Potty Training?

After today I think I want to buy some pull-ups, haha. So many diapers on and off.

This morning started with Grace saying "Grace potty poop", so I immediately took her to sit on the potty and she actually sat there for much longer than she usually does. She eventually got restless and wanted down,  so I just put a new diaper on her.  Five minutes later she had a poopy diaper!

She's barely in the beginning stages of figuring out what the potty is actually for,  and I don't know if I'm ready for it!

The whole rest of the day she's been telling me Zach needs to go potty and Zach will tell me that Grace needs to. Haha, is this what potty training twins feels like?  They are funny.

I really haven't actually been potty training in any serious way.  I just take Grace to sit when she asks.  She will usually ask 2-3 times a day.  She never makes anything of it,  but at least she's interested?

I guess I'm just waiting for something to actually happen before being serious about it.  Just because she's interested doesn't mean she's actually ready physically.

Is it possible that she could be potty trained before the baby comes?  That seems crazy to me.  To skip having two babies in diapers?

Who knows what will happen.  I won't hold my breath.

Well, that's a glimpse into my life.  These kids make me happy.  I'm always learning just as much as they are,  I think.

Spring

I can't even express how happy I am that it's March!  Woohooo spring!

We've been going on walks again, and it's just so nice to be able to go outside.

Grace was getting so cabin feverish that everyday she'd ask to "go", which pretty much meant go in the car and get away from the house!  Haha, she didn't care where we went,  (jk, she really just always wants to go to my mom's house) she just wanted to go!

We go play outside twice a day now and I can already see it increasing our happiness.  Grace is a lot calmer and more willing to go play with toys by herself when we are inside now, and she just seems happier overall.

Yay sunshine!

I got to go see my other baby on Friday,  which was so happy! To see the baby move around and to see almost all the features already in place...such a miracle. Modern technology is amazing.

I already feel like a balloon.

Seriously, I'm not really that big yet,  but for 3 months along and compared to last time I feel rather large.

Funny story about that,  haha.

On Sunday after church one of the old ladies in our ward stopped me and told me she thinks I've 'lost so much weight!  Wow, you look so good!'

I went home and said to Jeff,  is this a joke!? Hahaha

I'm starting to pop out pregnant,  and she's saying I look better than before? WHAT DID I LOOK LIKE BEFORE!?

I'll just take it as classic crazy old lady and move on, I guess.

(I've clearly moved on...haha...not)

One interesting thing about diabetic pregnancies is your blood sugar is crazier than normal. And believe me,  the normal stuff is crazy enough.

So much unpredictability.  Oh my goodness,  exhausting!

With most people  the first trimester or so is full of lows.  I'm in several Type 1 support groups on Facebook,  and I've read a lot of people say that for the first trimester most people are chugging juice boxes day in and out.

Then some resistance starts to happen and your blood sugar sky rockets up through the third trimester and you end up taking a ridiculous amount of insulin till the end.

I would be lying if I didn't say thinking about all of that stresses me out.

I also would be lying if I didn't said I am so determined to make it work,  cause I want to meet this baby so badly.

I definitely took Grace's easy pregnancy for granted.
With this high risk one I'm having to work so hard, around the clock,  I know it'll be that much sweeter when I get to bring home this new baby.

I think my numbers have been in pretty good control so far. I didn't really experience the never ending lows in the first trimester,  cause I think my body is still trying to figure out what having this disease is even like.

I've definitely had more lows than before, and it's for sure been hard and annoying, but not like a lot of people describe.

With the good weather and going on walks it's added a whole other element into figuring out my blood.

Exercise makes blood sugar drop, so trying to figure that out on top of it already being on the low side is.....fun.

I want to exercise though. It feels good to get out and move.  Endorphins are wonderful!

Being low a lot is kind of hard when you're a mom.

You know those mom memes of mom's trying to sneak treats or food in the other room and hope their children don't hear them?

Imagine that X 100, cause eating to get my blood sugar up is pretty dang essential.  Sharing isn't really an option.

Poor Grace always wants what I'm eating.

I'm now moving into the 2nd trimester, so it'll be interesting to see how things change!

