a little history of insulin

This link has a super interesting video about the History of Insulin that i thought y'all might want to take a look at.  It's quite eye opening, exciting, and sad all at the same time.

http://www.joslin.org/info/History_of_Insulin.html

it really breaks my heart to think that had we lived in pre insulin times, i would simply be watching my sweet little girl wasting away... starving to death and i wouldn't be able to do anything about it...it horrifies me....

               insulin is just a treatment though... and we need a cure

dairy free, gluten free, ?sugar free?!

This giant cupcake with an obscene amount of icing is what happens when this sugar deprived momma goes to the store by myself.... and then i start eating the icing in the car.... shameful.

So i got to go to the grocery store today, by myself!  we needed more cotton balls for finger/toe/injection site cleaning, and i NEEDED something ridiculously high in sugar to eat... we don't keep much in the house b/c i don't want joey seeing us eating things she shouldn't be having.  But i have a horrible sweet tooth, i mean it has historically been ridiculous.  Eating around my house has taken on a whole new meaning anyways.  I have to eat dairy free, mostly soy free and now we're eating gluten free too.  S & C can't tolerate dairy or soy if I eat it, and Joey and I (and the babies) have recently gone gluten free.... My poor husband is basically starving, or eating out, or eating whatever he can scrounge up. 
So what did I end up with today... That's right, this giant cupcake that i asked the bakery to put more icing on for me...i only eat the icing, so no flour and no dairy, impressively enough, also NO benefit to me nutritionally, but man, did that icing taste amazing!
I'm pretty sure this makes me a horrible mom, sneaking around to eat icing...
I'll work on being better.... when i'm done with the icing on this cupcake :)

http://jdrfevents.donordrive.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=donorDrive.participant&participantID=15320
go Team JDRF!!

document document document....

joey's blood sugar over the past week... not too bad, but not too good either.... lows are basically every morning and highs are every nite. 

so, i thought it'd be interesting for those out there who don't know what blood glucose ranges type 1 diabetics see on a regular basis, well, these  are the ones we see every day.  These are joey's numbers from the past week.  We check about 7-10 times a day.  When someone says "oh, they manage their diabetes well,"  this actually mean that their life is pretty much consumed by these numbers and trying to get them into the correct range.  Yep, that's our life... consumed by the numbers that pop up on our little glucometer screen.  If this was a graph of my blood glucoses, pretty much every one would be within the green range 80-110.  Well, as you can see, that's not quite the case with Type 1 diabetes, no matter how well you're managed... and like i said, this is a good week.

i am however, very grateful for this program, diabetes pilot, that lets me document everything on my phone and then i can sync it to my computer and email joey's doc all the info every week (glucoses, carbs/fat per meal, insulin given, exercise done, and more).... oh yes, so i must document EVERYTHING!!!  good thing i'm a nurse and have learned to document everything already... i just didn't think i'd be doing it in my everyday life.

go team Shamrock Marathon team JDRF !!

http://jdrfevents.donordrive.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=donorDrive.participant&participantID=15320

Thoughts from my crazy mind

thoughts from my crazy mind:
 I find it incredibly tough to ever turn my mind off these days... constantly thinking about joey, how she's feeling, what the high blood sugars are doing to her little body in the long run, what the low blood sugars can do to her in the short run... what could happen if i ever sleep though my alarms in the middle of the night and miss taking her sugar when she's having a low blood glucose.  what if she doesn't wake up? it's enough to make a momma crazy... then my mind goes to the very real risk that S & C have of also eventually having Type 1 Diabetes... ugh...I know my mom would say that i shouldn't worry, but seriously, how can i not worry.

Joey at the JDRF walk with her "faces of Diabetes" sign...one month after diagnosis

joey with her boyfriends/supporters.  we LOVE us some Jacob and Dylan!

So as I said on my last post I have decided that running the Shamrock Marathon in March is the best way to put all my efforts and energy into raising funds for those with Type 1 Diabetes.  My sweet little Joey girl depends on ground breaking research that the JDRF funds.  Can you believe that less than 85 years ago, those diagnosed with type 1 diabetes died within a year or so... Basically their bodies starved to death because they lacked the functioning beta cells to produce the insulin that moves the glucose into the cells that gives us energy to do anything and everything we do... like breathe.

another day, another run in the triple jogging stroller... we have to bring her whole diabetes kit... glucometer, insulin, glucagon, emergency sugar supplements, snacks, water, carb free snacks, and even more.... everytime we go out the door

Running a marathon is tough work, but fighting every second of every day against the horrible disease of Type 1 diabetes is even more difficult.
Maybe one day she won't have to wake up multiple times at night to have her blood glucose taken, to have to eat food or get insulin...
Maybe one day she'll be able to have a bite to eat without thinking of how many carbs are in it and how much insulin she needs to have in order to counteract the effect of the sugar....
Maybe one day she won't have to have over 10 pricks and shots a day just to keep her alive...

