Scott Benner 6/25/21 Scott Benner 6/25/21

#497 Boys Have Feelings

Chad has feelings and he's the father of a young type 1.

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Scott Benner 0:00
Hello friends and welcome to Episode 497 of the Juicebox Podcast.

On today's show, I'm going to be speaking with the father of a young type one. The Father's name is Chad. And Chad has feelings. Actually, boys have feelings. We're going to talk about them today, and so much more. Please remember while you're listening that nothing you hear on the Juicebox Podcast should be considered advice, medical or otherwise, always consult a physician before making any changes to your healthcare plan, or becoming bold with insulin.

Perhaps you've been hearing about the pro tip series from the Juicebox Podcast and like to learn more, you can find them at Episode 210 right in your podcast player, or if you'd like to pick through a little bit online first. Diabetes pro tip.com. That's pretty much all I have for you. Here comes chat.

Have you always wanted to help with Type One Diabetes Research but don't have the time or the means to be involved in a study? Well, you should check out the T one D exchange. You can support type one research and the Juicebox Podcast by going to T one d exchange.org. forward slash juice box. When you get there. It's super simple to do and just takes a couple of minutes. You click on join our registry now. Complete a simple survey and you're done. T one D exchange research has led to increased insurance coverage for blood glucose meter test strips changes in the American Diabetes Association guidelines for pediatric a one c goals. It's helped with FDA expansion of Dexcom CGM labeling, and Medicare coverage for CGM devices. Everything you do will be 100% HIPAA compliant, and 1,000,000%. Anonymous. Sometimes after you fill out the survey, the T one D exchange will reach out to you with other opportunities that you can either take advantage of or not. I've heard some listeners of the podcast have been contacted recently and they were really happy that they were T one d exchange.org. forward slash juice box. Check it out.

Chad 2:48
Hello, name's Chad, the father to a three year old diabetic Carson. Carson was diagnosed in on September 11 of 2019. changed our life forever spoke to be on this because I noticed ever since day one, it seemed like the the doctors you know, we're talking specifically to my wife and it's like sometimes I wasn't even in the room and I just I didn't know that was a general perception in the community with with parents raising type one children or or not.

Scott Benner 3:31
What I found your note very interesting because this is really the tone that you came from. And I want to get to all of it. But before I do, you're an East Coast person, right? Just in general.

Chad 3:41
I'm in Yep, I'm in northeastern Maryland.

Scott Benner 3:44
Alright, so I want to make sure about something before we start especially after last night's Monday Night Football game. You didn't name that poor kid after Carson Wentz. Did you

Chad 3:52
know absolutely. Absolutely. Actually that's funny because we we do we live 45 minutes from Philadelphia. I grew up in New England. I'm a I'm a Patriots fan. Okay. And my wife actually wished kind of harm on Carson Wentz because she did not want the name to become popular.

Scott Benner 4:11
Well, he fixed that. Don't worry, oh,

Unknown Speaker 4:14
my God, she What?

Chad 4:16
She said, She goes, I hope he she's like this is bad, but I hope he gets injured that way. This name just doesn't start popping up everywhere. And that season later that season. He pretty much broke his leg. He's tore his ACL and then Nick foles came in and beat my patriots in the Super Bowl.

Scott Benner 4:35
So you got paid back, but yeah, exactly. Hopefully everyone's not going to be named Carson 15 years from now. Yeah, I have to admit I thought we did at the time. In 2000, actually 1999 when we came up with the name, when we chose coal we we didn't know anybody who named their kid coal and now it's it's much more common. He actually plays on a you know in in college There are two coals on his baseball team. Oh, wow. So we didn't do a great job. But yeah, Carson Wentz took care of this for you, but I love the story. So you, you put the ogopogo on Carson. And then they came back around gotcha in the Super Bowl. Yes. Yeah. Yeah. And it really did too, because we just basically sent out like, guy number two to beat the hell out of you. Yes, yeah.

Chad 5:22
Well, right. He had like the game of his life. And it still wasn't enough.

Scott Benner 5:25
You know, you know, it's so funny. And I won't we won't talk about football long. But my mom's like, almost 80. And I was driving or somewhere the other day, and we spent a good amount of time in the car talking about that Super Bowl. And she loves football. And I said it, I said it. It was just whoever had the ball last. Like they if the Patriots would just got the ball back one more time. Like I actually think there's a strong case to be made that Brandon Graham won the Super Bowl. Oh, yeah. Yeah. knocking the ball out of Brady's sack. Yeah, yeah. But anyway, I it's hilarious that that all came back around to get you by the way, your wife, your wife. I want to meet sometime vicious lady. She couldn't have just, like, wish that he changed his name or something like, Yeah, no, she's, she's, she's pretty harsh. She would write for the cat hope a car falls on. You know. Interesting. Anyway. So a couple things about your note, grab me. One that I think we're gonna spend a fair amount of time talking about was how you felt in the room where the doctor was sort of looking through you? And and how, in general, when you're paying attention online, you don't see a ton of men involved. And moreover, you do see a lot of moms complaining about their husbands? Yes. I don't know that you found. I don't know that you found an issue in the diabetes community. I think you just found that issue in the Yeah, yeah. In the world. But first, tell me a little bit about the diagnosis. We you were there as it happened. And, and yeah, it's in the very beginning.

Chad 7:07
Yep. So we, you know, we noticed the telltale signs, he was drinking, he was drinking like half a gallon of water a day losing weight. At first, we just thought, you know, Carson is a big kid, he wasn't he was a 10 pound baby at birth. And at first, you know, my wife, just I always lose those baby fat. And then he's paying for his diaper every night. And you know, she looked it up early. This was we start seeing signs in June of 2019. And, you know, she wanted to get appointment with a doctor. And it just so happened, they were able to get us in just three weeks after his second birthday. For his two year exam, and, you know, she pushed the doctor, I want to be, you know, I want to test it for type one, I see all these signs, she wasn't too concerned. And she was actually pushing against the test. And we were like, hey, it's it's a simple test. And, you know, they tested the urine and, you know, glucose showed up in the urine. She actually called me at work. I just, I just ran out 5k that morning, I was late coming into work. My my co workers and I were we were talking about 911 just where we were on that day and I had a specific co worker tell me he said, you know, not everyone nine love means the same. I have a old co worker that whose child was born on 911 he he spent the morning you know, at the hospital, you know, enjoying this this wonderful day the birth of his son, right? And he's you know, I specifically remember him telling me He's like, not everyone's nine elevens the same that walk into work and you know, so it goes so and someone's phone's been ringing off the hook and I go to my cubicle and it was like six, seven missed calls from my wife called her back and she she told me that you know, there was glucose in the urine to get home and pack bags. We there's a really good Children's Hospital in the RSA I DuPont wilmington delaware but I guess our insurance didn't cover overnight stays there and so they said you are covered up at CHOP in Philadelphia so and it up chops Lee on one the top children's diabetes hospitals in the world. So we turned out lucky there. So yeah, I packed my bag. Karstens blood sugar was was 370 something it wasn't, you know, crazy, but it was high. And yeah, we stayed there for three nights for the training. I was hands on with the training, looking up glucose monitors and and trying to figure insulin pumps very early. In fact, after In the first night he his blood sugar the next morning was that was a perfect blood Hunter. I remember that vividly.

Scott Benner 10:07
Well, it's interesting, isn't it that the 370 now, what it meant back then you were just like, oh, as they told me his blood sugar's high, and he has diabetes. And now Yeah, it feels a little different.

Chad 10:18
Yeah, yeah. And now Now we start fretting over, you know, one 180 200

Scott Benner 10:23
sounds like you guys caught it really quickly, though. 370 is, you know, elevated, obviously, but yeah, he was wearing a DK or anything like that.

Chad 10:31
Yeah, no, he was, you know, perfectly fine. We're in there with another family whose child was in was in DK and, you know, that was scary. And I, I, I'm, I'm glad that I have my wife and she still you know, part of his she's a stay at home mom. So she's she's able to see those signs day in and day out. So that helped us a lot. Is he your only child or your? So he is our only child, but we do have custody of our seven year old niece, Sophia. So it's like we have two children. Right.

Scott Benner 11:04
But he was your My point was it's the first baby Your wife had raised. It wasn't Yes. Wow. She did a good job too. Yeah, yeah. Well, she's got magic powers. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. She can find diabetes and brake professional quarterbacks legs. Oh my goodness. I just want to say one last time that the Eagles are terrible. I'm an Eagles fan. And I'm gonna say it right now. I don't I can tell you all what happened. But I don't think anybody here wants to hear but I am facing up to it. They are an absolutely pitiful football team top to bottom.

Chad 11:40
But they're only like half the game out in the in the NFC. so

Scott Benner 11:43
pitiful football team and a pitiful division. That's for certain. Yeah, I know why they're leaving the field. The announcers like the Eagles are three, seven and won or whatever they aren't. He's like they're still in it. If only they could win two games in a row, they'd be the champions. mess. Anyway. Okay, so your your 911 is not everybody else's 911 Yeah. And somebody you know, puts the specter of it overtop of you just moments before you find out. Yeah, that's the case. It would have been nice if he would have said something like, you know, I know some people who win the lottery on 911 By the way, Chad your phone's been ringing all mark. Yeah. I won the Powerball baby there are moving people around. You are magical, but they don't use their powers. Well. Well, I I mean, Ardennes. I guess by now we've hinted around it long enough that that is Arden's Children's Hospital chop in Philadelphia. Okay. Yeah. People must know by now listening. But she was diagnosed in Virginia because we were on vacation. That's right. Yeah. But I've never had anything but but good experiences a chop and they definitely are a classy hospital that that that's on the you know, on the bend of the cutting edge the way they talk to people I definitely think that you lucked out going there. But I imagine that's not your hospital anymore. You don't make the trip every time

Chad 13:15
No, we still do it's it's it's less than an hour away. So no kidding. Yeah. Oh, we we love it that much. Especially our diabetes educator. You know that that helped a lot someone someone walking in the room after your son's diagnosed and him being diagnosed as well. Shout out to Ken Yeah, just just seeing that a healthy healthy man my age living breathing diabetes every day himself. So should feel right. Yeah.

Scott Benner 13:45
So your CD he is a guy named Ken and he has typos. Yes. Look at you can do and good work making Chad's family feel better. Very nice. I the only thing about that place that I hate is parking at it and getting Oh yeah. Yeah, it's actually yeah, the Burgess area is terrible. It just yeah, I'm making laps. And like that was it. Oh,

Chad 14:06
I had to place a pin on my on my Google Maps just so I know exactly where to go every time because I miss it. You know, every time

Scott Benner 14:14
I read your thought your your child was lucky enough to be diagnosed in the age of you know, cell phones I had it scratched out on a piece of paper with a hand drawn thing that a friend of mine who would work down there once was like that you go around this corner and through this place fear and you're like, Okay, driving down my babies with me. My wife's back at work. I'm like, it's fine. Everything's fine. This is exactly how I plan life. It's gonna be alright. never really felt Alright, I guess. But now it does. You know, I think that's kind of important to say because I just recently was watching a newly diagnosed family. Ask school questions online. And it just occurred to me as they were speaking that so soon they won't feel like this and they don't And they don't realize it. You know? It's Yeah, kind of.

Chad 15:05
I started listening to your very first episodes, I think I'm up to 25. But it just, it was just five years ago. And that feels just, it feels like the Stone Age. And you know, the progress in these families so much Carson is diagnosed in September, and by the end of October, he was on Dexcom g six. By the beginning of November, we were testing out the Omnipod on them. And December 1, he was alive with insulin when so yeah, we we progressed, you know, chop was very good progress on us very quick. And by January 1, he has his own cell phone. So

Scott Benner 15:46
I do remember Arden being in kindergarten with an iPhone, and every parent in the town hating me and my wife for for causing that uproar. Yeah, she's just, you know, it was funny, like so we all in the beginning, we just wanted Arden to be able to call us from the bus. That was our whole that was our whole goal. And we took her to the store. And you know, no one was looking to buy an expensive cell phone when she was five, trust me. And we you know, we're like these little flip phones that used to exist in a little shells and clam shells and everything. We tried so hard in the store to teach her how to like, use it. And she just, you know, weird menus and she couldn't remember everything. But that, you know, you have to admit that through that that iPhone in front of her in five seconds later, she had the whole thing figured out how to use it. All right, well, here's your baby crack. And if you ever feel dizzy on the bus called daddy. It was pretty much the whole thing. Yeah, but the other families were pissed. They were just very unhappy that Arden was wandering around with an iPhone, you know, she is 16. And yeah, yeah, she's

Chad 16:57
she's a she's Yeah, she's 11. Then in the podcast, I'm

Scott Benner 17:01
listening. That's crazy. And the podcast you're listening to right now? She's 11? That's Yes. My point is she's 16. You know, she's never broken an iPhone. Really? Oh, she's had one since she was five. She's never broken one

Chad 17:12
ever. I think I broke five when I was 25. Alone, you know?

Scott Benner 17:17
Through mine. I tried to put mine in my pocket the other day. And for some reason, just threw it at the floor. Getting old.

Chad 17:26
I don't want to end there always within like three months after buying it brand new.

Scott Benner 17:30
Yeah. Anyway, so chat, I do want to really dig in because I don't know many. I mean, I, I guess how do I want to put this? So I have access to the demographics of the private Facebook group for the podcast. And it's, you know, just the it's obviously not everybody that listens. And it's not everybody in the world. But I can tell you that overwhelmingly, there are women in the group. And the men that are in there are more likely to be type ones themselves. Yeah, not the fathers of type ones. A lot of fathers get added to the group by the mothers. But I don't see them being active. I don't know that that doesn't mean that they're not watching because I can also see the analytics and a huge portion of the people who are members of the group are active within the group every day, although a smaller percentage of them actually post and answer questions and stuff like that. It's, you know, the way the internet works. But it is incredibly uncommon to hear from men who don't have type one. And I am aware of some type one groups for fathers of children with Type One Diabetes. And I don't spend much time in them at all, but the times I have looked, they are more of a I don't even know how to put it. It's like, like a relief valve. Yeah, it's it's like the digital equivalent of getting together and Yep, shooting or kicking or yelling at something. Yes, is what it feels like. And I don't know, you know, psychologically, I don't know what that is, I'm sure we could easily dig in and, you know, go down the rabbit hole of boys are taught not to, you know, show their feelings and things like that, or Yeah, or whatever. But it didn't strike you that way. It obviously didn't strike me that way. I was, um, you know, I, I don't ever talk about it on here very much. But in my book, I joke that I am really just too overly shy of being able to give birth, because I'm a lady basically, in a lot of ways, because I grew up through my mid 20s 30s and 40s, you know, being a stay at home parent. And, you know, became very evident very quickly that if, if my kids didn't have that, that thing that my wife would have intrinsically known that I didn't really know, that kind of care that it was going to be detrimental to them so I just sort of threw myself into it. You Completely headfirst I just yeah, that's what I'm gonna do. So I don't you know, I don't have that when you see me share or hear me share on here. It's it's a pretty direct valve right to my heart I'm not you know I'm not protecting my how I how I sound or anything like that I'm not trying to produce a veneer of, you know, masculinity. I've been over that for a while. Yeah, yeah, yeah, you only have to be a stay at home dad before it's a thing so long before you realize that you know, you are the the heel of a lot of, of you know, whispering you know, in circles I'm sure it's not like that any longer. But you know,

Chad 20:44
yeah, I yeah, I think as you know, we specially younger generations. Yeah, that that that will change with time.

Scott Benner 20:57
Having said that, john, if I could lean the other way for a second. Let me let me have 1980 Scott, talk to you for a second. I don't see a ton of guys built like construction workers who are stay at home dads, either. No, six, four guys that can benchpress a car that have just decided not to work. I mean, I'm sure there were some but they mostly look like me. You know? Although I wish I was taller, but that's not the point. I'll tell you right now. I'm gonna get your wife to wish for my height help I'd be happy if I could just get my phone back in my pocket and you tell her to just say out loud you know something about Scott always successfully putting his phone away. To do that magical work on me. But you're a working guy you know you're not the stay at home. Is there something about you or how you grew up that made you want to be involved?

Chad 21:48
So I think being a being the only boy I'm surrounded by girls and my my dad and round a lot. Maybe Maybe that helped deal with you know,

Scott Benner 22:03
Chad, you're a couple ovary shy having a baby too. Is that what you're saying? Yeah, yeah,

Chad 22:07
maybe it's too much it'd be too much pain for me. I got I rarely get sick. I got sick a couple years ago went to the doctor and and I was like, I don't know. something's really wrong with me and, and the doctor, somebody Chad, you have a cold? Yeah.

Scott Benner 22:25
Well, last week, I got sick. And I was on the sofa for four days. Kelly's like What's wrong? I'm like, I feel a little flush. And when I turned my head too fast, I feel dizzy.

Chad 22:36
Yeah, I was passed out over I mean, I swear I almost cut off my thumb. My wife says it was just a it's a paper cut. But I guess I almost passed out.

Scott Benner 22:48
It's so funny. I've really been injured in my life. Like really, really injured. And that I've handled fine. Yes, like I've, if you ever meet me look for the scar on my left hand that goes midway through my thumb down into my palm. And like I felt laid my hand open, and that I handled completely fine. I've had welders flash where I went blind for a few days that I handled completely fine. I've had a giant molten piece of steel fall into my boot. And of course I couldn't get to it quickly enough. So the moisture in my foot, put it out and like just burned a hole right into the top of my foot. That's fine. rip my ankle apart that I handled fine. If I get a little woozy when I turn my head.

Chad 23:31
Yeah. Well, that's why I told her I said I was kneeling down looking at the cut and then I stood up too fast and all the blood just rushed him. You know, as you get older when you stand up too fast. You can't like

Scott Benner 23:42
change. You got the vapors. That's what happened. Even 1860 illness you just have been overcome. That's all. So you grew up in a family where your father wasn't around a ton. You had a bunch of sisters and a mom. Yes. Yeah. Yeah. Do you feel like you'd have that that more kind of caretaker vibe about you?

Chad 24:04
Yeah, I do. I you know, I things things around the house like household chores are are pretty 5050 as much as they can be with the with the time a lot, you know, with my eight hour spent the job. What What did help out with with caring for Carson was I, you know, six months after diagnosis Coronavirus, it's our streets and I was at home with the family day in and day out. And also I had this Master's project to finish my master's and it revolved around just tracking all the different elements to type one diabetes is just a blueprint of a system. And I devote a lot of research and, and time into that so I was learning about type one a lot. And and during that time, I really was able to dig into like numbers and you know, fine tune adjustments with that.

Scott Benner 25:03
What's your background in systems engineering? Oh, do you have that classic engineering brain? Yes. Yeah.

Chad 25:11
I think that helped out tremendously with with Carson's diagnosis and then my wife, she's an accountant, she's uh, she or she has degree in accounting. She you know, she's she's good with numbers herself. So that that helped out tremendously.

Scott Benner 25:27
And you find that valuable and so like, your management is going really well. Right?

Chad 25:32
for cars. Oh, yeah. Yeah. So within a within six months, Carson was under seven, a one C and at the year mark, he was under six

Scott Benner 25:43
c that's so we I want to pick through that a little bit. Because my experience talking to people, there's there's certain buckets, I'm finding people falling in the more and more experiences I have, for instance, I've said recently, nurses tend to struggle a lot with being the caregivers of people with type one diabetes, which is fascinating is something about how they're trained, and what they do day to day that doesn't mesh with the part of type one that's more style. And you know, then then math. Yes. And I've now seen that so many times. I'm willing to say that out loud. I'm not saying you know, nurses can't figure it out. I'm just saying that they struggle. They they feel like they have a natural built in roadblock. But I've also noticed that people with engineering backgrounds seem to find their own way through it. It's not ever classically mathematical and it's not usually completely like the way I talk about it. They find their own way. So well. Yeah. What did you do and our

Chad 26:45
our our that's funny, sad because our diabetes educator, my six month mark, no Carlin's on a low Basal rate just because of his size. And like, like all night, he's at point one units while he was going high a few nights. And, you know, the problem with that size is you can only increase by 50% more insulin, and that's not really needed. So we, we kind of, we throw in some random point, one fives and two is that nightly basil rate or, you know, every other hour, and you know, is diabetes educators like what the hell are you guys doing? This is off and it's like, hey, it works. Yeah,

Scott Benner 27:24
I'm bumping and nudging with basil is what I'm doing. Yeah, yeah. Well, it's, um, have you looked into that? Are you interested in on the pod five when it comes out using only pod? So are you gonna go to an algorithm?

Chad 27:37
Yeah, very intro, but I've read that, you know, he, I think there's an age requirement to it five or six years old?

Unknown Speaker 27:45
Yeah, I'm

Scott Benner 27:45
listening. I'm not sure. But historically, doctors can write things off label for use, and it's done with diabetes and kids forever. I would think it would be more about you. exhibiting that you can handle it. Yes. Yeah. And that would be that I'm looking at Arden's blood sugar right now. It's funny, it's 94. She's in class. And, um, there's part of me that just is, like, I wonder why it's not 89. Just ridiculous, right? But, but it's, it's, um, and I don't, and I wouldn't, I would, interestingly, come to some conclusion like the one you did, except, I don't think about it in any of the terms you did. Like, I'm sure you were very just like, well, we'll you know, we'll do this. You know, we'll do a little bit here and then move it up and move it down and move it up and move down. And that'll keep the bounce, by the way, that's kind of brilliant. Chad being able to see, you know, because when I say things like, you know, Basil doesn't like when you make a change to your basil doesn't happen immediately. Yeah. You could make the leap in your head that if I just stagger it, then every once in a while, we'll get a little bit of a push down. But it won't be enough to make him low. Yes. And then you tried it, which is huge, because I spoke to someone yesterday on the phone. And she's like, I don't know what's wrong. My daughter's blood sugar has been high since she moved to an insulin pump. And people want to blame the pump right away. Like when we were on MBI it was fine. And now this pump and you know, it's so high. So I'm asking my questions picking through it. So what was her total basil on MDI? And she said, 13 units a day. And I said, you know, show me your Basal rates. Now. We added them up and it was eight minutes. Yeah. And I said, I think we found the problem. Yeah, you know, and she's like, no, but she gets low. Like, yeah, but and then that's when the explanation starts. And it's such a simple thing that I'll say it here. A lot of you experienced Lowe's make the reasonable determination that you have too much insulin. That's why got low, for some reason, take it out of the basil every time. Yeah, then blood sugars trend up because you don't have enough Basal insulin which causes you to have to Bolus too much at meals, but you probably can't bring yourself to do it. So you under Bolus a meal, the meal shoots up, the pressure of the high blood sugar gets to you, you correct it. And then as the corrections working, the food digests out of the system, there's nothing there to hold up the number you crashed down. And instead of seeing that process, you turn your Basal down more. Yeah, which just makes it worse. It's the exact opposite of what you're supposed to do.

Chad 30:39
Oh, yeah, we were Yeah. About the same week, we changed probably the Bolus numbers for for food more than more than you know, we'll see a trend over three days and be like, Alright, well, something's something's obviously up. And we will we'll change his food ratio.

Scott Benner 30:56
I think one of the most important things that we do that ends up being difficult for people to wrap their heads around and and to implement because there's no real rule to it is the part where you, you know, just understand the impact of the food. I mean, this podcast forced me to talk about glycemic load and glycemic index, because you people wouldn't listen to me when I just said, just Bolus what you think the plate needs, learn from last time and do it again, that really is how I do it. I look at a plate and I go into this much if it doesn't work, I make a correction. Next time she eats that food, I take what we Bolus plus the correction I put it in. Now I hear from people a Scott, I can't remember all that I have a job, you know, and so I don't not understand that. But that's why one day I said the Jenny, I we got to talk about glycemic load and glycemic index as much as I don't want to. Because that's not how I want to think about it. But at some point, the podcast got so big that I was like I have a responsibility here. I just you know, now I have to now I have to do it. So you guys are forcing me to learn more things. And think about things differently. Because you're, you're being resistant and not listening to me. And I have enough of that with my children. If someone would just listen chat when I speak, that would be lovely. I just want one person not to argue with me just to go, Hey, the guy said do this, I'll just do it. But that's an incredibly important part. Because, you know, as I explained to anybody out it'll sit still a listener who asks, 10 you know, 10 carbs of one food doesn't impact your blood sugar the same ways 10 carbs of another food and you can't just act like it does and then go oh, I don't know what happened. I count the carbs. You can't do that. But man, people do it. So yeah.

