I win

For the most interesting call to Dexcom yesterday, that is.

The reason for the call was the out of range icon on her reciever for over an hour, even though the receiver was right next to her.

As I was following the CSR's instructions, I could hear a howling from the family room.  I looked over, and although I could hear Lucas, I couldn't see him.

"Mom!  Mom!  Lucas is stuck under the sofa!"

Elise was telling the truth, so the poor CSR had to listen in on the chaos as I told her to, "hold on, my baby is stuck under the sofa".  He was very, very stuck; so I had to lift up the sofa while Elise dragged him out.

Here is my reenactment:

***no actual babies were harmed in the taking of this picture

I wonder if they'll use the recording for training purposes... how not to bust out laughing at a customer.

The connection

I woke up; my heart pounding and sweat just pouring off of me.  As my eyes adjusted to the dim light of the bedroom, I realized that it had just been a dream; the shakiness, feeling dizzy, my CGM buzzing a low blood sugar and the number on the monitor coming in at 29.

This had happened before; dreams where I was the one with diabetes and I was experiencing a low blood sugar.  It always amazes me how vivid and real the symptoms are.  

In my dream I was at work, and I was struggling to tell my co-workers what was wrong. I was on the verge of passing out and I managed to spit the words, "my blood sugar..." out, when they all came running.

That's when I awoke to the dexcom screaming about a LOW that my daughter was experiencing right at that moment.  I ran into her room, and the check turned up a 56.

This is also not the first time I've had dreams about being low, only to awake and find that Elise actually is.

Once again, I am amazed by motherhood.

All you need is gum... and a whole bunch of love

The other day we had a particularly bad CGM insertion.  Elise flinched as I pressed in the plunger, and then started to cry.  Something that is unheard of around here.

Upon closer inspection, I found out why... a small dot of red began to bloom.  Then seep,  And drip.

Aw, crap.

We removed it ASAP and I gave up on any chance of her wanting another one any time soon. We've been having some problem areas and I've been depending on the CGM to help us pinpoint exactly what is going on.

I came downstairs after nursing Lucas when Elise ran up to me and said, "I'm ready to try again!"

So we did... this time it went just fine.  I looked at Elise and told her that I was so proud and amazed by her bravery.

She hugged me and said, "Oh thank you Mama!  All you really need is some gum.  And a whole bunch of love.  Thank you for giving me both."

Swoon... I love that girl.

*we always give her gum to chew during pod changes and CGM insertions.  She swears it takes away the pain.

A tale of two Dexes - My thoughts on the G4

Thoughts.  Not review.  Mostly because my brain can't handle a full-fledged review at this point.  My melon is far too consumed with growing a baby to be very coherent these days.  So the following is the best I have to offer...

Lunchtime with the Dexcom G4

Let me start of by saying I love me some G4.  So much so that I want to run off to Hawaii, marry it and have a whole generation of little G4s with it.  Does that make me weird? 

What has me swooning:

-The range. Oh-sweet-Lord-in-heaven-above, the range!  The G4 boasts a range of 20 feet, but we have seen  far better than that.  In fact, we can keep the receiver in our room at night, and it picks her up over 20 feet away and around a few corners.  I nearly peed myself with excitement when I realized this.  Although the peeing itself is not so special in that it doesn't take much these days.  Seriously, a stifled giggle is a huge problem.  All the Mamas in the house know what I'm sayin'.

What was I talking about?

-The size.  When I saw side-by-side comparisons, they did not do justice to just how much smaller the G4 is than the 7+.  Gone is the cumbersome oval-shaped curiosity (most people could not figure out what it was... one woman asked if it was a GPS for Elise), and in it's place is a sleek, Ipod-esque receiver that most people don't give a second glance to. It is lighter, thinner, and overall has a nice feel to it.



You'd think I'd clean off my counter to get a decent shot...



-The colours.  The interface is pretty much the same as the 7+, but the colours make it a whole lot easier on the eyes.  The reds for lows and yellows for highs irk my husband, but I'm coming around on it.  I like being able to look quickly at the graph and see the trouble spots in plain view.


The prettiest 24-hour graph I ever did see.  Yes, I am bragging!



-The COLOUR.  As in pink.  I'm not such a fan of the pink as I am the marketing geniuses that made it attractive to my daughter.  As I've said before, well played.

What makes my bum itch

(as an aside, this is why I could never be a professional reviewer.  Seriously, what company would want someone who talks about marrying inanimate objects, incontinence, and itchy bums?)