my little thug princess showing off her "full sleeve" of princess tattoos

 but until then, i'll work my butt off to raise all the money i can, all the awareness i can, and all the support i can, because my sweet girl's life depends on it. 

http://jdrfevents.donordrive.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=donorDrive.participant&participantID=15320

Did you know that a sibling of someone with T1D has a 1/10-1/20 chance of developing T1D!  This is up from the 1/400 chance that everyone has...  Think about giving a donation as a Christmas gift, birthday gift, tax free end of the year donation, anything you can think of, because truly, this means EVERYTHING to my family. 

sweet joey so excited to be leaving the hospital after spending 3 days there after her diagnosis with type 1 diabetes

Attempting to restart blogging, and taking a whole new spin on things...

So, life has taken a crazy turn since the last time i wrote here over 2 years ago.  This blog is going to emphasize healthy living, of course, but it's also going to focus on caring for and living with a child with type 1 diabetes...

the day joey was diagnosed with type 1 diabetes.  all she wanted to eat was grapes and we couldn't let her until we got her blood sugar down.... so grape tomatoes had to suffice....

I am currently raising money for the JDRF (juvenille Diabetes research foundation)

which supplies BY FAR the most amount of money for research to prevent, treat and one day cure Type 1 Diabetes.

this is how we train for the shamrock marathon, although i don't really make joey push the triple stroller too often

 I will be running the Shamrock Marathon in March for team JDRF.    This organization is like a lifeline that I can pour my efforts and energy into and really know that I am doing the best I can to help improve the health of my child.  I have put the link for my fundraising page on here..

http://jdrfevents.donordrive.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=donorDrive.participant&participantID=15320

http://jdrfevents.donordrive.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=donorDrive.participant&participantID=15320

 take a look if you have time.  And know that if you donate to the JDRF, either through my link/team page, or in another manner, your money is going to an amazing cause that is basically a lifeline for thousands of people like my sweet little girl.  thanks for taking time to read this, and i'll be updating it more often than once every 2 years :)
here is a great article that and i thought it was very inspirational, sad, and informational.  regardless of whether Type 1 diabetes effects you, you really have to have respect for those that live with it and are effected by it.
http://www.foxnews.com/health/2011/05/31/man-celebrates-85-years-living-diabetes/

breaks my heart that diabetes causes so many health effects, especially glaucoma and diabetic retinopathy.  i can't imagine anything but perfection when i look at my sweet joey's eyes

aresenic and lace... well, not quite... part 1 of ?

DISCLAIMER:  prepare yourselves... this is a LONG one, but super informative... so please read!!!
 part 1


I have a confession, which is definitely NOT going to come as a shock to many.... i am an HGTV junky.  Since we moved into our house almost 4 years ago, we have redone the following: (feel free to skip this section  if you want)

-new carpet throughout, retiled, gutted and redesigned our gorgeous bathroom with custom tile tub after we had already redone it partially, new backdoor after we had already put new molding up around the old one, gutted den, retiled, new insulation, recessed lighting, fan, surround sound wired, drywalled walls and ceiling, repainted the entire house, some rooms twice, took out the wall at the bottom of the stairs and made a custom bench with lifting top and storage and storage drawers underneath, redone and reorganized laundry room with all new shelving (but we do need to tile it), redone downstairs bathroom, repainted cabinets twice, new hardware, new counters/sink/range/hood/dishwasher, getting ready to scrape the ceiling and put in new lighting in the kitchen, new fans in 3 bedrooms, new railings for the staircase, stained deck, 2 new patios and a pathway between them, with a fence around the beautiful organic garden we put in too, new trellis, reorganized hall closets upstairs and downstairs, painted, tiled and new shelving

-there might be more, but i don't remember, and really i'm impressed if you made it this far down the list...

all of this to say, I remember when my dad was putting in the trellis and we were using "salt treated" wood, he said something about chemicals that were being used to treat the wood... as it is often my husband doing the wood working (my circular saw skills are only about par on a good day) i hadn't even thought about wood being treated with chemicals.

so then this morning, i, of course have HGTV on and they are demo-ing a deck. i'm thinking to myself, i sure hope they are going to re-purpose that wood, but as they are throwing it all away, the host of the show says basically under his breath "we have to get rid of all this wood because it's pre 2003 and was treated with arsenic"...YEP, YOU JUST READ THAT CORRECTLY... ARSENIC!!...WHAT!?! 

i was dumbfounded...so i did what any normal person would do and googled it.  what i found out shocked me, so i'll try to summarize:

Arsenic exposure can also lead to nerve damage, dizziness, numbness, immune diseases, cardiovascular disease, diabetes, and changes in hormone function. Lung and bladder cancer are the two health effects most often related to exposure to CCA (chromated copper arsenate)-treated wood.
The worst part of this whole thing is that there were/are no regulations about labeling such wood, so we really don't know what was and wasn't treated as CCA wood was used from 1970 until 2003.... this means picnic benches, decks, railings, playset and more us and our kids are around, play on, have food sitting on, eat off of, etc... and when it rains and this stuff gets wet, the arsenic leaches off and onto the ground and then kids, pets, etc play on the ground and can get arsenic poisoning in this manner as well...

