17:20
our personality is kind of never dived. And I I don't know, I don't I don't really want to go to No, I'm not asked don't go

Scott Benner 17:28
any farther than you want to. But I hear you had problems with your mom, you ended up in that situation. You wrecked the car, I'm assuming under some sort of influence. Am I right? No, no

Caitlin 17:38
actually just drove it. I was just driving a little bit too fast on an exit ramp and my tire blew out. And I wrapped it around a pole at 70 kilometers an hour. And luckily, it was the passenger side that hit first because the passenger side was in my lap.

Unknown Speaker 17:54
Oh my god.

Caitlin 17:55
So if I'd hit the other way, it probably would have been a lot worse. I didn't break anything. But looking at it afterwards. And, you know, I was like, Okay, wait, like, I need to figure something out and find a plan for my life. Because just going to work and going home. And that's just not enough for me, I need to do something worthwhile.

Scott Benner 18:14
Wow. So that was your moment where you're just like, Alright, I'm going to, I'm going to be a productive part of this world. And for myself, maybe and if not for everybody else.

Caitlin 18:23
Yeah, and not reproductive. That wasn't the original plan. I gotta say, just because, you know, if you like you had a car accident, then you met a guy and you had a baby. It didn't quite go exactly like that. Well, let's

Scott Benner 18:34
get back to this party, Where, where, you know, the superstar hits you up, and you're getting along and everything and how you're married in a couple of years.

Caitlin 18:47
Yeah, it was actually really fast. I don't know, we just had a pretty good connection right away. We conversation was really easy. We both had different, like very different life experiences. But we were both kind of in the system for a bit and had trouble with our parents. And, you know, he was in the military before. So he had a lot of Army stories and stuff, which was cool. And we realized when we were chatting that, you know, we lived pretty close together. And we have similar goals in life. And we just didn't start off with the intention of dating. It was just chatting, and then we went to dating and then I don't know, it took like two months for me to move into his house. Because I mean, at the time, I was just living in my dad's basement. So I mean, I was happy to get out of there. And then then, a few months, I guess into it, he proposed maybe nine months after we started seeing each other.

Unknown Speaker 19:49
Wow, Caitlin,

Caitlin 19:50
and then, you know, a few months after he proposed I got pregnant. And then we're like, okay, so our plan to get married the year later just got pushed up a year, right. And then We planned we planned a wedding in like two months.

Scott Benner 20:02
Wow. And then some handful of months later, you really are a very mature person standing in a hospital with a baby who's unconscious?

Caitlin 20:13
Yeah, exactly.

Scott Benner 20:15
Probably maturity another 10 years. That moment. Hmm.

Caitlin 20:18
Wow. Yeah.

Scott Benner 20:19
Do you know what I mean by that? Like, I feel like that sometimes like there's sometimes things that happen, they just level you up, I guess for you know, I don't know how to say it otherwise, but you just go from one level of understanding maturity, whatever to another one in a split second. And I would think an unconscious baby would would do that for you. You probably went from 23 to 30. In that afternoon,

Caitlin 20:41
I feel like it like I'm 35 now but I feel much older.

Unknown Speaker 20:45
Yeah, yeah,

Caitlin 20:46
I have that feeling. You know, I've been through so much. No, one thing that though, like, especially big allergy like dairy. One thing it does is it teaches you that you have to start from scratch and I never really was a big person that cooked. I liked the pre prepared things that I could just toss in a pot and mix the sauce in with the pasta or ordering in we used to eat out or order in a lot. And all of a sudden all of that was gone. Yeah. So I had to learn to cook. I had to learn to bake because I was like, Well, my kids first birthday. They're going to need a cake. And I can't buy a cake from a bakery. I can't buy a cake from a grocery store because they're all made with like dairy. I need to find something. So I learned to bake. I couldn't use one of those boxes, the cake boxes. Okay. And yeah, so all of a sudden, it was just like, I had to grow up really fast. So

Scott Benner 21:37
you're pretty clean eating household then right? But you you you know everything that's in your food.

Caitlin 21:42
Yeah, knowing it and caring about it are two different things, though. I gotta say. How do you mean? Well, I know what's in the food. And just as a little background, it's not only dairy that she's allergic to, we found out through multiple other reactions. She has a few other allergies. And we found them out usually all in the same way. involving you know, epi pens and emergency room visits and stuff. But we like she has a lot of food allergies.

Scott Benner 22:11
What other things is she allergic to? Or would it be easier to list the things she's not allergic to?

Caitlin 22:16
Well, they're just, they're just major things. I mean, she's allergic to eggs.

Unknown Speaker 22:19
Okay.

Caitlin 22:20
Also, she's allergic to Sesame. She's allergic to peanuts. And she's allergic to beef blood,

Scott Benner 22:30
if that makes sense. Beef blood so she can eat well cooked beef.

Caitlin 22:34
Yes. But sometimes it gives her stomach issues. But nonetheless, she can eat beef in theory like a spaghetti sauce. It's fine. We're so good. Because I've learned to cook with horse meat. And I really didn't like horse meat.

Scott Benner 22:47
Hold on a second. Write that down. is me so? Beef blood, because there's a protein that gets cooked out.

Caitlin 22:55
Exactly. Okay. It gets transformed when it heats to a certain temperature.

Scott Benner 23:00
What What about eggs? Do you know what her interaction her bad interaction is with all these things? Like you said protein for there's a protein in the dairy one and the beef is there. Like what about eggs, sesame and peanuts?

Caitlin 23:12
Well, it's the the sesame oil yet again, it's all a protein. So there's a protein in the sesame oil that she's allergic to. For the eggs. She's allergic to it. The the yolk the white end when it's cooked, because some people can tolerate cooked egg but we tried that and it didn't work. Okay. We tried it at the hospital. Just clarification the allergist did a test about it and she failed the test.

Scott Benner 23:35
Well, this is my this. You knew what I was gonna ask you because I'm like, how do you test and you test every food? Like is is like the first five years of our life just like okay, touch this. Get in the car. Oh, wait, you're okay. Get back out of the car. Like how do you test the food like that?

Caitlin 23:54
Well, it was a nerve racking for the first I mean, the dairy was one thing. And then at nine months, she was nine months old when we introduced the egg. And she had the reaction to that. And after that I got like, almost like PTSD. And I don't like overusing the term but I woke up in night sweats, wondering if she was alive. So I'm gonna call it PTSD because it took me a few months to get over it. But I was always worried every time I introduced a new food that the reaction would wouldn't appear instantly because it can take like eight hours. And I was worried that she wouldn't be alive when I went and got her in the morning because she would have had a reaction overnight. And she's just a baby. She can't even get out of her crib.

Scott Benner 24:34
So every time you feed or something new that happens again and again and again over and over and over and it looks like five times. You came true. Did you end up in the hospital each of those five times eggs? sesame excetera

Unknown Speaker 24:50
Yes.

Unknown Speaker 24:51
Same experience was

Caitlin 24:52
she out? Um, it wasn't exactly the same. It strangely the the egg one was like Just projectile vomiting. I can't really say it any worse. And she was red and swollen everywhere, but she didn't like pass out or lose consciousness. But we had the epi pen at that point which made it better. Okay. And I mean, giving an epi pen to a baby isn't. It doesn't feel right. But it worked. And the first after the first time I did it, it was like, Okay, I can do this epi pen, Call an ambulance go to the hospital. Wow, I'm

Unknown Speaker 25:25
sorry.

Caitlin 25:26
That's so that was I mean, that was her childhood.

Unknown Speaker 25:30
Really? Kind of yours too.

Caitlin 25:35
I was I was I lost my childhood long before that, at that point. Well, then whatever sounds sad, but actually, I don't mind. I don't look back and say oh, what if? Because, you know, it is?

Scott Benner 25:45
It is what it is. So I don't want to dig too far into this. But do you enjoy being the kind of parent you wish you would have had?

Caitlin 25:54
Yes. Okay. I guess I do. And sometimes I feel like, I'm not doing the best job that I could or I'll notice myself saying things that I promised I would never say to my own kids when I before I had them. But I think we all do that. Like oh my gosh, I sound like my mother. Yeah, I think at some point, yeah, I've

Scott Benner 26:13
done a few things that I think my dad did. And but Kelly's good at calling me and being like, Yo, what are you doing? Man, you know, and stopping me pretty quickly, which is very helpful. Because in the moment, sometimes those things feel like they feel right, because they're kind of all you know. Okay, so Hold on. Let me clear my head for a second because my I just had three questions. They take us in three different directions. Um, does she have anything else besides food allergies?

Caitlin 26:45
Well, she has diabetes.

Scott Benner 26:46
Yeah. When did what came next? I guess after the food allergies should be the question.

Caitlin 26:51
What we figured out all the food allergies. And then in grade one, we figured out she had ADHD, like really badly, and I had my suspicions. How do

Unknown Speaker 27:01
you figure that out?

Caitlin 27:03
The teacher said she couldn't sit down for more than 30 seconds at a time. And she flew off the handle very quickly when anything was like went not to plan. She also had like tactile issues, like she doesn't tolerate certain fabrics of clothing. Or like seams in her socks. She doesn't like those things. Unfortunately, she also doesn't like the feeling of a medicalert bracelet or any of those medical IDs. And we've tried lots, but she won't wear them.

Scott Benner 27:38
Is ADHD considered autoimmune or is is our

Caitlin 27:42
separate. So that wasn't really autoimmune. It just kind of made everything a little trickier. Like for the food allergies, she had to know not to touch anyone else's food. Because she always had her own food. Yeah. But when you don't have like great self control, and you don't think through your actions.

Scott Benner 28:05
It's hard not to want to throw a medium rare steak at your siblings. I hear what you're saying. Yeah.

Caitlin 28:10
Well, I mean, we did have a case where she grabbed the milk cup from her sister when she was younger. And we she knew that she wasn't allowed to, but she just picked up the wrong one, even though it was a different color glass. And she drank out of it. And that was another ER visit.

