We don’t have many opportunities to sleep in at our house.. We usually suffer from a lack of sleep during the week so I cherish the few weekends when we can sleep in an extra hour or so… I’m not talking about the sleep in of years past – I’m talking until 7.30 – 8am here people… and boy is it nice..!
Today I got to sleep in – I rolled over and looked at the clock and it was almost 8am… WOW – at that particular moment my bed felt SO GOOD…
I momentarily thought of rolling back over and closing my eyes until I remembered I needed to be up and out to look after my best friends puppy dogs – she was out of town and it was my job to take them out and feed them.. No big deal – I need to get up to feed my OWN puppy dogs who I am surprised are not begging to go out by now…
I grab my computer, check my email and then it hits me..
OMG – HOLY CRAP – OH NO – @#$! …..
TOTAL – COMPLETE and utter PANIC..
Let’s go back in time so I can explain…
Eden’s insulin pump alarmed last night that she had a low reservoir – this alarm goes off when it gets down to 15 units… 15 units of insulin can last her quite a while if she is not eating and correcting a high blood sugar. We had just had dinner – she had dosed and we had all just sat down to watch TV after another busy afternoon when I heard her pump alarm…
I don’t always hear it alarm – and Eden RARELY tells me if it DOES alarm so when I hear it I always ask her how many units are left… She can press a button scroll down and it tells her how many units are left in her pump… Last night she said 7 units… SEVEN… that means it had alarmed a while ago – I didn’t hear it and she didn’t tell me…
I NEEDED TO ADD INSULIN TO HER PUMP…
As I had literally JUST sat down I mentally said to myself – OK – it can wait a little while I will do it before bed…
Time for bed came – the previous night Eden had slept in our bedroom. This rarely happens, but our house had been overtaken by a teenage sleepover party – so Eden hung out in our room with us and we watched a movie together… The bedding was all still in there so she decided she would just camp out with us for another night.. FINE by ME… MUCH easier to do the nighttime blood sugar checks when she is at the end of your bed versus trudging all the way to the other end of the house in the middle of the night!
Eden tested – PERFECT bed time number – YAY… meaning she didn’t need any insulin.
My alarm was set for 2am – I checked her blood sugar and it was 230 – I DID NOT give her a correction because she had 3 hours of basketball that afternoon and I knew she would come down on her own… no insulin needed..
I did not hear ANY ALARMS during the night – I didn’t give her any boluses, but she still had her basal insulin trickling in as it always does 24hrs a day – using the insulin that is in her pump.. Eden NEEDS insulin 24hrs a day to SURVIVE..
Guess what this momma forgot to do???
ADD MORE INSULIN TO EDEN’s PUMP before bed…
WOW – now this isn’t just a bad momma moment – this could potentially have a VERY BAD outcome with extremely high blood sugars, ketones and DKA…
I jump up out of bed – say a few choice words – check her pump and sure enough in the space where it should tell me how many units are left it says ——- @#$% @#^$ … WHY ISN’T THE PUMP SCREAMING AT US ?!?!?!
I check her blood sugar and by some MIRACLE she is only 250….
THANK YOU UNIVERSE – this momma would NEVER have been able to forgive herself…
How I FORGOT something so important I have no idea – I’m sure we all have our moments when our memory fails us, but this one was SCARY and could have resulted in my precious daughter being very, very ill…
We dodged a major bullet – I am feeling incredibly guilty and obviously will NEVER wait and try to remember to do something this important EVER AGAIN…
Eden's Effort 