Life

Life is rough.  It does not give us anything that we do not earn. And when you take something you have not earned. You are stealing.  If you are not willing to work for something then you do not deserve it.

So much pain

The last few days have been such a blur.  The pain I feel in my heart seems to be overflowing lately.

Many people do not know this but I have a twin sister.  She was born two minutes after me and ever since then I have talked to her almost every day, if not twice a day.  She was my support when I went through my divorce in 2004, and then let me live with her and her husband in 2005 when I moved from Missouri.  She was what I considered my best friend.  And then last year something happened that has torn us apart.  The last year of my life has been filled with pain for both of us. Neither of us can fix the wrong. But we still are divided by this.  I want it to be over but our respective spouses will never back down and thus our relationship will never be exactly the same.  And things happen in life that we cannot always go on the same way as we always have I understand that and respect that and have faith that God will provide the knowledge and understanding for things to change.  It's just very hard that one day our children were best friends and now a year later, they do not get to see each other as often because of this rift.  Please whomever is out there, pray for us. Pray that God can heal the pain and strife between us.

Second,  The recent murder of the 20 innocent children in Newtown Ct. has my heart overflowing with pain and anguish.  Every night I go to bed praying that my daughter will wake up in the morning.  That blood sugars will not go crazy in the night and that I will be able to hold her in my arms.  The parents of the 20 children will not get to hold their children any longer.  Their children have been sent to God and he will now watch over them.  They were innocent and did not deserve to spend their last minutes in this world in the Hell that the jerk created. I will not name him, I will not allow his name to be burned into my brain, he does not deserve what little inkling of brain cells it takes to remember his name.

It's not to say I don't understand mental illness.  However I do not believe that if you are mentally ill, you do not have some semblance or knowledge that something is going wrong in your head and that you should seek help.  I have a severe form of depression, I have for years. It drives me to be seriously distraught in normal life issues. So I take medication.  I watch myself for signs that the depression is rearing it's ugly head, and then two years ago anxiety creepily snuck it's way in. I manage my anxiety and depression, watching closely for things to change, because I do not want to be one of those people.  My husband and son are both bi-polar, both of them require medication, neither have ever desired to harm people.  However both have done things they do not remember doing but never intentionally. It's so darn hard really. To make a decision. What do you do..But at least TRY to remember that in life you must take care of yourself and if you do not feel like you can then you need to turn it over to someone to help you medically because you cannot go on in life and allow innocent lives to be destroyed.

Hell called Diabetes

Long before this hell we call Diabetes I never held my daughter down to pour sugar down her throat. Although many people believe that is how our children have become diabetic. I never had to hold her down and force her to drink juice. It was never a matter of forcing her to eat food to bring her blood sugar up. Long ago I was able to just let her throw her fit and eventually she would eat...we

ll because all kids do! I don't have the luxury of just saying...big deal she will eat when she get's hungry, because as the mother of a diabetic we don't get that option anymore. Waiting it out means the possibility of a low and life threatening blood sugar. It sucks...it sucks so bad that we need a cure so bad. I hate this disease. I hate the fact that my teenage daughter and son have had to grow up in the last year and a half learning how to help hold down her sister. Learned to run to grab a cup of juice in an emergency, even having to find the red box of Glucagon once. It sucks...very much...

And every day we struggle to lengths no one else but another parent of a diabetic understands.  

Every day I wake up and hold my breath until I reach my daughter. Praying that she is breathing.  And when she takes the breath...I nearly want to cry.  God is good to us.  But at the same time...I need to have more faith that I can do this.  

An honor for my daughter

Today is the day that I laid down on a bed and allowed someone to push needles into my back for over an hour.  To honor my daughter. My beautiful baby girl that was diagnosed with Type 1 Diabetes over a year ago.  Each time I felt pain I thought to myself how painful the disease must be for her. Each day enduring 8-14 finger pokes.  Each day for the first year of her diagnosis getting 8-10 shots per day of insulin.  Now every 3 days getting the site changes that allow her to use an insulin pump to administer insulin every 3 minutes and each day of her life.  It is amazing to me how strong she is. So today I was strong.  But even at my strongest. My beautiful baby girl still sat next to the table where I laid and held on to mommy's hand.  She stroked my hair and loved on me as the needles sliced into my skin.  But every time I winced in pain she was telling me it was ok.  Much like I do for her. I am so blessed.  Blessed by a little girl who over a year ago was so skinny, fragile and lethargic you would not have guessed she was the same child she is now.  Every  minute of every day I think about what my daughter's life is like now.  It's hard to remember the short time of her life she didn't have diabetes.  In the not too distant future she will have diabetes for longer than she didn't have Diabetes.  I want to change my daughter's life.  We need a cure.  And we need it now.  Please think about donating to a great cause.  The cure for diabetes is needed.  Go to this link http://www2.jdrf.org/goto/SugarsforSarah , Donate to a great cause.  The one that may save my daughter's life.  The cause that I hold so dear to my heart because I know that one day.  Somehow, Someway my daughter will have a cure.  

  

It's here it's here!!!!

