foran_object

My Diabetes, my job, my lifestyle, my health and my future

A part of me really enjoys the fact that my job often entails that I travel to far away lands. Getting to live life somewhat differently, experience different culture, and see different sights has truly enlarged my understanding of the world, and to some extent has partially raised a veil of ignorance that I’ve always had regarding many aspects of the human race.

For me, a typical overseas trip pulls my stress level way up however. Two problems that consistently plague me are my inability to adjust to local time, and inexplicably bad blood sugar episodes.

I left for Germany this past Sunday, and it’s now early Friday morning. I’m still waking up in the middle of the night and then lying in bed for hours, too tired to do anything, but too awake to sleep. At 4:15 AM this morning, I awoke feeling sick. Managing my eating, exercise/exertion/stress, and my thus my blood sugars, is always a challenge on a trip, so right away I headed for my blood glucose meter. 19.6. This is very bad. In the 14 years that I’ve had Diabetes, I’ve been above 18 less than 20 times. All, except 2-3, have been within the last two years.

I’ve always chosen to make life decisions that most people would not call conservative, especially considering my Diabetes. I’ve run 10 Km races, all without adequate training. Once I even ran after being up all night partying, although at least I didn’t drink. I’ve stayed up all night partying and drinking. I’ve eaten an incredibly diverse range of foods from chocolate bars to sushi. From authentic curries prepared by real Indian people to the Tiramisu that I ate tonight for dessert at the Italian restaurant, and that most definitely contributed to my 19.6 blood sugar. I have pushed my body physically to almost exhaustion, hiking, working for a moving company, and most recently doing construction work on my building. I’ve damaged my body by breaking bones, spraining ankles, cutting myself.

My point is basically that I have not let my diabetes limit my life much, if at all. I try hard to manage my blood sugars. I’m certainly not ignorant of the situation. Sometimes I test as much as 10 times in a day.

<< I have more to say, but it I feel like crap, and I’m tired. I’ll continue this later>>>

posted by foran  # 9:29 PM