Friends For Life: The Outtakes.

I think this is my last FFL post. Really. I'll shut up about it now.

Along with the bonding, learning, and misty eyes, we also had a lot of laughter. A lot of silly. A lot of video that we couldn't really use.

Unless you make a blooper reel, that is.

Friends For Life: Just Talking.

Chris (of Just Talking podcast and A Consequence of Hypoglycemia fame) assumed the role of cat-herder a couple of times during FFL as he recorded two podcasts with a scattering of adults with T1 (and some of their spouses, too). You'll hear from folks like Lee Ann, Scott, Brian, Jacquie, Jess, Sara, Dayle, Martin, Karen, Simon, Courtney... the list goes on.

We talk about the sessions we were looking forward to, the You Can Do This Project booth (plans, and then the afterthoughts), how we met each other, pregnancy, and anything else that came up.

Head on over and take a listen!

The "before":
http://justtalkingpodcast.com/2012/07/03/friends-for-life-bakers-dozen/

The "after": http://justtalkingpodcast.com/2012/07/10/friends-for-life-aftermath/

And if you'd like to watch a small snippet of the conversation, here you go:

I Scream, You Scream.

My friend Jeff is passing through the West of Mid this week, and kindly chose to pay Aaron, Billy and I a visit. We had some dinner, drove him around to "see the sights" (many of which were closed due to the holiday - whoops), and proceeded to indulge in what was apparently some diabetes-friendly ice cream.

Jeff told me that he tends to absorb the glucose from his fellow PWDs. I believe it.

I also commend his tolerance of one very vocal member of our clan who would Not. Leave. Him. Alone.

Bark! Bark! Bark! Bark!

Thanks for visiting, Jeff!

Wordless Wednesday: This Appeared In My Mailbox.

Hashtag jewelry... now why didn't I include that in my "gifts for PWDs" list?

I am simply blown away. I am in the process of finding a chain to wear this beautiful, awesome pendant on, because I want it close to my heart (and I want people to ask about it, so I can tell them about how wonderful the DOC can be!).

Thank you friends - I absolutely adore it, and what a wonderful surprise it was! :)

Road Trip!

Aaron and I just got back from a five-day weekend in the great state of Indiana, as we attended our friends' wedding (Yay Erin and Adam!!) and got into some other antics. Thoughts and highlights:

• Indiana - at least, the part we were in - is so scenic this time of year! I felt like I was living inside of a postcard photo. But did I think to take pictures of the scenery? I did not.
• The wedding was beautiful, and I DID remember to take pictures of that.
• I also made sure to snap a picture of this banner at the church. I know that our friends did not personally select this to adorn the church wall for their wedding, so I feel (relatively) safe in saying... wow. Red eyes, pale skin, and outstretched bloody hands? You decide what that means.
• In the olden days before I had this certain type of diabetes-centric confidence, I would have balked at wearing a dress to a wedding. (Why? Because dresses don't generally have nifty pockets to house various diabetes paraphernalia. I felt condemned to pants.) This weekend was an occasion where I felt comfortable in my own skin, so to speak. My insulin pump was hooked onto the front of my bra, my Dexcom receiver was stuffed into the side, and my confidence was on the dance floor. And guess what? No one noticed the robot parts. (Well, they didn't notice until later in the evening when I made it a point to be all blatant and "look at how MacGyver I was tonight!" about it with some of the bridal party - whom I had met for the first time that weekend. There may have been some wine involved earlier in the night.)
• Being in Indiana also meant that Aaron and I got to grab some lunch with some DOC friends - Cherise (and her daughter) and Mike (and his wife)! We decided that while we were together, we should do a Big Blue Test by testing, walking around downtown Indy's Monument Circle, and testing again. Want to know what the Big Blue Test is and how you can do it, too? Go check out http://www.bigbluetest.org/ for more info! (There also may be video evidence of our walk and results coming soon. Maybe.)
• Indiana has both Dunkin' Donuts and Chick-Fil-A, which meant that Aaron and I both got to satisfy our less-than-healthy food cravings. We also tried Steak 'n Shake for the first time. We were less than impressed. 
• Since Eli Lilly has a huge campus right by the part of downtown we stayed at, I was hoping to swing through and take a look. (Because that's what normal people do on vacation, right? Visit the pharmaceutical companies that make their life-saving medication?) Unfortunately, the Colts game foiled our plans and this is as close as I got. (Also, I have no idea why this bullet point is centered.)

• The hotel we stayed in Saturday night is housed inside of Indianapolis' historic Union Station, which meant that the hotel actually had (non-working) train cars in it. What's that? You want to know if I was totally solemn and serious while standing on one of the train car's steps? 

In short: we had a great time. :)

Disclaimer: Lilly did not ask me to visit them or mention them in this post. I wanted to go because I'm a huge nerd who will make special travel plans to accomodate diabetes-centric tourist destinations. Like you do.

