The Ritual

Rough day for my Sydney...although it got much better at the end of it. All is well that ends well, right? Today happened to be a site changing day AND a CGM (continuous glucose monitor) change day. There were tears, gnashing of teeth, fits of tantrum...as well as the crying Sydney was doing. This is one of the many reasons why we are doing Team Sydney again. I hate having to hurt my little girl to keep her alive. Some of you might remember our first experience with the CGM (click HERE to familiarize yourself and to have a little chuckle.) I still have a love/hate relationship with this piece of equipment. The reasons are as follows, in no particular order:

1) The needle is big and painful!
2) It causes the most tears...from both of us.
3)Did I mention the needle is big.
4) You have to "shoot" the 1 inch needle into her fatty tissue and it creeps me out EVERY time I have to do this. I don't think I will ever get used to this part of her disease.

I'm lovin' it because

5)It has really helped us to tighten Sydney's numbers. We have much better control when She wears this for a couple of weeks every other month.
6) Technology like this means that our scientists are learning so much about this disease...each new piece of technology, *theoretically*, means we are that much closer to a cure.

So while we tasted some of the "bitter" today, we also were able to taste the "sweet." After the site change and sensor input, we went to a local garden shop and bought the seeds for our vegetable garden. Yay! We are still at least a month away from planting, but the girls loved picking out the vegetables we will be growing! Then we had dinner at Arctic Circle and the girls got to play on the big toys there! Ok onto the pics...the most exciting part of this blog.

~The home for Syd's new site...at least for 3 days until we have to find it a new home again.


~Close up of this little gadget that give Syd her insulin.


~This is her sensor site...or her CGM.


~Her CGM with the battery on and the tegaderm tape on so it stays in place. The bandaid under it is to help protect her tender skin. After 10 days with it on, the battery usually cuts through the skin leaving more open wounds to heal and/or scar. So this helps to keep the skin from breaking. The visible red marks are actually from her sensor 2 times ago. It took a long time to heal. I made the mistake of putting a bandaid over the hole after I removed the sensor. Well apparently tegaderm makes the skin very tender and when I took the bandaid off, it ripped skin off with it.


~After the above mentioned "doozys" for the day, we bought our seeds and took the girls to Arctic Circle. They had a great time, as you can see from the collage below. You can click on it to make it bigger if you so desire.

~Just in case you were curious how the CGM is inserted, we took a little video of it. Granted, the video is not great. At some point, I will try to get a better one made. For now, this will have to do. I honestly hate, hate, hate doing this. It is just an awful feeling. For those diabetic parents who follow this blog. Syd has the minimed 522 pump with the Real-Time CGM. Other pumps have different versions of the CGM and I don't know how they work. So just keep that in mind. It takes me so long to actually push the trigger to shoot it in. I hate this part...but keep in mind, the day did get much better!