#1265 Snap, Crackle, Pop

Adrienne was diagnosed with Type 1 diabetes during her pregnancy. She also has a Bipolar II diagnosis, which she isn't convinced is correct.

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 1265 of the Juicebox Podcast

today's an interesting episode with Adriana, she's 29 years old the mom to a little boy. And she was diagnosed with type one diabetes about 19 weeks into her pregnancy with him back in June of 2022. Since then, she's gotten a bipolar diagnosis, which she doesn't particularly agree with. You're going to hear our entire conversation and then after that, another conversation I had with her later, so she finished recording with me and then thought of other things that she wanted to say, I let her come back on to complete her record. 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. Don't forget, if you use my link drink ag one.com/juice box you'll get a free year supply of vitamin D and five free travel packs with your first order. And if you go to cozy earth.com and use the offer code juice box at checkout, you're gonna save 30% off of your entire order. And if you'd like to help with type one diabetes research and you're a US resident who is a type one or the caregiver of a type one, all you have to do is go to T one D exchange.org/juicebox. Join the registry and complete the survey that should take you about 10 minutes, your answers are going to help T one D exchange.org/juicebox podcast. This episode of The Juicebox Podcast is sponsored by hungry route. The easiest way to eat healthy, hungry route.com/juice box. today's podcast is sponsored by touched by type one check them out on Facebook, Instagram, and at touched by type one.org. If you're looking for an organization who's helping people with type one diabetes, you're looking for touched by type one. Today's episode is sponsored by Medtronic diabetes, a company that's bringing people together to redefine what it means to live with diabetes. Later in this episode, I'll be speaking with Jaylen, he was diagnosed with type one diabetes at 14. He's 29. Now he's going to tell you a little bit about his story. To hear more stories with Medtronic champions, go to Medtronic diabetes.com/juicebox or search the hashtag Medtronic champion on your favorite social media platform.

Adrienne 2:27
Hey, my name is Adrian. I'm 29 years old, a mom to a little boy who is almost a year and a half and I was diagnosed type one at 19 weeks pregnant with him in June of 2022.

Scott Benner 2:38
Let's go Hold on a second. Could you start in hot? So you're in 2022 You're pregnant?

Adrienne 2:46
I am here's my first and only child, okay. And I was actually supposed to be going into the OB office to have the gender reveal ultrasound. But I walked in and they had mistakenly booked me for a regular doctor's appointment. And my doctor was not on staff that day he was at the hospital delivering and so they asked me if I wanted to see someone else that was on the team that day. And I you know, I was kind of irritated by it. But I was like sure might as well. So I went in and saw a nurse practitioner who was great, but standard procedure for any doctor's appointment there at the OB is to do a urine sample before you're seeing. So a nurse came in and she's like, you know, we saw something that kind of flagged us and your urine we want to check your sugar. So she did a finger poke and I came back like 391 I think it was and I could see she was concerned. So she poked again. And she's like, okay, we're just gonna check to be safe. And my second pick was 457. So she left and unfamiliar face poked back in and it was the nurse practitioner who never bothered to introduce herself. She said, What did you have for lunch today? That was where her first words to me so that well we did break the ice and sheepishly admitted that I had given into a pregnancy craving for Taco Bell. So that was great. But she said that her blood sugar had she eat and Taco Bell probably wouldn't have been over 120 And so that was her way of telling me that I was diabetic. She said that they didn't think it was gestational it was too soon into my pregnancy for that to have developed was her gut instinct, but they were going to send me home over the weekend to check before and after meals, that type of thing. So I basically just broke down crying there in the office asked zero questions and left there with no idea what I was doing. But they had me monitor over the weekend. And things kind of just rolled from there and thankfully my partner works in pharmacy so he was able to bring home all of the supplies I needed that same day was able to kind of push things through pretty quickly. So that's how the story started. And

Scott Benner 4:42
long story short, your baby's name is chalupa? Is that correct? Right.

Adrienne 4:46
That's exactly right. No, his name is Lucas. Oh,

Scott Benner 4:49
does anybody know what chalupa means? Like? Is that a real word? Is that like a word that like Taco Bell made up? Right.

Adrienne 4:55
That's a good question.

Scott Benner 4:56
I'll figure that out while you're telling me about everything that's happened. Oh, no, it's a real food. Several specialty dishes of south central Mexico. Okay, thank you. I thought maybe it was a marketing word. You said, That's how she told me I had diabetes. She didn't say to you, you have diabetes. She just said, that's not what my blood sugar would do. And I'm super healthy.

Adrienne 5:17
That's how she led off was that, you know, that's not how her sugar would have responded. But she said, You know, I think you are a type one diabetic. Unfortunately, this is not something that goes away. You know, I had heard of gestational diabetes. I wasn't super familiar with it. And I, you know, just kind of, I guess, asked again, that was my only question was, are you sure this is not gestational? It's not going to go away when he's born. And she said, No. And at that point, I pretty much just couldn't pull myself together enough to even ask her any questions. And she just apologized for having to break this news to someone that you know, she had never even met before. She was super sweet. But that was a shock. Nobody in my family has type one. No autoimmune that we're aware of. I do have a type two grandfather. So you know, familiar with that side of it. But type one was pretty new to me.

Scott Benner 6:04
No autoimmune at all. Ra celiac.

Adrienne 6:07
My grandmother had on my dad's side, a gluten intolerance, which she says is going away. So

Scott Benner 6:15
how old is she?

Adrienne 6:17
She just turned 80.

Scott Benner 6:19
My friend, Mike, he's gone now. But his grandmother when we were growing up in the in the last 10 years of her life, she poundcake and smoke cigarettes. What away? She just did not eat food anymore. Get up in the morning, have a piece of pancake, smoke a cigarette? And then that's just what she did all day long. I just wonder if maybe she stopped eating gluten didn't realize that the gluten thing is going away. Right,

Adrienne 6:42
right. Well, she did avoid it for some time. And now she says she can have little bits and not be bothered by it. So good for her.

Scott Benner 6:50
Yeah, I stay alive long enough. Yeah. Well, okay, so that's interesting. But I have your notes here in front of me. So it's a little unfair. But do you have anything else going on besides the type on post

Adrienne 7:02
type one diagnosis actually also received a bipolar two diagnosis? This was last August, and I am still not 100% settled into that. A lot of things about it do make sense, with, you know, my my history, but I haven't fully embraced that, I guess quite yet. I'm still navigating treatment and trying to find something that alleviates symptoms. Yeah, we're still in the throes of that. So yeah,

Scott Benner 7:29
I asked because if you listen to the podcast, you've heard me say this now. You know, when I started saying to people, is there any other autoimmune in your family? Eventually, people like they rattle things off? Like you just did it? You're like, I didn't ask about type two. But you said, oh, you know, somebody has type two. A lot of people would go, Oh, and I have my uncle's bipolar. Like they were just thinking of things that were, you know, wrong with people. And then they in their family and they would blurt them out. And my god, like, that's one at a time somebody said, My uncle's bipolar. I was like, What the hell is going on? You know, like, and I always wonder if it's not an inflammation issue, like autoimmune inflammation, that kind of mix. It's I mean, I obviously barely got into high school. So I don't know. But it's, you know, anecdotally, a lot of people say bipolar to me. So Right. Yeah, that's interesting. Yeah. And was that your whole life? Like, did you like you said you there were signs what were the signs growing up? I'd like to introduce you to your partner in eating healthy, hungry route. The easiest way to eat healthy hunger route has the best fruits, vegetables, premium meats, kids snacks, soups and stews, baked goods, and so much more hungry route.com/juice box. You can save hours of planning, shopping and cooking by letting hungry route deliver food you'll love right to your door and hungry route is here to support your fueling goals. Do you need more vegetables less sodium hungry route can make that happen? If you're ready to dig in, use my link hungry route.com/juice box links in the show notes links at juicebox podcast.com. This episode is sponsored by Medtronic diabetes, Medtronic diabetes.com/juice box. And now we're going to hear from Medtronic champion Jalen. I

Speaker 1 9:15
was going straight into high school. So it was a summer heading into high school was that particularly difficult? Unimaginable. You know, I missed my entire summer. So I went I was going to a brand new school. I was around a bunch of new people that I had not been going to school with. So it was hard trying to balance that while also explaining to people what type one diabetes was. My hometown did not have an endocrinologist. So I was traveling over an hour to the nearest endocrinologist for children. So you know, I outside of that I didn't have any type of support in my hometown. Did

Scott Benner 9:48
you try to explain to people or did you find it easier just to stay private?

Speaker 1 9:53
I honestly I just held back I didn't really like talking about it. It was just it felt like it was just an repeating wreck. Where I was saying things and people weren't understanding it. And I also was still in the process of learning it. So I just kept it to myself didn't really talk about it.

Scott Benner 10:07
Did you eventually find people in real life that you could confide in. I

Speaker 1 10:12
never really got the experience until after getting to college. And then once I graduated college, it's all I see, you know, you can easily search Medtronic champions, you see people that pop up and you're like, wow, look at all this content. And I think that's something that motivates me started embracing more, you know, how I'm able to type one diabetes, Medtronic

Scott Benner 10:32
diabetes.com/juice box to hear more stories from the Medtronic champion community, I

Adrienne 10:40
guess, early to mid teens, I started having issues with depression and anxiety. So I've been treated for that since I was in my teens. But with bipolar two, there are more stretches spent in depressive periods, then there are in hypomania. So the difference between type two are bipolar two and one, you don't quite reach the full heights of mania. So you're maybe irritable or anxious, restless type of thing, but you're not just totally off the rails experiencing things that bipolar one usually would. And again, it's more time spent in depressive episodes, but you know, you live your life, like everything is revolving around the problems that you're having. And I have found just some selfish things, I guess about myself in the way I've lived in the past and just kind of disregarded what might be going on with the people close to me, when I myself am dealing with something. Everything else kind of just shuts off, which is embarrassing to even talk about. But then I'm worried that this is just going to talk sound totally scattered, because this is pretty new to me. Like I said, I'm I'm still not even fully convinced that that's what's going on. Okay. There are things about the diagnosis that, like I said, makes sense just about my personality and the way that I have lived but haven't found a treatment yet, that is super helpful. So I'm not fully convinced that that's what's going on. But they said that something like bipolar two could be triggered by the type one diagnosis, you know, being a traumatic event could also have been pregnancy. I do really notice though, that when my blood sugar is on a roller coaster, my mental state follows. So I think that's pretty normal for people with, you know, high sugars to have your inability or you know, just to not be themselves. So it's hard for me to kind of differentiate what may actually be bipolar versus just, you know, the things that go along with type one. Yeah,

Scott Benner 12:33
I don't have bipolar and my personality ebbs and flows with my daughter's blood sugar. So that's, yeah, that's fair. Yeah. Long depressive episodes. What does that look like? Like day to day?

Adrienne 12:45
Well, so this is actually another interesting element, they diagnosed me as rapid cycling bipolar two, so I can I can swing from, you know, it seems like one minute to the next, but I'll have a lot of ups and downs within a day. I think that the actual guidelines for diagnosing bipolar two, rapid cycling would be like four, or five depressive episodes in a few months, which to me doesn't seem that rapid. No, not at all. Because I like I'm sitting over here thinking I'm swinging you know, one side of the pendulum to the other multiple times of days. So

Scott Benner 13:20
Adrian, what's that look like? Is it like, oh my god, the world's ending? Everything is Terrible. Let's go climb Mount Everest, I just want to die. You guys want to try it? Like Like, is it like, sorry? Oh, hell, no, I just jumped to the. But like, is it like that is it just like, like, up, down, up, down, up, down like big swings like that, it

Adrienne 13:41
is big swings, I can go from like, I'm trying to think of just an example here, I wake up in a completely awful mood, you know, usually it's a crying baby that jolts you out of bed. So there's there's that it's a way to start the day. But you know, I'll walk into you know, take them out of the crib and we can have a restart, be totally snuggly, and you know, just head downstairs and something can set me off. It can be you know, the dog tripping us up as we go down the stairs, or just something that, you know, didn't get put away from the night before. And it just totally sends me into this spiral of oh my gosh, I'm not gonna get anything done today. Like, look at all this stuff that's got to, you know, happen around me and I'm working full time from home while also caring for the toddler and you know, most of the household stuff kind of defaults to me, I know you've had that experience in your life. But it's just a constant feeling, I guess, of being buried under the things that you see need to be done. When something good happens in your life that you know it can can really increase or better your mood, but then the slightest thing can really tip you off. And I feel terrible for my family because I know that I can be difficult to live with. I feel like my partner walks on eggshells. Oftentimes when he comes home because he doesn't know what version of me he's gonna get. But I keep telling myself that this is just a crazy period of time. I have lots of new things going on with the baby and the new diagnosis. You know, type one, I'm still navigating that there were no pre pregnancy settings to default back to and my insulin needs are constantly changing still. And

Scott Benner 15:14
can I ask a question here, if you had your thyroid checked, so,

Adrienne 15:17
because of you, I had actually requested some more in depth thyroid panels pretty shortly after I got diagnosed. type one, and they ran another panel just last week, actually. So I just got those results back and everything looks pretty normal. My TSH is like right on the border of low like the the low end of the scale, and I know this different app can be one second, by

Scott Benner 15:45
the way, you should see my notes in front of me 29 Bipolar question mark diagnosed during pregnancy thyroid question mark bleep

Adrienne 15:56
oh, gosh, okay, I

Scott Benner 15:58
had to make the note, Adrian because I got really panicked that Rob would take out the whole sentence and I really just wanted the word out not the whole sentence.

Adrienne 16:04
It's so funny. No,

Scott Benner 16:07
it's chalupa real. That's one of my other notes. I don't know why you people listen to

Adrienne 16:14
I do. I can't remember it yesterday. I was listening to it was an older episode and cut. I was in tears. Scott. You had me cracking up? I'm

Scott Benner 16:21
gonna have to go hilarious. Yeah, no, you really are. No.

Adrienne 16:25
I gotta say, too. I found the podcast. My first night in the hospital. I spent three nights in the hospital after I was diagnosed. And I pretty much went without any good information straight from the doctors because I was getting so much conflicting information. I went to Reddit, which I know you have mixed feelings on.

Scott Benner 16:44
No, no, no. Let's be clear, because that's not good. I love Reddit. I just don't go there. That's all the people on Reddit are very nice to me. I love you all. Don't let this lady speak for me. I don't say anything bad about you. Do not get me in trouble on Reddit. Adrian, what are you doing?

Adrienne 16:57
Oh, sorry. No, no, I thought maybe I had heard once that just weren't maybe weren't sure what the platform was.

Scott Benner 17:05
I don't want to say there was one time No, no, we won't talk about that. Anyway, the people on Reddit are really kind and they always are telling people about the podcast. I'm being genuine and sincere. Yeah, they are

Adrienne 17:15
absolutely wonderful. So that I was actually referred twice to the podcast in my first post, and I had cross posted my initial inquiry into a few different subreddits. But Heidi's pottery and you'll one one night, and they both said you have to listen to the Pro Tip series. And so the first episode I heard was newly diagnosed or starting over.

Scott Benner 17:35
So that makes you upset. It

Adrienne 17:37
is it's no not in a bad way. At

Scott Benner 17:40
all, let me know. Just kidding. Actually, Adrian, it would be great for the podcast, if you had a big mood swing while we were recording, but I don't.

Adrienne 17:50
You're in for a treat.

Scott Benner 17:52
So people reached out and they found you. That's amazing.

Adrienne 17:55
Yeah, they responded to my post. And you know, everybody just had the best words of encouragement and it was a lot of No Hey, sorry, you're invited to this crappy club arrived. But it is a great community and they could not sing your praises highly enough on there just was so so grateful that they pointed me your direction. Because honestly, like I said, with the the mixed info I was getting at diagnosis, your podcast was such a pillar of consistency and solid info that I could tell was really impacting people just from the Facebook group. I was in that really quickly as well. The community there is just unmatched. So so grateful. You're

Scott Benner 18:35
doing Who am I thinking? Yo, MTV Raps and Heidi song, what am I doing? Heidi's pottery? Oh, okay, thank you Heidi's pottery,

Adrienne 18:43
and Yo, 119119

Scott Benner 18:47
I really, I genuinely appreciate all kind you guys are and that you were sharing with me? Look what you did for a drink. It's really amazing. I would have never found you that way. You know? Yeah,

Adrienne 18:56
it's a it's a big world out there for sure. But just super grateful that they happen to see that post and, and come up listening to you. Yeah.

Scott Benner 19:06
Obviously, you're making the post because you need help. And I'm gonna I guess let's dig backwards a little bit. You came out of the hospital with what was your understanding of diabetes leaving the hospital or even in there?

Adrienne 19:16
They mostly were just trying to stabilize my sugar's I wasn't like, off the rails 91 See at diagnosis was only 8.9. And so they thought that it must have been the pregnancy that kicked it off. My agency wasn't high enough for it to have been something before that. And so they sent me straight to like labor and delivery. And so that's where I was being treated. They seem to have I mean, and I would never be able to tell the difference obviously at that point, you know, whether they knew much about type one or not. They seemed to they got my sugar's down, I you know, was vaguely briefed on how I would be handling things with both short and long acting insulin when I left. I never gave myself an injection at the hospital. They did it each time. And then the only education I really got was my OB coming in to check on me and my actual doctor in the middle of the night he came in at like two in the morning, I had just fallen asleep not that long before. He was talking about my lifespan and all the complications that were gonna happen while you're walking out of a dead sleep to tell me these things. And so that was the impression I had of type one when I left. The hospital was like this doom and gloom thing he did say, you know, there's some technology now that helps with management. But basically, this is where you're headed. That was really awful. And then I was referred to an endo, who works within the hospital system there. And she, Okay, I gotta, I gotta rewind a little bit. So when I found your podcast, you know, I started hearing all this about Dexcom and Omnipod. Those were the two, the two things that stuck in my brain. And so then I left there, really urging my teams to help me get this technology. And I was set up with a virtual visit with a diabetes educator. A couple of days after I was released from the hospital. When we logged on, she said, Oh, you know, I was really hoping you'd be here in person, because I wanted to set you up with a Dexcom. And I just about came out of my skin. I was like, I will be there in 15 minutes. You know, please let me come in, don't get

Scott Benner 21:18
the guy on the phone said that word. Right. You're like, I heard the guy on the podcast, say that word. Yes.

Adrienne 21:24
Yeah, I need that. Yeah, I will be there. And she's like, okay, yeah, I'll wait for you. And I could not believe that I figured she was going to reschedule me and you know, make me wait for this. But so we got that set up. That was great. And then, after seeing her, I finally got connected with the endocrinologist. And I asked her pretty much immediately about getting on a pump. And she said, It's too much for you to learn right now. I don't think you can do it. And I was like, at listen, I will tell you what I can or can't learn, you know, my main concern now is not killing this baby. Like, they don't even want you to get pregnant as a type one, unless you're a onesies below a certain level. And I went into pregnancy, not even knowing that I had this. And so I'm panicking thinking that I'm going to harm my baby. I just want all of the tools that are available to me. And so I really pushed on Omnipod. And she was not going to do it. And so I went back to my diabetes educator. And, you know, she had kind of given me the impression that she thought I could I could handle this information, you know, that I was catching on kind of quickly. And I credit the podcast with that, by the way. She Yeah. She said, Okay, well, I'll see what I can do. I'll put some notes in and, you know, we'll, we'll talk to the Endo. And that never happens. She didn't put notes in my file, but I had reached out to insolate you with their insurance coverage check. And they reached out directly to my Endo. And before I knew it, I had a prescription on file at Rite Aid for the entrepot. Five. And where did this even come from? Because my endo never approved it. I never talked to her about it again, all I did was ask about my insurance coverage. So I don't know what happened there. But yeah, I ended up on the Omnipod. Five within a month of diagnosis. I think I think insolate for that because I you know, I couldn't get anywhere with my doctor. Yeah.

Scott Benner 23:11
I mean, it's not uncommon, like, you know what, you bumped into there. And that person didn't know you? They didn't How much time do they have with you when they said I don't think you can handle this.

Adrienne 23:22
I was in her office for probably 20 minutes. But the only reason for that was because she just kept talking over me and talking over me talking over me and I, I left they're so frustrated and discouraged. You know, this person is she's not hearing my questions or my concerns. Like, I know, there's there's also the element of you don't even know what to ask, because you don't know what information you don't have. But it seems like she just was looking down on me, I guess because I didn't know what I was talking about. And like she just had

Scott Benner 23:54
diabetes at that point. Eight seconds. Right? Yeah. A little over a week. Right? Of course, you know, and she's not asking you questions. She's, she's just pontificating. Pretty

Adrienne 24:06
much. And I got the the typical, you know, 15 carbs to treat a low was on a sliding scale before insulin, and they had started me on mph, which eventually got changed, thankfully, because I didn't have a great experience with that. I feel like I'm just talking circles now.