-The alarms. Not the fact that they exist, but the ear-splitting annoyance of them.  You have a few more to choose from, but I find the new fancy-schmancy alarms to be worse than the originals.  I am still in favour of being able to upload music and use those for alarms.  Since it looks like an Ipod, couldn't it sound like one?  I would go with "Low" by Flo Rida for lows, and "High" by The Cure for highs.  Not too original, but I think it shows off my diverse musical tastes, don't you?

-The rashes.  You'll remember that Elise used to get horrific rashes from the adhesive when we were using the Dexcom 7+.  It was one of the main reasons we didn't fight her when she wanted to stop using the dex.  I was so tired of looking at her swollen, red skin.  So far the rashes haven't been as bad, but you need to read my next point to find out why.  I just wish they could figure out a way to make the adhesive hypo-allergenic.

-The failures.  We are two-for-two on sensor failures so far.  The first sensor lasted only two days.  The second, five.  Now I will say that Dexcom is GREAT at replacing these sensors, but they still bug me.  Leading up to the failure, we usually see an hourglass in the upper right-hand corner, followed by the dreaded ???. Each time, the Dex came back, only to fail outright a few hours later. Still, this doesn't deter me from loving the G4.

-The transmitter and how freaking hard it is to remove it from the sensor.  I don't remember having as much of an issue with the 7, but both times I've changed the sensor, removing the transmitter has been a fight.  I can't even use the designated remover-thingy (not it's real name), because it broke when I tried.  We use baby oil or unisolve to take the sensor off of Elise's skin, so that doesn't make it any easier.

Things that make me say "meh"
(in other words, things that don't bug me)

-The transmitter size.  Yeah, it sticks out a bit more, but if that's the trade-off for better range, I'm all for it.


Old on the left, new on the right

 -The transmitter life. Only 6 months compared to the 7+'s 18-month life.  Again, if that's the trade-off for better range, I'm okay with it.

-The insertion device.  Some people hate it, and seem a little ticked that it hasn't changed.  I have no issue with it, and Elise barely flinches during the insertion, so it's no big thing to us.

So... those are my thoughts on the G4.  I'm glad Elise happened to be looking over my shoulder when I was reading about it, because I never would have pursued it on my own.   We took a break from it last night after the sensor failure and I miss it already!

A Dex-ing we will go!

I never thought I would utter (or type, as it were) these words again, but we are about to be Dex-ing once again!

It all started when I was reading about the release of the brand-spankin' new Dexcom G4.  Elise happened to be looking over my shoulder and asked what I was looking at.  When I told her it was a brand new Dexcom, her eyes got very wide and she exclaimed,

"You mean it's PINK now???"

Oh you devious little marketing rascals of Dexcom... Let me just interject that you missed the boat by not offering one in camouflage.  You missed that oh-so-important demographic of boys, ages 2 - whenever-camo-stops-being-cool.

Anyway, when I confirmed that, yes Elise... there IS a pink Dexcom, she decided she wanted to wear a CGM again because, "sometimes it helps to know where my blood sugars are going!"

After chatting with our insurance and our supply company, we found out that it would be covered at 100%.  What-the-what???  Free Dex?  Giddyup!

Or course, what this really means is we've just already paid an obscene amount out-of-pocket for all the other medical stuff, but I'm going to pretend I don't know that.  FREE DEX!

So we're about to fire that baby up.  Today will be a pod change/sensor insertion day.  Awesome.

At least SHE'S happy about it... for now.

Who am I???

Remember back a few months ago when Elise decided she no longer wanted to wear the Dexcom?  I was beside myself with worry... we had just started pumping and were so used to the constant stream of numbers.

Well, a couple of days ago, Elise started bugging me to wear it again.  When asked why, she said, "so you won't have to check my blood sugar if I'm not eating... you can just check my monitor!"

I managed to distract her for a couple of days, but she started asking again.  Today, she just wouldn't take no for an answer.  So I dusted off the dex, and put my rusty insertion skills to the test.  The result:

One happy girl!  I'm still scratching my head about this, but I've always said it's HER body and she can decide what she does and doesn't want to wear.

So, we're dex-ing again!  I am so interested to see how long it lasts!

***I just want to add that I have nothing against the dex.  In fact, I love it.  It helped us so much when Elise was on MDI and when she started pumping.  I just got used to not being at its beck and call.  I loved seeing her bare, rash-free skin.  It made me happy not to see her lugging the receiver around.  We got to a point where we felt that her settings were great, and she was feeling her lows, so the dex wasn't necessary anymore.  Just wanted to make sure we're clear that I have no bad feelings towards the dexcom.