We've told Grace that I have a baby in my tummy, and obviously she has no idea what that actually means.  When you think about it,  that's a really weird concept for an almost 2 year old,  hahaha.

She did kiss my stomach the other day and said "baby!" though,  so who knows what she really understands.  :)

It's amazing how these little people become your whole world. I can't imagine doing anything else with my life. I'm so glad I have these little ones to watch grow and be my best friends.

Baby Numero Dos!

We've officially told the world (Facebook and Instagram) that I'm pregnant!

I feel like it's all down hill now (even though we're only 1/3 of the way through). Sometimes just getting past telling everyone makes it feel so much more like it's really happening!

I just posted a blog of something I wrote the day we found out! December 26th. Go check it out!

I actually had wanted to take a pregnancy test on Christmas, cause I really had the feeling I was pregnant, but I didn't want to ruin Christmas if I wasn't! Ha ha, call me weird, I know I am. So the day after Christmas is when we found out!

If you read that post I kind of explained how I feel like this baby is truly a miracle for us.

With all of my medical awfulness, just being able to conceive and carry a baby is a miracle to me!

With Grace it took us a year, exactly 12 months, to get pregnant. Although that doesn't measure up to the years and years of infertility that many of my friends have and are dealing with, for us it was a big thing. It was a major trial in our lives.

I used to HATE....hate hate hate....when people would say things like: "We got pregnant by surprise!!!" "It's a whoops baby!!" "We didn't even WANT to get pregnant!" "It happened immediately!" "On our first try!"

Those are the worst things to say to people who are struggling to get pregnant.

Ugh.

And although I know those people didn't really mean any harm by those comments, I still struggled with them.

How completely ironic is it then that we literally got pregnant immediately with THIS baby?

By no means was it a mistake....or a whoops....or unplanned.

It was very much planned!

We hoped and hoped and hoped that despite all of my medical obstacles we'd have another baby sooner, rather than later....

And it happened!

I'm still so happy and in shock about it!

It's such a manifestation of how God is looking out for me and my situation.

Everyone is so different. All situations are different and unique.

I know mine is tailored to what it needs to be to help me grow exactly how I'm supposed to.

I know we needed to learn from that year of trying to get pregnant with Grace.

And I know I've needed to learn 203,507,845 things from my diabetes.

Diabetes and pregnancy is.......

Hard.

There is so much involved.

(I'll probably only really explain the tip of the iceberg here)

I have three high risk doctors.

Up till now my appointments have kind of been every other week....sometimes weekly....but before long they will definitely be every week.

When you're pregnant with diabetes you have to keep your blood sugar in very tight control. Tighter numbers than when you're not pregnant, because there are more things that could go wrong than with a normal pregnancy.

The list of possible complications is very real....and yet I very much ignore it most of the time, for my own sanity, ha ha.

Because of that list, though, I was having to test my blood 12 times a day.

I felt like that was all I was doing! (Probably cause it was all I was doing)

Now with my CGM (see post 2 times ago for explanation on what a CGM is) I can look at trends on that and that makes my life SOOO much easier! I still have to test a little bit to ensure accuracy, but seriously...

Stabbing myself 3 times a day VS 12 times a day?

I'll take it.

There's probably a whole novel I could write about diabetes and pregnancy, but I'll leave it at that, cause I don't want to get too glum, ha ha.

I've felt a little more sick with this pregnancy than I did the first one.

It's mostly just that I never want to eat anything!  Food is so awful!

Slightly problematic when you have an auto immune disease that makes you eat every 3 hours.

Also,  I've been so tired! There have been days when I'll just sit and hope Grace and Zach aren't playing with matches,  cause I'm just so exhausted,  haha.

(Jk I'm not THAT irresponsible.......)

I think a lot of it is in the difference of lifestyle.  When I was pregnant with Grace I was out in the workforce with clients all day.  I couldn't very easily just pass as sick day in and out.  I think my mind was a lot busier and just being out and active didn't let me feel as tired and sick.

Now that I'm home,  I can stay in pajamas all day and sit in my comfortable recliner!  A lot more time to think about my condition,  between chasing a toddler around the house. Haha. I seriously need to go on a walk or something. Getting a little stir crazy around here.