Scott Benner 24:23
No age. Are you doing great. Are you really worried that you're not doing well? Well, I

Adrienne 24:28
was mostly worried that the story wouldn't even make sense. I feel like there's so many elements I've just been jumping around. Not at all. Don't

Scott Benner 24:34
worry about I'm following you perfectly. Well, don't worry about that. Yeah. Okay, so they get your pump. Did you get a CGM at the same time or no,

Adrienne 24:44
no. So I was on a roll. I had the Dexcom about six days after diagnosis and then the Omnipod five a month after and after I got the prescription for the Omni pod. They actually had an alert come out for a shortage of Omnipod vibes and so I was supposed to be going in for my pump training in a couple of days. And so I was waiting on. It's like a provider who delivers your prescriptions, I guess it's alto pharmacy and they were supposed to be delivering Omni pods. Then I got an alert that they were in short supply. So I spent a long time on the phone with the pharmacy and this poor girl. She was just so wonderful. I told her like, I'm about to leave town. I'm supposed to get my pump training right before I go, you know, is there any way I can I drive and pick these up somewhere. And she's like, well, it looks like there's a pharmacy. This place was three hours from my house. I'm just gonna do it. I drove and I picked them up. That was my first box. Wow, that's, yeah, got the training.

Scott Benner 25:41
My parents picked me up to adopt me in during a tropical storm. They said it was like a hurricane. And I always felt like that meant some thing like that. They probably really wanted me. But now I look back as an adult. And I'm like, it's probably the only baby they got offered your life one way. What is this pumpkin to do? It better be special. I

Adrienne 26:05
was so so glad to be able to even pick it up. I don't care about the drive. But ya know, that was that was great. And I've actually since switched from Omnipod five on the dash now and I'm looping with Android APs.

Scott Benner 26:19
Oh, look at you. Did you move into Dexcom? G seven. Are you still with G six?

Adrienne 26:22
I'm still with G six. But yeah, I just started looping. Right before Christmas. Christmas Eve actually was my first day on the dash. So that's Did you say you do it so far. I EPS Android EPS. Yeah. Who

Scott Benner 26:35
did you set up yourself?

Adrienne 26:37
So I set up the Nightscout through T one pow. And then I built built a PS on my own? Yeah. Good for you. Yeah. Awesome. Awesome. Instructions. Yeah,

Scott Benner 26:47
no kidding. I am. I let somebody helped me, but still. Thank you, Mike. I wish I did. Yeah, no, no, I there's a part of me that knows for sure. I wouldn't do it. Right. But it's working astonishingly well for Arden. Really great. Really? Yes. So and she's using it with G seven, which is nice, too.

Adrienne 27:06
How is she liking g7

Scott Benner 27:08
It's smaller and easier to swap. I think that's what she knows about it. So it's what she gets. Arden really doesn't dig nuts and bolts into diabetes. Like she knows how to do it. She knows how to handle like I've not seen she's been in college now for a year and a half. I haven't seen one circumstance come up that she hasn't handled well. Like really, really good and outstanding. Yeah. But she's she's not wanting to talk about it a lot. She doesn't want to sit around and talk about IVs. Even if I come up to her, I'm like, Hey, we have to do this. Because of this. She goes, Okay. I'm like, do you understand? She goes yeah, and I'm like, okay, but it's not dismissive. It's just she's not looking to conversate around. That's fair. Yeah. Yeah, there's nothing about me. I don't talk about it either. Which is probably weird for people to hear. But I don't. I don't find myself talking about diabetes very frequently.

Adrienne 27:55
I imagine you spent so much time doing it on the podcast probably doesn't leak into your personal life.

Scott Benner 28:00
I'm tucked out on it. I'm good. I've had enough. I've had enough conversations. I want to, I want to, I want to make sure this timeline is right. So how far along are you when you're diagnosed? Tell me again, late 19 weeks, 18 weeks now I'm gonna do some quick math. That's like five months. And you're probably impressed off. So did that. But don't think it's great. Yeah, thank you. It's actually four months in three weeks. But so five months, you still have month 678. You still got four to go. And you're on a pump pretty quickly, six weeks. So you do a pump at a CGM for the last three months of your pregnancy? And where did you get your a one C two during the pregnancy? So

Adrienne 28:45
I started at 8.9 that diagnosis and by the time I gave birth, I was 5.4. Which I don't know if that's actually good or not, because it seems like a huge drop in that amount of time, which I know is not good for you. But my sugars were so much more in control. I was proud of myself, my team was impressed with what they were seeing with the graphs, and I just could not have done that with a podcast. I

Scott Benner 29:14
well. Oh, well. I'll let you say something nice about me in a second. But I was gonna say that as much as I don't know the actual ramifications of you bringing it down that quickly. I think for the baby. It's the step I would have thought I would have said, Hey, let's get it down. You know, because we're growing a baby here.

Unknown Speaker 29:29
Right?

Scott Benner 29:30
Did you change your diet? Was there any more Taco Bell after that? No,

Adrienne 29:35
no more Taco Bell, although so this is kind of another interesting element too. I feel like the type one diagnosis really messed with my relationship with food, which I'm sure you hear all the time, but not in the way that I would expect. So I did control myself better during the pregnancy for baby's sake, but holy cow after he arrived. Self control abilities really just plummeted. So, I found that the the foods that I was figuring out the Bolus for the best were the worst foods for me, you know, things that I would just try and fail, try and fail until I finally figured them out. Like I have to know how to Bolus for a decent amount of fries. So you know, things that I just, I don't want to give up. Like, I'm more inclined to eat the things that I know I shouldn't have now that I know that I shouldn't have them, you know, almost like I don't, I don't want to be told you know that I can't do something food was a really big, I don't know, I'm a foodie, I love I love the experience of eating and I'm French fries as a terrible example to demonstrate that but I would miss that you know, and so it's really important to me to know that I can maintain, you know, a normal sense of

Scott Benner 30:45
well listen, anybody who's ever bitten into a properly cooked french fry with crispy and salty on the outside and squishy and potato in the middle is not gonna that's a good example. I think so i

Adrienne 30:57
think so probably not as good as a chalupa, but we'll go with it. Yeah.

Scott Benner 30:59
Did you know by the way, in 1997, Taco Bell ran a commercial with Chihuahua named Gidget. And, and I think

Adrienne 31:06
you know, Taco Bell.

Scott Benner 31:07
Yeah. So say that again. You know, Taco Bell. The reason I bring it up is because when I remembered I remembered a secret or Taco Bell. And I don't know any Spanish at all. I just wonder how it stuck in my in my head. Like, how did I get quitter? Oh, right, but not the yo. So anyway, I'm upset with myself over that one. Do you think now 97 You know that one? 2007 2000. So that's 30 years ago.

Adrienne 31:33
Did it run longer than 97? I wonder because I definitely remember the Chihuahua.

Scott Benner 31:37
It's huge on YouTube. Like legitimately, like, almost like this is the commercial. It's a little chihuahua. He's like running through the street. And then he sees another shoe ally falls in love. And then what happens tolerance passes by.

Okay, so here's the premise. That Chihuahua is running down the street. There's another Chihuahua, a lady Chihuahua, who's looking at him with love. But he rolls right buyer to a guy eaten a taco and then says what he says. My kind of dog bites what I'm seeing from you, is you would probably give up love for a taco.

Adrienne 32:27
I might, I might

Scott Benner 32:30
see you ended up getting very good at bolusing for things that you're like healthwise, I shouldn't be doing this. But hey, look how good I am at boys and for it.

Adrienne 32:37
Well, I think I've gotten better at bolusing for those things. I don't know if I've gotten good at it. But I did figure out there's a sandwich from Panera that I have nailed. You know, things like that staples that I crave often. Like, I gotta figure that out. Because I don't know if I'll make it without having that in my life. So here we are.

Scott Benner 32:57
What's the Bolus for the sandwich? What do you do? So I

Adrienne 33:01
actually have to drag that out. And so I'll tell you, I haven't eaten that Panera sandwich. Since I started looping. I'm having trouble with the extended carbs and getting those to work right, with APS but still working it out. But when I was on Omnipod, five, it was an extended Bolus for like two and a half hours. And I would do about 60% upfront and the other 40% dragged out. My carb ratio is one to 12 Currently, I don't know what it was at the time, but

Scott Benner 33:28
you're in manual at that point with Omnipod. Five. I

Adrienne 33:32
never stayed in automated mode after Okay, so Oh, because you couldn't while you're pregnant. Right? Right. Yeah, just wasn't tight enough. Right

Scott Benner 33:40
control. So I was gonna say cuz you said extendable. So I was like, that's gonna confuse people. You cannot do an extended Bolus and automation with sorry, don't be sorry. Be apologizing. And I'm, I'm cleaning it up. Don't worry. You're good at that. Yeah. So you're like doing a heavy extended Bolus on this sandwich. You've got it all figured out. It's working well for you. Do you Pre-Bolus it?

Adrienne 34:00
Oh, yeah. Yeah. And that I think postpartum has been a huge hang up for me the Pre-Bolus. Because if, if I do Pre-Bolus Oftentimes, I'll get distracted by something else and then totally forget to eat and then I'm tanking. Or sometimes it's like, oh, shoot, you know, I forgot to Pre-Bolus and now I know I'm going to skyrocket. So it's, you know, adding that extra extra amount onto the front end of the Bolus and hoping to even it out later.

Scott Benner 34:28
Are you finding it difficult to be a mom? I

Adrienne 34:32
am i i love it. I would not trade it for the world. That little boy is just my pride and joy. But yeah, it's been hard. the postpartum period was really rough. And I feel like with the type one diagnosis, you know, this sounds selfish, but I feel like I got robbed of a very happy time in my life. Of course, the pregnancy was perfect. I didn't really have morning sickness. I think I got I got sick twice over the whole pregnancy. You know, most of the The downsides that you hear about carrying a child just didn't apply to me and it should have been a really joyous time in my life if not for this. And same thing with the first year of his life. You know, I, like I said, I had no pre pregnancy settings to go back to for my pump had no idea what my needs would be. I have no idea. If I was honeymooning. I'm sure I probably was. But my requirements change.

Scott Benner 35:24
Yeah, you might have caught a little bit of a break while you're pregnant in the honeymoon, but still a heavy usage because of the hormones I imagined. And then you have the baby and you don't need as much but you don't have any frame of reference for how to go back. Right?

Adrienne 35:35
Exactly. Yes. It's like starting from scratch. Yeah. Twice, eight, six months.

Scott Benner 35:39
Yeah, yeah. While you're supposed to be celebrating this, this, this thing that may be coming in instead, you're Listen, I'm not a lady. But I've been married to one for a long time. I would imagine that getting really bad news during a time when you're so flooded with hormones is probably extra difficult. It

Adrienne 35:58
was bad. It was bad. I ended up back on antidepressants after having like a total meltdown in my OBS office. Like alright, but I feel like he kind of wanted to just wash his hands. And he's like, Well, we'll get you taken care of and we'll see how this goes after you give birth but we're

Scott Benner 36:14
gonna get this one. Hi. So she stopped yelling. Right?

Adrienne 36:19
It was like yelling. Crying,

Scott Benner 36:21
I would imagine. Yeah, like devastated. No, yeah, absolutely.

Adrienne 36:25
Yeah. Cuz you're, you're afraid for your kid and you're afraid because this, you know, same guy who is now like, Okay, well, we'll start John, something he was the one that came into my hospital room in the middle of the night was telling me how my life was gonna be shorter. And I was gonna have all these these problems down the road.

Scott Benner 36:41
How much shorter? Did he tell you? This is ridiculous.

Adrienne 36:45
I don't think he gave me an amount. He just basically told me that type ones are known to have shorter lifespans, especially women. He said, I don't know why that is because I feel like when I googled that after, I didn't see anything

Scott Benner 36:58
like that, but probably knew one lady that died. Yeah, yes. You

Adrienne 37:02
know, aside from that experience, he was the most amazing doctor, I really loved him. So that was that was really bizarre to me.

Scott Benner 37:09
But there's one day when when he ignored the fact that I was pregnant for the first time having a baby super excited, all of a sudden found out I have an incurable disease, and then started thinking about my own health, and the baby's health. And the fact that I didn't know what I was doing. And all the joy was stripped out in my moment. And then he's like, Hey, by the way, you're probably gonna die sooner now. Right? Yeah. I don't know why that didn't go. Well, Adrian, this It's baffling.

Adrienne 37:36
Ya know, oh, my gosh.

Scott Benner 37:40
Is Wrong with everybody? Let's say you were gonna die sooner. Let's just say that that's true for a second. We can't hold on to that information for a little bit. That has to come out today.

Adrienne 37:53
My friend, yeah. Figure it out.

Scott Benner 37:55
That guy is not married. Or if he was that lady left him.

Adrienne 37:59
His appears happily married with a couple of kids. Yeah,

Scott Benner 38:04
I don't know why what she's putting up with at home or What? What? Maybe he's got common sense at home that he doesn't have when he's sitting with you. Also, you look young. I know. You're not young. I know. You're 29. But I know what you look like. You look young, like even that you would think would would like I don't know, like garner a little bit of like, fatherly care from the guy or something like that. Like, you know, you're gonna die sooner. To weird place to start, you know?

Adrienne 38:29
No, yeah, really, as it is. Wow.

Scott Benner 38:32
Yeah. What are you gonna do? Exactly. So, so I'm sorry. So baby comes flying out. That all goes great. But then Besides, your insulin needs changing, you get hit with postpartum how quickly? Does that happen after the birth? And how long does it stick with you for and what was it like?

Adrienne 38:49
Well, I would say within a couple of weeks, I noticed a big change in myself. And my partner took I think he took about a week and a half after the baby came my boss so it's, you know, funny enough, he is actually type one himself and he was in the car with me the day that I got called in to come to the hospital after I had monitored my sugar's you know, that weekend after the initial doctor's appointment? Yeah. So he heard me reading off my numbers to the nurse, and he had no idea what had been going on. And when I hung up the phone, he said, that sounds like blood sugar. And that doesn't sound very good. And I was like, geez, no, thanks. He has been a great resource for me. But all that to say this company that I work for is about eight men. And there's no precedent for what happens when a female employee needs to take maternity leave. And so when he found out I was pregnant, he's like, Well, what do you think? And I said, Well, I think standard in the US is 12 weeks. And he said, Oh, I was you know, thinking more like three weeks. Oh,

Scott Benner 39:49
you bring the baby to the office right after you have it and keep working place.

Adrienne 39:54
Well, thankfully, I work from home. And so they they were flexible. They met me at eight weeks, but Even still, I mean, anybody who's had a baby would say, that's just not enough time, especially when you're navigating all this new stuff. And I would say within a couple of weeks in, to circle back to your question, I started noticing, like I said, a change in myself, it was a really lonely period. You know, when your partner's gone during the day, you're now responsible for caring for this small human, you have no clue what you're doing. You know, you're navigating this new disease at I breastfed and nursing dropped my sugar a lot. And so I was having scary lows. I remember my partner coming home from work, and I was just completely out of sorts. I don't remember where the baby was somewhere safe. He was either in his crib, or maybe sleeping in his swing or something like that. But my partner found me just kind of wandering around trying to put on this baby carrier sling thing that I had, and I was not making any sense, you know, he was totally sweaty and shaky, and just not, you know, I didn't want to eat anything. But this poor guy he has put up with a lot, you know, that fell in love with me. I mean, he didn't know what he was signing up for, you know, he has a son from a previous marriage who just turned 16. And he had not been planning on having any more kids. And so our son Lucas was a

Scott Benner 41:20
blessing to us. Yeah, fries blessing, but it happened after a wedding. No. Do you guys go out to a movie try to have dinner? Thought it would be safe. What happened? No,

Adrienne 41:29
no, just, uh, we're, we're still not married yet. That's that's down the road. But I actually found out that I was pregnant on a business trip. That was the shock. So

Scott Benner 41:38
hey, guys, I'm gonna need 12 weeks off and about a year. Right? Yeah, surprise.

Adrienne 41:44
No, but right after we found out we were pregnant, pretty much. You know, within a couple of months, I got this diagnosis. And now he's not responsible for me. But he's encumbered with all of my alarms. And you know, whatever nonsense I'm dealing with on a bad sugar day. You have concerned about that? Well, I mean, the alarms kept me up all night, every night, up until birth, pretty much. And now you know, baby's awake in the night, my alarms are still going off. Like he he gets the backlash from when I'm frustrated by sugars. You know, every time I'm high or super low, I feel like I'm failing, which is extra scary to me, because I'm worried that my son is going to get it. That's really heavy on my brains. I've been paranoid about that since since I was diagnosed. Even just last night, actually, my son had been drinking a lot of water. And he ended up throwing up in the middle of the night, which he hasn't done. You know, they split up when they're young, young. But yeah, in terms of actually getting sick, I had never seen that from him. And I just about lost my mind last night. We were checking his sugar, he was beautiful 72. But I find myself checking often, and I'm afraid of every sickness that comes into our house, because I don't want that to be what kicks it off for him. Just hyper, hyper aware. I'm

Scott Benner 43:05
about 23 years ahead of you, on my race to the grave with you, pretty far ahead of you. The best thing I could say, and the thing that I found very comforting and helpful throughout my life and raising kids and your childhood as type one. And, you know, my son has hypothyroidism. So does my daughter, you know, like, I've got health issues around me. I would just tell you that worry is a waste of imagination, that you absolutely have no idea what will or won't happen in the future. And you're using up your your capital now on worrying about something that might never happen and probably won't ever happen. But if it is to happen, I want you all charged up and ready to go when we're actually when there's actually a fight to fight. You know what I mean? Yeah, I know, that's not as easy said. And as easy said is done. But wait, I got that. I just get that back. Who cares? You know what I mean? I know it's, you know what I mean? It's a saying you all know what it means. It's you know, but it's absolutely true. And you will figure it out one day, so don't dilly dally get into it. Because you can't spend any time pre planning and worrying are not the same things. That is like you can you know what to do, right? If this happens, I'll test his blood sugar. Other than that, you'd never think of it again. People get sick. There's nothing you can do about it. That is very true. Yeah, you are not in control.

Adrienne 44:28
I believe that. I've seen that the last couple of years.

Scott Benner 44:32
And neither am I. I hate to pile on with the make you feel bad questions, but you're not married. And you got the baby. And a year ago, you weren't bipolar and had type one diabetes. And do you worry about that? Do you ever like look at the door at 505 and go hey, ain't coming back. Or like, you know, like,

Adrienne 44:53
worried that he's voice totally. Yeah. Well, I mean, yeah, that the thoughts have been They're for sure I feel, like I said, I felt like I became a burden when this happened, and especially, you know, with the, I never want my son to listen to this, and feel like oh, man, you know, my parents weren't expecting me or, you know, they're not happy. I'm here. But Adrian,

Scott Benner 45:14
if this podcast still around, when Lucas is old enough to listen to podcast, I am going to be such a successful podcaster that he'll just be thrilled that he was mentioned on my amazing show that's been running for 30 years. Don't worry about a plan for

Adrienne 45:28
that plan for it. Okay. I believe it. The thought has been there. Absolutely. A lot of this is now what he's signed up for.

Scott Benner 45:34
Yeah. I mean, I don't see how somebody wouldn't think that like not that you're like, actually thinking this guy is going to bail me. But I mean, like, like, what's

Adrienne 45:40
the appeal to staying for him? Well,

Scott Benner 45:42
I'm assuming you love you. That's not my point. My point is like, from your perspective, why would you not wonder about that? Like, that's not worrying? That to me seems like, Ah, okay. Well, I could see how this could end up happening. Now, once I've thought it through. I would voice it to him. And then I would like, I wouldn't worry about it again. Yeah. Because I think the worst thing you can do is in your heart, hold out even 10% of an idea that like there's going to be another shoot, it's going to drop, and then because it always I think it stops you from being completely present in your relationship. If you're worried the person is always going to leave you. That's absolutely, yeah, you're right. 23 years ahead of you. Well, I

Adrienne 46:24
won't have long to catch up to you.

Scott Benner 46:26
Oh, no. Yeah, you and I should be dying right around the same time, according to him. So right on your tail, Scott. I'm very good now. So I'm gonna live forever.

Adrienne 46:35
Excellent. Yes. You're probably dropped

Scott Benner 46:38
dead next year. And people go oh, remember when he said he was 10? He was gonna live forever.

Adrienne 46:43
Too many chalupas?

Scott Benner 46:44
I've never I don't do the Taco Bell.

Adrienne 46:48
It's good for you. I don't get it shouldn't shouldn't. Yeah, I

Scott Benner 46:51
don't get the whole you have it out there. Right. Is one of the shoe from the house somewhere. I live in a fancy place. No, I mean, I could be at a Taco Bell in five minutes if I catch one light. But I drive past that every day. And I'm like, I don't understand what you people are doing it. They're so good for you. For you. I really don't.

Adrienne 47:09
It's sometimes you just need something greasy and awful. Yeah, I don't

Scott Benner 47:13
have that. I don't have that feeling. greasy. Makes me feel unpleasant in my belly.