Yet another problem... there is still plenty of wood out there being sold that has arsenic in it, the manufacturers had tons of it and were not made to properly dispose of it, but rather just sell it until it's gone... this is crazy to me!

Here's a great passage from an amazing website that really explains why kids are at such risk for housing/building related hazards:

Although housing-related health hazards are a concern for people of every age group, young children are at special risk from health hazards in their homes. Young children spend the vast majority of their time in the home and they are most vulnerable biologically. Children’s bodies take in proportionately greater amounts of environmental toxins than adults, and their rapidly developing organs are especially vulnerable to pollutants. Since children naturally crawl and play on the floor, they are in direct contact with areas where contaminants accumulate, and they are likely to ingest those contaminants through their normal hand-to-mouth behavior and play.

http://www.afhh.org/ahh/ahh_main.htm

i will continue this rant topic in my next blog, but wanted to get this info out ASAP as you may want to be extra careful ...

on another note... today is my daughter's first birthday :)  Happy first birthday, joey!!!
ps, sorry but no pictures :( iphoto is not being cooperative :(

electro-what?

sorry, let me finish the new kitchen counters, etc, and i'll get to the green remodel....

okay, so anyone who knows me knows that i truly deeply love three things (well, really i love more than that, but for the purposes of this post, i'll just focus on three) 1-running, 2-the beach, 3-snowboarding.  so, of course this means that my poor little kiddo gets drug around to all of these places (from 100 plus this summer to -10 degrees and 10,000 feet up in keystone colorado).  i am a good motivated mom and have some guilt that my habits may be somewhat annoying my daughter, so i try my best to make sure she's as happy as she can be while we're out in the heat ( or at altitude). 

getting ready to go up the gondola

at the top of keystone

at the continental divide in loveland, colorado, like 11 or 12,000 feet

running at keystone

heading out for a run back at home

She's had coconut water to help combat altitude sickness when we went from 0-10,000+ feet in 1 day, on all of our hot runs, and at the beach.  I started her on it at around 5 1/2 months and she's Loved it ever since!

about 5 years ago on a yoga teacher training trip to costa rica, i learned all about the awesomeness of coconut water.  now, i do love coconut, so when my friend and i were laying out on the beach, and a nice man was walking up and down the beach dragging a cooler behind him and asked us if we wanted a coconut, i thought, "when in rome..." and said yes.  He pulled out chilled coconuts from the cooler and took a screw driver and put a hole through the rind and gave them to us.  heaven, i tell you!! 

(no, this is not the man in costa rica, this is my hot husband when we were in key west.  i was 26 weeks preggo, and he was being a good hubby and shimmied up a coconut tree for me )

okay, i know the following is a lot of information, but just take a glance through it.  i bet you'll learn a LOT you didn't know about coconut water:

Coconut water is a naturally isotonic fluid, meaning it has the same properties and electrolyte levels as your blood does.  (it has even been used in IV form !). This means it hydrates extremely well!!

"Coconut water is the very stuff of Nature, biologically Pure, full of Natural Sugars, Salts, and Vitamins to ward off fatigue and is the next wave of energy drinks BUT natural", according to Mortin Satin, Chief of the United Nation's Food & Agriculture Organization.

• Coconut water contains more potassium 294 mg sports drinks 117 mg
• Coconut water has less sodium 25mg, sports drinks have around 41mg
• Coconut water has 5mg of Natural Sugars where sports and energy drinks range from 10-25mg of Altered Sugars.
• Coconut water is very high in Chloride at 118mg, compared to sports drinks at about 39mg.

Data is based on a 100ml drink from http://www.knowledgebase-script.com/demo/article-320.html

All of this to say, i have been giving my daughter coconut water all summer long.  i know the people at the children's hospital thought i was def. a nut when i told them, no thanks, i brought my own drink to give her,  no pedialyte for this kiddo.  but why would i ever give her artificial colors/flavors when there is such a better option out there?!!  

for those of you out there who HATE coconut, don't worry, it doesn't taste very coconutty, it's the water from an unripe coconut, NOT the milk that is fatty once it starts to ripen and absorb with the coconut meat.

my daughter and me at the beach

My favorite brand here in the states, since it's hard to just get a fresh young coconut in Virginia, is Vita-Coco. http://www.vitacoco.com/  and you can recycle the container :) 

the best coconut water ever!!!