Okay, where was I?

Sometime in October I started writing about getting sick, getting diagnosed with a scary level of hypertension and diabetes, how I got sick and suicidal from the side effects of one on the meds I was on and intended to chronicle what I was doing about all of that.

That was October 15th. It's now December 16th and I have a lot of catching up to do.


Part something: "Shut up, bitch! No, not you. I was talking to my blood glucose meter!"

The ADA books refer "striving for excellence" when it comes to testing your blood glucose levels and that sounded pretty reasonable, but I got to the point that any escalation in my FBS (fasting blood sugar) left me devastated. One morning following a road trip where my sugar dipped and I had to break out my 1/3 cup of granola because we were in the middle of nowhere and hours past my lunchtime, my sugar went up to 139 after being in the 110s for about a week. My blood pressure was 159 over 74. You would have thought Nashville was losing it's NHL team, I was so teary.


Oh, and let's not forget the night I lost a staredown contest with a vegetable...

I got to the point that I felt like any and all food was dangerous. One night I could not bring myself to eat a wedge of steamed cabbage because I was terrified it would raise my BG. My thoughts never got too far from "This is going to kill me slowly and horribly by closing off my arteries, taking my sight, my limbs and my renal function and there's not a thing I can do about it." That's right, people, at some point in my life, I was actually paralyzed with fear because, you know, napa cabbage kills.


My friends and family were and are really fabulous.

Have you ever had one of those dreams where you are in a situation and feel the need to talk, shout or say something and you can't speak? That is kind of how I had been feeling all Fall. Friends and family kept in touch, let me know they care and it has meant a lot. The bad part was that I was very shut off because I felt like I was truly going crazy and unlike good chocolate or stories about bad ex-boyfriends and idiotic college administrators, some things just aren't meant to be shared.


So what did I do?

Stay tuned.


copyright 2008 jas faulkner