Scott Benner 5/17/22 Scott Benner 5/17/22

#683 Diabetes Rodeo

Megan has type 1 diabetes and loves a good rodeo.

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

+ Click for EPISODE TRANSCRIPT

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

Scott Benner 0:00
Hello friends, and welcome to episode 683 of the Juicebox Podcast.

On this episode of The Juicebox Podcast, I'll be speaking with Megan. She is an adult living with type one diabetes, and she has rodeo stories, among other things. She actually has two sisters who also live with type one. We'll find out more about it on today's episode of The Juicebox Podcast. While you're listening, please remember 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 health care plan, or becoming bold with insulin. If you're a US resident who has type one, or is the caregiver of someone with type one, you have the opportunity to support people with type one diabetes and this podcast by going to T one D exchange.org. Forward slash juicebox. There you join the registry fill out the survey. And in fewer than 10 minutes, you've helped the podcast and people with type one with the simple answers to very easy questions. It's just data that they need, but they need you to go answer the question so they get the data. T one D exchange.org. Forward slash juicebox completely anonymous 100% HIPAA compliant this show is sponsored today by the glucagon that my daughter carries. G voc hypo Penn, find out more at G voc glucagon.com. Forward slash juicebox. I just received Ardens on the pod five order from us med it's a terrific place to get your diabetes supplies, head over to us med.com forward slash juicebox or call 888-721-1514 To get your free benefits check.

Megan 2:05
Okay, it's kind of surreal, because I've heard your voice for so long. It's weird that you're actually talking to me this time.

Scott Benner 2:12
Well, are you worried that it's a voice in your head because I can say something specific to you? I know your name is Meghan. A voice and I guess a voice in your head but no, you're Meghan as well. Right. Hold on. Let's think just something I know that your boy, I don't know anything. The voice in your head. Wouldn't I could be a voice in your head. Megan. Oh, well, right. Live with it. Yep. All right, Guy whenever you're ready, go ahead.

Megan 2:35
Hi, my name is Megan. I am a type one diabetic who've been diabetic for 26 years. I also have two sisters that are type ones. And we just get through this life together.

Scott Benner 2:47
You have any other siblings besides those two sisters?

Megan 2:51
Yes, we have two brothers that are not type ones

Scott Benner 2:54
who see your parents make female type ones not male type ones.

Megan 2:59
Exactly.

Scott Benner 3:00
Do your brothers have any other autoimmune issues?

Megan 3:03
Nope. They're perfectly healthy. Bastards. Right. lucky then.

Scott Benner 3:10
Wow, that's interesting. Does your mom have any?

Megan 3:13
Nope, nobody in either side of our family has any really issues. They had done a lot of studies at the beginning when the first two are diagnosed because my oldest sister's 19 years older than I am. And so when they were diagnosed, it was three days apart. They had done a lot of studies trying to figure out like why it was just those two, they first kind of thought about maybe it was every other child. Well, then after my middle sister, my brother was born and he wasn't in type one. But my mom had lost one between the two of them. So they were like, Okay, well, it's not that. And my mom talks about how when she was pregnant with my younger brother. She said, I pray that he was a boy and wouldn't be a type one because I couldn't handle three of them. And then three years later, here I come a girl type one also

Scott Benner 4:08
my server to tell you that story.

Megan 4:12
Sorry,

Scott Benner 4:13
so you've had type one for 26 years. How old are you?

Megan 4:16
29 I was diagnosed when I was three. Okay.

Scott Benner 4:19
And how old is your older sister?

Megan 4:23
She's 48. So they've been they were diagnosed in 82. Wow, she was nine and then the middle sister was three. When they were diagnosed. Like I said three days apart. They ended up getting a conjoined room at the hospital. So that was probably a lot of fun for my parents.

Scott Benner 4:43
Wow. How old is your middle sister?

Megan 4:46
She is 43 Sorry, maybe

Scott Benner 4:50
you all have the same dad. Yep. Your parents are weird. I love this. Okay, it's gonna be fun. And then the brothers are Where did It just It doesn't matter. But I want to know how old are the brothers?

Megan 5:03
So that brandy or she's the oldest and then we've got a brother. That's after three years after her. Three years after her is our middle sister Kayla. Three years are 10 years later is my other brother. And then three years later is me.

Scott Benner 5:19
Wow. So basically 40 840-543-3326 or 2929. Yep. Wow. And how old are your parents? 112?

Megan 5:29
It seems like it's sometimes. I guess they feel like it but they're not. I think my dad's 72 Maybe No, kid. Really? No.

Scott Benner 5:39
Wow, they got going. And they didn't stop. Big breaks in between. Yeah.

Megan 5:45
Everyone always asked. They're like, Y'all have the same parents. Right? Yep. All the same parents. Question. Yeah. What just happened that way?

Scott Benner 5:56
Was I alright, I'm just going to ask this one last question, then I'll get off your parents, which seems like how your dad did it. He just asked the question and got off for a while. And I got back home again. So there's no family planning here. Like the idea of like, they just when babies came, they came, they make you guys on purpose? Like, what's

Megan 6:18
the last few of us? We're definitely not on purpose, but are like to think that we are the best two? I would imagine. So. I mean, we'll just go to leave it at that.

Scott Benner 6:30
What did your mom do for a living? Did you just sit around and rest her uterus? Or did you have a job? Or Wouldn't she?

Megan 6:35
She actually did have a job. She used to work in the school board. So she for a little while she was working in the lunch room. And then she moved to be a secretary at in school with kids with special needs. And then she turned into Yeah, she was a secretary, then she turned into a secretary at an elementary school. So when I went to school, my mom worked at the school. Yeah. And so it was pretty easy to go through, you know, all my type one problems with her. Only a few doors down. Cool.

Scott Benner 7:10
That's great. So all right. Do you have functionally a completely different diabetes than your older sister did? Do they mean? Like, did she have different gear and different ways to do it than you did? Did your mom have to learn diabetes? A number of times, I guess, is my question.

Megan 7:28
Um, I don't really think so. When we were younger. Now, nowadays, yes, absolutely. We all tend to it differently. We all have, you know, different ways to go about it. And we all have different agencies, for sure. So like, when, when I was diagnosed, my two big sisters were doing shots. And they were checking their blood sugar and all of this stuff. So I started doing my own shots when I was like, between four and five, just because they did it so I could do it. Which I don't know if that helped my mom or made her even more nervous. I was four years old giving myself a shot. I don't really know. But that's, you know, and I so I learned a lot from them up until I was old enough to figure out some things on my own and kind of veered away from some of the ways that they do theirs or have done them.

Scott Benner 8:28
Okay. Well, let's talk about you for a couple minutes. 26 years. That's i Five. I'm gonna guess it's 1995 said about right? Yes. Yep. Oh, wow. I'm sorry, shocked myself, because I was right. I wish that wasn't true. Okay. So 1991 That's crazy. Because when you say 26 years, I'm getting so old now. Like, that feels like 1980 to me. I don't know if that's something you launder. You probably won't understand that till you're older but so 1995 you're diagnosed you and you you're working with injections. And so are your soldiers. You're the rest of your family. What's the what's a goal? Like, do you know? Do you know what your mom was shooting for what she was trying to do? I mean, I'm assuming knock her out of her mind. But you know, like, how did she manage things?

Megan 9:24
Yes, I do. A lot of the mind was the main goal, I believe. You know, she just was trying to keep our blood sugar. I mean, back then, I feel like things have changed so much. Back then it was like you wanted your blood sugar between our what they were telling her I guess, was like 90 to 150. And if we were in there, we were good to go. If not, then we'd have to watch it to see where it was gonna go. And then we would do something about it. Which obviously Nowadays, I really don't even want to be 90 are for sure don't want to be 150. And I'm watching it every, obviously five minutes and making adjustments at all times, rather than how it was done whenever I was first diagnosed or even until I got an insulin pump, and I was in the sixth grade, like, okay, you know, so back then it was just, if it was above 150, then we drink some water, go exercise and come back and check and see if it was because I mean, you don't want to make your four year old do six shots in a day. So you're going to try something else to try to get your blood sugar down before you have to go that route.

Scott Benner 10:44
I see. And what what did you guys do for Lowe's?

Megan 10:49
Um, we just the normal like orange juice type stuff. Or just like a little candy, or Hershey Kiss, my mom is obsessed with them. And that's probably why because she had to keep them around for so long. Just to give us a little something to bring our blood sugars up.

Scott Benner 11:08
That's interesting. When did you I mean, you're talking now about yourself in the when you're talking about yourself in the present. You're talking like a person that has a CGM. So I assume you have one?

Megan 11:16
I do. Yes, I have a Dexcom.

Scott Benner 11:18
How long have you had that?

Megan 11:20
I think I've had it for about three years. Because I got it a little while before I got pregnant with my first little boy.

Scott Benner 11:29
Is that when? So I don't want to spoil things. And I also don't know the answer. But when did you like you're talking now like about keeping very specific blood sugars for yourself? Like, when did that start for you? And what got you going with that?

Megan 11:43
Um, I tried to keep it pretty steady, even on just the regular blood test. But it was when I actually got my Dexcom and could see, you know, I would the standard is, you know, you eat, you do a blood test, you know, an hour after you've eaten, and see what your blood sugar is, won't an hour after it was usually pretty good. Well, then when I got to Dexcom, it's like, oh, yeah, it's pretty good an hour after, but 20 minutes after it shooting straight up. So I guess it was when I got to Dexcom that I really started paying a lot more attention to keeping my blood sugar stable at all times, because I you know, do a blood test every couple hours. And if it was still pretty good. And you're like, oh, yeah, I've kept it this whole time. That was awesome. In reality, that is not how it was

Scott Benner 12:41
jumping up and then staying up and then probably crashing down. And you were just testing at times where it looked okay. Right. Yeah. I remember that feeling like I did. The nurse practitioner always told me to test at a certain time. And I thought, well, if I test then it's definitely going to be okay. Right. And she didn't understand why that didn't make sense to me as to what we really should understand what's happening in between, shouldn't we? And she's like, No, she's like, it's probably high. And I'm like, what, like, nobody. Nobody understands this, you know, so you get a CGM, and you start seeing it. A spike in a meal. What was your first? Like? How did you impact that?

Megan 13:24
So I was started talking with my endo a lot more about just trying to get it figured out on what because I also saw I got a Dexcom and a new pump on the same day, which maybe not wasn't a good idea. But it's fine. We we've got it figured out. So then we were working on, you know, I would call him more often and try and figure out, Hey, What settings do we need to change? And nowadays, I don't, I don't really call him, I just do. I just do whatever I think because obviously, I'm not going to make my setting change. And then my blood sugar's gonna stay 40 for four hours, and may not change back or at least bump it a little bit more. So he's pretty okay with me making some changes on my own. Just because I pay attention to it a lot more nowadays than, Oh, I'm able to pay attention to it a lot more than I was when I first started going to him.

Scott Benner 14:21
So did you like start Pre-Bolus thing? Is that how you? Did you not do that prior? And then the DEC did not?

Megan 14:27
I did not and I would I would rarely put in carbs. And I was like, Oh, I probably need two and a half units. We'll just go with that. And it was like, Oh, that probably wasn't correct. But it was. I mean, I was in college and rodeoing and always gone. So I was like, Yeah, this should work.

Scott Benner 14:48
rodeoing you said earlier? Earlier, I couldn't figure it out. You said earlier, tend to my diabetes. And I was like where did that come from? Like where does like 10 I've never heard somebody say 10 Do it like you would tend to a fire or attend to an animal. Is that where that came from? Do you think? Yeah, probably. Yeah, that's cool how long you've been riding?

Megan 15:09
Um, my entire family has my dad um, you shred bucking horses when he was younger, and then there's only the oldest sister she's the only one in our family that has not rodeoed my husband is a bull rider my brother's rope calves. I've roped My sister has it's just in the family. You know one of my uncle's owns a rodeo company. My brothers made them Super Bowl of rodeo is what they call it. This will be his 12th year and so it's just in the family. We've all done it and we all love the sport and continue to stay at the minute

Scott Benner 15:55
when you have diabetes and use insulin, low blood sugar can happen when you don't expect it. GE voc hypo pen is a ready to use glucagon option that can treat very low blood sugar in adults and kids with diabetes ages two and above. Find out more go to G voc glucagon.com forward slash juicebox G voc shouldn't be used in patients with pheochromocytoma or insulinoma visit G voc glucagon.com/risk.

If receiving your diabetes supplies is a constant headache, just know that it doesn't have to be you could be using us met. US med prides themselves on the white glove treatment that they'll be offering to you. They carry everything from insulin pumps and diabetes testing supplies to the latest and CGM like libre two and the Dexcom G six. US med accepts Medicare nationwide and over 800 private insurers better service and better care is what US med wants to give you head over to us med.com forward slash juice box to get your free benefits check or you can call 888721151. For us Matt has served over 1 million diabetes customers since 1996. And they'd love to add you to that list. So if you'd like to get 90 days worth of supplies and fast free shipping without all the headaches, check out us med there are links in the show notes of the podcast player you're listening in right now. And links at juicebox podcast.com to G vo hypo Penn, US Med and all of the sponsors

PBR is that the professional? Nope. No, that's,

Megan 17:57
that's the yes, that's the professional bull riding but we're in the PRCA, which is the professional cowboys Rodeo Association.

Scott Benner 18:03
Mike, if you want to hear something weird. Sure, so I had no idea that you rodeoed or that anybody in your family did, and yesterday. So it's a little bit of a side street, it may not come to surprise to some of you. But the popularity of the podcast, I get a lot of emails from people who want me to do things. And sometimes they're amazingly odd, like and don't seem connected to anything that I really am involved in. And yesterday I got an email from PBR and they want to know if I wanted to sell tickets to rodeos on my podcast. And I just thought, wow, I just deleted it. Because first of all, what am I gonna do you know what I mean? But secondly, yeah, I was like, No, I don't want to do that Delete. And then you came on here today and said, I rodeo. And I'm like, how does a word that never comes up in my life come up in my life twice in the last 36 hours. That's so strange. So I assume you live in Connecticut? No, I'm just using it.

Megan 19:02
We are in Southwest Louisiana. Okay, where the hurricanes hit last year that that was me. They they hit me right there.

Scott Benner 19:10
No kidding. How is? So you're not the first person I've spoken to from Louisiana like so how is healthcare there? Like, how was it talked about through your provider? Like, are you like the, like the most well controlled type one in your provider's office? Like, how does that what's the expectation?

Megan 19:30
I don't think I am. But I do know that. Like I said, He gives me a lot of leeway on things that I want to do on my own. Just because he knows that I pay so much attention to stuff. And when I go in, I'm like, Hey, this is what I'm seeing. I think we should change this. And that's not that's if I haven't changed it already. Because I like to let him you know, kind of, obviously give me his expertise on it right. And so we'll talk about that. But my endo is great. He's super smart. And he helps with whatever. But he also will sit there and listen to what I believe we should do rather than just been like, oh, well, you don't have a degree. So you don't know anything. I'm gonna tell you what to do. Okay, which is really, really good. You know, now both my sisters also go to him just because he's helped me so much. And as I said, always open to what I believe.

Scott Benner 20:31
Are you close with your sisters? Yes. Do you guys talk about diabetes visit not come up. Oh, all the time. Okay, all the time. How does that intersect with your, your communication and your relationships? With them?

Megan 20:45
Um, no, it just, I think it makes us closer. Because, you know, if my if I just reinserted my pump, and two hours later, still not doing what I need it to do. And I get aggravated, because I have to put another site and then I can always fix them. And you get the oh my gosh, I hate that. Or, man, that sucks. You know, that type of stuff.

Scott Benner 21:12
But yes, it's right. The camaraderie. It does.

Megan 21:14
Yes, absolutely. I think I wouldn't, I wouldn't be on the weird, I wouldn't be the diabetic I am today without them. That does sound weird. But in the same token, that is true. You know, I know. It sucks. And I can tell them Yeah, it does suck sometimes. But I'm also going to be there when, like our middle sister, she just got on a Dexcom and just got on the same pump that we have, not that long ago. So she's still figuring out the settings and things like that. So, but she can call either one of us and say, Hey, this is what's going on. Or we see because we're all following each other on our Dexcom. So we're like, you know, the middle of the night texture, hey, change your basil, you know, things like that. So it does make it way easier. And that's not even talking about how when your insurance takes forever to get your supplies, and you have to call them and be like, hey, the Dexcom sensor. I'll give you one back whenever I get my supplies. And you know, that's that. That's, that's really cool. I hate that we all have it. But it makes it a lot easier when you can do things like that.

Scott Benner 22:29
So you find yourself sitting around sometimes looking at one of your sister's blood sugars in like kind of a thoughtful way. Like, what I wonder what she should be doing or what's going wrong here, etc. What is she doing? Right? Yes? Do you ever find yourself more interested in their blood sugar than yours? No. Okay, that's a fair

Megan 22:48
No, I. So I just had my second son. He'll be two months old on the 31st graduation. And so thank you, that was a big deal was to make sure that my blood sugar's were where they needed to be because it wasn't just for myself. It was for them. And so when I had my first one, I started paying a lot more attention. And you know, making sure that like I said, my blood sugar's were in the right spot for him, not for me. He was depending on me, and I need to lead them in the right way and get everything on the numbers that they needed to be for him to succeed and be well on his way. And rambunctious little guy just running around with no cares in the world.

Scott Benner 23:38
Well, he's got to ride a horse one day, it sounds like

Megan 23:40
he's been on them.

Scott Benner 23:43
So what did you do during your pregnancy? That that mean? Did you get this success that you were hoping for?

Megan 23:49
I did. Um, so my first one I went to was about 5.0 the whole time. And my second one, it was 4.9. To my OB his son is a type one. And so that's why they kind of over at our Endo, they kind of encouraged us to go see him. And he's also great. And so when I started going there, he's like, Yeah, your blood sugars are pretty good. And then when I went to 4.9, he's like, Well, that's pretty low. I don't know if we want it that bad. Well, no, that's fine. And so then he started saying he's like, Well, high blood sugars cause more birth defects. He's like low blood sugars don't really cause any. Well then my endo was like 4.9 it's too low. We need to get it out. We need to get it up. So I mean, there was that but still, it was pretty stable. First one wasn't.

Scott Benner 24:44
How did you how did you make that happen? What did you just get very aggressive with your insulin? Did you change your diet? Like what did you do?

Megan 24:50
I'm just a lot more aggressive with my insulin and obviously listen to your podcast and knowing about because Like I told you in my email, I've been diabetic for a long time. But I've learned a lot just listening to what other people are saying, or, you know, the episodes that you're doing to help. No, I moved my high alert 120. And I started paying attention to the Pre-Bolus to see when I should actually do it. Just different things like that. Put a lot more effort into and before I was pregnant by a onesie was 6.0 Maybe. So it wasn't like, that was good. I went from eight till to a 4.9. Yeah, you know, so it was still pretty good. But like I said, once, I found out I was pregnant, it was it was actually my Endo, who did the bloodwork and told me that I was for sure pregnant. And so once I found that out, my mindset changed. Like I said that it was for him. And it wasn't just for me, well, you

Scott Benner 26:03
got to keep your body in good shape, you have to have three more kids.

Megan 26:08
I don't know about that. My husband, every time anyone asked him how many kids he wants, he says 12. And I say you can have 12. But I'm not going to wait for that. Yeah, you can find some

Scott Benner 26:20
people maybe to get that. Right. Well, what is he Rockefeller? How much money he got? Who's paid for these

Megan 26:28
kids? Right? I don't know. If he just thinks you know, kids are free labor. I can help them with the cows and all the things we got going on. I really don't know. But he says that anytime anyone asked him?

Scott Benner 26:40
Do you have a farm? You or your husband? Yes, we,

Megan 26:43
we have some, some pastures that are ours. And then we have some lease pastures and Cows and dogs and all the good stuff.

Scott Benner 26:53
Do you make a living with the farm?

Megan 26:56
Um, we, we just have that kind of as a side deal. We do make money off of it. But we also work. Other I mean, we are self employed. So it's not like, we have these nine to five jobs or anything. But we do make part of our part of our living off of it. Yes.

Scott Benner 27:15
That's really excellent. Yeah, tell your husband, you cannot make 12 babies and your is your oldest boy or girl?

Megan 27:22
Boy, they're both boys, boys.

Scott Benner 27:24
But a B. So do you worry about them having I mean, all three of your sisters have diabetes? Do you worry about them having diabetes? Or do you just like? How do you think?

Megan 27:35
Yes, it's obviously always in the back of my mind. So our oldest it was, we were about to have to take him to just a regular checkup. And he was he always wanted water always wanted water. And of course, red flags are coming. And so I tell my doctor, I'm like, you've got to do a blood test on him. I can I have one in my bag. But I don't, I don't know, if I didn't want him. You know, I didn't want to prick his finger. Or if I didn't want to see the results myself. So that terrified me. So she checked it. And she's like, I just want to let you know, it's probably not probably just thirsty, am I? Who knows. But he you know, his blood sugar was fine. But it's like, it's always in the back of my mind, which I know. I've read, you know, the some books about it and things like that. So I know that the female being a type one is the less chance for the children to get it. And then also, since I was over 25, when I was pregnant, then that chance also goes down for them.

Scott Benner 28:48
So there's what did you read? I mean, that's interesting. I've never heard that. So that's really interesting.