Chad 32:45
And that's like a lot of what like our extended family doesn't doesn't understand. My wife sister the other day, they were talking about getting pizza and my wife was just like, shaking her head and and yeah, she had explained Yeah, he kind of pizza but it just means we're up till 12 midnight. 1am chasing protein and fat and stuff. Yeah.

Scott Benner 33:08
You hear somebody talking about pizza at seven o'clock. You start thinking about what you're Yeah, then what am i binge watching right now? Am I gonna enjoy that? Will I be able to follow it when I'm tired? I have a I always have a binge watch going. It's easy to watch. And one that's more that you have to focus on more. And I know at a certain time, like right now I'm watching Deadwood. But the dialogue is so thick with like old timey euphemisms like you really have to pay attention to follow along. So I don't know I don't do that when after about 10pm is something more Poppy, you know something a little more pillory after 10. So I can pay attention. But it's interesting, isn't it? When someone mentions pizza, you start doing the math in your head. I could probably if this goes right, I could probably go to bed by midnight. If it goes wrong. I wouldn't be able to. You gotta get up in the morning at seven to go to work. Is there any chance we could just have a nice wrap with Yeah. We could put it tomato in it and sprinkle some cheese on top. It'll be just like pizza. And that's socks, man. Oh, my God. And you're you know, it's understandable that other people don't think about it that way.

Chad 34:17
Yeah. And, you know, I, I have a I have a cousin with type one. And I had, you know, I had before it's diagnosed and that I had very little knowledge of what even like type one was from type two and, and all I knew about diabetes was Walter Brimley in the diabetes commercial. So

Scott Benner 34:37
you notice a little bit about it. You called him Walter Brimley. It's Wilford Brimley. Oh, well, there you go. I don't know if you know the story about Wilford Brimley. His mom named him after a very famous sports star. And then realized everyone was gonna call the name Wilford to everybody. So she killed him. And that's why he's the only Wilford you've ever heard of. Back in 1850 it's very long time ago. Hey, I pushed him down on mine. Call it a prospecting accident sounds very sad story but he got to be the only Welford so and look how it didn't help him cuz you call to Walter. How many Walters Do you know in in your life? One? Yeah, I know two and one of them's from mash so that's not a real person that's a character. And they call them radar anyway, so really nobody called him Walter ever do people watch mash? I don't imagine they do. It must not be funny. Any My father was still growing up. How old's your dad? Now?

Unknown Speaker 35:38
He is 62 that's making me feel bad about liking mash. I gotta be honest with you.

Scott Benner 35:46
Anyway, you don't start watching mash now because it was had a 70s aesthetic where you'll just look and go This isn't funny. And I'm just I'm watching it. And um, you know, I remember watching it when I was 12. So anyway, yeah, that's not if you want to television recommendation justified is terrific. justified. God justified. I'm enjoying Deadwood. I've gone into the modern Western phase of my life for some reason right now. I just watched a terrible show on Netflix called longmire that I loved way more than I should have. am and what's the one with Kevin Costner right now that I really enjoyed? It's almost like a like an E. These they call them like, nighttime soap operas the way they were. I sound like my grandmother right now. Hold on a second. I'll tell you the name of my story. What is wrong with me? We got them old. I don't I don't recognize it completely. But I am. Kevin Costner who I can. All the sudden. I don't know how to use Google either. Hold on. I have no idea. What do you Yellowstone? Okay, I've heard of this. So good. Not good in a way like, you know, Hamlet, not saying that. Just you know, they kill a lot of people for no good reason. And there's pretty landscapes. There you go. That's, that's my high bar for tell fish. Yes. Are you writing it down? Yeah, if you hate it, don't blame me.

Chad 37:27
75% Rotten Tomatoes.

Scott Benner 37:29
I don't even know what that means to me that when I see something like that I'm so jaded about the internet. What I think is that it got popular. So they hired a bunch of people to go on and leave bad reviews for it. Like, well, that's a good review. So I used to say, yeah, yeah, that's good review. Does that mean that 75% of the people like it?

Chad 37:51
Yeah. I used to think that about Rotten Tomatoes. I thought the more Rotten Tomatoes you got the worse it was. But no, it it is a it's a good thing.

Scott Benner 38:00
Wow. Way to make something that some so confusing that Yeah, I'm on can't follow it. What a business model. It must be the same person who came up with insulin sensitivity number going down as a down stronger? Yeah. Yeah. Wow, maybe that is why. All right. If the person who made Rotten Tomatoes is listening, I want to understand where that rating came from. Please call I would like to know, so Chad, like, I really want to dig into how it feels like to, to realize you've you're being excluded in your child's care.

Chad 38:38
It's very frustrating. Especially it is a toddler, a giant toddler to to keep his numbers that you know that good and stuff out. I just kind of so that that kind of happened early on our last visit. Um, you know, it kind of involved me more just because well, my, my wife for when told them she's like, hey, Chad's. Chad's behind a lot of these numbers a lot of these changes and at that time, I think we were having too many lows so we were kind of seeking you know, some advice on on what to do, but it was also summer so yeah, who who knows it seemed like once fall hit his his need for insulin went down but uh yeah, it's just frustrating to you know, it's almost like I'm invisible in there and and maybe it's just because the note normal household the father is putting in a lot hours each week and you know, they just don't have the time for to and to review you know, numbers and go over treatment and stuff. You know, I was able to dive in deeper just because of Coronavirus and me working from home pretty much all summer. I'm back in the office now. And I'm, you know, less hands off right now because I'm at work, but, you know, I still call in daily to see how things are going. And

Scott Benner 40:11
so it would have just in general been nice if the physician would have added the extra sentence to say, Hey, you know, how are you guys dividing care here? Yes, and not just just immediately disregard you, I have to tell you, as you're, as you're explaining that I put, I tried to put myself in a classic woman's position and most of history and I thought, Man, this must be how women feel when people talk to their husbands, and not to them, which I'm sure happens to ladies Far, far more frequently than it happens to guys. So, yeah, you might have just, you know, experienced a little bit of a reversal of that. Wow, you know, I just tricked my mind to, you know, you just, it's, it's, you were finally in the scenario where people have power look to the female in the pairing and say, This must be the person in charge. And it struck you really poorly, but badly enough, by the way that you were willing to write an email to a podcast and want to come on and talk about it? Yeah, imagine if women stuck up for themselves like that podcast would be a very interesting with people saying, you know, I go into places and, you know, I go, we went to a bank to get a mortgage, and they talked to my husband, and you know, I make more money than he does. And it doesn't seem to matter. And, you know, all the crap that girls go through. Plus they get their periods. It really isn't fair. Yeah. No, I wouldn't trade it for the world. No, no, it's terrible. I tried to joke about it here. But it? No, it's never received. Well, I have to be honest with you. And Arden is very, like, you know, anytime Arden has her period, and she'll just be like, leave me alone. Like, she's very like out front about it. She's like, This is not the time for you to be talking to me about this. And I go, okay. It's like, wow, interesting tactic. My wife spent years telling me, I'm the same no matter what I'm like, I don't think you are, but I'll go with you. Arden's just like I am not the same Leave me alone. She's excellently she's taking First off, and she's, she's out in front of it. But no, seriously, Big Girls have to carry babies. And that period of thing really seems like a horror. I'm not gonna lie, you know. And I just, I don't mean the act of it. I mean, like, having to go through it and the pain and the hormonal changes and just watching how you have to adjust Arden's insulin for different you know, I don't mean times of the month like that, but But honestly, like, different weeks in the month are, you know, completely different. I was talking to a listener from England yesterday trying to help her with her basil. And, and I said, Okay, now, will this just work like for, you know, this week? You know, aren't you basically like two or three different people through the month diabetes wise, you're and then now I'm, like, embarrassed I've ever spoken to her before. And I'm like, you know, you're like the oscillating you you're like the you know, almost there you in the actual event you and she's like, yeah, I guess that's right. And so then we talked about how to, you know, move her correction ratios and our basil and stuff like that as her body is looking for more insulin and how to recognize when it is very suddenly happens to Lisa Arden needs to go back to the original setting. So it's, you know, trust me least Carson doesn't have to do that.

Chad 43:44
Yeah, eyes are like glazed over. Just think about that.

Scott Benner 43:49
He really, if you if you can wrap your head around it once you can see it, then it's just about the telltale signs, and then you see the signs and make the change. Now obviously with the glucose monitor, way easier to see those signs because the signs really just are more difficult to bring down after a meal if it goes high. Looking like your insulin to carb ratio has gone up a little bit for meals and that your basil has gone up. So as I see that happening, there's a little turns the dials we make make make the insulin, stronger, stronger, stronger but then as the as yatse happens as as as the I don't even know what to say like the event is the event weird. I just want to say bleeding but that seems wrong. So my mind can't find words in case anyone's wondering what's happening inside of my head. Does that happens as soon as that happens, I guess. Then the insulin needs for Arden go backwards. She needs less wear. I've heard that the exact opposite from other people. But the truth is, is once it happens, it happens and you just kind of follow along with it. Now if I left that to Arden, you know, would probably take her days to see all my blood sugar has been high. And you know, I don't think she'd see it as quickly as I do. But anyway, so Chad, let's let's go over a couple things you don't like being treated the way women have been treated throughout history makes you upset. I think I think that you didn't realize that I was going to turn this around on you like this, which I didn't plan on doing when we started now.

Chad 45:26
I'm gonna go through my wife's email, see if she's been talking to you.

Scott Benner 45:31
I just told you, I'm like, I'm just, I'm, I'm a mom at heart. I started, I started defending the other side of like, you know, this is what happens to me. Because I guess now that we're talking about it is what happens to me having been a stay at home dad, in a situation like that I my most vivid memories of it happened around my kids sports, where I yeah, the men, you know what you would think I'd be a party of, but rich, by the way of you know, I live in a town where a lot of people love baseball and softball, this town has won the Little League World Series for softball multiple times. So ports are a big deal around here. And my son is one of the only children from this town who plays baseball in college, you might think I know a little something about it. But when the when those collections of guys, coaches or fathers would happen, I was excluded. Like I was a mom. Wow. And and it's, you know, no one ever wants cared for my opinion about what was even when they were sitting around sharing opinions. If I spoke, it was like, Oh, look, Scott wants to say something, and I'm okay with it now, but it happened constantly. Maybe I really did see that side of it. Because of my own experience just now. And I'm not. I'll just bleep this out. I'm not shitting on you for feeling that way. Like I understand how you feel it to be excluded like that. But I think that this generation would call that male privilege. Yeah, yeah. I wouldn't call it that. Because I'm 50. Almost, and I hate all that. But

Chad 47:04
maybe I'm considered a millennial. So yeah, maybe, maybe. That's how you think of it.

Scott Benner 47:09
Yeah, I don't use words like woke and privilege and things like that in my life. I just think that you know, things are. Sometimes people are awesome. You know, it doesn't. It doesn't need a branding. It really is the internet that forced us to brand like basic concepts of life. Oh, yeah. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. male privilege. This used to be called people didn't treat women. Well. That's, you know, and that's still what's happening, by the way, except now it has a name. So turn so fancy, Chad. Chad, are you very worried that this episode is going to be called Chad has male privilege? I'm not maybe I'll embrace it now. Don't worry. That's not the way I'm going. I just it occurred to me as a listener, you might right now be gone? What is he gonna call this episode of Mike? I don't give my you don't have. You don't have my, you can't use this anymore. Stop just hanging up out of nowhere. But no, I think it's interesting because it happens to I see it happen to men in this situation constantly. And, and I see how it affects them, it makes them feel badly. When I see guys talking about it privately. their feelings are hurt. They know, they know that their wives don't trust them with their kids. You know, moreover, they know that they don't have as much information and that they're not doing as much for their children as they want to be around the medical decisions. And it's really hurtful to them. You know, I can see that because I am a guy. I mean, the way they come off, you'd never Yeah, you know, from from a female perspective, they just look like idiots. You know, I mean, like just ranting children, but I can, I can see it, you know, for what it is because I felt that way too and don't do a good job of expressing myself. So, you know, for as good of a job as I do of expressing myself on the podcast around diabetes. I'm still a guy in my personal life, and I still screw it up in my personal life constantly. You know, I'm forever thinking to myself, that's not what I meant. Why did I say that? You ever had that feeling? Oh, 17 times a day. That's not what I meant. Why do I say it that way? So and I don't think that's an easy thing for a person of the opposite sex to to appreciate just as I don't understand what the hell my wife's talking about sometimes. But I you know, I see it. So for ladies listening. I I've tried to say this throughout the podcast a number of different ways, but I don't think your husbands are disinterested. I think they're concerned they're going to mess something up, or just intrinsically believe that you're better at it than they are and so they don't want to get in the way. Or some of them are lazy. I mean, some of them are playing, you know, PlayStation. I get that but Also we do stuff like that sometimes so that we don't have to be put in the position to fail. Guys guys aren't good at failing. Not that anybody is, but we take it pretty badly. When it's hardwired in you that you're supposed to go outside, clunk something over the head, drag it back to the house so we can eat it. And if we don't we all die. You know, when you can't do those things, it's a it's depressing a little bit, you know? But luckily, you don't have to feel like that around the diabetes. That's Yeah.

Chad 50:29
But it is, it is also difficult kind of CO parenting co managing, you know, me my wife had had our arguments over over what to do nothing, nothing really. He they just kinda, you know, you know, I just, Hey, can we feed them something different or, you know, dose differently, but, uh, but you know, it's been fine. And it's so far, it's that well,

Scott Benner 50:57
around here, the biggest the longest fight has been Pre-Bolus thing. So yeah, not that everybody doesn't understand how important it is. But the people who aren't me are not as diligent about it. And I have just been steadfastly just banging that drum and they, they've gotten so much better at it. But and by the way, I'm obviously speaking around my wife. My son's not Bolus thing Arden Friday. We're talking about food with her. And she's just busy. She's a busy person. She works, you know, a lot. And, you know, just like you hear everybody else say like, it's hard to think a half an hour before a meal. Hey, where's my blood sugar? What should I be doing right now? We're an hour before, you know, let's correct this 120 now, so it's easier at dinner time, that kind of stuff. And so I'll just you know, Mike, and I, but I don't always say it nicely. Like, I'm way nicer to you people than I am to my own family. Yeah, yeah. So I'm just like, come on. Could someone Pre-Bolus like I, I sometimes I'm like, if I leave the house for an hour, and I come back, I'll look at art and I'll go, because I left your blood sugar doesn't get to go up 50 points. Like, like, You're making me feel like, but here's the other side of it. It makes me feel like I have to stay here. And that's not fair to me. Right? Like I shouldn't I shouldn't have to feel like that, like everybody can take their little piece of it. But I don't know, I guess what I'm saying is, I think good. in general. Some ways that men act could easily be misunderstood for apathy, when I think it's more that we just don't want to screw things up very bad.

Chad 52:35
Yeah. No. Yeah. I think I think that's 100% correct. And, and some of those, like, those diabetes dads groups on like Facebook and other. They, you know, there's now most of the dads are very outspoken, and they kind of know what they're doing, just because they're part of the group. But there are a few dads out there that, you know, seeking advice and looking for, hey, my wife wants me to help out more. And just, you know, kind of step one, you know, ask him for help on step one. So,

Scott Benner 53:11
yeah, well, it's also hard to ask people for help, when you don't sometimes know what it is you need them to do. Yeah, you know, and I think that can happen too. Or sometimes it's like, I need help, because this isn't going the way I want it to. And then you're now going to enlist another person who has not been involved, who doesn't know anything about it, to try to figure out the things you couldn't figure out while you're involved? Yeah, and then that's just then you've let them down. You know, and then that's really the interplay I'm talking about is that, you know, I know, we don't talk about the world like this much anymore, but it's still true. Like, you know, like, for most people, there's expectations you have of your spouse, and when that person doesn't come through, you might not consciously think, Oh, I pick the loser, you know what I mean? But they're inside your brain somewhere I need has been left down, she or he was supposed to do this thing. They don't do it. And now I have a, you know, a lesser feeling about the decision I've made. And that's how 25 years later you end up gone. Could you get out of here, please. We're all trying to avoid that. And so people defend themselves by not putting themselves in positions where they can let their spouses down. And then you get this, which is you feel like you've been left alone to take care of diabetes, by a person who doesn't care when really what happened is very likely, that person just very badly doesn't want to play it out. You know, and they don't know what to do. And not everybody figures it out like Chad did. Because not everybody gets an engineer's brain and COVID-19 to sit around the house and stare at their newly diagnosed. Stare at numbers. Yeah, seriously. If you were worth doing that, if it wasn't for COVID you might not be as involved.

Chad 54:55
No, no, but so he was put on the bump pumping the seven And, you know, at that time, we were kind of scared to death of insulin, you know, scared of giving too much. And Christmas, Christmas night, we're back at CHOP. And just because there was a stomach, stomach bug and an ear infection, and he wasn't eating and is vomiting, and his, his blood sugar was through the roof and ketones, so we ended up back at CHOP, and that that kind of, you know, that kind of scare made us less afraid of insulin and then then we started listening to your podcast, and then it's just like, yeah, you know, we weren't, I didn't want to be back in that situation again. So.

Scott Benner 55:44
So it took it took a kind of a DK thing to take your fear, all you really did was shift your fear to the other side of the scale. Yes, right. You were scared to being low, right? Until you saw what happens when you got hired. And you're like, Okay, let's be scared of that instead. Yeah. I think that's that really is the game. Honestly, it really is. It's to it's to realize that none of this is you know, completely baby proof safe. Yeah, and what side of the game are we gonna play in? Are we gonna play in the side where if we do things, right, you know, we're gonna have these these successes that lead to better health, or are we going to you know, we're gonna go on the other side we're doing it right just means elevated blood sugar, but nobody gets low. So, yeah, that's the trade off. And I think that really is in most people's minds. Like that's the trade off they're making. I'm the one who's saying and hopefully other people listening are thinking that that's that's not a that's not a real decision that has to be made you don't it isn't either or it isn't either B you know, having a one C and the sixes and get low a lot or having a one C and the sevens or eights and never got low. I don't think that's the case. I think people have a one season sevens and eights get low too. I think they get low more viciously than people who have their insolence so well balanced that they can sit in a five a one see Arden doesn't get low, like like in a scary way. I don't think she's had a scary low I mean, I don't remember what in the last couple of years you know and by that I mean like oh my god get used she's gonna die drink this drink this that kind of stuff. Like I don't remember that happening anymore because our insolence so well dialed in that aside of a real anomaly that just it almost can't happen.

Chad 57:37
Yeah and and with with her age, I'm guessing She needs a lot more insulin now. It's it's easier for for you guys to fine tune that. Yeah, you can. You can adjust by 5% 10%. So

Scott Benner 57:49
you're not going from a point? Oh, five to a point. Point. One double one is insulin. Yeah. I've doubled his insulin by giving him a 10th of a unit. Yeah, right. Yeah, that's not the case. Well, you know, this is a really tough time. And you're right, it will get easier as bodyweight comes. And the difference between, you know, a half a unit a unit, it's not really that great anymore. You know, I've come to realize that in the last year, so he used to take if I had to make a wild Bolus to break a stuck blood sugar. It was two units for Arden like if Arden's blood sugar's 117. It wouldn't move like I could give her two units to break it free. That's more like three units now. Wow. So I keep wondering when when it's going to be more and more we actually chat let's uh, let's tell a story here. So at Thanksgiving we we screwed up at Thanksgiving for all of my I put up the Thanksgiving episode. I got literally hundreds of thank yous afterwards about oh my god, my Thanksgiving is so much better because of this episode. Mine wasn't. So because I was up cooking all morning. Arden's blood sugar was terrific. She's upstairs, getting a slow start to the day. She's up. And my wife's family has a tradition of making these terrible cinnamon bonds on holiday mornings, and I say terrible because they're packaged and there's just nothing it's just sugar and wrapped in more sugar with some sugar. And I know how to bowls for them. It's not a big deal. But there's like 55 carbs and one of them. Wow. And I text Arden I say mom's putting those cinnamon buns in the you know the oven now and Arden's blood sugar's like 95 like, you know, like so. Why don't you Bolus 10 carbs right now. And then, you know we're gonna do a little more in a little bit and blah, blah, blah. So she says okay, she Bolus is the 10 carbs. And I text her a little while later. And cinnamon buns are getting closer I was like now I want you to put in seven units and I figured out the carbs for those But I want to get seven units going right now, keep in mind that by the time this is over for this freakin sentiment bond, I'm going to need to give her like 14 units of insulin because it's just, no one should be eating these things I want to be, right. And so I said seven units. She goes, I can't. And I'm like, What? Just give yourself seven units? And she's like, no, and I'm like, will it not let you so now like, I'm running through, like, all the things that I'm not sure like, Why can't she just give herself insulin? And she finally text back? I'm out of insulin, the pumps almost empty. And I'm like, Oh, okay. And then I was like, Alright, come downstairs, we'll change your pump real quick. But we're going to inject this other insulin. So I kind of feel like I'm being slick. And we have some fiasco left for when we tried the fiasco like, Well, you know, I wonder if I can't do this in a way where she won't have to wait. And she can still eat this. The cinnamon bun. Well, I draw up a lot of insulin in a in a syringe. It's like 10 units. Right? And Arden's never gotten a syringe with more than probably like two or three units in it. So she goes, whoa, what are we doing? And I was inside explained the whole thing to her. And she goes, make sense. But Wow, that's a lot of insulin and that syringe and I said, Yeah, I'm like, you know, my buddy, growing up as an adult would give themselves sometimes, like 30 or 40 units of that insulin, he that old insulin he used to use in this big syringe. And she's like, it was like, full and I was like, Yeah, she's like, well, and then she couldn't imagine it. Like, I think she thought it was going to just run out of her body when we push the plunger down. Seriously, she couldn't, she couldn't like wrap her head around it. So we put it in. And I was like, see it stayed in? She goes, huh? It's just really stunning, you know? And, and I had it like I did, I did it. I really did for 45 minutes after she ate that cinnamon bond. Her blood sugar was 110. I was like, I am a genius. Those people are right, you know, and then suddenly, boom, it was not enough. And the one thing I didn't account for, because I used what I thought was enough. The Ask was that, you know, when you put a new pump site on, your Basal is not working, you don't have that that pressure I needed to Bolus for the basil. And I didn't so Arden's blood sugar got out ahead of me.

twice over the next hour and a half, I cut it down at 150. And, but then I went back to Cooking. And then the next thing I knew what I thought was falling, did that, you know that little hump on the Dexcom it starts heading down, then it rolls around and comes back up again. Right? That happened. I had to be more aggressive. I stopped it at 180. And then I had to I had to hit it again. Because she got up to like two 220 or something like that. So it's all just because the insulin was you know, was messed up the delivery, the insulin was all messed up because we literally I changed for clarity, we changed an insulin pump and immediately went into a cinnamon pod. And I had enough hubris to think I could do it. But I was I missed. But once I saw that happening, I said to Kelly, I'm like, I'm not messing with this. And I gave her a lot of insulin like I I put her blood sugar into a fall on purpose, and then caught it so that the rest of thanksgiving wouldn't be ruined. So if you see Arden's 24 hour graph for Thanksgiving, it's fascinating because she's sweet 70 and like 100 for you know, 21 hours and then there's this like mountain in the middle that I don't usually see the flags roller coaster. It's worse the it's like freefall. It went up so sharply and came down so sharply couldn't even call it a roller coaster. But I To me, the key is that as badly as it all when I knew what to do at every step of the way, I never made her low. You know, and that to me is like that's how I know I'm good at it. Like she didn't get low afterwards ever. And then right away, boom, the rest of the day was right back where I expected it to be again. I got the insulin in where it needed to be. I cleared out the carbs and right back in the game. I was proud of it actually by the time it was over. I was disappointed and then proud. a weird feeling. Oh, what the cinnamon bun. Oh my god. They're the worst. Like, I don't know who makes them Pillsbury or something. They come in like that. cardboard. Yeah. Like, you literally should not eat it. It's just bad for you. And my,

Chad 1:04:41
my father was recently diagnosed with Type two and he cleared out his fridge and I think like he brought over to two of those cans. Yeah. It's like we can't use this. Yeah, I was like that. This is this is why you're just diagnosed with Type two.