Dexcom FAIL

We finally decided to slap a sensor back on Elise because of some very scary daytime lows she's been having. About an hour after she eats, her BG is in the 40s. Every stinking time I bolus her, it's the same thing.

The weird part is at night, it's like the insulin won't touch her. I recently upped her basal because by around 1 am, she would be in the 200s when going to bed with a BG of 130. Now she's in the 300s by 1 am. And I am so afraid to give a full correction because of what happens during the day. But if we don't do a full correction, she wakes up high.

We used to have the opposite problem at night... she was very sensitive to insulin. But I guess the only thing that is constant with D is change, right?

Anyway, back to the lows and the dex. Yesterday, I started giving her HALF of the suggested bolus, and she would be in the 90s after 1 hour. So I decided I had had enough, and on went the dex.

The funny thing is, I had almost forgotten how to do it. When I finally got it on, I noticed it was bleeding a bit. But I didn't have the heart to pull it off and do it again, since yesterday was also pod change day, and Elise had a friend over and wanted to go back to playing. I figured it would stop bleeding and hopefully not affect the numbers.

Everything seemed fine, except dex was a little slow on picking up the drops, but I blame this on the fact that we probably need a new transmitter.

Then came bath time and I noticed she had a LOT of blood on the adhesive. So after wearing it for only 5 hours, I pulled it off and saw THIS (squeamish alert):

Poor girl, she never cried or complained that it hurt. And it kept bleeding after I took it off. It wasn't on long enough to get any usable data, and I'm not sure if we're going to try again.

These lows are just scaring me so much. The only time I've seen this happen is when she's getting sick (or after she's been sick), but it's been going on for about 4 days and so far seems fine.

Diabetes, as usual, is causing my brain to hurt. Blergh.

Missing the in-between

We are going on day 5 without our trusty dexcom, and I have to say I'm handling it better than I had expected. After being bombarded with a constant stream of information for almost 1 1/2 years, my world has become a little dimmer. Finger pokes allow only little glimpses of what is happening in Elise's body.

I won't lie to you... It has been really hard. Especially in the middle of the night when foggy, sleep-deprived brains are trying to make decisions.

We pulled our sensor on Friday, after four days of the dex giving us the middle finger by way of the ???. On the last day, I think we got 3 full hours of actual data (not consecutive hours, mind you). Friday night to Sunday afternoon were awful due to two pod failures. I miss correcting and seeing that downward arrow to let you know that it's working.

We've had a run of bad luck with our pods... we went through 7 this weekend (not all of them made it onto Elise's body). When we'd get a working pod, we would see some beautiful numbers... although having lived with the CGM for this long, I have to wonder what's going on in the in-between.

As of now, we have no plans to put it back on anytime soon. With the addition of the pod, Elise's skin is a MESS. There is just no real estate left on her tiny body.

But I miss it. Who knew one could love a piece of technology so much?

Ouch

I'm sending out the bat signal once again to the DOC. I'm at a loss with what to do with the dexcom. The sensor is causing terrible rashes on Elise's arms and legs. She is so itchy while she's wearing the sensor, and the rash remains as long as almost two weeks after we remove it.

We're pretty much at the end of the road with where we can put it. She has a rash on every site we use. I've asked her about using her bum, but she's not so enthusiastic about it. I know I could push the issue, but from what I've read, most of you don't have a lot of luck with bum sites.

Here's a picture of her leg... I think the sensor was removed about 12 days ago.


I tried giving her a break, but it lasted 1/2 a day... her numbers are just so weird right now (plus I was too scared to go without it at night while Fred was away). But we really need her to be able to wear it when she goes back to school in about a week.

I just don't feel comfortable sending my 3 year old to school without the dexcom. In fact, we will have to pull her out if she's unable to wear it. This will absolutely break her heart, she's been asking when school starts almost everyday for a month.

Plus, will this be a problem when we start her on a pump? Will we have rashes and itchiness in two areas? Again, we absolutely will not put her on a pump if the same thing happens. She is so miserable and I don't know how to help her.

Surely Elise is not the only one out there with sensitive skin... I'm not sure why this is a problem all of a sudden. She's worn the dexcom for over a year now. Could it be the hot weather? Anyone out the have any advice???

Lenny and Harold ride again

Diabetes Bloopers - Wednesday

This is not really a blooper, per se. But a not-so-funny-at-the-time anecdote that makes me chuckle now that some time has passed.