Megan 28:52
I thought it was in Jenny's book in Jenny's book

Scott Benner 28:56
is about it. You

Megan 28:58
I'm not don't quote me on that. Because I'm not positive if that was the one that I read it in. Or if it was something else,

Scott Benner 29:05
no, I find out that's that's really interesting. But that.

Megan 29:09
I said, That's what I read. And so it gives you a comment helps me out. Yes. But like I said, it's always in the going to it will always be in the back of my mind which my oldest sister has two kids. Neither one of them are diabetic. My middle sister has a daughter and she's not diabetic either. And so those also help that I'm like, well, they aren't they don't have it. So maybe my voice won't either.

Scott Benner 29:34
Yeah, well, I hope not. So your your sisters have kids as well. Yes, both of them. Okay. How about your brothers? Did your brothers have any children?

Megan 29:43
I'm one of them has he has a daughter and then he has stepped up

Scott Benner 29:47
and there's no diabetes there. Anybody have thyroid issues or anything see?

Megan 29:53
Me and the oldest sister we have some thyroid issues. You know I have to be on the thyroid medication for but other than that it's really not much of anything. I didn't I think my grandma and my uncle had some problems with their liver. My grandma died from cirrhosis of the liver, which was not caused by alcohol. So I mean, other than that, other than that, no. All right, I'm lucky. Yes.

Scott Benner 30:30
You guys are just less than I've started to feel that way sometimes, too. Oh, my gosh, how many things can go wrong with people? You know?

Megan 30:37
Yeah, when I was younger, it used to kind of aggravate me that I was a diabetic and that my brother wasn't. But my mom, you should tell me that, you know. We only got it because we could handle it. And they couldn't. And I was like, You're right. He could not handle this, which is not true. But whenever I was six, that was for sure. The truth? It made me feel better. Yeah. Yes, I could do it. And he can't just couldn't. So that's why he didn't get it.

Scott Benner 31:07
What does that aggravation feel like because I just interviewed a 14 year old yesterday. And I asked him if he was bothered, that his siblings didn't have and he said, No, it didn't matter to him. But what was it just like when it got frustrating? You're like, Well, why is this happening to me and not everybody else?

Megan 31:23
Yes, um, it was probably mainly. So when I got my first insulin pump. It was a summer going into my fifth grade year. And that's when they were pretty new. And the cannula was, I don't know, it felt like five inches, it obviously wasn't but, and then also went in at an angle. And I was very tiny. And so every time I would go in and would like, hit a muscle or hit something and bend. Also, we were going to a big rodeo that we'd go to in Colorado Springs in the summer. And I was so sick, because my blood sugar was, you know, the pump wasn't working right, and we couldn't figure it out. And that's pretty much mainly the time that it got. So aggravating was because he could go and have fun and do all the stuff that we do, you know, at that rodeo that we'd go to every year and I literally just had to sit in the camper because my blood sugar was going so crazy. For the most part, it didn't bother me. And I've never gone through this stage where I'm like, I don't want to be a diabetic. So I'm just not going to take care of myself, or middle sister did, she did go through that stage, she now has a glass eye because of it. And so maybe seeing that happen to her made me realize, oh, just because you does you don't want it doesn't mean it goes away. And you still have to take care of yourself to prevent things like that from happening. And so, like I said, I didn't obviously when I was little it was I probably did get aggravated at him. But for the most part, it wasn't too bad. You know, I wasn't just angry that I had the disease. And that may have had a lot of dealings with that my sisters had it also. So if I was mad that I had it, then I had to be mad that they had it also. But they weren't. You know, at that time, they weren't mad about it. So I didn't need to be

Scott Benner 33:36
When did your sister did she? Did she always ignore it? Or was there a spot in her life when

Megan 33:44
there was Yep, a spot not her life. Just a few I don't even know if it was a few years but she just got it got a boyfriend she was you know in are probably 18 or 19 and just didn't just didn't want to take care of it didn't want to be diabetic. And obviously now she regrets it might majorly and she knows that all the issues that she has was her own fault. Pretty much that you know, she did that to herself back in her younger days, but she's doing a lot better now.

Scott Benner 34:22
Yeah, people shouldn't have to pay with an AI to learn a life lesson. You know? It's Yes, I'm sorry. But you say it did value there was value in her struggle for you because you just were like, oh, okay, I can't ignore this. I'm just not going to write. How about your older sister? Is she? How old? How old was your oldest sister when she was diagnosed? You know?

Megan 34:46
She was nine.

Scott Benner 34:47
She was nine. How about the next one? Sorry. And then you were three as well? Yes, yeah. Okay. Do any of you have children? Do any of them have daughters that are older than three?

Unknown Speaker 35:01
Yes. Both of them.

Scott Benner 35:02
Do they have older than nine year olds? Yep. Okay. Okay.

Megan 35:07
The oldest one her daughter's 28. And the other one hers is 20.

Scott Benner 35:14
Do you guys ever consider doing trial net for the kids?

Unknown Speaker 35:18
No, no,

Scott Benner 35:19
we haven't you want to know?

Megan 35:22
I don't know.

Scott Benner 35:24
It's a hard question.

Megan 35:25
I would, right? Yeah, I would psych myself out so many different times, if I'm probably if I knew there was a chance, rather than just trying to live our lives and, you know, be able to enjoy them. And then if it comes up, it comes up. I know how to deal with it. I knew, you know, I know how to live with being the type one and so I could teach them which. Honestly, it will be very different to being the mother of one, rather than being myself. I will probably, I would cry a lot more than I do just for myself,

Scott Benner 36:08
probably beginning to cry about diabetes stuff. Get overwhelming? No, not really anymore. had in the past?

Megan 36:20
Um, yeah, it used to, like I said, when I was in college, it's, it's not like I was a party anymore. I've never had alcohol or drugs ever in my entire life. So it's not like I just got off on, you know, drugs and alcohol and college and my blood sugar went crazy. But I guess it was just late nights and things like that, that would make my blood sugar kind of go a little, little different than they are now. And so then it would, it would be aggravating just that I was always having to do something different to take care of it. Yeah. When the same things weren't working.

Scott Benner 37:00
But no break. Like you didn't have any, like real breakdowns where it just know kind of crushed? No,

Megan 37:05
not really.

Scott Benner 37:09
My question just flew out of my head, that since I've been thinking of this question for 10 minutes, how is it possible that now that I needed, it's not there. It's very disappointing, Meghan. Alright. So while I find my question, can you tell me a little bit about what you've taken out of the podcast, it's been valuable for you.

Megan 37:28
I think the number one thing really is changing your high alert to the 120. Because obviously, it makes so much sense. Now, when you you know, when I heard you say it, you know, change it, change it to 120, because it's going to take you less time, and lessons learned to get it back to where you want it to be, rather than when it alerts you at 150 or 180. And when you said that, I really just wanted to hit myself in the head and be like, go, Hello. Why didn't you think of that?

Scott Benner 38:04
Yeah, that's so cool. That it's such a simple idea, right? But if you don't get high, you won't get high. So just Yeah, rapid before it.

Megan 38:12
Doesn't You're right. And I really think that helped a lot in my pregnancy. Was that it? And one time? I know, my answer, I guess had messed up in the middle of the night. And I didn't wake up to it. I didn't wake up feeling tired or whatever. And when I did wake up, I think my budget was 250. And that, okay, I lied, I bawled my eyes out, like freaked out, because my blood sugar was 250 for, you know, six hours or whatever. And I never took care of it to take care of my baby. And I just instantly knew something was gonna be wrong with them. And I was like, I had high blood sugar. Oh, my goodness. So I talked to my mom, my sisters, and they're like, calm down. It's fine. If your blood sugar wasn't that, you know, it wasn't above 600 for six months, it was it was only a short time, it's not gonna affect anything. Just get it back down and everything will be pretty fine, you know? But at that moment, my husband was working out of town. So I was home alone with our oldest one and it just it was like I was a failure as a mom at that moment because I didn't check in make sure that my blood sugar was not high in the middle of the night while sleeping.

Scott Benner 39:41
Any any. Do you think that might be some like pregnancy hormones to like the reaction?

Megan 39:46
Yeah, probably. Yeah. I cried a lot when I was pregnant and my husband, he's like, what's wrong away? I'm so happy. It doesn't feel like that. Oh, yes, I am. And he's like, okay,

Scott Benner 40:00
If he wants to 10 more times, does he? So I, you know, it's funny, I said, Can you tell me about this? And you were three words into it. And I instantly thought of what I wanted to ask you. And I was like, That's amazing, my stupid brain. But my question I've been dying to know, the whole time is, you kept such an amazing agency during the pregnancy. How has it been afterwards?

Megan 40:24
Um, it was, I think five one went a couple of weeks ago, when I went to my Endo. And then after my other son, it never went above six, I think it was 5.2. Maybe one up to 5.7. Between having the two of them. They're only two years apart. So not even two years apart.

Scott Benner 40:51
You've got a system now like, you know what you're doing.

Megan 40:54
I feel like it's, I've got it down pretty good. But then the way type one is you get I mean, you're like, you're like, I've got it figured out. And then boom, there.

Scott Benner 41:07
Something could change in your body, physiologically, or you know about your exercise routine or stuff like that, but you can still adjust to that. I'm saying I know you don't want to jinx it, but you're doing really well. Like it's Yeah, I feel like it yes, no kidding.

Megan 41:21
I'm proud of it. And my husband, he will take all the credit. Before we I mean, we've been together for seven years. And before we got together, you know, there was just like, oh, yeah, my blood sugar is fine. It's fine. Oh, you're eating a pancake. Oh, good. I'll have a few bites. It's fine. You know, whatever. And he and I used to love pop tarts. That's probably terrible. But I loved Pop Tarts, fried Pop Tarts.

Scott Benner 41:51
Firstly, hold on just a second. You took me by surprise. You said a lot of things that I'm not like accustomed to like with rodeo and stuff like that. But you fry a pop tart.

Megan 42:01
I actually got it at a big rodeo in Canada. in Calgary. Yes, it is a it's a pop tart fried and pancake batter, which is probably the worst thing a diabetic could ever have. Wait, wait,

Scott Benner 42:15
wait, wait. So wait. So I take the pop tart. I dip it in pancake batter, and then I put it in the hot grease? Yes. So it's like a pancake with a pop tart center?

Megan 42:28
Yes, it is absolutely delicious. Yes, it was. Like I said probably the worst thing for diabetic because pop tarts are a bajillion carbs, and sugar.

Scott Benner 42:43
And they hit really hard. They're not even committed to their carb count. They're really tough the Bolus for

Megan 42:48
Yes, yes, they are. And so when he got I guess brave enough to be like, Look, we will have to make some changes here. That's probably when I first started like paying attention a little bit more. Okay, is when he started talking about it.

Scott Benner 43:06
He talked about like, more healthy eating. Yes, he was like,

Megan 43:10
no Pop Tarts. Absolutely not. You cannot have those anymore. And I have not had a pop tart. And I couldn't tell you. I see him at the grocery store. And they look phenomenal.

Scott Benner 43:22
Mega we got a guy just walked by. Yeah, that's good. So two things. A list and Pop Tarts aren't good for anybody. Let's just say that. You know, it just they they make diabetes difficult if you're using insulin for certain, or I guess if you were type two as well, but um, but is he like a better eater? Like has he seemed more healthy? Like it was? Like, are you eating Pop Tarts while he's having brussel sprouts and a piece of chicken or like,

Megan 43:50
did he do he was really a huge fan of honey buns. Um, but he doesn't really, he really doesn't like sweets. He is actually the cook in the family who loves to cook and he cooks really? Well. We try not to tell him because his head gets really big. But he does cook really well. And we're from the South and in Louisiana so we eat rice with like, pretty much every meal. So it's not like he's a healthy either, but I guess he doesn't like sweets for one and then he realized that those are really really bad for me. Like hey, maybe you shouldn't have those. And then he would just like in a loving way want my blood sugar to be the best just so that I would feel better and all this stuff. And so yeah, I do. I do not usually give him the credit but he deserves some of it.

Scott Benner 44:51
Well, I don't want to push you down a road but what's your favorite pop tart?

Megan 44:55
Strawberry,

Unknown Speaker 44:56
strawberry. hotter. That's

Megan 44:57
the one all right

Scott Benner 45:00
Oh, crunchy. So

Megan 45:02
once they fried, so the one I actually had, it gets worse and worse. It was the fried Pop Tart. And then they put like whipped cream on top with Fruity Pebbles. And so it Yeah, it was terrible Canadian. Yes. It's like the festival you know like the huge you have on the rads and all this stuff the Calgary Stampede. And so they had the fried oreos fried ice cream fried butter, and all that fun stuff.

Scott Benner 45:37
Where you butter? Yeah, it's

Megan 45:40
it's weird and ice cream. I don't understand how they do it. I have never tasted either. So um,

Scott Benner 45:46
how would you like the butter hits the it's got to be frozen, right? You put frozen butter into the how the hell do you fry butter? Isn't butter, just grease that hasn't been melted yet?

Megan 45:57
Yeah. It's confusing, but people do it.

Scott Benner 46:00
Probably a wizard living in Canada that figure that out. I have to be honest, I've never had any of the things you've just said. As you're saying them. I don't want them. But I don't like greasy stuff to begin with. Like anything deep, deep fried is not really my speed. But that's, that's really interesting. Okay, so. So you're not having trouble managing your blood sugar's after the pregnancy. Like sometimes people come on and talk about like, I was able to take care of it during pregnancy. But after the baby came, I got so busy and like I kind of forgot about myself. But you're you're staying on top of it.

Megan 46:38
Yes. So this one, um, the first, my first one, my blood sugar would drop and crazy amount. breastfeeding him. So I could it could be 120 When I start feeding him. And by the end of his feed. It's like 60. And so when I went back to my Endo, after I had him or had my second one, we kind of tweak some things. And it hasn't been like that now, the past few days. If it's, you know, my budget or some, you know, fat over Bolus because I'm actually working at a rodeo right now. And so it's there's a lot going on. But if I over Bolus and I'm working and don't finish my food and enough time before the Bolus hits, and it starts going down like one little one little baby piece of chocolate to try to get it up and level out. It just shooting it straight up. So that's something that I need to work on. I don't know what I don't know what could cause that or what settings I need to change because it doesn't make sense. But for the most part, it has been pretty easy for me to to take care of and stay on track. I guess just because I'd still just want to make sure I take care of myself for them. Ya know that they don't deserve me to not take care of myself or to not pay enough attention to be able to take care of myself. So

Scott Benner 48:17
you're a good mom.

Megan 48:19
Thank you. Yeah. And the oldest one Mike said he's, he's rambunctious Hogan, he loves to be on the move. And like Buck Buck with pillows and watch tractors go around in circles for hours. And

Scott Benner 48:34
you don't just release them in the wild. If you have them. Right. You keep them in the house.

Megan 48:38
Yeah, for the most part. He's released a lot.

Scott Benner 48:44
Because I was like, maybe she's just like putting them out in that pasture. And then they're not. Yeah, but

Megan 48:47
yeah, they can take care of themselves. You you refer

Scott Benner 48:51
to the end of breastfeeding is like the end of feeding time. And that was hilarious. I didn't laugh because you were being so genuine when you're talking about that was between tending diabetes and referring to the kids like cattle like for feeding. Like this is how I love this. I love Well,

Megan 49:07
I will tell you, my husband says. So my breastfeeding journey ended at four months with my first one and he says, this one's gonna be better because I was fattened up a little bit more before I had this one. And then you always they always produce milk better on their second one. So when, you know, when they're a heifer and they're pregnant, the milks not that good. But their second one, they produce more milk. So your husband refers to all of us as cattle.

Scott Benner 49:39
You're all just cattle in his mind, just so he took what he knew about how cattle produce milk and explained did that your breastfeeding is gonna go differently because of this.

Megan 49:48
Yes, yes. It's gonna be way better than some. So we'll see.

Scott Benner 49:53
I want to make sure I understand. The first time you were a heifer. Yes. What is the hell? What's the designation for half What does that mean?

Megan 50:01
A heifer is a female calf that has not had a cow yet. Haven't has not had a calf yet. Okay. And so once they have a calf than they are now a cow.

Scott Benner 50:12
Okay. Right. So So you're a heifer if you've never had a baby and your cow once you have had one. Yes. Interest, so your account now so since you're a cow, your milk is gonna be better.

Megan 50:26
Yep. Now as a little fatter, you gotta fattened up before,

Scott Benner 50:31
you gotta make sure he doesn't throw you on a milking machine and try to make money off do you fall asleep? You wake up here and click, click, click Like you're like, Whoa, whoa, hold on. Hold on. What's happening? Yeah, that's a loving thing. Right? For people up north who hear this? Like he's not commenting on your weight. It's literally just

Megan 50:49
No, no, no, as genuine and loving as he can be.

Scott Benner 50:54
That's excellent. If you have more than one calf, you just always a cow. Yes. How do you think it would go? If I referred to my wife as a cow today? Without explaining this conversation? We're not? Well, not Well,

Megan 51:07
I would advise against that.

Scott Benner 51:10
Yeah, I'm not going to do that. I was just wondering what you thought like, what level of lamp do you think would come at my head? If I was like, talking to Megan day, and her husband says you're a cow. Yeah, without context, I think it gets ugly. Yeah, I would definitely die in that conversation. Yeah. Well, does your have your three siblings who have diabetes? Would you call your your management the tightest, or no? Yes. Did they ever ask you about it? Because they can see your CGM? Yes. What do they want to know? Yeah.

Megan 51:46
I'm just on like the changes that need to be made on their settings. You know, like, Hey, can you look and see if my, you know if my correction needs to be changed, or if it's actually my carb ratio that needs to be changed. And so we'll go through stuff like that, and kind of work on figuring figuring it out. Before, we have to call our endo and get his opinion on it.

Scott Benner 52:16
What? Do they listen to the bar? Guest?

Megan 52:21
I think they do some but not as much as I do.

Scott Benner 52:24
Has that ever been your answer? Have you ever been like you should just listen to this? Yes.

Megan 52:29
I've told him multiple times. I'm always

Scott Benner 52:31
trying to understand. By the way, I have to get this thought out of my head before I go down this road. Do you think I could get away with calling the episode Megan as a cow? I couldn't, right? There'd be backlash from many different feminine groups and things like that. I would know probably

Megan 52:45
would I get? Yeah. Okay. So we're not gonna either do that. Or fried.

Scott Benner 52:49
Fried Pop Tarts? Yeah, that's a pretty good one, too. That's a really good one. You might have just done it. Okay. So I'm trying to understand not about your sister specifically. But in general, I was just having this conversation. Actually, before I got on with you, I was having a conversation with one of the people who facilitates one of the ads that I have on the podcast. And I was talking about a thing that I wanted to do to help people and I was looking for funding for it. And we were having a bigger conversation. And during that conversation, I said, it's hard to get, it's hard to do a good thing for people like you, you have to talk them into it sometimes. And they're right. I said to her, I was like, there are times I want to just like grab people and go, Listen, I'm going to do this thing for you. Now. It's going to help you like just accept it. You know what I mean? Like, because sometimes it just, it's not that easy. Like making the information available, isn't enough, sometimes making it accessible and easy to listen to? is not enough. Sometimes Sometimes people I've had people tell me, I don't have time to listen to the podcast. And I'm like, why don't understand you're wasting, in my opinion, so much of your life fighting with diabetes, like just make a few hours here and there. And then you don't have to have that fight anymore when it's over. But it's not that easy to get through to people. And I don't know why. I mean, I haven't given up on trying to figure it out. But it's frustrating.

Megan 54:11
Yeah, I could imagine it is true. Just to give them the information, like you said readily available doesn't always work. It's not enough pushing them to, to try and listen to it. I forever just think harder. Yeah, I

Scott Benner 54:26
forever. Just think of one person who responded to me. I said, Look, you know, I've put a lot of my life and time and effort into creating these episodes here. I think if you just listen through them, your answers are in there plus, way more, you'll just it'll be easier for you and she's like, can't you just explain it to me? Like, well, I mean,

Megan 54:46
I did in all of these episodes.

Scott Benner 54:49
I did already Yeah, it's there. Like just go listen, but too much. And so right. You know, I don't know. Like, I don't want to think that some people are beyond Hold on. Second, I'm sorry. That's a time of year. I don't want to think that people are beyond help, because I think everybody could figure it out. And I do think the information would reach most people. I just I don't know. Like, I mean, it can't be my job to chase people around one at a time. But do you ever feel responsible for your sisters? Do you ever feel that you know something? And why won't they just do it? Or listen? Or does that ever come up to you?

Megan 55:30
Yes, I've actually, for them. And for my OB, I actually, I guess, before I knew you had a list of all the defining diabetes episodes and things like that. And the Pro Tip series, I went through and made a list of them. I was like, Look, you don't have to listen to, you know, like this, like, just, this is about my life. I'm not really gonna teach anyone about anything right here,

Scott Benner 55:57
I think. But okay.

Megan 55:59
But, you know, I'm like, if you at least listen to these. They're teaching you a lot of things that will affect your diabetes and how you manage it and all this stuff. So like, if you're only going to listen to some, then listen to these. Yeah, I agree with that. Which, you know, I don't like said I don't really know how many they have listened to. They, they do have better control of it. Within the last couple of years. I'm not saying that's because I decided that I needed better control over mine. Or what really pushed him to, to understand think about it more. But yeah, nowadays.