Scott Benner 1:04:59
You're asking too much of your system dad. And this right here is you asking too much of it. And I want to be clear like, you know, Arden has one of those cinnamon buns like on Thanksgiving morning and Christmas morning and yeah, that's really the only time of year she ever has has them. And I one of them and I have to be honest with you. It was sugar if ik I don't know why marketers don't just go right for it and just say, Oh my god, so much sugar, you're gonna love this. It's no crack, but in food is what it should say, you know, but it's just all processed food. And which even makes it worse. Like the carbs are if you counted the carbs on those muffins, and just Bolus the carbs. I don't see how your blood sugar wouldn't be 500 Yeah, you know, so Oh, probably higher. Yeah, just a it's just insane. How how impactful that those that is? And, you know, definitely tells me Don't eat it. And I don't just mean if you have diabetes, I just mean in general, this is clearly this is clearly not okay. Yeah, once or twice a year and, and yeah, that's it and still be prepared to be a little dopey afterwards, you know, from all the insulin that your body is going to be really even if you don't have to type on just all the insulin your body's gonna be releasing, you're gonna be tired as hell. Chad, is there anything that we we didn't talk about that you wanted to? Um, I

Chad 1:06:25
don't think so. I think we covered a lot we've covered football. Men, menstruation cycles of teenage girls.

Scott Benner 1:06:35
Everything you thought you were going to talk about today now as a two year old little boy with male privilege. That's right. I'm gonna call this episode boys have feelings. What do you think of that? Boys have I like it?

Chad 1:06:48
My wife wants me to talk about more my my feeling she was saying the other day there was a children's cancer. Commercial on and you know, I start getting teary eyed and stuff. And she's told me I love when you cry. Yeah.

Scott Benner 1:07:05
I don't believe them. Chad, and I've just lumped together. Yeah, hold on a second. All right, we're down a rabbit hole here chat. I have always been a sensitive kid. Like as growing up, and I'm a sensitive adult. And you know, I'll cry it. Almost any movie adulation from a group in a film will make me cry every time like when they let Rudy play? Do you know what I'm talking about? Yeah, yeah, I just start crying. I'm like, Oh my god, we're gonna let him play. He works so hard. You're gonna let him in. It's gonna be something. You know, the high school puts a video up of, you know, the kid that helps with the team who's disabled and they let him run a touchdown back. I'm just crying. Like, just Just so you know, people come on the podcast and say the podcast helps them. I'm like, okay, it's good. Thanks. You know? So I've always been that person. I'm also not not masculine in other ways. But I don't think I don't think they mean it. I think not everybody. I'm not I shouldn't say they like I'm generalizing every woman on the planet. But in general, I just said I shouldn't generalize. And then I follow up with in general, but in general, I think you do want to see people open up a little bit. But there's, there's a line where I do think there's some hard wiring in you that's like, I that's the guy I need to, you know, kill the thing and drag it back to the house. Like he can't be crying all the time. I killed a deer. Like, you know, that's not what you're looking for. Yeah, you're looking for, hey, it's out front of the step. Let's cut the skin off at neath this thing. And and, you know, I don't I don't disagree. That being vulnerable is a bad thing in a interpersonal relationship. I think you should be. And I am. But I do think you pay attention masculine tax for it. Yeah, if that makes sense. I do think you lose some points somewhere else in the back of somebody's brain. And not all the time. Maybe. But once you turn into me and you're just like, you know, you ever see that horrible movie life as a house? You haven't because it's terrible. No, but it's, it's don't look it up real quick. Yeah, Rotten Tomatoes. You think it's got a lot of rotten something. It's about somebody who has cancer. I don't really remember the whole thing. All I can tell you is my wife wanted to see it. I was like, I don't want to go see this terrible movie. But I went with her because I'm a good guy. And we're in the theater, and the lights are coming up at the end and she looks at us like are you crying?

Unknown Speaker 1:09:36
I'm like, No.

Scott Benner 1:09:42
But yeah, I don't think that that then makes my wife look at me and go, I should probably take him out in the car and have sex with them. I think it makes you think. I hope if they come for us, he can protect us. But I don't think he can What is he starts talking about the, the, the war and how sad it is, like, in the middle of when I need him at the front door to shooting, you know, I don't know, like, I'm not disappointed with who I am. And I'm not sad that I that I'm willing to be like that. But I will be honest and say that I grew up with my mom, as a single mother telling me Oh, women are going to like that you're sensitive. But I think what she was really saying was, I wish your father was a little sensitive. Yeah. And I did find through dating, that I don't think that's what, at least the girls I was meeting, you know, more or more, more than less, we're looking for, like, I really think that they wanted more, whatever standard masculinity is. But I found my sweet spot here. They haven't kicked out, you know? Yeah, so I'm allowed to stay. I always tell the kids I'm like, Listen, when mom gets rid of me. I need you on my side a little bit. Like, what am I eventually it's gonna happen. There's no way she can put up with me forever. So I'm just saying. Like, what it happens. If you're older and you you're not in the house anymore. Just believe that I tried his hardest. Anyway, Chad, when do you think you're getting kicked out? You probably have time. Your kids are younger.

Chad 1:11:28
Yeah. Hopefully I'll make it to college. You know, Carson reaches college. Oh,

Scott Benner 1:11:34
you're gonna at least need to be there to make another baby that looks like Carson. Yeah, she's going to need you for that. And then she's gonna want you to help pay for school without arguing with you. Plus, she'll figure out in like four or five more years, and she doesn't have to have sex with if she doesn't want to anymore. So that takes away a lot of the burden. And but also the your niece that you said you have custody of is that your niece or her niece, her niece. So see, you're also you got that going for you? Yeah, you're doing that extra family thing. So yeah, that'll probably buy your five years. I think you can make it to like 2044. Wow, good for you, Chad. Do you not think every guy just wonders when it's over? Yeah. Well, they say divorce rates are going down. So he gets a financial thing. Like, why can't afford to leave? Yeah. I can't afford two Christmases. I don't like him. But I do like my car. And if I just drive in the car more, I won't be around him as much. This all makes sense. And I'm not I'm not saying because you're providing I'm saying that. I think most people have a two income situation. And yeah, so you're hearing divorce rates are going down?

Chad 1:12:55
Yeah, I've read it the other day. Now. Now it's kind of skewed. because not many people are getting married. So obviously they can't get divorced. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. Is one of those one liner like articles, you know, the headline article, and then you go and read to it. And, you know, but but the most successful marriages are the people that you know, go to college and kind of wait, before they get

Scott Benner 1:13:24
Oh, I tell my kids all the time, like you don't like 30 is probably the low number for where I would ask you to get married if I got to be in charge of it. Is it 2019 the US divorce rates fell to a 50 year low in 2019. Yeah, but you're telling me if I keep reading, what I'm going to learn is that marriage rates are also down so they're eligible for divorce. Yeah. Wow. It's a big drop. Yeah, look at that. 19 7085 your wife's gonna listen to this. He's like so what you ended up talking about is when we're going to get divorce This is 85% number of newly married people get per 1000 unmarried population at age 15. Plus the US marriage rate reaches all time low. It went from in the 70s. This numbers at 85.9 in the 80s. It was 68.8. By the time it gets to 2010 35.1. It's 33.2 and 2019. I don't really know what the numbers represent. Because I'm trying not to read while I'm talking to you, but it's a it's a harsh drop.

Unknown Speaker 1:14:31
Wow.

Scott Benner 1:14:33
Yeah. Next thing we should Google is have marriage. Oh, wait. Here it is. The US marriage rate just hit an all time low in 2019. Yeah, there's the rest of it was clickbait. Yeah, yes. You can't get divorced if you don't get married. Well, that's my common sense. I'm always telling people like Yo, if you don't get high, you can't get high. So just don't do it. Oh my gosh. Sorry, Chad, you're delightful. Thanks for coming on and doing this. I appreciate it. Thank you. Seriously, I'm I'm really thrilled that you're doing so well so early on and diagnosed and

Chad 1:15:12
a Scott that it's, it's all to you man like, you know, I think you know all I can think of is what my son's diagnosed at two he's gonna have you know the rest of his life with with crappy blood sugar numbers and stuff and you know my wife started listening to you and I listened to you especially your bold with insulin podcast and and you know that that changed our life and we you know well we'll change Carson's life, you know, he'll have a healthy normal, normal can be life because of you and your podcast. That's really

Scott Benner 1:15:50
nicely to say thank you tell him to grow up and learn how to be a quarterback so that in my declining years, I don't have to watch the garbage I watched last night. Honestly. Well do you know when you're watching a sporting event you think I honestly feel like I could have done better there and yet I know I can't. That's the horrible feeling. I have watching the Eagles now at this point. I'm like, I think I could block for a half a second. Yeah, yeah.

Chad 1:16:12
At least I could have done that was like a I think it was the Broncos over the weekend. They couldn't feel the single quarterback because Coronavirus and I read the stat line. So the guy they played quarterback and he was like one for nine for 15 yards. And I was like I

Scott Benner 1:16:28
could have done that. I definitely could have accomplished that. Well, I have to be honest with you. I thought the NFL completely dropped the ball this weekend because as soon as I heard that story, I wanted to watch the Denver Broncos football.

Chad 1:16:39
Yeah. So that Yeah, I turned it on came on right at four o'clock. I turned it on and just just I watched a couple possessions for the Broncos. And I was like, wow, this is this is really bad.

Scott Benner 1:16:49
Well, you're lucky because I couldn't even find it on television here. But I and I didn't want to watch him fail. Like I really thought this is fascinating. Like this, this an athletic person who has no business doing this thing being put in it at the most difficult level. Like I wonder how, like, I just thought it would be interesting to watch him try. You know, and you don't ever get that opportunity. Yeah, but I couldn't find the game anywhere. So I couldn't watch I did watch highlights. And the one thing I noticed was that the arm strength that are that a successful pro quarterback has is is insane compared to everybody else because this kid threw a nice ball. But when he tried to go down the field, he just did not have enough to get the ball there before the cornerback could react and step in front of the ball. And I thought well, if this cornerback is this good, but can't make a play like this in a normal football game, that means that the quarterbacks arms are just way more powerful than you think. So the next time you see a guy drop a ball on an NFL football game and you think just catch it. I guarantee if he threw it at you like that it would kill you. By fingers would fall your hands would just break and it would hit you in the face and that'd be the end of it. Yeah, maybe be a look these guys are. They're just insane athletes because this kid like I said, He's I saw him throw an out pattern, maybe 25 yards down the field. And it's a good ball. He was set up. Well, his mechanics were good. The ball traveled well. And the quarterback looked like he had time to have a sandwich before he stepped in front of it. And yeah, he'll never be a quarterback again in the NFL, but I think good for him and going out there and try that that's a I thought that was ballsy as hell or something. Anyway, all right, Chad, thanks so much. I am I appreciate you doing Hey, huge thanks to Chad for coming on the show and sharing so openly. And I want to remind you again about the T one D exchange. Past participants like you have helped to bring increased coverage for test trips, Medicare coverage for CGM, and changes to the ADA guidelines for pediatric a once eagles. And it's exciting to imagine what your participation could lead to next T one d exchange.org. forward slash juice box support type one research and support the Juicebox Podcast. And don't forget if you're looking for those diabetes pro tip episodes, they begin in Episode 210 in your podcast player or can be found at diabetes pro tip calm

#496 How We Eat: Keto

Mike is an adult living with type 1 diabetes.

+ Click for EPISODE TRANSCRIPT

Scott Benner 0:10
Hello friends and welcome to Episode 496 of the Juicebox Podcast six of the Juicebox Podcast. Hello, Hello, friends. Hello. Hello. Today's episode is with Mike. Mike's had Type One Diabetes for a long time. And he's here to talk about how we eat. Mike will actually be back on the show later in the year to talk about some of his complications that we didn't cover that here. It seemed like it needed its own place. But look out for Mike again in an upcoming afterdark episode. Please remember while you're listening that nothing you hear on the Juicebox Podcast should be considered advice, medical or otherwise, I wonder how long I could get my voice for real. Always cold. No, always consult a physician before making any changes to your health care plan. We're becoming bold with insulin that hurt my chest. I used up all the time where I usually tell you there's a bunch of other episodes about how people eat but you'll find them they're in there somewhere.

This episode of The Juicebox Podcast is sponsored by Omni pod makers of the Omni pod tubeless insulin pump, you may be eligible for a free 30 day trial of the Omni pod dash Holy moly. 30 days I know that's what you were thinking. Check it out at Omni pod comm forward slash juice box. And the show is also sponsored today by the Dexcom g six continuous glucose monitor dexcom.com forward slash juice box Get started today. do good things for yourself on the pod and Dexcom qualify as a good thing for yourself or for a loved one. You get my point. Okay, here comes the show.

Mike 2:11
My name is Mike. I live in San Diego, California and type one diabetic. And for those of you around the world, this is the good old USA.

Scott Benner 2:20
Alright, Mike, you and I know each other bizarrely In my opinion, just because of how I think of the world. So COVID hits. And I got caught up for a second in a hysteria that content providers all got caught up in the idea that somehow because people were going to now work from home, they were going to lose track of their of their people. And I think they they're like, Okay, well everybody's you know, using, you know, video chatting. We'll all do these video chats. People can say whatever they want. Mike, let me be cynical right out of the box. Okay, they can say if they want to, I just wanted to keep all my people connected and everything but they were already connected, like not going to work didn't disconnect them. I think people thought lives were going to change. And that these followers and I'm making quotes with my fingers, because I don't think of the people listening as followers. But I think that people believe they were going to lose their followers that their lives were going to change, they were going to forget about their favorite Facebook page, or charitable organization. So they tried to hold them all together. And then I fell right into it. I was like, I'll hold a zoom for everybody. And the funny thing is, is I liked it. I was like, Oh, this is nice, like get together a little bit. But we would have, I mean, sometimes 7080 people on that zoom, right? And so then I got competitive about it. Because there were other people holding them that had like four or 510 people and I was like I'm kicking their ass I should keep. But No, but seriously, like I had a really good time with it. But at some point, it wasn't sustainable. And people didn't need it anymore. Like I think after the fear of life just change really drastically, very quickly went away. I don't think I just I don't think people wanted it any longer. And And honestly, I felt like my time for everybody listening was better served making the podcast then, because it took a lot of time to do. But you were one of the people that came into it. Yeah, that's correct. Right. And that's where we met eventually.

Mike 4:25
Yeah, that's, that's where Matter of fact, it was. So I got turned on by the podcast several weeks before that. listening to it started applying your, your techniques of bumping and nudging and I was actually out on a walk. It was about 12 bags about 1130 California time, which was almost you were about halfway into your No, you weren't quite into it. You're almost into your first zoom chat which I heard on that pod. Okay, I'm like, trying to hurry back. So I could get in on the zoom. And I made it about halfway through. So that was our that was our first,

Scott Benner 5:08
right. And I know that we're talking about it, and I'm done being flippant about it, I really did like it. And I thought it was I thought it was great. What ended up happening was, unlike what I expected, I thought it was going to be like a conversation to make people feel connected. But it kind of quickly turned into, like, ask Scott and Jenny live except Jenny wasn't there. And people were just asking me a lot of questions, which I was happy to do, because you were seeing some people had the questions, but not the nerve to speak up. So if someone asked the question, everybody sort of got the benefit from it. And it's not that I wouldn't continue doing it. I do think it's nice, actually. But I don't know, like, I'll say I just I ran out. It got I was also thrown into COVID at the time, you know, so my life was kind of messed up, too. But I really didn't want to see, my concern wasn't like everyone else's. I don't think people are going to abandon this podcast. I think the podcast has a real solid following. My concern was not creating content in a moment when you needed something that represented normal to you. So I wanted there to keep being content. But then I was surprised by the whole thing. And I liked talking to everybody. It felt like I was giving a talk in public except I didn't have to get on a plane first. It was kind of nice, honestly.

Mike 6:32
Yeah, I think it was a it was a nice tie into it. Like you said at that time, COVID hit and everybody was freaking and panicking. So it was you know, we're at home, we're not out seeing our friends and our normal comrades who are listening to the podcast, and then to be able to kind of have that you did a few zoom kind of connection of, Okay, we're there together, which kind of

Scott Benner 6:53
comes every one of those makes, I have to be honest, I've gotten a number of notes during Corona. By the way, COVID Corona, I bounced back and forth, you think I'd pick one. But during during COVID I got a number of notes. And that was really what it was about from people like thank you for being consistent with the show. That was a real like strong threw in a lot of the messages. So anyway, I don't know if we were planning to have you on. Before we start I started talking to people about how they eat or not. But I do want to learn a little bit about you before we find out about how you eat. Just so how old were you when you were diagnosed? How old are you now

Mike 7:34
so yeah, so I was between I was actually miss diagnosed at first. I was around nine I was mis diagnosed from a general practitioner having an ulcer. I was getting my symptoms were getting those double over stomach cramps I guess I had the flu or something. And from my understanding that could trigger your body attacking this pancreas which was that's what was happening. Right? So Miss diagnosed with an ulcer, the doctor and the general practitioner diagnosed my mother with being too hard on me so sent her to a psychiatrist, which was furthest from the truth. So my poor mother long story short, they're treating me for a, an ulcer, and I'm just whether in a way, and they finally had taken me to the hospital. So it was right around 10 Wow. And then I was finally correctly diagnosed. Okay,

Scott Benner 8:29
we have to I know that you were young and it was not you're not. You're not an old man, but you're not a young man. And so I'm saying I know it wasn't five minutes ago but but do you have a little context for that? So they thought your mother was like, overbearing

Mike 8:46
about your health? Yeah, just life in general. Just you know, being a kid so the kid is you know, why would a eight 910 year old have an ulcer unless your mother was stressing you out? Oh, that was Yeah, so because I was having such bad stomach cramps bouts of it. When I guess my body was attacking the pancreas. We went to our general practitioner, he said, well, that bad of a stomach cramp. He's got to have an ulcer. So you have to be hard on the boy.

Scott Benner 9:14
What year was this like?

Mike 9:16
7074 75 right in that range? Okay. Because I remember around 76 when the Freedom Train came that's about when I was properly diagnosed. So yeah, so for a year so so I did the bare lilium test and all that stuff. And I remember that I remember that. The X ray technician was there doing the bare lilium whatever they call it stuff to see where the ulcer was. And I'm drinking the stuff of course my sugars are probably all out of whack from actually being a type one and diagnosed I met I just vomited all over the cutest technician. Remember the look on her face just saw this pink stuff. So that was that was my one of my memories of that but yeah, so my mother was dead. Not hard on us. She was an excellent mother. very loving, caring. But

Scott Benner 10:04
What a strange leap in. Like, how come they didn't think you were upset about, you know, the Nixon scandal?

Mike 10:12
Actually, I could have been, but I didn't follow politics at that time. You never know. I could have been a secret politician. But yeah, no, that wasn't wasn't the case. And it's kind of funny. We're not funny, but just pictures of around that time, you know, skin bones, all the symptoms, right? But

Scott Benner 10:30
nobody put it together from being pressured by somebody is what they thought. Wow. Yeah. Yeah. Well, it's come a long way in a short time. Hmm. I know. It's hard to it's hard to feel that way in the moment. But for anyone, it's really like putting the numbers together here in the early 70s. Mike's mother was sent to a psychologist for how terrible she was to Mike because his stomach hurt. Yeah, that sexism in case you're wondering? Completely? Yeah, yeah. Wow, that's really crazy. Okay, so they originally they eventually find out that you don't have an ulcer? What's management, like in the early 70s?

Mike 11:07
Oh, my gosh. So in the early 70s, well, there was beef and pork, insulin, so you would take the beef until you were kind of, you know, resistant to that. And then you'd take the pork until you were not resistant to that there was no meters. No, there was no really way to test, they kind of you weren't falling over, you were doing good was kind of their rule of thumb. They had exchange rates, which, you know, you know, to starches, or that tend to call it to breads, fat, or protein. And you'd kind of try to do that and go on which throw that right out the window, you take a shot at that time was on one shot a day of a mixture of, you know, obviously the regular beef or pork and then long acting. And you just took that and went about your day. Nobody knew what you were, I was probably, I've probably always fight around 500 I had to bend because I never fell over.

Scott Benner 12:08
Like it really is when you stop and think about it. Like I'm assuming you'd eat something if you were dizzy. And then other than that, you didn't think about it.

Mike 12:15
Yeah, that was that that was it. And then you'd go to the doctor every three or six months, whatever it was, at that time, I really don't remember. And they would obviously do the a one to a one c test and scold your parents because you were probably too high. But that's how do you how do you bring it down? You know,

Scott Benner 12:31
in modern thinking, what that really makes me think about is just helping somebody the other day, I was teaching them how to correct a lower blood sugar without over correcting it. And I made this offhand comment. I was like, hey, look, it's so close right now. If your child has a chewy vitamin, like a gummy vitamin that you use, now would be a great time to give it and she's like, Yeah, he does that they only have four carbs on that. That's perfect. Give him four carbs. So Kate gets the vitamin. Of course she gets nervous because this she's just starting to learn how to do it and gives him a few Skittles. And then the kids blood sugar's 200. And keeping in mind that that's how it all works. Like imagine just Hey, I'm busy. I'll eat you weren't you weren't having to scuttle you were eating you were having a meal right if you got

Mike 13:21
oh yeah that time so the rays and boxes about the size of a cigarette pack. You measure how many carbs that thing had in it

Scott Benner 13:29
so that when you

Mike 13:31
eat one of those you drink plus that maybe the orange juice and so you were probably from you know 40 to 500 again overcorrection

Scott Benner 13:44
and when did meters come into your life?

Mike 13:47
So Gosh, I got my first meter and 1987 15

Scott Benner 13:54
or so years later

Mike 13:58
yeah krim 76 or whatever it was 287 So yeah, that's when I got my first meter there was your mid 20s really nothing before that really no control no

Scott Benner 14:12
and and I'm thinking that not being able to see your blood sugar in any kind of time forget like real time like nowadays if you have a glucose monitor if you're lucky to have one of those you you probably had no you probably that was probably starting over right getting a meter because

Mike 14:27
that was that was completely starting over so prior to that you just you took whatever insulin the doctor kind of prescribe you the morning and the evening and pretty much ate whatever you want to use.

Scott Benner 14:40
All right, When did you become a modern type one like When did you get a pump? When did you move to quicker acting insulin all that stuff?

Mike 14:50
Yeah, so prior to 87 when the the newer insulin came out the newer version pork and beef, I was switched to that, but never any control. And I was just living my life I was actually in Florida at the time. And in Fort Lauderdale. And so you know, eat and do whatever you want, I was overweight, out of shape out of control, my doctor was kind of like, because I had to have a prescription for insulin, you could buy the syringes over the counter. And so at that point, my doctor was ready to fire me as a diabetic and kind of said that nobody's gonna take care of you in South Florida less you go see this person and say that you're taking control. That's kind of when I became a modern diabetic, okay. And 8787, so to speak, and then got in shape, lost a bunch of weight on set, I was way overweight, and nakshi 91. I was my doctor's first patient on insulin pump at that time

Scott Benner 15:55
in 1991, four years, after four years after the doctor, I'm assuming told you look, you're close to being a lost cause in the system.

Mike 16:03
Yeah, pretty much. Okay. Well, you got to remember back in the 60s, the doctors estimated you had approximately 10 year lifespan. In the 70s. And I remember this vividly the doctor looking at me and saying, you'll never live in old folks home. So, you know, that was kind of a maybe a 30 year span. So in my mind, take into consideration it's got in my mind from a kid, I was never gonna live past 30. So why do anything different, right? Don't buy doctor and he said, you know, dude, you're, you're going down.

