Thoughts on starting insulin for the first time

Insulin syringesI began injecting insulin for the first time a couple of days ago. I included an image of the syringes I now have to use in an effort to connect to my readers more thoroughly. If you found yourself flinching the second this page appeared in your browser then I’ll consider the effect successful (anything for my readers).

This is scary as hell.

Look, I know diabetes is progressive. I know that once you’re found to be diabetic the chances are you’ll always be a diabetic even if you are only 5 foot, 11 inches tall and weigh all of 150 pounds. And I realize that a type II diabetic like myself wasn’t guaranteed to be able to control my diabetes with pills “for ever more” especially when the docs have no clue as to why I developed diabetes in the first place or why it’s progressing the way it is. My diet is good, I’ve never really had any sort of sweet tooth at all and there’s no history of diabetes on either side of my family. Still, when my HbA1c came back at 12.1% (normal is 4% to 6%) and my afternoon blood sugar readings were somewhere in the 400s (normal is 70 to 150) it became clear that something needed to be done. And that something was insulin.

But as a lot of folks realize, knowing what may be coming is one thing. The reality of the situation is quite a different matter.

Not that I’m squeamish about needles at all. I don’t get all sweaty and shaky with eyes rolling back into my skull and drooling a lot. Nope, I just simply pass out the moment I see the needle, saves all the theatrics. Okay, that’s not true in fact, I couldn’t care less about needles. I’ve been poked by them all my life so these little things (1/2 inch long and so thin I can’t see it without my reading glasses) are no problem at all. Of course injecting yourself instead of someone else doing it for you can take the wind out of your sails at first I’ll allow that much.

So I’ve had my training including injection practice down at my local VA and I’ve given myself injections (20 units twice a day) for two days now and all done with proper clinical precision–more or less. The label on the phial of insulin they sent tells me that it’s a delayed action, “human” NPH type whatever that means.

And “human” type? As compared to what exactly? Non-human type? Badger type or perhaps salamander type? Klingon type? I attempted a bit of research on the old WWW and all I got out of it was a disturbing sense of profound confusion and a solid idea that diabetics like me should stay as far away from these diabetes forums as possible. I mean really, the way one person treats their diabetes is absolutely not how another person should treat their diabetes and it seemed to me that a lot of unprofessional advice in that area was being passed around in these forums I visited. First impressions you know.

I believe I’ll stick with my docs and professional med sites when it comes to questions about diabetes for now.

Okay then, it appears to be lunch time and since I am at the very beginning of my insulin regime and still not off the type II medication I’ve been taking for the last few years (glipizide)–I’d better have some lunch.

 

Conversation lost or just misplaced?

I wish I’d had a camera. Then again probably not, as the two subjects I had wanted to snap a quick picture of might have taken offense if they had happened to notice this older guy walking towards them pointing a some sort of device in their direction–or would they? It doesn’t really matter, I didn’t get a picture. Sorry about that.

After a few afternoon chores the other day, the last day we had any sort of sun in it, I decided to walk over to my wife’s quilt shop and help her close up. Once I had made it up out of our small Clyde River valley to the top of East Main street and started the downhill run to my honey’s shop, I came upon a sight that, for a second or so, took a bit of wind out of my sails.

A couple was walking up the sidewalk towards me, a young couple. Not unusual to see these kinds of things even in these northern territories of the State of Vermont (we do have young people up here you know, not just old farmers who give bad directions to tourists). These couples even hold hands now and then (shock!). What had virtually (but not realistically) stopped me in my tracks was the fact that not only were these two not holding hands (no rule says they have to, of course) but they were each talking on their own cell/smart phones and completely ignoring the person walking beside them.

Hi Beth. Wanna go for a walk? I need to make a couple calls.

Sure, Brian. I need to make a couple myself.

So why bother going for a walk?

A very long time ago (about 10 years before the word ‘weblog’ came into being) I once wrote a short, rather silly thing called ‘Conversation Lost’ in which I lamented thusly and in highly condensed form:

Four score and several years ago there were likely a whole lot more people who actually knew how many years a ‘score’ was and how to properly apply the word into a conversation. Also, there were most likely a hell of a lot more people who knew exactly what a conversation was and moreover, how to properly apply one between two or more people for a reasonable period of time, say more than 43.067 seconds and carry on said conversation without managing to insult anyone by being politically, socially, or sexually incorrect.