If you are rather new-ish to my insane ramblings, you might not know who Lenny and Harold are. They are Those that Shall not be Ignored. Simply put, Lenny and Harold are the little voices in my head that speak up when something could be very wrong; especially in the realm of all things diabetes.

Since the arrival of the Dexcom, they've sort of been on vacation. A much needed vacation. Although they still show up to tell me things like; on no planet does that shirt go with those pants. Or maybe I really should exercise my right to remain silent now.

But the other night, our Dexcom decided to take a powder in the form of the dreaded ???. I thought it was because Elise was sleeping on the sensor. Not so much. It turns out that the transmitter had popped out.

Let me break here and tell you that there is nothing quite so awesome as searching through a mountain of stuffed animals, blankets, and the plethora of other craziness that Elise sleeps with for a little grey hunk of plastic that is the size of an international postage stamp. It. Is. So. Aaaawesooooome.

After we popped that elusive sucker back in (another not-so-easy task), we waited for the Dexcom to calibrate.

About 45 minutes later, as I tried in vain to sleep, Lenny and Harold showed up.

"Get up! Get up! Sheeeeeee's loooooow. Come on, get your mis-matched ass (yes, I even have trouble co-ordinating my pjs) outta bed and check your daughter!"

Thinking I was just being paranoid because I didn't have the Dexcom working, I tried to ignore them. But they just wouldn't shut up. They're kinda like Charlie Sheen in that respect.

Finally I went in and checked her... 52. Well, crap-a-doodle-doo. Looks like Lenny and Harold are batting a thousand still. It's nice to know they can still be trusted.

Like the deserts miss the rain

Thank God that week is over. I've been MIA and for good reason. Fred was out of town and my kids decided to try and kill me by not letting me sleep. Every. Single. Night.

Whether is was Elise up for 3 hours crying, the dexcom alerting to numbers that were off by sometimes as much as 200, stubborn lows, or Mattias waking up every 90 minutes, which happened every night while Fred was gone. Combine all that with the usual feeding problems and it was a nightmare.

But he's back, and I am so, so thankful. He is an awesome husband and does whatever it takes to support me. Even though his flight came in at 12:30 am, almost two hours late, he came home and talked me down from a very tall ledge (for reasons I'll get to in a moment). Mwah! Love ya, Freddie!

I am also thankful for my friend Liz, who came over twice, brought me lunch, and listened as I did the "ugly cry" for two hours. She also gave me some very wonderful advice, which I appreciate even more because I know it wasn't easy for her to do, because she was unsure of how I would take it. Thank you Liz, it's the REAL friend who will tell you the stuff you don't necessarily want to hear.

I started taking a prescription drug for my nursing issues. I was very leery about taking it because of the side effects, but after learning Mattias hadn't gained any weight in 3 weeks, I felt I had no choice. It has been wonderful and awful all at the same time.

Wonderful because my supply has almost doubled and I've only been taking it for a few days. Since I started, Mattias stopped waking up every 90 minutes at night, and only woke up once to feed. Ah-MA-zing! He also seems more content during the day.

Awful because the side effects really are terrible. During the day, the fatigue is so bad I feel like I'm going to fall over. I can't concentrate and can barely form a coherent sentence. And at night I lay in bed, suffering through panic attacks. The night Fred got home, it was really bad. I had gone to bed at 9:30, and was unable to fall asleep (read: pass out from sheer exhaustion) until almost 3:00 am. I cannot even begin to explain how horrible it felt. I was so tired, but couldn't sit still. At one point I remember thinking if removed my pjs and went walking out in the pouring rain, I would be okay (yeah... weird. I know). Thankfully, Fred came home and sat with me, attempting to calm me down.

After all that, you'd think I would stop taking it, right? Not so much. I did cut my dose (after consulting my doctor) in half, but I have my reasons for continuing.

The way I look at it is this; as parents of a diabetic, we don't have to wake up 2 - 3 (sometimes more) times a night to check our kids. In fact, some endos don't understand why we do it. But we do. For our kids. For their safety. For their health. Often at the detriment of our own. Because we would do anything to avoid the unimaginable.

Now Mattias will not starve, but to me his health is at risk. He started in the 50th percentile for weight and now he's in the 10th. He has feeding issues and I will do anything I can to help him.

The good news is the lower dose doesn't make me quite as crazy. I still get agitated, but I can deal with it. I'm also not going to take it at bedtime, because that I can't deal with.