Scott Benner 56:43
It's excellent. I am. I agree with you to like, I think the podcast is entertaining. I enjoy it. Like I'm I'm really enjoying talking to you. I think people would really enjoy listening to this. But everybody doesn't want this conversational stuff. Some people really do just want the management stuff, and they want to be gone. And I understand. I think there's a lot to be learned from the conversations. But if you just want to do the management stuff, I get why you would feel that way. But I mean, it's out there it and it's the guy stand behind it that those pro tip episodes that defining diabetes, even like the new variables, that kind of stuff is you're not going to get that kind of information from a doctor. Right? It's just very helpful. So excuse me. I want to make sure is there anything that we haven't talked about that you wanted to I don't want to get through an hour and have missed something? No, why did you want to come up?

Megan 57:41
I feel like now I made my husband sound like a jerk. But he really is he really

Scott Benner 57:47
worried about? Yes, I

Megan 57:49
after I said that. I was like man, people are gonna think why is she married as someone who talks to her about like, she's a cow, but

Scott Benner 57:58
talk to you like you're a cow. He's using colloquialisms? Yeah, they're part of the Yeah,

Megan 58:02
that's what I mean. He does is explaining to me as something that he already knows about. Sounds like me. And maybe I should have said that. But he really is very loving.

Scott Benner 58:14
How I took it. I actually took it like maybe breastfeeding the first time was difficult. And that he was trying to comfort you and tell you that it was probably going to be better this time. Yeah. That was that was it in his own way. Exactly. I thought it was terrific. I took it as loving. And I took it as I mean, I took it as an insight into your life. I didn't take it as like he's some bad guy running around calling you a cow. And I mean, like,

Megan 58:43
why is she still with him?

Scott Benner 58:45
Well, obviously, because you still have to have 10 more of his babies. You can't leave. Yeah. I do think he's wrong about that, by the way.

Megan 58:54
Yeah, yeah, I don't. We're just gonna let him think what he wants to think for now.

Scott Benner 59:02
I think if you get keep that thought in his head, you're gonna start keeping a stick next to the bed that you're going to hit. Like, no, no, no. Like, I'm not having 12 babies.

Unknown Speaker 59:14
Exactly. Babies.

Scott Benner 59:16
I wouldn't want. I wouldn't want to be responsible for 12 oranges. I would be afraid they'd go bad before I could eat them. Yeah. How did your mom now that you guys are older? Do you ever talk to your mom about your diabetes? Does she still worry about it?

Megan 59:34
Yes, yes. Especially since she can see all of our ducks calms. She still does worry about it a lot. I sometimes turn mine off. Because I have a husband that lives in the house with me. So as my blood sugar's go low in the middle of the night, and I don't wake up on my own. He's going to wake me up. Yeah, you know, and so sometimes I don't want my mom to have to know about it, I guess Sure. Because I'm like, I can take care of it. Now, when I'm home alone, then I'll you know, turn it back on for just in case I don't wake up. And they wake up and call me and say, hey, you know, maybe you should check that out. But she still does worry about it a lot. And my dad even he'll wake up in the morning and say, Okay, who was the culprit last night? Who was it? Was it? Yes. He's like, who was it last night that made all this noise.

Scott Benner 1:00:40
But they want to know that it's so Parliament's for safety, but part of it is because it's just ingrained in them right, like worrying about you guys. And, and, and staying on top of it. Yeah, I think I get that. I also understand you wanting to have privacy from it, too. But do you think she understands it at all? Like, does your mom get the whole CGM thing? Is she following along still?

Megan 1:01:07
Yes, yeah, she, when we first got them, you know, we kind of explained a lot of things to her. And just like stuff on your podcast, when I tell her I'm like, oh, you know, this is what I learned. And she does kind of like me just like, oh, well, yeah, that makes a lot of sense to do. You know, to do it that way to catch this or whatever. So she still wants to learn about it. And wants to help us in any way that she can.

Scott Benner 1:01:38
Sweet. That's really nice. Yeah, makes me feel good. She's.

Unknown Speaker 1:01:42
She's a good lady.

Scott Benner 1:01:44
She's not bothered by it either. It just seems no. Yeah. It's really excellent. Well, you seem like a good mom. It seems like you had a good mom. So make sense, right?

Megan 1:01:55
Yeah. I hope I can be half the mom she is. Well,

Scott Benner 1:01:58
I'm sure you will be I'm sure you'll do much better. I'm sure you'll take what you learned from her and, and build on top of it. I'll try to Are you worried that you won't be a good mom?

Megan 1:02:10
Ah, no, not really. I just know how much my mom has done for us. And anytime I have any questions or need anything at all that show for sure. Be there and I plan to be the exact same way for my boys. So I don't I don't think I will be a bad mom. I just want I just have a lot of big shoes to fill.

Scott Benner 1:02:35
You have such high regard for your mom. You think it's it's a you might have difficulty living up to what she's done? Yes. I bet you won't. But that's really sweet. That's excellent. I like you, Megan. This is fun. I think you were wrong about the Strawberry Pop Tarts. But I think otherwise, it's

Megan 1:02:56
like what popular decent person?

Scott Benner 1:02:59
No, I just mean picking strawberry first. I think I would have chosen like what Pop Tart would I go to right now if I was having a pop tart? Brown sugar.

Megan 1:03:11
I mean, when I was younger, it was a hot fudge sundae when I didn't even now. Yeah, now I'm just straight shrub right now. My oldest one, he loves the little NutriGrain bars with the strawberry. So it's basically like a pop tart. It's just a lot better for him than an actual

Scott Benner 1:03:36
healthier pop out. Yes,

Megan 1:03:38
they do. They do have some kind of like, sugar free pop tart. I don't know if it's good or not. And I've thought about ordering it a couple of times. I haven't. But I feel like the NutriGrain bars. Those are pretty. They're still pretty good. And I feel like they're not as terrible for us. So what he does, and we pretend like they're Pop Tarts.

Scott Benner 1:04:06
You guys should basically be eating lettuce at home because when you go to the rodeo, you're going to eat something horrible. You need to bounce. Yes. I think one of the most shocking things you told me is that Canadians are peddling terrible food to people. That's why it's cat is Canada's a big the roadies are big in Canada, right. Yeah. Yeah. I wonder why that is.

Megan 1:04:32
Their big. A lot of places that people don't say they think if you rodeo you're definitely from Texas. Which you know, they honestly that's where most most people in America. They think that's it. You rodeo you're from Texas. They don't understand. I mean like Florida when you think of Florida What do you think of beaches, Disney World? Florida has more horses and cattle and More than any other state. Yeah, people don't understand that. They just don't know

Scott Benner 1:05:05
Florida is a southern state like at its core for sure. Like it's just yeah, it has it just happens to be on a sunny. Just have sunny. Yeah, that's that's 100% certain I think of Florida's like Texas with a beach.

Megan 1:05:21
Yep, that's pretty much it. Yeah.

Scott Benner 1:05:23
Okay. All right. Hey, I just have a last question for you. I'll let you go. What do you do in the rodeo?

Megan 1:05:31
I don't compete anymore. I used to rope. So on a horse, chasing the calf, and rope it, and then my rope breaks off in the calf runs away. Like because he's having a great time.

Scott Benner 1:05:46
Were you any good at it?

Megan 1:05:48
I'm not gonna say I was very good. No, no, my brothers are. My brothers are great. Did

Scott Benner 1:05:53
you enjoy it?

Megan 1:05:55
Yes, I did. Yeah. But now I so now like I said, I'm working on radio right now. Now I work for photographer. So he takes pictures of the rodeo events. And then I go in and take the pictures off of the card that he has put them on. And then I move them into different folders for each person. So that when they come up to look at their pictures, all they have to do is tell us their name. And they can look at every picture we've taken of them the whole time. And so we do this. We come to Perry, Georgia, twice a year, and then we go to just we go to Oklahoma, we go to Texas, Louisiana. We just go all over and do that. So that's that's what we're doing right now.

Scott Benner 1:06:45
Your husband rodeo. Yep, he used

Megan 1:06:47
to ride bulls.

Scott Benner 1:06:48
No kidding. That seems like a crazy thing to me.

Megan 1:06:52
It's pretty crazy. Yes. This whole right side is titanium. And then his bottom left half is titanium all so

Scott Benner 1:07:01
he's got a couple of plates and screws and things going on? Oh, yeah. He's got a lot. Yeah. Yeah, that that sounds like you just said to me, like he climbed on the back of a bear. And then held on to it. Like I just Yeah. But that's, that's fun. It's fun to watch. I'll tell you that much.

Megan 1:07:18
Yep. It's, it's exciting and also terrifying at the same time.

Scott Benner 1:07:23
Yeah, no kidding. All right. Well, I, I really appreciate you coming on and doing this. Thank you very much. Thank you have a good time.

Megan 1:07:32
Yes, did you I was nervous. pretty nervous at first, but then I was just like, oh, well, this is it. This is me. And did you know if it works, it works.

Scott Benner 1:07:45
What? What would you? And I've never asked anybody this before? Do you ever have? Did you have a concern that other people with diabetes wouldn't like your answers about diabetes? Or you didn't think of that?

Megan 1:07:56
Yes. Um, you know that. But I'm a warrior. And I want to please everyone. And so I do. I mean, obviously, I freaked out that I said, my husband talks about me like, he talks about a cow. So that made me think doubt was like, oh, man, I shouldn't say that. So yes, I do worry that people were like, Oh, why she, you know, why is she doing it that way? That's not the right way. She's supposed to do it this way, which, in actuality, we all have our different ways of tending, sorry, tending to it. Sorry.

Scott Benner 1:08:38
You're getting you'll miss attending to diabetes. Again, I would have loved that. Meghan, come on.

Megan 1:08:44
Yes. You know, we all have our different ways to attend to the issues that come up with our disease. And just because the way I tend to mine is not the way that challenge tends to the IRS does not mean that I'm right, or they're right. It just, is what works for us. And

Scott Benner 1:09:04
imagine, imagine if I would have thought that if I would have said no, I don't want to say what I do, because I'd be afraid that people would disagree with it, then none of this would exist.

Megan 1:09:14
Right? I wouldn't have had so much success from now, you know, almost changing the way that I viewed the disease, I guess and took care of it. And I want to have a four point on a one. See when I was pregnant.

Scott Benner 1:09:30
Yeah. Did you name the kid after me?

Megan 1:09:33
I did it. It was one. It was a top runner, but we'll make the

Scott Benner 1:09:40
Hey, people are buying people are getting vanity license plates. That's a juice box on it now. So that's just as good as it may be to me. Yeah, absolutely. I've there's three now. Pennsylvania, Indiana, and Ohio. People have gotten box license plates. I did. and ask anybody to do it. They just did it. I'm very, I'm oddly very proud of it. Yes, you should be. I don't know why. But I'm like, I didn't expect when I started a podcast that one day people would be like, you know, I'm going to put the name of this podcast on my license plate made me feel like I have to do it. Like, what if somebody in New Jersey gets it before? I do? Yeah, maybe I have to.

Megan 1:10:21
Yep. Well, I

Scott Benner 1:10:22
thought you did a great job. And I give everything that you shared, I want to be clear that I think if people wouldn't come on and share how they really feel that the podcast would be valueless. So it's not important for people to agree with each other. It's important to hear different ideas. And then you can either say no, I'm good with what I'm doing. Or Wow, she made a good point about that. And no, I, that thing you talked about about setting 120 alarm for your CGM. I believe that in my heart, but I can't say it every day. You know what I mean? Are the podcasts repetitive or boring? Yeah. So you brought it up. So I'm thrilled that you did. Truth is, you set a high alarm at a lower level, you can respond sooner before your blood sugar gets higher, and use a smaller amount of insulin to stop the rise, which makes you less likely to have a low later, that sentence is really important. And I'm glad you brought it up today. So thank you very much.

Megan 1:11:18
Yeah, thank you for teaching it to me.

Scott Benner 1:11:21
Come on. This is something that popped into my head once and I was like that, then I tried it and it worked. And then you know is years later, I had somebody from Dexcom, like a scientist from Dexcom. Come on. And there's an entire they've done an entire study about that in the in the last couple of years, and it just holds true. You set those alarms at a certain spot, you will do better. That's it. So anyway, I am going to go I really appreciate you doing this. Could you hold on one second for me before you hang up? Yep, thank you.

A huge thank you to one of today's sponsors, G voc glucagon, find out more about Chivo Capo pen at G Vogue glucagon.com forward slash juicebox you spell that G VOKEGLUC AG o n.com. Forward slash juicebox. I'd also like to thank us Med and remind you to go to us med.com Ford slash juice box or call 888-721-1514 To get your free benefits check.

Thank you so much for listening. I'll be back very soon with another episode of The Juicebox Podcast.

#682 Charlotte Drury

Yea, that Charlotte Drury. The one who got type 1 diabetes a month before her Olympic trials.

+ Click for EPISODE TRANSCRIPT

Scott Benner 0:00
Hello friends, and welcome to episode 682 of the Juicebox Podcast

I think we can all agree that there's never a great time to be diagnosed with diabetes, but one month before the Olympic trials, that's really bad timing. And that's exactly what happened to today's guest, Charlotte Drewery. I know you think I'm gonna have her on here and talk about all her Olympic hopes and trampoline and everything. And sure we'll get all that but I actually invited Charlotte on because of something I saw her going through on Instagram. While you're listening today, please remember 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 health care plan, or becoming bold with insulin. A if you're a US resident Charlotte or with the Olympics us you know us if you're a US resident who has type one diabetes, or is the caregiver of someone with type one, please go to T one D exchange.org. Ford slash juice box right now and take the survey. When you do you'll be helping people with type one diabetes and supporting the Juicebox Podcast. I have to tell you, I thought Charlotte and I got along famously, I actually think we're friends now.

This episode of The Juicebox Podcast is sponsored by Dexcom, makers of the Dexcom G six continuous glucose monitoring system. Go right now to dexcom.com forward slash juice box to learn more, or even to get started. The podcast is also sponsored by Omni pod makers of the Omni pod dash and the Omni pod five, you may be eligible for a free 30 day supply of the Omni pod dash and you can find that out at Omni pod.com forward slash juice box. There are links to the sponsors in the show notes of your podcast player at juicebox podcast.com.

Charlotte Drury 2:10
I am Charlotte. I obviously have type one diabetes, and I'm here today to just chat.

Scott Benner 2:16
Cool. Well, it's not that obvious. I talked to a lot of people who don't have diabetes, they end up being caregivers but I take your point. Let me tell you about how I spent the five minutes before you came on. I'm your name breaks my brain the way Charlotte is spelled versus I agree how I hear it my head. And I had never considered it before sitting down. I was like, her name is Charlotte, Charlotte lot. And then I got Lou and

Charlotte Drury 2:46
every Starbucks barista has had that exact same revelation.

Scott Benner 2:49
Well, then I got lost in it. And then I was looking at your last name. And I'm like, Oh my God, our last name is weird, too. So now I'm just sitting here, staring at the screen going Charlotte Drewery Drewery, Charlotte, and I was like, oh my god, I sounds like

Charlotte Drury 3:06
if you put my name and did Google Translate and you got like the exact pronunciation of each phonetic letter.

Scott Benner 3:12
Exactly. That's exactly right. Because when I think of it, your name Charlotte. And I don't consider how Drewery is, is spelled. And then the more I said Drewery I started saying it wrong. And then I freaked myself out. I stopped thinking about it. So

Charlotte Drury 3:29
then the entire word itself lost its meaning and then you question the meaning of life and yeah,

Scott Benner 3:34
where do you I fell down that sort of like bizarre psychedelic rabbit hole. I was like, her name doesn't make sense. But anyway, great. Marry a guy named Smith one day or something. I think you could really straight this whole problem out. Perfect. How old are you, Charlotte?

Charlotte Drury 3:52
I am 25. But I'll be 26 in two weeks. Oh, happy

Scott Benner 3:56
birthday. Thanks. And then you're gonna see me writing. I don't usually do video with most people. So now Charlotte's watching me to make the podcast and I'm suddenly aware of myself,

Charlotte Drury 4:05
making them very nervous. And in fact, that actually brought a magnifying glass. So I will be holding that up the whole time. I know you guys are listening. You can't tell but I'm just worried. I have I have this unlocked.

Scott Benner 4:15
I'm just thrilled. You don't know where my hairline used to be? You have nothing. You have no perspective. So you're 26 How old were you? 26 and two weeks. How old were you when you were diagnosed?

Charlotte Drury 4:28
I was 24. But it was about almost exactly a year ago.

Scott Benner 4:32
Okay, so you've only had diabetes for about a year. diagnosed. All right. Interesting. So when you first started thinking something was wrong, what were your symptoms?

Charlotte Drury 4:45
Um, well, I've been an athlete my whole life. And I was just kind of used to a certain level of performance. And over like the last or not the last year I guess starting two years ago, I kind of started noticing a decline in training and it was just So sudden and really hard to keep up and, you know, chalk it up to the pandemic and just stress in general. And then after about a year of that, noticing that I just felt couch lock fatigue, moody, unhappy. I didn't notice that like dry mouth having to go to the bathroom all the time, until looking back on it, because I just assumed that I was working out so much that I was really dehydrated. But yeah, those were really my main symptoms, and it was really just falling behind in sport.

Scott Benner 5:32
Okay. I guess when you perform at a higher level, was it obvious sooner than you think if it was just you, like, you know, not able to walk your 30 minutes on the treadmill, like after work like most of us attempt to do, but you know,

Charlotte Drury 5:47
I do. And I don't, I think it's kind of a double edged sword of, because I was working out so much and performing at such a high level, my body kind of kept this level of fitness, throughout the physical decline that diabetes was getting or untreated diabetes was causing. And then the other side of that is that I think I might have not noticed at all. Or notice the physical decline if I wasn't trying to push myself so hard. So it was like maybe I just was able to push myself harder for longer.

Scott Benner 6:18
Do you think your body was at a level where even though the decline was significant? You were able to kind of power past it? Yeah, and definitely. And that's the

Charlotte Drury 6:27
mentality of elite sport. I think it's like, Oh, you don't feel good. Try harder.

Scott Benner 6:33
Yeah, I know my son wants. He plays baseball in college. He wants twisted his ankle, it was purple, and twice the size it should be. And he says to me, I think if I wrap this I can play.

Charlotte Drury 6:44
Oh, yeah. I totally hear that. I broke my ankle. And I still tried to compete.

Scott Benner 6:50
Like I say, I said, I don't think we're going to do that as the one we're gonna we get this fixed up first. But it's yeah, it's also tough, because you spend so much time I think people probably think about it much. But you know, the performance of your sport, or the, you know, or the game, whatever it ends up being is such a small percentage of the actual time you spend working towards it. And, you know, it's hard to it's hard to give that away, when you've put nine months or a year into this idea that you're going to play in a nine inning baseball game. 50 Oh, my

Charlotte Drury 7:24
God. Yeah. Preaching to the choir. Like, my routines. So for trampoline, because I'm a trampoline. It's my routines are 20 seconds. And I trained from when I was three years old in gymnastics to make it to an Olympic Games, where you compete for 20 seconds,

Scott Benner 7:40
right? Did you ever think about it cognitively as it was coming up? Like what am I doing? Oh, yeah. Like, because if we put this in other context, you would not do this?

Charlotte Drury 7:53
Literally not? Absolutely not. Are you like, I mean, I have to like, look at myself in the mirror and be like, You're crazy. What what are you thinking?

Scott Benner 8:05
I'm going to ask you later about because I am interested in what drives you to make a decision like that and to stick with it. But okay, so you have this this. This kind of left down of your physical performance? Do you end up going to a doctor? Do you tell a parent a coach, how do you proceed?

Charlotte Drury 8:20
Yeah, I went to my doctor because we, I had attended a national team training camp. And it was like our first camp back since pandemic, it was supposed to like kick off the year leading into the Olympics. And I just was getting my ass kicked I junior athletes that were doing better than me and couldn't get through teams that could do anything. I was absolutely miserable. And on the way home, I was like this is beyond just being mentally burned out. This is beyond just falling behind and getting older and really hard sport. Something's wrong with me. Like I fully had that penny drop moment of something is wrong. I don't know what it is, but something's wrong. So as soon as I got home, I landed, I called my doctor. She ordered some bloodwork got it done right away. And then she called me that evening, and was like, surprised. Do you have diabetes?

Scott Benner 9:14
No, I don't. Because Wilford Brimley has diabetes, and I'm not like him at all. And I don't understand this unless you have it in your family.

Charlotte Drury 9:22
No, nobody, not a single person. My little sister does have celiac. So that is the autoimmune kind of similar, or like,

Scott Benner 9:31
yeah, no, I was gonna ask you in a second if there's any autoimmune in your family. So trust me. Yeah, that's the really the only thing Okay, no, thyroid, anywhere. Nope. Here's one. I liked it.

Charlotte Drury 9:42
Like, I think maybe like a cousin has a thyroid thing.

Scott Benner 9:47
That counts. Okay, cool. It counts. Yes. There's like an aunt like after Christmas dinner runs to the bathroom for like a half hour stomach gets upset anything like that? I don't think so. A lot of times, it's still There's people have celiac, they just don't know they do. Really? Yeah. And it's just they think they say things like, Ah, my stomach doesn't like me like, Okay, does that

Charlotte Drury 10:09
also doesn't like me, but that could have been the bagel and ice cream and pizza.

