Selfish Sleeper

Sometimes I feel very selfish when it comes to my sleep. I often go to bed earlier than the boy because he's a snorer and I know if I'm asleep before he is I can usually make it through the night, even when he's sawing logs.

I have started to notice that I'm becoming more selfish when it comes to his diabetes as well.

This summer it seems like there have been more middle of the night lows than usual. In fact, it's been about 1 a week for the past month or so - there have even been a couple incidences where the paramedics have had to show up and help me get his glucose levels back up. And more times than not, if he makes it through the night, he's waking up in a low-blood sugar state.

A few weeks back I asked him what he used to do when he was living alone...how he dealt with all these lows. His answer was simply that he's more careful when he lives alone.

That didn't seem fair to me. So because he knows that I'm here to take care of him, he can be more lax with his personal diabetes care? Really?!

Last night was another low incident, though I'm pretty sure it wasn't because of insulin confusion this time, thankfully. But I woke up to him making all kinds of strange sounds in bed, so I grabbed his glucometer and tested for him...with his groggy permission of course.

Sure enough it read 28. Damn. Out of curiosity I checked the history and when he tested before bed he was at 36. So did he not juice up before coming to bed or did he take that much insulin with dessert that it was still dropping even after getting some more sugar?

Probably a question I will never know the answer to.

So I got him some juice, woke him up, made him drink it, then he fell right back asleep. I on the other hand, did not. I stared at the clock. 2:12 am. I laid there for 30 minutes to monitor his behavior, which was basically unchanged.

About the time he rolled onto his back and crowded me, I headed to the couch for some peace and quiet. I knew that laying there in bed, I wasn't going to get any sleep the rest of the night.

I'm getting used to sleeping on the couch a couple nights a week. I guess it's not so bad. At least I'm getting some restful sleep for part of the night.

I do feel like it's selfish to leave the bed, especially not knowing exactly where his blood sugar levels stand, but I'm starting to realize that I need sleep too - even if it's not in the same room as the love of my life.

A date with the paramedics

As we were cuddled up on the couch watching a movie last night, it struck me that, when it was time for his daily Lantus dose, I saw him drawing from his bottle of R.

But he assured me that he took 10 units of the fast-acting R just shortly before the Lantus dose to counteract the frozen yogurt dessert we were having.

I was skeptical, because I swore it was when he was supposed to be taking his long-lasting insulin, but I wasn't paying full attention so I didn't press the issue.

Though my bringing this up did get his attention, so he checked his blood sugar often for the next few hours.

At 11:30 it was 78. Good, he liked that number.

Then at midnight just before we started to doze off he tested again; the glucometer read LO. Just LO.

Sure enough, it's that damn insulin confusion again.

But he was walking and talking just fine, so when he went downstairs to drink some juice and have a cigarette to wait out the low, I didn't think much of it. We'd been watching a movie in bed that was about half way through, so I decided to take it to him downstairs to watch while I went to sleep.

Thank GOD I went downstairs when I did. He was standing, but the convulsions had started. Not 1 minute after I walked down those steps was he unable to stand on his own. He sat down on the coffee table, but could no longer hold himself up. I was holding him up as he spasmed in my arms.

I felt totally helpless. The juice bottle wasn't within reaching distance, and if I let him go to fetch it, he was going to hit the hardwood floor. Both cell phones were upstairs on the nightstand. I could do nothing aside from hold him up.

So I decided to get him to the floor. He wasn't super happy about it, but by the time I got him there he wasn't saying much of anything; convulsions continued.

I ran upstairs, grabbed my cell and dialed 911.

After explaining the situation, I opened the blinds so I knew when the paramedics would arrive.

Lucky for us, we're about 4 city blocks from the fire station, so it never takes long.

A local cop was the first to arrive. He was in the area and thought he'd stop to see if he could help. Nope- sorry dude. Turns out, he really was just bored; said there was nothing else going on tonight.

Honestly that pissed me off a bit. My living room is not the place for you at 2:30 am, sorry guy! But of course, I couldn't exactly kick him out. And once the paramedics arrived, I had other things on my mind.

Luckily, he was startled out of it by the 4 random people in our house and he was able to get up and drink some juice. I think the juice he'd had before they got there was finally kicking in. He was up to 29 at least. And holding a pretty nice conversation I might add.

When that happens and he actually doesn't need medical attention, I always feel a little bad, 1) for waking up the paramedics, and 2) for the unnecessary attention from strangers that he has to endure.

After they left he apologized for the insulin mix up and scaring me. I can't say it's something I've even remotely gotten used to, but I have become more comfortable picking up the phone and dialing 911. I used to hesitate, not knowing if I could get him to consume enough sugar to bring him back. But sometimes it's just best to have the extra help.

I'm a pretty small girl, and he's 6 foot+, 185 lbs of pure muscle. Sometimes I'm scared that I might get hurt while trying to help him or move him.

Though I have to say, I'm one of the lucky ones, because he's far from violent. In fact, even through his convulsions last night he continued to use what was left of his strength to wrap his arms around me and ask me to hug him.

As he laid on the floor, nearly unconscious, I continued to rub his arms and tell him how much I love him - and hearing those words he'd squeeze my hand.

I'm thankful that I'm not one of those caregivers who wonders if they'll get hit during a low.

After another half hour or so we checked again and he was up to 93. Good to go to bed!

But of course, that didn't make me sleep easy. Throughout the night as he snored away, I continued to wake up at the slightest movement and touch his head/neck to make sure he wasn't sweating and to ask him every time he rustled if he was okay.

I suppose that's what's going to happen when you're a worry wart like me. Though, as I tell myself, it's better to be too concerned than not at all. After all, if I wasn't, what would have happened at 2:30 this morning?

Insulin Confusion

Here's something I don't get: why do all insulin bottles look the same?

Shouldn't the fast-acting have some sort of flag on it so that users don't get it confused with the long-lasting insulin vile?

I mean, really?!

Last week we had an incident where, when it came time for the daily Lantus® dose, 15 units of the fast-acting insulin were injected by mistake. About 20 minutes later, I caught this mistake as I was arranging items in the refrigerator.

After consuming a large glass of apple juice and finding something to munch on to offset this mistake, he proceeded to apologize profusely, since we were going to have to stay up for a couple extra hours to monitor blood sugar (and behavior changes, just in case he dropped quick - that's where I tend to come in handy).

I of course was just happy that we caught this before going to bed - this most certainly would have gone badly in the middle of the night.

But it got me to thinking, how often does this happen? Of those times where we've dealt with 3AM crashes, how many were because of insulin confusion? Did a mistake just like this one cause him to wake with a blood sugar of 29 the next morning (and consider himself lucky that he's still standing)?

I've considered marking the fast-acting insulin bottles with giant red marks, but I don't want to encroach on his routine. For the most part, he's made this work for him over the years, and who am I to insert myself and start mucking things up? But I can't help but want to make things easier, and healthier, for him in the long run.

Anyone experience this situation before? How do you keep the insulin bottles straight as to avoid issues such as this?