Scott Benner 28:26
I tried to imagine the military like, scenario that happens, like she grabs the milk and everybody just gets up going to the hospital and then everybody just goes to their positions. And is it just like a very orderly situation? Get that you get the epi pen, I'll get the car running. I mean, you know, one of these got to clear the caribou out of the driveway so you can get moving and stuff like that. And so

Caitlin 28:52
all the 10 feet of snow out of the driveway.

Scott Benner 28:54
Yeah, I mean, gotta call a Mountie. There's a lot to do.

Caitlin 28:59
Yeah, and the Mountie has to saddle his horse.

Scott Benner 29:02
Listen, you're making my point for me. A lot of problems really, you got to wait till the third periods over. What if it goes into overtime?

Caitlin 29:11
We can stream on our cell phones up here. You know, we can't leave

Scott Benner 29:15
now. Pawel bored, he's got a hattrick Alright, so the ADHD can lead to issues like that. Is there something to do for the ADHD?

Caitlin 29:28
She has she's on medication for it, which helps her a lot during the day to concentrate there are side effects to it, which are not ideal, but we have to deal with them. Because the alternative is that she doesn't go to a regular school. It was at the point where the school was like she you have to get this under control or we were going to have to send her somewhere else because we cannot handle her.

Scott Benner 29:50
Okay. So the medications so that she can stay in school but you see side effects that you don't like what are those

Caitlin 29:58
mood changes as She's like her behavior is better, but she's not as happy. Okay, she's in, she's still very oppositional that doesn't really help with the opposition. And it cuts her appetite. Very like a lot during the day. You should

Scott Benner 30:16
put her in a car and drive it into a pole.

Caitlin 30:19
I don't think it works at that age, though.

Scott Benner 30:21
Okay. Well keep it in mind as a backup plan. Stranger as right. Alright, well

just keep in your head. You know, it's not it's not advice, but it's a it's an idea. Okay, so

that's unpleasant, and I'm sorry about that. What comes after the ADHD?

Caitlin 30:44
Then it would be the type one,

Unknown Speaker 30:46
then you get diabetes? Yep. How old when that happened?

Caitlin 30:50
Um, that was two years ago, actually. Almost exactly. So September 2018.

Scott Benner 30:57
When that happened? Did you just think yeah, of course she had IV. Or, or what? Were were you in the in the ability to accept things as they come?

Caitlin 31:09
I think actually, that's, that's funny, because that's what seemed to surprise the doctors so much. Like, because just the way we accepted it. I mean, not to say we were happy about it. And we weren't like, Oh, well, of course, something else is going to go wrong. We were We were upset. But at that point, we were like, okay, but this is our life, and we have to deal with it. Just like everything else that's changed in our life. It's just a little more. So you know, what's it? I mean, it is a big deal, but at the same time, like, I'm not gonna trade my kid in because they have medical issues, right? Which is the funniest thing like, Oh, well, how do you do it? I get that all the time. How do you manage? Well, what's the alternative? You know, it makes me feel like like, what's the alternative to managing my kid dies? Yeah,

Scott Benner 31:52
right. I'm not gonna do I can't not do it. But it makes me feel like, you know, those old war movies where the young guys are huddled in the, you know, huddled with their clutching their gun and crying. And there's some Western guy who's just wandering through while people are shooting and shelling, like, just like, whatever. This is how it goes. People shoot at us, and doesn't seem to flinch. It sounds like you're just you're hardened at this point. You just, you can deal.

Caitlin 32:19
Yeah, I think that's it. Like, really. I mean, we had our suspicions that were weird things that were going on. At first, I thought it was the ADHD medication she was on. Like, she had times where she was just like writhing on the floor and screaming that she wanted something, which was super out of character. I mean, even for an eight year old.

Unknown Speaker 32:43
When water,

Caitlin 32:45
like water or just that, like, I don't know what to do, I need to run but I don't want to run I need to run but I don't want to run. And just like I don't want to go outside. But I want to go outside and just this total, like need to move

Scott Benner 32:57
was the most was the that's interesting. Do you think it's possible that the effects of the high blood sugar was fighting with the ADHD?

Caitlin 33:07
I'm thinking so actually, like looking back on it, I thought it was just that she was going through a hard time with like adapting to a schedule change or whatever, right. But looking back, I'm thinking like at those times, her blood sugar was probably really high. And we just had no idea. So she felt terrible,

Scott Benner 33:23
couldn't move. But our brains telling her we can't sit still.

Caitlin 33:28
Yeah, because it needs to burn off energy. Because she had like the excess of sugar. Like I think that's what it was, but and it only happened occasionally for maybe like two weeks. And then we went on vacation. And we went camping. So for two weeks, she was running around all the time. And we were outside at the beach in the water and like snacking constantly, but at the same time like burning off stuff.

Scott Benner 33:54
But you're in Canada, how do you go to the beach? Is it just like icebergs and like some sand and with rocks?

Caitlin 33:59
You know, Nova Scotia is really close to Maine. Oh, I

Scott Benner 34:03
see. You're not Antarctica. I don't I gotta get a map, I think really take a hard look. I can actually

Caitlin 34:12
if the border were open, I'd be able to drive to the US in less than two hours.

Scott Benner 34:16
Oh, yeah, your kid could run there. 90 minutes. Just so you know,

Caitlin 34:20
is a lot faster than me. And I'm not proud of that.

Scott Benner 34:24
somebody tried to get my son to go to Maine to go to college. And he took a call with with a coach and he got off and he's like, the guy was trying to sell me on the idea of they go hunting. He's like, I don't want to shoot anything. I don't want to have to hunt just to play baseball. And I was like, I don't think you do and he goes to really good school. And I said yeah, I'm like, I think it's in Canada, though.

Caitlin 34:50
but not quite.

Scott Benner 34:52
Yeah. So he's like, I don't I I'm not it's too cold. I was like, No, I hear you. So anyway, I know where Maine is. I just didn't know that. I didn't know you live near there.

Caitlin 35:02
I'm sorry. I'm in Quebec. Not far from Montreal.

Scott Benner 35:05
Okay. All right. reference point. Yeah. Well, then you even laughed. I made a bird a reference. He was Vancouver. And you still know Canadians, you know everything about hockey. Seriously,

Caitlin 35:18
I was being polite.

Unknown Speaker 35:19
You don't, don't don't

Caitlin 35:20
really follow hockey. To me, like, the only hockey player I'd love to hear about is Max Domi. And that's because he's the guy. And he's, he's type one. And he plays for the Montreal Canadiens.

Scott Benner 35:34
So if I y'all skate the ice, you won't immediately I'll shoot the puck afterwards. Nothing like that. Okay.

Caitlin 35:40
No, I don't skate either.

Scott Benner 35:43
I don't either, like

Caitlin 35:44
winter, and I don't like maple syrup.

Scott Benner 35:45
You kind of get the hell out of Canada. I seriously, I'm looking I want to retire. Somewhere where it doesn't snow when it's not humid. Other than that, I don't care what the place is. Do you think that place exists?

Unknown Speaker 36:00
No,

Scott Benner 36:01
yeah, I don't either. But that's what I want.

Caitlin 36:04
Unless you want to go to like Saudi Arabia.

Scott Benner 36:09
Doesn't snow not humid. I also don't want to be in prison for no real reason. So I

Caitlin 36:16
thought the only country that came to mind really quickly, I'm not very good at geography. I have to

Scott Benner 36:20
admit, I don't know anything about the political setup of Saudi Arabia. But I have to imagine that I would do something to get myself thrown in prison pretty quickly. So I'm gonna have to take a hard pass on that. But I seriously I, I either that or I need like, 5 million more people to listen to the podcast every month so that I can own a house somewhere. I I'd like to have a summer house and a winter house maybe. But I don't think that's in the cards. Anyway, well, we'll work on it. That's my dream is summer house winter house, I really want to avoid humidity and snow. That's all I have. And you know what will happen? I'll finally get to that I'll send to this place where I can have a summer house and a winter house. And then I'll get old and I won't be able to travel. And then I'll just be pained by the fact that there's a house somewhere that's not humid in the summer, and I can't get away.

Caitlin 37:09
That's really depressing thought.

Scott Benner 37:11
Yeah, that's what's gonna happen. Anyway. Okay. So tell me about how you manage type one with the other stuff. Does the other stuff impact the type one management?

Caitlin 37:22
It definitely does? I mean, I'm sure everyone goes through it at the beginning. In our case, when we went to the ER, her blood sugar was and I didn't bring my calculator I promised I wait,

Scott Benner 37:36
wait, hold on a second. If you just go to computer Juicebox Podcast calm right at the top, click on a one cm blood glucose calculator, you will be taken to a handy dandy little device. So you tell me a number. I'll click on m m o l, you say a number and then I'll I'll translate it for you.

Caitlin 37:58
42.6 42.6

Scott Benner 38:02
was an A Oh my goodness. was a 767 blood sugar, which translates to a 28.4 a one say?

