We were eligible for a continuous glucose monitor 30 days post diagnosis...supposedly. We took our data and learned our new skills and at our one month follow up appointment we talked to our team about getting a CGM. They agreed that we were ready, our son was ready but we were two days shy of 30 so we left that visit with instructions for how to get "started" on the process of getting the monitor.
N was diagnosed in early December and tomorrow it will be March...we are still waiting. No CGM yet. Nope. Just waiting. And waiting. And waiting.
I know the CGM won't solve his diabetes but I believe it will improve the quality of care we are providing. I believe we can keep him in range better with the information provided. I also believe it will give us some peace of mind. The CGM can alarm for us if he is out of range. This would be a huge help, especially in the middle of the night.
N wants to go play with his friends in the neighborhood and right now we make them all stay near our house. We make sure he is well in range before he goes outside and we check him every two hours when he is playing outside with his friends. He gets rather tired of us showing up too. Especially when they are jumping on the trampoline and he has to stop to get his finger poked.
It would also help at school. Right now he has his blood sugar checked at 7:15 in the morning. He then checks it twice at school; before lunch and 30 minutes before he gets on the bus (allowing them time to treat a low and still get to go home). You know when he doesn't check is blood sugar at school? After PE or after recesses. Not a huge deal but N is typically treating a low 1-2 times per week at school on PE days. Our school nurse is fabulous and handles these with ease helping him to learn how to handle these himself and how to keep calm. We are working together to adjust breakfast and lunch on PE days. We've lowered his lunch insulin and increased his breakfast carbs but we haven't got it completely worked out yet. If we were receiving the CGM data we would see how his body is reacting to the exercise and would be better equipped. Maybe he needs a snack right before PE or right after...hard to know right now...not enough information. We just know he is often low in the afternoon on PE days and sometimes he is low at lunch on PE days.
We're fortunate because N can identify when he feels low pretty consistently. He is almost always the one who alerts us to his low. It is extremely rare for us to do a scheduled BG and find it low. We find it low because he comes to us and says he feels shaky and he thinks he is low.
We are scripted for a Dexcom 6 from our endocrinologist but our insurance company has us going through their preferred supply company rather than directly from Dexcom. I got a text message from the medical supply company over a week ago saying they had our paperwork and would be calling us soon. To me, soon should be within 2 days but to a big medical supply company I have no way of knowing what "soon" means. I do know that I'm back to waiting. Waiting for a call. I assume it will be more waiting after that because then they will be shipping the monitor. Hopefully we have it in the next couple of weeks.
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