Unfortunately, conversation today seems to be limited mostly to “howyadoin?“,” whazup?” and “howzitgoin?” along with the various ingenious replies such as “okay“, “nahmuch“, and “whythehelldonyoumindyerowndambizness!“.

In those days, long before the first blog ever showed up on the then budding Internet thingy, us tech-heads of old used to sit around the office/garage/basement/bar table and talk about what technology might bring in the near future. We could easily imagine tablets and smart phones, multiple core processors, flash drives (SSDs) and all sorts of other neat devices and computer technology we take for granted today, even way back then. We’d sketch them out, build 3D models, talk about the components and supporting resources we’d need to make a certain device like a tablet computer viable, what technology existed back then and what still needed to be developed. If you looked at it from that long ago viewpoint, we young geeks/tech-heads/nerds of old had all the devices of today only said devices were still in our heads rather than in our hands and on our desktops.

What I doubt any one of us could possibly imagine back then was what I witnessed just the other day. The human reaction to all this present instant communication. How what we dreamed about way-back-when would end up causing present day people (younger people?) to still spend their time with each other, like taking a walk together for example, but talking on their respective cell phones rather than to each other. Perhaps if I had been as cynical back then as I am now I might have seen this coming but alas, I was not. Probably a good thing now that think about it.

I have since realized that I’ve seen this kind of phenomenon before just not so up close and personal as having this young couple pass me on the sidewalk yabbering into their respective mobile devices about two completely different subjects while successfully tuning out the fact that there was actually someone walking beside them. Have our priorities shifted so much that our friends and acquaintances who are not with us become more important than the ones who are?

Do I feel completely out of touch with this mobile generation? In a word–yup!

So now I think I’ll take a walk. Feel free to join me if you wish.

Just leave the smart phone home for once would you?

 

Official Declaration of the Occupation of New York City

By now I’m sure you’ve all heard about #OccupyWallStreet. A phenomenon of peaceful protesters occupying large areas of New York City in and around Wall Street. And now this “protest” appears to be fanning out across the country it fits and starts, popping up in various major cities here and there. I understand Boston is being occupied as I write this. So what is this #OccupyWallStreet protest all about?

Well, that’s the question that has been on the media’ so called mind since the protest first began. No one seemed to know–even the protesters. Or did they? After today, there’s no doubt what these folks are all about:

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Declaration of the Occupation of New York City

As we gather together in solidarity to express a feeling of mass injustice, we must not lose sight of what brought us together. We write so that all people who feel wronged by the corporate forces of the world can know that we are your allies.

As one people, united, we acknowledge the reality: that the future of the human race requires the cooperation of its members; that our system must protect our rights, and upon corruption of that system, it is up to the individuals to protect their own rights, and those of their neighbors; that a democratic government derives its just power from the people, but corporations do not seek consent to extract wealth from the people and the Earth; and that no true democracy is attainable when the process is determined by economic power. We come to you at a time when corporations, which place profit over people, self-interest over justice, and oppression over equality, run our governments. We have peaceably assembled here, as is our right, to let these facts be known.

They have taken our houses through an illegal foreclosure process, despite not having the original mortgage.

They have taken bailouts from taxpayers with impunity, and continue to give Executives exorbitant bonuses.

They have perpetuated inequality and discrimination in the workplace based on age, the color of one’s skin, sex, gender identity and sexual orientation.

They have poisoned the food supply through negligence, and undermined the farming system through monopolization.

They have profited off of the torture, confinement, and cruel treatment of countless nonhuman animals, and actively hide these practices.

They have continuously sought to strip employees of the right to negotiate for better pay and safer working conditions.

They have held students hostage with tens of thousands of dollars of debt on education, which is itself a human right.

They have consistently outsourced labor and used that outsourcing as leverage to cut workers’ healthcare and pay.

They have influenced the courts to achieve the same rights as people, with none of the culpability or responsibility.