Wordless Wednesday: Welcome To Kansas City.

image credit :)

Simonpalooza: Simon's Arrival.

Friday night was spent at Jess and her husband's house with snacks, cupcakes, a live Twitter feed of our weekend's hashtag on their TV (how nerdy are we?) and the creation of some welcome posters.

image credit (for all in this post): Sara

T-shirts were distributed and we made plans to greet Simon at the airport.

Have we mentioned that he thought just one person was coming to pick him up?

All twenty-something of us gathered at his gate, and tried to wait patiently. Our group attracted a bit of attention from both the TSA ("....Wow.") and fellow passengers. One gentleman that deplaned early saw our group and asked, "Are you all waiting for the Australian guy?" *cue affirmative squealing* "Oh, he's a GREAT guy. I sat next to him on the plane and heard his whole story. You're really going to like him. He's great."

It seemed like we waited hours, but it really was only minutes. We decided that he must have been the "nice guy" that was letting everyone else get off of the plane ahead of him. :)

And when he finally was within view... well... you need to see it for yourself, I think. Allison at DiabetesMine put together a video explaining what "Simonpalooza" was all about, and got Simon's arrival on film. The look on Simon's face when it registered that the big mob of people was for HIM... well, that one moment would have made the whole trip worth it.

It isn't that Simon is some sort of celebrity (though he most certainly is in our eyes), though the spectators at the airport probaby believed he was. (They also believed that Sara's marriage proposal sign was the real deal, until we told them it wasn't. Ha!) It's more that we all knew the sacrifice he'd made to come to the U.S. and what it meant to him. And what's even better is that it meant that to us, too. We lift each other up in this community; we cheer each other on; we share the weight of our difficulties and challenges. (Related: Simon is so fearlessly honest that I think his words took a few of us by surprise. Case in point: Simon telling Cherise what she and her work have meant to him. Sara caught part of that moment and posted a video today - it's very worth the watch.)

That undercurrent of understanding we all share amplified the emotion of the moments we had.

As Jess described in her vlog today: We're all with the band.



Simonpalooza: What You Do Matters.

I just got back from a large meet-up of wonderful DOC folks, which you may have seen on Twitter as "Simonpalooza". (Named because our friend Simon, who is from Australia, flew here for the specific purpose of meeting as many of his diabetes online community friends as he could - who we now just refer to as "friends".) I'll be recapping some of my favorite memories from the weekend over the next few days, and what the experience meant to so many of us.

It meant that around 30 of us (type 1, type 2, LADA, and our loved ones) made the trek to Kansas City to spend a couple of days with people we love (and prove to each other that we are real, actual people).

It meant that we all seemed to feel very okay about being stared at for things like pump tubing flapping in the breeze and matching t-shirts that no one else understood, because we understood it.

There we went, walking down the street. And we totally did get
the funniest looks from everyone we met.

It meant that each time someone asked about those t-shirts, our story became a little bit less about telling the truth and little more about fanning the flames of Blünt Lancet folklore.

The relatively short trip for us (less than five hours' drive) meant that Aaron finally got to meet some of the people I talk about all the time. (And they found out that he's a real person!)

It meant that we got to see, hear, and bear hug the people who so often can put words and hashtags to what we're feeling in our own lives - with diabetes and without.

It meant that I heard Simon's story straight from the man himself, and the memory of our conversation is something that I will remember and cherish always.

It meant that I cried. A whole lot.

It seems that things happen for a reason - the people you meet, the places you end up, the things you do. To borrow a phrase from someone wiser than I am, it's nearly impossible to connect the dots while looking forward - it's only when you look back on life that you can see the clear connections between decisions, circumstances and situations.

Sometimes you share your life with others (whether it is blogging, Twitter, online forums, whatever) and have no way to know if what you're doing is helping anyone. You share your experiences in the hopes that what you've been through resonates with someone; that maybe hearing your story will bring them some small amount of comfort. You hope that you can spark just a little glimmer of the thought, "I'm not alone after all".

This weekend provided multiple opportunities for folks to tell each other, face to face, that what they do matters - because they themselves were impacted by it. It's hard to wrap your head around the kind of impact simply know someone who is living and struggling and triumphing over the same thing that you are can have, but this weekend I had a chance to witness that very emotion in person.

It was beautiful, and I'm so thankful to know so many wonderful people. What you do matters - so please, keep doing it.




