To say I am a fan of this device is quite the understatement. I am not. A continual glucose monitor reads your blood glucose every 15 minutes and will warn you before you are about to be super high or super low. If you are sleeping, it dings constantly until you awaken to check your blood sugar. One would think "if this checks your blood sugar every 15 minutes, no more poking your poor banged up fingers right?" ...absolutely not. First off, you have to "calibrate" the device every 6-12 hours and sometimes if not calibrated correctly the readings are WAY off. One day it was dinging at me that my blood sugar was 344, after quickly checking with my meter, I discovered I was really 162 and fine. I will admit, it has woken me up and saved me from crashing a few times, and yes I understand the necessity of this medical device which is sometimes quite uncomfortable. I thought I, myself would be brave and show everyone exactly how not fun this thing is to put on.
I remember sitting in the waiting room before my training thinking to myself, "you haven't even looked at this thing yet, you better see what you're in for..." 10 seconds later I was on my feet informing my mom we were going home. What I saw looked way worse than the "piercer" for my pump and on top of that, when I asked the instructor if this hurt, she flippin' paused. ...GREAT! Her response ended up being "if you insert it correctly then no..." not the answer I wanted to hear. I made it through class once again with a new device now attached to my other side. Scared, angry, sore and confused summed up a lot of how I felt towards life and my body in general.
Back to this oh so lovely process. Please note I am not the smallest girl ever so taking pictures of my abdomen was a little nerve racking. :) This is by far my most personal post physically but I figured instead of taking pictures off of the internet, I would be brave and just show you my body and my way!
Not my prettiest picture, I had just got done working out and ready for a bubble bath
My Little Box of Life
-I have so many pictures of this part due to the fact that I was taking forever to convince myself to "shoot" it into my abdomen.
Third-I hold the gun flat footed which is at a 90 degree angle. My instructor told me to hold it up a little higher to avoid irritation.
I keep the "feet" of the "gun" flat and then raise it up a bit
Fourth-comes the lovely part of clicking the button on the gun, which shoots the long needle quickly into you. What should be the fastest part of this entire process is actually the longest. It usually takes me a bit to work up the courage to intentionally inflict pain upon myself. I'll change where I want to place the sensor, take more deep breaths then suddenly "BAM" I pushed it.
I have to take the gun apart from the sensor
Fifth-Next I have to take out the long needle. You do this by squeezing the two sides and drawing out the needle in one swift motion.
The needle is still in there, you have to draw the needle out at a 90 degree angle aslo
Sixth-You have to put plenty of pressure on the sensor because usually you bleed after the needle is taken out, and if you bleed too much the sensor will not work.
The needle after taking it out of my stomach
Bleeding just a little
Seventh-Leave the sensor in for a minimum of 30 minutes before attaching the monitor.
Waiting my 30 minutes to connect my monirot
Compared to the size of a quarter
Eighth-After attaching the monitor you put your tape and cover over the sensor, this was the hardest par,t other than getting the courage to shoot my abdomen, due to the fact that I, nor my mom could figure out the tape... and she's an RN. lol
The monitor in it's charger waiting to be connected
The first part of taping it all up
Finally you connect the sensor with your pump by pushing a lot of buttons on your pump followed by a 2hr fast. After two hours it will ding you to check your blood sugar and calibrate.
The end result
My pump set on the other side, getting ready to be moved to the same side coinciding with my sensor
Overall, this process is relatively quick and not as painful at all as I am sure I lead on, just frustrating as much of this disease is. I wear my sensor three days on three days off, just to give myself a little break. I am woken up almost every night I wear it due to myself not calibrating it correctly, forgetting to calibrate is period, or if I am going low, or high. It literally makes you check your blood sugar in the middle of the night. I have became a little bit self conscious of the sensor when it comes to staying the night somewhere else. Recently my mom and I stayed in a hotel room together out of town and she woke up probably four or five times due to my sensor dinging me. I kept silencing it because I just wanted to sleep and it has become a habit. She finally woke me up and made me check my blood sugar which was fine, I had just calibrated it wrong. She was so tired of the dinging and quite annoyed. In a way I was happy she got to see exactly why I dislike this thing so much but at the same time it made me more self conscious. I don't want to be sleeping over at a friend's house and annoy them with this loud device or get yelled at. I have already planned on not wearing it around when I stay with people. I will soon not care and get this device figured out but all I can think on a daily basis is:
GOD BESS THE POOR MAN THAT WILL HAVE TO PUT UP WITH ME!!! :)