Adrienne 47:18
Yeah,

Scott Benner 47:19
yeah. You're right about that. So anyway, all right. What are we going to do? Adrian, we got, we got all of our problems laid out in front of us, we're doing pretty well with the diabetes, you're learning the algorithm or to get rid of some of those lows. So you can you know, sleep through the night, stop those alarms from going off. But what about the rest of it? How are you managing? I mean, you said they put you on some sort of antidepressant, but did you stay on it?

Adrienne 47:40
Well, I'm on something different now. So I was on the antidepressant through the pregnancy, and then through breastfeeding, because that's, you know, what has been studied to be safe for nursing women. But since then, they have put me on a different medication that's sometimes used to treat bipolar two, but it's actually a seizure medication. So I'm at the therapeutic dose of that. And some days, I feel like it helps some days I don't. So I really don't know if that's the meds or if it's just a better day, if that makes sense. I'm still navigating. And my last appointment I had with the psychiatrist, I was actually really low blood sugar wise, and just was pretty worthless for actually making any headway during the appointment. So that kind of put things on pause. So I'll meet with her again, in another month or so. I see her about every month, in another month or so. Yeah, we don't we don't meet every month. Okay. It's actually kind of hard to get in with her. There's a shortage of mental health professionals.

Scott Benner 48:36
Firing the Yeah, I think COVID might have done that. Yeah, I believe everybody a reason to need one and enough time to figure out how to do it. So yeah, a problem. Wow. I can't believe that as frequently as you can get in. It's

Adrienne 48:52
pretty crazy. And it's worse. I guess now with OB GYN is out here. People are talking about not being able to get in to see anybody you know that they're calling until October or November, which is obviously not an option if you're pregnant now, you know, so I thought

Scott Benner 49:07
you get here in October. That's where do you live in the woods or something?

Adrienne 49:12
I live in western Washington. So I'm on the west side of the Puget Sound.

Scott Benner 49:20
Region, Canada in the ocean. I hear what you're saying. Pretty much you got no, you're stuck. You better learn how to be an OB on your own. Do you think you'd ever have another kid?

Adrienne 49:30
Right now? No, I think I think we're good.

Scott Benner 49:34
I'm fine. Yeah, everything's fine.

Adrienne 49:37
You've seen that picture. The dogs sitting in the Burning Room? This is fine. Everything's fine.

Scott Benner 49:45
No one worry. You know, it's funny when my son was in, like kindergarten, he had this principle. And I used to joke that she was a great politician because if you came to her and said the building is on fire and the kids can't get out, she'd be like, don't worry about it. We've seen this before. We'll take care of It like, you know, she's like on that level. She passed away last week and I thought I could stop that one. No, let's hear her spin this.

Adrienne 50:10
Oh my gosh, I'm

Scott Benner 50:11
just teasing. She's like a eulogy.

Adrienne 50:17
Would you speak at my funeral? Scott, when I'm sure

Scott Benner 50:19
I'll never forget the day, I met Adrian. Oh, Jesus, what a mess. Do you have a lot of hope? Like, are you hopeful about your direction? Do you feel like you're focused and have the help around you that you need to get where you want to go?

Adrienne 50:37
I have such a great support system. I feel really, really blessed. And I feel guilty even complaining about any of this stuff. Because man, I know that there are people out there who are navigating a lot worse, alone. And so I do feel like I have hope I have got a great family in my corner. Nice. I'm really happy with my care team. Now I have changed. endocrinologist and my my endo now is actually type one herself, which is amazing. That has changed a lot about the way we approach there. And just her her understanding of where I'm at. And her her willingness to help me. I was shocked that she actually loops. I can't remember if I even said that. She loops herself. And so it was funny. I was actually trying to be covert in my, my my chart message to her when I was asking about switching from the Omnipod five to the dash. Like I think I'd like to lean towards some you know, tighter control and you know, more in depth settings or something. And I put like a winky face because I didn't know if I was supposed to talk about looping since it's not FDA approved. I didn't want that in her system. She wrote back she's like, do you mean that you want to loop? And I'm like, Well, now I feel like a weirdo for

Scott Benner 51:45
talking about it. Now. I

Adrienne 51:48
don't know what that is. Yeah, no, but that's, that's been wonderful. She's amazing. And yeah, just like I said, my family has been great through all of this, my mom especially, she lives a couple hours for me, but she has done everything she can to learn about type one and what's going on, I do feel like she has probably the best understanding of anybody in my family, she really dove in with me. And, you know, it's such an onslaught of new information that makes no sense in the beginning. And, you know, I probably buried her with all of my venting and complaints. But she's, she's been great. She gets it in. really grateful to have her in my corner, too. Yeah.

Scott Benner 52:27
I'm sure if you keep going the way you're going, you're gonna you're gonna find your way to the other side of it. You know, I mean, my wife had postpartum after she had call. Like, she was like, completely disconnected from him for a little while. Yeah, in the beginning, like he looked like, like furniture. Her I think, you know, like she knew, you know, the baby, and I love the baby and all that stuff. But she just she felt disconnected for a while. Until I heard

Adrienne 52:52
that. Yeah. That alone gives you feelings of guilt. Because you know, you're you're supposed to feel one way about this baby that's here now. And you know, to not have that right off the bat is really hard. Sure. Did she come out of it fairly quickly. Yeah.

Scott Benner 53:05
I mean, it wasn't. It wasn't too too long. And but she also had, you know, I don't know, like, I wonder too. We never were checking her thyroid back then. And I don't know that we even knew what to look for back then. You know, but she then after having Arden lived with, like, untreated hypothyroidism for years, but I don't know if it was, you know, what the situation was prior to that we look back sometimes to a couple of things that happened before. And some of her symptomatic stuff matched my son's before we figured out about his hypothyroidism, which is probably Hashimotos Oh, wow. And you wonder, like, how long was something like that impact? They may? And you know, like, how much effect does that have? If your TSH is two by the way? Did you ever figure out what it was in the paperwork?

Adrienne 53:50
I totally spaced on that until you started talking about this again, I just pulled it up. It's point 665.

Scott Benner 53:54
Your TSH is great. Yeah. So the normal

Adrienne 53:58
range point five, five to 4.78. So it's like right on the low end. And I don't know if I should push for that.

Scott Benner 54:06
I mean, if you don't have a problem with your thyroid that low TSH shouldn't be

Adrienne 54:10
an issue. Well, they said it was visibly enlarged my thyroid Oh,

Scott Benner 54:14
do you maybe have hyperthyroidism? That's

Adrienne 54:17
what I'm thinking this so they had some nodules that they weren't concerned about when they did the last ultrasound or thyroid ultrasound, I guess is what they do. But they didn't feel the need to explore that further. TSH is on the lower side, but the three T four looks great. Oh,

Scott Benner 54:33
yeah, I mean, I would want somebody paying closer attention to it because of just some of the symptoms that come with thyroid problems. I'm gonna yank up hyperthyroid symptoms.

Adrienne 54:45
I'm insanely sensitive to heat, like night sweats, out of control, which really piqued or I guess raised a red flag for me because that's something pretty new. I'd say within the last couple of months that is just really become a problem. So that's why I had asked again for that thyroid panel. This last week when they were doing my UNC and we'll see what she says I have an appointment with her in a couple days. So let's do

Scott Benner 55:09
a hands up yay or nay ready? nervous, anxious or irritable. Yay. All three hyper activity you may find it hard to stay still and have a lot of nervous energy. Occasionally mood swings. Yeah. difficulty sleeping. Yeah. Feeling tired all the time. Absolutely. Sensitivity to heat. Yes. Muscle weakness.

Adrienne 55:34
Not so much. You

Scott Benner 55:35
gotta pay too much. Not really know there's the a lot. Yes, he?

Unknown Speaker 55:41
Yes.

Scott Benner 55:42
Do you make the thin poopy diarrhea?

Adrienne 55:44
Not super often. No.

Scott Benner 55:47
Have you had a loss of well is gonna say a loss of interest in sex. You found out you were pregnant. on a business trip to a guy you're not married to I bet you that got rid of your interest. And we

Adrienne 55:56
had we'd been together for a decent amount of time prior to that. It's not like a one night stand. You

Scott Benner 56:01
probably have a back now on your side of the bed. Keep that thing over there. But do you have a loss of interest in sex? I do not. enlarged thyroid gland. Yes. excessive sweating. Yes. Loose nails.

No, any hives? No. Loss of hair. Yes.

You lost weight.

Adrienne 56:21
I fluctuate. I fluctuate.

Scott Benner 56:24
I mean, I go find a rock solid. Endo to take care of this for me.

Adrienne 56:29
I absolutely trust my current Endo. I just wonder if when she sees the actual lab results? She would think yeah, there's no reason to pursue this. I'm hoping not. I said with Kelly they you just pushed it right until they actually tried the meds for

Scott Benner 56:43
her. Here's what I might say. At the moment. I have a lot of symptoms that people are telling me are bipolar two that also match thyroid issues. Let's not be treated me for something I don't have. So this thing is a lot more controllable than the other thing. Why don't we find out if this is what this is first? Because I mean, can you imagine if you I mean I don't know. Again? Hand to god, I almost didn't make it through high school. But can you imagine? Can you imagine if you're being treated for bipolar two and what you have is a thyroid dysregulation

Adrienne 57:17
that would be absolutely wild and a huge relief, I think. Right?

Scott Benner 57:22
And so like especially because it all came on at once. Right? Right. You know after the baby and a lot of times ladies thyroids go pop snack or crack snack up. What am I trying to say? Crack? What am I trying to say? Pop? Snap, Crack. Crack Snapple pop? Is that it? Holy shit. I might have Bipolar to a lot of times thyroid issues. Yeah, go pop after pregnancies. Right? Yeah, true. I mean, what are the odds that you got bipolar two, and your thyroid exploded? At the same time as you got type one diabetes?

Adrienne 58:03
That's what I'm thinking just a hot mess over here. Wow. I really would love for it to be thyroid.

Scott Benner 58:08
I would love to be right about this. And I mean, a for you and your happiness. Sure. But I mean, B for me, because I would look like a master diagnostician. I wouldn't be a BA. I'd be like Dr. House. Except with a Paul. Absolutely. Yes. Yes. He's British. You know, the actor.

Adrienne 58:27
You have a good accent? No, I

Scott Benner 58:28
can't do it. But he he did an American accent on the TV show. So it doesn't matter. I'm good. Yeah. Yeah.

Adrienne 58:33
I'm impressed with their ability to do that. Sometimes.

Scott Benner 58:36
I hear what you're saying. Sometimes they're okay at it. Wow. I can't remember the rice krispies commercial, but I know the Taco Bell one.

Adrienne 58:46
That's interesting. It's a sign I think you're supposed to eat there.

Scott Benner 58:49
I think I'm supposed to start drinking caffeine. Yeah, my brain firing a little faster. Snap, Crackle pop. Right. Snap crack. That's exactly right. Who can we call the episode Snap, Crackle pop.

Adrienne 59:01
Please do.

Scott Benner 59:02
I don't see why we couldn't because we can't call it so. By the way, a thing you did not say you wanted to do just the thing I said out loud. All right. Let's get that out. Yeah, let's be clear, in case your kid doesn't have listened to this one day. Your mom's a face to face lover. Don't worry about it. That's an appropriate Adrienne.

Unknown Speaker 59:22
You're fine.

Scott Benner 59:25
Oh, no, I figured you were cool a while ago. Don't worry about it. Well, Jesus Christ, what a mess. Alright, I want this fix. And I want it I want a report back in six months. Is that fair? That's

Adrienne 59:38
fair. Yeah, I will let you know about the thyroid. Seriously.

Scott Benner 59:41
I would love to know Like honestly, whether it's the cause of all your issues or not. It needs to be well regulated, so that you can at least eliminate those possibilities because even people with well regulated thyroids seem see ups and downs with the symptoms throughout their life. Sure, you know, it's not a it's not a perfect system? For sure. Yeah, I don't know. I want to know more about this seriously, will you keep in touch for me? Yeah, I would love that. Alright, is there anything we haven't talked about that we should have?

Adrienne 1:00:11
One thing that I did mean to include that I didn't. And this, I think just speaks to the importance of advocating for yourself. So I have seen all across Reddit, all throughout the podcast, the Facebook group, but the general consensus was to not trust an emergency medical setting with your type one care. And so

Scott Benner 1:00:33
Oh, my news is freaking out.

Adrienne 1:00:37
Oh, yeah. No, no, I mean, I had already come to that conclusion. But this was just really eye opening. And it's been great. I love love that whistleblower Colvin? Oh, yes. But they totally lost my train of thought. So my OB, I had asked him, you know, what happens with sugar control when you go in to deliver because they actually induced me a couple of weeks early, which I guess is common with type one, moms delivering babies. And he said, Well, normally, we put you on an insulin and glucose drip while you're there, and it would be in our care, just kind of hit the brakes. And I was like, I really, really would feel more comfortable. If I could do it myself. You know, I'm on this pump. Now. Can I you know, as long as I'm aware, and we're not doing like an emergency C section or something? Can I be the one responsible for my own blood sugar? And he said, Yes. When I got there to deliver, the nursing team was not aware of that. And so I didn't really bring it up at first. And then it was time for me to do a pod change. And they saw me filling my pod. Somebody came in and they're like, what's that? Yeah. So it explained to her and then she was all over me about my sugars. And I remember my mom had actually brought a Starbucks breakfast sandwich one morning, it's like, the second day I was there. And I had eaten that. And the nurse had said, Well, if your sugar goes above, you know, like, this one 110 or 120. I think it was 120. She said, I have to tell Dr. Swanson. And all right. So every time she would come in to ask me, I had been watching and my sugar was slowly creeping up. And I was at like, 136. And she came in and she asked me what the sugar was. And so we just like, This is terrible. But we lied to her. But I didn't want to give up control of my sugar. And I was like, Oh, we'll get it back down. And it was fine with sugars were great. I never went over 150 Anytime I was in the hospital, despite the the food that they bring, and they'd be arrived, no complications. He was a little over six pounds, his sugar was great. Couldn't have asked for a better delivery. But

Scott Benner 1:02:29
congratulations. I'm glad. I'm glad he was good. And I don't mind you lying about that. I think that's fine. I want to say this, though, with deference to my wife, who's lovely and nice of her to let me talk about her on hair, stuff like that. Before my wife's thyroid issue was diagnosed, and she was being medicated. I thought she was out of her mind sometimes. Like I was making plans on how to murder if I'm being on, like, not legally, like, I wasn't really like hyperbolically. I mean, I would literally think like, how am I going to like, explain to my kids that this is the lady I picked to make babies with, like, like, it was like that kind of like, ooh, like all over the place. And then she got the Synthroid. And like, in a week or two, it was just like all gone. I was like, Oh, wow, that's better. So and it was for years. Like I really thought she was like, cuckoo for Cocoa Puffs. There's a lot of cereal references in this one today. I don't know why exactly. But you sound like you eat the food. So you're down with what I'm saying? I do I do. Lady rolling into the hospital, the Starbucks sandwich or something else wrong?

Adrienne 1:03:35
Yeah. When I was there at diagnosis I had, I was actually sneaking food. Clearly, I had no idea what I what I was in for here or what I was dealing with. But yeah, it wasn't anything terrible. I had like a grocery bag that had some apples in it and some nuts. And like, you know, they had already dosed me for dinner and they left me for the night and I'm just sitting there snack and listening to the podcast, like totally uncovered fruit carbs. Yeah, things have changed. But

Scott Benner 1:04:02
I also know a woman local to me, who I definitely know wouldn't want me telling her her name. But like I've said this before, like she was known throughout this town as being like, I don't want to say the word but you know, the really bad one the word? Yeah, you know what I'm talking about. It's got four letters, and we don't use it very often. She for you know, years like to everybody was just the nastiest person and then smiling and then not like it was really strange. And then one day, she did an apology tour around the town and came and found everybody and said, Hey, I'm sorry, it turns out I had like undiagnosed Hashimotos. And, you know, I'm, I'm doing well now and I can only imagine how I must have been and I apologize, like literally. So that's amazing. I'm just saying. I mean, I know you were depressed when you were a teenager, but I mean, I go find five girls that weren't and you know, a lot of different conversation. I don't know. I'm super excited for you to find out.

Adrienne 1:04:57
I cannot wait to get into the Endo. That makes me also

Scott Benner 1:05:02
agent. Can I say something? I have no business saying? Sure. And I mean, this was love because I've interviewed a number of people with bipolar. And I really do. I've enjoyed every one of the conversations. I count some of them as friends. Like the whole thing. You don't have the vibe. Well, sorry. I know that's not technical, but there's a vibe and you don't have it. Interesting. Okay. So find out.

Adrienne 1:05:28
Yeah, me too. Me too.

Scott Benner 1:05:29
You feel why I cut you off.

Adrienne 1:05:31
You feel? No, I feel like I'm off my rocker a lot of the time. You know, just and I don't know if that's just because I'm hyper aware of how I'm probably coming off to the people around me now that I have this, you know, possible diagnosis in my brain? Yeah, I don't know. But I would be,

Scott Benner 1:05:49
by the way, if you have Bipolar to whatever, like I'm not saying like, try to avoid it if it's true. But no, I'm saying like, read out the other more obvious easier to figure out items before you jump to you know, that. Absolutely. That's all. Alright, I'm gonna let you go. You were terrific. I feel bad about what I said Mommy makes is a face to face lover that seemed over the line. And I'm definitely going to get a review. Listen, let me just say it right now. If you want to leave a review that said that was creepy or agent didn't deserve that or whatever, blah, blah, blah. It's fine. Just make sure you sign the review woke girl. Okay, we that's all just please. You know, you can't screw around anymore. Like, by the way, I'm fighting back. And I think a lot of other people are too. I don't know if you notice this in culture right now. But I think the pendulum swinging the other way. I think we're gonna get back to Saturday. What do you think of that? I'm hoping so. Yeah. Oh, it's coming. I can feel it. The wind is blowing in the right direction. Now, I think everybody's tired of pretending they're not thinking everything they're thinking. Anyway, that's a completely different story. And hold on one second. And I will say goodbye to you actually. Here's the thing I usually do when you're not being recorded. But for you. I'll do it when you're being recorded. Watch this. Adrian, thanks so much for doing this. I really appreciate it. Did I say anything that made you uncomfortable? Or is there anything you'd like to have come out of the episode? No,

Adrienne 1:07:15
I Well, I mean, maybe the comments.

Scott Benner 1:07:21
Were bleeping that all out. Don't worry. Aside from that. Yeah, yeah. No, I you understand I went for the most bombastic mood swing thing I could think of. Absolutely. Not that I think you're like, Wayne or something like that. You understand what's happening right now?

Unknown Speaker 1:07:35
I do.

Scott Benner 1:07:37
It's, what is it a week after we recorded

Adrienne 1:07:39
now? About a week and a half? I think Yeah. Okay.

Scott Benner 1:07:43
So I don't want to stifle you. So I'm going to say what I want to say at the end. That makes that a fair. But you contacted me a few days afterwards and tell people what you told me? Yeah.