Scott Benner 10:14
Yeah. It's interesting. You said about getting older when you're young because you're you're 24. At that point, you're like, maybe I'm just getting older. Again, my son said to me, this spring is a spring training was getting going. He's the senior. I said, How's it going? He goes, I feel old. And I was like, yeah, he goes, he's like, like, the rust is breaking off, and I'll be okay. But he all he did was lift through the offseason and hit, you know, inside. And he just said, he's like, I just, I see some of these younger kids rolling around. And they just, they don't show up, like creaky the next day, like I do. And it took them a couple of weeks. And he sprung back. But he's like, I feel old. It was weird to hear a person say that to me.

Charlotte Drury 10:54
I mean, that was like, fully my mentality in that year of training, undiagnosed, was, Oh, I'm just past my peak. Oh, bummer. I'm just not that good anymore. And given a little bit more time being healthy, I think I totally would have gotten back to 100% been, like back to fighting for him. But by the time I was diagnosed, it was only a couple of weeks until Olympic trials and a couple of months until the Olympics, so it really wasn't enough time to kind of start up and build all that strength back that I had lost in the last year. It did my best, but definitely a lot of it came back, but not all of it, which is kind of a bummer. But

Scott Benner 11:38
I hear you. Yeah, listen, I just, it's hard. I just had to have knee surgery because I woke up one day and my knee hurts. So don't complain. I wasn't bouncing on anything. So you, you get this news from the doctor? Are you training somewhere alone? Are you living at home? Or are you near family or friends?

Charlotte Drury 11:58
No, I was actually just living with my partner. And my parents had left and moved out of state like two days before I was diagnosed. So it was really just me and my partner. And then obviously, my support system in the gym, which is my coach and teammates and stuff. But through the pandemic. I mean, I was training by myself. So it was just my coach and I. So my circle was really small.

Scott Benner 12:20
So what does your I mean, how do you know what your blood sugar was when that bloodwork went back?

Charlotte Drury 12:26
My agency was 14.6. I don't know exactly what my blood sugar was in that moment. But I do remember pricking my finger like right after I was diagnosed like a couple of times, and it being in the six hundreds.

Scott Benner 12:38
Yeah, that's crazy. You mentioned that it's possible that it was going on for longer than you knew. Looking back, what do you think was going on?

Charlotte Drury 12:47
So I had suffered a couple of injuries in the late months of 2019. And they were nothing major major. I mean, I guess one of them was pretty major had a really, really bad concussion that, you know, took me out of school to get a training. And that took a super long time to heal. The same thing is like I had a tear in one of the ligaments on the top of my foot. And it just was not healing, it was an injury that should have taken, you know, a month to kind of clear up. And it took three, four or five months before I felt like it was like anywhere near normal again. So I was healing really slow, which looking back. That was before I was even having a like tangible decline in performance and sport performance. But my body was just struggling, I think.

Scott Benner 13:39
Yeah, no, it's completely. I mean, there are people who, I mean, some people have Lada, you know, type one and a half, and it takes years and years and years of like this slow, slow decline. And, you know, it's not, it's not crazy. I mean, still a quick onset with type one is common, right? And quick, could be a couple of months or, you know, etc. But I hear you it happens so slow, and you don't see it happening, you know, what was the Yeah, and

Charlotte Drury 14:04
you just explain it away. You know, you just, you just come up with all the reasons of why you're fine. Like, it takes a lot to get to that tipping point to think oh, you know, maybe something's wrong.

Scott Benner 14:19
Well, my daughter was two and she was diagnosed. And she had just switched from bottles. So when she would have these incredibly heavy diapers, we'd be like, Wow, because because she's drinking so much with our cups, like we were, we were proud of her. Right. And thinking, oh God, where we like where she dehydrated before because look how much she's drinking now and you just, you're just not Yeah, exactly. You explain it away. Yeah. Because surely they think it would be a long unhappy life. If everything that happened your brain ran to you know, I probably have diabetes, or oh my god, right. You know what, this probably is arm cancer. You know, like, it's like, you know, like so like, I think it's a it's a protective measure. In some ways. It just ends up in this scenario becomes dangerous if you don't pay attention to it. What? What if any technology do you leave the diagnosis with?

Charlotte Drury 15:10
So I walked out of the doctor's office with a long acting insulin. That was it. Oh, no Anna and a finger prick her finger meter. I call it my finger picker. I don't think that's actually what

Scott Benner 15:21
it's called. Call whatever you want. I don't care. So you're just left with like a Basal insulin? Do they give you nice syringes?

Charlotte Drury 15:30
Or a pen? They gave me a pen and a sample of four needle heads.

Scott Benner 15:36
Okay. And let's just call it your picker. And but a meter, you gotta meter and test strips got a meter? And yeah, and a way to make a hole on your finger. Yep, actually got three things. You got test strips. That's the picker part is a picker, which I think is called a lance. Yeah,

Charlotte Drury 15:53
I agree. Since I was learning so much at the time.

Scott Benner 15:57
Charlotte agrees I've made it it's called Lance. Why thank you. How benevolent

Charlotte Drury 16:03
petition to change it to prickers. I just there was so much to remember at that time. And I think whenever I needed my picker, it was I was either low or really high, my brain wasn't working. And I would just point and be like, I mean, I need I need the pricking thing.

Scott Benner 16:28
The Dexcom G six is a continuous glucose monitoring system. It's a small device that you wear, that sends a signal to your smartphone, or to a receiver. That signal tells you what your blood sugar is, constantly, continuously, you understand continuous glucose monitoring system, glucose sugar system anyway, consistently, constantly use whatever word you want. It's there all the time on your Dexcom receiver or on your phone, your phone, your phone, alright, or on your phone, that can be an Android or an iPhone, I am picking up my iPhone right now. My daughter's blood sugar is 133. It is actually rather stable. It's been stable long enough now that when I get done making this ad, I'm gonna send her a text that says, Why don't you push your blood sugar a little bit? Why do I? Why do I say that? Well, a few hours ago, Arden changed her insulin pump her on the pod. At that time, we were leading into a meal. Okay, not great timing, right. But it is what it is. Now, two hours after the meal, I'm pretty confident that the pod is up and running, working great doing what I expect it to do. And that maybe we should have used more insulin for the meal. I can tell that by looking at the stability of this line. This is not a blood sugar that's about to rise or fall. It's stable and steady. We missed on the meal. We're gonna give her a little more. Maybe we missed because it was the new pod site? Or maybe, I don't know, doesn't matter really does it? All I know is I'm getting back data that makes sense that feels actionable to me. And I feel confident using it dexcom.com forward slash juice box. These are our results and yours may vary. But there are about a million great ways to use a Dexcom. If you're using insulin, it tells you so much. That data is so valuable. You really should check it out. Get started today with the Dexcom G six or check out Dex coms Hello Dex comm program, which if you're eligible for we'll give you a 10 day free trial of the Dexcom G six links in the show notes links at juicebox podcast.com to Dexcom. And to our next sponsor, Omni pod makers of the Omni pod dash. Now talk about free trials. The Omni pod dash free trial if you're eligible is 30 days long, which is a month or 12 of the Year 112 of a year for the free. If you go to Omni pod.com Ford slash juice box and are eligible for that free trial of the on the pod dash at my link, you'll be able to check your eligibility, your insurance coverage and get started right now, you can learn more by clicking on a link there, right where you can fill in some information and say, hey, I want to know more about the dash. Or I want to know more about the Omnipod five, you can even click on a link here says Call me you put in your name and your little businesses in my area. You know what I mean? couple bits of information. Bada bing, bada boom, they'll give you a call to be like, Hello, is this bill? Hey, Bill. What's up? Bill? This is Omnipod. You asked us to give you a call. You have any questions? You'd be like, Oh my god, I have a ton of questions. I'm interested in starting the on the VOD dash, am I eligible for a free 30 day trial? Or you might say I want to get me some of that sweet, sweet Omni pod five algorithm you got going on over there? How about that, I want to know more on the pod.com forward slash juice box, get started, get moving, you deserve this technology for full safety risk information and free trial terms and conditions. You can also visit omnipod.com forward slash juice box

it stuck well also, I mean, I guess not for nothing, not the diabetes doesn't invade everyone's life and put your real life on hold for a minute, but your real life was you thought you were going to be in the Olympics, right? Yeah. So it wasn't like you couldn't go to English. And you were like, Yeah, let's make that up next semester. So you have like, your big time constraint, lifelong pursuits. That somebody's like, hey, guess what? Those 20 seconds you've been praying for me? Yeah, maybe not. And so maybe not. Yeah. And that's in your head, too. Did you then what did they do give you you have to make an appoint with an endo. Because, I mean, you're just doing Basal. You weren't Bolus. Yeah, it

Charlotte Drury 21:06
was honestly like a disaster at the start, like so because I'd seen like, I saw my primary care and she's fantastic. I've seen her my like whole life. And she was like, You need to come into the office first thing in the morning. There's like an endos office connected to my primary care office. So I went into there, but the endo was like, you know, booked out for months, and you can't get an appointment. She literally just walked me into the office and the nurse educator or nurse practitioner or some somebody in the office was just like, oh, okay, like, well, here's some insulin, take 10 units prick your finger. By

Scott Benner 21:44
you've had it for a year. Now you realize that's plenty of information. You're fine. Yeah, no, I'm fine. I'm doing good. See what happens and listen, if you faint. Get your printer and get your progress your blood? How long? How long did you live like that?

Charlotte Drury 22:01
It was only it was a week. So I think that was maybe like a Monday. And then the office? And like, Go, Dr. PERIES. My primary care. She was like, No, you're gonna get her in this week. You are going to get her in. Yeah. And the office was like, well, we'll try. We'll try. And she. I was literally in the doctor's office that morning. Sobbing and then they brought her in because I was so emotionally distraught. And she was like, You're gonna be okay, it's gonna be fine. And she looks at the nurse in the room. And she goes, you're gonna get her in and just like death stares her. And then it's like, well, we'll try it. And she goes, No, you're gone. Get her

Scott Benner 22:42
to kill her on your side once. And I was like just just shriveled up in a corner. Like, yeah, yeah, no.

Charlotte Drury 22:54
I think I was like, snuck in on like, a Friday. So it was maybe like five days of me just try not to eat a carb, and learn as much as I can and reach out to anybody in the world that I know that has type one. Yeah. And yeah, I mean, that first week, those first two weeks and even after seeing the endo for the first time, he just upped my basil and actually still didn't prescribe me a fast second insulin. And it wasn't until I think the following week that I was doing like virtual appointments with the nurse educator in the office where they teach you everything. And she was like, you really need a fast acting insulin. I was like, I don't know a lot. But I know you're right. I heard that. So she called the doctor. And then then he prescribed it. And then I got it. And then I got started on it. And that's when I really started to feel better and

Scott Benner 23:41
get directions from them about how to use it, or were you figuring it out online? Or?

Charlotte Drury 23:46
Um, she did give me some directions, but I was so confused. Again, horrible, really horrible. Oh, my God, she doesn't

Scott Benner 23:57
know let's get better at your job. Have some pride

Charlotte Drury 24:01
honestly do better. Um, no, I was like, trying to figure it out online. But again, all those words are new, and everything's just so new. I really just needed somebody to very simply break it down for me. And she was the nurse educator was really cautious and telling me this or that or this or that? Because diabetes is so personal, which it absolutely is, once you have it figured out. But there are some like baseline rules. You just kind of need to know,

Scott Benner 24:32
Charlotte, I have a series that must be over 40s It's got to be over 40 episodes long. Now. There's basically five to 10 minute episodes that are called defining diabetes. It's every term that you hear. And it's not. It's not read to you like out of a definition. You know, like here it is from the it's Look, here's Bolus. This is what Bolus means. Here's what it means. Technically, here's what it's gonna mean in your life every day. It's a fun, you know, I pride myself on making the Very listenable diabetes content. And so it's a fun conversation where when you end it you go I know what Basal means now. I know what yeah, you know, the K means now like, because to your point people are yelling a bunch of words that you know, context for them whatsoever that and you're scared. Yeah. And your blood sugar's probably still vacillating all over the place, and your life is changed irreparably. And you're worried about your 20 seconds. And you know, like, like, every other thing that happens, I, if it makes you feel better when my daughter, my daughter was diagnosed, a nurse came in the room, fourth day, I think, and said that they were going to teach us how to count carbs. And then she started adding fractions, and I just, I just started crying. Like, like, just like crying, and my wife goes, you're gonna need to come back and she left the room and one of the only times Charlotte, your youngster, but one of the only times my wife's been nice to me, like the last 30 years, and she turned to me, she goes, you're okay, you know how to add fractions. And I said, I'm gonna kill her. That's what's gonna win. And I didn't mean the nurse. I met my daughter. I meant I'm gonna mess this math up. I'm gonna kill her. I know I am. That's what it felt like, in the moment. Yeah, I lost the ability to add fractions because of the pressure. And in some ways, this podcast exists because I don't count carbs. And I don't do things the way other people do. And, you know, inside of this podcast is how we my daughter's a one C is, you really don't know this podcast. I know. My daughter is a once he has been from five, two to six, two for eight years. Wow. Any diet restrictions. I know how to use insulin, and I know how to talk about it. I just don't know how to count carbs and add fractions when you need.

Charlotte Drury 26:49
Tough. I remember that day in fourth grade vividly. Yeah,

Scott Benner 26:52
was terrible. And Mr. Chabot? Let me be honest with you. While we're calling people out. Mr. Cicala, my fourth grade teacher was a horror, okay. He hated me. I know he did. I know you're allowed to hate children. You just don't talk about it. This man did not like me whatsoever. Thought I was sarcastic. I was probably a little fat kid, which, you know, in this in the seven days, and I kind of get any respect there. There's no like personal choice. But I've done. It's not like that's the body's comfortable in there like Scott, stop eating, you know, a shame the four year old for certain, right? And so every Friday, he'd give a math test. And it was 100 quick questions, where he you'd take a piece of paper was one to 100, a little pencil, and he'd go two times three, and you had to write six and move to line two, because he was already saying five times eight. And they were simple.

Charlotte Drury 27:40
I would get this is when you discovered what anxiety was,

Scott Benner 27:43
I would get most of them wrong. And then what would happen is you had to write each 110 times over the weekend. So my entire weekend was spent writing out 1000s of multiplication things over and over again, while my parents yelled at me. Like, how could you not understand three times five is like, well, I know it now that you're saying it, you know, and like and so I think he enjoyed torturing me. I don't even remember why we're talking about that anymore. But

Charlotte Drury 28:10
I would agree with that. We're unpacking childhood trauma. We're here we're here for at all

Scott Benner 28:14
can I tell you? He's probably dead. And I'm okay with it.

Unknown Speaker 28:20
C'est la vie.

Scott Benner 28:21
Were there were people who loved them. But he was very mean to me and I don't have any I have no remorse.

Charlotte Drury 28:26
You know what? He wronged you? And that's okay. You can you can feel what you feel

Scott Benner 28:30
sure you have no idea how bad I am with names. That I know that man's odd last name still means he really? He tortured me? Yeah,

Charlotte Drury 28:38
you're gonna remember it for the rest of your life.

Scott Benner 28:39
So anyway, so sorry, let us just segue away from that. Because you're on the podcast. I don't imagine you know why you're on the podcast. I know why you're on. And it's not because just to let people know to talk about me again in fourth grade when you all send me emails a year ago, you should get Charlotte Drury on the podcast. She just got diabetes. She's trying to be in the Olympics. You make me not want to do it when you do that. I don't like doing what everybody else is doing. It makes me uncomfortable. Because all I can think I everyone's going to interview this Charlotte girl. And I don't want to just be like it'll get lost in the mix. I'm like, No. So you weren't on a year ago because of the people who wrote me to ask to have you on. I know it's backwards. You're on today. I'll get a list of their names. Yeah, you will you should exact your retribution to as I've done just now with Mr. Cipolla. There's a strong possibility you're episode's going to be called Mr. Scola, by the way,

Charlotte Drury 29:36
support that through and through. In fact, I think we should trademark his name and started.

Scott Benner 29:42
Yeah, I want to make money off his ass. That's a good idea.

Charlotte Drury 29:46
So in your trauma dollars,

Scott Benner 29:48
the reason I reached out to you is because somebody tagged me in something on Instagram, and I got to watch you have a difficult moment in public. And I saw you You like every other person with diabetes and not like a bouncy girl? Or like, I don't mean to be like derivative. You know what I mean? I'm sure what you do is really cool. I do I do. But I wanted to talk to you about that. That's why I asked you on why it took me 25 minutes to get to it. There's no way to know because we took the witness a long road, we've been chatting, and I have not even asked you yet about what you think of those kids on tick tock, who bounce hundreds of feet in the air in their backyard trampolines. As I walk in and go, That kid's gonna die. That kid's gonna die. like maniacs they're gonna die, right? Yeah. Yeah, let's get away from that. Seriously, if no one's seen those videos, you have to find them. But that's not what I'm talking about. Like they literally I mean, am I wrong? Are they going 50 100 feet in the air?

Charlotte Drury 30:48
easily, easily. They're insane.

Scott Benner 30:51
And there's other spinning the entire time. Yeah, they do more

Charlotte Drury 30:55
flips and like one bounce than I do. And like for sometimes,

Scott Benner 30:59
I don't even understand how they're not dead when they just hit the trampoline. Because I

Charlotte Drury 31:04
also agree with that. I genuinely am baffled by those kids. They are maniacs. I think they were born with rubber bones. I and like, God bless them the day their prefrontal cortex fully develops, and they realize what they've been doing for the last 15 years has been insane.

Scott Benner 31:20
I blame the drugs, Charlotte, I don't know. I don't know how you would do. I mean, I'm being honest. Okay, so can you tell me a little bit about like, I think you did. I'm not the social media maven that maybe I should be. But I feel like you were just asking questions of people and having conversations through Instagram. But what led you to that that moment?

Charlotte Drury 31:46
Yeah, I think. So I actually did talk about this a lot with some people that are really close in my life, and then with a bunch of people on social media have. I've been diagnosed for a year now. And in my head, that kind of feels like a long time. But with diabetes, you know, you're looking at the rest of your life. The year is such a, it's a fraction of the rest of your life. And it was really hitting me that I was having all of these like identity changes of oh my god, I've always classified myself as a healthy person. Am I a healthy person? Am I an able bodied person? Am I capable person? Am I an independent person, all these things that I valued. And for like a solid week, I just slowly started having this unraveling this like slow brewing meltdown. And then one night, it was like, maybe 10 o'clock at night, and I'm in bed, and I'm just like sobbing, and having this meltdown. And it all being diabetes related and diabetes focused, and not knowing who to talk to you about it. And then I was like, well, there's actually like, 1000s of people that I can talk to about it right now. And selfishly, I really need support. So I posted it on my story. And I was just asking for support. I said I was struggling, what helps you when you guys are struggling, and it was just a q&a. And I got 1000s of messages in reply that were so kind and thoughtful and helpful. And I felt seen, I felt validated. I had new ways of thinking and people were shifting my perspective. And because they were so insightful, and a couple of people in those questions had asked if I could also share them because they were also struggling. So I was like, what a great opportunity to now share these answers with everybody else that's also here in this community. And so I did and it was like a really cathartic experience. It took me a good 24 hours to be able to go through and read all the questions without just crying the whole time. Because again, I was really fragile in the moment. And they were really helpful. They were hitting the nerves that were raw. And it was nice, and I was everybody always talks about, you know, you need your community and you need the diabetes community to kind of prop you up when you're feeling a little weak or a little shaky. And they were right. I mean, I felt really not better. I felt better, not fixed. Obviously not completely through that like slump, I'm still definitely in it, but a lot better. And I think after that day, I started to kind of get out of that burnout, depressive, not depression, because it's not depression right now. But the depressive slip like slope.

Scott Benner 34:30
So I mean, it caught my attention because I mean, surely I don't have diabetes. I should knock on wood because I'm probably gonna die. I mean, it's gonna be iron. It's gonna have to follow me at some point, right? I'm gonna have to climb on here one day be like, okay, it happened. But for the moment I don't. I make this podcast because my daughter is who's 18 In a couple of weeks, has had it since she was two. I started writing a blog before blogs were a thing. It helped people and I liked that it help people. At some point, I recognize that it was all raw nerve blogging, I was just like something would happen. And I would write about it, and people would come in and go, that happens to me too. And then it would make them feel better that it happens to someone else. I saw the value in it. But there was just one day where I thought, like, my conscious thought was, it's nice to know you're not alone at 2am, right? Even though you're alone in your home, even though you're alone in your home, somewhere, countless people are up going, Oh, my blood sugar's low, and they're drinking a juice or they're worried or they're eating their kitchen or whatever, there's comfort in that. And I started thinking, it's not enough to just offer comfort, like, what if we could stop them from being low at 2am? Like, how would that be? And so I started to focus the blog more about that. It's how it kind of ended up translating into the podcast. But as much as I could see the value in it through the blog, the podcast is by magnitudes, much bigger than than the pot than the blog ever was. And now I'm actually speaking to people. And it always strikes me because in my heart, the podcast is about management. But it's, it's not really. And it's got these facets that some of them I'm less aware of, because I don't have diabetes. But when people start coming on and tell these great stories, and they're sharing their lives, and at some point, I kind of ham fisted ly go. So how does the podcast help you? Because you know, I need my moment. You understand? Yeah, I mean, after you land on the trampoline, you stand there for a second because you're like, Yeah, someone ought to clap right now. And but anyway, but seriously, I try to what I really am trying to do is connect their stories to how the podcast helped them. So hopefully, it'll help somebody else. But, but the Joking aside, so many people say that it's the community aspect of the podcast, that's the most valuable part for them coming on every day and listening to someone else tell a story about their life. And I always knew it was important. I never could connect it completely. And so you had this opportunity. I assume your Instagram following grew mightily when you got to type one. Yeah, truly, now there's crazy community around type one diabetes that almost doesn't exist and other disease states. And so do you think? Do you think you'd still be in that space? If you didn't have those people to talk to?