Scott Benner 16:38
So there's a shift in technology enough so that people didn't any longer believe that you were going to die. By the time you were 30. Except for you who had gone so hard after the idea that it was like maybe you Well, I find a lot of my my friends, you know, kind of my ages that were diabetic at that time. And I don't know why the age 30 wasn't a milestone or an argument of age, but pretty much everybody thought 30 was it. And then 30 came on like, I'm still here. I gotta wait to lose.

Mike 17:14
Technology definitely came along. And obviously, as I don't ever want to say it's a good time to be diagnosed type one. But nowadays, it's a pretty good error to be diagnosed with type one.

Scott Benner 17:26
It's better than it's better than the day before. Always. I feel like we think now the best time and one day you look back on this time and think Oh, I can't believe that's what we used to do. You know? If you're lucky if you're lucky, you get to think that Yeah, and by that I mean if we're lucky the technology will continue to improve and become more affordable so that people can look back at this moment think how barbaric a continuous glucose monitor ended insulin pump, you know, or whatever will happen. Interesting. How did you lose the weight? And because I because as I know you I'm sorry to cut you off. But as I know you you just seem like an older fit gentlemen to me.

Mike 18:03
Like that. Thank you. Yeah, yeah, so and obviously in 87 we got my first meter in the hospital for a week learn how to be in control. Doctors like you got to lose weight. And at that time, there wasn't a lot of type ones being very active and I'm, I'm either don't do it or get way involved in it. So I was an auto mechanic at the time of my parts manager was racing bicycles amateur. So he's like, man, once you get a bike and come along and and, you know, lose some weight because I couldn't jog anymore. I ran cross country and track in high school but I'd been in a bad car accident my knees wouldn't take it. So cycling seemed like the thing to be bought a bike and I lost 45 pounds my first month and got heavily into amateur bicycle racing.

Scott Benner 18:54
Well, you lost 45 pounds in a month riding a bicycle would you ride it to

Mike 19:00
Fort Lauderdale area day one a up and down and ended up doing about 1000 miles my first month. Wow. My first I remember my first ride out I could barely do seven miles without pulling over every mile and Oh, geez. And stretching and, and cramping and, and but yeah. So that's that's how I did that. And then just fell in love with cycling.

Scott Benner 19:24
See, I'm writing down a note here. You can't see what I'm writing, but it's by a bike. Because Jeez, that's amazing. Wow, good for you. That's right. It's not that good for him to invite you along and try to help. You don't mean like be a friend in that situation. Yeah, it was.

Mike 19:43
It was an interesting time. Again, it wasn't a lot of type ones at being that active. So I was my doctor is only that active of a diabetic. And he kept saying my BMI was you know, too low. You need to you need to gain weight and I mean To 20 503,000 calories a day, burn it off, and I had like, no body fat. So and then from there with the injections, I was on multiple injections obviously at that time, and I just couldn't get up in here that I was getting up at, like 2am, injecting going back to sleep, getting up at three eating, going back to sleep. And at 530, I get up and depending on my blood sugar, I could either go work out with the advanced groups. This is when I got more heavily into cycling, I could then go work out the advanced group I had to back off because of my blood sugar. So the pump seemed like the thing to do at that time. Yeah, it took me six months to convince them that a pump was a good idea.

Scott Benner 20:44
So you have an all or nothing like personality, then yeah, right. Yeah, I'm not burnout. I just heard a mike tyson recently say that he didn't want to even work out. Because he didn't want to reignite his ego about competition. And I sort of didn't understand what he meant. And then he went on to say, his wife told him he looked heavy. So he got on a treadmill. And then he went 15 minutes, and then he wanted to go 20, then you want to go an hour, they want to go three hours, because he's just very competitive. And he was doing it. So if he was going to do it, he was going to do it all the way. And now I'm hearing he's gonna fight Roy Jones Jr. in an exhibition match. So it's, you know, it was either I'm going to get fat, and that's it. Or if I start moving, I gotta go punch somebody because I'm a box. Yeah. Very runner up or down. Yeah. Um, so how much of that impacts how you handle other things. I'm wondering, I'm assuming a lot. And you're on here today. Mainly to tell us about how you eat so what's your eating style.

Mike 21:49
Now my eating style, I was eating any and everything. I do the cooking in the house, I like to cook. I teach barbecue. So I was eating any and everything. And with your methods, got my agency down. And recently a few months ago switch to keto. just seemed like the thing to do not having the impact of the you know, the heavy glycemic and out index just for me personally, it seemed to work out pretty good. So um, but I do about 29 carbs a day. And then high protein, high fat is what I'm doing.

Scott Benner 22:31
How long have you been at that? Hey, why don't you set your summer free with the Omni pod dash, you can enjoy your beach and pool days without having to disconnect your tubing or stopping your insulin. You can wear whatever you want, without having to worry about where to clip your pump, or how to carry your pen. There's no better time than the summer to try the Omni pod. Whether you've always wanted to try an insulin pump, or simply want to cut out your tubing for the summer. You can try the on the pod dash now for free for 30 days. Are you hearing through what I'm saying there? If you're using another pump, but you wish you had on the pod dash for the summertime, you can try out the free. You get it you're paying attention right? Go find out if you're eligible on the pod.com forward slash juice box. Maybe that on the pod dash trial for 30 days, we'll be right for you. And since you can now get your only pod through a pharmacy, there's no commitment or long term contracts. like there might be with other tube pumps. I feel like I'm telling you to cheat on your insulin pump. It feels weird. Okay, so if you want to learn more, if you want to find out the full terms and conditions of what I've just talked about, all you have to do is go to Omni pod comm forward slash juice box. Now let's talk about the Dexcom. CGM. Dexcom gs six continuous glucose monitor is the weapon of choice against diabetes. In my opinion, being able to see the speed and direction of your blood sugar or a loved one's blood sugar makes all of the difference in the world. No more guessing what your blood sugar is what it's going to be what this food does what that food does. No more like I'll just count my carbs and put in my insulin and then wait three hours and I'll test again if I'm Heil. Correct. And if I'm low, I'll eat some juice or something. No more. Now you can just see everything happen. You can. You're like, I know I'm old. But you know the matrix where, you know, Neo, you guys might know as john wick, he slows down time. And the bullets like stop at midair like Imagine being able to slow diabetes down so you can see it happening. So you can just step out of the way of a potential problem. Hmm, that's how I use it. My daughter's a one C has been between five, two and six, two for seven years now. I believe I've lost track. Our results are ours, of course, and yours may vary. But understanding what your blood sugar's doing is the first step to doing better dexcom.com forward slash juice box. I forgot to tell you about all the other stuff. It's got alarms and alerts and you can share your data with other people. But you'll figure it out the website dexcom.com. forward slash juice box on the pod.com forward slash juice box. Hey, what the heck Juicebox Podcast calm, get a little plug for myself. There's a little more music left. How about this? The diabetes pro tip episodes are available starting at Episode 210 in your podcast player, but you can also find them at diabetes pro tip.com. Alright, let's get back to Mike we'll find out how long he's been doing this and much more. I'm about May, since May. Okay, so you're coming up on six months? Maybe? Tell me when you make a decision to try something like that. How do you figure out how to do it even?

Mike 26:13
Oh, well. I did a lot of research first. Check with all my doctors. And I'm also working with Ginni with integrate diabetes, been a good help a lot of positive input. And just researching it figured out what's going to work and why. So that's kind of how I got into it.

Scott Benner 26:39
You know, you check with your doctor and say, Look, I'm going to eat like a high protein high fat diet. Is that okay with you like or at least be aware of it? I guess. So. You know, I look for I say,

Mike 26:50
yeah, so I was on obviously, high cholesterol, this that the other vaccine off my cholesterol medicine now. I get most of my carbs from like, for instance, broccolis beans, you know, low glycemic vegetables like that.

Scott Benner 27:06
So you had high cholesterol, so much so that you were on a medication for it? And now that you're eating keto, you don't need that medication anymore. Correct? Gotcha.

Mike 27:14
Yeah, it's interesting to get it, I could get into more of that if you want. But don't tell me about it, please.

Scott Benner 27:19
Because what it made me think about was when I when I, when I speak to somebody, and they're like, you know, we're getting low all the time. And I look at their graph, and I'm like, well, you need more basil. And they think that's not right, I said I was getting low, I must need less insulin. And so the, the, the thing they're seeing this low blood sugar makes them feel like, Oh, I definitely need less insulin, except they don't recognize that because their basil is far too low. There are over bolusing their meals, the meals are getting out of balance with the insulin, and they're causing this crash later. It's just very causal effect. And, and that made me think of that, like, you know, if I saw that my cholesterol was high, I might think to myself, well, I definitely have to eat less fat, right? Well, no, not necessarily. But that's what I would think. Yeah. So tell me about it.

Mike 28:09
Sure. Well, first of all, your theory of donco high, and you won't go low. And by and I was eating massive carbs. And I figured it out. But you know, I'm doing 1214 unit for lunch type of a Bolus. I'm thinking now that sense. And then you read about what is inflammatory in your arteries, and this and that it is the artificial, the bleached flowers, it's the artificial, anything low fat, low, you know, that type of stuff, they have to add stuff in there to make it taste good. So all that stuff is inflammatory to your. And again, I'm not a doctor, I don't play one on TV, I just want to preface that. But all the what goes into your veins is the inflammation is what's inflammatory, which causes the arterial disease. So if you're eating let's for instance, I do grass fed beef, free range chickens. I do the best pork I can find. I'm not doing heritage pork yet. But natural beef fat, your body was meant to process natural chicken fats, pork fat, if you're eating like margarines, and stuff like that, that has all the artificial stuff that's inflammatory. So if you take in the inflammatory stuff away from your diet, you you're, you lower your risk for the cardiovascular disease. And I look at the French they, you know, real butters, heavy creams, all the natural stuff, which was what your body was meant to process. It's like a grain fed cow. The molecular structure of the cow, the meat is changed and our body's not meant to process that so if you get a grass fed cow, our body's meant to process that same thing with you know, natural vegetables not you know, genetically modified vegetables. our body's meant to process that so and I can feel the difference. I'm just after, you know, several weeks of eating that way. And I don't know who you are, but there's nothing better than eggs fried bacon grease.

Scott Benner 30:13
You know, I'm sorry, you made me think of something my dad used to do. But

Mike 30:17
yeah, you know, and so, you know, using your methods and for Bolus and bumping and nudging and eating a better meal is, you know, I reached my goal and a one C. And if you look at my, my chart, my glide for the most part, yeah, I still have highs and still have a few lows. But it looks like a flatline. You know, most guys dead, which,

Scott Benner 30:41
what is your anyone say, at the moment,

Mike 30:44
my last day when C was 5.7. And I was head trending that way, just through looking at Dexcom. And those but I'm usually pretty close, I finally got my one taken several weeks ago, and it was it was 5.7 was my goal for you, to me, and I was proud of that. I was seven, two to nine. And my doctor was like, Great go to God, you know.

Scott Benner 31:06
So you're saying two to nine prior to finding the podcast? Yeah. And then consistently, and then you get to where would the podcast

Mike 31:14
with your podcast? I got down my best on my graph was five, seven, but I was averaging five, nine, okay, to 659 to 659 to six.

Scott Benner 31:23
And then the condo moved you more or not? Correct?

Mike 31:26
It did maybe down to five, seven? Pretty, pretty stable family.

Scott Benner 31:30
Excellent. Yeah. And you feel I think more importantly,

Mike 31:34
yeah, I feel a lot better. Um, you know, I've got a lot of nerve damage from prior just, you know, you figure all those years as a kid, no meters know this, that the other, but definitely feel better. I have hypoglycemic and awareness. So I'm trying to stay around the 100, not the 70 to 80. I say, till I get my, my next service dog back, and then I'll feel more comfortable staying down and then I'm shooting for, you know, below five.

Scott Benner 32:01
So that was my point. That's the point where I was disconnected for a second because if you have such a stable line, I was wondering why not that by the way, none of this is a judgement. I was just thinking like, if you were that good with the insulin and eating keto, I would think you could be closer to a five, then closer to a six. So I thought there must be a reason why you were doing that. And yeah, that's a very good reason.

Mike 32:22
Yeah, I've passed. Well, past several years, the wheels have fallen off the bus here but developed hypoglycemic and awareness. And so I got a service dog. And he was awesome would wake you up at night. You know, they're not robots, but they they can't do work for their train properly. So I was more comfortable. You know, being lower at that table. I was still in the sevens at that time, because that's what the doctor said. Yeah, you got a great, fine. Yeah, that 300 no problem, but it's just an excursion. Yeah, right. But anyways, so had the dog he had to have his kidney replaced. So he got replaced, and they're training another one now. So what once I know the dog will wake me up at night. I'm more comfortable being at a lower range.

Scott Benner 33:05
Gotcha. Hey, your dogs, like in a convalescent center somewhere.

Mike 33:09
Now he got retired. He's living in a two acre fenced in yard. Up in Riverside, I think it is. So he had to be adopted out because the medication he was on. He was not alerting properly. He had a reflex this energy, which is a bladder issue, which was caused anyways. So because he wouldn't alert properly because of the medication, he would sleep through the night sometimes. So I see had to be easily he had to be replaced. So he got retired. He's running around. He's happy for him.

Scott Benner 33:39
That's good for you, too. And how long will it take them to train a new dog?

Mike 33:43
They're training one right now. I've met in fact, they trained I had another one that wasn't trained for me but didn't work out. And where I work, he was just too afraid of the environment. Okay, so the training one now it should be anywhere from six months to a year. Wow. That's a nice time I set my clock to wake up every few hours and make sure that I'm in a good zone at night.

Scott Benner 34:04
And mostly you are. Yeah, yeah, for the most part. Gotcha. hypoglycemic unawareness is we never really talked about it. But since you're here, you you could be 20 and not know it right? You don't know until you're unconscious. Yep. Wow. No dizziness, no confusion. You're not talking oddly. Just not the you know, I'm I guess.

Mike 34:26
My wife says occasionally, she'll notice something. Hey, let's go test you. You know, because sometimes the CGM like backseat of the roller coaster, you know, it takes a few minutes to catch up. So I'm in that dip and don't don't know it. It's just yeah. happens. He's talking to you in 30. And Hi.

Scott Benner 34:45
Did you did you drag your wife into keto? Is she doing it with you?

Mike 34:48
Yeah, so she's doing since I'm cooking the house. She eats whatever and

Scott Benner 34:53
she has no real choice actually. Now

Mike 34:56
so she she's also doing keto. She does. She runs marathons. And she's actually noticed she has more energy with keto than not.

Scott Benner 35:07
Well, listen, I'm certainly no expert on any of this, which is why I'm trying to talk to so many different people. My experience in my life would be that when I was in my 20s, I gained a lot of weight. And we did the Atkins diet, which I think basically is, you know, very, very low carb. And I lost a lot of weight fairly quickly doing that. And I have to echo your sentiment that I felt, I mean, obviously, I lost weight. So I'd feel better about that in general. But I do believe that there's something about processing grain and flour and all that stuff that your body really just some people's bodies just struggle with. And, you know, so I am not at the point where I would, I don't mean restrictive in the way that you might take it, but I'm not at the point where I could do something that's as restrictive as keto, but I am really specific about what I eat, I guess, like I really try hard to stay away from most of the things you're talking about. In my day to day eating my day to day eating is very kind of natural. And I agree with you a little things like I'd rather use butter than margarine. You know, I tried for them not to be preserved as in things extra ingredients. I don't know what they are, I stay away from a lot of oils and processed food. But then at the same time, like the kids asked the other day, they're like, Can you make sugar cookies for us? And I was like, of course I can. So I whipped up some sugar cookies and now I'm not sure if I made them for them or me. But you know, so that's it really for me.

Mike 36:46
You can still eat the cookies. I don't find it hard personally hard to maintain, you know, keto, you know we don't i don't like go out to restaurants anyways and obviously we're don't go out because of COVID right now or Corona however you like you said you want to call it but I don't find it hard to to maintain because I was never a sweets person anyway, so you know desserts and cookies were never a thing even as a kid before type one. I just don't find it hard to there's so many recipes now and the early. I'm not saying anything against the early Atkins or whatever. But that was more of kind of a dirty keto for my understanding how well it was Mark, you know, eat all the greasy cheeseburgers and bacon and just all that versus you need to add some like the broccoli you need to have some carbohydrates so you get some of the more nert nutrients, the macros. And there's dirty keto now which there's dirty keto clean keto. I've tried to do it where I am doing a cleaner keto and, you know, again, we didn't have the cookies in the crap but that was a Dorito Holic or chip a Holic if you want to be generic popcorn a Holic just don't eat that stuff anymore. Because all the other ingredients that go with it.

Scott Benner 38:04
Yeah, so there's me I don't I if something comes in a bag, I don't eat. Like that just seems to be my role. I there's I've chosen aisles in the grocery store. That just, I don't go in anymore. I'm like, I just don't i don't go in that. That is not for me. Now the problem is, it's interesting for you is how old are you right now? 54. Okay, so you're 54 you're married? There's no children in the house right.

Mike 38:28
Now. Other than me, my wife would say no, yeah,

Scott Benner 38:32
I understand that. But like, I'm 49. Actually, I think I'm 49. The other day, I was confused about how old I am. I'm not quite, but I really don't know how I guess we can figure it out. But I'm not gonna bother there. I'm right around that space. And but I still have two kids in the house often on two kids, one kid for sure. My wife who's not interested in eating a specific way you're not away. And so I am a little in the middle of balancing everyone's desires around food, which is interesting. But I noticed for myself as I get older, food becomes more and more the way I wanted it to be when I was younger, like in my heart. If we could just if the Jetsons pill will just pop out on the table. And I can eat it and stay healthy and alive. I love cooking. But I think I would opt for that more often than not because I'm a slippery slope eater. For sure. Like I don't eat more Soylent Green. I don't know. Maybe I'm alright with that. Because I'm not like, I'm not like, oh, sugar cookie. I'll have one of those. I'm like, oh, sugar cookie, I just won't eat today. And I'll have five sugar cookies today. Instead, like I'll make sugar cookies my whole day. And I don't meaningfully understand that about myself. But I can't eat chips. Doritos, like that stuff. I would be like sick and biking. I can make popcorn and like have a handful of it. But then I'm done. Like I couldn't eat a bowl of it. It's if it's the salt and butter. If it's gonna get me Yeah, if that makes no sense and sugar I guess to in there, but otherwise I put sugar in nothing. And I am one of those people that if everyone around me stopped eating that way, I don't think I ever would again. But that it's here it gets me. It's

Mike 40:15
that's why we couldn't keep some of this stuff in the house. Like I couldn't keep chips in the house because if I knew it was there, you know, you have one I need the whole bag. of popcorn. I'd get up at three in the morning. It's like popcorn is like crack cocaine for me. Anyway, all the people out there that know me, you'll know who I am. I just I have no control over power. Yeah,

Scott Benner 40:34
yeah. No. Is it the sometimes I think it's the texture more than the food. I don't know if that makes sense. Or not like I like the way cookies feel on my mouth. I don't like the way string beans feel in my mouth. I don't know what psychological issue I have around that. But I am tactile to begin with. Like when I go shopping. I end like in a clothing store. I touch everything. Yeah, like I want to touch the like I it's part of my ability to like understand that there are things I don't like the way they feel in my mouth. And you know, I don't know another way to put that but but so to the Quito what are some examples of Fuji now You and I have something in common? A you obviously were doing it much longer than I was. But at the beginning of COVID I decided I was going to learn how to smoke meat. And I started right around the time COVID started it was hard to get a hold of a grill to be perfectly honest around it's hard to buy anything right now, actually, but I got it and I've spent the last like five or six months. Like I can make ribs now terrifically, even little things like I like to have turkey in the house to slice up. So instead of buying like lunch meat, I'll go buy turkey breasts and just smoke them. And then and I slice at them as I need them. That that I've really enjoyed actually learning how to do all that. I've learned how to make pizza on the grill from like scratch, like from like scratch scratch. But you helped me in the beginning because I didn't know I didn't know a lot about it. I ended up asking you a lot of questions. But yeah, is that where most of your food comes from?

Mike 42:10
Well, yeah, a lot of it does. Because anything you could do in the oven you could do in the smoker, you know the they go from depending on your brand, a smoker, they'll go from, you know 150 to 600. So when you get the higher temperatures, it's like that woodfired pizza oven flavors. Obviously I don't do pizzas anymore. I used to do a same thing. Make my own dough ton of pizza as we do a lot of couches prior but now doing keto I smoke got a great recipe for smoked meatball so well one of the one of the dishes is some boiled or not boiled but pan fried kind of get moist out tomatoes, some spinach, some cheeses and the smoked meatballs instead of cooking the meatballs in the oven. I smoked them and they're just they're awesome smoke a lot of my vegetables that we eat you know do admit In fact, yesterday I did the barbecue started teach with just started to import or not importing but they started selling Australian wagyu and that is just a bomb. So I did a wagyu tried tip yesterday for dinner. That was amazing. Couple days prior to that pulled pork do a lot of ribs. Hamburgers on the on the smoker. Do you ever do more

Scott Benner 43:31
exotic animals like elk or venison or stuff like that? Do you get involved in that at all?

Mike 43:37
I've gotten a little bit one of my co workers is a big Hunter. And he'll bring stuff in and he'll give me a package of whatever and he'll say let's I'll be out for lunch tomorrow at whatever time so I got a smoker at work too. So

Scott Benner 43:55
it is something you walk away from for a long periods of time. So you can't get a lot of other things done while it's happening. It's just a little bit of pre planning is how I find Yeah, you know, what we do?

Mike 44:03
We do low and slow and hot and fast. Depends on what you're cooking. So that's good. I like it. That tried tip last night took me an hour and a half. Yeah, I did that at 380.

Scott Benner 44:16
Well, does everybody and everybody doesn't need this kind of time to eat keto, right, like there's ways to do it. No,

Mike 44:22
no, no, no, you can. You can whip stuff up fast. Like I said, that's kind of the most people eat 1520 different items. That's kind of what seems to be the average people's diet. So we repeat a lot of our meals throughout the week, be it salmon be at the meatballs with the spinach and tomatoes, be it you know, the spaghetti you know the zucchini spaghetti so a lot of the dishes we do was kind of the same thing and I've always been a 20 minute or under kind of meal guy for the average. So something you could come home and make quick But good and healthy. So I find that a keto it's easy. There's a lot of different apps you can get. One of the specific ones I has will will suggest menus, you put in your, your, your body weight, your your birth, your height, what you want to do you want to maintain lose gain, and it'll suggest meals and recipes for you. So it's, it's, it's as hard as you want or as easy as you want. And that's an that's an any diet, be it high carb, low carb. Yeah, paleo.

Scott Benner 45:31
It's funny, as you're talking, I realized that everything is everything's branded in the world today. Like you could sit here and you're like high carb, low carb, keto, paleo, vegan, vegetarian pescatarian. Like, you know, everyone's branded their way of eating. But in the end, you're eating more meat with vegetables, and no grains. It's like, yeah, that's kind and no, you don't eat processed food. That's pretty much, right.

