Day in the Life of a Type One
Good Morning Everyone. When I was on Instagram recently I saw this really interesting campaign created by @diabetesia.se and @pioneersyoungsverige called the #sTr1peD campaign created for Diabetes Awareness Month. The idea of the challenge is to show the world what it is like to live with T1Ds by marking every single decision or thought you have about diabetes on your hand throughout one day. Which I thought was just the most amazing idea, so I thought I would join in to end Diabetes Awareness Month.
So, throughout my day I had 29 thoughts about diabetes. I am going to document them all below so you can see exactly what diabetes-related things crossed my mind on this particular day. But, most of them were actions I had to do, like testing or bolusing. Some were thoughts that I had about things I had to do or felt. AND some were worries I had or moaning that I did throughout the day. I could have had like DOUBLE the stripes but as you will see, I kept certain things as one stripe where I could have split them into 2 or 3, but I thought that would be better for the sake of keeping this blog short and sweet.
Thursday 28th November 2019
For a bit on background, this was just a standard day off for me, I am currently at university but wasn’t in lessons or anything that day. So I spent the day just doing some uni work, relaxing, gyming and watching Netflix.
STRIPE 1- 6.30AM. I know what you’re thinking, ‘damn this girl wakes up early on her day off’...NO NO NO.
I like my sleep, a lot. Unfortunately for me, I woke up to pee so thought I’d test whilst I was at it. I was a teeny bit on the higher side so I did a correction and back to bed.
STRIPE 2- 9.00AM. I actually woke up here, I’ll tell you a secret but usually I sleep way TOO MUCH, so I am trying to get up at a reasonable time, I don’t like it but I feel better for it. Here, was another test, levels were good.
STRIPE 3- Pump started beeping at me to let me know I had so many units of insulin left so I knew I’d be changing my pump at some point today.
STRIPE 4- Here I had a little inside moan about the fact I’d be changing my pump site later, IM LAZY.
STRIPE 5- 9.30AM. Breakfast time. This is one of those times I could have counted way more stripes because I had to test, check the food labels, carb count and bolus but I rolled it all into one.
STRIPE 6- 11.30AM. Now I pee’d like three times since my breakfast so I thought my glucose might have been high so another test for me. I wasn’t actually high, I just pee a lot apparently.
STRIPE 7- 12.00PM. I wanted to go to the gym so I tested before I started getting ready, didn’t want to be too high or low before heading to the gym.
STRIPE 8- Packing my gym pack, getting all my supplies together. Testing kit, hypo treatment, PDM, more hypo treatment blah blah.
STRIPE 9- Time to drive. Whenever you drive your glucose has to be ‘5 to Drive’ so I always test beforehand to check I am okay.
STRIPE 10- 12.30PM. At the gym, test again and decided whether I am going to need a temp basal on or not.
STRIPE 11- 1.00PM. Checked again to make sure I wasn’t dropping low during cardio.
STRIPE 12- 1.30PM. Finished the gym, so CHECKING AGAIN.
STRIPE 13- Driving home from the gym, didn’t check again because I had done it only a few minutes before but it crossed my mind.
STRIPE 14- 1.55PM. Guess what…checking again. Deciding whether I need a temp basal to keep me from hypoing a little later on.
STRIPE 15- 2.15PM. Lunch time. More testing, carb counting, bolusing.
STRIPE 16- 4PM. I actually had 2 hours of no thoughts (may or may not have been napping). But, I was snacky so I tested and bolused again.
STRIPE 17- 5.30PM. HYPO. Corrected my hypo.
STRIPE 18- Decided to change my temp basal to try and prevent anymore hypos.
STRIPE 19- 6.00PM. Just another test to check I was okay after my hypo.
STRIPE 20- 6.30PM. Tea time. Testing, carb counting, blousing.
STRIPE 21- 7.30PM. I did a guesstimate for my tea so checked to see how the glucose were doing.
STRIPE 22- 8.20PM. Knew I needed to do a pod change so moaned about doing a pod change.
STRIPE 23- 8.30PM. Actually did the pod change.
STRIPE 24- 8.45PM. Just doing another glucose test.
STRIPE 25- 9.15PM. Glucose were on the lower side, not quite hypo so I changed my temp basal.
STRIPE 26- 9.30PM. Bedtime snack, I am a snacky person okay. No bolus because I didn’t want another hypo.
STRIPE 27- 10.00PM. Checking glucose again, still thinking about not wanting to hypo.
STRIPE 28- 10.30PM. About to go to sleep, so checking my glucose a final time.
STRIPE 29- The final diabetes thought for Thursday the 28th of November- worrying about hypoing overnight.
It was so crazy taking part in the #sTr1peD campaign, 29 times where I was taking care of my diabetes or it was on my mind. Sometimes you just don’t realize how much time you give a day to your type one diabetes!! Check out the campaign on Instagram and join in to spread awareness for T1D! Cally x
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