Well, we pulled the trigger and got our daughter the upgrade for her Minimed insulin pump to a Revel with the Continuous Glucose Monitor. I warned her it was coming, but I was not prepared for the resistance to putting the sucker on her.
The pump is great, the CGM sensors, not so much. They are freakin' huge needles and it took me one hour to convince her to let me put it on her. We iced her bum, we talked, we cajoled, we pleaded, we reasoned, but the only reason she consented was because we had a birthday party to go to, the clock was ticking and I refused to back down.
We had to establish the rules of engagement. Three kisses, then I had to count to three, but I couldn't touch her with the inserter until three. Then I had to say "ok" before I pushed the button.
She did it and cried like a baby. Said it hurt like hell. It bled a little, but she said it hurt for a good 20 minutes, but she was fine by the time we reached the party.
We didn't start the sensor until after the party and the sensor had its wick wet, so calibration was immediate. She thought it was pretty cool when the blood sugar numbers finally popped up on the screen of her pump.
She watched it through the afternoon and into evening. We'd ask, "Have you taken your blood sugar lately?" with a smile and she would whip out her pump and tell us the number.
We calibrated at bedtime, but she lost the sensor around 11:00 pm. I positioned it closer to her Minilink Transmitter and she was fine, until 3:00 am. She came in and said she was high, so I wanted to check against her meter and it was off. CGM said 315, meter said 230. That was significant enough for me, because the calibration had about the same difference earlier in the evening. I sat in the dark and decided to turn off the CGM and restart the sensor.
By morning things seemed to match, but she was still running high. She took some Advair for breathing difficulties and I know that was shooting her blood sugars up. She called me from school and said the thing was beeping all morning. High blood sugars, missed bolus warnings, even though she bolused. I reminded her it is going to take time to balance her insulin levels to match what is happening in her body. When that happens, she hopefully won't hear any beeps at all .
More in my next post, but I'm not sure I will be able to convince her to put that sensor on again. We'll see. More later.