Mike 45:56
Yeah, no, I eliminated all processed foods. Matter of fact, we went through all our cabinets, and we came up with like, three boxes of stuff that we donated to the church of everything that we just don't eat anymore. All the processed the carbs, the pastas, you know, all that stuff. Yeah,

Scott Benner 46:14
I found myself I got away from my idea earlier. But I wanted to finish by saying that I find that as I get older, I don't see eating as entertainment anymore. Maybe. But as the way I did when I was younger, I don't know why that is. I mean, it's not it's not wisdom, certainly, cuz you could bring a couple of those cookies in here, right now, I'd be like, I'm gonna eat those. And I wouldn't even I wouldn't even need to want them. But when. But when I'm very careful about my, I guess I do eat on an intermittent schedule. And when I'm specific about that, you know, say you started, start off not eating that way. And then I moved into an intermittent fasting schedule. So I went from like, 11am to 7pm. And I would just eat in that space. And for the first month, I was like, I'm just gonna test the idea of intermittent, I'm not going to limit me, I'm just gonna eat the way I always eat right in here. And I lost like, 15 pounds doing that, and generally did feel better. At some point, I found myself in the middle of the baseball season for my son getting home a little later. And I was like, Well, I didn't eat dinner yet. And it's 730 I'll just eat. And then I wouldn't get done eating till 815. And then that was that was the slippery slope, right? Like, then you're just sort of like, Oh, well, it's, you know, 1030 I'm hungry. It's sad. elevens almost coming and that, but it's very specific about that schedule, and how your body deals with having food or not having food with, you know, insulin levels and energy and a lot of other things. And as soon as you get outside of those hours, I could eat anything inside of those hours and lose weight. But as soon as I opened those hours up a little more, I put the weight back on again. It started to come back. It was it really, really interesting. I don't know, I don't think there's a right answer for anybody. I think that what works works and you know, if you're listening, if you're listening to you and going look, Mike, alright, but I wanted some bread, you know, like, you still could not eat a bag of Doritos. You know what I mean? Like, there's reasonable

Mike 48:14
I don't crave this stuff anymore. I don't crave because I used to eat out fast food. It was just easy. burger fries. Come home. I made all my own breads, all this stuff. And you know, you need a loaf of bread in two days. Because it was good. Yeah. But because you're not having those spikes and insulin and spikes and you know, all that sugar and salt and things that come with that. I I don't crave anything anymore. It's just an I used to like, see a fast food commercial that literally my wife and I really had to go get the keys, get in the car, go get whatever they were advertising. Pavlov's dog. Yeah, it really was. And I did. And since and I crave that. So I thought I craved it for a longest time that I had a cheat meal. We have local fast food. Mostly Southern California, Texas, had these little mini tacos, and I just used to love those are tiny tacos. And so I finally went in one day, I'd been a couple months into keto and I had it for lunch and I shot up to 300 I felt like crap. And I'm like, never again and I I just don't crave that stuff Good for you.

Scott Benner 49:18
Well, I think in the end, you're not saying anything crazy. You're saying there are natural things that were on the earth long before someone figured out what high fructose corn syrup is. And people ate those things for a long time. So our bodies have developed and grown to be good at that stuff. And you know what, by the way, I have no idea. I'm not a scientist, nor am I a person who can see the future. But there's part of me that thinks that one day we all might just weigh 500 pounds and be really good at digesting high fructose corn syrup. I don't know that. That's not that that can't happen. But I can I can definitely say I don't want that to happen to me. So I'm with you. Not as Are you lose me as vegetables? I just I really dislike vegetables. It's probably my parents fault because they used to yell at me about eating them and I think they really made me hate them like I feel a defiance about them

Mike 50:12
depends on the vegetables and again, we don't eat tons of them but and it's like the green stuff the the Rockies the cauliflower is not green, unless it shouldn't be green. But if and I hated brussels sprouts and asparagus until he cooked them on the smoker Konya smoker on about like 300 little either olive oil and whatever barbecue rub you want. Throw them on the smoker for a little bit. I love asparagus and brussel sprouts now. Really? Yeah. All right, Mike.

Scott Benner 50:41
Well, I'll tell you what, you send me the you send me a recipe for brussel sprouts and asparagus on a smoker. I will try it and I'll include it in this episode. Because I will if you can make me a Brussel sprout you're a magician.

Mike 50:57
Dude, I seriously man, I tried them over the years because your taste change? I think Well, let me try it. Let me try it right up until several months ago, you could not pay me to eat brussel sprouts or asparagus. Okay, now it's like part of one of our staples. Yeah.

Scott Benner 51:10
Well that I would love to know about that. Because I don't think I have I cook them for my family. So like everybody else here eats asparagus and brussel sprouts as two examples. Like I make a lot of vegetables, I just make them and then I don't touch them afterwards. Which is also makes it by the way harder as the cook to make because I don't really know what I'm shooting for and texture and things like that, you know?

Mike 51:32
Well, that's that's another neat thing with like flash flash and like Tomcat flash frozen vegetables. So if you get like those steamer bags of broccoli, that you throw in the microwave for 10 minutes, that's probably better than buying the fresh stuff at the grocery store and either over steaming it. It's simple, it's easy, you divided it up, put your favorite barbecue rub on it, and it makes it even better. And a little bit of butter here so butter and salt will cover a lot of

Scott Benner 52:03
what broccoli is. Is that what you're telling me?

Mike 52:04
No, no. I was you know, not I wasn't implying that. But you know, if you want to flavor it, but it's it. Some of that stuff is my point is it's so easy to make nowadays. Because you don't have to have you know, go to the store, get all the fresh vegetables, you got to eat them. Within a few days, they start going back, get to flat flash, frozen tongue twister, flash frozen vegetables, and there is healthiest eating and getting fresh. And it's it's not. That was my point. It's not hard to eat good.

Scott Benner 52:37
Yeah, well, I because I think that that ends up being one of the arguments sometimes about any diet structure is that people are like, Oh, it's so expensive to do. You know, because you're talking about meat meats more expensive. Is there a way to eat keto? I guess not. Because that would be dirty, right? If I was doing it with lesser meats, I guess or

Mike 53:00
Well, you know, you want to get the best you can afford. And, you know, grass fed beef sounds obviously better, a little bit more, it's not that much more. If you go to a restaurant, and you're going to spend 30 bucks a pop, if you go out to a fast food joint, it's almost $20 for two people anymore. So if you spend, let's say six bucks on a pound of grass fed beef, that's going to feed the two of you, there's three bucks a person for better meat than you would get if you went to the restaurant or the fast food place, right? Or just spent $1 less than got the, you know, the regular grain fed. So it's really not expensive. It's kind of you know, if you watch what you're doing, and we don't ever get I don't look for sales. I don't do coupon shopping. I'm just I don't want to say I don't have the time for it. But I just I don't have the I don't have the patience for it.

Scott Benner 53:53
I always, every time the cashier says Do you have any coupons? I said no. I'm against saving money. Thank you. Because I know that's how it feels to them. But I'm just I don't have the mind for it. Like you could cut out a coupon and leave it on the countertop. And I'll just I won't remember it. I don't know why that is exactly. Okay. Well, what what what do you think people should know about keto eating that they don't know? Like, what's what's not in the, you know, out in the world about it, things you learned or things you think they should know?

Mike 54:26
Gosh, well, I always remembered from the prior and even my mom and my mom's still stuck in the 70s for diabetes education, and how things work and it's like no, and when the the Atkins and I'm not talking about about it, I think it's a it's another alternative for people but the original is your body was going into ketoacidosis at that time, which was thought to be the same as diabetic ketoacidosis, which is bad. What you're actually doing is you're going to a keto keto Genesis. So your body's learning to burn the fat That's the one thing that my wife said was gives her more energy before when she would run it would take her four or five miles to warm up. Now she is warmed up in the first mile because you're not, you're not accessing all those glucose sources right away to try to deplete, you're burning, you're burning, you're burning fat. So that's why you have the higher fat but you need good fat the grass fed if you can butters are regular butter, the fat from the pork, the beef, even beef tallow you can use in cooking so you're putting clean fats in your your your body that your body was meant to burn, it's the same thing and they the whole cholesterol thing back when you know margarine came about and so they everybody go low fat low this, and they were still having all this coronary artery disease and heart attacks. Well, it was from all the inflammation that you were getting from all the non fat, low fat, all the additives. So by by eating, drinking whole milk, using whole creams, using stuff your body was meant to process, your body's going to run cleaner. And I've noticed my blood pressure's lower. Like I said, I got off my, my cholesterol medication and again, consult your physicians, your doctors, you know,

Scott Benner 56:14
don't just start taking your medication.

Mike 56:16
No, but it you know, it got it lowered just because I'm not having all that stuff. So, you know, I like you can do this. There's there's keto without eating meat, you know, people who don't, you know, vegans or whatever the Monday you could still get your proteins from your, your lagoons and what have you. But, you know, it's, it's, it's been good for us. It's not difficult. You're not not eating food you enjoy, I'm not eating, you know, crap, or just stuffing myself with, you know, stick of butter in my coffee every day. So, you know, there's no look into it. There's, there's keto for diabetics, and there's a lot of good information, and there's a lot of bad information out there. So that's, that's why I consulted. You know, like all my doctors. Again, Jenny, she's a dietitian. And, you know, did my research do? I would say, with anybody, any diet is do your due diligence, do your research, don't just listen to one source. Yeah, and find what works for you.

Scott Benner 57:25
I think too, I mean, about finding information, like, everyone's got their, you know, the, everyone's got the castle, they're defending, you know, for the most part, and because I don't eat any specific way, I thought maybe I'm a good person to talk to about how other people eat because I really don't, I don't have a, you know, I don't have a horse in the in the race. I don't care one way or the other, you know, just say what you're gonna say. But I think too, you got to be careful about people who are making money off of things. So if you know, it's, hey, there's this keto lifestyle, and for just $50 a month, we'll take like, there, you're there, you're falling into a trap. I admit, I agree with you about the about the fats, and about natural foods as well. Like, I would just never eat margarine. But my wife's like, you know, she's like, this is what I have to do, because there's less fat and I'm like, I really think you're wrong. You know, but there's, I can't get through to her. And she's she and maybe I'm wrong,

Mike 58:16
you know, so it's, it's all processed under high heat. And it's like, like, you know, the vegetable oils on stuff. It's all processed with high heat. So it's actually not good for you. It's inflammatory. So, you know, it's not for everybody. And then there's there's the other side of it that you know, if you want to eat a certain way when you want to have pizza, and is that the other you can figure it out that works for you. You know what, back to you.

Scott Benner 58:42
Oh, yeah, I I genuinely imagine people understand that are listening. But in case someone's coming in from the outside, like, I'm not doing these episodes, because I'm trying to change anybody's mind. I just, you know, I think everybody, if we're going to understand how to use insulin, it should be everybody should understand how to use it, not just people who eat, you know, whatever a classic meal is they mean, if somebody eats keto, they should know how to use insulin just the same as if they don't, so I'm just trying to pump information into the podcast.

Mike 59:08
cut my insulin way in half. My basil rates are obviously down, way down. And I've noticed which didn't take me long to learn but I had to learn the different proteins for instance, like the beef, the hamburgers, or whatever, that kind of fats versus the pull the pork fats, and then they kind of hit me differently. Okay, so I have a different approach to is, you know, obviously, I don't Bolus before I eat I Bolus after and then depending beef, pork or whatever, I might do an extended. I'm using loop so I'll do an override maybe a 30% override for three or four hours. And I found that that works pretty good for me and I'm typically pretty on you know, the other day I had a pretty bad day. I Got up higher than I wanted to. But, you know, yeah, stretches of the world also add to that.

Scott Benner 1:00:05
No kidding. I think it's it's so important for people to hear that in any context. I mean, you're eating almost no carbs. And your blood sugar is going up from protein. And the fat, it's so I mean, there's a pro tip episode about it. And I mean, we've tried our hardest to, like, make sure people understand that it's not just some magical diabetes rise that happens. But you know, that protein gets broken down, and it gets stored as glucose. So yeah, yeah, it's not hard to understand, I guess, if you if you put it simply enough, but it happens later. So you can't you can't Pre-Bolus and eat keto, because that insulin will crush you before that process of the breaking down of the protein ever happened?

Mike 1:00:47
Correct? Yeah, yeah, I was. I was Pre-Bolus and maybe up to an hour before. So I had for the most part, for the last. I don't how many years, I've had a turkey sandwich for breakfast every every morning. When I know out hits me too. I really enjoyed it. And I would Pre-Bolus almost up to an hour before eating that and kind of hit that right. And with keto for breakfast, I'm depending on where I'm at. Might be a half hour to an hour after before I Bolus for the proteins in the fat.

Scott Benner 1:01:18
Do you find your your kidneys and and just the the system of disposing of liquid waste is an easier process without carbs. Do you mean I don't know. I just find that if I if I feel like my, if I feel like my health is tumbling in the wrong direction. I'll go to a very low carb thing for a couple of days. And the first thing I find happens is that the excess waterway to me just goes away. Like are you retaining less water now?

Mike 1:01:48
No. So I drink a ton of water. So prior to Corona COVID

Scott Benner 1:01:57
let's call it COVID

Mike 1:01:58
COVID I keep a case of water in my truck or car Jeep whenever I was driving the day and anywhere I went even if it was to the gas station a block away I drink a bottle of water. Okay, so I was drinking, you know, 10 1215 bottles of water a day. Since I'm not driving, I drink a 12 pack minimum of sparkling water, which is basically nothing in it. So I'm always flushing anyways. Okay,

Scott Benner 1:02:23
so your process?

Mike 1:02:26
Yeah. I've noticed I probably have a little bit more water retention. Since I'm not doing as much like I'm not working as hard right now. But I know that's just water. And but I'm still constantly flushing. So I haven't noticed the difference in that.

Scott Benner 1:02:44
Okay. I'm just wondering. Hmm, but you do need your fiber. I will say that, hey, listen, I am not embarrassed at all. Let me just say something right here right now. What I use is an old classic Metamucil still has the sugar in it. I don't want any of that fancy sugar free Metamucil into a few ounces of water. Everything is perfect forever. And why do I have to do that? Because I don't mean the goddamn vegetables.

Mike 1:03:12
I noticed that's one thing I noticed. I am using a psyllium husk. Good that doesn't have any sugars or additives. So even with the vegetables I'm eating, I'm not eating a ton. But and I wasn't eating a lot of vegetables prior. I'm doing that better now. But so I'll do a teaspoon of that. And I find that that worked out quite well.

Scott Benner 1:03:33
I have to be honest with you. I joke about it because I'm older. But I wish someone would have found me when I was 20 years old and said hey, pick a fiber supplement. I really do wish somebody would have said that to me. I think it would have changed my life. Yeah, it can't hurt just have a little have have enough supplements have enough in you that what your body needs is available to it. And that's all do you take any supplements at all like I take I take a zinc and a D? I take a fish oil and vitamin B every day

Mike 1:04:07
you do I started taking just a men's 40 plus just kind of a I mean, I get a lot of I never got the keto flu. I've always had enough sodium and mineral from all the rubs and barbecue stuff. So I just took that on a recommendation. But other than that prior to that I've never taken supplements. I didn't understand what you just said keto

Scott Benner 1:04:27
flu.

Mike 1:04:29
Yeah, so when you start keto, sometimes people say they get a headache. And is because if you're most processed foods, I'll have a ton of sodium you go to fast food sodium, you go to the restaurant sodium. So your minerals go down when you start keto if you're not keeping that up. So because a lot of people don't salt heavy, so if you're when you go to keto, your your electrolytes get lower. So you need to pay attention that and one of the sides of that, as they call it keto flu, you get a little bit of a headache, you're foggy. Okay, you can take some chicken broth and kind of get over that level now,

Scott Benner 1:05:08
I guess also you're getting away from sugar. Possibly too, right? If you're making like a real firm switch like, bang, I'm going from this to that.

Mike 1:05:16
Yeah, well, the breads I used to make only had three teaspoons for the lopen anyways. But yeah, there's sugar in french fries that you get at the fast food and there's, you know, sugar and salt makes everything taste better. So yeah, you're getting away from that, but it's mostly the the electrolytes the salts. Okay.

Scott Benner 1:05:31
Have you stumbled during this process at all? a loaf of French bread got to you or something like that? or?

Mike 1:05:38
Yeah, so we had, it wasn't I'm not blaming my wife for that monthly, but we did have a pizza the other day. Yeah. And it was horrible. And I felt like I'm so glad I had it.

Scott Benner 1:05:49
So you ate the pizza and your body just rejected the idea of the pizza.

Mike 1:05:53
I used to be able to eat half. if not more of a pizza, we'd go to the the one of the local places that's national chain and it was deep dish. It was great. And we could easily eat half of it and some of the cheesy breads and I had two pieces and I felt like I ate a cow. Yeah, just just your your body was like what, why? Why are you doing this? And I was like, you know to at all night I was like I kept just Bolus Bolus, Bolus 200% override it was I it was.

Scott Benner 1:06:26
So when I make mine, I make a nice like it's a Neapolitan is a very thin crust. And you know sparsely with cheese, and there's some sauce and maybe I'll put like, you know, sausage or something like that on it. But they're also like 12 inch pizzas. And I could probably eat like, I guess if I pushed myself. I could eat a whole 12 inch pizza, but I don't usually. And then I don't make it again for five, six weeks. And then yeah, it just pops up on a Sunday. Like sometimes I just want to get up in the morning and cook all day and not think about anything and and

Mike 1:06:59
Well, yeah, when we were normally when I was making pizzas I do. You do a typical dough ball. I put it in forts. I make my own for myself and then whatever trophy wife wanted, and we do pesto's I do barbecue sauces. We do you know, all that stuff, you know, pretty thin crust. And that's the stuff when I was making them.

Scott Benner 1:07:20
How do you handle barbecue sauce when you're like, do you use any sauces when you smoke Are you just mostly dry rub everything.

Mike 1:07:26
I pretty much dry rub. I've never been a fan of barbecue sauce. Just because meat has to stand on its own. But for the pizzas that we use a little thin, then barbecue sauce. So one of the things we used to do the way I teach barbecue at the barbecue started every month we'd have a free for all barbecue come down and I'd make you know 50 6070 pizzas, and we'd use the different sauces that he sold in the store to show what you could do with it. Yeah, and you're using a tablespoon maybe on a pizza. So it does doesn't hit you too hard.

Scott Benner 1:08:00
Right? That makes sense. Yeah, I have to say that. The moment I learned that pizza crust had to be cooked, hot and fast changed. I yeah, I make too much and my neighbors can kind of smell it happening. You see them they're in the backyard. They're kind of like his he can offer me a pizza. You know, and and I'll kind of pass them out a little bit. My one neighbors like this is the best pizza in town. And I was like, well, it's just, you know, just put a little more effort into the dough and and and by the way, I feel like because I cold ferment the dough and it takes days for it to come together. I actually feel like my body processes it better than then if I would have made it the other way. I I can't imagine that I could ever completely. I should say that I think I believe and I agree that flour, processed white flour is not something your body's meant to deal with. I believe that. And at the same time, I don't know what's going to have to happen to me. For me to not have pizza again.

Mike 1:09:05
I'll send you a recipe for a dough it uses Parmesan cheese, eggs, and such. And if you if you can tell me that it doesn't taste like real pizza dough or if not better than some of them. Really. I'd be surprised. Yeah, we did. We did several different doze and that one restaurant that we the national chain that we would get them from I love that flavor and it is really close to their cheesy bread flavor. And then some of my prior to that goes I'd use double lot flour. And it was just some of the best Oh,

Scott Benner 1:09:36
yeah, no, I there's definitely ways to make good food better. And it but it takes a lot of effort. And a lot of you know, time I think that's what I said earlier like sometimes I just want to like when I'm looking for a day off on a Sunday. I sometimes choose cooking something that takes a lot of time because nobody can argue with that. Nobody can look at you and go Hey, go do this now to be like, Oh, I can't sorry. This is how long it takes to make the pulled pork. Yeah, it's like so um, and by the way not not to go down the rabbit hole but I made pulled pork and crock pots before my life and I thought they were good and smoking uphold pork is a is magical it just it's an I lean towards you I make the meat in more of I guess would be considered more of a Texas style which is just dry rubs and and nothing really wet on them. I do put a little bit of a thin sauce on the on the ribs but but i like i like that style of cooking meat.

Mike 1:10:38
Yeah, we do competition ribs, we we saw some a bit for that kind of turnout, which is a different read than you'd normally have that you'd cook for your your friends and neighbors. But that's pretty much the only time where you really use sauces and honeys and

Scott Benner 1:10:50
yeah, that's that's too much. The other thing about me is I eat like a little girl. Like I'm not kidding, like I, I have a little bit of food, which is sad all the time. Like I'm the fattest guy, it doesn't need that you've ever met in your life. Because, you know, I'll make these three racks of ribs. There's only four people in the house. And I take four or five little ribs off and I'm done. I'm like, Oh, they were really good. And they're like, have more. I'm like I can't I'm kind of full. You know, like I fill up easily. It's it's fascinating how quickly I get full. I actually I'm insulting little girls who I'm sure it could pretty much out eat me No problem. I don't know how it is. I don't know, I don't know how it is I eat Exactly. But I get full quickly. And then it's funny when with empty calories. I don't get full. Like with the cookies, I could eat them. Like mass wise, I could eat way more cookies than I could eat beef for some reason. It's

Mike 1:11:42
because your body keeps spiking insulin, which then makes you hungry again is coming down. Yeah. It's just that it's just an effect like Chinese food effect.

Scott Benner 1:11:50
I believe you and I know it's right. And I've heard enough people talk about it. I've seen it happen enough in my life. There are some foods that just turn your brain and your body into a garbage disposal for more of that it just makes you want it in a way that is I mean, they say rice Sugar Sugar is more addictive than, than some drugs they say it is. Yeah. So can be. Alright. What have we not put in this episode that belongs in here? Anything? Um, gosh. You know, it's Monday,

Mike 1:12:25
I had a couple of points. I just want to make sure we we hit or talked about, I appreciate them. Yeah, so I kind of want to go back to from when I was first diagnosed to then when I got in control in the 80s to kind of now it's education, diabetic educators education as far as Ed, your podcast is, I think does the most justice to the world. Because there's just not enough education out there. And what you do the pro tips, the Ascot and Jenny, which, you know, if you're in the hospital, you get your five or 10 minutes education, you leave and nobody thinks to go back. And nobody really tells you to go back, which is a disservice to type ones because as things change as technology changes. So my first training was in the 70s, which wasn't my trainings, my parents. My second training was when the 80s and that was kind of it, then you figure it out. My third training was education. What I mean by training was your podcast. And then I continued that with Jenny, which you have to relearn things or talk about things which like I said, My doctor 20 years just told me I was doing great. never told me you know, maybe she'd go back and get some more education on diet or control or how to come from between seven and nine down to respective. Like I said, I got a lot and you know, neurological damage and neuropathy. And, you know, education is key. Yeah,

Scott Benner 1:13:57
I work or somebody just say to you, hey, by the way, you know, protein could turn into sugar, sugar needs insulin, you know, like any of those things could be told to you and, and and genuinely aren't. And I think I at this point, I'm at peace now with why it happens that way. I just don't. I mean, listen, it's gonna sound pompous for half a second. But I'm really good at explaining diabetes to people. And so I've tried, in my mind to wonder if I was a doctor in that situation, how would I get this across the people? And the best I can come up with is I would send them to the podcast. I can't. It's too much. And it's you can't just we're not machines. You can't just download that much information at one time and have it make sense the next time you need it. I think it's something about the conversational nature of this. It's part of why it sticks to you.

Mike 1:14:55
It is and and after, listen to the podcast and work Going with Jenny. And, again, my doctor 20 years it never said to do better. But I think they have a, they have a guideline that they have to go between, okay, keep people around seven, you know, and now we have CGM and such, how much damage could have I avoided? You know, 15 years ago when I got my first or Dexcom. seven plus, you know, just just with that technology might have might have I avoided but I think, again, most of my damages from early on, but you know, I think the doctors have a guideline they have to go to, I think they could gently refer you for to the podcast, if you want to know more fine tuning this will work because there's not a lot of I don't want to say there's not great diabetic educators out there sure that they also have a guide. Yes, there are, but they also have guidelines that they need to follow, which is what the doctor tells him, right?

Scott Benner 1:15:50
Yeah, and there's no point when you can say to somebody like, oh, that happened, all you really got to do is this, like the hacks and the, and the little things that you would only know by doing it every day, no one's either gonna think to tell it to you, or they're gonna be afraid you're gonna misunderstand it. And so there's that piece of it, too, is that nobody really wants to say it out loud. You know, which is fascinating.

Mike 1:16:12
10% of type ones that are taking care of themselves, the rest of them just, you know, I know my I got some friends it just like, yeah, you're a zealot. Yeah, for wanting to talk to other type ones and hang out. But, you know, I don't think that's true. But you know, it is what it is it.