Adrienne 1:07:54
So of course, as soon as we hung up, I was kind of going through everything that we had talked about. And in my I don't know if it was nerves for the podcast itself. We're not really sure what but just thought of a bunch of things that I had meant to say, points that were pretty important to my story, and at least my experience with the mental health side of things that we had discussed, and just wanted to make sure that I left the full story on the table and wasn't leaving anything out. So

Scott Benner 1:08:19
I asked you a question you felt like you didn't answer fully. Is that right? That's

Adrienne 1:08:23
right. Yeah, you had asked what a typical mood swing looks like. And I think that my go to example, on the spot was something about the dog tripping me as I went down the stairs, you know, kind of setting me off and making me angry. But that just seemed like such a superficial example, I suppose kind of a knee jerk answer to your question. And it's a lot deeper than that. So just kind of wanted to clarify and tell me about it. Yeah, so I guess what I should have left in there was that I am a pretty high strung person on a day to day basis. There's just kind of like a persistent tightly wound feeling in my chest. And it's not unhappiness in any way. It's just anxiety, just kind of jittery, that type of thing. And so without any sort of aid, that's my baseline. For me, it's kind of up or down from there. And the reason I decided to kind of reach out for help in the first place was a newly developed issue with anger and sudden outbursts that I was having. So I could swing from my normal state to an absolute rage over something that seemed insignificant, kind of what I had touched on before something small could totally started off. So it could be a basic miscommunication with my partner or a stubborn high blood sugar that I you know, hadn't been able to tackle, getting cut off on the highway, you know, being overstimulated from a sensory point of view. Sometimes it's just looking around at things that I can't get to because you know, I'm fighting a toddler and trying to work full time during the day. You know, things that normally I would have handled with ease. Suddenly, were becoming these five alarm fires that would physically affect me in the moment and then later spiral me into these unhealthy III thought patterns. So my vision would start to wave or go dark, when it would get angry, and my heart would race, you know, start sweating all these things, and it's momentary, but it was totally overtaking me, which was scary to look at those moments and realize that you're kind of out of control. And then it could go a couple of ways. You know, sometimes minutes later, it's, it's gone, and you just needed a minute to, you know, kind of freak out and bam, your day is back to normal, then you, you know, feel remorse for that anger or lack of control, it's scary to think of yourself that way. It's embarrassing the way that you act, and you get further from your family, your partner, you start to feel like a burden. And, of course, you figure out how to course correct and move on from there, but then you're, you know, kind of full of this self loathing for being difficult. And you just get down on yourself and wonder how long it'll be before the people around you. You know, just kind of get fed up with it, you get tired of yourself after a while. So, you know, it's hard when frustration over something small becomes, you know, something that snowballs into, you know, I can't believe I've been this way, and I'm not cut out to be a parent, my son's gonna hate me for acting like this, you know, just it turns into this, this big ordeal in your brain that that really just kicks you while you're down. And on the flip side of that, sometimes you can just stay elevated. And I think one of the main differences between bipolar one and two they say is that we don't reach that full blown euphoric mania. So when we're in an elevated state, you know, it's it's irritation or restlessness, I think an another element of that, that I kind of saw from my past when this diagnosis was first kind of brought to my attention was that in that hypomanic state, you can have this sense of self grandiosity. And so I was laughing, looking back thinking about all the times that I had this great idea, like, Hey, I'm gonna pick up this new hobby, or I'm gonna get graded this, this is the time that I'm going to make it in music, you know, the band is really going to take off this year, that type of thing. And I have spent loads of money on materials for new hobbies that I never gave a second look to. So there's like, unopened boxes of soap making supplies and stuff in my garage from like, four years ago. Because you just get on these winds of productivity, and you know, thinking that you're going to do something great. And then it just kind of falls to the wayside. Yeah, a lot of times that elevated state for me is, you know, a mode of rage cleaning of something has irritated me, I will just jump into binge cleaning mode. So those periods are probably my most productive, but also probably the most unpleasant for my family, I would think.

Scott Benner 1:12:30
What made you want to clear me because you gave an answer, right? Like, nobody would have listened to your episode and been like, Oh, she skirted the question, like so it was important to you, actually, when I got your email, and I don't want to be flippant about this, but I got your email. And I remembered at some point during the podcast going like, Well, I wonder if your thyroid thing is impacting your behavior? Maybe you don't have Bipolar, but when I got your email, I actually thought I know she has bipolar. Okay. Because Because every not every, but an overwhelming amount of people who I've interviewed who are bipolar. Follow up with an email telling me about the things they didn't say that they should have said, Oh, geez, it's very common for me. Like so. But is there a difference? Is there like, that kind of like manic like, oh, there's so many things. I didn't say I should have said things like blah, blah? Or did you just think I was trying to be honest. And I didn't give an honest answer. Like that was the part I couldn't tell about you. So I'm not sold that this is what's happening yet. That's why I wanted you to speak first, actually, because I kind of wanted to see what road you went down. No,

Adrienne 1:13:39
that makes sense. And I appreciate that. Because like I said, in the first time that I recorded with you, I am not even 100% Certain on the diagnosis. This is kind of new to me still learning about it. And you know, seeing what makes sense and what doesn't. When I first hung up with you, it was not so much a matter of not being honest about the story. It just was like all these things that had escaped my mind. And I had worked myself up so much for this, this chance to talk to you and to hopefully give back on a platform that has helped me so much it was like why and I don't want to leave holes in my story or maybe offend you know, other people who are in this, you know, mental health community by giving such a superficial or

Scott Benner 1:14:21
so you didn't have like a mad like, a mad dash feeling that you had to correct something. Well,

Adrienne 1:14:28
I did. And I don't know. Yeah, I mean, I wrote to you, I think I think it was just within a day or so. And it was

Scott Benner 1:14:35
quick. Yeah, it was quite surprised me when it came. I was like, Oh, here it is.

Adrienne 1:14:42
The most high maintenance person you've reported. Oh, no,

Scott Benner 1:14:44
no, I want to say no, not even close. I did an after dark episode once with a lovely woman like really lovely. And at the end of it, I made the mistake of saying like, well, if you want to hear it first, I'll let you listen. into it. Oh no. And months later, she and I were involved in an editing process that was I just thought, Oh, God, this is never gonna stop. And I didn't want to let her down, you know, but she'd get manic. And then she'd want a bunch of things fixed, and then show. And it's interesting, because everybody feels that way. There's not one person that doesn't record this podcast, and later in the day think, oh, you know what I should have said, but most people just go, No. And then that, then that's the end of it. Right? Right. But I also know the feet like I understand the feeling, because I'm a talker. And there's Listen, people who don't laugh at me, if in your car, I could turn this microphone on and talk for a full day. I just could, I know I could, I would get interested in what I was talking about, and dig through ideas. And, like, I know I could, but I also have the knowledge that I can do it again tomorrow. So if I'm in the middle of a conversation, and I don't bring something up, I think, oh, that's no big deal. The next time it comes up, I'll say it then. Because I have that opportunity. But you don't. This was your one shot to get your story out. So I feel that too. Definitely.

Adrienne 1:16:11
And I think well, first off, I don't think any of us would laugh or complain. If you were to turn on the mic and just talk for a day. It would be a treat

Scott Benner 1:16:18
my family like that. But I appreciate you. Thanks. Thank you.

Adrienne 1:16:22
Yeah, it just, it was more, I think, I guess more of not wanting to minimize this condition nicely, I guess, or offend the mental health community by you know, equating it to being annoyed with my dog for you know, tripping me on the stairs or something like that. I just really, that wasn't sitting well with me and I had left out, you know, the kind of the biggest part of this whole thing. You know, what made me seek the help to begin with was the sudden anger issues. I was having an Yeah, I'm not sure how I just totally skipped over that. I think, like I had indicated in my email. I just wasn't planning to spend as much time on the mental health portion of it just because the diagnosis was so new to me. Yeah, and uncertain, but I really appreciate you letting me know,

Scott Benner 1:17:05
I'm clarifying. I'm super happy to the one like my one, like reservation was like, oh, everybody's gonna send me an email. But like, I forgot to say something to and I'd be like, Alright, that's enough. Stop. So but, but um, I know I was happy to I mean, your emails like very well thought out and cogent I read it. And I was like, Okay, I see what she wants to do here. Like, that's, that's cool. We should definitely do it. The anger thing. And I have a couple of questions about it, if you don't mind. Okay, so anger, like, I understand, like zero to 100, for no reason. But then do you hang on to it later? Or does it dissipate?

Adrienne 1:17:39
I'm sorry, for my my Dexcom alarm here,

Unknown Speaker 1:17:41
don't be sorry. It depends, I

Adrienne 1:17:43
think on on what set me off to begin with, you know, I can think of a couple instances, just within the last probably five or six months or so. It's mostly in conversation with the partner, you know, you have a discussion about maybe something from the past that's come up that's a little bit heated. And you know, what, there? There's the specific example, what he was saying to me was not at all what I remembered him saying before, and I'm saying no, that's that's not what you told me, it's not what you told me. And eventually, it's like, something just snaps. And that's when all these, you know, visual disturbances started happening. And I can just feel this wave of angry coming over me. And that last, that last a while, you know, once that initial wave kind of passes, the residual feelings of just frustration, bitterness, stick around, until they're replaced with that, you know, kind of kicking yourself for a man, I was a real jerk. And you know what most of these people think. And I remember once took me probably three or four months before I even shared this diagnosis with my partner, it was kind of a harder one for me to swallow, just because I wasn't sure about it. But I remember after I had shared with him, conversation didn't really go very far. He didn't ask any questions was kind of like me throwing the information out there. And that's as far as it went. But a couple of weeks later, we were in, you know, sort of a disagreement. And he just said, I don't understand how you can flip from totally fine to fly it off the handle with no prompt, basically, how does this happen to you? And that was, that was tough to hear that was?

Scott Benner 1:19:17
Was this not Your? Your mo prior to recently? No,

Adrienne 1:19:23
not really. And that's kind of what made me question this diagnosis to begin with was because there's just so many big events that have happened in my life with the pregnancy with the diabetes diagnosis, you know, I just lost my dad. Three years ago, I was actually diagnosed the day before his birthday. But there was just a lot of large things happening in my life kind of that at one time, and I thought, Well, maybe it's just the stress of all that, you know, that's changing how I'm handling things. But it was not a point in my life where I wanted to see those changes in me, you know, it's more important now than ever to, to not be the person that To fly off the handle, you've got a young baby in the house. And that's just no way to be. But yeah, this is this is new to me.

Scott Benner 1:20:06
I'm gonna say something that feels like it's out of left field. And it might it might be, but I've been paying attention to this and picking through it for a few months now. Have you ever heard of the MTHFR mutation? I have not. So I think it's colloquially called the motherfucker gene. I think probably just because of the the acronym. Symptoms vary from person to person. And from variant a variant. If you do a quick internet search, you'll likely find many websites claiming the MTHFR directly causes a number of conditions keep in mind the research around it, and its effects is evolving. evidence linking most of these health conditions to the gene or currently lacking has been disproven. So it's one of those things that like, it might just be a bro science thing. Okay? Like, you know, I really don't know. But they say that something like 60% of us can't have like, have this problem where we can't I don't know if I'm gonna say this correctly. Even we can't methylate fully we can't methyl I forget exactly how the wording is, but that, you know, not being able to absorb this absorbed folate leads to cardiovascular problems, depression, anxiety, bipolar, schizophrenia, colon cancer, leukemia, chronic pain, fatigue, nerve pain, migraines, reoccurring miscarriages, and women of childbearing age pregnancies with neural tube defects like spinal, spinal bifida. And so the way it's treated is you just take a methylated vitamin that your body can pick up this folate, right? I am just like, I don't know, I'm so enamored by the idea of it. And I'm, I'm trying to pick through it a little bit because it can have other impacts to like digestion issues, and other stuff like that. And so many of these so many autoimmune issues. They have such similar, you know, symptoms, right. And I know that I could be 1,000,000% off like Adriana, seriously, I don't know what I'm talking about, okay. All I am is a person who has like 1000, you know, have conversations with people, I've probably, I mean, if I've recorded 1100 podcasts, and each of them are about an hour long. I've talked to people for a really long time and pick through their lives. And so many people talk about depression, anxiety, bipolar, on a type one podcast, I get it comes up a lot chronic pain, fatigue, people talk about migraines, like all this stuff. And I'm like, I wonder if like, Jesus, is it just something like this? Simple, you know. And so anyway, I bought a bunch of vitamins, and I'm spreading them out amongst a few people who I think might fit the bill a little bit. And we're just going to kind of see now you can actually get tested for it. It's like, yeah, you can get, like there's places online, you can get the test for like $89. And, you know, you could also have your doctor look at, I'm gonna use the wrong word. I'm gonna look closely. So I can say because you can ask your primary care physician to order the MTHFR blood tests for you. Although most insurance companies don't cover it, that type of gene test, it may leave you with a bill. There are places online that offer them. But there's this one thing you can test for homeo. Gotta watch this, I should have been ready to talk about this. Although I didn't know it was gonna come up actually. Just 23 me to help me if you have it. Oh, if you already have purchased 23andme test kit, you can log in to see your mth fr status by downloading your raw genetic data. Now, that's the thing where I heard 23andme stopped giving people access to their raw genetic data. Really? So I'm not sure if that's still I don't know if I have an account on this. I

Unknown Speaker 1:23:51
mean, yeah.

Scott Benner 1:23:57
As an added security measure, we're requiring that all customers choose a new password unique to 23 me reset your password I get well, this is fun to do on a podcast. Hold on. See if I can get through this pretty quickly. Send reset email. We've sent your email. Not air. Reset was pretty quick.

Adrienne 1:24:20
I was pretty sure you've been asked this but do you ever consider voice acting? Oh, did you?

Scott Benner 1:24:25
Adriana listened to me. Did you hear the dewdrop diaries episode? I don't think so. Okay, so gentleman comes on. Right? And his. He's the producer of a Netflix like animated series. And he was really great. I enjoyed talking to him. Actually. It's very interesting. His daughter is named Arden and she has type one diabetes. Oh my gosh, it's very there's a lot of similar like weird similarities, right? So we had to put in my username. And I said something I don't know if somebody online said don't like you should let Scott to a voice On the show, and he goes, Well, if we get a second season we will. Then he got a second season. I did not hear back.

Adrienne 1:25:08
Okay, he was paying down that door. I

Scott Benner 1:25:10
don't know what I would do with all that. Money. Yeah, but it does sound fun. I have to admit.

Adrienne 1:25:17
Yeah, I don't think so. Yes, totally let loose. Alright,

Scott Benner 1:25:21
so the problem when I use this password, other options, choose my own password. I don't mind when Apple like suggests like a 97 digit password, but sometimes it doesn't save it in the end, then I don't know what the hell it is afterwards. Wait, my new password is not long enough. All right, we're not doing this now.

Adrienne 1:25:47
Sorry to derail you.

Scott Benner 1:25:50
By mutation though. Yeah, me too. So I just wish that sorry. To 3d. Try to make up the password real quick. I've made up a password and song. I didn't know how to do it anymore. The machine does it for you now. When I grew up, not so uphill

Adrienne 1:26:11
both ways in the snow.

Scott Benner 1:26:12
Oh my God, for sure. Now they alright, I changed the password. Now. Enter your verification code. Oh, Christ. Jesus, remember, and please remember me I don't want to do this again. Once I get in there, and I don't have an account or something. Oh, I do have an account. Okay, now, how do I get to raw genetic data?

Hold on a second.

I gotta Google that right? For all genetic data can I get raw data from 23 you can access your alternate data is coming through me account using the bras bras browse raw data feature you can view brought over the hell is that? How come I don't just see that. But a tease this was almost I feel like I have to come through Family Tree View All DNA relatives, surveys and studies edit answers, publications, research over your health trades. My health and action plan. What the hell? What are your DNA book DNA relatives? I did this because I'm adopted. And I thought like one day like, obviously, somebody's gonna pop up that I'm like, Oh my God, look, I'm talking. It never happens. Like I'm, you know, the closest it's gotten is a second cousin.

Adrienne 1:27:25
If any family is something my my partner has actually adopted. Also, he did ancestry.com and was able to find some grandparents, uncle and his mom, but not reached out to anyone yet.

Scott Benner 1:27:38
I actually found a second cousin who was Facebook friends with a friend of mines daughter.

Adrienne 1:27:43
Oh, my gosh, you're kidding. Is that just because of regional locale idea.

Scott Benner 1:27:46
I reached out and I was like, Would you mind like bridging a gap here? And she's like, I'm not comfortable with that. I was like, Okay, wow. So yeah, that's okay. How in the hell view my profile? Yeah, that's my socks, traits, wellness. View All wellness reports. Can you search that? You can search it pause. I'm going to type in the MTHFR. In search your role genotype data? Oh, look at that. That was pretty easy. Search button kids, it works. Browse your genome data is raw, uninterrupted format, your A's or T's or G's or C's, you can search for specific genes, markers positions of interest. While there's a lot there's a ton of this MTHFR. How am I supposed to know what any of this means? This is an advanced view. Yeah, no. Marker, assembly position variants, your genotype. I'm clicking. Welcome to the reference report. I feel like I'm on that ride in the original Jurassic Park all the time. When stuff like this happens, then they're like, Hey, have you You remember when the little Anyway, the thing was talking to them? Very details. There's a lot of data here that I don't. And I'm not going to understand splice donor region variants.

Adrienne 1:29:20
On 23andme is blog they say that? The short answer is no they do not test for mutations in the Mt. FHR. Gene says that they include more than a dozen variants on their reports, but they don't have a report that specifically test for mutations. Whatever that means. Oh, the

Scott Benner 1:29:38
internet's let us down again. Sorry for the No, don't be sorry. It's not your fault. Whose cheese? Yeah, well, maybe we'll take this part out. Who knows? But I'm gonna find out more about it. Like I think I'm going to get the testing done like so because I was talking to a person the other day and we were like Googling around a little bit. And the next thing you know, we were talking about Ehlers Danlos And there seems to be a connection there, perhaps. And I was like, Oh, this is interesting. So I have a bunch of like, I have a bunch of information saved. And I have a note to myself to do an episode about it. So I'm gonna try and see what happens. But right it it just it's one of those things like, listen, is that the answer? Probably not. But the idea that you're in $89 test on the internet away from finding out that you can't process, you know, folate properly, and you just need a vitamin. You know what I mean? Like, that's, that

Adrienne 1:30:30
could be the missing piece. For some people.

Scott Benner 1:30:32
I hate that idea. Like that. I know, it's not going to be for most people, but like, I hate to do this for somebody. And we're just all sitting around and not doing anything about it. I hope that makes sense or not. No, that makes total sense. It's the way I feel when people don't take their thyroid medication correctly, or they don't use enough insulin. I'm like, Oh my God, there's just this tiny little thing to do. And you'd be so much better off. And you don't know about it. But I do. Like, I wish there was a way to get to those people all the time. Anyway, I'm going to figure this out. And then I'm going to talk about on the podcast at some point, but excited to hear what you learn. One, we'll see what happens unless maybe you're gonna you know, who knows you yell at somebody and they're gonna like, you end up in jail. Don't yell at anybody too loud. Okay. Try. You're the most conscientious person about their mental health that I've ever spoken to so far.

Adrienne 1:31:16
Yeah, well, thanks. I feel like you have no choice but to be now because you're just I think we talked about this last time we spoke but just afraid to step on any toes. You never know who you might offend. There's

Scott Benner 1:31:28
something about the way you approach this. And the diagnosis that don't go together for me, and I can't and that's very colloquial, I obviously don't know what the hell I'm talking about. But it just feels it feels weird to me somehow, if that makes sense

Adrienne 1:31:42
or not. It makes sense. Because I feel the same way. And I like I said, don't ever want to write this off. Or yeah, of course, belittle it in any way. It is. It's a it's an important thing. And I know a lot of people really

Scott Benner 1:31:54
struggle, of course, yeah, no, no, I agree. I'm just talking about between you and what I know of you so far. Anyway, if I figure something else about this, I'll let you know. Please

Adrienne 1:32:04
do. And then just to kind of close the loop, I I had an appointment with my endo a couple days after I last spoke with you. And I had told you I was going to run the thyroid stuff by her. And we had done some lab work prior to that appointment. And what she saw she wasn't really concerned with she said she would keep monitoring, but right now she didn't think thyroid would be behind any of this. So

Scott Benner 1:32:25
what was your TSH in the testing?

Adrienne 1:32:27
I think it was like point 661 Or something like that

Scott Benner 1:32:31
seems very good. So yeah, I'm sorry. It would have been nice if it was an easy answer. Yeah,

Adrienne 1:32:37
let's see. Yeah, keep keep working. But like I said, I really appreciate you taking the time to let me come back on and clarify and it's

Scott Benner 1:32:45
my pleasure. I'm glad you took the time. Thank you very much. That's awesome. It takes care of Scott to hold on one second.

If you're ready to try America's most loved food delivery service, just check out hungry route.com slashed juice box plans start as low as $69 per week. You can skip a week or cancel at any time hungry route.com/juice box. The conversation you just heard was sponsored by touched by type one. Check them out, please at touched by type one.org on Instagram and Facebook. You're gonna love them. I love them. They're helping so many people at touched by type one.org Jalen is an incredible example of what so many experienced living with diabetes, you show up for yourself and others every day, never letting diabetes define you. And that is what the Medtronic champion community is all about. Each of us is strong and together, we're even stronger. To hear more stories from the Medtronic champion community or to share your own story. Visit Medtronic diabetes.com/juice box and look out online for the hashtag Medtronic champion. Okay, well, here we are at the end of the episode. You're still with me? Thank you. I really do appreciate that. What else could you do for me? Why don't you tell a friend about the show or leave a five star review? Maybe you could make sure you're following or subscribing your podcast app. Go to YouTube and follow me or Instagram Tik Tok? Oh, gosh, here's one. Make sure you're following the podcast in the private Facebook group as well as the public Facebook page. You don't want to miss please do not know about the private group. You have to join the private group. As of this recording, it has 51,000 members in it. They're active, talking about diabetes, whatever you need to know. There's a conversation happening in there right now. And I'm there all the time. Tag me. I'll say hi. Hey, what's up everybody? If you've noticed that the podcast sounds better, and you're thinking like how does that happen? What you're hearing is Rob at wrong way recording doing his magic to these files. So if you want him to do his magic to you, wrong way recording.com You got a podcast you want somebody to edit it you want Rob

---

Please support the sponsors

The Juicebox Podcast is a free show, but if you'd like to support the podcast directly, you can make a gift here. Recent donations were used to pay for podcast hosting fees. Thank you to all who have sent 5, 10 and 20 dollars!

Donate

#1264 Weekly News 7/22/24

For the week of July 22, 2024

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 12 164 of the Juicebox Podcast.