They have spent millions of dollars on legal teams that look for ways to get them out of contracts in regards to health insurance.

They have sold our privacy as a commodity.

They have used the military and police force to prevent freedom of the press.

They have deliberately declined to recall faulty products endangering lives in pursuit of profit.

They determine economic policy, despite the catastrophic failures their policies have produced and continue to produce.

They have donated large sums of money to politicians supposed to be regulating them.

They continue to block alternate forms of energy to keep us dependent on oil.

They continue to block generic forms of medicine that could save people’s lives in order to protect investments that have already turned a substantive profit.

They have purposely covered up oil spills, accidents, faulty bookkeeping, and inactive ingredients in pursuit of profit.

They purposefully keep people misinformed and fearful through their control of the media.

They have accepted private contracts to murder prisoners even when presented with serious doubts about their guilt.

They have perpetuated colonialism at home and abroad.

They have participated in the torture and murder of innocent civilians overseas.

They continue to create weapons of mass destruction in order to receive government contracts.*

To the people of the world,

We, the New York City General Assembly occupying Wall Street in Liberty Square, urge you to assert your power.

Exercise your right to peaceably assemble; occupy public space; create a process to address the problems we face, and generate solutions accessible to everyone.

To all communities that take action and form groups in the spirit of direct democracy, we offer support, documentation, and all of the resources at our disposal.

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Well now, I guess there’s no longer any question as to what the reason is for all this protesting, right? I applaud them for it and since the sentiment appears to be reaching people all over the country I would hazard the guess that a lot of other people are feeling the same way–including myself. Could it possibly be that America is finally waking up? If they are I fear it is too late but that’s an entirely other matter. What all this #OccupyWallStreet phenomenon has me thinking about is not the reason for it, which they have now made abundantly clear (do they have a spokesman by the way?), but the purpose and what they hope to achieve? And how?

I certainly don’t have the answer. Do they?

Once upon another lifetime, or it seems that way to me now anyway, a Navy instructor once educated a class of us “new recruits” about the art of complaining. It was brief and to the point as usual:

Don’t bitch unless you have a solution to offer”

Pretty much says it all now doesn’t it? Too bad more people don’t follow that particular rule.

So here we are in the middle of what is rapidly becoming a nationwide phenomenon. Like that word, “phenomenon” do you? Seems like the media is loving the heck out of right now. Unfortunately, I get the irritating feeling that although it may not be too little, it’s probably too late. Time will tell just as it always does.

You must live in Vermont if…

In an effort to lighten that increasingly oppressive feeling that accompanies the inevitable Winter that’s literally right around the corner for these parts, I give you Jeff Foxworthy’s classic opinion of this wonderful state of Vermont:

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Forget Rednecks … here is what Jeff Foxworthy has to say about Vermonters…

If someone in a Home Depot store offers you assistance and they don’t work there, you live in Vermont.

If you’ve worn shorts and a parka at the same time, you live in Vermont.

If you’ve had a lengthy telephone conversation with someone who dialed a wrong number, you live in Vermont.

If “Vacation” means going anywhere south of Burlington for the weekend, you live in Vermont.

If you measure distance in hours, you live in Vermont.

If you know several people who have hit a deer more than once, you live in Vermont.

If you have switched from “heat” to “A/C” in the same day and back again, you live in Vermont.

If you can drive 75 mph through 2 feet of snow during a raging blizzard without flinching, you live in Vermont.

If you install security lights on your house and garage, but leave both unlocked, you live in Vermont.

If you carry jumper cables in your car and your wife knows how to use them, you live in Vermont.

If you design your kid’s Halloween costume to fit over a snowsuit, you live in Vermont.

If the speed limit on the highway is 65 mph, you’re going 80, and everybody is passing you, you live in Vermont.

If driving is better in the winter because the potholes are filled with snow, you live in Vermont.

If you know all four seasons: almost winter, winter, still winter, and road construction, you live in Vermont.

If you have more miles on your snow blower than your car, you live in Vermont.

If you find 10 degrees “a little chilly,” you live in Vermont.

And one from myself…

If your idea of a good time on a Friday night is watching cars get stuck in the snow trying to make it up the road, you live in Vermont.