Scott Benner 1:16:31
I don't think there's a way to understand. And then to put it into practice, if you don't immerse yourself in it a little bit. And, you know, I heard from somebody recently, and I, you know, I took some time to talk to this person on the phone at the end, I said, Okay, so here are these episodes I want you to listen to and then you can contact me back and ask me any questions you have? And she said, I don't have time to listen to that. And I don't think she meant it that way. I think she meant I don't have time. Like, I think I meant she, I want to make sure I'm like saying it correctly. She couldn't imagine giving time away to this thing, because diabetes is such a, like a Hellfire in her life. So what I said was, look, I don't think this is going to be cliched, but you don't not have time. Like you have to make time for this. Because you could all the time you're giving away to fighting low blood sugars and worrying about spikes as like imagine not having to do that anymore. So find 20 hours. Listen to those episodes. I think you can put them in your ears and listen while you're doing anything. Like you don't have to be sitting taking notes. And then yeah, you'll save all that time and your health.

Mike 1:17:41
Yeah, I've turned everybody I can from the top of the mountain. It's like, Look, you gotta listen to this podcast. Listen to this. Listen to this, listen to this. And you know, the ones that do like, hey, thanks, man. It's like because it's, it's a whole nother way of looking at just just think about just the bumping and nudging that I started gently. Just being as you call bold with insulin. I was terrified to insulin. I'm hypoglycemic, right? You know, just just doing that. It's like, Wow, what a huge impact. And nobody told me that before. Yeah, my doctor 20 years never said, hey, let's, you know,

Scott Benner 1:18:16
seems like such common sense to me. Like even when I first set it out loud. I thought, this is a waste of people's time, who would look at a 160 blood sugar and not do anything about it. You like,

Mike 1:18:29
yeah, I'm with 350 because I didn't want to get woken up at night. Yeah, my alarm now is 120

Scott Benner 1:18:35
get woken up in the morning comes to pick you up. My doctor said that was fine. Yeah. If you want to sleep, that's okay to do that. kind of started leaving high so you can sleep? I mean that I think everybody gets those words spoken to them. And, and I say, you know, there's a world where it can stay lower and stable, and you can still sleep. Yes. Just understanding how the insulin works. And if you want to eat keto, and do it, you can. And if you want to have bread and do it, you can you just have to understand how it works. There's different caveats to different diets, but

Mike 1:19:11
and I figured I figured it out prior keto, just by the bumping nudge and I went from 350 to 300 300 to 250. You know, I lowered that line till I got to 180. And I was like, Well, why not go lower? Well,

Scott Benner 1:19:26
I'm gonna let you go in a second. But your progression makes me happy. Because you, you know, from, from my perspective, you prove out the theory. You were you were you're an older diabetics or somebody who got, you know, not great technology, not great insulin moved into different areas within that space of a one. See, that's obviously too high, but people are telling you, don't worry about it. It's okay. You found the podcast, learn how to implement it, it worked for you, you could cut you could keep eating like that if you wanted to, and you'd be able to take good care of yourself. And now you've decided, you know what I'm going to eat keto. But you're still using what you learned in the podcast, you're just using it for the keto diet 100% This is my goal. My goal is I don't care what you eat, you need to understand how insulin works. And then you can eat however you want. I've never once I've never once thought of myself as caring about how people eat. I'm not pushing carbs on you, I'm just saying that I think it's unreasonable to think that everybody is going to be a vegan, or everybody's going to be low carb, and everyone deserves to have low stable blood sugars, that Yeah,

Mike 1:20:32
you need to learn how the insulin works. And that was never really explained in detail. And that's where to go back to the education if, you know, however, you can get it and thank you for putting this out there. And, and I know a lot of people that turn it on to the podcast, it's the same thing. It's like, Wow, man, it but it's learning how to learning how to it works. You're right timing and amount. Yep, whatever it is you're eating, I don't care what you eat, you can eat, you know, candy Carmo corns all day long, if you can figure it out, God more power to you, but know how to do it. And that's what I learned from the podcast.

Scott Benner 1:21:07
Thank you. And I appreciate you saying that. Here it is. Eating healthy, whatever that means. And having stable blood sugars are not the same thing. They don't need to be the same thing. You know, like you can control any carbs you take in with insulin if you do it correctly. I'm not saying it's a great idea. Like I'm not saying the karma corn all day long. But if you're going to just because that's your decision, doesn't mean you don't deserve to have good blood sugars, a nice day one C and a nice long life as long as you can live it. And I don't understand anybody who would argue one diet from another. That's that's a that's a different conversation. Like if you want to make one of those arguments, like you shouldn't eat meat, or you know, you know, whatever, like whatever your argument might be. That's a different argument, then you need to understand your insulin, but somehow they get conflated sometimes. Yeah,

Mike 1:22:06
yeah, they do. And it's just, it's like the people that look at you can't have that cookie. Like, well, why not? So there's two things that type one diabetic cannot eat. First is poison. Yeah. 100%. Second is anything made with poison. So that cookie is not made with poison, dammit, I can eat it.

Scott Benner 1:22:21
But if you don't know how to use your insulin, you eat a cookie, your blood sugar's gonna be 350. Just so you know. And so let's get that straight. And I think we went a long way towards helping people understand what it is to eat keto, these x, these conversations are not to teach people to eat keto, or teach people to be a vegan, it's to have a real conversation with a person with type one who has made that choice. So I appreciate you coming on and sharing this all with us. I really do. Sure happy to do it. Thank you. It's been really nice knowing you to me, not that we're never gonna see each other again, like, but I've enjoyed. I've enjoyed our relationship. So. So I appreciate that as well. Thank you. All right. Hold on one sec. I'll send you those recipes. Oh, yeah, seriously do that. I will put them in the show notes. There'll be right in the show notes with the links to the advertisers that if you click on the podcast gets to keep going, right, Mike?

Mike 1:23:11
Yeah, absolutely. And I did switch g ship because he you.

Scott Benner 1:23:15
Thank you Dexcom, Mike bought a G six because of me. And I did get a new meter. Ah, got the Contour. Next One. The winnaar News. Ah, there we go.

Mike 1:23:26
And that thing is spot on. accurate and I'm going to take up one more minute of your time I don't like. So I've been at type one test monkey for years. And I don't know if you know what a y si machine is. But it's a it's basically the most accurate meter there is and they take these blood draws for whatever they're doing every so often. So that meter compared to the y si the closest in it was the Accu check and that was several years ago at my old meter, right? It was dead on closest from all the meters and I had like five different meters with me. I'm not gonna go into other names, but you want a good one. Get the right one

Scott Benner 1:24:05
Contour. Next One. I knew it right. Hey, let's just say right here, Contour. Next One Contour Next One slash juicebox. That's all you gotta do. Now, I appreciate you saying that. Because seriously, I meant everything I said about wanting to help people. And this podcast went from what I thought was going to be an extension of my blog to a real legitimate full time job. It's this podcast takes up my entire week. And I'm happy to do it. I actually really very much enjoy doing it. You know, but the other side of that is is that you know, I got kids and bills and house and everything else and I can't give away Hey, he's showing me the meter. He really has it. It's a great meter. And you know, I'm not selling anymore. I really mean this as the technology gets better and better and better. You know, CGM. You still need a meter. Yep. So have a good one. Cuz you're going to get one anyway. So, you know, get a good one. That's all I get a great one. Yeah. Good point, Mike. Let's not just get a good meter get a great meter. You guys might hear that in the future ad by the way.

Mike 1:25:12
The other thing that really upsets me is the FDA allows meters plus or minus 20%. So are you 80? Or 120? Right? Are you 50? Or are you whereas, you know, if you have a great meter that you can rely on, you can rely on that number

Scott Benner 1:25:29
to tell you something else while we're being mad about things. If you I mean, how much more difficult can it be to make a great meter than a good meter? Like, if you're gonna make a meter? Why would it not just like, work really well. And by the way, if it doesn't work really well be a mentioned, get out of the game, save yourself, the best meter we could make is the sixth best meter in the world. Maybe we shouldn't make blood glucose meters, we'll make something else. You know, it's such an odd thing. I think that about cars. I think about cars sometimes, too. I'm like, how much effort would have been to just make this piece so it didn't fall off the car?

Mike 1:26:05
You know, you figure they save $2 per one unit over 100,000

Scott Benner 1:26:09
you're making the car already? Why don't you make it nice? Is it really? Yeah, I don't understand that. So anyway, we can talk forever. I've got to go live my life. And I'm assuming that you have to cook for your wife or she'll starve to death. So it's coming up on lunchtime. So yeah, I have to make something for my trophy wife. Well, I'm glad that she's an exceptional woman that you sound like you seem lucky to have. I am every day I wake up and she's still there. Thank you. Sometimes my wife will get up and walk out I'll look at the kids and I go I knew she was gonna leave eventually. Get here from the other room. She's like, I'm just using the bathroom like none of that said she's out of here. I can tell. Okay, Mike, thanks so much, man. I really appreciate it.

Mike 1:26:53
Hey, thank you, Scott. I really appreciate you know

Scott Benner 1:26:55
that's it's my pleasure. Have a good night. Thanks. Hey, huge thanks to Mike for coming on the show. He'll be back again after dark series. Wow, did you hear that Thunder? I'm not editing that out that scared the living crap out of me. Thank you also to the on the pod see if you're eligible for the free 30 day trial the dash and on the pod comm forward slash juice box and dexcom@dexcom.com forward slash juicebox. Get yourself a CGM. Find out what's going on. This could be the end of my life. So if you if you never hear from Oh my god, the dogs are going crazy. That was a lot of thunder. Wow. x comment on the pod paying for a weather report. Hmm, it's raining in New Jersey. This AccuWeather forecast is brought to you by Dexcom and Omni pod. Thank you so much for listening. I'll be back soon with another episode of the Juicebox Podcast.

#495 Hilary is Trying to Kill Me

Hilary is the mom of a young child living with type 1 diabetes.

+ Click for EPISODE TRANSCRIPT

Scott Benner 0:10
Hello friends and welcome to Episode 495 of the Juicebox Podcast. Today's show is with Hillary, and Hillary is trying to kill me. She wanted to come on the show, then she recorded this episode, and it was terrific. And then she sent me an email and said, I don't think I did a good job. Please don't let anybody hear it. And then months later sent me another email and said, I changed my mind. You could let people hear it. I was like Hilary, I've already deleted your episode, it's gone. But I found it on a backup server backup server. It was backed up somewhere, way, way back. And I'm delighted to bring it to you now. Please remember while you're listening, not to try to kill me, and 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. Hillary Hillary Hillary this show is sponsored today by the glucagon that my daughter carries g vo hype open, Find out more at G Vogue glucagon.com forward slash juice box. The show is also sponsored today by the Contour Next One blood glucose meter. It is incredibly accurate, easy to hold easy to use as a super bright light. I'm going to tell you more about it later. For now just know this, you can find out more about it get started. See if you're eligible for a free meter at Contour Next one.com forward slash juice box. I want to give you a tiny bit of context for this episode before it starts. Hillary came on to talk about how her child eats with Type One Diabetes, it was going to be part of the how we eat series. But when it was over, Joking aside from earlier, she just felt like she didn't do a good job of explaining. But I just really loved the episode. And you know you don't make a good conversation. trumps everything else for me. I thought it was a great episode. She wasn't happy about it in so much as how she described their eating style. So this is not part of the how we eat series. But it is a really great episode of the podcast. And Hillary. I forgive you for trying to kill me.

Hilary 2:46
I'm Hillary. I'm married. We live in Southern California. And we have two children. One is five and one is three. And Joan is a type one diabetic.

Scott Benner 2:58
What do you do for a living? Because you've never used zoom before? That's for sure.

Hilary 3:02
Do I have used zoom before? I am not working right now. But I am I'm I'm teaching kindergarten right now. So are you really not not by choice? not by choice? Oh, California, I'm being forced to teach kindergarten.

Scott Benner 3:22
deputized your major teachers. I'll be right that. No, that's so how many kids do you have in total? to two? And that's it forever? To forever? I feel like that's a smart move. Which one has type one? Joe and she just turned three last week. Wow. Okay, when was she diagnosed?

Hilary 3:43
She was diagnosed when she was 11 months.

Scott Benner 3:45
Who is she named after? Because that's a very traditional name.

Hilary 3:50
Oh, you know what, just, she's Nate. We have a Joan in the family. But we just really liked it. We both were it was hard to agree on a name. And with my son. We went back and forth and with with her. My husband said, you know, how about john? I was like, Yeah, let's do that. Let's just, and we didn't mess with it. I mean, if you agree on something, I feel like you know, just go with it.

Scott Benner 4:11
So I need to know, if you didn't have to make this decision along with somebody else. What would John's name be? Did you have one picked out that he couldn't agree with and vice versa?

Hilary 4:22
No, no, no. Well, he was thinking about Ruby, but I think I that wasn't a name that I really liked. But no, it's just it was just easy. We just both thought you know, Joe,

Scott Benner 4:34
I think Ruby is a woman who sang in a 90 minute 19 speakeasy somewhere. Well,

Hilary 4:40
it's like country music. My husband likes country music. So anyway, I did

Scott Benner 4:49
this down if they like country music, it's fine. I'm just joking. I'm really just trying to say stupid stuff to loosen you up so we can start talking about the diabetes. Yeah. So how old again? Was she when she was diagnosed? 11 months, 11 months that's really young.

Unknown Speaker 5:07
So Young,

Scott Benner 5:08
are you would you describe yourself as just on the emotional edge or things going? Okay.

Hilary 5:14
Um, I would say they're going okay, now most days, but I don't think I mean, I was actually just perusing pictures while I was waiting for you to call. And I was looking back, so I couldn't remember because he's looping. I was like, I wouldn't I couldn't remember when she started looping. And so I was looking back at pictures. And I was just seeing pictures from that time that first year when she was really young. And my son, you know, was just turning four when she was when she had been diagnosed. And it was just really hectic and hard. The first I was crying, like, all the time. Yeah. And it was just I remember driving one time somewhere, and I was just like, I should not be driving like this is, you know, because I hadn't slept it was just out of control.

Scott Benner 5:58
I so I think, what's yours? What do you say? I said, I think my life was similar to yours back then.

Hilary 6:06
Yeah, I mean, I really appreciate you being so open about like, just going, you said that you went up to your, when your wife brought Chinese food home and you just went up to your shower, and you just started crying because it's like, you feel like that sometime. It's just like, you know, are you just trying to keep it together? You know, it was really hard, but I feel like lately, you know, it was the first year was I feel like, you know, it took like a year and a half, I'd say I mean, I feel like it takes a while I think it's gonna take a long time to really get where I felt like to also get where I want to be where I don't see a number and kind of like clench up or take like a breath, you know, like just, you know, have that poker face which I'm excited about a psychologist kind of coming on and talking about like the effects of like, like how to help yourself maybe some tools with you know, higher emoting you know, yeah, you try not to I know I don't like you don't do that. That's why I love listening to cuz I'm like, how you can just like, you do what you need to do. And then you're you don't think about it again, it's to me very inspiring, because I would love to get there.

Scott Benner 7:17
Well, it was a process because for quite some time, I felt like I was doing that. But my wife said that my face gave me away that even if I get if I get hold it in verbally, she's like, it's just coming out through your face. She said, you might as well just look at us. And you know, say what's your thing? Yeah, I used to I've said on here before, but it was like a knee jerk reaction when something didn't go the way I wanted it to, I'd say out loud for some reason, like just under my breath a little bit. And my wife's like, that's hard on on us to hear like her and I and everything. I said, Okay, well, I wasn't doing like I wasn't like, you know what I'll do? You know what? You don't my Fingal Bay? It wasn't like, you know, it wasn't like that. It was just like, was it? You know, just or you're thinking

Hilary 8:05
I messed up. I mean, you're thinking that you messed up not anybody else. That's how I feel.

Scott Benner 8:10
It's a compounding too. It's it's you feel like you screwed something up, you feel like you're hurting their health. You feel like you're messing up the next thing you think you feel like you're letting them down. You feel like you're keeping them from eating. And it just hits you at once. And you're just like, gosh, like, I don't think there's anything like anyway, apparently, it's not good for people around men who are in what I guess you would call us. Like, I don't even know how to talk about sexuality anymore. There's so many different words like, Is there a word for when you're married to a woman? And you're a man? That's the traditional? Is that traditional? I don't even know what to call that. Anyway, I think I think men will know that I'm a large complaint from your spouse is usually tone. Right? Because this guy's just don't think about that. We say what we mean, we don't mean anything more or less than that. And the tone really, you probably shouldn't even infer anything from my tone. You know, I'm not even thinking that far ahead. But, I mean, it's going to be the rest of my life trying to figure that out. Because I know, you know, just the way things are said or impactful on people. And that probably sounds crazy coming from me because I do do a good job on the podcast talking to people the way I the way I would perfectly like to speak to everybody but the key is that I'm not sitting down quietly in front of a microphone having every one of my personal conversations and I'm not centered all the time and think you know, things are going on around you and you're unfocused or running around or tired and just happens, you know? Yeah. Well, I feel for you and it sucks to because the people around you who aren't taking on the lion's share of the responsibility don't really completely understand what it feels like either. Yeah, yeah, it's not great. But anyway, what is Joan using? Is she have any gear? Is she MDI? What's she doing?

Hilary 10:05
Um, she has been looping since she was 14 months. So we've been doing it for a while. And I worked with Kenny. I was like, reached out to him because on Facebook, he always chimes in. And I mean, he changed everything for us. I felt like I was about to give up because I was like, I just feel like we're not really looping. I mean, it's a big change. Okay, I have to back up. When we first when we first started. It was like, my husband described it as like, we've been living without running water. And it's like, turned on now. Like, we have water, because it just felt like a safety net. Like, you know, someone's already working on it. Or like Jenny says, a little grim. Is it good? Or did you want the Gremlins anyway? Someone said something about little Gremlins cleaning up and like, taking care of stuff, you know, while you can go about your life. So, you know, I feel like it's taking care of the highs and lows, but my settings weren't right. And they weren't completely off. But you know, like, for me, I started like fidgeting, and then I'd fidget a little more. And then it was something else. And then by the time it was, you know, a year later, I just felt like, gosh, I just still don't I still not grooving with it, you know, all the way would help, but not as much as other people I would see out there. Yeah. So that's when I reached out to Kenny and I said, you know, can you help me and he lives in Southern California. So we got together. And I mean, man, it's insane. I'm like, You're like a wizard. So that helped a knife, though. I mean, it really works, you know, and he also has so many good videos now on the so called bloopers page, and the, like, the videos that he's done, where he explains nightscout and really goes through everything, and it's really helpful. He's gonna come back. I, I'm glad that he is. Because I just find that he's who I've gotten so much from. And yeah, he's, he's been great. So it's,

Scott Benner 12:02
it really is interesting. You know, for people who don't loop or, you know, use some sort of an algorithm, there's a number of settings. And if those settings aren't correct, it just doesn't work very well. And you can also get the settings close enough that it works well away from food, but near food, it's kind of a disaster,

Hilary 12:20
or one setting could be making up for another. So in some situations, it's working really well, half the time, but the other half it doesn't work, which I think was what was happening with us. But we did one basil rate, which I had, like, I think I had like maybe six or seven basil rates. Yeah, I mean, because on a traditional pump, I mean, I I remember when john was first diagnosed, and we were on, we'd done the Omni pod and T slim, we tried a few different ones. And now we're on Medtronic, because of looping. They didn't have the Omni pod when we first started doing it anyways, but but with the T with a tea slim, we would call in to you know, the the nurse would say adjust this, adjust this change your Basal rate? Oh, it sounds like you need to step down your baseline. And so I had all these different ones until Kenny said, don't you just need one? Especially with I think with anything? I don't know, I bet it just smooth things out.

Scott Benner 13:20
Yeah, I agree that we're basically to Basal rate situation, there's a slightly lower one overnight, and there is during the day. Yeah. And, you know, someone like Kenny, who can see the real mathematical cause and effect of things. That's a, it's just, it's, it's fascinating to me that he can look and say, this is happening. So that means that this is too great, but then he can look at the you know, at the other setting and say, Well, if you make this one weaker, that one has to be stronger, and vice versa, like he just knows. And it's funny, I know now, like I can look at the settings and just change them. But I don't have any of the cognitive thoughts that he has to get to it. I don't even know how to do that. I just know that knob is gonna make this happen and that knob is gonna make this happen.

Hilary 14:13
Yeah. And I think it's interesting what he said about x strep that he used that for MDI and that he had even tighter control us just looking at the data coming back from that. I was like, how are you doing? You know, he really does understand

Scott Benner 14:25
and I've said it before, and I've said it to him too that he also has a younger child and as Do you and so we tried the the just like his idea for just one basil rate. And it worked great away from hormones. And then when hormones existed his settings were useless. Like they weren't they wouldn't work so I so I totally makes sense. I now think of Arden is like three different people. Yeah, and that fixed it. It just it didn't i didn't fight it. Like I hear people say all the time, like you can't figure out like hormones and you know, talking about periods pretty special. difficulty. And I just decided one day, I'm like, she's one kind of person in this, this space, she's one kind of a person in this week, and this week, she's a different person. And so her needs are different. I'll meet her needs. And then the next, you know, the next thing you have to do is figure out like, when does it happen? So, after a couple of weeks, you just see it like, okay, when, when this starts to drift up, these are the settings and when it begins to drift lower, then you go back to the other ones, and you get a little more aggressive with meal boluses in the for art, and it's the handful of days before the actual event begins. Which I say that way, because in my mind wants me to say it before she bleeds, and I'm pretty sure that's completely insensitive and correct. So I end up saying the event or something like that. Yeah, whenever Mazel Tov happens. So it really is interesting, but how is how, how are the outcomes now that you're all set up?

Hilary 16:01
I feel like we're good. It's, yeah, we we just kind of, I mean, there's days when she spikes and you know, I just kind of take care of that, but I feel like her car pound everything's, you know, right. And, you know, I try to keep her. I try to keep her under 130. I mean, usually, if I see a 130 I'm going to Bolus and I feel like we sometimes maybe have a little bit more like a feed insulin a lot, but I'd rather she snack so much. I mean, she's always eating I feel like so I know, there's gonna be a meal coming up anyway. So I would rather just make sure that there isn't a spike, even if I think it'll probably slow down, you know, cuz she's so young. And I have complete control because she's with me all the time. So I just think, give her the best care I can right now. Or you can Yeah, yeah, I do feel like Luke does a good job. I'm not just gonna leave it to loop to knock down something that's that if I miss if I miss time, something you know, which I feel like happens all the time. I don't know how you do it. I feel like with the the lunch that you give Arden and then she can you can just extend, you know, like put in the loop. what it should do. And it keeps like all of it comes in and works at the right time. Like I just feel like that's so hard to do.

