Mum of three Annie is this week’s wonderful podcast guest. She recalls a dramatic start to her daughter Mimi’s life with type 1 diabetes after a hospital admission for DKA at just seven months old turned her family’s world upside down.
From wading terrified through the complete unknown, learning to micro-dose with syringes to being able to spot a hypo just by the pallor of Mimi’s skin, Annie recounts with grace and poignancy both the harrowing and uplifting experiences that type 1 has brought to their lives as Mimi has grown from a very tiny, very unwell baby to a healthy, feisty and hilarious teenager.
Take a look at Annie’s blog, The Understudy Pancreas.
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2 Comments
Thank you both so much for this episode.
It’s the first time – in over a decade – that I’ve heard a story similar to ours. My daughter was diagnosed as a baby. We went through severe DKA with a tiny child who had a bG of 55mM on admission, and a blood pH right at the edge of viability. We had the impossibility of managing a baby on injections, then moving to a pump aged one and adding a cgm aged two. We had the ridiculousness of carb counting, and trying to figure out how much of a 6 carb yogurt had gone into the baby, versus how much was on the floor or in her hair! How to manage boluses and breastfeeding was something we had to figure out for ourselves.
I recognised the contraction of the friendship network post-diagnosis, as we’re trapped in a mad whirlwind of terror and exhaustion, whilst all but a few precious friends back off, or simply continue on with their own lives, whilst your own life is virtually unrecognizable from before.
I feel like you’ve opened a window, one that I can share with people who don’t understand why we still struggle with this. People who don’t understand the effort made by my daughter, her wonderful big sister and her two exhausted parents to support this amazing, funny, happy, healthy 11 year old.
Thank you.
Hi Diana,
Huge apologies for how overdue this reply is, and thank you so much for your generous comments. Annie is just fantastic isn’t she? It sounds like you had such a dramatic introduction to all of this and I truly think you have it so much harder as parents. It sound like you’ve worked so hard and I’m so pleased to hear that your daughter is happy and healthy. Huge credit to you all for dealing with this unruly condition and sending virtual hugs too! Take care x