Where is spring??

Another interesting thing to note with this pregnancy is, according to a trend in my family, I should be having a girl!

I've blogged about this before, but I'll explain it again, cause who really remembers all of my blogs?

I think Jeff doesn't even remember most of them! :)

There is a trend in my family...and if you're part of the trend there will be a baby girl in the family born when you're 13 and then later on, you're supposed to have a daughter when you're 26.

So....I'm part of this trend.

It's been going on for about 4 generations now.

When my grandma was 13 her sister was born.

When my grandma was 26 and her sister was 13 my mom was born.

When my grandma's sister was 26 and my mom was 13 my mom's cousin was born.

When my mom was 26 and my mom's cousin was 13 I was born. (TA DA!)

When my mom's cousin was 26 and I was 13 my mom's cousin's daughter was born.

NOW...

I'm 26 and pregnant.....and my mom's cousin's daughter will be 13 this summer.

So what does that mean?

In reality it probably means I'll have a boy and completely throw everything off. Ha ha ha ha.

It'll be interesting to see what happens!

Having a girl would be fun so Grace could be close in age with a sister! But having a boy would be great in so many ways too.

At this point I'm not really rooting for one more than the other.

I just love babies! And as long as they are healthy and happy, gender doesn't matter to me.

Something else fun with this baby, is it will be the third grandbaby born this year for Jeff's family.

This happened with Grace too.

The year Grace was born, Zach and Eliza were born 3 months and 1 month before her.

Now with this baby, Jeff's sister Natalie is having a baby in May and our sister-in-law Laurel is having a baby in July! So those baby's will be 3 months and 1 month older than our baby!

We're starting a new trend! Ha ha ha ha....jk.

I think that's fun though that we keep having our babies at the end of the three babies every time.

Having a bunch of cousins all the same age is fun!

Well,  that's about all to report on this life change so far.

Grace is going to be a great big sister,  cause she LOVES babies.  But I think like most oldest children she'll have an interesting transition having to share me with someone else.  She's very much into have ALL of my attention! :)

Our Christmas Miracle

Written on December 26, 2015

Our Christmas Miracle

The past week I’ve had this feeling that I might be pregnant.

I really didn’t have a lot of evidence, other than I’ve been heading to the bathroom way too often!

Oh the joys….it’s all coming back to me, ha ha.

Then a few days ago my blood sugar numbers started being weird, when they have been pretty solid for the past couple months. I took that as a pretty significant sign.

I was supposed to start my period yesterday and when I didn’t, I knew I wanted to take an at home test this morning.

I took it and as I waited for the results I looked away and said in my head “It’s going to be negative. It’s negative. I’m not pregnant. It’s okay, I’m not pregnant.”

I looked down at it and there were two lines!

Positive!

I got pretty emotional and went and told Jeff!

WE WERE SO HAPPY!

We ARE so happy!

I just kept telling Jeff, I hope it’s true. I really hope it’s true!

Life is a miracle. Being able to conceive and have babies is such a miracle!

I feel like this baby is even more of a miracle for us though.

I have so many medical factors working against me!

It’s heartbreaking most of the time.

When I got diagnosed with PCOS before having Grace, it then took us a year to get pregnant with her.

This time around I had that fear in the back of my head, but then there is the big monster called Type 1 Diabetes that had me worried too.

When I was diagnosed in May they told me I would have to have two amazing A1Cs before I could even THINK about getting pregnant.

A1Cs are tested every 3 months. So from May I had to wait till September and from September I had to wait till December.

I was feeling pretty defeated, cause we couldn’t even start thinking about trying till December! That was months after I had wanted.

But there are so many scary things with diabetes and pregnancy, that I knew we had to listen to the doctors. I knew that Heavenly Father had the timing worked out, but my heart was still bursting.

Although diabetes is unpredictable, I fought it hard for those six months and I accomplished those amazing A1Cs.

I was so happy! It was December, I was in the clear!

And then there was the thought of “well, what if it takes a whole year again cause of my PCOS!”

Dang you chronic diseases!

Well, the miracle of all miracles happened for us, and we got pregnant immediately!