So quick in and out, this is the News for the week of July 22 2024. I picked out a few stories that I found interesting, not the least of which is Lance Bass from in sync as diabetes all of a sudden, 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. If you have type one diabetes are the caregiver of someone with type one and you're a US resident, please, when you're done with this episode, it's going to be 10 minutes this episode and then take 10 more minutes to complete the survey AT T one D exchange.org/juice. Box support yourself. support other people with type one diabetes, support me support Lance Bass, he won the exchange.org/juice box just complete the survey. It's all you need to do and you're and you've helped. That's it, it's going to be helpful. Don't forget, if you use my link drink ag one.com/juice box you'll get a free year supply of vitamin D and five free travel packs with your first order. And if you go to cozy earth.com and use the offer code juice box at checkout, you're gonna save 30% off of your entire order. Listen, just wait till August the percentage is going to go back to 40 and cozy Earth. Don't tell them I told you this is the diabetes news I found interesting for the week of July 22 2024 Welcome back everybody. Not a long one today but an interesting one. This first part is from science.org in an article titled The benefits of GLP one drugs beyond obesity glucagon, like peptide one based medicines have weight loss independent actions. Here's the breakdown of that GLP one function of course, glucagon like peptide GLP. One is secreted from gut endocrine cells in response to food ingestion and enhances glucose dependent insulin secretion. GLP one receptor activation reduces glucagon secretion slows gastric emptying and helps in weight management. This is things by now a lot of you know early GLP one therapies like eggs net tide and liar Gula tide sorry, required daily administration where the whereas these new versions, like semaglutide, for example, allow for weekly doses. Now there's cardiovascular benefits. These agonists have shown significant cardiovascular benefits such as reducing the risk of non fatal stroke, myocardial infarctions and cardiovascular deaths in people with type two diabetes and obesity. Okay, so maybe it's because they lost weight but maybe it's maybe it's something else. It also shows heart protection GLP one therapies protect the heart independently of glucose control or weight loss AHA demonstrated in both diabetic and non diabetic animals inflammation reduction GLP one drugs help reduce systematic inflammation, which may contribute to their cardiovascular benefits. This anti inflammatory effect is partially mediated through new GS neuronal GLP one our activation I have no idea that is around your liver and kidney health GLP one R is involved in approving liver and kidney function, though the exact mechanism particularly in the liver health are still being studied. What about neuro protections GLP one drugs have shown potential in reducing neuro inflammed inflammation and protecting against neurodegeneration in conditions like stroke and nurture, and neuro degenerative diseases. Trials indicate that GLP one therapies may have benefits in reducing rates of cognitive dysfunction, substance use disorder and possibly even psychiatric conditions like depression and compulsive behaviors. And if you heard the episode, I think two weeks ago, there's a mom on there telling the story of how it was very helpful with her child's bipolar disorder. They say here the next generation therapies, new GLP one based therapies are being developed, often combined with other receptor agonists like G IPR and glucagon receptor, excuse me glucagon receptor to enhance efficacy and provide greater weight loss and cardio metabolic benefits. Expanded uses you may see in the future ongoing research aims to extend the use of GLP one therapies beyond diabetes and obesity to other chronic conditions, including liver kidney disease and various neurological and psychiatric disorders. I think gives you a little conclusion here it says GLP one drugs have evolved from primarily treating diabetes to offering broad health benefits including significant cardiovascular renal neurological protection, future research and development are poised to expand their therapeutic application further remember years from now when this stuff is helping with so many things, you heard it from me first little story here from Helio news overview to come the fast okay the FDA Fast Tracks designation for diamonds immunotherapy. The FDA has granted Fast Track designation to the drug are H G ad six five slash alum, this is from diametre the I A mid an antigen specific immunotherapy developed by the diamond diamond medical. This designation aims to expedite the development and review of the drug trip targeting excuse me, children with stage one or stage two type one diabetes who carry the HLA Dr three DQ two genotype, Say that five times fast. Oh, the purpose here is designed to preserve endogenous insulin production. It works by delivering recombinant gad 65 proteins interal, emphatically How'd I get that right, which helps the immune system tolerate the body's insulin production producing beta cells rather than attacking them. Die made is currently being evaluated in the diagnose a three phase three trial, which is randomized placebo controlled study involving approximately 330 patients ages 12 to 20 years old who were recently diagnosed with type one diabetes and carry the HLA Dr three DQ two genotype. Wow, the trial was just a lot. The trial aims to measure changes in blood glucose levels and the function of beta cells over 24 months. So the significance of this fast tracking here says this is the second Fast Track designation for Diamond this year emphasizing its potential to delay the onset of clinically diagnosed type one. Previous designations for for treating individuals with stage three type one diabetes, innovation. some talking points here represents a novel approach by targeting specific genetic profiles to prevent or delay the progression of type one diabetes, it is pretty specific, ongoing phase three trial, and preventative studies highlight the significant strides being made in developing effective treatments for type one diabetes. Of course, this is a human study, not a mousy thing, which is nice to hear. Let's ask our friends here at Chad GPT a question. Just going to ask if this trial is still open to participants. So let's see what I can figure out very quickly for you in case you're interested. It's doing it's looking scouring. Oh yes, the diamond trials currently open to participants. Here are the details. The participants will receive three intro intro lymphatic injections of diamond or a placebo given one month a part of the primary efficacy endpoints are the preservation of endogenous insulin production and improve blood glucose control. Looks like you can go to the website dy mid D ay ay myd.com. The phase two open label trial evaluates the safety of feasibility and the participants the trial aims to enroll 10 to 16 children ha day team study will involve two to three injections. Yeah, you guys should check it out. If you're interesting. Both trials are actively recruiting and you can find out more information expressed interest in participating by visiting the respective trial websites or content or contacting diamond medically. Diamond medical directly. Can I get a URL? I would it tell me I could contact the URL but then not tell me the URL. It Chachi so silly diag and OD dash three.com. That's the diagnosed three phase three trial. And general information about dynamic clinical trials di m id.com. Forward slash Doc's TOC s forge slash clinical trials dot ASP x looks like it's going to bring up a forum for you. If you're interested, check it out. Or you can just Google it di m ID trials dia M yd. And here's some breaking news. Oh, this is really news. But you know, Lance Bass from the band in sync. Turns out he's got Lada and he's talking about it. So very new information. By the way BP BP BP is breaking news. Okay, let's see. Lance Bass discusses this trick image management imposed by his management team since it's time within sync. He was forced to hide his sexuality or Okay, well that's got nothing to do with diabetes. So it's like wait, where's the part about the diabetes?

During the COVID 19 pandemic back bass was diagnosed with diabetes. He is now learning to manage his condition focusing on his diet exercise and insulin regime. This diagnosis has made him more conscious of his health and lifestyle choice last pass you want to be on the diabetes podcast baby baths enjoy spending time with his husband and their twins. Man How is it possible you could give me an article about Lance Bass tell me more about the diabetes oh my what a common story it happened to our own Lance Bass he was misdiagnosed as a type two says he's still coming to terms with his latest diagnosis. Bass already feels more empowered living with type 1.5 which is also returned referred to as latent autoimmune diabetes we know what a lot is you don't have to tell us quote I'm type one and a half which I had no idea was a thing until a few weeks ago you and everybody else maybe but you know I'm interested in fascinating to me finding the whole new level diabetes had no clue about it's not unusual at somebody with type one and a half which usually occurs later in life is initially misdiagnosis. Type two says the Mayo Clinic you could have asked me that I could have told you the same thing. Differences that one and a half is a result of an autoimmune disease here we know all this. What? I didn't realize that it was one and a half. He says I was out there doing a bunch of stuff that wasn't helping him. Okay. Well, you guys jump up on the social medias and ping Lance Bass tell him we want him to come on the podcast tell a story so we can figure out they're interesting. Lance Bass got type one and a half. I'd love to ask him about his life. That'd be fun. Alright, kids, listen. I'm gonna jump. Okay, I hope you found these interesting. I hope you're enjoying the news segments. 10 minutes, I feel like is a nice little bit. That's all I got for you today. Hey, this isn't really an ad but screen for type one is the sponsor. And after one of those stories in there, I thought maybe you guys would want to know about it screened for type one.com You should check it out. If you want to find out how to get your loved ones and even extended extended memories, sorry, extended members of your family that I blend together member and family and come up with memories. That's crazy. screen for type one.com There's a link in the show notes. I was looking for a way that we could all get nice and tan and meet each other and spend some time talking about diabetes. How are we going to do that on a juice cruise? Juice cruise 2025 departs Galveston, Texas on Monday, June 23 2025. It's a five night trip through the Western Caribbean visiting of course Galveston, Costa Maya and Cozumel. I'm going to be there. Eric is going to be there. And we're working on some other special guests. Now, why do we need to be there? Because during the days at sea, we're going to be holding conferences. You can get involved in these talks around type one diabetes, and they're going to be Q and A's. Plenty of time for everyone to get to talk, ask their questions and get their questions answered. So if you're looking for a nice adult or family vacation, you want to meet your favorite podcast host but you can't figure out where Jason Bateman lives. So you'll settle for me. If you want to talk about diabetes, or you know what, maybe you want to meet some people living with type one, or just get a tan with a bunch of cool people. You can do that on juice cruise 2025 spaces limited. Head now to juicebox podcast.com and click on that banner. You can find out all about the different cabins that are available to you. and register today. links in the show notes links at juicebox podcast.com. I hope to see you on board. I know that Facebook has a bad reputation. But please give the private Facebook group for the Juicebox Podcast. A healthy once over Juicebox Podcast type one diabetes. The group now has 47,000 members in it, it gets 150 new members a day. It is completely free. And at the very least you can watch other people talk about diabetes, and everybody is welcome type one type two gestational loved ones, everyone is welcome. Go up into the feature tab of the private Facebook group. And there you'll see lists upon lists of all of the management series that are available to you for free in the Juicebox Podcast, becoming a member of that group. I really think it will help you it will at least give you a community. You'll be able to kind of lurk around see what people are talking about. Pick up some tips and tricks. Maybe you can ask a question or offer some help Juicebox Podcast type one diabetes on Facebook. Hey, thanks for listening all the way to the end. I really appreciate your loyalty and listenership. Thank you so much for listening. I'll be back very soon with another episode of The Juicebox Podcast

I don't really have anything to put here. But the music It just always goes at the end. You know? I don't know what I should be talking to you about really? Hey, you know what, here's a super simple thing. If you want the list of all the management series, they are pinned in the featured tab of the private Facebook group, or you can find them in the menu at juicebox podcast.com. That seems to be a thing people ask about all the time and have trouble finding. Of course, if you're listening now online or on YouTube, please subscribe or follow in an audio app like Apple podcasts, Spotify, Amazon music, something like that. It helps the show and if you love it, leave a review make it five stars and say something cool that would make somebody else want to try out the Juicebox Podcast

---

Please support the sponsors

The Juicebox Podcast is a free show, but if you'd like to support the podcast directly, you can make a gift here. Recent donations were used to pay for podcast hosting fees. Thank you to all who have sent 5, 10 and 20 dollars!

Donate

#1263 DKA In Our Town Part 2

Brianna continues discussing the challenges of managing her son's type 1 diabetes post-DKA and the support systems involved.

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 1263 of the Juicebox Podcast

Welcome back, this is part two of a two part episode if you haven't listened to 1262 Do not start listening to this one because it's not going to make any sense. This is part two, Episode 1262 is part one, this is Episode 1263, part two of DKA in our town, 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. Tickets for the 2025 Juice cruise are limited. I'm not just saying that they actually are limited. We have a certain window to sell them in. And then that's it juicebox podcast.com Scroll down to the juice cruise banner, click on it. Find a cabin that works for you and register right now. You are absolutely limited by time on this one. I'm so sorry to say that it sounds pushy, but it's the absolute truth juice cruise 2025 I hope to see you there, we're gonna get a tan talk about diabetes and meet a ton of great people who are living with diabetes. It's kind of going to be like floating diabetes camp. But you won't have to sleep in a log cabin, you'll get a tan. And it's not just for adults or kids. It's for everybody.

This episode of The Juicebox Podcast is sponsored by the Omni pod five, learn more and get started today at Omni pod.com/juice box. Check it out. today's podcast is sponsored by us med us med.com/juice box you can get your diabetes supplies from the same place that we do and I'm talking about Dexcom li Bray Omni pod tandem and so much more. Us med.com/juice box or call 888-721-1514 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.

Brianna 2:17
So anyway, so the next day, it's five o'clock in the morning, this is the 31st at this point, we noticed that his right leg was swollen. And you know, we told the nurses were like, hey, his leg looks bigger. Also, we were really concerned because his face was swollen, you could see the tip of his nose was like shiny. And his eyelids were so swollen that he could barely open his eyes. And like the fat, like is on the top of his feet were swollen. So it was just like his entire body. And so he told the nurses and you know, it's five o'clock in the morning, and they come in, they end up calling the IV team and, and they're looking at it and you know, they thought like the IV could be infiltrated like we need, you know, this one's blown. Like we need to get potentially something else in him. While they're looking at it. The IV team, like one of the girls was like, you know, you need to call the doctor. And so he goes out calls the doctor comes back in on his little, you know, phone, he's like on the phone with the doctor at that point. And she's like, You better tell him to hurry up and get here. And so like, we're like what, you know, like, again, like we have no idea what's happening. So, doctor comes in, he looks at it. He's like, yeah, definitely needs, you know, new IV. You know, at that point, though, this is only like a day after he is resolved from DKA. And, you know, he really doesn't have a lot of sights left that they can even really try. So they took him back to that little procedure room to try to get another IV. He's in there for a while again, and they ended up getting one in his foot. He mentioned that they were going to try to like the only ones left tours were his scalp. But they're like, We don't like to do that. So they finally got one in his foot. And then we're like, Okay, well why is this leg swollen? Why is it two times the size of his other leg? So at that point, in addition to like they were still doing, I guess like, you know, blood sugar checks really frequently labs really frequently they had been doing neurologic, like hourly exams, like we were sleeping. I mean, that was non existent for most of the time that we were in the hospital, like 45 minutes here and there. Now they were checking like his leg circumference, like every time like every couple hours to see if it was going down. And you know, like another like 12 hours went by and it wasn't going down. And like I was like, Do you think that he needs an ultrasound? They had told us in the beginning that they wanted to get that line out of his leg as soon as possible because there was a high risk for a blood clot. You know, I just wasn't comfortable with it. And again, parental instinct kicks in where it's like okay, first of all, we almost got sent home like what, what is the harm at this point to expose him to on ultrasound like that's like, no big deal. Like, just to rule it out, put my mind at ease. So they did an ultrasound. At that point, I rob actually went home to go get his clothes. And he also went home to grab COVID tests because at that point, my throat was really raw, and the air was really dry there. And I was thinking like, Okay, this is probably because it's super dry. But like, in the back of my mind, I'm like, what if I'm getting sick? Like, you know, we were in hospitals, we were in the doctor's office, like, what if I was exposed, things like that. So I'm here by myself, they do his ultrasound, Rob gets back. And probably like an hour after his ultrasound was done, they came in and they're like, he has a blood clot. And he's like, Jesus

Scott Benner 5:46
Christ. Are you serious? Oh, my God. Kids, okay, now, right?

Brianna 5:53
He is,

Scott Benner 5:54
Okay, keep going. I needed that. I just make sure. She's like,

Brianna 5:58
it's just like, you know, like, when you feel like things can't get worse. But then they do. And then they do again. So you know, that happens. And we're like, oh, great, like, now what? And they're like, Well, we're gonna need to start them on blood centers right away. So they got the orders and for that, so he was on Lovenox, then in the hospital injections twice a day there. I think they actually had one going through his IV at first before he was disconnected from the IV. Anyway, so Rob gets back with those with all of our stuff and the COVID tests and whatnot. And, you know, by that point, it was like hours later, after I start started feeling like that wrongness in my throat. And I started to feel like a little congested, and I'm like, great. So anyway, I ended up going the bathroom. Like, I'm just going to do this COVID test. It was positive.

Scott Benner 6:44
Yeah, of course it was. I don't see how I'm waiting for a building to fall on you or something. So like the positive COVID test. You don't even have the there was the hospital held up while you were there? Did you have to brandish a weapon to defend it or anything like that? Like how close the Die Hard did this get? Exactly? Jesus? Faster? Can you tell me what part of the country you live in without telling me exactly where you live?

Brianna 7:08
I can tell you the state. That's fine. Good. We live in Pennsylvania, the western part? central central. Oh, yeah.

Scott Benner 7:17
My son went to college there. I know what you're saying. Don't worry.

Brianna 7:20
You know, so at that point, then I had to tell the nurse like, you know, because they're in and out constantly. And actually, you know, they were being very lax. Like they were all masked and like, visitors were supposed to be masked too. But like, we were there for so long at that point, like, it was like, a couple of days, like they were really lacs about us with masks. And so like Rob Kai, and I obviously weren't masked, and, you know, I had to tell the nurse like, Hey, I just took a COVID test, and it's positive. And so then it went from, you know, I put on a mask, obviously, for, you know, out of hers, at that point to continue to expose other people. But they ended up moving us to the what's it called the negative pressure rooms, okay. They had like, one of those. And so they moved us into there. And then from that point forward, they were in PPE for the rest of the time. And they had to change it every time they came into our room, and somebody was in our room, like, every 20 minutes. So I can't imagine how much waste it like pains me

Scott Benner 8:20
counting, counting and counting. I'm counting constantly saying

Brianna 8:24
insane. I mean, because we were there for 11 days. And it was like on the third day that we were diagnosed with COVID. So anyway, so I was positive. At that point. Rob was feeling fine. They had tested chi, he was negative. And then that night into the next day, chi spiked a fever overnight, and he tested positive for COVID. That Well, yeah,

Scott Benner 8:41
I mean, I think we were all waiting for that. But yeah, how many decades will take you to pay the hospital bill?

Brianna 8:49
I would love to know, like what, you know, the actual total is I haven't gone back and looked at that. I don't really want to know, but

Scott Benner 8:55
your insurance is handling it, though. Yeah, I'm

Brianna 8:59
very fortunate for that. You know, then they were like, Okay, well, he obviously has diabetes, you know, he's high risk. He has COVID. Now, they were like, he's a candidate, they ended up looking into it. He's a candidate for remdesivir. And, you know, like, there's like, a lot of talk about, like, what's a good treatment is, you know, what not like over, you know, the time that COVID started. And so it's like, you're really hesitant to like, give something to your baby. That's, I mean, he's only nine months old. And, you know, it's not really like that known, but we just trusted them. And obviously, we were like, if we don't, and he gets even sicker. And we didn't you know, give him treatment. He's

Scott Benner 9:35
in no situation to like fight a virus off during all this probably. Yeah,

Brianna 9:39
like he just recovered from DKA like, he's so weak. You know, he had lost weight from even just the like, when he first got in the hospital. He already had like, last week. You know, that was just like a really trying time. He lost his voice. He was coughing. Thankfully, like it never went to his lungs. That was obviously like the greatest fear you know, tempered Your checks like so we had like all of these checks. And so really there was somebody in there like every 2030 minutes. So anyway, and at one point like his, his temperature actually went like the other way. And they're like, like hypothermia. And like they come in and they have these clothes like these random clothes and like they're bundling them up in like this random, like, I don't know if they had like a donation, like they took in donations of clothing. And he's like, in this like, little like baseball, like it was like a baseball, like sleeper. And then they, they put them in that and then they like, put them in this little sweatshirt. Like they had them all bundled up. It was just crazy. And then the next day, Rob ended up starting to feel bad. So, you know, here we are, like, we're feeling awful. They're like trying and you know, like, at that point, like most people would be starting to get like diabetes education, and like nutritionists and things like that. But we were like, literally like on like death's doorstep like we got COVID Really bad. Yeah. Like every single symptom that you could possibly have. Oh,

Scott Benner 11:02
the two of you were oh my god, we did you. Did you prove yourself? Briana, if you make poop in your pants, there was no.

Brianna 11:08
Thankfully that thankfully. did not happen.

Scott Benner 11:11
I imagine you've just been like, Yeah, sure. Why not?

Brianna 11:15
I mean, things couldn't get any worse at that point where you you were

Scott Benner 11:18
living in this in this room in this pressure room, right? Oh,

Brianna 11:21
yeah. Yeah, we couldn't leave at that point. So at first, like we could least go out and like, you know, alternate like going to like the little cafe area or, you know, Rob would go and grab us like breakfast or coffee or whatever. And then we were like completely in isolation. Like they had to get us things if we needed it. And it was like they

Scott Benner 11:37
bring you cots. How big was the room? I'm sorry. I have a lot of questions. How big was the room?

Brianna 11:41
It was actually a really big room. Okay, but Rob Chi

Scott Benner 11:45
in this in this room? This? What do they call them again? Pressure? What do they call, like negative negative pressure rooms? Right. So yeah, that means when they open the door, like airborne stuff, can't break the door, seal it just right. So they're basically this is a zombie movie. Now. They're like, we'll just keep the three of them in there until they die. And then the scrape will mount back. Yeah, okay. Yeah, no one looked like they were gonna shoot you. Right? They weren't like, well put them down. Nothing like that. Okay, good. Good. Good.