Charlotte Drury 37:26
That's a really good question. Um, no. However, that's only because I have been through a lot in my life in sport, and with this diagnosis, and I have been forced to figure things out on my own before. And I am confident in my ability to figure things out and to get through things. However, did I arrive there a lot quicker and a lot more comforted and comfortable, because of the community. Absolutely. But I thoroughly believe that every single one of us as individuals, because we have to, can figure it out. However, we don't have to do it alone. We don't have to. And the fact that we have community makes it so much easier. And because all those people reached out and shared their their tidbits of information and what they've learned when they've been in these tough spots, probably by themselves as well. It just made it that much easier. They just showed me the way out.

Scott Benner 38:35
My Week is lining up so strangely. So you're 26. Last night, I interviewed a 26 year old girl who talked about how she had a very has an had a very tough life, and was not raised to find her way out of it. And she's doing it anyway. Right? She's finding these tools. And she's not just she's not just saying this is hard. Somebody helped me. She's figuring out how to help herself. And then she's dragging herself forward. And then looking ahead and figuring out the next thing and dragging yourself forward again. And I just had Sorry, I was just having this conversation like 16 hours ago with her about this thing. And then you said the same thing in a completely different way. Like we all have the capacity somehow and I think I'm looping in her story, which will come out much later than your so people won't have a lot of context. So I don't know what you want from me, but I just want to just hold it to you now. So it because it would be easy to look at you and go Oh, sure. The Olympic girl can do it. But I'm not that. Like I I think that sometimes like there's no reason I don't have a ton of famous people, as many as I could. Athletes, as many as I could, because they look like Superman sometimes. And you're like Oh yeah, sure. Superman dedic Great, what am I gonna do, you don't even like I can't jump up in the air. So like and, and at the same time, I think there's an amazing value in hearing that you a person who knows how to work really hard for something over extended amounts of time, which is a real skill. And a person who doesn't have nearly any of your conveniences, like, like coming up, how you both came to the same conclusion, you're gonna you're gonna get there differently with different ideas. But, I mean, it's just a very human idea. Like, we all can do something you don't I mean, and then wait and see what happens next, there's more, and there's more, and you could just kind of keep going. It's, you know, I mean, I don't know, I don't think of life as like a work to get to a party, I think of it is. Do my best today. So I'm gonna do my best tomorrow, you know, kind of thing? Yeah. Can you talk a little bit about what some of those people said that you found helpful in the moment?

Charlotte Drury 40:57
A lot of it that has stuck with me, especially even today of like, reframing how you think about what you're grateful for. Because everybody's always like, oh, make your gratitude list, you know, list five things that you're grateful for. And it's like, well, yeah, I'm grateful for five things, but I'm also really ungrateful for a lot of other things.

Scott Benner 41:18
My Netflix, being free is not overpowering the diabetes thing.

Charlotte Drury 41:24
Spring is not fixing the fact that my pancreas is broken, right? But it was reframe what it is you're grateful for. So you can hate this disease, but you can be grateful for life. Okay, I can do that. I am grateful for like, I am grateful for living, and I hate this disease. Another person wrote, whenever I start to really resent my broken pancreas, I start making a list out loud. And I list all the body parts that are working, and are doing their jobs, and that allow me to live my life. And so I also started doing that. And I say, thank you skin from for protecting me from the sun today. Thank you brain for helping me read this book today. Thank you eyes for working so well. Thank you nose for not being stuffy today. Like we should really think our noses more often for not being stuffy when they're not stuffy. And like, that was really impactful advice for me and putting gratitude in a lens that I felt like I could reach it in that moment.

Scott Benner 42:26
Can I ask you before you move on before you move on? Yeah, I don't want you to lose your place. But did you grow up in such a way where things worked out for you? No, no, the things work? Can you take take training out of it for a second? Did things just work out? Like the sofa was clean? The house was nice. Like that kind of stuff? Yeah. Right. Yeah. Expect and then you grew up. I know, this sounds crazy. I am really old when I say this. But the internet and cell phones change people's expectations of getting what they want when they want it. Like that idea. Like I think the example I used the other day talking to somebody is when you watch a TV show and you like I don't know who that is in the background. You just pause it, you look it up and like, oh, it's Joe Montana. Joe Montana is a character actor. And you and you know all about Joe Montana, his life at that point. Yeah, that happened to me when I was 26. I'd have to go to work and be like, Hey, have any of you ever seen this TV show? No. It's on Tuesdays at eight. If you could watch it, I just want to know who they like, there's no, like, I'm used to not getting the answers to my questions. And I grew up incredibly broke. I was used to things not going well. And I do wonder sometimes how that how that informs how I feel and what I do next, when things go wrong, because I almost expect things to go wrong. You know, and so when I do, I'm like, Okay, well, now we'll take care of this, you know, and anyway, but you also see you have this duality, where you grew up reasonably well. And at the same time, put yourself into something incredibly difficult. That was probably constantly knocking you down. Yes, yeah. Okay, so these both at the

Charlotte Drury 44:03
end of the day, I did have, you know, a safe, clean, happy home to always return to, right. Granted, I was there at night and sleeping, the majority of my day was in the gym, and the majority of my identities in the gym, but I always had a soft place to land. Right? So there's, there's that and that has definitely been formative to me in kind of giving me that like, underlying assumption that I'm always going to be okay. I will always figure it out. But I'm not scared that you know, I'm going to be on the streets or I'm not scared that my family is not going to be there for me one day, you know, like, I have that sense of strength and stability in my life that I'm so grateful for. But when it comes to sport, like oh my God, not a single thing, everyone right and this has been a therapy topic.

Scott Benner 45:00
Hey, you know, you just named your autobiography. Unless it's unless it's a like a colloquialism that people use that I've never heard before you just named your autobiography,

Charlotte Drury 45:09
a soft land, a soft place to land,

Scott Benner 45:13
see how it works? plane and then life? And I mean, I'm just saying it's a metaphor. It's all right. Honestly, yeah, I'm not even. I'm not even taking that for the title. Because that's for you. Although I would like to thank you at the end of the book, that's all

Charlotte Drury 45:29
you can be in the dedication.

Scott Benner 45:30
Yeah, that would be nice. Tell me about that, about putting yourself in terribly difficult situations on purpose. And then those situations torturing you. And you could just look at them and go, Hey, you know what, I'm not doing this anymore. But instead, you show back up every day and let it punch in the face again, what what's, what's wrong with you? Let's talk about what's wrong inside of your brain that you would put yourself through?

Charlotte Drury 45:56
I don't really have a good answer for that. Because I'm also like, Why did I do that? When I looked in the mirror in the morning, I was like, I am miserable. I hate this. This is horrible. Let's go to it. I think I think it was so ingrained in my identity of this is who I am. I am somebody who shows up. I am somebody who does the sport. I am somebody who does hard things. I said I was going to do this, and I'm going to see it through. Because I am somebody that sees things through. However, I have recently learned the value of quitting. And I have taken away the negative connotation that quitting has. And I think everybody should quit something in their life. And it's only just started to kind of unravel a little bit so that I can live a little bit of a softer, kinder, not so intense life. Yeah, I don't know. If you have an answer for me of where that came from, that would probably save you $1,000 in therapy. Well,

Scott Benner 46:57
listen, I don't know your parents, but that's where I would start and the let's skip past them for a minute. Are you incredibly competitive? I was yeah, I totally was more with yourself, or with the thing you were doing? Did you care more about the score? Or about doing it? Right?

Charlotte Drury 47:14
Doing it? Right? Yeah, my son. The thing is, is if I didn't write the score was good.

Scott Benner 47:18
So my son can leave a game that they lose nine to nothing, and have three good at bats and make a catch. And he'll be like I was I did perfect today. Like, you know, and he's more competitive with himself than he is. I think there's a world where my son could lose every baseball game he's ever been in, and still be somewhat fulfilled by it, although it would become a drudgery at some point. Right. But I'm always interested in that if people are like they do they want to win, or do they want to be good?

Charlotte Drury 47:49
Yeah, so I. So I think it's only slightly different because this is an individual sport, and the success or failure hinges solely on me and what I do

Scott Benner 48:02
same thing, so

Charlotte Drury 48:04
yeah, if I. Yeah. Yeah. So there's been times where I would have you know, won a competition but been a little bit disappointed that one thing didn't go right. And I would get hung up on that one thing. So I do think that it's definitely me being my biggest competitor.

Scott Benner 48:25
Are you a completionist? In other places? Do you start? Yeah. Do you start a movie that you don't like and watch the rest of it anyway?

Charlotte Drury 48:33
Do you know I don't like movies. That's a weird fact about me.

Scott Benner 48:36
That's okay. Pick something different puzzle book.

Charlotte Drury 48:40
Yes, I'll finish a book I don't like okay.

Scott Benner 48:43
All right. Well, here's the tough question. How old were you when you realize you didn't like is it tumbling? I'm sorry. This is the this is the thing. Everyone's gonna like the people who listen are not going to be surprised by this. But I told you right when we started, I'm gonna say something to you. You might find shocking. I don't know what sport you do.

Charlotte Drury 49:00
That's fair. I think that's refreshing. Also, it's trampling nobody knows what sport I'm doing.

Scott Benner 49:06
I figured it out as you were talking, but the first time you said it, I went Oh, okay. Cool. So we call trampoline trampoline. It's not trampolining.

Charlotte Drury 49:16
Correct. Correct. Trampoline is both a noun and a verb.

Scott Benner 49:19
Okay. And so let me ask you then How old were you the first time you realize you were better at it than other people your age?

Charlotte Drury 49:28
I'm on it. Honestly, like it took a really long time. I so I did artistic gymnastics from three till 13 Quit artistic gymnastics nursery thinks they're so burned out and realized that I wasn't gonna go to the Olympics for it. And I was like, that's not worth it. If I'm going to be working out five to eight hours a day to not go to the Olympics, that doesn't sound Sure. So quit that and then started trampling for fun, like, solely because they needed something to do I always think I carried that kind of like chip on my shoulder from artistic gymnastics of I'm not actually that good. I'm just kind of doing it. I'm not the best. I've never been the best. And so even when I was like, winning senior league nationals, and I was like, Oh, well, I'm just not, I'm not the best. Like, I am not the best. Maybe I won this competition, but I am not the best. So it took me like a really long time to even knowledge, the fact that I was really good at the sport.

Scott Benner 50:30
That's what keeps you going. That's why people who are good at things are good at them, though. Because they don't they don't sit back and rest. They don't they don't say, Oh, look how good I am. This is as good as I need to be at this is always something else. And something more and a fine tune here. Or you get to somewhere where it feels like a pinnacle. And you go, it's Pentacles not high enough. I'm going to tear this down. I'm going to tear it down and rebuild it again and start over and better the next time. I've watched my son tried to hit a baseball since he was three years old. I know what you're talking about. So it's exhausting. Yeah. And it's actually funny, because right now he's talking about going to grad school to keep playing. And I'm trying to find the words to say, Are you sure you want to do that? Before before? And I don't want to dissuade him if he really does want to do it, but and I but I it's a weird position to be in, right? Because I don't want to be the person that steps in and says, Hey, Charlotte, stop bouncing up and down on that thing. You got other things you could write, right? Because then you might stop and three years from now by like, this guy knew. Yeah, yeah, me stop doing this. And so I don't want to do that to my son. And at the same time, I don't want him to wake up five years from now and be in your position where you're like, Why the hell was I doing that for so long? You know, and especially when the when the payoff at the end? Is so unlikely to begin with. And but you were on it, like you were you were you really weren't right, you were headed to it? Is that right? Yeah. Do you think? So? Tell me that. So let's go back for a second you get diabetes? How far off are the Olympics at that moment?

Charlotte Drury 52:07
timewise. They're three months away three months

Scott Benner 52:09
away? Have you qualified? Are you trying to qualify?

Charlotte Drury 52:13
We still had all of the qualifiers to go through. So we had country qualification. So we still needed to compete at a World Cup to get the US spot. There were still that uncertainty. And then I still had three Olympic trials to compete at.

Scott Benner 52:27
Do you have any confidence that it would have gone your way?

Charlotte Drury 52:31
Had I not had diabetes? Yeah. Yes.

Scott Benner 52:34
Yeah, absolutely. Thank you, it would have worked out.

Charlotte Drury 52:37
Totally. And I mean, I do have like, you know, the evidence to support that as well. Because in 2020, before pandemic, and that season started in end of January, I think it was in February competed a World Cup. And I competed at a at the first Olympic trial of 2020. And knock those both out of the water, like I was in fighting for him. And I felt really good. And I for as tumultuous as my entire elite career has been, that was the first time where I was kind of having that thought, again, in a very long time of, I think this might work out, I think I can do this, it, it's right there. And I really didn't believe that I was going to get to that point again. Because also, my God, there's so much I mean, this Olympic cycle was really hard. The last Olympic cycle was worse. It was It destroyed me as a human being, I mean, just wrecked me, I was training for the 2016 Olympics. And I ended up breaking my foot the day before the last Olympic trial. So I had made it all the way up until that point training from three years old, to I was 20. And I survived a lifetime of training, just to literally break my foot the day before I was going to reach my goal. And I also kind of came in with a younger mentality, you know, I was 20 years old. And all I knew was this. So losing that, you know, my life is over. Not only is that I just lose the Olympics, I definitely lost my entire identity. So coming into this Olympics and getting diabetes, and seeing that decline and thinking that my grasp on the Olympics is going to be loosening and slowing down and I guess I'm losing it again. I wasn't as distraught by it, because I came in with a lot of a different mentality than I did in 2016. Because I saw how bad that destroyed me not making it and I wasn't really gonna let myself get back to that point.

Scott Benner 54:44
Have you made Have you met Kate Hall yet? No. Do you know who she is? No. Okay. So Kate is a long jumper. Who has type one? Who if I'm not mistake and blew up something in her leg right before the Olympics last time.

Charlotte Drury 55:05
The club no one wants to be in. Yeah.

Scott Benner 55:07
Kate Hall 2043 on Instagram. Okay, you guys might look her up, you might have a lot in common.

Unknown Speaker 55:15
That'd be the most depressing dinner party.

Scott Benner 55:18
Hey, Kate. Remember when the sadness washed over you? I do Charlotte. I remember the sadness. Should we get wine? Probably. How do you Bolus for wine? I don't know. If I want to jump off a bridge? Sure. So

Charlotte Drury 55:35
it'd be a soft place to land? Probably.

Scott Benner 55:40
Maybe, right. I mean, you you're, you probably there's probably a trampoline. Do you still? Do you work out at this point? Like just for personal fitness? Or how do you? How do you go backwards that far.

Charlotte Drury 55:55
It's only recently that I've started to even incorporate like physical activity into my life again. I definitely after I mean after 2016 as well. And after this past games, do that, like full pendulum rebound of working out all day long to absolutely doing nothing. And refusing to step in a gym and I don't think I'll ever stepped foot in a gym. Gym, not a gymnastics gym. I would love to go back and play around on a trampoline because I do love trampoline. I love bouncing. But will I go lift weights again? Probably not. But I do like to like, go out for walks. Maybe I'll jog for a little bit of it. Maybe I'll rent a little bit. Love bike riding. I love the like, lifestyle. Fitness, like the ways that I can incorporate activity and movement into just my life. Instead of having to carve out hours of my day to work out.

Scott Benner 56:54
If you haven't felt like this. Don't let me lead you there. But do you ever feel like a pawn in someone else's game? Like your college? Right? And I'm assuming they probably paid for a lot of it because you were you know, an athlete for them? Do you ever stop and look back and think nobody cares about my education? I'm just here because I can do trampoline. And because they can take pictures of me and put it on their social media and bring other kids in and go look bouncy girl, she's gonna go to the Olympics. Don't you want to get an English degree from us? Like like that? Does that? Does that? Did that happen? Did you think about that?

Charlotte Drury 57:28
I, I felt like that in a slightly different way. Because I did go to college. But it had nothing to do with trampoline, there was no trampoline program in college. So I was going to school and doing trampoline for the national team completely as two separate things. So, you know, college was something that I chose to do outside of sport. But I did I do feel like a pawn or I really felt like a soldier for gymnastics, where I was doing the hardest job in the organization. But was told that I was replaceable and told that I wasn't important and that it's not about me. It's about what I can do. And and yeah, it feels I do remember having that like specific lightbulb moment. I could tell you exactly where I was standing when I was like, hang on. This is really backwards. This is really wrong. Like did you ever watch the good place? Yeah,

Scott Benner 58:25
I love that show.

Charlotte Drury 58:25
You know, when that moment where she's like, Oh my god, this is the bad place? Yeah, like I've had that moment of like, oh my god, this isn't right. This is not how human beings should be treated. Athletes should be treated. This is not how I want to be valued. This is not how I want my life to be built. I don't like feeling like this. I don't like feeling like I'm replaceable and not poor. And yeah, only as good as what my score is tell me I am.

Scott Benner 58:54
It's like somebody takes the the culmination of your life's work and a major part of your identity. And they've built another thing that's based on you doing that. And you realize that in this moment, while you're competing, you have all of these desires and focuses and the person maybe even coaching you doesn't really care about you. They care about coaching, something that wins with the person that pays them is happy and they keep their job and it's almost it becomes not about the sport anymore. It becomes about everybody sustaining each other's entity. And I've just I've had those feelings. I've looked over at some of my son's coaches, and I thought he does not even know my kid. He just knows he catches that ball. I keep this job. That's that's how it feels sometimes.

Charlotte Drury 59:45
Yeah, and I think at a certain level, it's totally like that. intrinsics of course, but the reason I was able to survive 2021 was because my coach cared about me as a person. 40 cared about me as an athlete. That's excellent. He absolutely was my number one supporter of me as Charlotte as the person. That second I told him that I got this diagnosis. He didn't ask me about coming to the gym. He didn't ask me when I was coming back what my plan was what I wanted to do. He said, Take all the time you need, I'm here to meet me. Like, that's good. He's my number one.

Scott Benner 1:00:25
And also, I'm going to be honest with you, I had an ulterior motive for asking the question, I wasn't sure where you're gonna come back, because I've had this other thought that I've wondered about, and you seem just honest enough to answer this question. So let's see it feel like when suddenly a bunch of diabetes media outlets approach you, because you're one person that got diabetes today, but you look like you're going to the Olympics. And now suddenly, you're in the middle of, um, you described it earlier, right? You're completely confused. You don't know what's going on. Your health is all over the place. You're worried about your life, everything seems like it's gone. And then someone's like, Hey, I just got the funniest text. I'm gonna tell you about a second. I did some. And they're like, Hey, we know who you are. You're wearing something that says USA on the front of it, and you got diabetes, we want to interview you. Now. You're just upon again, right? But now for a different situation. But you You did it. So like, I'm not taking it, I would have done it too. I'm just asking, like, are you aware while it's happening? Or no.

Charlotte Drury 1:01:28
I think looking back, I have a lot more clarity. Now that the dust has settled on this last year. Because again, everything happened so fast. And there is one thing that not bothers me, but something that that I am really aware of. And it's I don't know how to really put this in words, it's like, I guess I feel like an imposter. I feel like I'm not really the person. That should be, you know, the diabetes poster child for diabetics, sport. Like, I did have diabetes for the year, before leading into the games. And I was diagnosed three months before the games. But I didn't know what I was doing. Like, I was just trying to survive. I was relying on all of the training that I had my whole life. Just to get through these three months, and doing these interviews now and having this attention and being in people being so excited, and being so inspired by it. And I was done propelled forward by that support. But I also like, God, the people that are diagnosed at two years old, the people that are diagnosed at 6789 10. Like, you guys are truly something else. You guys are truly like, I don't think I could have done that. Like

Scott Benner 1:02:49
somebody in those people. Right? Yeah. So

Charlotte Drury 1:02:52
So earlier, I'm a platform because they're the real superstars of this. Yeah.

Scott Benner 1:02:56
So earlier, I joked, I was half joking and half not joking about not reaching out to you at first, because people told me that I don't like to be told what to do, which is my own problem, right. But the other part of it that I didn't mention was, I don't like it when that happens for you. I don't know you, I have no reason to feel protective of you. But when people were like, ask this girl, I was like, Can she just leave this girl alone? Like, she just got diabetes, like her whole life looks like it's falling apart, and you're making her like, stand up and smile and go, I have type one, and I'm okay. And I'm like, I mean, I know it's inspirational for people. But you could be just as inspirational a year later. It doesn't need to be right now. So there's something about that click Beatty nature of content. And I don't buy into it. Like if you go back and look at the I mean, this podcast might have almost 700 episodes at this point. Wow. And the way you finish things I'd like for you to start at the beginning because I feel like I could get 700 Good downloads out of you, but but she's like, I'm not giving up now. He was terrible in season three. No, I wasn't. But, but I like just talking to regular people. They don't hide things. They're not practiced. They don't think oh, I can't say that. or I shouldn't say this. They just tell their story. And and I think just what you think put them out front, I mean, some of the biggest names in this space. Some of these people I really like. And I know a number of them. I don't want them on the podcast. They're just gonna say the same thing. They say all the time when somebody asks them a question. Again, it's not their fault. They're their dogs almost like

Charlotte Drury 1:04:33
they're just like, they're so scared of saying something that will alienate anybody. And I get it. I have been there. I mean, I've been Yeah, like, you know, the Little Miss Perfect gymnast, like doing interviews and saying great things about everybody all the time. Like it's only like recently that I really wanted to be a lot more honest because that's what connects with people and selfishly That's how people connect with me. And I need that connection.