The video above was created by Sara, who so thoughtfully brought a video camera and wrangled us together to get these clips recorded. Please check in with her blog in the coming days to see the photos and videos she took of the weekend. There were a lot of great "moments" that she caught on film. :)

In order of video appearance (and who they are on Twitter):

Babs @babssoup
Jon @kssoup
Bob @rpederse
Cherise @Diabetic_Iz_Me
Nina (Cherise's mom)
Sara @saraknic
Jeff @jeffmather
Lisa (Jeff's wife)
Sarah Jane @SaJaBetes
Allison @AMBlass
Eric (Allison's husband)
Jess @jessmeandd
Josh @TypeBoring
Victoria @victoriacumbow
Melissa @sweetlyvoiced
Heather (and Becca!!) @auntlyh
Courtney @iamsquee
Kim @txtngmypancreas
Aaron (Kim's husband)
Mike @MHoskins2179
Scott J. @scottkjohnson
Kelly @kellyrawlings
Scott S. @Strangely_T1
Simon @STroyCrow

Giant Chew Toy, It Is Not.

Bullet points are my friends.

• There's nothing quite like getting a haircut and blowdry at a salon to make me feel like I'm living in a hair commercial. I might have indulgently (and obnoxiously?) swung my hair around just a wee bit at the grocery store before I headed home on Saturday.
• The diabetes gods will always ensure that no matter where I put a new infusion site, Aaron will snag it while hugging me. And that I will reflexively respond, "It's okay!!", while trying to mask the wincing.
• The JDRF had a live webcast last week on glucose-responsive (or "smart", as it's otherwise known) insulin - if you missed it, you can watch the archived version here.
• Several awesome people with diabetes will be convening this coming weekend in Kansas City (there's a NYC meet-up, too), and I am beyond excited to see everyone - and meet some face-to-face for the first time! Also, I will get to prove that my husband is a real person, as this is only the second DOC meetup he's been able to attend with me. ;)  I'll be tweeting as much as I can remember to over the weekend. (Sometimes it's hard to remember - I'd rather live the moment and talk about it later, you know?)
• Billy - your brand new dog bed is not a giant chew toy. STOP IT. (P.S. Thanks for the snuggles this morning; you make Mondays just that much more bearable. Or dogable. You're not a bear. Whatever.)

Charlie Brown and a D-Meetup.

I spent the last few days in Kansas City, staying with a friend of mine from high school. We try to get together every few months; spending a weekend at the other's place. It's nice to have some "girl time" sometimes, you know?

The weekend was full of fun, and some new experiences. (Diabetes might disagree on the "fun" part, as Jim's graphs resembled the stripe on Charlie Brown's shirt for most of the weekend - but, whatever.)  I tried tapas for the first time, spent some quality time at Crate and Barrel, and helped my friend hang a super heavy mirror on her wall (turns out I'm handy after all!).

I also might have had some alcohol on Saturday night, which led to some dancing and shouting along to techno-infused rock classics (She took the midnight train going aaaaanyyyyyywheeeeeeeeere!)

The frosting on that cupcake of a weekend was getting to meet up with some fellow d-bloggers for lunch yesterday! (Once we finally found a place that was open on Sundays, that is.)  :)  Our group included Scott of Strangely Diabetic, Bob from T Minus Two, Jess of Me and D, and Babs from My Glycated Life; along with some friends and "type 3"s. It was great spending time with you all, and I hope we can do it more often.  :)

What a good lookin' group!



Meet-ups.

There's something delightful and familiar about meeting someone else with T1 for the first time.  On Saturday, I had the pleasure of meeting up with fellow T1 and erstwhile diabetes blogger Kay while she was in town for the football game.  My husband and I joined her and her friend downtown, as they were on their way to pick up their tickets. 

Is it just me, or are people with diabetes some of the most friendly and awesome people on earth? 

Kay and Kim.

We walked around UNL's campus for about an hour or so, and never ran out of things to talk about.  Kay brought up, and I totally agreed, that there always seems to be a sense of familiarity among T1's; even if you've just met, you feel as though you've known the person for some time.  There seems to be an undercurrent of understanding among us.

We talked about her insulin pump scare the day before; how others are never as excited about the straight line on our Dexcom graphs as we are; what our favorite flavor of glucose tabs are (fruit punch for me; grape for Kay); her meet-up with Lorraine in NY, and my meet-up with the TCOYD Des Moines folks in September.

We also discussed another point.  As I get to know more and more PWDs, I find that there is a segment of the population who seem to have it all "figured out" - or, at least they sure make it seem that way.  They do the same thing every day, and get the same results.  I asked Kay, "Is it like that for you?  Because most of the time, I feel like the numbers have the lead, and I'm just chasing after them, not the other way around.  I mean, everything works sometimes, but it's definitely not all the time."  It's as if my whole regimen has to be rehauled every few months, because what worked before just doesn't anymore.  While I am so happy for others who have an A1C significantly lower than mine, or who don't experience the fluctuations I do, some part of me feels a little bit left out.  Knowing that others deal with this too gives me some encouragement and motivation to keep at it.

It was a pleasure meeting you, Kay!  (And Go Big Red!)