Brianna 12:10
Unfortunately, unfortunately, not. Fortunately.

Scott Benner 12:15
And you got really, so you had the sweats. And good. Tell me about your COVID for a second. Long

Brianna 12:22
story short, I was the same thing. Like what you just said, like I was sweating, but then I get really cold. So this is like something that stands out in my mind, I kept turning up the thermostat in the room whenever I would get cold. And then it would be like 1000 degrees in there. And like, you know, the staff would be coming in and out and like, I will never get the one of the endocrinologist like in the room trying to talk to us about you know, they were trying to get like, they were trying to get him Dexcom right away. So you know, like talking to us about that. And like she was like sweating, like he's in her PPE and like you could like see, like beads. Oh

Scott Benner 12:57
my god, the first time I had COVID It was like the sweats were crazy. And then exhaustion, and like middle the day that I was kind of okay, and then I got freezing cold and then that went back and forth all day and then I couldn't sleep at night I'd sit up sweating from like 9pm till 6am Then I would sleep from like 6am to like 9am And then I'd get up and make the podcast and then I would do it all over again. It went on for like a week and a half there are episodes of the podcast where I I recorded them sitting here wrapped in blankets or sitting here in a T shirt dripping like I was coming off a meth like like there's like like and I'm just like you'll never know when you listen to them but I'm very proud of myself because I was like, That's right. Yeah, but so you went through that stuck in that room was there arguing Erie too sick to argue. If you take insulin or sulfonylureas you are at risk for your blood sugar going too low. You need a safety net when it matters most. Be ready with G voc hypo pen. My daughter carries G voc hypo pen everywhere she goes because it's a ready to use rescue pen for treating very low blood sugar and people with diabetes ages two and above that I trust. Low blood sugar emergencies can happen unexpectedly and they demand quick action. Luckily G vo Capo pen can be administered in two simple steps even by yourself in certain situations. Show those around you where you store G vo Capo pen and how to use it. They need to know how to use G vo Capo pen before an emergency situation happens. Learn more about why G voc hypo pen is in Ardens diabetes toolkit at G voc glucagon.com/juicebox. G voc shouldn't be used if you have a tumor in the gland on the top of your kidneys called a pheochromocytoma. Or if you have a tumor in your pancreas called an insulinoma. Visit G voc glucagon.com/risk For safety information

Brianna 15:00
Oh, no, no, we were we definitely like we were just so like, are sad were like worried we're feeling awful. Like we're just trying to feel better. And like, you know, we weren't sleeping and you know, you're sick you need to sleep to get better. And like we couldn't really sleep. There were a couple of times that like we literally just like, shut off. Like I remember one time I was just like, I literally cannot stay awake anymore, even though I wanted to. Like I had that feeling that I didn't want to sleep because I didn't want to miss anything I didn't sure like the doctors coming in the checks, like what was this result? You know, but one time I just had to shut off and I went to sleep. And we were talking about that the other day actually, Rob told me that there was like a time that they had to come in and get get a blood draw. And he was just like, Absolutely, like hysterical chi was. And, you know, he said like how he felt so alone in that moment, because I was actually I was in the same room. I was sleeping on the couch. But I was like literally passed out. You know, it was just like a really like, low moment for him. I guess like, you know, you're in this realization, you're feeling awful. You're babies, you know, you just feel helpless. So it was just like a lot of that, and just trying to feel better, so that you could take in the information that they're trying to tell you. So another moment that stands out to me is, you know, I was so sleep deprived. And I remember I was sitting in a recliner, holding chi and our endocrinologist, someone was talking to us and trying to explain something about diabetes and insulin regimen and things like that. And what they were going to try to do. And I was just like nodding off. Like I was literally like head going down, falling asleep. And she's like saying to rob, like, is she okay? And he's like, Oh, yeah.

Scott Benner 16:40
No, everything's fine. We're all fine. Nothing to worry about here.

Brianna 16:44
I mean, so anyway, so Okay, time goes on. And obviously, we're starting where we had to have a video visit with hematologist from the main hospital that our hospital system is part of, they didn't have a pediatric hematologist, you know, on site. So they came out, like once a month, to our endocrinology office, it's like a multi specialty group for pediatrics. And they, we were going to end up meeting with them after the hospital, but we had a video consult with them, so that they could explain to us like after Kai gets out of the hospital, like he has his blood clot. And like, we need to talk to you about like, what's going to happen, like he, first of all, he's going to need to be on blood thinners twice a day for three months, probably. And also, he's going to have to have ultrasounds again to check like every six weeks to see if the blood clot is going away. And they explained it like, you know, the Lovenox the blood center is not to dissolve the blood clot. Like that's not what it's for, it's to make it less sticky. So blood stops attaching to it. And like making it larger, which obviously isn't like higher risk, you know, as the blood clot gets larger, and things like that. And, you know, so we're like, what happens if the blood clot does dislodge and go somewhere else? Like, you know, so now we have to be scared of that, like, is his blood clot going to cause a stroke? You know, is it going to go to his heart, you know, things like that. So like, not only do we have now a newly diagnosed type one diabetic, we have COVID this blood clot issue, like, you know, that he got from the IV that obviously was needed to save his life, but now also is threatening his life. And now we're going to have to give him injections of you know, blood centers. They did also explain that the like, if the blood clot sticks around, and if it gets larger because of where it was and how it was blocking, like there was a potential like it could be there forever. And then it could potentially like cause problems like,

Scott Benner 18:44
are you oh my gosh, like it could cause like

Brianna 18:47
discoloration of his leg. It could cause like cramps in his leg. Like if he played sports in the future. Like it could cause issues with that. He might need like stockings forever depression.

Scott Benner 18:57
Yeah,

Brianna 18:58
yeah. Yeah, like so like, again, we're like reeling like how can this literally get any worse? Right?

Scott Benner 19:04
Did you find out did it get worse?

Brianna 19:06
We started to get better. He got his Dexcom on they came in trained us on that. And I was super thankful that like that was like a, you know, like some kids and I'm so blown away by this are sent away like, especially like really little without a CGM. And I just, I find that really wrong. Because like, it's I feel like in this day and age, it's like, unnecessary and archaic. Yeah, for sure. To do that. It's just Yeah. Anyway, so our hospital was like amazing with that our doctors were amazing. Like getting him technology right away, you know, especially given his age. And like they just didn't really know like they ended up giving him so they started him on Lantus and homologue. And they gave him his like, first doses, subcutaneous, like after he was off of the IV and like the drip and everything. They gave him his Lantis and his human log at the same time, and they ended up like just tanking him completely. Like, there was nurses in there, and we're like, piping glucose gel in his mouth, like, you know, and that's kind of like our first experiences with Lowe's then, you know, like, they're freaking out, like, oh, we gotta get, you know, it's just was like really scary. And they're freaking out,

Scott Benner 20:17
isn't it? You're like, well, I don't know what I'm talking about. But they Oh, God, they don't know either. Yeah,

Brianna 20:23
yeah, exactly. And so, you know, then of course, he's like backup the three 400 After the glucose gel and things like that. So this kind of like went on. And then they realized that they could not even use like the human dog Junior pen, like the half unit pen and keep him stable. Like, even like if he was 400 that it was too much. So at that point, they realized that they needed to get him on a pod, on Omni pod so that they could do smaller amounts. And they were amazing at getting that prior all sent through, like, super super quick because I think they basically told the insurance like this kid, either gonna stay in the hospital on like a drip, because we can't even control it with a pen, or, you know, injections or you're gonna give them an omni pod. And we actually ended up I think, so we had Dexcom on like, day three, and then Omni pod trainer came in on, it was just the doctor, we had the Dexcom trainer, their Omni pod on day five. So the doctor came in and put the first one on and you know, explained about the PDM and things like that, you know, they were able to do as basil, which is Basil was point o five, of course per hour, he was only 16 pounds. When we were in the hospital, he dropped down to like 15. So he was like super, super insulin sensitive.

Scott Benner 21:44
My daughter is 20 years old, I can't even believe it. She was diagnosed with type one diabetes when she was two. And she put her first insulin pump on when she was four. That insulin pump was an omni pod. And it's been an omni pod every day since then. That's 16 straight years of wearing Omni pod, it's been a friend to us. And I believe it could be a friend to you, Omni pod.com/juicebox. Whether you get the Omni pod dash, or the automation that's available with the Omni pod five, you are going to enjoy tubeless insulin pumping, you're going to be able to jump into a shower, or a pool or a bathtub without taking off your pump. That's right, you will not have to disconnect to bathe with an omni pod. You also won't have to disconnect to play a sport, or to do anything where a regular two pump has to come off. Arden has been wearing an omni pod for 16 years. She knows other people that wear different pumps. And she has never once asked the question, should I be trying a different pump? Never once Omni pod.com/juice box, get a pump that you'll be happy with forever. You've probably heard me talk about us Med and how simple it is to reorder with us med using their email system. But did you know that if you don't see the email and you're set up for this, you have to set it up. They don't just randomly call you but I'm set up to be called if I don't respond to the email because I don't trust myself. 100% So one time I didn't respond to the email and the phone rings the house is like ring. You know how it works. And I picked it up I was like Hello. And it was just the recording was like us med doesn't actually sound like that. But you know what I'm saying? It said hey, you're I don't remember exactly what it says. But it's basically like hey, your orders ready you want us to send it push this button if you want us to send it or if you'd like to wait I think it lets you put it off like a couple of weeks or push this button for that. That's pretty much it. I push the button to send it and a few days later box right at my door. That's it us med.com/juice box or call 888-721-1514 Get your free benefits check now and get started with us med Dex comm Omni pod tandem freestyle, they've got all your favorites, even that new eyelet pump, check them out now at us med.com/juice box or by calling 888-721-1514 There are links in the show notes of your podcast player and links at juicebox podcast.com to us Med and to all the sponsors. So

Brianna 24:15
after the first pod change, he ended up having like a a low and like we're sitting there and you know, he he was dropping on Dexcom and his head like he was sitting in my lap and his head just kind of like started like bobbing a little bit. And he got like super sleepy and like we're trying to like rouse him and, you know, obviously he was feeling low, especially after being you know, 500 blood sugar for so long. And so we're like, okay, you know, they treated him whatever. And then we ended up having a pod failure in the middle of the night. I think that next night, and the doctor had to come in at like four or five o'clock in the morning because they were giving him boluses and nothing was happening and she was changing it out and and probably like an hour or two hours after that, he ended up having another low. And she actually was in there. And you could see the fear in her face. This is the endocrinologist. And she was actually piping peaches, like through a syringe, like baby food, peaches into his mouth. And then she's like, you know, get glucose gel and you know, like, give him more give him more like, okay, it's fine. Give him more. You could just tell she was like, really? Kind of like what's going on? Yeah. So like that happened. And then like, Rob, and I started talking about it and are like, okay, so this is like, weird. Like, he got this pot on. He's had now two pods on and why is he having like these seeming like low blood sugars after he gets these pods on, like, you know, he's on such little amounts. And, you know, things like that. So there was another intensive issue was like, really awesome. We actually had issues with chi feeding while we were there. So I was sick with COVID. And actually, my breast milk supply tanked completely. Like I was not producing, like barely anything, probably very hydrated to Oh, yeah. And super stressed, and which is a huge part of it. And, you know, COVID actually is known to tank supplies. And he was like, refusing to eat, they actually have this picture of all of the different formulas, they had all these formulas line that they brought in, he would not take a single formula because he was never formula fed. And you know, he just didn't want it and they had apple juice, like a toddler like Apple and carry pouch, we ended up ultimately, like, trying to give him cow's milk, which you're not supposed to do until after one. And that was literally the only thing that he would like, maybe take like a little bit of it. Okay. And so that's how we kind of got by but like, at one point, the doctors like, we have to get him to eat something because she couldn't do some insulin, and like figure out what his ratios and things like that were because he wouldn't eat. I mean, how much is the way at that point? 15 pounds. Yeah,

Scott Benner 26:58
I listen Arden weight 19 pounds, and I couldn't do it. And she was eating, you know, after she got the hospital's freaking impossible, almost, you would have taken food away from or I don't know what I would have been able to do. Yeah, yeah,

Brianna 27:09
it was just crazy. And we're just like, well, I'm like, I don't know what to do. So like, they were trying to, like, they had like a lactation consultant and like, trying to, like, be able to like up my supply. So like, he could, you know, hopefully eat something. So it was like, very, like small amounts of ounces. Like, you know, we were trying to like then, you know, bottle feed him. And he would take obviously, and then he was taking a little bit of the cow's milk so it was like after a couple of days, but this one awesome, awesome intensive is she was so sweet. She actually went to like Trader Joe's. And she like we had told her we actually were doing baby led weaning, have you ever heard or? Yeah,

Scott Benner 27:43
baby led weaning? Like, Lea. I don't know, baby LED. I gotta find out. I got Google.

Brianna 27:52
Yeah, that's what it's called. I'm like thinking of like, just, like weird when you say it fast. That's yeah. Yeah. So it's like, instead of like doing purees, and things like you pretty much just go into like finger foods. And so we were in the process of, we were trying to do 100 Different foods by age one. And we were up to 40 foods like right before he was diagnosed. And you know, so it was really fun. We were actually like, recording every single new food that he ate. Like his reaction to everything. So it was like a fun experience. And like, just like that, trying to hit that goal of 100 foods. So anyway, we told her like, you know, at home he really liked like berries, you know, things like that. And so she actually went out to Trader Joe's and got him like fresh blueberries, strawberries. She got him like fishy crackers and things you knew he would eat? Yeah, like that. He would potentially like try so and she brought back like stuff for us. Like the one day she's like, you know, I know you guys are like stuck in here. She's like, I'm going for coffee. Would you like anything like it was just like really comforting. You know, like, you don't really get that a lot with like a health care provider that she's going to go out and get your kid food and you know, bring you coffee.

Scott Benner 28:55
At some point. They were probably like these poor people like and you'd been there for 1011 days they probably felt like they knew at that point, you know? Yeah,

Brianna 29:05
like and we did express like to her to like at that point. So she was the one who really listened to us when we told her told her about the pods were like look something is happening something is not right here. Like when he gets these pods on it seems like he his blood sugar's dropping. And you know, she's like I get it like you know, like she knew she had heard around I'm sure because like there were nurses involved the doctors involved with these like times that they're like, you know, piping glucose gel and peaches and things in his mouth. So she listened and I was like at that point like frantically like searching the internet for information about Omni pod and I think at that point I had already found I think I found juice box while I was still in the hospital. Because I was already like a group person. Prior to all of this, like I have a group for everything like everything. Craft thing vacations, you name it, I have a group for it. And I was just like searching like it is Has anybody had this reaction to the pods. And I did end up coming across something on the Omni pod, their manual. And it talked about a priming dose. So when the pod is placed, and you pinch the skin up, and that cannula inserts, that insulin that goes into the tube, like obviously is touching the infusion site, what, like he was so insulin sensitive, that, you know, we then had the thought that that priming Bolus was then causing him to tank.

Scott Benner 30:44
Okay. Even at that little bit, geez. Yeah. So,

Brianna 30:49
you know, like, we couldn't prove it, obviously. And so then our doctor, like reached out to the insolate rep. And was like, hey, like, we have this baby, we're having this issue, whenever we put the pods on, and, you know, at first, like, they didn't really like kind of like, believe it, I guess you would say. And then like, after, like, I think he got three pods total in the hospital. And we ended up because of like, who was on call, we had all three, endocrinologist, the first one, the gentleman, he was only like day one. And then the other two female endocrinologist, they had us pretty much for like the rest of the days that we were there. And so they got to witness a lot, obviously. And like, the third time it happened, like, the endocrinologist who he ultimately ended up with, you know, she got to experience it too, because she also had an event where she was, you know, piping glucose gel into his mouth with a syringe. And you could just again, see the fear. And these doctors eyes, like what's going on? And so, you know, they ended up talking to their colleagues back at like, the main hospital, because when they had backing up, when they when she reached out to insulin, they're like, no, like, the rep was like, no, like, I don't think there's anything like that, that, you know, like, there's no prime Bolus, but like on the actual manual, it does say that. So walk me through.

Scott Benner 32:06
So you're because you prime an omni pod before you put it on? Right? Okay. And then you put it on, and it inserts and then what happens? So

Brianna 32:16
like that insulin that's in that tube, like obviously, then you know, connects?

Scott Benner 32:22
And then yeah, and that for somebody, your son sighs and in situation and not eating is a lot of insulin. Yeah, I got right.

Brianna 32:29
Yeah. And so they actually then talk to their colleagues. So the doctors like reach out to their colleagues at the main hospital. And they ended up coming up with a protocol for pump changes for chi, and like, I cringe at it now. Because they actually like wanted his blood sugar, like over 400 to put up to put a pot on him. And

Scott Benner 32:54
this is just really the amount of insulin that's in the cannula, which is very short to begin with. And then once it's an inserted, it's not like it was pushing more it was just kind of whatever was touching, keeping, I guess, is the word I'm looking for. Right? Which is probably just an it's probably just a couple of drops of insulin. I'm trying to think about it probably only a few drops. And

Brianna 33:19
when you think of like a drop of insulin like especially when he's on a basil of point oh five. And at that point, his Bolus is like point oh, four. Yeah.

Scott Benner 33:25
Oh, no, listen, when Arden was two years old, even I had to teach myself, I don't know how many people listen how far back I heard, yeah, like you had to, I used to take insulin, put it in a dish, color it with food coloring. And then and then I would draw it into the syringe. And then I would practice pushing on the plunger to get one drop to come out. So I put the food coloring in. So I could practice by the way not to inject it. And so what I would do is I would practice over and over again, visually, this is how much pressure let's add a drop of insulin from the syringe. And then I'd start doing it with my eyes closed, because you can't see the end of the syringe when it's inserted. Right, when I could do it with my eyes closed, then I would sometimes inject Arden with a drop of insulin, because that was enough and anymore was too much.

Brianna 34:10
Right? Exactly. So it's like nearly impossible without a pump. You know, for a child that small. Like you're really stressing yourself out. And I mean, like look at all the work you had to do to go through just like hopefully getting the right that's all

Scott Benner 34:24
I was shooting for. I was like well, and like literally I can feel myself now with my thumb like it's a little bit of pressure like That's enough pull it out. And that was you can only put like, I would only put like a half a unit in there just so I could get enough pressure to get a drop out. And that went on for a while, by the way because she's probably honeymooning to at some point and to be perfectly honest with you. I didn't even know what a honeymoon was back then. So I'm that guy in that story is not the guy you're talking to right now. Like he was in full on panic. So Right,

Brianna 34:56
exactly. Yeah. And yeah, and I mean, especially to win You're dealing with a child that's small, and like, you know, like I was a new mom, still, I was like, not even, like, I didn't even feel like myself again yet. Like, I felt like I wasn't even like, you know, really like, into motherhood, like when all of this happens

Scott Benner 35:15
like COVID. And you know, the experience of being in that room for that long, that's kind of be overwhelming, you

Brianna 35:22
know, this thing happening that they like, literally didn't even know what was happening. So the plan that they set up, then, when they sent us away from the hospital, was to take the stop the basil, take the old pump site off an hour before the site change, so obviously, that he's not getting any basil. So make sure that he's more than 300 by fingerstick. Before that, after the site change, feed him again, and keep the basil discontinued for an hour. If after an hour, his blood sugar was more than 350, we would turn the basil on but only for five minutes and turn it back off.

Scott Benner 35:58
Was this an overcorrection? Or does this actually what was necessary? Sounds like an overcorrection. To me, that's what I'm wondering. Well,

Brianna 36:05
yeah, well, so I, we started documenting them because like, eventually, like, I would love to, you know, potentially, like speak to somebody on the pod, or insolate. Just so you know, like, if this happens, like, I'm fine with it, like, I just don't want something to happen to another small child, like it happened to us. And that uncertainty and the fear, like, I am 100% Omnipod, I absolutely love it, our life would not be the same without it. Huge advocate. But in the same token, like if he would have been in range, and us not do what we do now, like so for instance, like there was a time where we did a pod change. And he was, I hate to say this 454 We were newly out of the hospital. And breast milk sent him to the moon. And so like at 830, he was 454. And by 1045, you know, so two hours later, he was already 226. In that time, he had more milk. So he had like fed again, he had dropped like 200 points. And then there was another couple of times that we had documented that it was like the same like he's dropping like 250 points, there was one he dropped over 200 points in one hour, a pod

Scott Benner 37:19
chain from a pot from putting a new pod on. Yes, with the basil off,

Brianna 37:23
right. No insulin on and he would have been in range, like at 100. You know, 150 when that happens, you know, like, obviously, we'd be dealing with like feeding a low that we had no idea where it ended. You know, so it was like really scary. And, you know, it took us a really long time to kind of like figured out a regimen for that. So she was thinking like by turning the basil back on for five minutes that like any insulin that might have been in the cannula would be delivered, like any extra, and then like turn it off again, because like he would have gotten that insulin that they thought could be in there. So basically just like observe for the next hour, like if his blood sugar was like study then turn the basil back on. If he was like below 300 Keep the basil off until he was like, leveled out. Yeah, has

Scott Benner 38:07
this experience made you better diabetes?