Caitlin 38:11
Yeah, that was her number when we went into the ER

Scott Benner 38:26
de veau hypo pan has no visible needle, and it's the first pre mixed autoinjector of glucagon for very low blood sugar and adults and kids with diabetes ages two and above. Not only is chivo hypo pen simple to administer, but it's simple to learn more about. All you have to do is go to G Vogue glucagon.com forward slash juicebox. g Vogue shouldn't be used in patients with insulin, Noma or pheochromocytoma. Visit je Vogue glucagon.com slash risk. You know not all devices are created equal. For instance, there are a lot and I mean a lot of blood glucose meters available for you to purchase. But sometimes we don't think of it that way because the doctor just writes a prescription and they usually write the prescription for the blood glucose meter that I don't know they normally write prescriptions for doesn't make it the best one doesn't make it the most accurate doesn't make it right for you just makes it the one they are accustomed to talking about. Well, I'm here to talk about the Contour. Next One blood glucose meter. It's simple. This meter is incredibly accurate. It is small and easy to carry, but not so small that you'll drop it. There's a bright light for nighttime viewing. The screen is easy to read. And if you want to pair it with their Bluetooth app on your Android or iPhone, you can and if you don't want to, you don't have to. Can I tell you a secret? We don't use the app. I just love the meter and so does Arden. If it's in her purse, if it's in my pocket, the test strips are incredibly, incredibly accurate and allow for second chance testing meaning should you swoop in there hit a little bit of blood but not enough, you have time to go back and get more without impacting the accuracy of the test. We're wasting the strip. That's all you need to know in my opinion, Contour Next one.com forward slash juicebox. Go there check it out. There's actually a ton more on the site. But today, I'm just want to make sure you remember that meter rocks. Contour Next one.com forward slash juice box. Last thing, please consider visiting T one d exchange.org. forward slash juice box and putting your information into the system. Okay, what am I saying? T one D exchange is gonna ask you to take a short survey. I believe it took me about seven minutes, you're going to need to be a US resident with type one or a US resident who is the caregiver of someone with type one, you answer super simple questions about diabetes. That will in no way make you feel uncomfortable. I was like these are easy. I can answer these. Now when you do this, it's completely anonymous. No one's gonna know it was you. And it is 100% HIPAA compliant. T one d exchange.org. forward slash juicebox. Why do you want to do this? Well, in my opinion, it's because past participants like you have helped to bring increased coverage for test trips, Medicare coverage for CGM, and changes in the ADA guidelines for pediatric a one c goals. And I personally am excited to imagine what your participation and mine will eventually lead to, isn't that cool? You answer some questions, they dad it up, and then they go do good stuff in the world, you can be part of that without ever leaving your house, you can do it from your phone, your tablet, your laptop, you cannot do it by smokes. But maybe if you give them enough data, they'll figure out how to do that. I don't think that's going to be true. You know, I'm gonna take that last part back no matter how much type one data you put into the T one D exchange, we're not going to figure out how to connect smoke signals to computers. And just real quick data for those of you who prefer data over data back to the show.

Caitlin, you're a bit of a neophyte on this. What you should have said after that was What's the address of that? calculator? That's amazing. And I would have said it to Juicebox Podcast comm forward slash conversion. And then you would have told the story about the rest of it. Go ahead. got

Caitlin 42:34
very sorry. No, no, no,

Scott Benner 42:35
no, it's it's your Canadian. You have no way to know. Go ahead.

Caitlin 42:38
Well, I do listen to it. So I should have known.

Scott Benner 42:42
I didn't know I was gonna pimp in there for a second. You were like, oh, it will just keep telling the story. Trying to tell people about the calculator. Caitlin, come on. I was thrilled you're from Canada.

Caitlin 42:53
No, so that was what her blood sugar was. When we went to the hospital. She's and that was that was that wasn't right after a meal. That was like five hours fasting.

Scott Benner 43:05
Oh, my goodness. She's She's got diabetes. Yeah.

Caitlin 43:08
So it was bad. And they basically brought us into the back and checked and she wasn't MDK apparently we she was really close, but not quite. So they gave her an injection. And they watched us for a few hours. And they sent us home

Scott Benner 43:22
to have a private room at the ER. That one was Yes. No. I mean, like one with like your name on.

Caitlin 43:29
At that point. I know some by name.

Unknown Speaker 43:32
Yes. Hey, you want to get Kaitlyn Oh, whoa.

Caitlin 43:37
No, I try to avoid it at all costs, but that her file is definitely thick. Every time I go there.

Scott Benner 43:43
The computer slows down. You can hear the hard drive clicking. It's like trying to bring the information up. Or do you have computers in Canada? Right?

Unknown Speaker 43:54
Yes, yeah, I'm on one now. Oh, fancy. Yeah.

Scott Benner 43:59
But honestly, there are 15 raccoons running on a wheel outside to make your own electricity, though, right.

Caitlin 44:06
Raccoons are a little above my budget. What are you using? mice?

Scott Benner 44:10
Oh, well, that's that. I mean, they're easier to feed. Exactly. Yeah, that's fine.

Caitlin 44:15
So you steal the neighbor's bird feed.

Scott Benner 44:18
Why isn't your neighbor like 10 miles away? Don't you have to get on an ATV to get your mail or something like that?

Caitlin 44:23
Well, mice run fast. Oh,

Scott Benner 44:25
well, you ride the mice. Now we're doing now we're getting somewhere.

Caitlin 44:30
I'm trying to play along here but it's not working.

Scott Benner 44:32
I have no idea why your mom didn't like you. I'm just kidding. Sorry. I wasn't even funny.

Unknown Speaker 44:37
And yet I'm laughing with the alcohol but Okay,

Unknown Speaker 44:40
we're gonna Oh, okay. I got you. I said, Well, yeah,

Caitlin 44:44
so the note so they gave her the injection of I guess fast acting and then they gave her a small snack. Which they actually had me go through their cupboard of food and I picked out a little baby food pouch of applesauce. Cheerios, because that was all that they had that she could eat. And she had that. And then they tested her blood sugar, like three hours later said, Okay, we're good. It went down enough. Now you're going to come back first thing in the morning, and you're going to go here, and you're going to talk to your doctor. And this was Labor Day weekend. So like we went in Friday night, she got back from school. And then we were there Saturday morning, first thing in the morning, and we met her endocrinologist. And we started the whole like, crazy. Everything.

Scott Benner 45:31
That's so yeah, that really sucks. Labor days. The only weekend I feel comfortable taking three days off in a row.

Caitlin 45:38
Yeah, it's this weekend, and I'm so happy. Yeah. Except it's kind of like a bittersweet thing, because it's now the diversity weekend. So

Scott Benner 45:45
yeah, no kidding. ruins picnicking and everything. Well, I have a question that's got little to do with what you just said, but it popped into my head. I think I'm gonna lose it if I don't. How much food do you travel with when you leave your house?

Caitlin 45:59
Well, a lot. Yeah, like we went camping. I took the kids camping this summer, my husband was still working because he couldn't get time off. It was a new job. So I took them camping out by Lake Huron. And we drove all the way. And my van was packed with food. Because I never know what I can get when I'm somewhere else. So like, she has like special chocolate. I have to buy specific brands of certain things. And I never know what's available. So I'm always packing everything.

Scott Benner 46:34
You're a hoarder, I would imagine. And

Unknown Speaker 46:36
I have to be Yeah, right. I

Scott Benner 46:38
on purpose. He did the other two kids have anything going on?

Caitlin 46:42
Um, luckily, no, my second one is allergic to peanuts. But at that point, they're like she's allergic to peanuts. I'm like, Oh, good. They're like, Oh, good. I'm like, like, I'm like only peanuts. I'm really not worried about that.

Scott Benner 46:54
Did you like smack her and say, Listen, you got to try harder.

Caitlin 46:59
I was super relieved. And then like my, my youngest, my son, he's not allergic to anything. So I was like, Okay, I guess Third time's a charm, they say and that worked that time. So

Scott Benner 47:09
what's the what's the age difference between the three kids?

Caitlin 47:14
Get again, you're gonna be like, what? 15 months between the first two? I understand. 18 months between the second two.

Unknown Speaker 47:20
You really don't like the cold?

Caitlin 47:21
No, my body doesn't like birth control. Oh, oh,

Scott Benner 47:26
you like your husband? I see what you're saying.

Caitlin 47:28
Yeah, it's, uh, let's just say it didn't work for me.

Scott Benner 47:31
You want to try putting him in a colder room? Because you might you might just avoid him.

Caitlin 47:35
I'm fixed. I can't have any more kids. I don't. That's why do you want it? You're so young. I'm like, I have three. I have nothing. I have nothing against adoption, if I want one later on. But I do not want to have more.

Scott Benner 47:47
He would he said Why do you want one? You should have touched milk on your oldest and been like, here, watch this.

Unknown Speaker 47:55
I don't want any more kids.

Caitlin 48:06
They don't like to do the surgery before you're like 30 or 35? Because they figure you might change your mind? And I'm like, No,

Scott Benner 48:12
yeah, I hear I said I see their side of it. But you can mean three kids is three kids. Yes, a lot of kids.

Caitlin 48:20
I do have six weeks a year where they follow an age. So my son is turning nine in October. And so for six weeks, I'll be able to say my kids are 1110 at nine years old. which always makes people kind of like jaw drop.

Scott Benner 48:38
Yeah. Or judge you quietly in their mind probably

Caitlin 48:40
always judge me. Or they get the impression that they're all from different parents, like all have different fathers.

Unknown Speaker 48:48
Oh, because they think at least one of you should have been saying

Caitlin 48:52
I'm young, you know? Yeah. I don't know. Like, no, it's I've been married. They're all the same father and I'm still married. Yeah,

Scott Benner 48:59
no, I mean, you're one of those. It's interesting. It sounds like you're gonna be married forever. And listen, I I'll be honest, like I've said on here before, like, the way my wife and I got married. The fact that I told you earlier that we have been married for 24 years, I think is is fairly astonishing and uncommon, to be perfectly honest. And, you know, we were very Yeah, we were super young. And, and she said to me the other day, she's like, what were we doing? I was like, I was a huge mistake. We really, we're always telling our kids like 30s a good age to start thinking about getting married. You know, you have kids when you're 55 That's it. That's how you handle it. I don't know if the kids are offended when we tell them that.

Caitlin 49:44
Oh, my husband seems to be on the on that hole. Well, you can date when you're 30 thing.

Scott Benner 49:49
Well, he he thinks so. Cuz he's lucky. He reached back 10 years to get a girl. Exactly. Yeah, he's like, I think he can wait till you're 14. Grab

Caitlin 49:57
yourself a nice 29 year old Usually you marry up for money, but I made a mistake there. You just went for the bank the bank statements.

Scott Benner 50:05
You just went for a good conversation. Gotcha cheap. I'm just saying, Hi, I know you're gonna hold out. Well, we didn't get to one thing that I don't want to skip over it. But from your email, eczema, she has eczema as well. Yes, she does. Now that's autoimmune, right? Yes, it is interesting.

Caitlin 50:27
Which means like, at this point where I actually forgot, but yeah, when she was a baby, it was really bad. Funny, I guess a funny semi related story was that we had a dog when she was born. And the dog loved the baby, and was so protective of the baby. But her eczema was so bad. And it was like, we'd be like, it was read. And it was just like dripping.

