Camp Hertko Hollow Retreat Weekend

Our family went to Diabetes Retreat Weekend at the Y Camp outside of Boone, Iowa last weekend to get a feel for what the full "Kids Only" week long camp in June would be like for Hannah.

It was a beautiful, scenic place with lots of things to do and activities to keep everyone busy.

Rock Wall Climbing

Zip Lining, horseback riding, archery and more. 

The whole family came, even Grandma...

and Hannah made lots of new friends.

Mom, Dad, Grandma and Jacob attended lots of seminars and met lots of other parents of Type 1 Diabetic children and learned that this disease affects so many people in the same way it affects our family.  We realized that we aren't the only ones who were devastated at the diagnosis, and who had sick children when they found out why their kids had strange symptoms, and we realized that we aren't the only parents who still cry a lot.  And most of the other parents have been diagnosed for a lot longer than we have.  We are only about 2 1/2 months into this thing and we are realizing that it's hard, it sucks, it takes a lot of work, a TON of knowledge, and there is no, nor will there ever be, a break from it, not ever.  But this camp is the closest thing to "getting a break from it" as Hannah will ever get.

This camp is probably the only camp that Hannah will be able to go to considering she has diabetes (no other camp would likely take her considering the level of care she requires and skill needed if something did happen), and the facilities are amazing.  So you bet, we will make it happen every year for her come June come hell or high water no matter what.

If you know of any children who are diabetic and who would love the opportunity to go to summer camp, but thought they couldn't, please tell them about Camp Hertko Hollow.  There is a place for them there, no matter their income level.  You can check it out online here--http://www.camphertkohollow.com/ or call Toll-Free 1-855-502-8500.  You can also email the camp director Deb Holwegner at d.holwegner@camphertkohollow.com

Trending high....

So, Hannah was trending high for a few days and we thought, OK, here comes the phone call to the endocrinologist for help in figuring out what to do to get her out of this trend we seemed to be seeing. 
Aaron, my husband had a thought.  If Hannah has one high number where she's either been mis-dosed, or for whatever reason she just has too much sugar in her blood, and we just continue on with the current insulin ratios we are using, what is ever going to actually get rid of that excess sugar.  I mean, when we were in the hospital, and they'd come in during the night, they would give her extra insulin just because she had a high reading.  No food, just insulin because she had a high number.  Granted, she still had ketones in her urine, but I think the idea was still the same.
So, anyway, we decided to use the sliding scale we had been given and give her an extra dosage of insulin based on whatever her BG number was just prior to eating her meal. 
If her blood sugar was 151-200 (and so on down the scale in increments, we were to give her an extra 0.5 units of her fast acting Humalog before she ate her dinner. 
Sure enough, come next mealtime, she was high again.  So we decided to use the sliding scale.  That time, we had to give her an extra 1.5 units of Humalog.  Seemed like a lot.  But, it did the trick.  Her next readings were great.  In fact, her readings since then, (dinner time on Friday) all of her numbers have been great.  We even had Easter dinner with a huge number of carbs to account for. 
It's just a theory, but hey, in this world of Type One Diabetes, we are called upon to be mathematicians, investigators, therapists, counselors, and yes, even theorists. 

Hannah's first night away since T1D diagnosis...

Hannah wanted to spend the night with her best friend (it was her birthday party), which meant it would be her first night away from home without mom and dad and the safety net we had so carefully cast around Hannah since her diagnosis of Type 1 Diabetes on February 13, 2014.  I was a complete wreck, and rather than cry on the way to her friend Chelsea's house, we decided to ROCK OUT! :-)