If you've made it this far, congrats. I know there has been a lot going on in the DOC lately, but I haven't had time time or energy to blog, read other blogs or comment. Those of you who are going through the fire right now, please know that you are in my prayers.

Hopefully I'll get my crap together soon. Because I miss you guys.

The tri-fecta

We've had bad sleep nights here before. That's certainly nothing new. Whether it's because of Mattias wanting to party in the wee hours of the morning, or due to BG issues or night terrors with Elise. Yup, been there, done that... got the dark circles under my eyes to prove it.

But never before have we had such a piss-poor night because of ALL THREE.

I went to bed around midnight, took my usual hour to fall asleep; and just as I was teetering on the edge, Mattias woke up to be fed. Okay, no problem.

Except that he pretty much refused to go back to sleep.

And then Elise's BG went low. And then she started crying about bumble bees in her room. Mattias was ticked off that nobody was paying attention to him. More BG issues. Dexcom beeping. More crying. Curses uttered. A failed attempt to nurse Mattias again, hoping he'd fall asleep. Screaming. Beeping. Cursing. More lows.... you get the idea.

It seemed once we'd get one problem with one kid settled, the other would need attention. And so it went. All. Night. Long. Unlike the Lionel Ritchie song, we were not raisin' the roof, nor having fun.

I think I finally got to sleep around 5:30 am. Poor Fred had a flight at 6:30 am. He left the house at 5:48, and STILL made the flight. That, my friends, is impressive.

I awoke, 2 1/2 hours later, and catapulted myself out of bed, because I realized that Elise had to be at school in 1 hour. I can't believe I actually got her there without spontaneously combusting.

So, here I sit. Sleep deprived. Tired. Alone for the next few days. Stressed. I've already had my first marshmellow/caramel chocolate egg of the day.

Something tells me it won't be the last.

Wednesday's numbers

BG at 8:03 pm (bedtime) - 133
BG the next morning at 8:02 am (wake-up) - 131

Number of times Mattias woke up to nurse - 1

Number of times Mattias woke up and put himself back to sleep - 4

Hours of sleep for Mom - 6

Now THAT'S what I'm talking about.

Le sigh...

Yes... Mattias is STILL waking up (and staying up) at all hours of the night. Although 2 nights ago he went back to sleep twice by himself. I got 6 hours of sleep that night and felt like a new woman.

Yes... we are still also dealing with wonky overnight numbers. And night terrors too.

To make matters worse, our dexcom has become a compulsive liar and alarming for no reason at all, pretty much only at night. Like a few minutes ago it alarmed telling me Elise was 74, straight down. Finger check showed 151. She better %&$*% well be 151 after all the %&$*@ carbs we've stuffed into her tonight. Can you say rebound high?

Our house is on the market and in no way ready to be seen. I'm stressed, I'm tired, I'm emotional, and THIS...


... is all I want to be doing.

SERENITY NOW!

Best. Day. Ever

So I've become a little obsessed with posting dexcom pics. Have you seen the weather in Texas lately? Snowy. Icy. Sleety (is that a word?). And just downright COLD! This morning it was 16 degrees F. That's -9 for my Canadian and other Celsius peeps. Translation... BRRRRR!

So there's not a whole lot to do around here except micro-manage Elise's diabetes and take pictures of the results. I give you my exhibit:

Blood Sugar Beauty; Dexcom Bears All.

I call this one "A 3 Hour Tour". It includes her bedtime snack.

This is "The Disappearing Line". It encapsulates 2 lunches, 1 breakfast, 1 dinner and 3 snacks. The missing data is from overnight when she was lying on her sensor.

"24 Hours of Bliss" Her BG didn't go above 170 or below 85 during this time period. Oh my, I love this picture so much, I am going to print it out and take it to a romantic Valentine's dinner.

I think I need a hobby.

Keeping our Dex dry

When playing in snow... the dexcom is a must. It was easy to keep him dry, but warm was another story. BRRRRRRR!

I got nothin'

I promise I'll stop just posting pictures of the dexcom and post something of substance soon. The last three or so days have been a little on the craptastic side. I've decided to start the paperwork on officially changing my kid's names to Crabby and Clingy. I swear they're conspiring in the night to gang up on me...

Onto the one thing that's making me happy these days. At least D is behaving. Of course, now that I've thrown that out into the universe, the universe is probably going to throw it up right back on me. It's okay. At least I have these pictures to remind me!