Scott Benner 50:57
Yeah, like, fluid, right?

Caitlin 50:59
Yeah, baby scratch, and we couldn't keep her hands off of it. And so we thought she was allergic to the dog. And so we actually found a better another home for the dog, which broke my heart. But we didn't like just dropped them at the pound or anything. We rehome him through a rescue. And we kept them until he went to his new family. And his new family sent me pictures. And so I knew he was in a good place. So I felt better about it. And we found out after the fact, when she had a reaction to egg, that it was actually the dog food she was allergic to wait a minute, every time the dog would touch her. He had traces of the food on his mouth or on his nose, or on his fur. And it was actually that she was reacting to the egg and his food.

Scott Benner 51:46
Oh my god, your life is crazy. By the way, this story would have been better if you said wolf dog. But that's neither here nor there. So keep going.

Caitlin 51:56
So she was a really big dog. So she

Scott Benner 51:57
wasn't allergic to the dog as so much as alerted to what he was constantly touching and being and that was enough. Yeah, could you in hindsight, would there have been a dog food you could have gotten that would have stopped that?

Unknown Speaker 52:12
Yes. Oh,

Scott Benner 52:14
you're sad about that. Right?

Caitlin 52:16
Yeah, but I mean, at this point, my dog like the dog is definitely dead.

Unknown Speaker 52:21
The episode, the dog is definitely dead. I think it's the name of this episode, Kate.

Caitlin 52:28
I mean, he was in Newfoundland and newfoundlands live like maximum like nine to 12 years, but 12 years is the max

Scott Benner 52:35
just timewise he

Caitlin 52:36
my daughter's like 12 and are almost 12. Yeah. So he would have been like 1415 by now. Well, that said,

Scott Benner 52:43
I just realized, as you were telling the story, I'm like, Oh, I bet you there was food that would have allowed them to keep the dog.

Caitlin 52:50
But I mean, looking back, it probably wasn't the worst thing in the world anyways, because it gave me more time to spend with my kids. I was gonna say and not have to worry about the dog and the dog for because newfoundlands talking about like 160 pound dog with long fur that draws a lot. But like, the sweetest dogs, they're like, many dogs. Yeah, they love kids, and they're super tolerant. But it's a lot of work to take care of a dog that size too.

Scott Benner 53:14
I agree as a person who was outside five minutes before I recorded with you going oh my god, Basal just go to the bathroom and get in the house. I gotta go upstairs. In the same time, I'm like, Am I pressuring this dog to do his business? I wouldn't like if someone was outside of the bathroom door going like, come on, Scott. Hey, Scott. Come on. I was doing it to the dog. Like we gotta go, man.

Caitlin 53:38
As an aside, we live in an apartment. We only have one bathroom. So five people one bathroom. I know how that feels. Oh, my gosh.

Scott Benner 53:44
How did the caribou get out of the parking lot? They must get all stuck because of the cars. Have you ever seen a caribou? Just Yes or no? Caitlin? Oh, yes. Oh, do you call them reindeer? No, I would. For no real reason. I would just be like Santos nearby. Okay, so food allergies, eczema, ADHD, type one diabetes. I missed asthma, right?

Caitlin 54:17
Yes.

Unknown Speaker 54:18
Ah, how does that

Unknown Speaker 54:21
manifest like I

Caitlin 54:25
we just noticed one doctor's appointment that there was a little bit of like, her lungs didn't sound clear. And that she was coughing a little bit and they said, Well, she probably has asthma. Do you ever notice that she's short of breath? I'm like, Well, sometimes. And so they prescribed her inhalers. It's never been anything that's led us to go to the ER, or anything like that. It's really just when she's doing intense physical exercise, or when she has a cold.

Scott Benner 54:53
It's interesting that your Mendoza line for illnesses. It's never sent us to VR, so it's not really a problem. That's that that was it. Just make a statement.

Caitlin 55:01
It's a strange baseline, but it's what we know. Yeah.

Scott Benner 55:05
So how does all of this I mean, let's talk about her like a person now, instead of a case study, like, how does all of this impact her?

Caitlin 55:16
Well, I mean, personality wise, she has a, she's not the most outgoing kid. And she doesn't like being different, because she's always been different. I mean, in daycare, when she was doing daycare, she, she had a packed lunch from home and everyone else had the food that they were serving at the daycare. And at school and kindergarten, she had to sit apart from everyone else in the lunchroom to make sure that there was no chance that she comes into contact with anyone else's food and kids throw food. So she's always felt different. So she doesn't like talking about these things at all. Okay, she doesn't like, just come out and say, you know, I have diabetes. And this is what diabetes is. And sometimes I have snacks. And sometimes I have to give myself insulin. And it's just the way I am when she's not comfortable doing that. So she likes to keep it all inside, which is really hard for her. And I'm hoping at some point that she becomes more confident to just, like, tell people about it. But I can't push it. I tried to actually, I think her teacher the first year that she was diagnosed, because it was the first year, the first week of school, that it happened, we didn't have a plan beforehand. Like she had been in school three days. And that's when she was diagnosed. So we kind of went in, she didn't miss any school. After the long weekend, she was right back at school. And it was kind of like, Okay, this is what we're dealing with. And the teacher got a little bit too proactive and tried to explain to the class, what she has, like what diabetes is, and it embarrassed her so much, because she didn't even understand what was going on at that point. Like it was new to her and she didn't want to talk about it. And there was a teacher telling everyone about her medical condition. Yeah, I think that actually just made it that much worse for her.

Scott Benner 57:12
Jenny and I just did an episode about talking about diabetes to people outside of your, you know, circle who don't listen to that. Yeah. And you just made me think of when I think I think I said in the episode, like the difference between what people need and what you think they need is sometimes, you know, a pretty big difference. And you don't know what other people want. And sometimes you try to help and you make it worse. So,

Caitlin 57:37
yeah, I know the teacher meant well, yeah, of course. And I mean, I've explained to her it's it's probably easier for you to explain at the beginning of the year to your classmates. why sometimes in class, your phone is beeping or why you're taking out rockets and eating rockets are those are Skittles or Smarties. Sorry, those are Smarties. You guys rockets are Smarties.

Scott Benner 58:01
Why don't I change the name just because a different country

Caitlin 58:03
because Smarties are actually like m&ms here. Well, yeah, it's a different brand of m&ms. Smarties is m&ms rockets are smart chocolates. So

Scott Benner 58:15
all right. I mean, jeez, who came first?

Caitlin 58:18
I think the Smarties like the chocolate thing with the candy over it came before which is why when your Smarties came here, they called them rockets.

Scott Benner 58:25
So we ripped you off.

Caitlin 58:27
I have no idea sounds like that's what's going on. I could probably Google it. No, don't if this is gonna be like a who got it. First thing I don't I don't want to get that far.

Scott Benner 58:35
Because I could get I could get absolutely enraptured by it. And just you know, we can talk about

Caitlin 58:40
like, the history of candy. Yeah,

Scott Benner 58:42
candy naming more specifically, not even the candy. I'll be like, Mars bar. Next, Caitlin. Where's that from? The podcast will be 19 hours long. And I'll be like, oh my god. Do you guys remember $100,000 bar? Why'd they change it to 100? grand? Which to you is probably m&ms but God Who knows? You don't I mean? Well, that's, I mean, that's really not great, obviously. And it's so she's trying to keep it private. Is that does that how does the ADHD conflict with the needs of diabetes? Or does it?

Caitlin 59:27
I don't know if it necessarily does, it's, it's harder to say because I can't expect my 11 year old to be on top of everything all the time. Sure, but she's very forgetful. So she'll forget her PDM and I have to just as opposed to nagging her. Okay, make sure you have all your stuff packed. I have to go and check it to make sure that she did because she's forgetful. The medication that cuts her appetite during the day is definitely a problem because that impacts her energy levels and also changes the way that we dose Insulin,

Scott Benner 1:00:00
because you can't get her to eat if you're in a panic situation.

Caitlin 1:00:04
Exactly. Like she's, I've had to threaten her with glucagon before. Like, I don't care if you're hungry, you're gonna eat it. Or like you've been dosed for it. You said you were gonna eat it, you cannot change your mind now. Okay, which actually, we don't Pre-Bolus anymore. I know. It's terrible, but we can't put that

Scott Benner 1:00:21
medication. It stops her from having any hunger at all.

Caitlin 1:00:26
Yeah, or it sometimes makes she says it makes her feel queasy to even think about eating. I'm sorry, which we're trying to figure it out with the doctor to see if maybe there's another one that won't impacted as much. But that's, there's a lot of different medications for ADHD. And they all work a little bit differently. So it's a trial and error, unfortunately, on that sense,

Scott Benner 1:00:46
yeah. Well, how does her? How does our agency usually run? And are you? Are you at least able to keep things kind of stable, or what happens?

Caitlin 1:00:58
Um, it's not as low as I'd like. But on the other hand, since starting her pump, we haven't had an official agency done. Because COVID

Unknown Speaker 1:01:07
yay. Okay.

Caitlin 1:01:08
So now all of her appointments that we do, they look at the, the numbers on the PDM that we upload, they look at the Dexcom. And they say, Okay, well, you know, do you notice this trend? And I'm like, Yeah, I've already fixed it. Do you notice that? Oh, yeah, no, we've adjusted the basil. So we're good. What doesn't really have anything to add? Really?

Scott Benner 1:01:27
Do you use clarity? Like, what's the estimated a one see through clarity?

Caitlin 1:01:31
It's never been right. Okay. I think I was always worried about that. I think the first time that we went in the a one c estimation that they had was like, 9.8. And it was actually 7.40. Wow. So I never really look at the number because I know that for us, it's really it's always been off. And I don't know why I know. A lot of people say it's right on for them. But maybe it's just because for, for my daughter, it just fluctuates so much. Yeah, I think her blood sugar sometimes goes up really fast, and then down really fast. And like, it's really hard to keep her on a steady line.