Scott Benner 17:28
You're just basically fooling it into being in ludicrous mode the entire time, the foods, you know, just keeping everything turned up, meaning that there's real active Bolus and real active basil. And it's just happening. It's just fighting. I think of it as two flame throwers in a cartoon hitting each other. I don't I my I just there's pictures that pop up into my head. And so the food The food's just trying to, you know, it's trying to get to the other side and you're just trying to stop it. So you just you meet you meet force with force is how I think of it. Yeah, you know, and I do that with, uh, you know, different absorption times. Just tell what

Hilary 18:07
absorption times are you putting in? Are you doing because I do like chili like fruit and some sort of like meat, cheese things. But the fruit I found I thought that the fruit would hit like, all really fast. But sometimes it doesn't like sometimes I over Bolus up front was what I was noticing was happening. And then she would go kind of too low and they would cut off basil. So I started splitting the Bolus, but I still feel like that's not really right, either. So I don't know what I'm doing wrong. But I feel like the timing is still confusing to me. And I don't know if it's because of other foods she's eaten. Because there's not much time between meals, it's like two hours between meals. I do

Scott Benner 18:49
find that it's incredibly easy to overpower simple sugar. And even if it's there count wise, it might not need the same power. And if Yeah, if that makes any sense. Yeah, I mean, so I'm trying to pull this up right now so I can look for an example. So about a half an hour before you and I began, we decided to change Arden's pump. And, and she had been sitting on our CGM, oddly, and nobody noticed. So she didn't have a signal for like half an hour or so. So the loops now not engaged, and her blood sugar's going up and there's no loop. So she gets this like 190 blood sugar that just none of us notice right away. So now it's a 190 blood sugar, it's time to change the pump. So we put on a new pump and make us you know, make a little bit of a Bolus. She announced that she's going to eat something. And I said, Well, I have to go upstairs. So just Bolus 10 carbs now and then figure out what you're going to do and put the rest of it in. I just I don't know what you know, what else am I gonna do? And then I get a text message a little while ago. What is now about 40 minutes ago, now. And the text message just says, I'm having a big potato and reheated macaroni and cheese. No, that's great, you should sprinkle some rice overtop of it. Sugar because that rice has no flavor. And so I said, Okay. So what I did was 80 carbs, 40 carbs for four hours, 40 carbs for three hours. And I opened the loop, because I don't even want to mess with it. Because it's a new pot. It's a new pot. It's a new pump site. And I don't know how well it's gonna work or not. So I don't want to get into the intricacies of basil rates being taken away right now right now. I just want insulin. And you know, that's where we are. She's 187. So I think

Hilary 20:49
how often do you open the loop a day? No, not every day. No, no, no, no, no. I never open the loop. I never do it. But I maybe maybe I should if I get into a situation. So like yesterday, John's blood sugar went really high. And I think it was adrenaline. And it was just up and then it finally came down. But I mean, I Bolus she's on diluted insulin. She's so it's you 25 25% of one unit. And I mean, I gave her six units. And it was finally came down. It was so bizarre. Well, it was almost like a like she was getting sick kind of you know, yeah, amount because I usually don't have to give her it would be you know, just a couple units if she was like at 180. To get her back in range.

Scott Benner 21:41
I have a sort of a concept about high blood sugars. And it's something I use in my own life, but it turned it started as kind of a teaching tool. I guess while I was talking to people. And you know, it's it's nice if you if you have time to listen to the podcast, it'll come to you. Alright,

Hilary 22:01
Scott, wait, I've listened to every single episode. Every single episode and and many several times. I love your podcast. I'm like the probably your biggest fan I think, Oh, thank you. I absolutely love it. And I tell everybody about it. I've told her info about it. I can I like just think it's the best thing because it's taught me I wouldn't have I mean, it. I can't believe they let people go out of the hospitals without giving them like some direction. You know what I mean? Yeah, and without finding your podcast, I mean, I'd be in the weeds.

Scott Benner 22:37
That's very nice. You didn't have to say that. Although I'm glad you did. And because it makes me feel good. And it gives me a nice break in the conversation where I can put the ads.

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Do you or someone you love, have diabetes and find yourself checking your blood sugar? You know what I mean? Like a little finger poke and squeeze, squeeze, squeeze and dip, dip dip and then a beep beep and then number that if you do you should be using a good meter. Maybe a great meter, maybe an amazing meter. Why do you have a bad one? Wait, do you have a bad one? You don't even know do you? You've never even looked into your meter. That's okay. A lot of us haven't. Luckily for you. I took care of that. I got the podcast set up with the Contour Next One blood glucose meter. It is super accurate, easy to handle, easy to use, easy to see at night. And it has Second Chance test strips that stop your strips from being wasted. If you miss the blood The first time you know when you get some blood but not enough and you have to go back. That's your second chance. The Contour Next One blood glucose meter allows second chances and it doesn't hurt the accuracy of the test. If you have to go back in to get more. So you're not wasting strips. You're getting a great number and you're doing it with a it's a hip little beaner I was gonna call it like stylish but I don't know how stylish a meter can be. I can tell you this. If fits great in your hand, it's easy to use, it's easy to put in your pocket, your bag, your purse, wherever you carry your diabetes supplies. And it just flat out works. It also may be cheaper in cash, like out of your pocket than you're paying for your meter. Now through your insurance company, I'm not sure but that's possible. And you can look into that at Contour Next one.com, forward slash juicebox. There, you can find out everything about the meter, the company the test strips, see the cash price, find out if you're eligible for a free meter. It is a comprehensive website. Well worth a couple of minutes you're gonna spend looking around it when you get done listening to this episode. That's a lot of confidence for me, isn't it? All right, Mike, you're gonna go look at this thing. I have to tell you, I sometimes look at the site. And I think who put this together? There's so much good information here. Well done, I think. And then I clap my hands lightly. As if I'm at the opera. Contour Next One comm forward slash juicebox links in the show notes, links at Juicebox Podcast comm support the sponsors support the show, let's get back to Hillary. And how she tortured me and then told me to get rid of the episode, delete it, just kill it like it. You know, it's like one of my children in these episodes, and she just wants it gone. wasn't that easy, Hillary? Just give it away like that. I have feelings. Just she's just like, hey, just get rid of the episode. You know, no big deal. Just go. I'm teasing Hillary, I really like her. Let's get back to the show.

What I was gonna say is before you were so kind is that when I'm talking to people who have not listened to the podcast the way you have, right who were coming into it in full freakout mode, you know, so I see I see it a lot on the Facebook page, like some people are just like, Hey, I'm here to listen to the podcast. And then they do it. That's just really cool. As a matter of fact, the podcast just had its best month ever. And this month had more downloads than the first two years of the podcast combined. Wow, crazy. That is awesome. So I appreciate you telling people because the word is definitely getting around. But But anyway, sometimes you get these people and they don't have all the ideas, and they still are having such bad outcomes that you want to try to get them somewhere stable to start over. Right? Yeah, so I have an idea about high blood sugars, the way I think about a really high blood sugar is crush it, stop it, get it stable. Because if you crush it, it's going to fall. And you have to stop that drop without causing another high because I just because you have to write so you know. So it's crushed it, stop it, get it stable. That's it. And I employ that for my own mistakes. Because I think it's almost impossible for most people to disembark the roller coaster while it's moving. I can do it. And I'm sure you'll be able to do it at some point people listening. But when you're first starting out to turn a 250, you know, into an ad during a meal is is a ninja plus level move. And like I can do it I could Bolus for a 200 give my kid a baked potato and and macaroni and cheese not be in the room not count the carbs not weigh the potato and end up at a good blood sugar. But, but most people can't What they need is the ability to start over with. And and so when that happens on loop, I just use the same concept. But you have to you have to open the loop to do that. So it doesn't take away the basil.

Hilary 29:09
I wonder if that was the issue because, you know, I'm also like, I feel like I can he's always said you know, don't trick loop don't tell it you're doing like don't put in fake carbs, you know, things like that. And so I'm like, I'm not going to be a fake Carver. And, and so I think you know, but also it's like the the nature of diabetes. Sometimes you're like, this takes this amount of insulin and you just I feel like sometimes I just beat my head up like yesterday. I was like, well, it doesn't take this much. It takes this much. You know, after you've done it a few times you think you know what, you know, which is something you say but then yesterday didn't work. It was weird. I don't

Scott Benner 29:43
know. Well, that's not fake carbon, though. Yeah, that's a dressing glycaemic load of food, right. So there can be I know that at some point, people are gonna be like, please stop saying this, but it's really important and nobody pays attention to it. So you know, you Get 10 carbs worth of baked potato and 10 carbs worth of I usually say watermelon because they're pretty diametrically opposed, right? And those two things are going to impact your blood sugar differently. So so whatever ratio you have set up for, you know, say your one unit per 10 carbs, that one unit might handle that watermelon perfectly, it may, in fact, handle a number of foods perfectly. If you actually had 10 carbs of it, it doesn't mean it's going to work on the baked potato. So if you know that the baked potato needs the insulin equivalent of 15 carbs, that's not fake carving. You don't that's not lying about carbs. That's being honest about need. Right, which is, you know, I don't even think that's splitting hairs. I just think that's a setting that the pumps and algorithms don't have, you know, I wish that they did one day they might but for now, they don't. You know, for sure. But anyway, yeah, that's, that's what I like to do. And it's so instead of the old fashioned way, you know, prior to an algorithm of crush it, stop it, get it stable. I do with a loop. I do crush it. figure out exactly when to turn the loop back on. Let it get stable on its own.

Hilary 31:22
See, I should have done that. I should I never open the loop. Like I said, I never do it. And that and I probably because I'm trying. Yeah, I probably should have yesterday and

Scott Benner 31:30
it's a different spot for everybody. I would imagine but Arden's about 140. Diagonal down. If you reengage the loop right about there, it gives it enough time to catch it.

Unknown Speaker 31:40
Oh, that's good. Yeah.

Scott Benner 31:42
And keeping in mind, too, this is important. I think most of our ties don't go much over 200. So it's not like we're, but it's still a fair amount of insulin, you know, that I'm talking about? Yeah.

Hilary 31:53
I mean, anything over 120 I feel like it gets a tax, you know? What do you feel like when it's over money, I get the tax, you know, gets a, because if you ever want, it's like so easy to bump in nudge, like you always say, you know, if you're, you know, in a really nice range, it doesn't take much insulin, but once it starts creeping up, it just takes more and more and more.

Scott Benner 32:14
Yep. The higher the higher, you get the you know, the I see people think of it as your insulin resistant, but I prefer to think of it as you know, it's a number you just didn't hit correctly. So now you have a deficit. So you I think of it as a deficit of insulin, some people call it an insulin resistance. I don't know that they don't, in theory and function mean the same thing. But right, you know, it's just the, it's just the way I prefer to think about it's the way that works on my brain. To be perfectly honest with you. I just want to I just want to understand what I'm doing. So you're on to talk about low carb eating, aren't you?

Hilary 32:53
I am low carb not very not not extremely low. We're low ish, low. It only

Scott Benner 32:58
took me a half an hour to get to really getting good at this podcasting thing, but I was enjoying our conversation. Wait, oh, people who like tune in because this one's gonna be called how we eat lowish carb. And then people are going to listen to us talk about stuff for half an hour, and then we're gonna start talking about carbs. And I'm like, this could have been upfront and to you, I tricked you. You're still listening. No, just kidding. No, no, I like having a nice conversation first. So we know, kind of what your situation is, and put people in a mindset. Yeah.

Hilary 33:27
I mean, I felt like the the situation was that she was diagnosed so young, too, you know, so that was part of the, the low carb approach was that the in the hospital, they were like she needs to eat. I think they told me 50 carbs per meal. Like, okay. And then I like put together a meal and I was like, like, how was she going to eat? She was also like she she had because she got sick. She had RSV at six months. And I noticed sort of that she kept on getting sick and different illnesses, a lot of ear infections. And and so that

Scott Benner 34:11
was RSP because I thought of Ruth Ruth Bader Ginsburg,

Unknown Speaker 34:14
when you said

Hilary 34:16
was like, wait, what is she sorry, RSV. It's like a respiratory infection. babies get sometimes end up in the hospital. So I think that's kind of what triggered things because after that, it was just like a slow decline of just her getting Yeah, take her to the doctor. Oh, I don't you know, she's just an ear infection. Okay. And then, finally, I took her in that last month, every single week and I was like, something's wrong with her. Something's wrong with her. And then she finally saw her pediatrician. But she was in decay at that point and had thrown up that day last she was instead of 19 pounds, she was 17 pounds. And like, you know, it was just those are

Scott Benner 34:56
those are Arden's exact weights. 19 pounds 70 I

Hilary 34:59
know I've heard you say that. Yeah. And it was funny because I don't know if it was, it's funny now, when we're, you know, in the house, and we were in a doctor's office, they did the meter, the nurse, you know, gave her a blood check. And it just said, you know, hi on it. And I was like, as you thought, Oh, that's so nice. It's it, you know? So that that made me laugh when you said that, because I thought the same thing was like, What a great, you know, little instrument.

Scott Benner 35:26
You know, only older people would have that thought who had really crappy electronics as a child, just like, Oh, look, it comes on and says, Hello, this is lovely. Yeah.

Hilary 35:38
Yeah. They told me so we went to the hospital after that, obviously. And then they were like, yeah, give her you know, I think it was like 30 to 50 carbs per meal. But I remember it was a it was a lot. It felt like a lot. And you know, we live in California, I eat pretty healthy. We, you know, we didn't really I mean, I don't know, it just, it just was. I think that's just how we ended up there. Because I was giving her Luckily, she was on diluted. And that was that made a huge difference. I felt like with just the not having a ton of lows and highs but she was on, you know, the level here at night, which was, you know, she would have you know, lows at night. It was it was tricky when everything first started, but it felt like, well, we can kind of do small meals, do like 15 carbs per meals and snacks throughout the day, then that kind of makes my life easier, in turn makes me happier and my family happier. So that's kind of how we got there.

Scott Benner 36:38
Alright, so I've like a layered question here. But first, I want to point out that you said, you know, we live in California so we eat healthy, which is why a lot of people don't like people from California in case you're wondering. You're like obviously I'm a healthy person. I live in California.

Hilary 36:54
I just went there's a lot of options. Right now actually, because we're escaping the fires. So we drove here with my fit like me and my kids and my husband drove to Texas. That's where we're from. Okay, cuz you're totally

Scott Benner 37:06
not from California. You said a word early on and it made me think to ask you where you were from. Originally, I made one. I made a note to ask where you're from originally. Now. I can't remember what word triggered me. But we're in Texas. We're about not exactly where because people will come and find you, Dallas. Oh, yeah. I'll tell you, Texas is I'm leaning on my wife about Texas because I feel like I could find no snow and no humidity somewhere in Texas.

Hilary 37:34
Now, it's so humid here, everywhere. But about Austin. I don't know, man. It's it's very buggy. There's so many bugs here too. And I'm not I'm not scared of bugs. I don't mind bugs. But I mean, I came back and I my ankles like everything's eaten up by running very buggy.

Scott Benner 37:52
Let me just believe this exists. Because as I get older, I don't want snow and I don't want humidity. These are my goals. They're very small goals.

Hilary 38:01
Sounds like the West Coast. Why don't you go to new or New Mexico or Arizona? I don't know. Everybody loves you in Salt Lake City. Right.

Scott Benner 38:09
I'm huge in Utah. I know. Sure. I could be the next leader of the church if I tried. I'm serious. I don't know if that was insensitive. And if it was, I apologize, but I think it's true.

Hilary 38:24
I mean, they like you. They're just like, it's beautiful, too. I've never, I've only driven through but it looks amazing.

Scott Benner 38:30
Someone sent me. Someone from Utah heard me say this and sent me a town. They're like, go here. And I looked online, and I was like, I'll be damn, I would like to live there. It was just really beautiful. You know? Yeah. Anyway, so. Okay. What I was gonna say is, you're kind of interesting, because of the timing of Joan's diagnosis in history. I mean, but you're almost gonna you're almost like a person who, you know, 10 years from now is gonna you know, you'll you'll meet somebody who bought a car that runs on gasoline, and you'll be like, oh my god. Wow, where'd you get that? And like, you know, your kid had diabetes for three months. And you put her on an algorithm. Yeah. And was she lower carb that whole time?

Hilary 39:13
Wait, it was more than three months because we did some things before it she she was diagnosed at 11 months.

Scott Benner 39:19
He did some things like he robbed the bank. What are we talking about? You did something

Hilary 39:22
Wait, I'm thinking maybe she was 17 months then but it said porch. I mean, I looked at my pictures this conversation has been a lie believe it No, no, but I mean, I look back at my pictures and it said for it was 14 months it was in February. So yeah, it was really quick after

Scott Benner 39:39
maybe your computer doesn't know what month it is. But that's not the point. Quick No,

Hilary 39:42
she didn't do MDI is very, very long. At all. You also with she got the the G six. Also when we left the hospital, she had a Dexcom she was wearing one from California. Say everybody leaves with the Dexcom from California.

Scott Benner 40:04
Hillary do not ruin my joke. I set that joke up masterfully sorry. Honestly, cut me a break. Okay, let me know though. No, but that's that's so far that's how did you talk them into a Dexcom? How did you even know to ask for one

Hilary 40:19
might well, my husband when she was diagnosed just like he was like we, you know, he's he just wanted to figure out the best things that we could get for her. And he's like, we need to get a pump, we need to get a Dexcom He's like, like the Omni pod. He was just had it all figured out. I was in the hospital just like, not able to talk pretty much like laying in the bed with Joan, you know? Yeah. So he figured it all out. And he's like, the tech guy, and that he does like all the research and all this stuff that we need to he set up our loop. And then I do the settings, which I think, you know, it's usually one person. I don't know, a lot of people I know, because it's a lot to take on setting it up. Well, I mean, people do it. But for me, it seems like a lot.

Scott Benner 41:00
Yeah, I don't know what I'm doing still. Like, there's, they're like, right now people are like, oh, there's a new version of the loop. And, you know, you have to rebuild nightscout or something like a No, thank you. I mean, it's still work and don't have to do it. You know, when I'll do it, by the way, is when I force Kenny to help me or anyone else, I'll just go online. And I'll, I'll I'll exchange some of my goodwill for help because I'm really confused by all that stuff. It's, it's, it's it's not dissimilar, by the way then how I make adjustments on pumps. I just, I just know turn that knob or click that box like I can get through the setup, but I have no tangible idea what I'm doing. Right. I just know where to click. It's Yeah, I must be infuriating to people who, whose minds work differently. But it's the best I can do. Yeah, it really is terrible. So what does lowish carb mean?

Hilary 42:03
Well, for me it it's just like, I'll, I'll I'll give her we'll try things. You know, I'm not I'm definitely if we're, you know, out and somebody has brought something to the park Well, well, not these days, but maybe in the future. You know, well, boys experiment with stuff. But I mean, when we're eating around the house is just, you know, as many lower carb options is sort of what I'm offering. And then I do like to make sure she gets you know, 10 to 15 carbohydrates. At least with the breakfast, lunch and dinner, and then snacks also if she wants, so it's like for breakfast, she had yogurt and berries. But the yogurt was sort of like a more high protein. Yogurt, which is not easy to Bolus for because you have for me because she is low. Like we all kind of eat lower carb sheet, especially with her being little like she's like a little kid, her body can produce ketones, right? So I don't want her to ever have high ketones because of her diet. So I that's why it makes sure that we check ketones, that she's that she's getting enough carbohydrates to kind of flush them out too. So you're trying she's also getting a lot of protein.

Scott Benner 43:20
Jenny explained this to me one time so there are ketones that come from eating and ketones that come from not enough insulin, they're not the same thing. And they and they don't and I ketones might be the wrong word. Because I remember complaining during that episode that there were so many words that sounded like each other that meant something different. But so it's you're just trying to avoid it more because she's such a tiny person. It leads the weight loss to right like

Hilary 43:47
Yeah, right. Yeah. But she hasn't had she's only been gaining weight and she's like, I don't know at a third 70th percentile which she's always been so she's I mean we eat a lot of so she eats like yogurt berries for breakfast or like she had I get this like low carb bread called sola. And it like with Walden farms jam on it in the morning or she'll eat bacon with fruit like usually berries or apples with like walnut butter. She also has like she has some allergy stuff going on or she's allergic to eggs and to soy and almonds so it's been tricky like just with some foods that she can't eat but we do a lot of nuts though even though she's allergic to almonds and we do a lot of nuts for snacks and about lunches. lunches. Sometimes like just leftovers from the night before if it's like chicken and vegetables asleep the chick she's usually She's like a little kid so she's I always I tried to offer vegetables to my children but they don't always they almost never eat them. salami is pretty easy cheese is she loves the least chocolate. I know they were a sponsor at some point or they still are you still

Scott Benner 45:12
have a switch over at the company and then we're going to get back on track.

Hilary 45:15
Okay, cuz we're I'm also obsessed with the chocolate like we buy so much Lily's chocolate. Because you know, it's like olives and lilies chocolate are like the two things I do not have to ball Bolus for everything else. I have to definitely give her insulin for I make what I make waffles out of, like, hurt out of, you know, alternative sort of nut flowers and stuff, right? Yeah, so I mean, there's a lot pretty much and especially with like the keto craze, and people like thinking, you know, doing like low carb diets, I feel like it's so much stuff now you can buy. But for me, it's just easier to do like, lots of different fish and meats and offer those and there's this stuff called moon cheese and like the parmesan, cracker kind of things that I mean, if she wants other stuff, and we're out, I'll also do that it's just, you know, she's here day to day. Yeah, with also my let me know, with my, I have a five year old, you know, trying to wrangle them and all that I just feel like it was putting in so much insulin, and getting the timing right and not getting like, you know, forgetting this or that it just felt like a lot of pressure and stress.

Scott Benner 46:35
So is can I ask you is the is the lowest carb diet a, a, an actual decision about nutrition? Or is it more about making bolusing easier, and the rest of the family just went along with it

Hilary 46:50
felt like it's both because I always have sort of eaten. I mean, always kind of ate this way. Anyways, we didn't eat a lot of bread. And then but my husband did. He was like, eating pizza and all kinds of stuff. And he always has. But ever since john is diagnosed, he stopped eating all of that kind of stuff. And he only eats like meat and vegetables now.

Scott Benner 47:12
Do you believe that during the day when he's not at home, he's just sitting in this car? I

Hilary 47:15
do I do. He's really he's he found also the rebel ice cream. So that's like his thing. He'll have like a pint of rebel ice cream at night, which Joan also can have, which is very cool. But I just feel like there's so many alternatives. And, like right now that it's it's easy enough

Scott Benner 47:37
just to stay on the lower side of carbs.

Hilary 47:39
Yeah. Because then, you know, we can just, like go to the beach, and I don't have to worry about how much insulin she has on board. And I have friends who, you know, it's just, I see the other side. And I feel like, gosh, that looks stressful. You know, because when we're at the park, the most unit she has on is maybe three and that's you know, she's so that's really only point seven, five, because it's diluted, you know, I mean, sometimes it's more but it's it's a it's where I could give her one card and she would be back at where she's supposed to be you know, so and I don't get the spikes and the drops. And so I feel like for right now her being so little and us just all being together as a family for the most of our days, it's especially in quarantine right now.

Scott Benner 48:24
You don't need extra things to be worried about or anything. And by the way, I not that you need my approval. But it sounds completely reasonable to me. And it sounds like it's working really well. So I mean, do you think there'll be a time? Where if she were to come to you and say like, Look, lady, I had pizza at a party? I don't know what to tell you. But I want more of it. Do you think you'd be able to handle bolusing it or do you feel like like so I guess what I'm saying is, is that being lower carb for managing insulin? Some it strikes me like it's sort of like setting the video game to beginner. And you know, so that it just, you know, everything's a little a little more forgiving as you're going which is terrific. It's it's an amazing idea. Obviously. My question isn't, you know, do you think you can sustain this? I don't think like that. But like, say it happened. say she's just like, I'm gonna eat this now. Would you need you'd need some practice, I would imagine, right?

Hilary 49:30
Yeah, I mean, I think with any I mean, we've we've I Bolus true pizza before. And one time, it was great. Another time. It wasn't another time. It was good. You know, like, so it's like, yeah, everything just takes practice. But I think because she's so little Like, right now it's just easier if she's not asking for something than to just do low carb. But if she does ask for something, then I certainly want her to be able to try it and you know, yeah, but you know, we went out to dumplings the other day. Like when I say the other day, it was probably a year ago because we've been inside with each other for six months now. But um, and she, I thought she'd be totally into them. And she like, picked up one dumpling when we finally got our food and she was just like, oh, and she only ate the meat inside. And I was just like, Oh my gosh, you fooled me, you know?

Scott Benner 50:25
She needs a fresh piece of white toast with some butter.