Scott Benner 1:05:03
Everyone needs a trial it it's the it's the obvious elephant in the room that everyone ignores. They would rather say, Hey, today we're going to interview this person whose name you might have heard who also has diabetes, instead of saying, I don't know, I could pull up a list of 1000 names, right? Instead of saying, Look, this is an and had some kids, one of them got sick. Here's what happened. You know what I mean? And that's because we're all in. And we're all Charlotte. We're not all Olympians. And I listen, I've come out and say it. I've had people on the show before who were famous. And I tried to ask them about their diabetes. They don't know the first thing about, like, you know, and you're just and then people listen to the show. And they're like, Hey, I've been waiting for so long for this person. And they came on, and they were not valuable. And I'm like, yeah. Welcome to the life of someone who has a trainer, you know what I mean? Or who's somebody who's a meal ticket for somebody and no one's gonna let their blood sugar get out of control? Because they know how to catch a ball or do a thing. Make money for other people? Yeah,

Charlotte Drury 1:06:08
it's just a different life. And that might be really relatable for a very small demographic of people who are also in that in that circle. You know, the majority, it's probably

Scott Benner 1:06:18
not, you know, I once had on Mark Andrews Mom, he's the tight end for the the Baltimore Ravens, it'd be so much for telling me that it would be. It would be cool if he was on, but it's way cooler to talk to his mom. Like she raised them with diabetes, you know, like, it's just I'm not saying he wouldn't. I mean, maybe I don't know the guy probably come on here be terrific. And shut me right up. But but you know, like, it's, I just want to talk smack about it. He's like, I heard you thought I wasn't gonna be interesting. Let's learn, I'm gonna be interesting. So by the way, if Mark Andrews hears this, of course, you can come on. That's not the point. The point is that is that real people's stories, not that Mark Andrews isn't a real person or that you're not a real person. It's just that you're not that real people aren't practiced. And they're not worried about saying something. And as you and I were talking, I started feeling like this person, you, you're in the middle of a metamorphosis right now, like you are really shifting, you know what I mean? And feels like you want to be whoever you think you're supposed to be. And not the person you spent a lot of time being. Am I right about that?

Charlotte Drury 1:07:27
I think if you'd asked me six months ago, I'd be like, yeah, absolutely. That's exactly what is happening. I'd also probably be crying. If you actually recognize,

Scott Benner 1:07:35
if you want to cry, Charlotte, that'd be terrific. It really helps the podcast.

Charlotte Drury 1:07:39
ratings go sky.

Scott Benner 1:07:41
Love it when you're crying. No, I'm just kidding.

Charlotte Drury 1:07:44
But no, I do agree. I think I think I have gone through a lot in the last year. I feel like I've got a lot gone through a lot in the last eight years, I am only recently finding peace and what I've been through. And I really feel like the common theme that has now woven through the last couple of months is peace is that I found that I can be where my feet are, and that I can be happy with that. And that I don't have to pretend that I'm doing okay. And I don't have to pretend that everything's great and easy and wonderful, because that's the story that everybody wants to hear. Yeah, like I get to be a little bit more honest. And this is this community is very receiving I don't really feel like I have to perform on social media whatsoever I do. Fully just like to be me on it. It's not a friend or anything like that. But my therapist also said something. She was like you're we're are kind of caught between paradoxes right now, like your whole life is a little bit of a paradox because you are simultaneously so grateful to be out of sport. But I also really want to be back in it. Like there's a part of me that craves to be there again. And I'm, how is that possible? And I'm also simultaneously the happiest that I've ever been, but struggling with this really big thing. And so it's really confusing. I'm confused all the time.

Scott Benner 1:09:09
I'm always worried about performers. And if you're an art if you're a sports person, or an artist or something, you're a performer, like I have to some degree with this, like, what happens when your thing goes away? Where do you get your jolt? Where do you get your Jolt from? The the name that I always fall on recently is a former New York met and Philadelphia Philly Lenny Dykstra who slife just complete like prison drugs like tech something like I mean, a lot, a lot of you like, and I always looked at him and I felt bad, because I was like, That guy is just looking for that jolt that he felt when he hit that baseball or when he ran a ball down in a corner and 60,000 people scream like where do you get that from every day? You know what I mean? Like, yeah, so you've got this unnatural level of feedback, and then suddenly it's gone and listen I mean, I talked to a lot of people, I don't know one of them, really. But I can tell you that a lot of people are going to hear the conversation you and I are having. And if you suddenly told me, I didn't have an outlet for my thoughts anymore, I don't know that I wouldn't feel like you feel right now. You know, like, because this is a thing I do that I enjoy. And if you just took it from me right away, it would be hard to transfer to I think the transition? I really do. Absolutely, yeah. So I mean,

Charlotte Drury 1:10:29
as much as it is, as we all want to be human beings, no matter what, we are going to be a little bit of human doings. Like, who what we do, greatly influences who we are, that is inescapable, there's no way to get around that. But I have recently found a balance, and I don't want to be like preaching this. But the balance of finding things that you can do that are consistent, that won't be taken away from me. So the things that truly make me happy, it's really traveling, it's been in nature, it's connecting with people, those are things that I'm always going to be able to do. And whether or not it's, you know, trampoline and the success and the daily wins, or the daily losses that I get from that, that drives me forward. Like that. That always translatable to something else. But kind of, I guess I've stacked my identity with so many things now. But if you take any one thing out, towers not gonna fall.

Scott Benner 1:11:28
That's excellent. I am, I'm older than you by a lot. And recently, my wife and I are just trying to make sure that you know, our retirement looks like it's coming together. And the person who's helping us with that said, Well, what do you want to do when you retire? And I joked my way through it, and then later told my wife and told him, he's a friend. I said, that's the worst thing anybody's asked me in two years. I said, because I just see myself as a tool. I see myself in a couple of ways. I see myself as a tool that makes money. So the people I love are okay. And I see myself as a tool who makes diabetes content, so people with diabetes can be happier and healthier. If you take those things from me and told me I'm retired, I honestly don't know what would make me happy. And yeah, and I'm really lucky because the feeling of calm, that you're doing something valuable. I get out of this podcast, like the idea that I pay a bill, help people and enjoy what I'm doing, I think is magical. Like, I don't know how I got that lucky. And I also think while you're talking, how crazy is it that most people just want a little bit of that jolt and can't find it day to day? And then the people who get it get an unnatural amount of it. Right? Yeah, you've got a middle ground. Yeah, like why couldn't like why can't Lenny Dykstra or you share your pie with 100 other people so that people aren't driving home 1000 miles an hour screaming at each other out windows and yelling at people online, just trying to find some excitement, you know what I mean, like somewhere, and meanwhile, you've got more than anybody needs in the whole world. It's just

Charlotte Drury 1:13:08
I think it's funny that also that, that's kind of the perception that people have of me. I might just be because trampling is a very obscure sport that doesn't have like this massive fan base. It's not like it's basketball, or even artistic gymnastics. Like, I really don't feel like I've ever had this much attention, or, like, you know, a stadium of people clapping for me,

Scott Benner 1:13:35
like, coming from your parents. Were they proud of you? Did you not want to let them down any of that stuff?

Charlotte Drury 1:13:45
To be honest, I really think that my head was down. And I was working so hard that I wasn't really looking. I mean, obviously, their approval and their support meant so much to me, and I'll probably unpack that in the next couple of years. Of like, how much that meant to me. But I think it was important that I was proving to myself that I was good enough. And I think that's truly what my driver was, because if we're really gonna get into it, I myself, my biggest thing is that I've never been good enough. And that's really what's driven me forward through a lot of things is, oh, I will be good enough when I reach this goal, or I will be good enough when I do this, or worthy, like whatever word you want to put in there that connects with you. It's it's, it's always that sense of incompleteness. And I just don't know that I ever received that from sport, even making an Olympic team. I don't feel any more complete than I did before making the team and I don't feel any less complete, but I feel like exactly the same person. And the things that truly fill me up. Have nothing to do with sport anymore.

Scott Benner 1:14:51
Are you having any trouble with those feelings? And then are you applying them to diabetes like are you feeling competitive about or health in an unhealthy way or anything like that.

Charlotte Drury 1:15:03
I definitely was, especially while I was still training, it was, I'm going to be the perfect diabetic, I'm going to be the best diabetic you've ever seen. Because I have three months to figure this out. And I need to was my excuse. But the truth was, I was just terrified. And I was I was just scared, I just wanted to be perfect with that management. And that's also something that's kind of unraveled in the last couple of months, and kind of led to that meltdown a couple of weeks ago, of, I can't be perfect, I'm too tired. I'm, I'm too tired dealing with this every single moment of every single day. And so I took my my glucose monitor off, and I just kind of said, Screw it, like, let's just relax for a week, I'm obviously going to still be safe and take care of myself to the best of my intuitive ability. But I can't I can't do this constant perfectionist mentality of everything needs to be perfect.

Scott Benner 1:15:55
Yeah, you need to find a way to put your head where Rhiness like, I want it to be good. And when it's not, I just move on. I don't I don't, I used to torture myself when my daughter's blood sugar got out of hand. Like I really would torture myself about it. And I just mean, like, sit there and think like, oh, you messed this up, or blah, blah. And then one day I was like, I can't like how is this sustainable? You know, like, I have to stop doing this. I thought a little bit about when my son was little. Before he went to play baseball, I would hug him because I'd been a stay at home dad for a really long time. So I'd hug him, I tell him, I love you. None of this matters. Go have fun. And then send them out. And as he got older, that changed into I love you. You're only playing baseball to get better at baseball, today's outcome is not important. Go have fun. And there was one time he was recruiting for college. And we were in a car and we were about to get out of it. I looked at him. I said, Hey, man, it actually really matters today. Like go out there. Like it really matters because I think this is this is where decisions get made today, you know? And he was like, Okay, I said, still have fun. But go for it, you know, just really go for it. And he did. And I do think today he is he is still who he is. And it applies to sport the way it does, it also applies to other things in his life. But he's not completely connected to it. And I want to hope that that is in some way from me saying this doesn't matter. grand scheme of things. You're not You're not a baseball player your call like go, you know, and? And I don't know, like, because you're gonna have to disconnect from all of that. I mean, you're wired a certain way, obviously, it is not going to be good. If you apply that to diabetes management over a lifetime, you're gonna be bad for you, right? I mean, that's the kind of thinking that leads to, I mean, eating disorders and, and all kinds of stuff, which I'm not saying you're here, I'm just saying that's not a path you want to go down, obviously.

Charlotte Drury 1:18:02
Oh, for sure. And just to kind of like, touch again on what you were saying to call of like, when that moment came of after, you know, his lifetime of training. And you said this moment does matter. And he didn't choke in that moment. And he was able to perform, and he was able to do it. Because he had a lifetime of preparation that said, I am Cole I am not baseball. And he just was able to go and have fun in the sport for a lifetime up to it. That's why he could perform in that moment. You know, when the pressure was on, he could draw on all of that experience. But if you put that pressure on a kid who's nine years old, and you said you need to win this game, or you need to win this meet, it's gonna freak out.

Scott Benner 1:18:47
I don't understand why people believe that that's the way to talk to anybody, let alone children. But like now do it now we're all gonna die. Well, you know, right there. I think we're in trouble. Because right, yeah, you're panicking the hell out of me. I think

Charlotte Drury 1:18:59
I think I remember getting told before an Olympic qualifier. And I think it was like, in good heart. But it was what you because it was just me competing at this meeting. If I didn't do well, at this beat, there was no spot for the United States and the Olympic Games. And it was like you need to perform so that everybody else for the rest of their life can say that they competed in US Olympic trials.

Scott Benner 1:19:30
Okay, I'm in charge everybody. Great. So just everybody's happiness, though. Is that all I'm in charge of right now. Yeah,

Charlotte Drury 1:19:39
exactly. I'm in charge of everybody's rest of life.

Scott Benner 1:19:42
Great. How old were you then by the way?

Charlotte Drury 1:19:45
I was 19. Yeah, it's

Scott Benner 1:19:46
perfect timing. That's a great time to be put in charge of everybody's life. You're really your finger on the pulse at that point. No, I fit but see, I think of everything that way. I mentioned recently on the podcast. If you liked the way that I talked about diabetes and it helps you it's really just the way I think about life translated to diabetes, you know, and, and I agree so much with what you just said, like when people the way it the way I think of it now is when people always say to me is my daughter's growing up? Will sure you're good at it, but how are you going to explain it to her. And I would always say, I'm not going to just explain it to her, she's going to live it. And through me, I'm going to shoulder most of it, she's going to see it happen. And she'll take from it what she needs. And one day, she's just going to know. And to your point, one day, my son's just gonna be able to walk out in front of I mean, I'm telling you 300 college coaches on a field the size of like, it was, like, massive, and everyone's holding a clipboard and looking at you, and it's baseball. So it's one at a time, your turn now, go catch the ball, you better do it better than the other kid, don't mess up Don't trip, when you get the ball in your hand, throw it to the right place. If you look bad for half a second, you actually see people look down and write and you can see lines, or you can see writing lines or writing on clipboards. And you can't be thinking about it in that moment. And I think diabetes is the same way. I think at the moment, you're thinking about it too much. And I swear to you, this is not a sales pitch. I don't listen, you and I are never gonna see each other after this. I agree. I've had a lovely time talking to you. But you know, but if shit goes sideways for you, Charlotte, what am I going to do? You don't I mean, but I could lay a list of episodes on you that I think would make your management easier. Cool. I think it would put you where you want it to be. And I think it would in a month or so's time. You would start doing things without thinking about them. And I think that's something a lot of people drive with. But you especially because I imagine that you just land on your feet on that trampling you don't. I guess when you think about it, you're in trouble. Right? Like you need to feel it. Exactly. Yeah. I think you need to feel diabetes. That's how I that's how I do it. And a lot of people listen to the show do it. Same way. I think it would work really well for you. I think I could maybe get two pages in that autobiography one day one. Yeah, well, I get one real estate. I mean, listen, I'm gonna save your life. And then the book. I deserve a little bit of a spot. You know what I mean? Like Jesus, you get really grumpy all the sudden, it's just an extra page, Charlotte, just tell them just tell the publisher, Look, I told this guy would do this. negotiable. I'm not going to charge your money for it. I just would like to see it happen. I wrote a book Charlotte and let me tell you something, it takes a lot of time. I wish they'd do it. It's just it takes so much time. And then you have to like pump it and pump it to get people to buy it. And then they buy it. And then it's it's gone. It's like an Instagram post that gets 1000s of likes. And then a week later, you look back and it has only gotten one more in six weeks. Like why just the world still not know about my amazing Instagram post. The book did this thing. It was like on fire and then it was gone. What did

Charlotte Drury 1:23:00
you here's, here's my question for you. Did you write the book to write the book? Or did you write the book to publish the book?

Scott Benner 1:23:07
Oh, that's interesting. I wrote the book. So I was offered a blurb in someone else's book. I've never told the story. Exactly, honestly, because I think it hurts somebody's feelings.

Charlotte Drury 1:23:18
That's okay. They probably will hear it. You think

Scott Benner 1:23:21
they're lovely people. And I don't mean it this way. So. So I was asked to write a blurb. I wrote a blurb. I think there's about 1000 words. Their publisher called me one day and said, Hey, do you have any ideas for books? And I said, What? And she goes, your 1000 words are probably the best 1000 words in that book. Do you want to write a book? And I was like, Yeah, because I want to write a book because I barely graduated from high school. And I was like, seriously, me? Sure. Why not? And so we're talking and she wanted it to be about diabetes. And I said, No, no, I'm not going to do that. I said, I'm not ready to talk to people about how to manage their diabetes. And for it to be somewhere forever static. I said that I am a stay at home dad, I think I have great stories about that. I could write about that. And she's like, alright, you have a week to send me an outline. So I wrote the outline in like 10 minutes. And then I sat on it for six days to make it look like I worked really hard on it. Of course, thank you. And I sent it to them, and they're like done, we'll send you this much money now. And in six months, you send us the manuscript, and we'll send you the other half. And I was like, Cool. I remember exactly my house where I called my wife while she was at work. I was like, I'm gonna write a book, it's gonna get published. And she's like, can you write a book? I swear to God, this is my wife. So again, if she's been nice to me, like four times, can you write a book? She says, and I go, I don't know. But I'm gonna find out. Yeah, exactly. That's the worst thing that happens is like giving back the advance. And I don't read a book. I'm like, I'm going to try you know. So, I will tell you that it's cool to be published. I don't look down on people who are self published, but when I see people self publish things there There's a small part of me that goes, somebody paid me to do it, but okay, and they're absolutely. So I have a little that I am very, I'm going to be honest with you. I'm incredibly competitive. Like, I love this podcast. Oh my god, I love that people love this podcast. But I love also that it's like the most popular one.

Charlotte Drury 1:25:20
Of course, nobody wants to be average at what they do.

Scott Benner 1:25:23
It does make me feel good. A little bit like I don't run around like, like, I'm not like, Listen, you know, listen,

Charlotte Drury 1:25:32
egos, Freud can go, you guys are a good thing. egos are good. To an extent. They, if you can get your ego filled in a healthy way from a certain outlet, it allows you to not have an ego in other places. It allows you to be a humble father, when you succeed at work. It allows you to be a failure of a writer or failure of a photographer, if you can succeed at something else, because you have the cushion to try because you said well, I know I can succeed at something.

Scott Benner 1:26:09
It also helps me stay motivated. Like I record this week, as an example, I recorded this podcast five times this week. So I've had probably five, six, I've probably had seven and a half hours of conversations this week. And a lot of talking Yeah. And in that time, I'm also editing the show and putting it off and supporting it online. It's a full like it's about a 75 an hour. Yeah, probably 75 hours a week, I put out a podcast. And if it was just mundane for me. I know it would it would wane but there's part of me that likes waking up in the morning and going like forget other like diabetes podcast forget health podcast. This This show is in the 96th percentile. All podcasts on Apple. Well, that I that's cool. Yeah. If I ever get tired, I think about that. I sit right down. And I'm like, so you're depressed and you have diabetes? Let's talk. You know, like, interesting. Yeah, I can I can, I can do it. Because I also listen to all that aside. I know how much it helps people. And it's amazing. You know what I mean? Like this the best the best thing I've ever done in my life, like aside on my children in my family, like making this for people's really cool. Yeah, the scopes important? Because I'm sure other people make great content that I'm unaware of. But if no one's listening to it.

Charlotte Drury 1:27:27
Listen. Yeah, exactly. You can't be a fan of something that you've never heard of.

Scott Benner 1:27:32
Right. So someone's got to see it bouncing up and down on that trampoline. Or what's the point? You know, exactly, then it's just anyway, all right.

Charlotte Drury 1:27:41
Yeah. Well, I have a question. I got one more question. Do you know your Enneagram number? Because I feel like I know your Enneagram number.

Scott Benner 1:27:47
My what number? Your Enneagram Oh, God. Two years old Charlotte, have you not just been impressed that I've kept up with this conversation and you're 26 You want me to start knowing things that younger people understand

Charlotte Drury 1:28:02
that? Okay, here's Okay, here's your homework.

Scott Benner 1:28:04
I got the internet. Go take

Charlotte Drury 1:28:05
the Enneagram test. It's not a quick thing. You can't do it right now.

Scott Benner 1:28:09
I gotta find it or I'm never gonna remember it. i My brain is not like, it's like,

Charlotte Drury 1:28:15
okay, okay. Once you do it, we'll circle back for part two. And we're going to we're going to dive into your Enneagram

Scott Benner 1:28:22
the Enneagram Institute.

Charlotte Drury 1:28:25
You can do it. The reading you take the test in a lot of different places. It's

Scott Benner 1:28:29
called a reading test. Rizzo Hudson. Enneagram. Trudy Trudy Yeah, Jesus very specific. What are we married, right? You're doing it wrong. Go to Trudy an idiot. Understand who you really are. Oh, God, this seems very scary.

Charlotte Drury 1:28:50
You're gonna love it. It's gonna be great.

Scott Benner 1:28:51
Right? You say? Yep. I have a hunch. Good.

Charlotte Drury 1:28:56
I have a hunch I should I spill it or should I'm going to hold I don't want to influence your results

Scott Benner 1:29:02
can influence my results. There's no way I'll remember I recorded like five of these a week. I just I'm getting

Charlotte Drury 1:29:09
I'm getting strong too with a one wing

Scott Benner 1:29:12
here to with a one way I won't remember that. So I'll just write it down. Okay, write it down. We'll circle back. I had a person on Tuesday who recorded a beautiful after dark episode when they about her life struggles young mom. She has type one her son cancer at a young age terrible story is one of my favorite episodes. And I asked her to come back on and she comes on we're talking for six minutes before I go oh, I know who you are. I am the worst. I don't. I know people. It's very it's very popular to say you don't prep for your content. Right because it makes you seem like all like I honestly I'm relatable. I swear to God when you started talking. I was like gymnastics. I don't know. it'll it'll come out, you know, and I really, I don't I don't know I don't prep for this at all.