Can you even believe that?

I kind of can’t.

With all of the medical things and my body waging war against itself, it didn’t and still doesn’t seem possible.

I really believe it’s a miracle in my life.

God is so aware of us.

He knows what is best for us. He knows how to give us things when we need them. Through months of patience, I know that faith works.

God’s timing always ends up being what we need. Even if it’s not what we want at the time, it ends up exactly how it should have.

I can’t believe I’m pregnant!

I’m so incredibly blessed! 

CGM

Today is a happy day!

Especially if you blog stalk me and read my post two times ago.

Well,  after much ado, I officially have my CGM!

WOOOOOHOOOOO!!!

A continuous glucose monitor,  for those of you who don't regularly think about this blog,  is a device that tells me what my blood sugar is all the time.

This is an incredible thing for a person with type 1 diabetes,  because so much of ... all my life runs around my blood sugar.

Every time I eat,  every time I want to exercise,  every time I drive,  pretty much doing most things requires me to know where my blood sugar is.

So many variables I have to think of, that most people take for granted.

Having this device allows me to just look at a screen and see where I am,  rather than having to endlessly prick my finger and get a blood sample.

Needless to say.....I'm so happy!!!

Diabetes burnout is such a real thing.

My goodness,  being on alert 24/7 gets tiring.

So this has made me so happy and relieved!  It alarms if my blood sugar is too low or high,  and it also has arrows to let me know if it's going up or down rapidly.

How it works,  is I have a sensor inserted into me and that transmits to the little screen and shows me a chart.

Technology is amazing,  huh?

 The gray area where the dotted line is,  is the range I'm supposed to stay in.

 Pink! If you're going to be physically dependent on something it might as well be cute, right?

 The sensor inserted in me.
 It inserts with a needle,  but the needle doesn't stay.  I'm not very good at explaining medical things, so just know there is a little piece of something under my skin checking out my blood.  That's about the best explanation I have,  haha!

My snapchat awesomeness,  cause I'm just really excited!

Commonly asked questions-

Q: Does it hurt or bug you at all?  (The sensor)
A: No,  I can't feel it at all actually.

Q: Is it an insulin pump?
A: No. This is totally different from a pump.  No insulin involved with this device! I still have to inject insulin with several shots a day.

And probably your next question....

Q: Why don't you have a pump?  Taking shots sounds awful!
A: I'm still coming out of the honeymoon period of type 1, so I don't take very much insulin right now.  I think I'll eventually get a pump,  but where I'm not taking tons of insulin I don't need one.  And yes,  shots aren't fun,  small amounts of medicine or not,  but staying alive IS fun,  so there's that!

I'm so grateful I live in a time when things like this are available to me.  Modern medicine and technology are so important! It's a great time to be alive!

Temple

I had a neat experience the other night!  I was able to clean the temple,  because it was our stakes turn to do so.

I had never done that before,  and I was excited and nervous to be given the chance to do it.

Excited,  because I knew it'd be a peaceful,  fun thing to do.....

Nervous,  because it was late at night and that's usually when my diabetes roars it's stupid head.

I usually have to snack, snack,  and snack some more before I go to bed every night to get to a good number.

When I tell people THAT side of diabetes they are always like "sweet!  That must be nice you can have treats!"

Trust me,  it gets real old.

Hahaha. .

Snacking for pleasure VS. Snacking for medical necessity.....

The feelings are night and day.

So cleaning the temple from 9:30-1:00 AM, when I usually go to bed at 10:00 had me nervous.

I checked my number before I left for the temple...

...74....a little low for comfort.....

Chug juice,  eat protein bar.

K, I got this!

Confidence!

Go into temple,  feeling good,  go change into the scrubs they give you to clean in....

Check my number just in case....

70.

What in the!? I went DOWN after eating and drinking?

Scarf down another protein bar in the locker room and hope for the best.

And then Heavenly Father showed me how much He loves me.

There were about 40 of us and we got divided up to clean all different parts of the temple.

Some people went up several floors,  others stayed close to where we started.

I ended up being assigned to vacuum the bapistry and other parts of the basement,  including the women's locker room!

