Exasperation...

It looks so sweet, don't it?

It looks like it should work as prescribed, meaning that it should lower my lower by blood sugar within a half-hour or so.

But it doesn't.

I am in the middle of a test at the moment. I ate a HUGE lunch today (boyfriend's birthday lunch at a buffet!), so I took 4 units of the insulin to the left while eating from my new bottle. Then I came back home and slept. Four hours later, my glucose level was 249 (This was at 5 pm). Thinking that perhaps I hadn't taken enough with lunch, I took 2 units of Novolog and resolved to eat in about an hour. An hour later, my blood glucose was in the 260s! I don't believe my stomach should still be digesting carbohydrates, so I don't think my small intestine suddenly released another round of glucose into my veins. I think the Novolog- even the new, shiny, free Novolog- either isn't working or is not working as it should.

The only way for me to find out is to keep testing each hour without eating or exerting myself. In 30 minutes, I'll test again. Hopefully it will be normalized then. Even if it is, however, I don't want it. Rapid acting insulin is useful because it works quickly and prevents huge spikes. If it doesn't do that, it's nearly worthless. But I can't go back to Humalog- before I ceased to take that, it was causing full-body hives and elevated pulse... NOT GOOD.

If NovoLog doesn't work right, what in the world can I do, though? God help me.

Yeah, Yeah, Yeah, the insulin's back..

A few days ago, I realized that my fast-acting insulin was not just not fast, but it was not acting. It had somehow gone bad and was not working to bring down my blood sugars. Because my pancreas still has some function and because my long-lasting was going strong, this wasn't an emergency (and perhaps would not have ever been one). However, it did leave me with only two options: 1. hover at 150-200 mg/dL all day, every day, until the time had come for my insurance to pay for a new bottle (20 days), or eat a restricted diet of either low-carb foods or VERY LITTLE medium carb foods.

I wasn't happy. I wasn't happy not just because I had two crappy options, but because I had/have so little control over these things now. No healthy pancreas have I to balance out my life, to prevent all the menacing complications, to help my entire endocrine system (NOT JUST INSULIN, BE THEE NOT FOOLED) to work properly as a human's should. Just two bottles of insulin, and if one's gone...

After a couple of days of major diabetes angst and pessimism, I- well, my mom, really- made the long trek to All Children's hospital where they gave us two free bottle of Novolog. I felt quite ecstatic, and I promised myself that I would begin to experiment with eating higher carbohydrate (80g or so per meal) and covering it with insulin (because that is my new plan*). Yet... Today, my waking blood sugar was 192... Which is really quite odd. It's typically 70 or so.

Anyhow. I don't want to be down Yes: this disease SUCKS, and it's not so unimportant as it might seem. Insulin keeps us alive, but sometimes, it does little else. Yet I hope the physiology of the disease will not change me. I don't want to be cranky, on edge, or as stressed as I've been lately. I don't want to act meanly, rashly, or selfishly (though to survive my thoughts must revolve around myself about 50% of the time..). I also don't want to lose any of my cognitive function, as some tests show can happen with type 1s. I guess that's my prayer, though it's still selfish: God, please help me and all other diabetics to manage the disease, be strong, utilize it as a way of honoring You and loving others, and please, if you could, don't take away my-or their- intellect. Amen.

*I've been looking into vegan nutrition and have decided I'm really going to analyze my diet to ensure I am getting adequate calcium, zinc, vitamin e, and lysine. I've been putting everything into cronometer.com as of late and have come up good- except in those areas. I am trying to fill in the gaps with "whole foods," so I've been eating beans 2x or more a day, drinking my fortified soy/hemp/almond milks daily, and eating a serving of wheat germ once or twice a day... Among other things. Even though I've heard (the probably true accusation) that insulin is sneakily designed to erradicate all your pancreatic function, rendering you sicker and more dependent on drugs, I figure I'll be healthiest if I am consistently reaching the RDI (in fact, I reach higher than it; I take Jack Norris' suggestions) of all vitamins and minerals.

But I hardly know..