Last week this Mom found herself in the ER on a Friday night, scheduling her surgery to remove her gallbladder the following day. Thank goodness we have Grandma who dropped her plans and rushed over to stay with the kids overnight and into the next day.
I am healing, slower than I expected but I am. Yesterday was 5 days post op and I am only taking 1 pain medication and only at night because laying down is more painful.
6:45 Bath time is over. Johnny is asking for ice-cream and tonight is a site change day, so its a good night to measure 1/2 cup and let the 4 year old enjoy some cookies-n-cream. Ice-cream all around, site change goes very smoothly.
7:00 John places Jocelyn in my arms while I rock her like every night. He then lifts her from me and sets her in her crib as I can not lift more than 10 pounds, doctors orders.
7:45 Johnny tells me he is hungry, a very normal way to put off bedtime. I always check blood sugars when he says he is hungry or low. It is my unspoken promise to him, that I will never discount his feelings about D. He is 191. For some reason, I do not check how much active insulin is in his system... that is not normally how I would handle it.
8:30 I decide I am off to bed and take a pain pill. John says he will join me soon.
8:45 I am feeling loopy and glad to be in bed. I hear John turn off everything downstairs and then head upstairs to check Johnny before our bedtime. I hear John waking up Johnny telling him to drink. I know he is low, but honestly I am very medicated and I am happy with my decision to let John handle it. John comes down a few minutes very uneasy and tells me Johnny was 39. Reality check... D doesn't care if I am on pain pills and if John weren't around I don't know how clearly I would be thinking.
9:00 We are both wide awake. He is 64. We forgot to suspend the pump so we do that and wait again.
9:20 Johnny is 84. I don't want to over correct him and shoot him sky high but 84 isn't good enough for us to go to sleep.
9:45 Johnny is 96. We give 12 carbs of gogurt and set a temp basal for 50%.
10:00 Johnny is 135 We go to sleep and set an alarm for midnight.
12:00 We wake to our alarm and John checks Johnny. I have adrenalin pumping through me as I wait feeling guilty I slept, feeling guilty I took that 1 pain pill, feeling guilty that I am in pain at all. he is 114. We set a new temp basal and I can tell John is wavering about setting an alarm again. Its easy to judge him. Its easy to not understand why he wouldn't set an alarm. How could he possibly risk it? The thing is, just because I am blogging about this night doesn't mean it doesn't happen all the time. Maybe not this exact scenario, but scenarios that require John and I to decide if we need to get up again in 2 hours or if we can "risk" sleeping is nightly... not exaggerating... so sometimes sleep wins. We are not proud of it, we feel that guilt every morning when we wake up. But that is our reality. I can see John struggle, I also know that I may not wake up again if I go back to sleep. So I get up and I stay up.
Check at 1am, 96. Reduce basal.
Check at 2am 140. Adjust basal
Check at 3:30am 156
4am I go to bed. I am tired and sore but I do not have that guilty feeling I am so used to having. John gets up with both kids at 6 and life goes on.
Kids go to preschool.
John goes to work.
I work from home.
We pretend that we weren't in fear all night. We pretend that we are doing "okay." Johnny pretends that it doesn't effect him. I pretend not to need help when people ask to let them know if they can help, because can I really ask that of someone? "Yes, I would love your help. Would you please come over and keep my kid alive all night. Just poke his finger, make on the spot decisions on how adjust insulin settings based on previous scenarios and the days activities. Don't sleep and don't let it show the next day... and the next.... and the next." When I do absolutely need help, I feel like I am letting my helper down because I can't make it easier for them. I can't spell it out nice and neatly for them. I can't lay out a highlighted route for them to follow. So asking for help is harder than just doing it.
If I do ask you for help, its because I desperately need it. Its not on a whim. I know it is a burden. I can order take out. I can let my house get filthy. But what I can't do is take a night off, I can't sleep guilt free, I can't take a pain pill next time I hurt. I can't ask more than once either.
