<p class="">My diabetes diagnosis shattered my confidence in my ability to take care of myself, and my plan quickly became to just get through the rest of the term, move home for the summer to my previous summer job and figure the rest out over the summer. Adjusting to my new normal of living with diabetes began while I was still in hospital, or did it?</p>

<p class="" style="white-space:pre-wrap;">Navigating your diabetes clinic can be so confusing. This is a guide to the who’s who in your diabetes healthcare team which is extremely useful because it can save so much time and frustration during your appointments, when you direct your questions to the appropriate person.&nbsp;</p>

<p><strong>There is a new sugar tax coming into effect in Ireland in April and as a person with type 1 diabetes, who has to keep high sugar edibles and drinkables on hand all of the time, I wasn’t sure how I felt about it at first.</strong></p>

Mid October, I went to the DiabetesSisters Weekend for Women conference Alexandria, Virginia. See disclaimer at the end. One of the outstanding presentations I attended was by Thriveabetes 2016 speaker, Gary Scheiner ’s presentation on “Making use of the Glycaemic Index”. This should not be a surprise to anyone has read Gary’s book “ Think Like a Pancreas ”. I will be honest here; when I heard the words “Glycaemic Index” I pretended I didn’t. And the reason is that several y

Back in October, I had a steroid injection in my hip. And yes, it drove my glucose levels bananas! For those of you who may not be aware of it, steroids are one of the medications that truly mess up glucose numbers for lots and lots of people.  The ultimate craziness only lasted two to three days but the residual crazy lingered a couple of weeks. Here’s a little of the backstory behind why I got a steroid injection. I have been complaining about my right hip for some time and

One of the factors not included in Diatribe’s 22 factors that influence glucose levels is the weather. Sometimes the weather plays with my diabetes management. And here’s how. Do you remember that really, really wet day we had last week? It seems like a distant memory now and I don’t think it had a name, like a storm name, but most of the country was flooded under a yellow weather warning. When I got up that morning and look out the window I thought “ Nope, I’m not walking,

My life is finally slowing down after a number of weeks of events, diabetes awareness "stuff" and children being off school for mid term break. I have so many blogs posts in my head and no time to write them. But soon... In the meantime, while I was fast asleep, my husband had a moment of inspiration about living life with type 1 diabetes and what common human experience might come close to describing the type 1 diabetes experience? Yes, there are a lot of questions to ask ab

Last week, Johnson & Johnson  Diabetes, who own Animas, announced that it was “exiting” out of the insulin pump business, effective immediately in the US and Canada. And eventually in the rest of the world. Once I read all the way down the press release to realise that it was just USA and Canada for now, I was relieved. Then I was seriously miffed, but not completely surprised. Since the Vibe insulin pump was introduced, a number of years ago, innovation seemed to have stalle

Every year, around this time, I have a conversation with myself about whether or not I should get the flu vaccine. And every year I make a different decision. Two signs of insanity right there; talking to myself and complete indecision. Whose worried? Not me! Oops, there I go again, talking to myself.  😆 Should everyone with diabetes get the flu vaccines? Well that is completely totally up to you. So far, I've only gotten it once and that was the winter I was pregnant with m

I've been using a continuous glucose monitor (CGM) since November 2015 and it has made a huge difference in my diabetes management. It has narrowed the glucose swings so much and it has been a huge relief in my anxiety relating to trying to avoid hypos. And I have worn it 24/7 since I got it. Last Friday, I had an MRI on my stupid 83 year old hip (another story) and I had to take my sensor off. So I decided to go the whole weekend cgm-free. I thought it would be nice to have

I'm sorry, I couldn't resist the alliteration. Over that last number of years, I’ve put on weight!!! I’m not overweight… Yet! I don’t feel overweight but my clothes are tight and I feel frumpy. I’m frustrated because I’m eating less and less, still fairly active but I’m still gaining weight. I’ve cut down of a lot of my carbs. I’m not willing to go carb free. I exercise a bit – I know I could do more but there are things that I have to do during my day and there are things on

It's summer in Ireland. But summer in Ireland means wearing a rain jacket a lot of the time or a cardi. However, the weather has warmed up enough recently and has been a bit drier to go out in short sleeves. This feels a little uncomfortable for me. Why? I wear a gadget thingy on the side of my upper arm. It looks odd and in short sleeves it’s hard to miss. Especially, when I've been wearing it for a couple of weeks when I've had to put extra tape on it to keep it stuck on an

I'm beginning to feel like I am becoming blind to information if it's not being blasted at me on social media. If it's not a flashy click bait image. And I think it's making my brain die slowly. Last week, my husband told me, (and I heard him tell me!!!, not the nod and yes response), that our broccoli in the garden was ready for picking and we shouldn't buy any for a number of weeks. Shortly after being told this, like an hour, I was doing the shopping and saw that broccoli

<p class="">Has anyone noticed their blood sugar/glucose numbers dropping lately as the Spring temperatures tease us? Welcome to Spring, where it’s hot, it's cold, it's summer one day and winter the next.</p>

I'm going to be an auntie again, after a 7 year gap in the birth of nephews and nieces. It’s going to happen any minute now. An-ny minute!!! And like any good big sister I've been sharing valued advice about the last days of pregnancy. I'm sure it's very welcome advice too:-D OMG, I can't wait to kidnap babysit this small baby. ONE MOMENT PLEASE! Sarah, please tell baby to get the head down, engage and one big whosh from in there:-) WHERE WAS I? All this sisterly advice has p

I've been using an insulin pump for almost seven years and it's unlikely that I will go back to injection pens. However, I know that things change over time and how I feel about things also change, so I will never say that I will never go back to injection pens because the future is unpredictable. This week, I have been thinking a lot about all the times I've changed the way I manage my diabetes and how difficult some of those changes were.  I remember when I was transitionin

Last May, I was asked by the organisers of the Future Health Summit to give a presentation on how I became an empowered person with diabetes. Some friends asked if I could blog about it. The reason for my topic choice was because the theme of the conference was Empowering the Patient, Information, Choice & Accountability and I decided to focus on Empowering the Patient element for my presentation. I feel like I am one, that diabetes does not have power over me, I have a lot o

Chances are that if you found my website you already know a little something about diabetes. But, you might be like me and always want to learn more. And there's ALWAYS is more to learn about diabetes. In this page/post I will attempt to give you my interpretation of diabetes. But I will also refer to medical people who can get more technical. I will also talk about the symptoms of diabetes, the risk factors and different types of diabetes. Diabetes is not easy to explain and

The end of May marked six months since I got CGM'd. WOW! It just flew by.  After two years of persistence, I finally got my CGM on November 27th 2015. When I announced this on social media I has a number of queries about how I managed to get approved and how difficult others were finding their quest. As always, the one thing that the diabetes community is brilliant at, is sharing knowledge through our personal experiences for the benefit of others. So, here is the story of ho

I am very privileged to know lots of people in the diabetes community. I also know a lot of people who aren’t particularly bothered about being called “Diabetic”. I respect their choice on that. However, I am not one of those people. I may have been once when I felt so uncomfortable talking about my diabetes that I felt it was easier and quicker to say “I’m diabetic” rather than say “I have diabetes”. These days though, the harsh sound of the ‘ic” at the end of the word makes