Overriding. La! La! La!

Turns out, I’m really good at making things harder on myself.

My endo has been telling this to me for years.  The mental tweeks I make in bolus amounts, the carb counting (plus some) add ons/take-aways I’m so keen on compensating with…it all seems to be in the best interest of just “adding work” to my already over-swelled brain.

I’m so against making adjustments to the pump because in some instances, change begets chaos.  And really…

So instead, I manually pad insulin, or override, and instead of letting the pump do all the work for me/us, (because isn’t that why we have it in the first place?) Instead, I let it do the math, and then do some of my own creative math and mash it all together. 

Which, has been quite successful, so successful even, maybe I would have never noticed.  But at the beginning of the school year my two youngest began taking the reigns more often, and well…let me give you an example:

“How many carbs for this plate, Mom?”

“What do you think?”

“I think it’s 65.”

Me, doing a mental scan of the plate think, “Hot damn, he seems to be spot on.  It really is 65.”

But my mouth says, “You are right, it’s 65…but give yourself 80.  You need more at night these days.”

What am I teaching him?

The entire point is to count the carbs correctly and put it in their pump.

Just a month ago my boys were convinced bananas were 10 carbs.  That is because every day at snack, I give them half the true carbs, to counteract all the running around they do at recess.  We had a conversation about this, and now they know that bananas are really 20 carbs…or sometimes even more.  But why don’t I just change the carb ratios between 9:30 and 10:30am so they can count the correct carbs and move on?

Maybe because on the weekends, they need those full amount of carbs.

It’s never just simple. 

Though I'm glad I'm not alone in this.  Last night I had dinner with a dear D Mom friend, and she told me she just downloaded the pump and CGM to her computer for the first time in forever.  Turns out, they've been overriding the pump 90% of the time.

There are so many variables, and really all unnoticeable until we try to explain it to someone else.  And in my case, the someone elses happens to be of the ages of 10 and 12.

To add to the numbers game, every basal rate for every boy has gone up this Winter break.  It’s an annual holiday-only tradition it seems, because as soon as school starts, they all have to go back to where they were before.  (Well, except J’s nights, I never upped his nights.)  I've been explaining why I make the changes that I do, to educate them.  Because they are old enough to know why.  I'm adjusting their insulin, which in turn adjusts their blood sugar numbers, and since it is affecting their bodies it is their right to know.  I think it all seems much more complicated than it really is because I’m thinking for three, and maybe it won’t be so mind boggling to them, because they will be thinking for one.

But then again, it really doesn’t seem overwhelming until I try to explain it all.  Once they have all the information and store it accordingly, won't it all be second nature to them too?  My underlying worry of overwhelming them seems to be fruitless.  The voice in my brain totally agrees.  But then again, the voice in my brain does sound like this...

So what does it know?

When I really think about it though…my boys are smarter than I think they are.  So I’ll continue giving my creative lessons and let the chips fall where they may.

Because diabetes doesn’t always go by the book, or by the pump settings.  At least when you are a growing child anyway.

If it is true information is power, my boys will light up a stadium before we know it.