I was going to be able to stay about as close as possible to my locker where all of my things were,  just in case I started feeling weird.

Do you know how big of a tender mercy that was for me?

Out of all the places they could have had me go,  I was able to stay where I felt the most comfortable.

That reaffirmed to me that God knows my circumstances and wants me to succeed.

A lot of times I feel really isolated with this disease I have. I don't have anyone immediately around me who knows how I feel.

Living with it on a daily basis and how it's a never ending concern can be lonely.

But I know God knows my heart.

I know He feels my pain and sorrows.

He never leaves me to feel like I'm completely alone.

I know He was especially mindful of me that night in His house.

He knew I didn't want to make a big deal of my situation and tell anyone about it.  He knew where I'd be comfortable while still being able to serve.

"I know He lives, I will follow faithfully...my heart I give to Him,  I know that my Savior loves me."

Advocate

I'm not gonna lie,  this is possibly my 15th or so post about diabetes that I've started in the past couple months.

They never make it to the publish button.

I wanted to attempt to write this post, because it's been my entire life the past couple of weeks.

Being an advocate for myself......

....is hard.

I've NEVER been outspoken about my needs.

I've never gone out of my way to make sure I'm put first.

That's just not comfortable for me.

Being a Type 1 Diabetic is basically the definition of needing to advocate for yourself though.

Needing to tell people you're around.....oh hey,  I need to eat some candy real quick before I pass out or die.  

Or....

Excuse me while I go give myself much more medicine that you'll ever consider taking on a daily basis,  because I have a dead organ that doesn't allow my body to function normal.

It goes both ways,  because I also need to advocate that diabetes isn't my fault.

That I don't need to eat only vegetables,  because guess what?  Even if I did,  I'd STILL have to take insulin.

Yes,  I can eat ice cream.

Yes,  I will live how I want.

Just because someone has lung cancer doesn't mean they stop breathing.

Just because my pancreas, which is a major organ that handles how food is digested, is completely nonresponsive doesn't mean I'm going to stop eating.

Being a advocate for myself towards people who self appoint themselves as my food police is hard.

Over the past 2 months I've been in the process of trying to acquire a device called a "continuous glucose monitor".

Basically what a CGM does is its a sensor that you insert into yourself (a fatty part of your body,  like the stomach,  leg, upper arm etc.) and it reads your blood sugar levels continuously.

This is a MAJOR thing for Type 1's cause blood sugar (aka our whole lives) determines so many things for us all day everyday.

Without this device you have to go solely off of pricking your fingers and getting blood samples that way.

With it, you have a device that at any given time you can look down at a screen and see where you're at.  High,  low,  in range.  The peace of mind that comes with a CGM is phenomenal.

So of course I want this,  right?

And of course it just can't be that easy, right?

Right.

I've been the middle man between my insurance,  doctors office (who is one day away from me firing them), and the company who sells these devices for the past 2 months.

It shouldn't be this hard!  I'm the perfect candidate for this thing.

Sometimes I just want to yell,  'please,  come live a day as me and tell me I don't need this device ASAP.'

Being an advocate for myself in this respect is so difficult.

These people are all supposed to be helping me get this thing,  and yet it's not working.

I've been on the phone with all of these people for probably about 3 hours today. I went and got documents from my pharmacy,  I went and got things from my doctor's office.

Ahhhh...

Being so physically dependent on things like this is life altering.

And having to advocate for that dependency is heart breaking sometimes.

Sometimes I wish my biggest problems were that my daughter is obsessed with Elsa and HAS to watch Frozen everyday,  which drives me crazy cause I don't like her watching so much TV.

Or that my landlord is crazy and promised us new carpet so we boxed up half our house only to find out we aren't getting the carpet,  haha.

Or that I hate going to the grocery store,  so we kind of borderline starve or Jeff has to get us take out more often than not.

Why can't I have normal people problems?

I mean,  I guess I do.

But they all seem really insignificant compared to my broken body.

I guess I'll keep practicing speaking up for myself and being that advocate I need to be.  No matter how hard or weird it is.

And I'll hope I'm done jumping through hoops and all of these medical people who should be my advocates get it together and get me what I need.