"My Entourage" or "What the F* is Beeping???" You pick the title.

After what happened this weekend, I wasn't sure which heading I should be naming this blog. At the beginning of the weekend, I fondly thought of my arsenal of machines as my own little entourage. We went shopping together, went for a long walk outside, and ate Reese's peanut butter eggs. My entourage had my BACK! My bg never tanked nor soared. I never heard a peep from any of them. All Saturday, life was gooood. They were so quiet that I *almost* forgot I had them at all. Sigh...

That was, until my church's Easter service. You see, my church offers multiple services but I attend the service time that is recorded and then uploaded to my church's website for others to view. At the beginning of the service, we are asked to not crinkle papery things and to turn our cell phones to vibrate, so as not to disrupt the sound quality of the video. Being a creature of habit, I always turn off my iPhone and then take my regular seat in the 2nd row at church; which is a cool 8 feet or so from the stage where the pastor stands.

During the Easter sermon, when my pastor was about to dramatically announce that "Jesus Has Risen!" something in my f'ing purse starts beeeeeeeeeping. This loud, muffled beep. Panic!!!!! OMG!!!!! How could I forget to turn my phone off before church????? I whip it out- oh wait- it IS turned off. Sh*!!!! What the F* is beeping??? I was sure everyone sitting in the vicinity of me was wondering the same thing. Even the pastor made eye contact with me, as I was whipping things out of my purse at 250 mph trying to solve the crisis. Is it the pod I'm wearing? Nope. Is it my pump's PDM? Nope. It can't be my Freestyle glucose meter's alarms.... Nope, not them, either. Ah-ha! It's Sam the CGM. Sam's warning me that I'm 60/LOW. I knew I wasn't low because I had checked my bg only 15 minutes prior and was slightly elevated. I apologized to those around me, most of whom silently forgave me when they realized it wasn't my cell phone. But fear set in. If Sam is beeping now that he thinks I'm 60, he's going to beep again when he thinks I've hit 55. Craaapppppp. I'm forced to drink a juice box, knowing full well it's going to unnecessarily jack up my bg, in order to avoid another show-stopping moment from Sam. Sweet, now everyone can hear me slurping my Juicy Juice juice box (cuz you can't avoid the slurrrp noise with their cheap straw).

Oh those awesome moments. FAIL!!!

Has anyone else had perfectly timed moments? Or am I the only lucky one?

Extreme Couponing for Diabetics and Celiacs.

I've found myself interested in this new show called Extreme Couponing. Has anyone else seen it? I really don't think I could ever successfully do what they do, partially because I care too much what others think of me (read: the poor people behind me in line as well as the cashier) and also because I do not have the time nor the coupon saavy that it takes. But thank goodness, I'll never have to worry about that anyway, because I'm 1). diabetic, and 2). celiac.

In general, food coupons are usually for some form of processed food, like cereals, baking mixes, chips or granola bars, none of which I can eat because they are either too high in carbs or, more likely, have gluten in them. Once in a while I'll get excited when I see a coupon for a yogurt (if it's a gluten free brand), or maybe for a frozen vegetable (without any sauces or seasonings on it, all of which contain gluten). But that's about the extent that I can use coupons. Following 2 medical diets sort of squashed those dreams.

Eating healthy isn't as expensive as many have said it to be. My cart is usually filled with fresh fruit, fresh or frozen vegetables, organic meat, tofu, dried beans/lentils, yogurt, eggs, fresh herbs, cheese, brown rice and ingredients to make my infamous low-carb (KILLER) chili. My grocery bill is extremely low compared to most of my friends', even though I have to to follow dietary restrictions. Your grocery bill is substantially reduced when you take the desserts, chocolate covered granola bars, cereals, potato chips and canned soups out of your cart.

I hope that someday there will be coupons for apples, bananas, dried beans and organic chicken. Maybe even some gluten free brands (which are so #$#$&*&#^$*&^! expensive that I usually avoid them altogether). But if you are diabetic and/or celiac, save your money by just sticking with whole foods, avoiding processed foods and put those extreme couponers to shame with your savings! ;) Here's too good eating!

Rage bolusing my way back to normal.

Today, I craved something sweet soooooo bad.

My hidden supply of sweets at my house had run dry, so I decided to drive over to the gluten-free bakery and buy a square of cake. I don't bake batches of sweets at home because, well, I'll eat all of it. It's safer for me to buy ONE square of cake at the bakery. Normally my go-to sweet is peanut M&Ms. I carefully measure out a 1/2 of serving, bolus ahead of time, and see just a small bump in my bg.

I even mastered eating a pancake on Sunday. I have been experimenting for a while, and finally NAILED it. One ginormous pancake with a (measured) side of pure maple syrup, and bg 2 hours post of under 120 = WINNER. Yesssssss!

That was not the case today after my piece of cake. I bolused ahead of time, I actually bolused so much that I was afraid I'd bottom out. Au contraire. I think you can determine from the picture approximately when I ate the cake. Despite the pre-meal bolus, my bg soared to close to 250. I raged bolused for a couple hours to get it back down to the normal range. It almost felt like a panic attack.

When I saw the bg spike, I took it personal. It was a reminder that you can't master diabetes. I felt as though I was being 'punished' for eating the cake.

My CDE has discouraged me from avoiding foods out of fear of how my bg will react to it. But I can't help but stay away from certain foods when I see what they do to my blood sugar (healthy food included). My bg is usually pretty stable because I eat the same foods almost every day of the week (with the exceptions of the occasional weekend pancake). My meals are very planned- a healthy fat, a healthy (measured or weighed) carb and a protein at every meal. So when I broke from the norm and had a piece of cake, I felt a sadness/anger/frustration at the situation and at myself for 'allowing' my bg to get that high. It takes the enjoyment out of eating "fun" foods when you convince yourself you are going to go blind from it.

Do you avoid foods that you know are landmines? Is the initial guilt and subsequent avoidance of food a normal reaction?