Look! From last night until this morning, her BG didn't go below 100 or above 200 (it looks like it dips, but finger poke said 134). Even better, the arrow didn't go beyond slightly down or slightly up. And look again... our high alert line is back! I don't know if you noticed in the other pics, but that line has been missing for awhile. We were having some horrible nights awhile ago where the dexcom kept alarming that she was above her high threshold. But she would always wake up in the morning in range, so we couldn't really correct her. So we turned off the high alert so we could get some sleep. And now, her high threshold isn't 200. I just put that in there because it makes me happy.

This morning from 6:45 until 9:45... I totally OWN breakfast (at least on days she doesn't have school).

Amy's comment on my last post made me chuckle: "Hahahahahahahahahaha! I totally see one of those fifty's style cartoon blocks of a woman in an apron and a spoon in the air declaring "Making breakfast my bitch"."

Something like this?:

What is the sound of one hand clapping?

Elise was in her room, reading.

I was in another room, nursing Mattias.

I checked Elise before I started nursing. 99 and holding steady on the CGM. It's almost dinner time and that's a completely normal number for her at this time.

10 minutes later... "beep, beep, beep", says the dexcom.

"Elise?" I ask. No answer. Crap.

"ELISE?" I bellow. Silence. Crap-on-a-stick.

"ELISE! ELISE! ELISE!" Nothing. CRAP CRAP CRAP.

Off comes a very hungry and protesting Mattias. I put him in his crib and run down the hall to find Elise asleep.

Or is she?

CGM says 90 steady. Meter says 134. Mom says a silent prayer of thanks.

A Dexcom beeping and silence from your child; two of the scariest sounds in the world.

Do you hear what I hear?

Some time ago I saw THE best Christmas cards in a store. On the front of the card, there was a choir of people wearing those oh-so-wonderful backless hospital gowns. They were singing, "Do you hear what I hear?". The caption on the card said, "Christmas at the mental hospital".

Funny? You betcha. Politically correct? Probably not. What does it have to do with this post? Not a whole lot, except these days Fred and I find ourselves saying, "did you hear that?" to each other a lot.

If you or your child has a CGM, then you are well-acquainted with it's many alarms; of the buzzing and beeping variety. My ears are finely tuned to be able to hear these alarms at all times.

The problem is that there are probably no fewer than 8 different items in our house that make similar sounding (or similar enough sounding to my very tired and very overworked ear drums) noises. Fred's Ipad, my laptop, my phone, Fred's phone, the smoke alarm, microwave, stove alarm, furnace (yes our furnace makes a buzzing noise. I'm told that it's okay) ... and that's not even counting the plethora of Elise's toys that boop, beep or buzz in some manner.

It's enough to drive a person crazy. Although for me, it's a very short trip.

Just today, I was sitting on the sofa with the TV on. Elise was in her room, having her "rest time" (since she recently decided not to nap anymore, I still send her upstairs for an obligatory momma-needs-a-break-from-YOU time), when I heard a very distinct buzzing.

Now usually Elise will call to me through the baby monitor, saying "my phone is ringing!" (and ohmygoodness that STILL tickles me that she says that) But there are days that she does fall asleep, so I lugged my behind upstairs to find her wide awake and a 105 flat on the monitor. Weird.

I decided it must have been on of the other noise-makers in the house and went back to my business of killing brain cells. It wasn't until a few hours later when I happened to be passing by the TV (which was still on) and heard the buzzing again. Turns out it was some stupid commercial!

It's so interesting to me that something that is just an every day noise to other people, causes us D-parents to snap to attention. My favourite is when Jessica, Laura and I are all hanging out and we have to figure out which of our kids is doing the buzzing or beeping.

Maybe Dexcom could have a music player on their next receiver... that way, instead of a buzz or a beep when Elise is low, it could play "Low" by Flo Rida.

I'm just sayin'... we've got to get our chuckles where we can.

Please come back to us Eileen

She was only with us a few short months, but we quickly came to love and depend on Eileen. She was our eyes when we couldn't see. Our ears when we couldn't hear. And saved our butts more times than I can count. Sure her whining grew tiresome at times, especially in the middle of the night. But as scarce as sleep is around here, I would give up a week's worth just to see her arrows and numbers once again.

Eileen left us tonight at 9:23 pm CST admidst beeps and shutdowns and failure messages. She gave us one final message: Err Code: 16R0F2D93c. I just wish I knew what it meant.

Okay, I'm sort of trying to be funny here, but this really, really sucks. And because I seemed to have pissed off the universe in some way, Dexcom shipping is shut down for the weekend and they won't be able to send us a new receiver until Tuesday.

I foresee a lot of sleepless nights in our future...