Hodgepodge Post

Pumping has been  going okay for the last week or so- no site failures. Still, when I saw a new doctor (a rheumatologist) two days ago and she had gotten records from another doctor, and the list of medications I'm on didn't agree with regards from Lantus, and she asked if I was on Lantus, I said no. I said, "I just started pumping so I stopped taking Lantus but I hate pumping so maybe I'll be back on Lantus." I'm not sure why I'm still pumping if the phrase "I HATE PUMPING" comes out of my mouth so readily.

I got a replacement pump but am still using the first one- am going to switch to the replacement one today for my insulin delivery. Have been running both with the same sensor to show CGM data which has been interesting because they have shown identical ISIGs at identical times with different interpretations (for instance, just now one alarmed low and showed 72 with one down arrow while the other alarmed low and showed 72 with two down arrows).

I saw a rheumatologist two days ago. She sent me for x-rays. She says that my symptoms are a "high suspicion for rheumatoid arthritis". She says somebody in his 20s should heal from injuries much much much better than I have. I fingered the diabetes. She said no- she says she doesn't have a whole lot of young diabetics coming in because of long standing pain in their hands- therefore it's not diabetes. So... while waiting for results I am experiencing what I hope are nocebo symptoms of pain throughout my hands and feet.

Lee Ann at The Butter Compartment has been trying to eat vegan and posting about it and also writing about her past with an eating disorder. Which triggers thoughts in me about how, when I was nine, I tried to starve myself because I wanted to die (nope, didn't care about being skinny). It didn't work, but I discovered that I could get a real thrill, a sort of high feeling, off of not eating. When I was ages 13 and 14 and 15, I did not eat (or drink) at all during daylight hours on Mondays or Thursdays. Sometimes the feeling was so good that I extended my fasts to two or even three days. It gave me a feeling of euphoria. Plus I always got sick to my stomach when I resumed eating so I didn't like that. I stopped doing it when it stopped feeling good, when I was 15, which just so happens to be only a few months before the weight loss started that didn't stop until I was diagnosed with diabetes. I sometimes wonder what, if anything, the not eating may have had to do with the diabetes.
Also, I am vegan. I've been vegan now for 14 years, and I am 25 years old, which is to say that I've been vegan for most of my life (vegetarian a couple years longer- vegan since January 2000 and vegetarian since November 1997). I became a vegan because of uncertainty about ethics and a desire to err on the side of caution. I've stayed a vegan for no reason except that it feels right.

Lee at lifeafterdx is a favorite blogger of mine and he's blogged only twice recently- he's had chickenpox. And memory loss from the chickenpox. His blog on the topic of memory loss made me think a lot about my memory loss. Increasing evidence says that it's not so rare for people to have memory loss like mine after DKA. It's been more than 7 years since I was in DKA. My cognitive function and memory have been very slowly improving for years. And yet the difference in my cognitive function and especially in my memory is profound.  I no longer deal with a persistent sense of disorientation. I expect myself to have the capabilities that I really have, now. But that memory loss is still a pervasive part of how I experience everything all day everyday now.