Brianna 38:10
Like in hindsight? Yeah, I would say

Scott Benner 38:14
because, first of all, let me say this on the pod is not FDA approved for people under two. So you guys were using it off label, which is fine. But I'm going to assume that what they would say is Well, yeah, that's an amount of insulin that I mean, it's it's just how the pot works. And for larger people, it's it's an nominal amount. That doesn't mean anything. But but my my, my bigger question is because it feels like you were like, a lot of trial by fire and a lot of getting to see how insulin works. And I'm wondering now, it's a year and a half later, right? Right. Like what's cause a one see right now,

Brianna 38:50
last time it was 7.1, down from 11. At diagnosis.

Scott Benner 38:53
Nice. And that and he's still little, he's, yeah,

Brianna 38:57
he's 26 pounds. And he's a little over two. He's still a little he's like really low percentiles still.

Scott Benner 39:03
Do you feel like do you feel confident about using insulin? Do you get what you expect? I guess is my question.

Brianna 39:09
Yeah. And I remember feeling like so like, I was like, on top of the world, the one time where we did a pod change for like, the first time when he was like, in range, and like, we knew the drop was coming. And we just like, fed it. You know, we're like, as soon as he started dropping, it's like, okay, give him some carbs weight, started dropping again, give him some carbs. Wait until we like leveled out and I like, felt like amazing, like that time that we like, did a pod chain, I

Scott Benner 39:35
did this thing. And I knew what was gonna happen. And then I made a change and it went the way I expected it to. It's such a good feeling. Yeah,

Brianna 39:42
so it really like affected a lot of stuff though. So like, you know, so when so when we went back, like three days later after we got discharged from the hospital, that was when our next pod change was and they wanted us to do it in the hospital and in the doctor's office. So outpatient, and it happened again, of course, like while we were there And so at that point they knew like 100%. Like, even though it's like, okay, no, this wasn't happening. They actually were like, okay, yeah, this is happening, like, we've now seen it like four times, and what the diabetes educator was actually the one who recommended tapping the pods out. And so what we do is when you take off the blue plastic piece, oh, by the way, you do. Yeah,

Scott Benner 40:24
I've done it for years. You I pinch the back of the pod. And then I slap the middle of it onto my finger. Yeah, yeah. Then the quick stop knocks out like, I do it for condensation real reasons under the window, because you knock out that kind of you knock out that extra in the window from the priming, and that you don't get the condensation buildup,

Brianna 40:44
right. So and I'm sure you've noticed, like you see insulin on your hands, like there's, and sometimes it's a really like, good bit. And so for him, like, we've actually like kind of reverse engineered the amount of like, with the amount of carbs we had to give him. And like, I think that it's probably up to like a point five, like a half unit, sometimes with how much we've had to feed him like after the drop happens. So now what we do is like, We actually just had a pot change last night, we do, like, depending on where he's at, like if he's in range, and a really good number will turn his basil off for an hour. Like just so he's not getting, you know, even more an extra because he just got some like, basically like a Bolus with the pot change. And we just don't know how much. And so if he's high, not at a number that we want, we'll, we'll still tap it, we'll put the pot on, keep the Bazelon. And we'll do like half of a correction, like whatever that is, we still usually have to catch it. But it's not, you know, like, we know it's going to happen now. But like the way that it affected us, like we couldn't do like a pod change on the go. Or, you know, because we'd be in the car and he'd be dropping, he's a baby, like we really can't, you know, give him low treatments, a lot of times in the car plus he gets carsick, like it's this, this thing. And then, you know, we can't do pod changes, like within a certain amount of time before bed is still because of the drop, and we know what's going to happen. So it limits things a little bit. But again, like I said, it's just you know, I'm so thankful. And I just really think that that's like one of the things I really wanted to emphasize was, you know, I really just think that especially a baby, a toddler, like pushing for a pump, like as soon as possible just to save like the parents like the anguish, like you had to go through with the food coloring. And, you know, trying to Yeah, and like chasing your baby around, you know, trying to give them shots and like a toddler and a baby is different than you know, like an older kid where you can say like, Hey, we have to wait a little bit for a snack like a toddler's grazing all day long. And we'd be like, we'd either have to give him like, you know, zero carb snacks in between injections or be chasing them around all day with a needle and it's just not something. You know, I really feel like you're a toddler is hard enough, right? A baby's hard enough, like you're already going through a drastic life change

Scott Benner 43:07
having to have Kindles is a big deal. Like it just really is. You know, yeah,

Brianna 43:11
it's huge. And so I definitely would, you know, like if you're newly diagnosed, and like, I just, like, feel so sad for the people that I see in the group that like their doctors, like, no, they want us to learn how to be like MDI first or do finger sticks before they get a CGM. And yeah, you know, just in case it fails, but like, I feel like, it's kind of like saying, you know, I don't know, I just feel like, it's really antiquated. Because you can always go back and learn a new skill, that's fine. Or they could have you figure it out in the hospital. And like, you still have to do finger sticks, even with a CGM. So like, that doesn't make any sense to me. You know, like, they can have you draw up in a syringe, like, they actually had us do that in the hospital to practice and, you know, inject like, they had the little, you know, plastic thing, or like, some people have an orange or whatever that you like, inject into and things like that. So, and especially for like a small child, like, it's just so uncertain. And, you know, I just think it's just so necessary to try to, you know, arm those people with with the technology, like, because we have it, why would you not?

Scott Benner 44:18
Yeah, no, I listen, I agree. I've heard arguments for the other side. There's nothing wrong with learning how to do MDI and you should know how to do it. But yeah, but I mean, the length of time being six months or a year is right, kind of silly. At some point.

Brianna 44:30
Yeah. There's that so yeah, so we got out of the hospital like things, you know, we kind of like got to know, like, the whole Omnipod. You know, we got our whole thing down with that. You know, we had a lot of follow ups, we had the blood clot follow ups. And also one of the concerns we had whenever we got out of the hospital was, you know, he's on a Blood Center. He cannot hit his head. He can't fall or you know, like, you have to be really careful because he could get a brain bleed. And mind you, he's nine months old. He's not even walking Yeah, like when we were in the hospital. And so, you know, he's learning then to walk on this blood center. And so like, that was like a really stressful thing that we had to go through. Also, he was barely on table food. So like, you know, learning to those for like, obviously every single food was not only new to learn how to dose for, but new to see if he would even like it. Yeah, you know, and he was eating so little, you know, we had a couple of instances like early on that were like, you know, some scary lows, we had a time he was on an antibiotic where he was definitely not absorbing carbs. And it was like kind of like a middle of the night situation. And you know, he was in like the 60s and he just like we're giving him like, straight glucose Jelani just like wasn't going up. And that like just kind of stuck with me, the hospital was like really traumatic, like that whole experience with like, the nurses and doctors being scared and us being scared. And like those, those experiences just like really, really affected me for a long time. And like being really scared of lows. So obviously, like, you know, I think a lot of people like our higher to start, you know, until we like really felt more comfortable with things. I remember, you know, like, I really could not take on any more information after his diagnosis, like it was just so much and so overwhelming. And, you know, so many appointments, that like I didn't really like start listening to the podcast, until probably I would say like about nine months, like not like religiously. Yeah, I listened to some here and there. But the first one I listened to, I think, besides like maybe a couple of like, the bold beginnings are defining diabetes, but fear of insulin, because that's what I had. And like, I've now listened to that, like, multiple times, like when I kind of get back in that, you know, that mindset? Because it's like, I almost go back to it. And more recently, I've actually had like a major regression. Yeah, tell me, No, tell me, please. So like we hit a year and like things are going really, really good. Like in in Dexcom, like the GMI was down to like, actually 6.7. Like, I like that year mark was like something that I felt like would be pivotal for me. I remember you saying and actually one of my other favorite episodes is like the time that I decided to share, and like giving yourself like this timeframe, like, Okay, I'm going to be okay, after this. Or, you know, like, I'll have it kind of figured out and like, I was just like, from kinda like nine months to a year, I felt like I was doing like, amazing. Like, we were actually like having meals where he like, wasn't spiking over 180. And, you know, just in really good control. And, you know, these past couple of months, there were two times and one of them was actually after a pod change, even after we had all of this experience, but we had to change a pot in the middle of the night. And, you know, we set alarms, like we know what's going to happen, and even no matter how much we tap out the pod how much you know, if we keep the basil off that kind of thing, like it's going to happen, where he's going to drop at least some and we set an alarm, but I guess he dropped sooner than that. So like our, our other alarms or backup alarms were going off. And it was like the reading we have a sugar pixel it was the reading was like at nine minus 12 or something when we sat up and looked at it. And immediately like, you know, we go and we're like sitting him up. And like, you know, one of us went and grabbed juice and like, sat him up immediately like chi drink. And, you know, like even before doing the finger stick, but when we did the finger stick he was already like 62. And you know, he's just out asleep that you're sitting this like poor two year old up and shoving a straw in his mouth. And he like didn't want to he was crying. He's

Scott Benner 48:39
like, hey, my blood sugar's dropping really fast. And I'm asleep. What the hell yeah. Who are you people and get out of my room?

Brianna 48:46
Yeah. And so, you know, like, he drank a little bit, but then I grabbed a pack of applesauce. I'm like, squeezing that in his mouth. You know, he's pushing it away from me. You know, I told Robin like, go grab anything, literally anything. And you know, so we're like, grabbing, like we had a lollipop we had, like, we don't really have, you know, a lot of snack foods a lot. But we had happen to have Oreos, you know, we're trying to give him like anything at that point, because he wouldn't take anything. So I ended up like taking the icing out of the middle of the Oreo and just like shoving it in his mouth. Good.

Scott Benner 49:17
On the cheeks, by the way. Yeah, inside of your cheeks. And

Brianna 49:21
yeah, and so like he ended up taking like a little bit more applesauce. Like I did a finger stick, like a couple of minutes later after that, and he was 52 You know, and we just tried to get as much as we could in him because again, we were kind of at that peak time where the pod was changed and the insulin, you know, or the the insulin was at its peak. And you know, he obviously was dropping rapidly and so you know that that was like really traumatic again and kind of brought back all of those thoughts from the hospital of course. And then we had another one that was actually kind of similar scenario, but he was awake and we just kind of like waited. You know, we don't want to give him carbs too soon when he was dropping from Another change and we kind of hit it a little bit too late. And he was like in the 60s again. And he it was just like, he was just dropping really rapidly. And so just like after those two experiences, it was weird. I just like had this like, regression. Like I all of a sudden got ready to get hurt. Yeah, oh my gosh, like, completely like, I feel like I just got out of the hospital. And it's like, you know, Rob is like so even keeled. And like, he's like, the totally the one in this situation in this like, entire thing. Like, he's like, you know, kind of got the diagnosis, like, obviously, like grieved. But like, move on. This is our life. He's amazing. He's healthy. Besides, you know, besides this. And like, for me, I went through the stages of grief over and over and over again, like the time in the months after. And that's the thing, like I feel like is because like, I always wanted to be a mom, I feel like I did everything right. during my pregnancy. I was like, all organic. I didn't eat lunch meat, I you know, didn't have nitrates or nitrites. And didn't use anything with like chemicals like for, you know, body products and things like that. And it's like, I just felt like I did everything, right. And like, here I am. And this is our life now. And so that was like, really, really hard for me. You know, it's, we got to that year mark, and like, we were doing so good. And then just like recently, I like regressed. And he's like, come on, he's like, you know, like, you know, this, like, you're smart, you know, this trust, you know, like, the whole thing, like, what's going on your your motto of,

Scott Benner 51:27
you know, what's going to happen is going to happen. Know, exactly,

Brianna 51:31
like, he's like, Brianna, carbs, like juice will stop any anything, like it'll turn it around. And, you know, but like, I cannot like sometimes, like, I just, it just went out the window. So I'm like really working on that recently, I feel like I'm doing a lot better in the past, like couple of weeks. And ironically, it's like, you know, happened before this, like recording and like when I signed up to do the recording actually, like it was kind of around that year mark, like a little bit after and like, we were doing really, really good. And it's like, I'm gonna go on here and talk about like, you know, we're doing great.

Scott Benner 52:01
I'm kicking ass. Now your ass is getting kicked. Yeah, go back again. The like, I mean, are you consciously working on it? Or are like, You know what I mean? Like, what are you doing to try to get yourself back to that place?

Brianna 52:14
Just like, you know, again, like re, like I said, like, you know, going back and like listening to like that podcast episode again, all out myself. I like did an anonymous post in the group, which I love that there's that feature there. Because it's like, you know, sometimes you want to put yourself out there, but sometimes you don't, especially if you feel like it's a stupid question. But I'm like, you know, was there ever a time that like, you know, juice didn't work for you, like, or like, didn't catch the low, you know, obviously, aside from being unconscious. Like, it was just really good to hear like, like, really seasoned diabetics like saying, like, no, like, it works like a charm every time, you know, that kind of thing. And that's really helped me and just like reading other people's experiences and things like that. And just like trying to remember that, like, we've been at this for a while now. And the other thing too, that's like, been really frustrating. And our doctor like at our last visit, could really tell, we went from like time and range of like, 70 to 90%, even 100% day to like 40 and 50.

Scott Benner 53:16
That's up to him. And that's you being tested with insulin again. It's

Brianna 53:20
overtrading low sometimes, but actually, more recently, it's because we keep having pod failures. So our son is now two and he is extremely, extremely active. And I'm assuming so we get a lot of occlusions our doctor did tell us that it's more common in kids because their bodies just like healing so quickly and like cells are turning over so quickly and things like that. And like you can actually see the occlusion like when you take it off, it's white, like the cells like gathered at the tip and like basically his body tried to heal against the cannula. So we'll have that happen. And then what I assume is tunneling like from him knocking it loose, like I'll take the pot off and I can see like kind of like a bubble of insulin at the infusion site. Like like we never his doses are so small that like we never would get like wet adhesive or anything around it. Because it's not that much that's coming out. But there's insulin there when I take the pot off. And obviously like you know, we're Bolus thing and you know, things aren't

Scott Benner 54:16
working quickly. Does that happen when it gets occluded? Like how many hours is it on before that happens sometimes,

Brianna 54:23
usually a couple hours but we pretty much have gotten the motto like when in doubt change it out for sure. We actually did back in September have like a DQ DK scare. He was fine. He was like trending down all night. And like he got down to the point where you know, he was gonna go low. And I ended up like giving him a little bit apple juice and he just kind of like shot up and I'm like, okay, maybe I gave him a little bit more juice than he needed. And I actually had to go to a doctor's appointment like an hour away that morning. And so I was like getting ready. I gave him a Bolus like because I overtreated her so I thought and you know an hour went by it didn't really do Imagine like, Okay, I gave him another Bolus told Rob like, Hey, I did this, I'm leaving. And you know, I got there and I looked and is like number still was like going up. I'm like, okay, something doesn't seem right. And I'm like, you have to get him up and get him moving around because sometimes like, it kind of gets stagnant. Like, his insulin doesn't start moving until he's moving when

Scott Benner 55:18
he's sedentary it, it doesn't work as well. Yeah, like, buddy, by the way, not just not just him. Yeah.

Brianna 55:26
And so you know, I'm like, get them up getting moving around, get them drinking, you know, fluids and see, you know, if it's, it starts moving. So anyway, you know, kind of time goes by, and you know, nothing really happens. And, you know, he's making breakfast, which he pretty much has like eggs and breakfast meat or something most mornings. And I'm like, if it doesn't change, like, really soon, like, we're gonna, I was like, You need to change it out. And so he was planning on doing that already. And so he had him in the highchair, eating his eggs, and he ended up getting sick. And at that point, I'm like, calling the doctor, I was on my way home from that. And she's like, Yeah, you need to bring him in. Because, you know, obviously, he's, he's starting to vomit, his blood sugar was sky high. We changed the pot as soon as I got home, but then we took him to the ER, and, you know, they hooked him up to fluids, and did labs, and he was definitely trending into DKA. Like, at that point. I mean, like, it wasn't full blown. But his labs,

Scott Benner 56:21
you of all people, you knew exactly what that looked like, at that point. Oh, yeah, for sure. Like,

Brianna 56:25
once he once he got sick, and then probably like, a month ago, kind of a similar situation where it was like, overnight, and we fed him something that like the fat and protein definitely could have caused a rise. And like, we could have, like missed a Bolus, you know, like, because he, like on a snack or something like that kind of like coupled and, you know, after a couple hours, like, I'm like, okay, you know, when I wasn't giving him like huge bonuses, because I'm like, it's nighttime, I need to sleep, like I don't want to tank him either. And so I was kind of like going, like really conservative on it. And, you know, like, nothing was really happening. He kind of plateaued. And same thing, like I woke him up, I'm like, Okay, you need to drink something, kind of get this moving, see what happens. And he like, took a couple of sips. And then he ended up getting sick, and I checked his ketones. And, you know, they were like moderate to large. And we had an actually a new endocrinologist on call. And he was like, you know, if you guys are comfortable, like don't rush to the ER, like, you can, you know, as long as his ketones, like he might be just nauseous from the ketones itself. Yeah. And, you know, if you can get him to keep down food or liquid, and, you know, you obviously changed his pot already. Check his ketones again, in two hours. And, you know, they were they were better in two hours, you know, so it's just like, wasn't working, it was occluded. And it's just frustrating because you can't see that, you know, that it's occluded, you know, you have to wait to take it off. And it's just like one of those things you don't want to waste. You know, I mean, he's, he's using small amounts of insulin, obviously, per day. And it's like, you don't want to waste you know, a pods waste, you know, extra insulin already. I

Scott Benner 57:57
have a question like, how much insulin? What is the correction at this point? Like, say, say you see a 200 blood sugar and you want to be 100? How much insulin does that take to move? So

Brianna 58:07
a point oh, five takes about down about 30 points. So I would probably do a point one five and have to catch it with a cracker. Yeah. Or something like that. You

Scott Benner 58:15
can't test whether or not it's your cannula with an injection because you still have still way too much insulin for

Brianna 58:22
him. Yeah, like his normal Bolus is like a meal Bolus, like his biggest meal Bolus is probably like 2.5 to 3.3. And that's like his biggest meal like carb heavy meal. And, like a normal correction Bolus for him is like, point 1.1 5.2 Still, yeah,

Scott Benner 58:42
I mean, your best friend is going to be him gaining weight. Right,

Brianna 58:46
exactly. And he eats like, amazing. Like, he's such a good eater. He eats everything. And, you know, so I'm, I'm really thankful for that. But yeah, so I mean, other than that, like things, you know, are good. He's so he's such a good boy. Like, he's so like, you know, with POD changes. And, you know, the Dexcom changes, like, you know, we were really against screentime, whenever, like, early on, like, before he was diagnosed, and we were gonna, like, you know, they say to wait, and things like that. But like when we were in the hospital, and you're trying to keep a nine month old in a hospital bed for 11 days, like we had the TV on the whole time, like in the background, too, because he was like laying still in a bed for days and days. Yeah,

Scott Benner 59:26
all your hippie ideas are out the window now. Now that you're in this,

Unknown Speaker 59:30
yeah.

Scott Benner 59:33
Look at the iPad, I don't care.

Brianna 59:36
So and he's good. Like, you literally are like, here, here. It is like you can distract him. He literally I'm like, lay on your belly. He takes it. He's watching his video, whatever. He doesn't care he winces and sometimes he'll grab for like, it hurts, but he needs you know, like, he'll move on after it and I'm just like, really, really thankful that You know, that's the case because I know a lot. I think that if he was diagnosed at an older age, I think if there's any silver lining to Obviously that he was diagnosed like this is his norm. It'll be his you know, that's all he'll be that he remembers. I

Scott Benner 1:00:06
believe that. And at the same time, I don't want to freak you out. But Arden is working through a fairly significant needle phobia at 19 years old really? So yeah. So it's it popped up on her when she was like, oh, gosh, like, I don't know, eight, maybe even a little younger. Like one day for a blood draw. She just like she climbed the walls like spider man in reverse. And it was never a prop up until then. She just had like, a weird reaction. She didn't want her blood draw. She's powered through it most of the time, but aren't and like the secret about Arden is is that after she was four, when she got on on the pod, Arden doesn't get injections. Like very infrequently, like maybe once in a while you're like, let me just inject some here to see if my the pump sites the problem. But that's just not the thing that comes up for us. So as a matter of fact, the first time I and I reintroduced the syringe was probably two years after she was on a pump. And when I pulled out she goes what is that? She like, didn't even know. And now today, like modern time, right now, she's using ozempic to help her with insulin sensitivity and probably PCOS symptoms, too. And, and so she has to inject it once a week. And it is been quite a thing. Like she's done the last two on her own. And I think she's got it now. But I mean, like, kung fu fighting hands, like as you're coming at her, like, she's like you do it. I can't do it. And this did come at her. And she's like, No, wait, wait. And as you reach, she'd reach out and push away. And I'm like, Arden, the needles uncovered. She's like, I can't stop myself. Her hands are just like, they're just like, No, no, no. And then she do it. And you know, didn't love it. But then she had to go back to college. So last week, and the week before she's done it on her own. But the first time she did it, she videoed it, there's no way she'll ever let anybody see the video. But it's borderlines on hilarious. And like, you would never believe that somebody's had diabetes for this long was like, I don't know if I can do this.