Charlotte Drury 1:30:10
That's why today was so fun. It was so refreshing.

Scott Benner 1:30:13
I'm glad best best interview you've done since you have diabetes. Yeah. Oh,

Charlotte Drury 1:30:18
all right. How about anybody else that's interviewed me though?

Scott Benner 1:30:22
No. Well, those people obviously did the best for you. They obviously did the garbage. That's no reason to be upset. That's not fun at all. Just very good at this. It's not their fault. You know what I mean? So no drugs. By the way, no one has been here. What's the pressure like for that? In doing drugs? Yeah, like for enhancing drugs in the Olympics? I never tested but I mean, people gotta get away with it. Right.

Charlotte Drury 1:30:51
I feel like in other sports, it's like, the pressures way bigger, like cycling and weightlifting, when it's like, it would make a difference. But in trampoline, it really wouldn't make a difference. Like I guess maybe you could be a little bit stronger. But

Scott Benner 1:31:04
rehab faster. Still not an issue, though.

Charlotte Drury 1:31:07
I mean, I mean, I guess it's just never crossed my mind. But I don't know what can make you flip better. Or like be better. In the air.

Scott Benner 1:31:17
You know, is the flipping all, like, muscle memory practice? And then letting go? Yeah, yeah.

Charlotte Drury 1:31:24
My best routines that I've competed, I'll finish. And I'll be like, I don't remember any of that. Was it good? I wasn't there for it.

Scott Benner 1:31:34
Yeah, my you know, it's so funny. You say that, because I'll go downstairs and my wife will be like, how was it? I'll be like, great. Good. What are you talking about? Like, I don't know. What's going on? I'm like, she's like, how do you know what's going on? Like, I don't know. I feel like it went well. And there are times I walked downstairs. I'm like, I don't know if I did very well today, or I was tired or something. Yeah. And then I'll listen back or I'll get a note. People are like, I love that episode. I'm like, oh, so it doesn't always have to be the way I want it to be it you know, other people can find it differently. Charlotte, you and I get along very well. This was delightful. This it? Oh, I say delightful all the time. That you said it and I didn't the people listening now we're gonna be like, feel stolen? No, it's Mecca. People are people are like, Oh, my God, Scott made her feel delightful without telling her that I'm telling you right now there are people just fanning themselves everywhere that like it happened. Do you want to hear about that? Do you want me to say something really tell you about the text that I said, Oh my God, I'll tell you about this. I do. I do. I do. So someone's gonna judge my daughter over this, but just let it go. My daughter and I are in the car the other day. And she's you know, she's getting ready to graduate from high school. And she's like, you know, we had such a calm year at school. She's like, there haven't been any big fights. There's no teen pregnancies. Like it's just been such a boring year. I got a text while you and I were talking. It says My wish came true. We got a teen pregnancy in school.

Charlotte Drury 1:33:01
Oh, this is like the equivalent of like reality TV in our society. Yeah,

Scott Benner 1:33:04
she like has my personality, but she's in like a smaller female person who's younger.

Charlotte Drury 1:33:09
So that's funny, though. That's funny. She should have a podcast.

Scott Benner 1:33:13
She trusts me. She was on one episode of this. And I get notes pretty much daily. Can Arden come back on the podcast? She's like, she's like, she's like, I don't care about all this, like, people I had sent questions for. And she's like, I don't I don't want to know I don't like she's like, this is your thing. I don't. Because I told her one day I was listening. I was like, the podcast is really popular. It's like you sure you don't want to come on at once in a while, maybe take it over when I get older. And she's like, No, like, Alright, fine. I felt like girl. I felt like I was a plumber. And I said to my son like, I can teach you how to better take over the family business. Yeah. And he was like, I want to go to college. I'm like, but we got trucks in the shop and everything. Who am I gonna give it to? You know? Anyway. You were really terrific. And I would say delightful. But you beat me to it. I stole it. Hey, do you know 1234567 It looks like you and I said seven. Well now eight times. But that's okay. I have a clean shows I just edited out they'll be like this little blip. I don't want to lose the show. Believe it or not. I can't run the show in India if I curse on it, and a couple of other places. Yeah, and it's popular.

Charlotte Drury 1:34:27
How much of an international audience do you get information on your demographics? Do they give you that?

Scott Benner 1:34:31
Do you want to do this right now? Do you think people care like we can stop recording but I can tell you

Charlotte Drury 1:34:36
they could they could duck out whenever they want. Yeah, I'll

Scott Benner 1:34:38
tell you what nerd out first again. Yeah, I'm gonna I'm gonna do is thank the sponsors that the guys so I mean, I really do need the sponsors. Like you're not getting this podcast about the sponsor, unless you all want to start paying for the show. And I'm pretty sure no one wants that. So just just you know, get a Jif of hypo pen or whatever today's thing just Same Yeah, yeah. Do you

Charlotte Drury 1:35:01
can you tell when people do like to fast forward 15 seconds through the sponsored

Scott Benner 1:35:07
more people? Yes. I mean, some people do jump through the ads, but I try very hard to make the ad something you want to listen to. Ah, okay. And sometimes I do that by recording them very late at night. So that I'm a little like loopy.

Charlotte Drury 1:35:24
So that your like actual, like excellent content in the ads.

Scott Benner 1:35:29
The ads feel like content anyway. Like I can't get some of these people are gonna end up making a better podcast and like keep giving away all my secrets. Are here's the top like, Alright, here's the top countries, US first than Canada. The show is huge in Australia, United Kingdom, Ireland, Germany, Sweden, the United Arab Emirates, New Zealand and Saudi Arabia.

Charlotte Drury 1:35:52
Hey, what what percentage of your people are from Arab Emirates?

Scott Benner 1:35:57
It's it's I don't have it as a percentage. The smaller number there on the list. Yeah. And I'm only looking at Cool. Yeah, I'm only looking at the last month. But from there, Israel, South Africa, France, Switzerland, Norway, Japan, Hong Kong, India, the Netherlands, Spain, Kuwait, Puerto Rico. Denmark, Egypt, Ukraine, Bahamas, Mexico. Singapore, Thailand. Panama, Finland. Cayman Islands. I'm huge in the Cayman Islands. I'm not kidding. Qatar, Taiwan, Slovakia, Chile, China, Italy, Romania, Belgium. These are all places in the last 30 days. Virgin Islands. While there's a place I don't know. Hold on. We'll come back to that. Poland. Austria. No. Say you have to say it out with your brain. Philippines. Portugal. Are you ready? Yeah. Libby, Libyan Libyan Arab. jamaa Haria.

Charlotte Drury 1:36:55
Okay, no, also have never heard of that. Now. I was an international studies major. I'm not sure that place exists. According to my knowledge. Oh, wait a minute.

Scott Benner 1:37:06
I'm googling. Yeah, that's a good place.

Charlotte Drury 1:37:09
It's earlier in the conversation. We can do that now.

Scott Benner 1:37:12
Oh, yeah. The internet's right here. It's in Libya. I guess history of

Charlotte Drury 1:37:18
lives like an independent territory inside of Libya,

Scott Benner 1:37:21
the Libyan Arab Juma the Libby Alright, hold on. Libyan Arab Gemma harissa is a country in Northern Africa that is slightly larger than the state of Alaska and shares borders with Tanzania, Algeria. Niger. It's a place and people

Charlotte Drury 1:37:43
haven't seen it the UN is it like I've never heard of this country.

Scott Benner 1:37:47
Right. Let's see United Nations. This is what you want to know about. Do they have a seat at the Yeah,

Charlotte Drury 1:37:52
I think I think that people are gonna agree with me. This is curious stuff.

Scott Benner 1:37:57
All right. Hold on. I got a un thing here from 2016. Libya political deal not open for renegotiation Libyan Arab Jim, I don't know the recent political chord paving the way for unity government. Libya is not open. It sounds like it's a split off thing around Libya. Best I can guess.

Charlotte Drury 1:38:19
You I just know that the rest of my day is going to be researching this.

Scott Benner 1:38:22
Well. I hope you do. Oh, here we go. Dominican Republic, Malaysia, Pakistan, Brazil, Czech Republic, Hungary, Russian Federation, Nepal, Malta, Nigeria. These are all places where people have listened with reasonable frequency in the list. That's really cool. Yeah, that's crazy, right? So everybody who has diabetes who speaks English at some point or another, finds out about the podcast. And it's because of the Pro Tip series, which I will tell you about as soon as we hang up here. Okay. Yeah, I knew that. That I can't believe you made me do that. Because it seems like I'm bragging. And I was

Charlotte Drury 1:38:58
I just listen, I allowed you to do that. I know you wanted to. Oh, my God.

Scott Benner 1:39:03
Are you kidding? If it was up to me, the whole podcast would just be about that. And then I'd be like, Oh, and here's bouncing it off though.

Charlotte Drury 1:39:09
You should end the podcast with I would just like to thank my listeners in and then name every single country.

Scott Benner 1:39:16
That wouldn't be too boring. Charlotte, let's say your name your your name really quick three times fast and see if we get lost. Ready?

Charlotte Drury 1:39:25
I have a lifetime of experience everything. My whole name do it. Charlie Gray, Charlotte Gray, Charlotte gray.

Scott Benner 1:39:30
It just falls apart. They're not even letters and sounds anymore.

Charlotte Drury 1:39:34
It's like saying word overnight or real name. That's all. That's it's in fact, it's it's quite a real name. And I like it.

Scott Benner 1:39:44
I do too. Is there anything we didn't talk about that we should have?

Charlotte Drury 1:39:49
I don't know. I can't remember what we talked about.

Scott Benner 1:39:51
Perfect way to end Hold on one second.

are a huge thanks to Omni pod for, you know being sponsors on the pod.com forward slash juice box find out if you're eligible for the free 30 day supply of the Omni pod dash or get more information about it or learn about the Omni pod five. You can do it all right there at my link, speaking to my links. What about dexcom.com? Forward slash juice box? Are you eligible for a free 10 day trial? The Dexcom G six. Yeah might be go check it out. dexcom.com forward slash juice box. US residents who have type one are the caregivers of type ones. Please go to T one D exchange.org. Forward slash juice box and fill out the survey. When you support the sponsors. You are supporting the show. I am the show. There's really there's just it's just me. So help. Click the links. Okay, thanks. Oh, you know who else I want to thank Miss Charlotte jury. Wasn't she delightful? Really, really, really good on the podcast today? I thought she was incredibly honest, really forthcoming, wonderfully relaxed, not guarded. I swear to you when this was over, she and I talked for another half an hour I met her partner. We I just really, really vibed with her thought she was terrific. I even joked with her. I said I'm gonna start up another podcast and just make you my co host. I don't know what that podcast would be about. But I think if I was doing it, whether I'd have a really good time. Anyway, I hope you enjoyed this episode too. I love to bring it to you. I will be back very soon with another episode of The Juicebox Podcast. Don't forget, subscribe and follow in your podcast players. Tell friends about the podcast, share links with them. Do your best to grow the podcast. You are my emissaries in the world. Go forth and emissary

#681 Defining Diabetes: Types of Diabetes

Scott and Jenny Smith define diabetes terms

Scott and Jenny Smith define diabetes terms In this Defining Diabetes episode, Scott and Jenny explain the different types of diabetes..

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

+ Click for EPISODE TRANSCRIPT

Scott Benner 0:00
Hello friends, and welcome to episode 681 of the Juicebox Podcast.

Today, I'm back with Jenny Smith for another episode of defining diabetes. And today Jenny and I are going to define all of the different types of diabetes. And there's more than you might think there's type one and type two. Sure. But what about type one and a half? Is there a type three, a type eight, we're gonna find out. While you're listening today, please remember 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. If you're a US resident who has type one diabetes, or is the caregiver of someone with type one, the T one D exchange is looking for your thoughts. Those thoughts come in the form of answers to survey questions that you can find at T one D exchange.org. Forward slash juicebox. completely anonymous, HIPAA compliant, easy to do, helps people with type one, t one D exchange.org, forward slash juicebox take you less time that it takes for you to figure out that Wordle. And you'll help somebody that word doesn't help anybody.

By the way, I got the word of last night and three, I was pretty proud of myself. I digress to say this. This episode of The Juicebox Podcast is sponsored by us med. Get your diabetes supplies from us med. I'm going to in this episode of the podcast when I get to the US med add, I'm going to read something that a listener sent me for now know this white glove treatment, always 90 days worth of supplies, they have fast free shipping, you get it every time us med check them out at us med.com forward slash use box or an 888-721-1514 at that link. And that number. You get yourself a free benefits check and get started today with us, Matt. Hey, Johnny, how are you?

Jennifer Smith, CDE 2:22
I'm fine. How are you? Scott? Good,

Scott Benner 2:24
good. Good. I want to do a defining episode today about the types of diabetes. Oh, fancy. I was surprised by this. So I mean, first, let's just get the one out of the way that I think will be easiest forest, type one diabetes. What is it?

Jennifer Smith, CDE 2:43
Essentially, conditioning the body that means that your pancreas is no longer producing insulin from the beta cells, right? I mean, there's been destruction of those beta cells to the effect that you now have virtually no or have no insulin production left. So

Scott Benner 3:04
you might also hear it called juvenile diabetes, insulin dependent diabetes. I think it's important to say it's a chronic condition. There's no known cure for it. And it's autoimmune. Correct, right. So this happened, because, you know, go listen to another episode about there's a defining diabetes episode about antibodies, that one listen to that one, if you want to know more about it, but the bare bones idea is you didn't do anything to get diabetes, your body just got a little confused, took off after your beta cells instead of the flu or coxsackievirus or whatever else you had that your body should have been doing that day. And now you do not have functioning beta cells in your pancreas. Correct. Alright, so there's not going to be much to this, obviously. But we want to put them all in here together. So type one diabetes, that's what it is. Boom. Now, you would think obviously, we're gonna go to type two diabetes, because you all know how to count you think one and then two comes after but no, there's that would be too easy. There's a type 1.5 diabetes. That's Lada. Right.

Jennifer Smith, CDE 4:15
That's Lada. And in fact, I've I mean, I think more lately, it's definitely been referred to as lotta latent autoimmune diabetes of the adult, right. I have heard the term one and a half a lot less often, which I think is actually not a bad thing. Because if you consider the true nature of that type of diabetes, it tends to be a lot more similar and is often classified with type one, but happens truly in adults, and is for most people a slower progression to diagnosis. Okay. So still is an autoimmune disorder or you know, an autoimmune condition where the body has destroyed beta cells. In adult, it seems to be a slower progressive destruction. So again, a sort of a slower diagnostic. In fact, I've had a number of people that I've worked with who've actually been misdiagnosed, because it was so slowly progressing, that they were just initially diagnosed type two, and they really weren't.

Scott Benner 5:27
Yeah, I hear about that a lot. Actually. The type does lotta have characteristics of both type one and type two? Was it somebody being like, cute when they named it? Like, it's almost type two and almost type one, and it's in the middle? Nothing like that.

Jennifer Smith, CDE 5:41
That really, I mean, again, there are there are characteristics I think in people who have either type one or type two, that could cross and look similar to the other type of diabetes being the two main types, type one and type two, right? And then you could have some insulin resistance in type one, which typically isn't the reason that type or it isn't the reason that type one is there, right? But they could have some resistance, which is much more classified with type two. So somebody with LADA could certainly have some of both of those pieces, but Lada will be diagnosed because there will be antibodies present. Okay.

Scott Benner 6:21
So if I want to think about that in a really basic way, it's a very slow onset type one diabetes that only happens in adults.

Jennifer Smith, CDE 6:30
Right? A B would not be a child and be diagnosed with ladder

Scott Benner 6:33
because of the super slow onset. People can confuse it for type two diabetes.

Jennifer Smith, CDE 6:38
In a general Yes, in a very easy way to see it. Yes. Yeah.

Scott Benner 6:42
Because it's you're still getting work out of your pancreas. But it's not shutting off kind of abruptly, like you see with type one. Correct, right. So when you're saying a slow onset, it's not like a honeymoon. It's, it's much more protracted than that.

Jennifer Smith, CDE 6:59
It is, in fact, people with people diagnosed with Leida Lada often have once they actually get diagnosed and have the right tools to manage insulin being major one of them right, they often then may have a longer honeymoon after they're actually diagnosed. And in fact, people with LADA also often have more beta cell preservation. Longer term, they still obviously have to use insulin, but their insulin doses may look very small, comparative to others who have had type one for a while and their same age and same body type and same activity level and whatnot. So there are you know, defining differences between type one and Lada diagnosis.

Scott Benner 7:55
I find it interesting when you Google something to see what else people ask about. Yeah,

Jennifer Smith, CDE 8:01
I'd be curious what did you Google? Well, I

Scott Benner 8:03
just definition type 1.5 diabetes. Because you mean you know you're gonna know way more about this stuff than I am. So I wanted to I wanted to be ready a little bit. People listening are like Oh, thanks.

Jennifer Smith, CDE 8:16
You wanted to put on your your graduation cap.

Scott Benner 8:19
I didn't want to do it. I didn't want to do it. A lot of people do and on podcasts and just philosophize out loud about things they think they heard one time so but I do want you to have a little bit of that because I think that that is how people start with Oh, I heard this or I thought that but so other things people ask about Latos what is the difference between type one and a lotta? How can you tell if you have Lada? What do you consider Lada? Does lotta diabetes, shorten your life? Oh, that's sad. Let me get some insulin should be fine, right? Correct. Shouldn't be shortened anything. But anyway, like not to even Delve. Although what's the difference between Let me see how it talks about the difference?

Jennifer Smith, CDE 9:01
I mean, I'm curious and who defined it would be another good and well, I guess in terms of source

Scott Benner 9:05
Yeah. So you I mean, you did a great job. This one comes to it goes to beyond type one.org. As a form of type one diabetes a lot is the result of your immune system attacking the beta cells in your pancreas to produce insulin. The only difference is that the attack is slower, which means so you don't need these people. You got Johnny, it's all good.

Jennifer Smith, CDE 9:25
But I'm glad that I'm in agreeance with another source of good information like beyond type one, let's

Scott Benner 9:32
say I don't even know what we would have done right now if I would have read something that completely contradicted what you said. I would have been like, Jenny's fired and then you as I was going away, you'd be like you don't even pay me and then that would have been the anyway. Alright. So now I got into this weird space. I know you think now we're definitely going to do type two. Not quite yet. Hold on. Where I saw someone online and we'll talk about this maybe at the end of this. I just put up a post and I was like, guys, hey, Listen, what else belongs in the defining diabetes series. And this person says, I keep hearing about type three diabetes. So I was like, alright, so I googled, and I got type three diabetes is a proposed term to describe the interlinked association between type one type two, and Alzheimer's disease. Yes, the term is used to look into potential triggers of Alzheimer's disease in people with diabetes,

Jennifer Smith, CDE 10:28
linked to insulin resistance, and insulin resistance and an insulin. Kept to remember that insulin like growth factor is what they're looking at insulin resistance specifically in the brain. And what they're, they've also often linked to type two and Alzheimer's disease, which is sort of what triggered this type three name overall. So there's a lot of medical research about blood sugar, and brain health. It's, it's amazing if you look into it, not only not only Alzheimer's, but Parkinson's and many of those neurological conditions disorders, there, there are a lot of big links with blood sugar.

Scott Benner 11:21
So then I went down a rat, another rabbit hole, oh, my god, what is type three C diabetes. And I was like, Where will this end? And then I kept googling. There's a type four, and a five and a six, and a seven, and an eight. And I stopped at eight because I got freaked out.

Jennifer Smith, CDE 11:43
And I, I mean, those are very specific to other system issues in the body. They're not, they're not definitely like type one type two gestational, they're not Lada they're not in that same realm of categorization. I mean, even when we were defining type one, you know, type one in another, and I'm sure it has some type of letter categorization to it. But I've worked with people who have actually had pancreatic cancer, and pancreatic, you know, removal from their body, which means that there's not one autoimmune reason that they are deficient in insulin or beta cells. They just don't have the gland anymore that makes it

Scott Benner 12:30
right. Like, what did they just when you have a penk Ritek? When they take out your pancreas for reasons that are like another thing? Do you? Are you assigned a different type? Or are you just type one that

Jennifer Smith, CDE 12:44
I believe that if it's a pancreatic cancer that falls into the type three C categorization. And I know that I've worked with only two people who have actually had cystic fibrosis. And as a result also had what we just treated the same as what we would do with type one diabetes, right? From a standpoint of management, its insulin management, both of them were on pumps, you know, so, but that's not true. Type One, there's another body condition there. Yeah. Because

Scott Benner 13:26
the auto immune didn't cause it. You're right, you're gonna live like a type one after that. But you didn't technically ever have type one diabetes. And that I've interviewed a number of people who have had their pancreas removed for other reasons. And they are they do want that distinction. The people I've spoken to so far, you know, I've also heard people who are well welcomed into the type one community and there have been times where people have said, like, you don't have type one diabetes, like you don't belong here. I don't know. I don't believe in that. That's no good for me. If you're using insulin, you need this help. And that's that. So anyway, let's just look for a second type for diabetes is a proposed term for diabetes caused by insulin resistance and older people who don't have overweight who don't have overweight or obesity. This is a 2015 study. So I think they just as they're studying more and more things, they just keep applying this because now when you get to type five, it's called moody five.