Scott Benner 1:02:13
You know, the next time I have somebody from Dexcom, on who understands that, I'm going to ask that question, because we have the similar, you know, I see things to people talking. And for us, it's always pretty close. You don't I mean, like within a not even just a percentage point. Like, you know, last point for something like that. That thing's usually pretty spot on for us. And yet I hear other people say the same thing like, oh, the estimation I get is is never what my one see is an off to find out why that is? That you know how that happens. That'd be interesting to know.

Caitlin 1:02:48
Yeah, I think our endocrinologist said, it. It seems to be about the amount of insulin on board that she might be quite high for me, like in 16, which I'm sure you can use your wonderful calculator. 11.7 a one c 288. blood sugar. Yeah, it can go up pretty high like that, but then it'll go down very soon afterwards. And that might just throw off the numbers in the a one C.

Scott Benner 1:03:15
Okay. So you can go from like 288 to, you can go kind of from like an 11 to a seven or even farther down.

Caitlin 1:03:23
even farther down. Okay. Really fast. Wow. Which makes the management a little bit tricky.

Scott Benner 1:03:29
Yeah, well, but you're not Pre-Bolus thing. So that's kind of to be expected. To be honest, you're shooting up because of the food and then crashing down because of the big Bolus afterwards, I imagine.

Caitlin 1:03:38
Yeah. And also activities a big thing too, because with a kid that's hyperactive, like if she's gonna eat breakfast, usually her breakfast is pretty, it's pretty much the same thing every day, so we can count on her eating it. She hasn't had her medication yet, so it hasn't cut her appetite. So we'll Pre-Bolus breakfast. But she could have that breakfast. And if she's gonna go down and play video games, because it's pouring rain outside, then she's gonna spike and she's gonna stay high. And if she's going outside to ride her bike with her friends, then she's gonna drop low on the exact same dose, the exact same carbs.

Scott Benner 1:04:17
Wow, that doesn't seem

Caitlin 1:04:19
like what works one day doesn't work the next day for her right. And so ratios are all over the place. Because of what she's doing. And we, I mean, we've tried adding extra snacks or, you know, doing temporary increase in the basil to compensate when she does video games and it works more or less. But there are those days where she's planning to do something and then hope she changes her mind and then goes through something else and it throws us off completely. Because her mind is like a ping pong ball.

Unknown Speaker 1:04:50
Yeah. Wow.

Caitlin 1:04:53
She's never doing the same thing two days in a row. So it's really hard to get that baseline to see what works for her. So we have to accept a little bit more. You know, I understand as much perfection, I'd love to see her in the sixes. We're in the sevens, but we're below eight. So I'm okay with that for now. Okay. And we're heading into puberty.

Unknown Speaker 1:05:12
Yeah, it's gonna get worse.

Unknown Speaker 1:05:14
Terrible. She, I

Scott Benner 1:05:15
need more. Did you think about using? Like Omnipod? Five when it comes out? Let's try and an algorithm doesn't

Caitlin 1:05:23
have the dash here yet. Oh, Canada cheese. I

Unknown Speaker 1:05:26
forgot. I don't

Caitlin 1:05:28
even have the dash here. Alright, so still on the old one.

Scott Benner 1:05:31
Are you interested in an algorithm when it's available to you?

Caitlin 1:05:34
I'm actually considering looping. So

Scott Benner 1:05:37
I'm just wondering if if something that would if I don't know like, I don't know if your scenario would be helped by that or not, but interested to find out.

Caitlin 1:05:47
I was I looked into looping. I haven't officially like gone through all the papers and stuff for it yet. But because it would help when she's out. Or when she's at school, at least it can make those little changes. So I don't have to constantly text message her saying you need to do this.

Scott Benner 1:06:03
Are you like limiting basil a lot and like doing Temp Basal.

Caitlin 1:06:08
I don't really usually do Temp Basal. I'll just be like, give yourself an extra point two, five.

Scott Benner 1:06:14
So you're kind of bumping at the at the number. Okay.

Caitlin 1:06:17
Yeah, exactly. So I'm

Unknown Speaker 1:06:19
trying to push down usually. Yeah.

Unknown Speaker 1:06:23
Are you okay?

Scott Benner 1:06:25
I'm gonna I just want to know if you're okay.

Caitlin 1:06:27
I'm good.

Scott Benner 1:06:28
You are. You just you're like you're not like secretly, like a heroin addict. Or, like, in the middle of the night, you don't leave to do high risk cooking or something like that just to do to escape. There's nothing crazy happening to you like, how are you coping? I guess is my question.

Caitlin 1:06:46
Well, I mean, it. Diabetes in itself is very stressful. It's probably the most stressful of everything. Because for allergies, I control what comes into the house, I make the food. And in general, if something's going to go bad, it's going to go bad right away. And I'll see it right away. But diabetes, I know, there's such long term impacts of everything. So I sometimes I'll fall asleep, and then she'll go high, because she had more protein at dinner. And I won't wake up to adjust it because my alarm goes off, but I ignored it. And then in the morning, I'll feel terribly guilty. But yet again, I need to sleep sometimes. And it's, it's hard. There's always parent guilt that you have about everything. And every decision you make when you're a parent, even if your kid is like perfectly healthy without any problems. It just adds an extra layer to it. So I guess it's just extra guilt. Finding time for things that I used to do. Before all of this, it's harder. like finding a babysitter isn't as obvious anymore. There's like one parent, one person that I can leave my kids with. And that's Grandma, and right now is COVID. I can't leave them with grandma. Yeah, no, cuz they're going to school.

Scott Benner 1:08:09
Oh, yeah. Well, Canada. Yeah, they sent him right out there like you go get him. How is How is COVID? there? Are you guys? Everything's coming back to normal or not yet?

Caitlin 1:08:22
Well, it the numbers were really high for a bit. And then they dropped back down. And they're starting to increase again, I guess because people are getting tired of staying home. They did reopen businesses. And so people are more in contact with each other. So I mean, nothing compared to what you guys are going through at all. But in the province of Quebec, we're getting like 100 and something new cases a day. It's 100. At one point, it was over 1000. Yeah. So it's definitely better than it was. But it's still enough to make me wonder that, you know, maybe we shouldn't be leaving the kids who are in school with 400 other students with grandma who has COPD. I just

Scott Benner 1:09:02
put an episode up yesterday. That's with a teacher. It was recorded right now. And by the way, I guess for context, it's September 3, but Kayla and I are talking right now. And we were talking about, you know, going back and I said I don't see how this is going to go well at all, but I guess Okay, let's, let's see. But you know, Arden's not going back to school. She's doing it remotely. And my son, my son's doing college remotely. He's like, quite literally down the hall right now getting an econ degree in his bedroom. So

Caitlin 1:09:31
no, what if it was an option? And maybe if I didn't work full time,

Scott Benner 1:09:36
Yeah, I know. I understand that. I understand the you know, the limitations for most people. I mean, I I do this so I can do this here. And that kind of opens up our options for keeping the kids with us. Oh, my gosh, dude. Alright, but you you just you just I'd like how are you hating on you said I'm okay. I'm good. That's I either you're lying to me or you're good. I don't know which one it is. But either way, I'm I don't. I'm not judging you. I'm just like, it's it's a lot. You know, it's also interesting to hear you say that the diabetes is, though, is the worst part of all this?

Caitlin 1:10:15
Yeah, it's the hardest to manage. It's not that it's like worst was the bad words won't kill her instantly. And if she has peanut butter, it would kill her within like minutes. But it's easier to avoid peanuts than it is to avoid eating.

Scott Benner 1:10:32
Well, it's true.

Caitlin 1:10:34
And we had, like, I think around the time that I sent you the email being like, I wanted to chat about this, like we were having huge power struggles with food. Okay, that was one of the biggest things that we were having. And one of the times we decided that that's when we we couldn't Pre-Bolus anymore. Is that one of the only things like she, in her, I guess her personality, she likes to control anything that she can, because she has so little control in so many aspects of her life. And that started like with the food allergies, because she couldn't control what she ate. So she wanted to control when she ate and how she ate. Now with the diabetes, it adds it added the extra well. Now what you eat is important, but also when you eat and how you eat it. So everything about it is important. Yeah. So we have to have the control. And she resented that for the longest time. And so what would happen is we'd sit down and she'd be like, Oh, yeah, for sure. I love this. I'm going to eat it. And then we dose her for it. And then she'd say, No, I'm not hungry. Now I want toast. Because she loves bread. Yeah,

Unknown Speaker 1:11:47
just to make the change, like

Caitlin 1:11:49
chicken and vegetables. That's what everyone's having for dinner, you're gonna have that. She's like, No, I'm not. You already gave me my insulin make me toast. And I was like, What?

Unknown Speaker 1:12:02
Caitlin? I'm gonna send you a link.

Caitlin 1:12:04
And so we got to this point where? Yeah, we got to this point where it was like, okay, the we have to come up with some way to work this because I can't sit there and threaten you with a glucagon injection. Or pour corn syrup down your throat, which we've done a few times. Because she just so demand she hated corn syrup. That was the only thing that we could get into her for carbs that were quick, when she was already been given the insulin and she was going down, but she suddenly refused to eat, because she wanted us to make something different. And I was like, No, okay, it's either this or I'm giving you a quarter cup of corn syrup.

Scott Benner 1:12:47
Oh, my God, that sounds terrible.

Caitlin 1:12:50
Okay, maybe not a quarter cup. That's a lot. Maybe like an eighth of a cup? Yes, it's a lot of sugar. And it's

Scott Benner 1:12:54
not your fault. Use a different system of measurement. So

Caitlin 1:12:57
I never understood ounces. Nope, totally strange. But so you're Yeah, I

Scott Benner 1:13:03
mean, that's really stressful. What you just said like, I felt stressed when you were saying it. So I don't know about like doing it must be. And I think everyone listening knows that pressure, who's had at least a smaller child or somebody who just refused. Like you're standing there at someone's, you know, literally crashing down with all this insulin going and you're just you're just like, you have to eat you have to you have to you have to and it's just such a panicky feeling. You definitely are not at your best in those moments. And and I think I've been there for certain. And, and your thing is compound that like 15 times over. I was going to say, if I send you a link, and you please have her get on the schedule for six years from now to record the podcast, because when she's 18 I really want to talk to your daughter.