Sarah's pump got here last week. It's an Animas Ping in blue. It is awesome. I cannot wait until Tuesday for the setup of the pump. I cannot believe that it's taken this long to get this taken care of.  Sarah is only 3 and doesn't really care too much either way I guess.  I have been sewing quite a bit lately and because I want Sarah to have pump pouches to keep her pump safely at her hip.  Here's some pictures. 

 The middle picture is Sarah wearing her new Princess Dress.  I made it from some fabric from JoAnn's.  I couldn't pass it up I knew she would love it.  It took me about 20 minutes to do it because it already had the elastic sewn in so I wouldn't have to do it myself :).

Please pray that Sarah does well on the pump for something that costs $8000....it better be worth the frustration it took to get it!

Living on the edge.............

There are days that I sit in my chair at home exhausted.  Emotionally, physically, everything. It seriously is hard to just breathe.  There are so many things in life now that were not there thirteen months ago. It is so frustrating.  and I hate it.  My 3 year old daughter deals with a life threatening disease every single day of her life.  And it is not fair.  And then I remember....Life is not Fair!  a Fair is where you go in the fall and you ride rides and drink lemonade and eat huge turkey legs and cotton candy.  Life will never be fair and if I continue to go down the path of life thinking that life is fair...well I'm not going to be a very good person in life. I will become bitter. So ....I am thankful.

I am thankful that Frederick Banting was able to invent insulin. His ability to make this life sustaining medication has changed my daughters life.  It took my daughter from a 1-2 year life expectancy after her diagnosis to now she can live a life full and active and great. Thank you GOD!

I am thankful that I have a great job.  That job provides good (not great but Good) medical insurance.  That medical insurance provides insulin needles, test strips, insulin and other supplies.

I am thankful for my friends in the Diabetic Online Community.  Without them I would not be able to function daily.  I get to get answers 24 hours a day because well...we are always awake. They have given so much one mother after knowing that I did not own a Blood Ketone meter was nice enough to send me some and some strips, they are not cheap but people were willing to share. That makes me thankful that God has brought me these people in my life at a time I so desperately needed them.

I am thankful for my children.  My teenagers help so much every day.  They have had to go without because of Sarah's diabetes.  The significant expense involved has drastically altered our financial situation. The two teens have taken it in stride and are willing to wait a little longer to get things because the money just isn't "there" as fast as it used to be.

I am thankful for my husband. He get's to put up with Sarah's mood swings from high's and lows as well as my mood swings from the stress.

I am thankful for my belief in God.  My life has had many ups and downs.  And with each up and down.  I have been able to pray and get reassurance that he is still there and better things are ahead for us. And Please Lord let there be a cure one day.

I am thankful for my life.  It is great.

Trying to Keep up...

So often in life it seems like I am two steps ahead in one area while I am four steps behind in other ways. Diabetes seems to have life running around in circles.  Soon we will be looking into getting a pump. I cannot wait.  I really believe that this will help us get a better control over her blood sugar.  I'm tired of having to stab her with needles all the time. She deserves the one stab every three days...That will be so much nicer for her. But then again there will be so many new things to learn.  It feels like diabetes is just a constant learning curve. There is no darn way we can keep up with the new technology and everything else. So Frustrating.  Just need a few days of sleep to catch up lol....

Trying to be healthier...we shall see

The last few months I have been thinking more and more about what we put into our bodies in the Pittman house.  With Sarah having to check her blood sugar constantly and us needing to constantly keep a log of her carbs etc. I find myself reading the labels of all of the food that we consume. This new found review of nutrition labels told me that we were putting way too darn much crap into our bodies. 

Years ago I used to can food at home.  Fruits and Vegetables galore.  I loved doing it. But it is a time consuming process and can be a costly start up.  Jars cost between 10-15 dollars for a dozen (they usually come with the lids and rings) and then you keep reusing the jars and rings but have to buy lid's each time. It's just not worth reusing the rings as it's a safety hazard.  You will also need a pressure canner (Water boils at 212 degrees,  it is impossible to kill the bacteria etc with just a water bath canner (how they did it in the older generations and please remember, many families were wiped out because of botulism etc so use a pressure canner.)  Now you can use a water bath canner for things like tomato's and high acid foods  I have not yet done this as I've not seen tomato's and things like that on sale enough that I want to do my own salsa...but that's coming.  Because nothing tastes better than home made salsa!

My oldest daughter Ashley and I started out with potato's which are incredably simple.  We measured out and got everything right.  And we now have over 24 jar's of yellow and red potato's.  We then moved on to carrots which were easy as can be.  Tonight we are doing Beans.  You can call them refried beans however because of how thick refried beans are we do not yet mash the beans until we are ready to use them however once they are done and canned, they are ready to eat out of the jar if you want..but I like them mashed.  For now they are just Pinto Beans with lot's of seasoning.  We added garlic, onions and a little taco seasoning.  That way once we get them out of the jar...they are ready to be mashed and eaten...YUMMY!

This summer as new foods come into season and are available, I plan on canning more of the foods we as a family eat a lot of.  Potato's are not unhealthy per se but I found that we as a family ate a lot of dried potato's and boxed potato's.  This way we just open the jar and drain the water off and either heat them up to mash them or toss them in a frying pan to fry. or toss them in a roasting pan to roast (heat up because they are already cooked I mean)