Jennifer Smith, CDE 14:27
Mo D Why is is mono

Scott Benner 14:30
moody. Excuse me? Yes. Yes. I'm sorry. I put one too many O's in my that's mature onset diabetes. Wait, why is my phone making noise Jennifer? I don't know. Somebody wants to reach you. I'm gonna curse here. This can Walgreens okay. You leave a prescription sit at Walgreens for five seconds. And they call you they are up your ass. It's here and get it. It's yeah, I'm like, if I know thank you be there. All right. Have it calmed down now I won't stop now it's good telling me when the pharmacist takes lunch is it noon

Jennifer Smith, CDE 15:11
and they take an hour lunch at least they do at my Walgreens well God

Scott Benner 15:14
bless that's fine but I don't need to hear about it on the machine every time they call like this happened yesterday.

Jennifer Smith, CDE 15:21
See they don't call me they send me a text message well I'm gonna behind don't have to hear anybody if you're

Scott Benner 15:26
listening to Walgreens you screwed yourself because I'm gonna opt out of this you know and I do find it goodbye she goes at the end goodbye goodbye podcast

Jennifer Smith, CDE 15:36
here was very important that she made sure that you know that your prescription is all set. I think

Scott Benner 15:41
it was a computer even Jenny I don't know if it was a heart but okay, so. So Modi is

how about I read some things from the online. I won't tell anybody's name or if I you know if the people are talking about other companies, I certainly won't, won't say them. But here's one. So far one conversation with us med has been infinitely more helpful than every conversation I've ever had with blank blank. Thank you so much for letting me know about us med. Is it possible another person says that it really will be this easy. It's hard to believe when you've had to deal with other companies that make getting your diabetes supplies so difficult. It's hard to believe that anything could be better, but it can be with us med here's what you do. You go to us med.com forward slash juice box get your free benefits check and get started. Don't like the internet. Use a phone 888-721-1514 They accept Medicare nationwide. US med accepts 800 private insurers they have an A plus rating with the Better Business Bureau. They carry everything from your insulin pumps to your diabetes testing supplies and everything in between. They have all the latest CGM Dexcom G six libre two. And they've served over 1 million diabetes customers since 1996. US med is where Arden is going to get on the pod five from us med they want you to get better service and better care than you're accustomed to. US med is proud of their white glove treatment. Give them a chance. Hit the link, call the number 888-721-1514 We're gonna us med.com forward slash juicebox. There are links in the show notes of your podcast player or at juicebox podcast.com. To us Med and all the sponsors. You could even find the T one D exchange there. T one D exchange.org. Forward slash juicebox. Take the survey Dexcom on the pod contour, G voc touched by type one. They're all there. Check them out. Listen, if you have a need for these things, I hope you use my link. That's really it. When you support the sponsors. You're supporting the podcast, I'm not telling you to go buy an insulin pump you don't want. That would be silly. But if you want it on the vaad use my link and one of Dexcom cha cha cha, you know what I mean? A one, two, cha cha three, four, cha cha cha

Jennifer Smith, CDE 18:27
Well, we have time at some point, I will tell you, if I never told you my Walgreens story, I wrote a letter to the head of Walgreens, you

Scott Benner 18:33
wrote a letter to Walgreens several years ago. Let's save that for the end of the year state of the Jenny address.

Jennifer Smith, CDE 18:39
Oh, yeah. That's an interesting story.

Scott Benner 18:43
I want to hear. So is Modi type five. Have you ever heard that?

Jennifer Smith, CDE 18:49
I've not heard Modi called type five. But I wouldn't be surprised if they've defined it within the category of all of the numbers of types of diabetes. I guess I've only really heard it called Modi. Now Modi in and of itself also has many. It's it's very strongly a genetic thing. Right. And it's different from both type one and type two. And the way that it's managed really depends on the type of Modi you have so Modi or type five diabetes. There are there's another little offshoot to that to say you have Modi this Modi you have Modi with these genes you have Modi with these genes, and some of them may be managed. Some of them may be managed with insulin similar to type one. Some of them may be managed with an oral med some of them may be managed with a baseline of a Basal insulin and lifestyle. So there are many depending on what your gene Mody type is, for lack of a better way to describe it. If there is a more standardized, I guess plan for how to help you take control.

Scott Benner 20:09
Well, CHOC Children's Hospital of Philadelphia has Modi as a form of diabetes caused by a mutation of a single gene. The mutation causes pancreatic beta cell to function abnormally, leading to insufficient production of insulin. In some cases, insulin resistance develops. In addition, the pancreas may not produce enough digestive enzymes on this link, they are calling it Modi five. Yeah. And then when interesting when you go back to like, so I just kept googling because I got like, I was like, was there Modi six, and there is Modi six arises from mutations of the gene for the transcription factor referred to as neurogenic. Differentiation one, so then you're that that is what's happening is we're getting into genetics. Now, you're asked, is there a type seven diabetes, a form of diabetes that is characterized by an Auto Sum node dominant mode of inheritance, onset and children or early child adulthood? Usually before 25, a primary defect of insulin secretion and frequent insulin dependence at the beginning of the disease? I'm telling you, I stopped at seven. Because I didn't know where to like, I just didn't know. But let's for fun, let's just change the to eight. And there

Jennifer Smith, CDE 21:26
is there is a registry as well, or I guess it's Chicago, there's a mean place in Chicago, I don't know the name of it. That actually keeps a registry of all people who have actually been tested, and have been given the diagnosis of one of these types of Modi. So it's interesting that it's, it's quite rare, I guess, is the the next thing to bring into this is that don't walk around thinking, Well, I've diabetes, Do I really have like, Modi? Number six? Yeah.

Scott Benner 22:02
No, probably not. Right, or Modi? Eight, which is the slow progressive pancreatic extra and dysfunction, fatty replacement of pancreatic para blah, blah. Who knows there? I'm getting into words. I can't, I can't. But anyway, yeah, I was gonna say the exact same thing, which is why I love you, which is you don't have Modi aid, calm down. And you know, although I might get one email from one person is like, I've got it and then send that email, because I'd love to have you on the show. Because interestingly, I've,

Jennifer Smith, CDE 22:31
I've, again, I've worked with a lot of pregnant or pregnancy, and I've worked with two women who had diagnosed Modi. And it was an it was an interesting, it was an interesting transition through the course of pregnancy, because things changed very differently, comparative to other pregnancies, both type one type two, and even gestational which I have now a lot of knowledge working with things changed very differently along the whole way. So

Scott Benner 23:07
well, then, in your opinion, if someone has type one, and they're treating it like type one, but they have a lot of insulin resistance or something else, at what point do you say can I get the genetic test? And does getting the test help you? Or does it just give you a diagnosis?

Jennifer Smith, CDE 23:22
I don't think you know somebody specifically with a diagnosis of type one who my first question would really be did you have diagnostic testing that showed it was actually auto immune dysfunction, right? Then it is type one, if there is significant insulin resistance, my next step is to say, well, you have Have you ever been tested for PCOS or polycystic ovarian syndrome? Right? Because that is, especially in women. That's a pretty significant reason that many women with type one may actually have some significant resistance over what they think their insulin needs should be based on what their lifestyle kind of looks like.

Scott Benner 24:07
I just wrote down PCOS as another defining idea. Honestly, our conversations today have given me a number of them. Okay, so here's my last question. I heard somebody say this online, and I couldn't tell if they were confused. Or if this was a thing. Can you have type two diabetes and then get type one diabetes? There's no reason you couldn't, right? You couldn't have type two and then have an autoimmune attack? Right? You wouldn't have them both at the same time.

Jennifer Smith, CDE 24:34
No, you wouldn't. And in the grants. Sure. Could that happen? Yeah, I guess. Now, the question also becomes, did the type two ever actually get tested to truly get the correct diagnosis when they were told they were type two. And now things have shifted and they get, let's say, maybe a smarter clinician who's like, Hey, I don't know let's do some testing. And then all of a sudden they end up being Type one there type two, probably did not change from type two into type one. No, no, I mean likely had antibodies all along that initially were never diagnosed the right way. And so they've transitioned to now Yes, being told their type one. But the antibodies have probably always been there.

Scott Benner 25:18
I 100% agree that most people who are going to have go through that process, that's exactly what's going to happen to them. Anecdotally, from what I've heard from so many people, but what I'm saying is, could you not get type two diabetes legitimately have type two diabetes, and then later in life, have an autoimmune attack that gave you type one?

Jennifer Smith, CDE 25:35
You could? I would, I would not leave anything to the realm of not possible in our world.

Scott Benner 25:42
I want to hear from somebody who has had that happen to them. But there is no world where you would. But after that happened to you, would you still now we're just philosophizing, would you still have type two diabetes and type one diabetes,

Jennifer Smith, CDE 25:55
you may still retain some of as you've asked before about resistance, you may still retain some of the characteristics of type two possibly want to hear from those as well. Yeah, that would be that would be certainly interesting. Now, I thought you were going more in the realm of somebody with type two, which I know we haven't defined type two yet. We'll get there. But somebody with type two who let's say, you know, they, they know that they don't have type one, they had a really good doctor, their doctor did do testing and everything. There were no, you know, antibodies or anything there. And they were doing really well with lifestyle and maybe oral medications and whatnot, and now they have to use insulin. That doesn't mean that they're type one. If they just because you have stopped being able to solely make use of oral meds, and you have to start using insulin as a type two. You are still a person with type two diabetes. Yeah. Okay. Why not a person with type one just because you're using insulin,

Scott Benner 26:59
right? You're a type two who uses insulin? Yes. And then a doctor would call it insulin dependent type two, right? Usually, that's how they talked about it. Your chart? Yeah. Okay. All right. So here's the last bit. I get to have more and more people with type two diabetes in the Facebook group, which has been really wonderful because I'm seeing people with type two who use insulin having a ton of success by listening to the podcast. I know people with type two in my own life, some of my own family. I've talked to people for years who have it, I have consistently been stunned by how little people with type two diabetes seem to understand type two diabetes, how little they're taught about it. How often it's enough of a boogeyman in their life that they don't even want to look into it. And, and for me, I just always find it to be sad. I wish if they knew more, they would know more. I personally, I've been dying to have more types who's on the podcast, it's hard to get them to come on. Because really, yeah, it's an I wish they would. Because I would like to, from my perspective, I'd like to have type twos come on and teach me about type two diabetes. I would love to have those conversations just so other people can hear them. But for the purposes of a definition, I want you to tell me what type two diabetes is. Because as I sit here, I wonder if I know. Yeah,

Jennifer Smith, CDE 28:25
I mean, essentially, type two diabetes is not autoimmune. That's one of the first things. It's an impairment really, in the way that body the body is able to use sugar. That's the simple definition of it. Why does that start? There are many thoughts in terms of why, certainly lifestyle is one of the biggest ones that most people hear in terms of, you know, activity level, weight. Genetics can also play a big role in type two diabetes, as well. And why does the body eventually stop using sugar so well, it's on a cellular level, right? It's the way that the body is really responding to the intake of food and breaking it down into your body's main fuel source, which is sugar for most people. The reason for the decline in insulin production happens over a long period of time, which is the reason that many people who are at time of diagnosis with type two, they have often been living with type two diabetes, without realizing that their body was having a problem for somewhere between five to even 10 years. So what ends up happening is that the cells become less able to use sugar. Which what does that do? It leaves more sugar in the bloodstream than should be You there. And the body, body is an amazing thing. It's, it's a self healing machine, it tries really hard to do its best to keep you healthy. So what it does is it sees more sugar, and it tries to ramp up the production of insulin. And for a time, that can work. So people that are having this in this sugar, you know, resistance, essentially, or inaccurate use of sugar, their body is ramping up insulin production enough that their blood tests may or may not show any problems. Which means that again, the doctor doesn't think that that there's a problem there. And then over time, what happens when you overuse anything? It gets tired. Yeah, and so these data cells get worn out from trying and trying and trying and trying to hyper there's that word hyper produce insulin, and they they can't keep up anymore. And so now in terms of testing, fasting testing, or especially Testing, testing, in the post meal time period, those are the points that a doctor could find glucose excursions that are well beyond what a person without any dysfunction in their body should have. So it's kind of a cascade of things that happens over a long period of time. Very unlike diagnosis of type one, which is pretty quick onset for most people. Yeah.

Scott Benner 31:34
We're gonna, I intend to dig into this more throughout the podcast, because in my, in my heart, like, I think, when you have a person with type one diabetes in your life that you're taking care of, it takes a toll on your health, too. And I, I'm trying to think big picture and long term here, but how many people who have young kids with type one right now are going to end up sleep deprived or time deprived and suddenly start ordering out more or cooking from boxes more something like that, and, and maybe they'll end up in a similar situation with type two diabetes down the road, I want them to be aware of it as much as they can. Because that number, like when you hear people talk about how many people have diabetes, there are, and they don't in the world, and they don't distinguish between type one or type two or certain country, the number you always see that's frightening is the Undiagnosed number. Yes, that that expectation of what that number is, is is insane. It really is. And I mean, it is it is type to impact the impact double, once you have it, is it impactful, always with diet, or just sometimes with diet? Like it's not like, like, if you could force everyone with type two diabetes to eat exactly the same way, they wouldn't all have the same outcomes, right?

Jennifer Smith, CDE 32:55
Not necessarily. And I think that goes along with again, where do you catch diagnosis, you know, if the body is then so stressed over trying to do as well as it can for you, for a long time, there, there may have been enough beta cell destruction, that you're never really going to get back to a baseline of no kind of medication, right? some lifestyle changes can last a very long time. But it's it's like anything, it's the sticking to that management plan. And not veering from it. Right. And then I think the other piece that you bring in, in terms of like, knowledge is, the sticking with it is it's a really hard thing, and when you've been sticking with with it, and then your doctor says, well, your numbers are still climbing. And you think, Well, gosh, I'm doing everything. And it was working. What is the point now, if you're gonna throw medication at me, despite my really good efforts at doing everything, and that's where you know, and working with a lot of type two population in the past. There's a lot of like, defeat in that. And the explanation that I always give is, your your type two is a it's a progressive condition. It is. And at some point, you may need medication. At some point further down the road, you may need insulin, it does not mean that you failed, it means that you've had this amount of time that you've really given your all and you've really done a great job to keep your body healthy. So you know what, now when medication gets added, it will likely work for a really good amount of time as well before potentially needing to progress on to another kind of medication or even insulin.

Scott Benner 34:55
I have a recording already done and I have another one coming up with a with Both with type twos, who through the podcast have really astonishing outcomes like really well, a woman with a, an A one C, I just saw her online the other day in the Force. She's so excited, you know, and I was so happy for it. And I've already recorded with her and she's such a character and so wonderful. I can't wait to put it out. And then I have a guy coming on, who not only got his a one CD together, but his blood sugar's and his weight and all this stuff is happening from a podcast that I started, so my daughter would know how to Bolus, you know, like, that's really crazy, right. And as like you and I talking today, I have so many notes in front of me about what I want to do with the podcast moving forward. I just, I can't wait to try to help more people. The I don't know, Jenny, if you know this, but we are recording on the first of April. And we are here, right? Yes, it's April Fool's Day. This is not a joke. But the podcast in the first exact 90 days of 2022 had a million downloads.

Jennifer Smith, CDE 36:05
That's super awesome.

Scott Benner 36:06
it the year before it took twice as long to get to a million in that year. In a couple of weeks, the show will have a total of 6 million. And I think a year from now, it'll be more like 12 million total downloads. That's super, that's super, it's insane. Like I what I see, I see it

Jennifer Smith, CDE 36:29
honestly is super in terms of that's the number of people that it's reaching. I mean, I'm excited for you. That's super awesome. From what you've been able to put out and be able to do. But I'm excited from the standpoint of the people that that means it's helping in some some way they're getting something out of it.

Scott Benner 36:48
That is That is how I think about it. I also think about about paying my bills, but that's a different situation. But I really do, I mean seriously, to be serious, like I really do think about it that way. Like I used to have that. I know I've said it before long time ago on the podcast, it as close to the feeling is I can describe to you. When you help somebody like this when you do something and you see it help a person and I mean really help them like a person with type two tells you they're a onesies, 4.5, or a person with type one tells you, hey, I just ran a marathon based on what I experienced from your podcasts or my A once he's been in the fives for three years because of what I heard from you. It just sounds completely bizarre. I'm telling you that when I reached 10 people, I immediately think, why couldn't I find 100? And when I found 100, I think why can't I find 1000? In the first time I got to 100,000 I thought this could be a million. And

Jennifer Smith, CDE 37:42
you're like, where are all the people hiding? And how can I find them to give them what's important? Well,

Scott Benner 37:47
when you see them when you see what happens for them. And then you realize that the the really one of the only thing standing between them in the situation they're in now in the situation they could be in is just access just hearing it one time. Like you think like my whole, like 24 hours a day should be about I should be walking around with a sign right? Like, says Pre-Bolus on it is your right, I don't know, you know, like you start to have that feeling I have over the years alleviated myself from some of that guilt, which and it was guilt in the beginning. Like I felt like I wasn't helping enough people. And now I just see it as I know, this thing helps them and how do I get it to them. And so the people listening are how it happens. They spread differently. It's amazing share

Jennifer Smith, CDE 38:33
sharing it. I mean, and I think that's, that's an important piece. I mean, I I've met two or three people just in my community who have either mentioned it not knowing who I like, or that I contribute anything Association, but just in passing kind of thing. And I met one actually at our community pool last summer. A mom and her little girl and her daughter had noticed my Dexcom on my arm and I could tell that they're kind of like looking at me and she came over and she's like, we just wanted to say hi because my daughter also has type one and she noticed you know, your your Dexcom and we got to talking and we introduced names and I was like going Jenny, you know and she's like, you're not chatty. Like Jenny in what way and she's like, Do you are you on that podcast? Like me? Yeah, you had your airport

Scott Benner 39:31
moment. That's lovely.

Unknown Speaker 39:33
Did it was lovely.

Scott Benner 39:35
I think the kids call that meta, don't they? I don't know. I don't I don't have time to define meta. We're out of time. But that is

Jennifer Smith, CDE 39:44
just so nice. You know if when you hear back like that, it's

Scott Benner 39:47
it's amazing. I don't know. I don't know another way other than Mike hamfisted comparison to a movie. That's about a real life tragedy. And I even as I'm saying and I'm like don't make this comparison it's not a comparison. I'm Trying to it's that feeling. It's that moment in that movie, where he thinks I should have done more. I used to I used to feel like that constantly. Like, why am I not doing more? And then and then when it starts doing this, you're like, oh, it's working. You know, and I shared that thing with you yesterday. Yes, yeah, that's just insane that a woman was messaging with her doctor. And I want I want to pull it up real quickly. If she's messaging with their doctor about a problem, and the doctor responds, the doctor, the endocrinologist responds, and says something like, Hey, you know, might not be a bad idea to do this. Blah, blah, blah. There's a Juicebox Podcast episode about that. It's number 263.

Jennifer Smith, CDE 40:44
When you texted to me, I was like, and this doctor, like, knew the episode number. I don't even know that I have to look the episode numbers up. I don't even know.

Scott Benner 40:53
I'm the worst person to ask about what's in this podcast. And I'm so busy making it I don't know anything about it. But it's, I saw that and I thought, oh, my gosh, that's incredible. Like, it's only the is a podcast is only eight years old. It only really started flourishing four years ago. And today, somebody's being messaged by an endocrinologist. Hey, listen to this podcast. I was I was as proud as I could have been when I saw that really, really something else? I'm sorry. Did we do justice? Just do an overview of type two diabetes?

Jennifer Smith, CDE 41:22
We did? I think it yes. In fact, I think the only other thing that I think probably would be of interest at some point might need to be added to your plethora of notes that you have there. Now, we've talked a lot about insulin. But there are so many things to get into in terms of meds.

Scott Benner 41:39
Yeah. Do you have five minutes or do you have to go?

Jennifer Smith, CDE 41:43
I have to go I yeah, I would love to but it would be more than five minutes you're

Scott Benner 41:47
you know, I don't mean about that. I what I was gonna say is that I have a list a list of things here from people that they want added to the defining series. Oh, awesome. And the meds was on there. So I'll break this list down and put it in our shared folder file so you can see it cool. But I really appreciate you doing this with me today. Thank you so much. No problem. Have a good weekend.

Jennifer Smith, CDE 42:09
You too. Thank you. Bye.

Scott Benner 42:17
First, I'd like to thank Jenny Smith and remind you that she works at integrated diabetes.com She's for hire, you can get ready to help you with your diabetes. Let me also thank us Med and remind you to go to us med.com forward slash juice box where to call 888-721-1514. To get your free benefits check us med take the survey AT T one D exchange.org. Forward slash juicebox. Find the diabetes pro tips at diabetes pro tip.com or juicebox podcast.com or by going to Episode 210 In your podcast player.

If you're listening to the podcast right now in an audio app, but you're not subscribed or following, please subscribe and follow to the Juicebox Podcast. If you love the podcast tell a friend about it. Best way to help the podcast is to tell someone else about the show. I think this is all I have for you right now. So I'm going to go but you know what I want to say before I leave. Thank you so much for listening. I'll be back very soon with another episode of The Juicebox Podcast.