Hilary 50:29
Yeah, actually, I use these for if I do give her food that she doesn't eat, I have the date bars with cashews in them. They're just dates and cashews. And they're so good. They're so easy to Bolus for and they're like 30 carbs. For one bar, I think or maybe they're the what is brand is that a ham what brand it is, but they're just dates and cashews. So I split one and a half, and that's 15 carbs. And so it's like, we miss something. She doesn't want it. It's there you go. And it's so study, and easy. But yeah, I think when she gets older, I have friends who I have. Like this one mom said her, you know, they were even like, very low carb. I don't know if they used our insulin, but they were very low carb. And when our son was diagnosed when he was really young, and then he got older, and he wanted to have pizza and God is friends and have burgers and things like that. So she, you know, he does that now. And she does that kind of work together and do their best. But you know, yeah, it's I say whatever. Well, I mean, the thing is, yeah, it's kind of for me, I think of it in like chunks of time of like, okay, for the next year, what are we going to be doing? And this is, so it's just so much easier the day to day to not have to, but I wouldn't, I wouldn't like it if she was upset that someone was eating something. And she was and I wouldn't want that situation at all. So if that was the situation, then I would say, okay, you want to try that? You know, let's do it.

Scott Benner 51:59
It's very possible that it'll never happen to her, she might just be very happy with how she eats. And that'll be that and,

Hilary 52:04
well, we've been out and she definitely has done that. So Oh, gotcha. It's okay. It's okay. You know, like it. It The thing is, is that we eat like this at home. And so when we are out and if things go sideways, I don't feel like I just think that the day to day of it would be for her age. And for me and like you said, this is like almost like the studying it on like a like a computer game to the beginning level. Because I am a beginner, I've only been diagnosed 11 months, and she just turned three. So we haven't been at it this long. So I feel like it It works great for that. So and there's just so many options, you know,

Scott Benner 52:42
yeah, no, I there obviously, obviously, is a ton of things that you can buy, and that tastes better than anything has in the past, etc. I was gonna say that, um, yesterday, an episode went up with a mom of a really young kid with diabetes. And she just threw herself into understanding how to Bolus for regular foods. She sends me something on Instagram every day, and food that the kid eats and the kids graph. And she's she's a rock star name's Tori. And she's amazing at it. And I just wonder, like, I would love for her to like I said, I'm having this Daydream where you like babysit her kid for a while. And she babysits yours for a while. And I see. No, they're on the east coast. So you'd have to FedEx them. And I think that's illegal. So and I don't know why it should be. But it definitely, by the way, if anyone's listening, I think it's illegal. It'll ship somebody in a box. But especially children, you think the The point is, is that she somehow figured it out. And and I don't know. Like you both listen to the podcast. So like, I'm just fascinated by that. Like, it doesn't matter to me, like, I genuinely mean it when I tell you, I don't care how anyone eats. And I'm going to end up saying this sentence probably on every episode of how we eat. But I just want people to understand how to use insulin. And from there, they can do it with whatever they want. And it sounds like you understand it really well. Now, it's just when you add more carbs, it's it's harder for you. And there's something in there like there's you're not bolusing and not for your your botching the timing or something like that. But it's doable. It's just not. It's not necessary. You know, I'm not arguing for or against any of the ideas of how people eat. I just interviewed a guy yesterday that was a vegan, and not for moral reasons, just just to eat vegan, and it's better for his body and he feels better. And I think that's cool. I actually think whatever people do that works for them is really great. I just want to sort of give voice to all the conversations. So

Hilary 54:51
I think that that's what I appreciate about your podcast is I don't feel like you have an agenda and you are genuinely just interested in people and their journeys. And I think in the type one community, sometimes I get nervous about talking to friends on either side, because it feels like there is like a divide or a stance that you have to take. And for me, you know, even saying like, we're low carb, like, it feels a little bit like, you're gonna be judged.

Scott Benner 55:18
You're not, you're like, you're like, you wouldn't be low carb enough.

Hilary 55:22
Oh, no, I think either way. Yes, yeah. Anyway, yeah, I do feel like and that's why I said low carb ish, because I didn't I didn't want someone to think that I was, you know, representing, because I'm not, you know, but it's, it seems like, just for me, it just makes sense to do what works for you. But I do think that's an interesting point that you bring up about, about the timing and that someone is doing it who has little kid and I sometimes I wonder, like, Am I am I not? Am I like scared? Because sometimes, recently, you ask somebody that like, are you just scared to give that amount of insulin? I was like, Oh, that's a good question for me to ask myself. Am I just scared? You know, of giving that much insulin? Or am I just trying to make it easier in my day to day life? Because if I give that amount of insulin? I would have? I mean, it seems like I would have to try it. Like at least seven times, I think to get things right. But with I feel like the little kids. She's always eating and it's so hard to like really get a good idea of Did you get the Bolus right or not? You know,

Scott Benner 56:32
I hear you. So what's the answer? I don't know. I don't know. Do you think about it for a second? I don't know. I'm what do you do you think you know? Yeah, of course. I know. Yeah. It's It's It's a mix of both. It started out because you because you were not having success? I would imagine.

Unknown Speaker 56:51
Yeah. And

Scott Benner 56:52
then it became easy. And now it's easy. And the further away from doing it. You get the harder it seems about right? I think it is. Yeah. I'm like, I'm almost a genius. I understand. I barely understand anything, Hillary just so you everyone listening understands. I'm good at watching people and, and knowing how to use insulin other than that. It's pretty much a mixed bag after that. But, but no, I would imagine that that's it based on what I've seen, you know, countless other people go through, I can tell you right now, if I come down to Texas and get my ankles bent a little bit, we can give Joan whatever. She wants to eat a bowl of soup for it and we'll be alright.

Hilary 57:36
We're going to be in California Scott. not staying in Texas.

Scott Benner 57:39
wasn't coming to Texas. So you know, it was more of a hypothetical, but I could do it. I also wonder too, how much does she weigh? Again? 31 pounds. How come you still diluting the insulin?

Hilary 57:51
We planted the loop until she's I think I'm four or five is what the end of said no, I think you get I mean, for me, it seems like tighter control because you don't have to. I mean, sometimes I wonder I don't know. I mean, you just her basil rates are, you know, some? Some of them are. You know, so little.

Scott Benner 58:20
How little how small. Like point two five? What would it be if it wasn't diluted?

Hilary 58:27
Uh, I don't think you could get it small enough. Right? Well, because it's, it's one unit is

Scott Benner 58:36
point two five doesn't make sense. It's point two five diluted, but she weighs 30 pounds. Let me look at what her setting. What's her a one say? Okay, would you tell me that? Yeah, it's a 5.5. I mean, it's working. I wouldn't change it if it's working. But obviously, I would just think at 30 pounds she could handle point two of regular at a regular strength. Yeah, I don't know. What's experimental. You're kidding. I'm just kidding.

Hilary 59:10
I mean, that's the only way to do it. That's the weird thing about type one. It's like, I remember when we first started on like, you know, can you tell me how much and then you realize it's all just you just experiment and see what happens you know, we I mean nothing really bad. No, if you're just if you're just trying things and poking around and not you know being too crazy nothing's gonna happen.

Scott Benner 59:31
I just the reason it's striking me is because I just released a person into the wild who I was helping privately and their their kid was like three years old and weighed like 40 pounds or something like that and, and the kid needed like ended up needing it. It's I don't mean it insultingly the kid and it I just said the same sentence. I'm just trying to avoid saying him so I don't get out of here. And instead I'm just being terrible. I'm like that thing that we were talking about. Anyway, the boy He's getting like half a unit an hour.

Hilary 1:00:04
We have sir her basil rate for the whole day is 4.8.

Scott Benner 1:00:08
Hold on. And that's the looted?

Hilary 1:00:11
Yeah, sorry, I don't have this info. I don't have her phone on me. I didn't know we're gonna talk about this. I thought we're talking about food. We are

Scott Benner 1:00:18
talking about food. So that's she's getting point two an hour of diluted insulin. Yeah, I see what you're saying. So that's probably, what's the dilution? How do you do one? Part Two? What one part?

Hilary 1:00:34
It's called diluent. So it's a I think some people use sailing. And then some people use dill, you went with different kinds of insulin.

Scott Benner 1:00:44
But is it like, Is it like a certain parts of insulin to a certain parts of the dilute? Brilliant? Yeah, yeah. What is it? How many parts? To what? Um, it's. So what do you mean? How many parts? How do you mix it? How do you do somebody mix it for you? Or do you mix it? I mix it? Yeah. Tell me how you mix it. As long as

Hilary 1:01:07
you want me to take you through how I mix it, I take out 250 units of insulin, right. And then I put in 250 units of Sorry, my kids are now walking into the room.

Scott Benner 1:01:26
Tell them we're doing something very watch a show. Yeah, watch a show, or find some pornography on their phone or something to leave us alone. So it's half in half. Basically, you're having it. So point two of this is equal to point one, I'm guessing have regular strength. And your pump will do that. Yeah, we're out. Yeah, we're on the Medtronic. Yeah, you're probably you think that we should move to to just not diluting anymore? Well, keeping in mind that I'm a dumb ass from New Jersey, who just bought a microphone and has an idea of how to get his voice onto the internet. I mean, I

Hilary 1:02:04
don't know. What do you think will happen if we don't dilute? Why will that be better?

Scott Benner 1:02:09
I just think you'd have more control over the insulin. What I might be wrong, you

Hilary 1:02:15
feel like do you feel like the diluting is is making it, like, diluted? I was thinking that it was making it not, like precise or something. That's what I fear is that, you know, because one little drop can make such a big difference, you know,

Scott Benner 1:02:34
so keeping in mind that what I know about this could fit into a thimble. I mean, that seems reasonable to me, but I could be 100% wrong. But I would try it for fun one day, I could try that. I would just make I would make her basil rate point one use, like full strength insulin and see what happens. Interesting. I never I never would have thought of doing that. I mean, if she starts like, you know, dropping drastically I might go Ah, that didn't work. Yeah. But doesn't the pump do like point? 052? Also?

Hilary 1:03:08
Yeah, that's what I like about the Medtronic pumps

Scott Benner 1:03:11
totally doable. Yeah, yeah. Here's a good time to say again, nothing you hear on the Juicebox Podcast should be considered advice, medical or otherwise. I really, I genuinely mean I, I'm, I'm just thinking of this in a fanciful way. I don't I have no idea what I'm talking. But what's the point of it just that you don't have to dilute it anymore? What's the point of deleting it?

Hilary 1:03:36
I don't, I don't know. Cuz I was told, I don't know. I don't ask questions like this. I don't know. I was, I was thinking, Hillary, you're just

Scott Benner 1:03:43
making me upset that I didn't marry somebody who's more like susceptible to authority. And constantly arguing with my wife about every last thing. She's got a goddamn opinion about everything. You're like, I don't know, someone told me.

Hilary 1:03:55
That's like my husband. My husband's like, he's the one who was kind of like spearheading the more lower carb, sort of, he's like, how are we feeding her all this crap? This is crazy. What they're telling us, you know, and I was like, I don't know. They're telling us. I'm just following what the doctor told me to do. And he's like, you need to stop it.

Scott Benner 1:04:10
If I had to guess about that. 50 carbs a day at a meal thing? I would when you said that the first time what it made me think was they know a ratio in that doctor's office and it's based off of 10s. Right, and they were just like, well, she's little half it, give her five. Like, I just that really struck me is such an arbitrary thing.

Hilary 1:04:34
It's so arbitrary. So much of what they had told us, you know, it was they told us to give her 15 carbs to treat her. She was going low. And I was doing it and I was like, This is crazy. You know, she's 300 and now we treat her with one you know, one carb is usually what she needs. It's just it's it's unfortunate

Scott Benner 1:04:55
here sips of a juice box. Just a little bit. Stop just like that. Yeah, yes. Especially when they're that small. Well, I can tell you that six days ago, I met a lovely woman named Patricia. And that's not her real name, but she'll know that that's funny when she hears it, and her son, few years old, I don't remember now, which will probably make her upset. Little kid, blood sugars kind of all over the place. I think it took me maybe 12 hours to get the kids blood sugar stable. And then a couple of more days to teach her how to Bolus and a day after that to tighten up his his basil and get them right. And I just unfollowed her yesterday. And she's, she's doing great. So it and the only thing that's there is she had a willingness to learn something new. And she she I can't believe I'm saying it like this, because I don't mean it this way. She listened well. Like she spoke up when I said something crazy. But I told her in the beginning, if I say something that seems completely out of line, please say something because I'm not there. Like, if I'm saying something that just makes you feel like that's not something we should do, then say that otherwise, you know, we're going to make some adjustments, turn some knobs, see where he gets high, and when he gets low, and then you're going to Pre-Bolus and learn the difference between the impact carbs have and that's it. She I never, I've never spoken anybody privately who's picked it up as fast as she did. It was really interesting to watch happen. She even inside of that week fought with her doctor's office, because they saw the data and said, What are you doing? She's like, I'm keeping my kids blood sugar from spiking all over the place. And they're like, no, that's gonna hurt him. And she's like, No, I think you're wrong. Like she fought back. And yeah, in a week, she's is amazing. Like, she's the quickest turnaround ever. It was really, really interesting. And I'm simultaneously talking to one other person who won't believe what they see. So they just keep throwing themselves into the same problem every three hours. And it doesn't matter what I say, they're not going to listen, so I'm probably gonna suggest to them that no, we shouldn't talk because it's just not worth anybody's time. Yeah, and that's fear, in my opinion.

Hilary 1:07:15
Yeah. Fear is a big thing. I think with the just, I think I think I have had that. And I still do, you know, because but I think it's now mentioned, like we were talking about just, it's just easier this way. Sure. You know, but I also, you know, she's going to preschool and I started thinking like, Well, you know, I don't they can't operate her pump like, she's going to be going just a few hours. So there's, I don't know, when they're this little, it just seems so much easier because it's a one car will raise her blood sugar 20 points. So if you get a miss timing of something, which is also easy to do when they're this little, I feel like I have a lot of nose noses. I feel like I know, I'm on the podcast right now. But if I was listening to it, I feel like I know what you would say. Next, almost. It's really funny to be on it. But what do you think I'm going to say? I think he would say like, I think there's I think that I'm like, there's obvious fear, you know, of, of just like letting her like this, you would have so much insulin on board, and that it's a fear thing. And that I should just try it.

Scott Benner 1:08:26
You know, you're making me think that therapy is such a scam. So I just, I just get somebody in a room and then charge them money to make them say things out loud. They already know. But they haven't said. Yeah, but it's very helpful. I don't know. Yeah, I just, well, let's submit this your insurance to see if I can get a copay for mental health. And

Hilary 1:08:46
you should be I feel like your podcast would be awesome that it should be submitted to insurance, you should be getting some sort of like, payment for this because it really is. Okay. The whole timing thing is I think the part that's hardest, because, you know, the protein rises, you know, there's things that come later that can have so much power and one day, there'll be a certain amount and then the next day they won't, that's where I I was getting frustrated, I think at the beginning, because I would try something three days in a row for breakfast and every day, it would be different.

Scott Benner 1:09:22
Sir, any chance that that has something to do with using diluted insulin?

Hilary 1:09:27
I don't. I don't, I don't know. I wouldn't think so. I mean, I know a lot of people who use or looted insulin and it works okay, or not a lot. I mean, I know. Well, what

Scott Benner 1:09:36
about the idea that the the lower carb options? Do they have a lot more protein in them sometimes?

Hilary 1:09:47
A lot for protein, but that also can be a timing thing. So it's kind of funny because I'm like, I always think about that like when I deal with like a protein rise that I missed on and I didn't hit it like because with Lou I found that I can't really set out a three or like a four hour absorption to hit. And it won't, it won't hit it hard enough when the protein rise happens like that two hours later, or an hour half later, okay, so I have to put in that she's eating carbs. And it's a three hour absorption an hour and a half after she eats to get the protein rise, not to rise, but if I forget, or whatever, I feel like a lot of this has to do with just me being absent minded and not paying attention. Then it messes up, you know, and then I've missed it.

Scott Benner 1:10:37
Are you absent minded? You don't seem absent minded.

Hilary 1:10:40
Very absent minded. Yeah. I get distracted pretty easily. Yeah. Yeah. Like, shy?

Scott Benner 1:10:47
Or like, how bad?

Hilary 1:10:49
No, not that bad. But you know, I just, you know, it's like two kids, you start playing and you know, then you go on to the next thing. And then it's like, oh, I gave you insulin, those a Pre-Bolus. I forgot. Oops, that kind of thing. Yeah, it's like, it's just one less thing to worry about, well, I guess the truth comes out. I'm just trying to make my life easier here. While

Scott Benner 1:11:08
you were being self taught you were being reflective just now what I was really going to say was, it sounds like it's working really great for you. And I wouldn't change it. I was just, it was just fun to talk about. I mean, there are people with children, your child's age at your child's weight that are using pumps that with insulin is not diluted was really my only point. But if it's working for you, then whatever, I just don't want you to get to the point where it stops working one day, and you're so far off of center that you don't even know how to restart.

Unknown Speaker 1:11:36
Yeah, you know,

Hilary 1:11:37
you know, it's interesting, because I mean, that's just protocol at the hospital that we're seeing that that if they're under three, they get diluted insulin that you as the parent gets to mix up every couple of weeks. And it's just part of the process. I remember when they told me that I was like, This is crazy. I can't mix up medicine. What am I chemist? Like? Are you kidding me? This like more stuff?

Scott Benner 1:11:59
What if I forget in the middle of me mixing it up what I'm doing?

Hilary 1:12:02
My husband did that. Like he was supposed to be the mixer for me. And he I came home and he was like had Crazy Eyes. And he's like, I don't know which one I put it in. If it was like diluted if it's the Kimball auger that diluted and I can't. I was like, Okay, stop. Just give me I'm gonna do this job. So,

Scott Benner 1:12:19
episode of Breaking Bad ever. Guys, shoot anybody? You're still money? No, no. Well, you're in Texas. Now you can shoot anybody you want. That's not true. You can't just shoot anybody in Texas. I just need to say that I think. Well, that's a listen. I appreciate you coming on. And I didn't, we didn't talk about what I expected, we would talk about as much. But I feel like we did at the same time. I feel like we talked about I feel like we talked about something that happens to a lot of people, especially people who are probably parents of younger children are people who just struggle out the gate. And the and when they don't figure out how to use insulin, the next very reasonable step is well, I'll limit the carbs then. I mean, I think that's completely reasonable. I always just have a feeling that I don't want you to, I don't want you to eat any certain way. Because you feel like you can't figure out the insulin. If you want to eat that way. I think that's really terrific. I genuinely believe that. But I don't I I'd be sad if I thought that every day you were making a plate and thinking, I really want an English muffin. But I don't know how to Bolus for it. That's all, that's all. And I think you could figure it out because other people have and they couldn't. And like I said, if you FedEx me that kid, I'll get her some pizza, get her all set up. But send a note with her because I don't think you can transport children over a state line like that. I'd probably be capping or if that happened. But But seriously, like, you know, just don't be do what you do. Because you want to do it. Yeah, I guess that's what I'm saying. And it's cool to know that there are a lot of low carb options. And it was interesting to hear you go over some things that she eats, that she enjoys a lot. But it was also interesting to hear you say that she has seen other food and been like, hey, Mommy, how come? I don't know french fry? You know? So

Hilary 1:14:22
right. I mean, I tried to do it when you know when we're out. And if she does want something, I feel like that's really reasonable. But if she wasn't happy with options at home, I think I would rethink things. But I think it's just she also was when she was diagnosed, she was just starting to eat finger foods because she had been sick for like a month before that, you know, and so it was just all everything was kind of skewed from there.

Scott Benner 1:14:52
I think bottles get used up to about like two years, right? It's not about that. It's about reasonable like breastfeeding or bottle feeding.

Hilary 1:14:59
Yeah. I was breastfeeding at the time. And I did stop that because that was it seemed really stressful. And then I found out I mean, I've heard from other people you've had on your podcast that they kept going and they just kind of rolled with it. It was pretty inspiring

Scott Benner 1:15:13
on a Bolus for

Hilary 1:15:15
Yeah, but it's I think, mainly I just want her to feel healthy day to day. And for our family to be happy. And, and not. I feel like when I went, you know, sort of, without knowing that she's definitely going to eat something to give her so much insulin, it gets tricky. Yeah. Do you ever did you feel like that beginning with Arden? Yes, like

Scott Benner 1:15:39
100%? Yeah, yeah. But what I figured out to do is what I tell people to do on the podcast now, which is juicebox, or pick, pick an amount of food you just for sure know, they're going to eat and that's your Pre-Bolus even if it's five carbs and Pre-Bolus, five carbs.

Hilary 1:15:54
And what happens when the timings off on it? So you're, then you're dealing with like a 200, or 250?

Scott Benner 1:15:59
I don't do that. What are you talking about? So you put in the five carbs, right to get some sort of a Pre-Bolus. And the minute the second, that you see that there's more food going in you Bolus. You don't wait till they're done eating, you go, okay, five carbs are in I've got a nice Pre-Bolus things are moving my direction. Also keep in mind, my daughter starts a meal at a reasonable blood sugar. It's not like I'm Pre-Bolus Singh, five carbs on a 250 blood sugar. It's right, you know, she's more around 100 somewhere, one, one side of the other of it. So you would get a little bit going, let it work as a Pre-Bolus give her the food. As soon as five carbs go in, and it's clear, she's gonna keep eating you Bolus for the rest. And that's it. And then that way, there's enough in there to make up for the timing. That's what I didn't. I mean, that's what that's that's what most people do, I think, who have little kids. And it's interesting. I think I've said it on here once before, but somebody contacted me privately once who had gastroparesis, who wanted to Pre-Bolus and we talked on the phone for like a half an hour. And at the end, I said like, I'm sorry, I can't think of what to tell you. Like, I don't have any, even like Fs suggestions here for you. I said, Oh, except you could Pre-Bolus the way people Pre-Bolus for infants was like, just give yourself a little and then once you see that the insolence impacting the way you expect, then give yourself the rest because the problem could be is that they could eat no digestion happens. And so the so the the you know, the glucose is not being pulled up by the blood. Now all that insolence in there, it's gonna, it's gonna kill you. And so once but once they see that digestion is happening, then add they need the insulin right away. And so they did the same thing.

Hilary 1:17:41
Yeah, I guess mine is just more of a timing thing, because I feel like I want to keep things under 180.

Scott Benner 1:17:47
Yeah, no, I know. But you definitely could. But it takes practice. But Alright, so this was good. I enjoyed this. Did you have fun? Did we not talk about anything that we shouldn't have that we should have that we know

Hilary 1:17:59
I think everything was good. I've got my whole family in here. Now. They found me

Scott Benner 1:18:03
as Jonah. Like, can we like pinch her so she cries so we can hear or something like that? Is that? JOHN, you want to say hi, john. He's trying to hear you, Joan. Hello, sweetie. How are you? Yes, Joan. Casey, hi. Hi. Hi, john. How are you? You know how good bread is? Oh, she's gone. Nevermind the turtles. Oh, that's really sweet. She sounds sweet. Yeah, she's a lot of fun. You didn't say that with a ton of conviction? Well, we've been we've been together for six months now. Yeah, she's fine as far as children go. Every day, same thing. That's great. Yeah, yeah, I hear ya. I really do. Alright, well, thank you so much. I appreciate you doing this. Yeah, that's fun. Cool.

A huge thank you to one of today's sponsors. g Vogue glucagon. Find out more about chivo Kibo pen at G Vogue glucagon.com forward slash juice box. you spell that GVOKEGL Uc ag o n.com forward slash juicebox. I also like to thank the Contour Next One blood glucose meter and remind you to go to Contour Next one.com forward slash juicebox to learn more about Arden's blood glucose meter. I also want to remind you to find the Facebook group for the podcast Juicebox Podcast type one diabetes.

Thank you so much for listening. I'll be back soon with another episode of the Juicebox Podcast. Please don't forget to leave an amazing review wherever you listen. tell a friend about the show or a stream I don't care. If you have to stand up on a bus and start talking about it. You need to do your part. Okay? I make the podcast, I get it to you doesn't cost you anything, the least you can do is stand up on a city bus, where there's about 60 people, I don't want you to waste your time with just three or four and say, Hey, anybody here have diabetes? I got a podcast for you. And say it out loud. If they seem confused, show them how to use their phone. Really, this is all I'm asking of you. Just public displays of affection for the podcast. And if you're an endocrinologist, or someone that works in the practice, and you've been suggesting the podcast to people, let me say thank you. That was really very kind of you. I appreciate that. All right now I'm really done.