Caitlin 1:13:50
Much Did your mom actually miss you? Yeah.

Scott Benner 1:13:53
Hey, siddhis Kaitlyn lady, right?

Caitlin 1:13:57
This whole thing that she did, like, how did that work for you? Are you even still alive?

Scott Benner 1:14:01
No, I just want I mean, her perspective on all this stuff. One day is gonna be fast. I don't imagine she'd be somebody who'd want to come on the podcast, but this is really interesting. And her perspective would be would be incredible, actually, because you're just doing the best you can. And you have obviously a lot of roadblocks and listen, she's she's in school, like you kept her in school. That's amazing. Right? She's her a one sees lower. She's, you know, as healthy as you can as you can accomplish right now. That's amazing. There's a lot here. I mean, you guys are doing you're just doing more than than I think anybody could expect. So it's really great. I you should be congratulated. I'm sure nobody's I don't know if anybody's ever taken the time to say to you like well done, but this is, this is well done. You are, You are the ringmaster of quite a show and you're and I can I can

Caitlin 1:14:59
It's not a show is a circus.

Unknown Speaker 1:15:02
I was gonna say you get the whole thing, right. You're all three rings. circuses don't even exist anymore.

Caitlin 1:15:09
No, not really. I don't know. They have like this horse thing. It's not as though Cirque du Soleil is still around, though they went bankrupt. I don't know how that's gonna work after COVID

Unknown Speaker 1:15:20
Yeah, it's not.

Caitlin 1:15:23
Not at all. Yeah. So, no. And it's it's interesting, too, because I think we've started on this. And then I got sidetracked because I do that very easily. Do you have ADHD? After the you know, when they take you in and they start doing all those the lessons after diagnosis? Yeah. And they're teaching and they have all these handouts pre prepared, and the nurse sits down with you. And in our case that we weren't in the hospital, so they didn't do it in the hospital. We went in, like two days or two mornings every week for like, a month. And they did the trainings and little bits. And they're like, Okay, well, here's some great idea for carb free snacks. And here's some good things like protein things. And I was, I would look at these sheets. And I would say, okay, nope, nope, nope, nope. Okay, cucumbers are okay. Nope, nope. And we just went through the list. Like, I can't, like I had to reinvent the whole thing. Yeah. Because that they're like, Okay, well, you know that. Some when you're maintaining blood sugar after a low, and it's going to be more than an hour, you give like some crackers and peanut butter or cake? No, we can't do that. Yeah. You know, or we can try this. No, we can't give yogurt. And this yogurt that's made with soy. It spikes her too fast. And it doesn't maintain for quite as long. So it doesn't act in the same way. So there's not always like a direct replacement for all of these things. So we had to kind of reinvent the diabetes wheel.

Unknown Speaker 1:16:53
Because for her, yeah.

Caitlin 1:16:56
And like, I'm on a few forums, and I keep seeing these things pop up, like oh, what are suggestions for this? And I have so few it's like, okay, you can have pepperoni sticks, or jerky? other CARB free snacks, vegetables.

Scott Benner 1:17:13
Yeah. Like, by the way, a lot of vegetables have carbs in them. And we tend not to think of it. So yeah,

Caitlin 1:17:19
but negligible. Like they're not the carrots of the world, but more like the cucumbers. And that's all she eats. Yeah. She doesn't like carrots. She likes red peppers, but they're too curvy.

Scott Benner 1:17:30
Is there even a way to quantify her diet? Or there's not right, like you just it's a bastardized diet that just fits for her.

Caitlin 1:17:38
Exactly. Okay. I mean, sometimes, like when I'm looking up recipes, I'll go like vegan, I'll type in vegan because it doesn't have the dairy or the eggs, for sure. Right? A lot of them have nuts and peanuts, because they want the extra protein. Or they have those fancy flowers that we can't use because they most of them are contained or may contain sesame's and others like traces of that. So I kind of melt together different recipes and like, Okay, I'm going to try it without this, or I'm going to add this instead. And you learn to adapt regular recipes, to not have that, like most any baking recipe that has milk, you can put soy milk instead, or almondmilk. But it's like the eggs. Not always the same. There's not they have egg replacement powder, but it doesn't work the same way as eggs do. Gotcha. So you have to find out different ways to do things. And it's just being creative, I guess. And a lot of trial and error. I was

Scott Benner 1:18:37
gonna say, how many meals Have you made where you're just like, Oh, god, this is not edible. Don't touch this.

Caitlin 1:18:44
That's usually like the day before I do groceries. And I'm like, I don't have much in the fridge. I'm just gonna toss a lot of this into this into the pan and stir fry it and serve it with rice. How about that?

Scott Benner 1:18:54
Wow, do do you do two meals? Or does the family pretty much all eat the same?

Caitlin 1:19:02
It depends. I usually like to cook one meal, because it's easiest that way. Yeah. But because of her allergies. My other two kids don't have those allergies. Sometimes they want things that she can't eat. And I'm not going to say like I always said from the beginning. I'm not going to take her allergens out of the house, because then nobody could eat anything. So I have milk in the house. We have eggs, I have peanut butter. We have lunch that we don't really have anything with sesame because sesame seeds get everywhere. But pretty much everything else we have in the house. And so sometimes I'll put a lasagna in the oven, and I'll make her like a submarine sandwich for dinner. Because she loves submarine sandwiches. It has her favorite ingredient bread.

Scott Benner 1:19:50
I love bread every listen. It's hard not to love bread. I have to be honest.

Caitlin 1:19:54
Yeah, that's it. She doesn't like pasta. Okay, so anything that's pasta, if you have Do you want anything pasta? like then? You know she'll have to have something else but she's gotten used to it. You know, we occasionally order pizza. I'm so lucky we don't have to deal with the pizza problem that I keep hearing about. Because we never have to dose for for pizza.

Scott Benner 1:20:15
Well, wait out Why? Because kids can eat cheese. She can't eat cheese, so she just doesn't touch the pizza at all.

Caitlin 1:20:22
Yeah. Okay, so have something else. All right,

Scott Benner 1:20:24
you'll never have to be involved in in the pizza Bolus.

Caitlin 1:20:28
Exactly. We got this, uh, this other pizza that was made without dairy. It has like, actually the same cheese replacement that she uses that she likes for her sandwiches and everything. But she did not like the pizza. So that's better.

Scott Benner 1:20:45
Wow. So is there any? Does any of this? Obviously the doop doop, I guess I'm gonna ask a stupid question. Because I don't know the answer to people grow out of allergies. That doesn't happen, right?

Caitlin 1:21:00
It does.

Unknown Speaker 1:21:01
It does. Yeah, it

Caitlin 1:21:02
does happen. The dairy, especially the egg, it can happen. Peanut isn't so common. But she's been tested for it. They said at the levels that at the severity of her allergies, chances are that she would never outgrow them. And actually, we had an allergist appointment a few months ago when they test her for everything. And she's still allergic to everything. So it looks like it's there forever. She's not one of those lucky kids that's eventually going to be able to eat it. And she doesn't qualify for all of those, those therapies that desensitize you. Because of the severity of her allergies with

Scott Benner 1:21:42
treatment, it wouldn't make it go away. It would just maybe lessen it a little. And if you just stay away from it, it's not a problem.

Caitlin 1:21:48
Exactly. It's easier to stay away from it. Because, I mean, I've looked at the protocols for them and gone through it, but they treat with steroids and steroids are gonna make our blood sugar terrible. So we just said you know what it is? It's just gonna be there for a while. And if when she's an adult, she wants to do it. That's fine. But we don't have time right now. Well, I don't think it's worth the risk. Yeah,

Scott Benner 1:22:10
I that sounds reasonable to me. How about the ADHD is the hope they're just a different medication that doesn't impact their mood, the same way.

Caitlin 1:22:19
Ah, I'm hoping that she learns to deal with it. I know that, that sounds really awful. But as much as medication helps, the ultimate goal is to be able to understand the way that your own brain works. And to learn to adapt the way you do things so that you can do things in a very similar way and be as effective as anyone else. tool to help that. But it's not like the crutch.

Scott Benner 1:22:49
So the hope here is the time and maturity and understanding kind of come together and, and help a little bit with that.

Caitlin 1:22:56
Yeah, and then maybe she won't need maybe as strong of a medication. Or maybe she'll go on to a different one. She's also tiny. I have to say you always said that art and like I listened to the podcast from the beginning. Thank you. I have to say I skipped a little bit in the middle. Oh, whoa, whoa, whoa,

Scott Benner 1:23:10
whoa, slow down a second. First of all, for people listening, it's not okay to skip. You start at the beginning of every episode. That's the deal. Okay. I watched your season. I listened to I watched the entire season on Netflix. That was not good. And I and I did it. Anyway, there were five seasons of a show. When I got to season three. I was like, This is terrible. But I soldiered through and I expect the same from all of you. But okay.

Caitlin 1:23:35
I skipped a few in the middle. But I did read like the headlines and a lot of the ones I skipped were like the the update to dex columns and all of those. Oh, they were just older. That's fine.

Scott Benner 1:23:44
You know those things? I didn't mean to jump down your throat. I'm sorry. That's fine.

Caitlin 1:23:47
I just to put it into context. I didn't mean like they weren't interesting. Although they were terrific to be like, I just wanted to be more

Scott Benner 1:23:54
up to date. You just didn't need to hear the announcement about the g4. Yeah, gotcha. I had I've never used right and it's not available anymore. I don't think so. Alright, that is acceptable halen. Okay. So and I guess too, so maybe there's a little hope with an algorithm based pump. Pick there is there is incremental gains to be made for you in here. Some of its time some of its technology some of its hoping, I guess. maturity Yeah. Wow. Oh my God, if one more thing goes wrong, is that the end? Are you just gonna like put some stuff in a bag and be like, Okay, well, goodbye.

