Frustrations

I am so sick and tired of medical office staff not being at least competent at their jobs. I know not everyone has bad office staff- in fact several of my doctors have really efficient and knowledgeable staff. I'm not talking about any of my doctors, though.

Someone I know had a surgery postponed twice because of negligent office staff. Need a co-surgeon? Wait until last minute to contact them, and then they are unavailable. Need patient to do something (or several somethings) before the surgery? Wait until last minute to tell them. Need to fill out FMLA paperwork? Do it wrong and then mess it up even more when it is resubmitted for corrections.

And don't get me started on the actual hospital where the surgery was performed. Oh my lord, it was as if they were trying to kill the patient. The nurses didn't communicate with each other, the attending doctor refused to administer medication at previously prescribed doses, and it felt like no one knew what was going on, and didn't care, either. 

Add to all of this some seriously concerning behaviors from my son, which required multiple medication changes and emergency psychiatrist appointments, and I am pretty sure that Atlas has somehow handed me his burden of carrying the heavens.

I would use pictures and gifs for all of this, but I am honestly not feeling it. I often use humor to temper unpleasantness, but I'm too depressed and tired to muster the effort. I am worn TF out right now.  

In actual diabetes news, I will be getting a new pump here in the next few days to replace the one I currently have. Its only issue is that it is out of warranty, but who am I to turn down a new pancreas?  I'll take a picture of it while it is still shiny and share it with you all. 

Of pumps and puppies

 I spent the weekend yo-yo-ing like Tommy Smothers.

#smothersbrothers #yoyo

My blood sugar was up, and then down, and then up, and then waaaay down, and then up, back waaay down, and then up, up, up and then I don't know what even happened. I woke up this morning with my pump telling me it was out of insulin and my blood sugar was 79.

Then I got to work and all of a sudden I was getting "Change Sensor" alerts because apparently the blasted thing wasn't working properly. I spent most of the weekend not giving insulin, giving too much insulin, finger sticking to check and see where my blood sugar was (and it wasn't as off as I would have expected), only to find out today that the sensor was whack and I wasn't going crazy.

I was in tears this morning because I had no idea what the hell was going on with my body.  I have an appointment with my endocrinologist's office later this week, and was ready to go in and say, WTF is WRONG with me? If it weren't for the fact that we'd added a puppy to our family this weekend as well, I would have been even more upset. As it was, she kept me pretty occupied.

She's itty bitty... for now

It's hard to describe how helpless you feel when you have a disease, which you've had for literally decades, and all of a sudden it's going off the rails and you have no control and you honestly don't know what the heck is going on. Frankly, it's scary. I had to call in sick last week because of it, which is something I am loathe to do. And the lows are just terrifying to me. Yes, I feel bloody awful when my blood sugar hits 450, but when it's 50 I not only don't feel well, there's a very good chance that I may not feel anything ever again if I don't get it under control.  Lows mean panic, and panic when you are already unable to make decisions and trying to navigate through a mental fog just leads to more panic, which means I am unsure if I am shaking because of a low blood sugar or if I think I'm gonna pass out and end up in the hospital.

Not being able to trust the sensor, which I admit I rely on way too much, is just another worry that I have to add to my list of things to worry about. As my therapist frequently points out, I have a lot of things on my plate, and dealing with the diabetes is one thing which I shouldn't neglect. Unfortunately, I do neglect it. So maybe it's mad at me. I don't know. 

Anyway, puppies!

What's my age... again?

   You'd be surprised how many things I am ineligible for because of the diabetes. Life insurance? No way. Aflac? Some of it yes, but a lot of it no. And if I ever tried to get health insurance outside of work I expect I'd be laughed at to my face. It's pretty demoralizing.  I should just start every conversation with an insurance agent with, "I have diabetes. Thanks for your time." It would save so much effort.

    There are worse things, though. Being kicked off of your insurance for no reason other than some idiots voted for a Big Beautiful load of BS, for one thing. I cannot imagine how people are going to survive. Now that is demoralizing. Knowing that I am almost at 30 years with my workplace, and that I could retire with my full retirement in less than five years but actually can't because I need the health insurance? How much more demoralized can I get?

    If you would, follow me down a rabbit hole of despair. Or no, don't. That's a rabbit hole I don't want to go down. It's just frustrating to know that I will have to work well into my old age, even though  I will technically have enough of a retirement to live comfortably at a relatively young age, because I need health insurance, and unlike every other democratic nation health insurance in the USA is tied to your workplace.  

Here we goooo...

   In other news, I am nearing retirement age and what the actual ****? Let's switch gears entirely.

   I consider myself a Xennial, the pronunciation of which is up for debate.  I was born somewhere between the years 1964 and 1980, the years designated for Generation X, but I am close enough to a Millennial (1981-1996) that I have a lot of Millennial tendencies. Xennials have been referred to as the Goonies Generation, the Nintendo Generation, and the Oregon Trail Generation.

                                                                         Sorry not sorry.

   We Xennials are a micro generation, because you really have to have been born in a specific time period to have had an analog childhood and a digital adulthood. I watched the Challenger explode on repeat, learned how to make it to the bathroom and the kitchen in a single commercial break, saw 9/11 happen live on TV, and got my first cell phone all before I could rent a car. I was a play outside, ride my bike all over the neighborhood (sorry Mom), Muppet Babies loving kid that turned into a flannel wearing, "Clueless" quoting teenager that knew how to use a computer and make a pretty mean mixtape. Or, to put it in boyband terms, I was old enough to be all about NKOTB and still young enough to be all about *NSYNC.

Yeah, okay, I'm still all about NKOTB. 

   Boybands aside (gasp!) there is one thing about this micro generation that I have seen, and that's we believe that 1990 was twenty years ago.  For some strange reason other generations don't agree. I mean, honestly, it's like the 2010's just didn't happen for us. I forget all about them. It's not like it's been over twenty years since blink-182 released "What's My Age Again?" and the thought of being 23 was kind of a laugh. Can it?

   All this to say that I find it very hard to believe that I am even remotely close to retirement. I mean, I'm still a young adult....at least mentally.