Brianna 1:02:06
So it's really crazy. Like how, you know, like, like I did, like, I felt so comfortable. And like you just kind of like, go through this phase of like, you know, you didn't know it was coming like that you feel this way. And just like that, you know, and I think about like, whenever he'll get older, like I see, like, moms, you know, dads in the group talk about, like, you know, how their kid was completely fine. They were good. They accepted it. And then like, they kind of like hit these like bumps in the road where, you know, they don't have diabetes anymore. And they wish they could be normal. And one mom said, like, you know, her son was like, Mommy, why are you hurting me? And like, you know, it's just like, heartbreaking. Like, you don't want to do this. And I think like that was when I said to rob, like, what's, what's one of the things like if there's anything you want me to mention, you know, and that's like, one of the things like you have this like precious child and like you have to hurt them to, you know, save them basically, you know, and to take care of them. And it's just, you know, that's like one of the things even though he's not as bothered by it, like it still affects him like he doesn't love it. He really Dexcom Yeah, I

Scott Benner 1:03:09
know. It's really hard. Yeah, no, it's it's incredibly difficult. I mean, I've over the years, like a number of things about once we found out that my, when Arden was really young, she told our Kelly sister, that she was excited for her birthday to come because she had wished for her diabetes to go away for a birthday. So she just had to make it to her birthday before it went

Brianna 1:03:31
away. Right. And that's the that's the time I decided to share. Right? Yeah, that was when she was really

Scott Benner 1:03:35
young. Yeah, she wants we were once discussing a friend of a family whose child has got a lot of like mental deficits. And she once told me, I'd rather be him than me. Her answer was because he can't die from his thing. Right.

Brianna 1:03:52
And it's, you know, you think about that, and it's, you know, there's I think you just said and one that I listened to the other day, like, you can't think of another diagnosis where you literally, like, if you forgot about it for a couple hours or like didn't do something like you could

Scott Benner 1:04:07
Yeah, you're having a lot of trouble. Right? Yeah, that quickly. By the way. I think if you got her back here today and asked her a she wouldn't remember saying those things and be I don't think she'd feel that way anymore. So there is that to that. Listen, the best advice I can give you. I've raised two kids now, is that everything happening today? That seems really, really important. Most of it doesn't end up being

Brianna 1:04:28
right. Yeah, for sure. And it's and it feels really heavy right now because obviously we are only a year and a half into the diagnosis and also, you know, just with him and being so young and just like a difficult baby. So one of the things prior to his diagnosis, he was waking up like 10 to 15 times a night, and I was back to work and I was literally so sleep deprived. Like I remember saying to Rob I'm like I am going

Scott Benner 1:04:52
to die. Oh, I've had that feeling like in the middle of night like this is it I'm gonna have a heart attack and my head's gonna pop. Yeah.

Brianna 1:04:58
I said I am So tired and like I was trying not to keep track of how often he was waking up, but so like, I would just nursed him back to sleep. And so like, when we talk to the endocrinologist, they said like, it probably was because his blood sugar was so high, and his body kept telling him, I'm hungry, I'm thirsty, because he was so high, and then he would nurse and then he'd be even higher. And it was just this cycle of constant, I'm hungry, I'm thirsty, I'm hungry. And so like, you know, like, looking back, it's like, okay, there was like a reason for that. And like, I could never bring it, like, I'm just not the person that can like do cry it out and things like that. And I'm glad that I didn't at this point. And I was at least like, like, he couldn't help it. And like he was actually going through like a medical condition as to like, why he was waking up. So, you know, that's just like, hard. But I'm glad that I know that there's likely the cause for that. Yeah. And I also think that too, just like one of the things that I wanted to say is like, my mental health throughout all of this has, like, like I said, I went through the stages of grief. And I think that a lot of it, like, the way that you react, I guess, like after the diagnosis, like I remember, there was a post recently that got like, a lot of attention. Somebody was like, basically, like, it could be worse kind of thing. And people were like, well, that doesn't feel that way to me. And this feels like the end all be all and it's extremely heavy. And, you know, it was like a lot of back and forth. And, like, I think that there's like a lot of things that like really play into how somebody bounces back from things Oh, sure. Like some, some people are just like, so different. And so I feel like it's really important for people to understand, and that's why I really love, like, how the podcast has helped me like listen to certain people and their stories. It's like, almost like sitting in on somebody else's therapy session.

Scott Benner 1:06:45
I know, I feel like that all the time. So it's like, okay, yeah, I

Brianna 1:06:49
feel that way. Okay, somebody feels like that, that I do. And I'm not the only one that feels like this is like, you know, like, ended my life for right now. And, you know, like, I think that just some people are more resilient and like, can deal with adversity a lot better than others. And like, can just like roll with it, like, oh, this our life now could be worse. I think that like personality types, like over thinkers, worriers, you know, people that are perfectionist that like, want to have like, complete control. I was used to, like, always, like, trying to be like, work and, you know, like a perfectionist. And, you know, I always had to have things certain way. And like, you know, obviously, diabetes is not like that. So that was really hard to accept. Were some people were like, Oh, he's Hi. Correct and move on. You know, like, I do double back a lot to the why which I do it more for like learning for the next time, not because I'm like, obsessing over but like, I just don't want this to happen again, you are still

Scott Benner 1:07:38
learning it. And by the way, your his scenario and your scenario are going to change drastically more frequently than people with older kids to

Brianna 1:07:47
make sure we have to go through like all the cycles, like oh, yeah,

Scott Benner 1:07:51
yeah. Oh, no, no, yes. But not just that, like, every time he puts five pounds on, everything's gonna change.

Brianna 1:07:56
Right. Right. True. Yeah. So So then, you know, also to think about people that like, you know, their access to supplies, like, you know, I said earlier with, like, the, you know, technology and things like that, you know, can they afford it? Do they have high deductibles, like, you know, things like that, will their doctor prescribe the technologies and then, you know, like, how much your life deviated from normal when diagnosis occurred, like I read about some people, like they're in the hospital, and like, for three days, and then they go back, and, you know, their kid has to go back to school the next week, or something like that, or two weeks. And, you know, like, they're pretty much like back to mostly normal. One of the things, you know, since the dka story was so long, like we actually on day three, while we were still in the hospital, Rob's family reached out to us and we're like, you guys need to move in with us. Like, you need to be able to focus on that boy, and, like, take care of him holy. And also, like, I knew I was gonna have to take time off of work. And like, the doctors, like we're expressing, like, this is like, serious, you know, obviously, and like, we don't know, like, this is going to be completely trial and error, obviously, like I was breastfeeding, and I was gonna have to be out of work. And like, we couldn't afford to keep our place. You know, we were in a rental. For six years, actually, it was a place I absolutely loved. And, you know, we just knew that we weren't going to be able to sustain that. And like, have me be off of work. So we made a decision on day three to give our landlord notice, like, because it was at the end of the month, it was the 29th when he was diagnosed that we were going to move out, we gave her 30 days notice and we actually ended up moving in with family that was about 45 minutes away. And we lived with him for nine months. And so you know, I think that it was I think it was really really good for us and then like Sometimes though, like obviously like isolating because like we were just focused on diabetes. Yeah, and like what was going on but like we really had to be we were giving the Lovenox injections. We had our so many follow ups. We also had to see a cardiologist because one of the things he was like profusely sweating too. And I think now like it was mostly happening when he was nursing and I think as well trigger was so high. Yeah. So thankfully, like, everything was good there. But he had to have like an echocardiogram. Like, there's just so much.

Scott Benner 1:10:06
I think I think if you're not at the top of a bell tower with a rifle, you're doing good. And so yeah, seriously, like, as long as you're holding and you see, listen, don't cheap, just look straight ahead and don't look at a clock. Do you know how long we've been talking?

Brianna 1:10:21
I know. Yeah. Like, like,

Scott Benner 1:10:23
I feel like if I keep recording, you'll you can keep talking. And that it would be interesting. And I think that's a reflection of how much you've been through in such a short amount of time. But you also seem like you're doing well considering?

Brianna 1:10:36
Yeah, I think that we've gotten to a point like we, we were there for nine months, we figured out like, you know, Rob was going to go back to work. And I was going to stay home with Kai. Back in June, we moved into the place we're at now we're, you know, back on our own, which was like a huge shift, because they, yeah, they were taking care of our meals or grocery shopping, things like that. And, you know, again, so it's like, just kind of getting back to that and having the meal plan and figuring out all the carbs for that and everything. But yeah, we're overall doing, you know, well, we really are trying to focus on He's amazing. And he's, you know, here, that's what Rob always like, emphasizes like, he's here. He's, he almost wasn't, yeah. Now you gotta listen, you imagine,

Scott Benner 1:11:18
I gotta tell you, like, I'm going to have you back on in like, two years. Because you're, you're going to look back on this time. And you're going to be like, Oh, my god, is that how it was? Because it's not good. It's just not going to feel like that anymore. And you don't know that now. I mean, and I can only tell you from having talked to so many people and seeing this happen over and over again. Obviously, you're, you know, nine months old is pretty young, but still I've had enough of these conversations. You will listen back to this. I swear to you in a couple of years and be like, Oh my god, like I don't even recognize that existence anymore. Like you're not going to be like this forever. So just keep going. Keep doing what you're doing. Like pay attention. You know, be diligent, learn new stuff, shift when he shifts and you're gonna be fine. And one. Listen, let me see if I can make you feel better. I'm gonna I'm gonna look at Arden's last Bolus.

Looks like she just put it in.

Yeah, she just she just had 20 carbs. Now Arden's insulin sensitivity has changed significantly because of ozempic. But she just had 20 grams a snack, it was 2.6 units. And since then, the algorithm has given her like another unit of insulin, as her blood sugar started to go up and her Basal is jacked up right now to like 2.4 an hour because the algorithm stopping a little bit of a spike. Point is, is that there will be a day that you'll be in a pizza place or something and you'll be like, alright, just use that 10 unit Bolus, let's go. And you're gonna think back to this and be like, Oh my God, I don't recognize these two things as being the same person, same life, but it's gonna be so yeah, I

Brianna 1:12:50
feel really hopeful. I'm just amazed by the like, just since he was diagnosed, how much technology has come out since then. And like a lot of like, the trials and things like that, but like Omnipod, fives been released since then. And you know, the Isla and, you know, multiple other

Scott Benner 1:13:06
g7 since then. Yeah, seven

Brianna 1:13:09
more common. Yeah. So there's like, I feel, I feel fortunate to be like, if he could be diagnosed in any time, like, I'm thankful for it to be this time. And, you know, we definitely are super hopeful for the future. But still, yeah, I just wanted to give hope to, you know, as they told us, you know, it was less than 1% that are diagnosed under one. And so like speaking back, all the way back to the beginning of our conversation, you know, about the rare things and here we are with, you know, now my son having this, you know, Rarity, like getting diagnosed under one of this, you know, it's just kind of crazy. But the one thing that like really helped to is there's, you know, seeing other really small children and, you know, like, I remember like frantically in the hospital, like searching the search bar for like, seven months, eight months, nine months, 10 months old, you know, like, trying to see like, what came up like the results? Like how many, you know, like, if were there other any, or were there any other kids? What's

Scott Benner 1:14:09
the I know my Facebook group is? Is this exceptional? I'm not. But what what's the best one for infants? Is it diapers and diabetes? diabetes?

Brianna 1:14:17
Yeah. Yeah. And I mean, that it's not the good thing is that they're like, not really competition, because it's not it's literally just a group.

Scott Benner 1:14:24
I mean, I meant exceptional in the in because it's, it's got a specific, well, it's a specific group of people. And they all Yeah, they all I mean, this is a niche of a niche of a niche of a niche, right, like, right person diabetes, but that's the that's the group I hear about most often that people say is helpful.

Brianna 1:14:41
And I think that I found divers and diabetes first and then I found your group from there. Somebody recommended that like when I was doing these searches, like I saw that in the comments, and I actually have like a screenshot that says Juicebox Podcast and then like, I looked that up later, and that's when I found your group. And so like, it's just, you know, No again, like, even like the podcast is amazing, but I'm so thankful for like just the resource of the group that you have like all of these, like super seasoned diabetics and diabetic parents and caregivers that are like all together. And they just like collaborate and like help people with their problems, whether it be like a mental health issue in that moment, or, you know, a technology issue in that moment, or how would people know to smack a Dexcom with a spoon to get it to release when it's stuck

Scott Benner 1:15:28
when Jesus would get stuck when it first came out? I

Brianna 1:15:30
remember that. Yes. Like, there's so there's like, it comes up a lot. Like, oh my gosh, my G sexist. Like the end, like people were like smacking with a spoon. Like, it's just so funny. But you would never know that. And it's all because like your group, and you know, just everything from the podcast, and I just, I'm super thankful that we were here when we found it.

Scott Benner 1:15:52
Like, I'm glad that it's helping you. I really am. I hope it my, at my funeral, somebody is gonna say that guy made a really great Facebook group. I don't know, even I'm stunned by how valuable it is for people, like you know, I mean, because I've said it on here before, I'm happy to reiterate, I didn't want to do it. I got like, you know, people that listen to podcasts were like, We need a place to talk about the podcast, I was like, Oh, I don't want to run a Facebook group. And then I did it now today. I mean, the last time I looked, it had 45 and a half 1000 members. Alright, it does, like 125 new posts a day. 8000 likes comments and hearts. And like just teeming with, like you said, All spectrum of the rainbow people who have had experience with type one, type two, Lada gestational, like there's so many people in there, and they're very good at talking to each other. And even the instances are very few and far between. And we and I take care of them very quickly, when they happen actually sounds very

Brianna 1:16:47
true. And that's the thing, too, is like, it's cool, because, you know, I can see in the threads, like you're responding to people and, you know, just like, it's important. It is like so it's not like it's like this, you know, unattainable thing?

Scott Benner 1:17:02
Yeah, no, I'm definitely in there. Because it's just, I mean, I see it as I see it for the value that it has, like it is it is providing something that healthcare can't provide. And

Brianna 1:17:14
that's the thing is, like, people don't realize, and that's the most frustrating thing. And I just wanted to mention this. I know I've talked a lot,

Scott Benner 1:17:20
you know, you definitely have to get the hell out of here. Yeah, sorry. My wife is texting me like, Hey, is everything okay?

Brianna 1:17:28
But the fat and protein thing like that is just I can not believe. And I just wonder how many people like are struggling day long? Because they don't know. Yeah, because they don't know. And like, if I wouldn't have learned that through the group and the podcast, and like, you know, one of the threads that had like the fat protein calculator, like, we use that all the time now, because we have to, like, he eats carbs. Like, we definitely don't restrict anything per se, but like, until he's a little older, where he can be like, Yeah, I'm 100% Eating what's on my plate, like we were, you know, definitely modest with, like, not going way overboard, that we would have to make up those carbs with something huge. So, you know, like, his meals are probably like 30 carbs, usually. And really well rounded meals, but like, he eats a lot of protein. And, you know, it's like we're we notoriously get, you know, spikes two hours after meal. Like, if we didn't have that resource, like, we would just be literally like, helpless, like we'd just be correcting all the time be like, well, well, I guess we missed the Bolus. And like, we wouldn't know that it wasn't from, like the carb count, you know? Yeah. And I think that can actually be really dangerous because like, how many people don't know that it's from the fat and protein and like, they're like, reaching out to endo to say like, Hey, like, they're going high after their meals, and like, say they missed the carb count, and then it ran into the protein fat rise, and they're like, Oh, you just need to like increase your carb ratio, and then they're like tanking them every time so it's like doesn't really know what

Scott Benner 1:19:00
you don't know, you don't know what variables are impacting at that point and you're chasing ghosts and you don't know what you're doing and it creates like a turn it's a tumble effect and then

Brianna 1:19:09
really going low again before they like then start going up from the fat protein. So it's just like, if like I just feel like there should be something that's told like I know that I'm trying to give like the do not die advice and like not trying to overwhelm people but just to say like hey, and also

Scott Benner 1:19:24
good long aware Good luck with that

Brianna 1:19:28
and protein can also turn to glucose after a certain amount of time and affect the blood sugar and you know, like we think like how early on like we were doing super low carb like when he was released and Rob and I said to each other like how much of it like that we were having problems that he was staying so I was probably from these like fat and protein rises.

Scott Benner 1:19:47
You're just in the beginning of all this so interesting to hear you talk about it, really? But I'm gonna stop talking. No, don't don't don't lie. I really appreciate you doing this and spending so much time obviously it's going to be a two part episode and you Although if it was up to me, I'd put it out like this. But I'm a person who listen to the three hour podcast, but not everybody loves them. So anyway, I really appreciate you doing this, I seriously would like you to stay in touch. And I really do think I'd like to have you back on in a couple of years. Like, I know, it seems like a long time, but I think there'll be a real valuable insight from this conversation to that one. Yeah, I

Brianna 1:20:20
think it'd be interesting to see as time goes on, and like you said, the weight gain and like the Omni pod guy, obviously, we plan on to staying on, you know, pods for a long time, it's really helped our control. And I mean, not that we know what MDI is like, but, you know, like, it's it's imperative for us, I think, was his age, but it'll be just really interesting to see. As he gains weight, like, do we still have those like drops? And like, how long does that last? Like, how long do we have to battle that? You know? Well, yeah, definitely.

Scott Benner 1:20:49
You're getting there. You're doing a great job. If somebody hasn't told you already. Let me be the one to tell you. I think you guys are doing terrific. And just keep it up. And I'm so happy that the group and the podcasts have been valuable for you. Thank you. Thanks for sharing this with

Brianna 1:21:02
me. All right. Well, thank you so much for today. And

Scott Benner 1:21:06
yeah, that's absolutely my pleasure. It's all I have to say you could talk your mind two and a half hours ago. You're like, I'm a little nervous. And I was like, like an hour ago. Is she talking about here? You're not nervous for sure. Hold on a second for me. Okay. Okay.

This episode of The Juicebox Podcast was sponsored by us med us med.com/juice box or call 888-721-1514 Get started today with us med links in the show notes links at juicebox podcast.com. If you'd like to wear the same insulin pump that Arden does, all you have to do is go to Omni pod.com/juicebox That's it. Head over now and get started today. And you'll be wearing the same tubeless insulin pump that Arden has been wearing since she was four years old. 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 GVOKEGLUC AG o n.com. Forward slash juicebox. Hey, thanks for listening all the way to the end. I really appreciate your loyalty and listenership. Thank you so much for listening. I'll be back very soon with another episode of The Juicebox Podcast. Subscribing to the Juicebox Podcast newsletter is this easy. You type juicebox podcast.com into a browser. Scroll to the bottom, put in your email address. Click Sign up. Hey, kids, listen up. You've made it to the end of the podcast. You must have enjoyed it. You know what else you might enjoy the private Facebook group for the Juicebox Podcast. I know you're thinking of Facebook, Scott, please but no. Beautiful group, wonderful people a fantastic community Juicebox Podcast, type one diabetes on Facebook. Of course, if you have type two, are you touched by diabetes in any way? You're absolutely welcome. It's a private group. So you'll have to answer a couple of questions before you come in. We'll make sure you're not a bot or an evildoer. Then you're on your way. You'll be part of the family. Hey, what's up everybody? If you've noticed that the podcast sounds better, and you're thinking like how does that happen? What you're hearing is Rob at wrong way recording doing his magic to these files. So if you want him to do his magic to you, wrong way, recording.com You got a podcast, you want somebody to edit it? You want Rob? All right, kids, we're done. We're at the end. Just do me one last favor, if you can, if you could please, if you have the need or the desire for something that one of the sponsors is providing, please use my links or my offer codes. They help the show so much. And that means me you're helping me to make this podcast every day. You're helping me to support the private Facebook group. Do all the things that I'm doing. I'm not asking you to buy something you don't want or something you don't need. But if you're gonna get one of these items, use my links or my offer codes. They helped me a ton. Thank you so much for listening and for supporting. I really do genuinely appreciate it. I'll be back very soon with another episode.

---

Please support the sponsors

The Juicebox Podcast is a free show, but if you'd like to support the podcast directly, you can make a gift here. Recent donations were used to pay for podcast hosting fees. Thank you to all who have sent 5, 10 and 20 dollars!

Donate