Caitlin 1:24:37
Oh, man. I mean, it's always on your mind, right? Because you always have this thing in the back of your mind like okay, my other two kids, they don't have anything else. What if you know my oldest got diabetes, but my son is in the same grade as my oldest was when she when she got diabetes? Is he gonna get it two. And a few weeks ago, he was like, I'm so thirsty and he was drinking a ton of water. And you're not I chased him around the house. For 20 minutes with the meter until I wrestled him to the ground, and I got a blood sugar test. Because I was just so paranoid that Oh my God, he's gonna get diabetes too.

Unknown Speaker 1:25:09
Yeah. Now you mentioned you was really

Unknown Speaker 1:25:12
thirsty. He was just thirsty.

Caitlin 1:25:15
Like, I guess he hadn't had any water all day. And then all of a sudden, he went to the bathroom, and he's like, six glasses of water just down to them. And I'm like, how can an eight year old drink that much water?

Scott Benner 1:25:24
Now I can understand you being concerned? How about the like you said the worry about Michigan when she was younger? Is that gone? For the most part, you don't wake up in a sweat anymore? Do you?

Caitlin 1:25:36
know not so much? I think sometimes. There is that some of those days where I wake up and the first thing is like, wow, I slept really well. And then the second thought that goes into my head is Oh, crap. I have to check the Dexcom Did I miss anything? Yeah, so it's like, it's always the next thing in my head. Like if I slept? Well, it means that maybe I missed an alarm.

Scott Benner 1:25:56
I hear it. I've had that thought. Yeah, I've listened before all the technology, you wake up and realize you slept soundly through the night? And I think I go God is Arden. Okay, that would be like the first thing I felt like that I sleep through something. Now it's to be perfectly honest, like she wakes up at the same blood sugar every morning. But quite honestly, I you know, but there's a lot of years of, of practice in. Yeah,

Caitlin 1:26:27
actually, her blood sugar's great overnight recently, but I'm not. I'm because everything in her life has been kind of like a little experiment. The doctor was always there. The endocrinologist was always saying, Wow, you're so you're so quick to learn this stuff. You're so good at making your own adjustments. I'm like, Well, that's because I've had to adjust everything else in our lives. Yeah, that's what you do going like, Okay, I'm not sure. Like, maybe I think I need to increase the basil between this time and this time, and I would just do it.

Scott Benner 1:26:56
Yeah, you have time for something. I'll

Caitlin 1:26:57
go back to it.

Unknown Speaker 1:26:59
Exactly.

Caitlin 1:27:01
Well, I if she goes low, the Dexcom is gonna beep and I'm gonna know and I'll treat it and then I'll know like, okay, that wasn't the right thing to do. It's one

Scott Benner 1:27:09
of the most amazing aspects of diabetes that I've, I've, I've never really understood, which was that idea of like, well, we'll just wait three months until someone tells us something else. And I get the fear. But I never I, you know what, I guess I kind of misspoke there. Like, I had it too when I was, you know, first add it. But since then, since I've kind of gotten away from it. It's the thing that never ceases to amaze me. Like, it's the one thing that I think, Wow, how do people get caught in that? How did I get caught? Not even. But it's because it seems so obvious. blood sugar's high, use more insulin, right? blood sugar's low, use less insulin, you know, like, like that. That's sort of an idea. And it's fascinating that it continues to happen over and over and over again, day after day after day, and nobody can change. I'm helping a person right now. And I've explained this thing to them three days in a row, and every day they understand it. And then the next day, they don't do it. It just keeps happening. It's fascinating, you know, and they'll get to it eventually. But it's just like, You understand, right? Like this happened because of this. So you still need to do this. Yes, Yes, I understand. Next day. Did you do that? No, I just didn't have the nerve over and over again. So good for you that you just were like, I don't have time to. I gotta just do this, you know?

Caitlin 1:28:36
Yeah. I mean, they say like, the, I think one thing that the hospital was really great at at the beginning, when we went through all the trainings was teaching us to adjust it on our own. It wasn't just like, this is how you're supposed to feed them. And this is how much insulin you have to give. But they said, okay, but if you notice what I have to call for one sec. I know you're gonna edit that out. So we're good.

Unknown Speaker 1:29:01
You have a lot of hope for me, God.

Caitlin 1:29:02
So I know that. Like when I see a trend for three days of her going higher or lower at a certain time that that means there's an adjustment that needs to be made. And they showed us how to do that. And they gave us suggestions on it. And when we did the class for the pump, they did the same thing. They said, Okay, this is what, like, this is how you change it. And this like if you see a high here, this is where you want to adjust it. Because remember, there's a four hour action. So if the kid is going low at 2pm every day, maybe you want to adjust the basil that's before it.

Unknown Speaker 1:29:35
That's encouraging,

Caitlin 1:29:36
you know, instead of the one that's like at two because that's too late, the insulin is just going in, then it's not the one that's changing it.

Scott Benner 1:29:42
Yeah, that's good to hear. It really.

Caitlin 1:29:44
They taught us like really well, I was really confident in that. But obviously there's I know that there's people that go through the same trainings as us that won't be as competent in it. And that's just a personality thing. I think I mean, my husband's military or former military, so He wants to like he's like, okay, let's just do it. They told us we can do it. Let's do it. Let's try it. Well, not everybody, and that'll be like, okay, you know, I think like, I think I want to try this. I, I don't know if it's gonna be good. We'll see. But you know, make sure you can hear the alarm tonight because if I'm sleeping too much, I want to make sure you like wake up.

Scott Benner 1:30:18
Yeah. Listen, not everyone has your life experiences either. Caitlin, those those you? We went through a training ground for this stuff. You're You're as ready to do these things as anybody you know.

Caitlin 1:30:27
Oh, yeah, I did the boot camp.

Scott Benner 1:30:29
You certainly did. Look

Unknown Speaker 1:30:30
at the boot camp. Listen,

Scott Benner 1:30:31
how old were you the first time you ran away?

Caitlin 1:30:35
I'm 14. Yeah,

Scott Benner 1:30:37
that's ballsy. You know what I mean? Like, seriously, it really is like, Look, I better off somewhere other than here. I'm going. That's not that's not a not something a 14 year old I think. Does lightly

Caitlin 1:30:51
plan the runaway very well. I didn't really know where I was going. I just left.

Scott Benner 1:30:57
I'll just walk in this direction. Did you bring food?

Caitlin 1:31:00
Yeah, I brought some stuff with me. Nice change of clothes. New socks. You know

Scott Benner 1:31:04
why? Yeah. You don't want your feet to get

Caitlin 1:31:06
my bank card.

Scott Benner 1:31:07
They say your bank card or your 14? Yeah, you do

Caitlin 1:31:12
not like a credit card. Just like interact debit.

Scott Benner 1:31:15
Yeah, but you had some money in the bank?

Caitlin 1:31:17
Yeah. Get out of here. Oh, I had I had like a I walked. I used to walk a dog for an old blind guy. I walked a seeing eye dog cuz he was getting too old. And the dog was getting stopstopstop 20 bucks a week. I

Unknown Speaker 1:31:35
don't know why that struck me. You. It's a seeing eye dog. Its whole job is to walk. It needs to be watched for. Other than that to

Caitlin 1:31:43
while he was getting fat because the guy was like 90. Like he left the house like once a day to do groceries?

Unknown Speaker 1:31:50
Did you have to let the dog

Caitlin 1:31:53
and the The company said like weren't You're too old. We're not going to give you another scene I dog when this one goes. So he wanted someone to walk it to help keep the dog healthier for longer so that he'd have them?

Scott Benner 1:32:05
I say, did you have to let the dog lead you while you were walking so that it could kind of do what it was supposed to do?

Caitlin 1:32:11
No, as soon as they're like, as soon as the dog isn't on a harness. They're like a regular dog. Oh, when you put on the special harness, then they're working and they know they're working. But when I would walk them, I'd walk them on a regular leash. And he was like, just, I'd take them to the park and we play fetch. And

Unknown Speaker 1:32:25
that's fascinating.

Caitlin 1:32:27
Like, it's completely different. Like he's very well trained. And he would come when I call them and everything but he was like a regular dog when he wasn't when he wasn't on the hardest,

Scott Benner 1:32:35
like how to work in play mode.

Unknown Speaker 1:32:37
Yeah,

Scott Benner 1:32:37
that's that I find that I'm so glad we found. That's really great. I'm gonna end on that, because I don't think we're gonna learn anything more interesting than then service dogs have, like, different years. That's, that's really cool. Did we not go over anything that you want to talk about?

Caitlin 1:32:55
I don't know, oh, there was something I don't even know if it's like relevant or related or anything? Let's find out. But there's this like one thing when I'm on these groups, and I think it carries through to like all these type one groups. Okay, but I'm on and you have to understand them on groups for, you know, differently wired kids also, and I want groups for allergies. So I have all these different Facebook groups. And I don't read everything because there's so much stuff. But there's just one thing that just it blows my mind when I see it. And I understand. But people just generally get so up in arms about people making jokes about diabetes. Like this comedian is terrible person because they made a joke about diabetes. And we're going to boycott it, because it's horrible what he said. And like, you would never joke about someone else's disability or whatever it is. They all follow kind of the same line of thinking like, you wouldn't joke about that. Why is diabetes so funny, right?

Unknown Speaker 1:33:58
And this bothers you.

Caitlin 1:34:00
Yeah, it bothers me because, and I don't know if it bothers me, but I like to try to explain it and I gotten kind of tired of trying to explain it that you like we as people who live with people that have type one diabetes, or we're caregivers for people with type one. Or maybe we do have type one ourselves, we live that so when someone says something that's hurtful, or a joke, that's like a joke, this just out of off color for us. And it, it hits the wrong way or it rubs us the wrong way. We only noticed it because that's what we live. Right. But there's plenty of people in my other forums for allergies where this guy was joking about, you know, kid couldn't eat ice cream, because they had an allergy. And that's so stupid and it exists everywhere. If and these comedians are making fun of everybody. Yeah. But if you don't live it, you don't notice it.

Scott Benner 1:34:57
Right. That's a very rare sponsible way to think of it a very mature way to think here's what I think about humor, okay? It's very simple to me. Everything has to be able to be funny. Because of the exact point you said, like I noticed a comedian that I like, and for years, he would make fun of adopted people. And the first time I remember it hitting me right in the center of the chest. I was like, Oh, I'm adopted. That's not funny. And then I thought, Oh, no, wait a minute. If I wasn't adopted, what I've laughed at that. I would, so it is fine. And I just have a sensitivity to it. And so I just at that moment, said to myself, if you're going to appreciate humor, then funny is funny. The if it's funny, it's funny. And if it's not, it's not. But there's no in between. It's either funny, or it's not funny. And you can't pick and choose, you can't say, well, that's funny, right? But that's not it's not funny to be adopted. But it's super funny. To have a seeing eye dog need to take a walk, you know, like that, because that just doesn't work that way. And if you're trying to make it work that way, you maybe shouldn't avoid humor all together, because it's not. I mean, I get the like, my disease isn't your punch line kind of feeling. And the people who it's striking, are having such a hard time probably at that moment that it's hard to hear. But I have to say that if you put me in charge of the world, I think I would have agreed with what you said. I think you just have to let let comedians be comedians, and sometimes they're gonna say stuff that's offensive to you. And you know, what's the option? They don't ever say anything offensive to anyone. And then comedies gone just like that, you know,

Caitlin 1:36:43
you can turn it off, you can opt to not watch the show again, you can do whatever. But writing them letters about how you're a poor kid isn't the shouldn't be the butt of your joke. It's a little over the top. Because something needs

Scott Benner 1:36:59
to be the butt of the joke, or there won't be a joke.

Caitlin 1:37:01
Exactly. Like we're always laughing at something. Yeah, everything. Nothing's important. I've laughed at everything in my life. I've had to at some times, because it's a way to de stress. And you know what, sometimes I hear these jokes about diabetes. And I laugh at them. I mean, yeah, it hits me on a little more personal level, or the kid that has an allergy. And you know, well, maybe the kids shouldn't be alive or Darwinism or whatever. I laugh at it. Because, you know, I got to admit, in the back of my head, I'm a very like cynical and kind of dark person. I have a dark sense of humor. And it's funny. I mean, of course, it's my kid. It's different. But I can see how it's funny.

Scott Benner 1:37:41
Yeah. Well, it's the somebody's saying

Caitlin 1:37:44
you should go out and do that. He's a comedian. Yeah. It's a way of venting. It's a way of just expressing yourself. And you might not agree with it. And you might not just like anything, politics, you don't agree with it, or like, it's you. It doesn't mean the other person's wrong. Everybody has they don't agree with you. Yeah,

Scott Benner 1:38:02
well, people are multifaceted. They have different experiences, their context is different. And so they're going to find some stuff one way and some stuff another way. It just gets weird when you start telling people what they can say. Because it bothers you.

Caitlin 1:38:17
And it's a slippery, very slippery,

Scott Benner 1:38:19
I will admit, by the way, some comedians are just not as good as others. And so you can have someone tell a joke, and it comes off really poorly. And another person can craft a similar joke where it feels more well thought out and constructed and told, and they do hit differently. Like some of it's just, you know, and people were just being mean to be mean. That's probably hard to take. But there are some comedians who just go with mean, and there's, you know, some people like that, too. So just Yeah, like you said, like a avoided if you don't want to hear it, but also to hunt it down, just to be upset about it. As you know, if I didn't hear it, but you put it on Facebook, and I'm like, oh, man, I'm outraged. Like, you're outraged, like you didn't even know.

Caitlin 1:39:05
Yeah, we have or had a comedy festival in Montreal. That happens every year. That's a

Scott Benner 1:39:10
that's one of the best comedy festivals in the world.

Caitlin 1:39:13
Exactly. And there's a show called the nasty show. And the comedians go there. And from what I understand everything is very just very nasty. And it can be funny, but occasionally, we'll get like a news thing afterwards, like, Oh, this joke offended me because of this. And I'm like, it was the nasty show. You can't like pay for tickets to go to a show called the nasty show, and then complain that the joke was nasty

Scott Benner 1:39:37
come out of the me like this was very, very nasty.

Caitlin 1:39:40
Like, you have to expect it. We put it right in the title.

Scott Benner 1:39:45
Put it we put in the title. It's not a ticket. Well, I will say this about online discourse is that it's very cyclical. And if you're not around it for a long time, like I have been, you don't see it. It seems like there's this world war. Something's happening for the first time. But it's happening for the 9,000,000th time. And it's going to happen again, when you're gone. And someone new is going to come in and have this experience over again, there's only a certain amount of experiences to be had in the world. And you're watching people have them for the first time, over and over and over again, it happens in politics, every, every generation in politics. This happens, like you'll watch a TV show from the 80s to the 90s, that, you know, was a dramatization of politics. And you'll think, Oh, my God, that's amazing. The topics they're covering are the same exact topics that we're worried about today. And I'm like, yeah, cuz there's only so many topics. It's not being it's, it's not, you don't I mean, it's not magical, that they were talking about school integration in the 90s. And you're still worried about school integration. Now. Life is glacial, like, our, our existence is a blip. And, you know, the way you get to real change is over massive amounts of time, that far exceed a lifespan. And so, as every new generation comes in, they experience the same problems, they go about them slightly differently, because their context is different. And the older people look back and go, Ah, we were dealing with that in the 60s, like, yeah, and you still are, except you gave up on it now, because you have a vacation home. So this guy is going to talk about it. And it's just going to keep happening and happening and happening. And that slowly drags progress forward at a speed that none of us can actually say. And that's why people repeat themselves, in my opinion, although I'm a guy with a podcast, and I could be 100% wrong. So but that's what I say. So that's it. So I duly noted, Caitlyn would like all of you in the Facebook groups to calm down.

Caitlin 1:41:50
Keep calm and carry on.

Scott Benner 1:41:52
Here's the funny thing, Caitlin, those people who you see who are upset will one day mature into people who look back and go Hmm. I remember when I got upset about that. But turns out comedy is comedy. So everybody's just learning, you know?

Unknown Speaker 1:42:07
Yeah.

Scott Benner 1:42:08
This was good. I really appreciate you doing this. Thank you so much.

Caitlin 1:42:12
Thanks for talking to me. Yeah, I

Scott Benner 1:42:14
mean, even though you were Canadian. I did it.

Caitlin 1:42:16
I mean, I've heard you talk to other Canadians too. And those caribou jokes that was kind of waiting for them. Well,

Scott Benner 1:42:21
it's the only Canadian reference. I have Mounties. caribou jokes and hockey. I don't know anything about Canada. I mean, what do you know about America?

Unknown Speaker 1:42:31
Um,

Unknown Speaker 1:42:32
nothing. See.

Caitlin 1:42:35
I was gonna go into it. But no. I mean, honestly, most of our news is American anyways, because we just kind of like, you know, this nice thing happened in this community. Look what's happening down there.

Scott Benner 1:42:48
Why are there so many knife attacks in Canada? kaylynn.

Caitlin 1:42:51
Because we don't have guns.

Scott Benner 1:42:52
That is that that's why people stab each other because they don't have guns. Right?

Caitlin 1:42:55
Well, no, we shoot each other too. But we're just not as angry people. You know, they probably started off being like, would you like a slice of cake? stab, stab, because they were. Yeah, I'm

Scott Benner 1:43:05
telling you that the it's that I brought this up before but there's this amazing Twitter feed. It's about this one section. I don't even know where it's at. But they they cover the crime in this one section of Canada and just people stab each other at an alarming rate. That's the only crime. It's always just like, you know, man's naked in the kitchen thinks he's a bird. And then it's you know, stabbing. And then if somebody gets down like that, it's fascinating. But anyway,

Caitlin 1:43:32
I'm not gonna very strange part of Canada. Man naked in kitchen thinks he's a bird. Yeah,

Scott Benner 1:43:39
I saw that one time or I'm making it up. It's hard to know. But anyway, there are a lot of weird things. It's just very, I don't know. And then I have this feeling that that's what Canada is. Which of course it's not.

Caitlin 1:43:51
It's probably just the focus of our news. It works a little bit differently. You guys like the big sensational headlines?

Scott Benner 1:43:57
You guys want

Caitlin 1:43:59
a little bit of everything?

Scott Benner 1:44:00
Yeah. Kid found an old big wheel still works. wishes that was a Green Machine. Like that kind of thing. You're like, Oh my God, that's amazing. I remember Green Machine. But we call them rockets. Alright, kailyn get off of here. You must have something to do.

Caitlin 1:44:20
I'm supposed to be working. But it's okay. Well, thank

Scott Benner 1:44:23
you. I really do appreciate doing this. I sincerely

Caitlin 1:44:26
thanks for thanks for your time, of course.

Scott Benner 1:44:38
A huge thank you to one of today's sponsors. gvoke glucagon. Find out more about Gvoke Hypopen at Gvokeglucagon.com/juicebox. you spell that? Je VOKEGLUC AG o n.com. forward slash juicebox Don't forget you can find the T one D exchange at T one d exchange.org. forward slash juice box. And of course, that Contour Next One blood glucose meter is waiting for you right now at ContourNextone.com/juicebox. Thanks so much for listening. We'll be back soon with more. Who is will w e apostrophe Ll it implies more than one person. I am the only person here I'll be back soon with more. I should have just said I will I will sound better like the show is an entity but it's not an entity. I'm literally the entirety of it. Where is it? If you collect me in the show together is that will. Again not will like will Robinson or I died and left well, but well, like will w e apostrophe. Oh.

Unknown Speaker 1:45:55
Let's try it again. Both

Scott Benner 1:45:55
ways the wood works better. Thanks so much for listening. I'll be back soon with more Juicebox Podcast. Thank you so much for listening. We'll be back soon with more episodes of the Juicebox Podcast doesn't matter. Is it just in my head? I don't think it matters.

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