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The wisdom of spares

marybadlady

Member
Messages
6
Hi all
So I'm writing this from bed feeling very sheepish and annoyed at myself. All month my BG monitor has been acting dodgy - claiming that the batteries were low when they were brand new and generally carrying on. I've been resolutely taking the back off the meter, rubbing the batteries, blowing into the workings etc as if it were some battle of wills that I could win with a machine. What a choob!

Anyway - yesterday lunchtime, it finally fell over and died. At this point I should point out that I did have another meter but it is the old freestyle mini and I stopped using it because I couldn't get hold of the strips for it, so no means of testing. I HATE not knowing what's going on, so as you can imagine, last night didn't go well. No idea what my sugars were doing and had fitful, panicky night's sleep with hideous dreams, where my BG monitor turned into a grenade and taking the strip out was akin to pulling the pin. Spent most of the night awake after that.

In the morning I shot my usual for breakfast and then went into work to ask the boss for time off to go and buy a new meter. Shop that had the one I was looking for was 15 mins walk away and off I toddled, only to have one of those blinding hypos on the way there. You know the ones where every time you blink it takes a while for your brain to compute the difference between the inside of your eye lids and what's in front of you. Arrived in the shop a sweaty, shaking mess and quietly waited in the queue, munching furiously on jelly beans despite not having a clue exactly how much I needed. The person serving me was new and hadn't worked out how to use the till or take card transactions so the whole thing took an age. This was a diabetes shop by the way and it didn't occur to me to mention to the server and her helper that I was suffering from a hypo and could I use the machine while they were working out the financials.

Got back to work and everyone is like: woah you look pale are you ok? And I'm like: yeah I'm just a bit tired, I'm fine. But I actually felt like a train had hit me and maybe carried off some of my internal organs into the bargain. All day I could barely concentrate as all my energy and focus was taken up trying to stop myself from crumpling into a heap under my desk and passing out. I will not give in I will not give in! But at 3.30 pm I gave in and went home early and have spent the last two hours passed out in bed in that hideous drugged feeling of sleep you get. All the while absolutely furious at myself.

I've had Type 1 for nearly 11 years now - you'd think I'd be used to it and organised by now. And you'd think I'd recognise when a hypo wipeout has happened and that there's no use fighting it. But I still refuse to accept that I'm not like everyone else and believe that mind can triumph over matter, be it symptoms, faulty BG monitors, the tide ... Because if I accept this, I will have let it win. It will be an admission that I am WEAK.

Something is wrong with this picture, no?
 
I'm with you on this, I'd be a panicky mess without my meter. Worse still that I'd have to walk to a shop and actually have a bad hypo. I wouldn't cope well with that! I used to get really anxious about hypos and have kept two of my old meters and have a pot of test strips spare for each. One of them lives in my work bag so even if I forget my current one or run out of tests strips, I've always got a means of testing in work.

If I were you I would've found a 24 hour chemist and bought some strips off them. Failing that, my work is pretty flexible so if I didn't have any test strips I would've just rung my manager and told them that I was going to be late whilst I went to the chemist.

Glad you're ok now!
 
It's all good in hindsight eh!

I've got a spare meter in my car. My theory on this is I drive 90% of the time. So say I test before leaving work to drive home and accidentally leave my kit on my desk, I then have a spare meter in the car which I can take in to the house for the evening. Ive only had to do this once (main issue was remembering to out it back into the car again)

And obviously it would work the other way if I left my kit on the kitchen table!
 
I acutally own 4 meters, I have one at work, one in the car, one in my bedroom and one in the kitchen. The Acuchek Aviva meter is quite cheap to buy
 
ljwilson said:
I acutally own 4 meters, I have one at work, one in the car, one in my bedroom and one in the kitchen. The Acuchek Aviva meter is quite cheap to buy

I wouldn't want too many. My consultant downloads my readings from my meter when I go to the clinic so if I had lots that I used regularly he wouldn't get a clear picture!
 
Ive always had a spare meter, even make sure iv got spare batterys for the meter too, must of been rubbish having a hypo is one thing having a hypo not knowing what your sugars are and being in a shop then walking back to work is another. I can test abit but I like too know what my sugars are doing, its shouldn't be about weakness I think its more weak not to be open about it, iam quite happy testing my sugars in public places while at the pub etc, and always take orange juice and a boost bar just in case I call it my little booty bag, and if by chance anyone commented decided to take the **** or judge me iam sure I could do it right back to them. For me my meter is like having an extra limb it goes everywhere with me, if it fails or I leave it I feel anxiety big time.....would be even better if they could bring a meter out like a wrist watch ha ha
 
hale710 said:
ljwilson said:
I acutally own 4 meters, I have one at work, one in the car, one in my bedroom and one in the kitchen. The Acuchek Aviva meter is quite cheap to buy

I wouldn't want too many. My consultant downloads my readings from my meter when I go to the clinic so if I had lots that I used regularly he wouldn't get a clear picture!

I do have a main one (the kitchen one) which is used most. I only have the Aviva and I don't think you can download from them? Probably wrong, I usually am!
I had my first Carbohydrate Counting and Insulin Adjustment Workshop session yesterday about carbs to insulin ratios in preparation for going on a pump in October. I have another one in 3 weeks time and the lead DSN is going to bring me the expert (I was the only one without one!) When I have it I will use that all of the time but keep my back ups just in case

Lorna
 
I don't know which meters download other than mine, I have a freestyle optium. I like it as it measures ketones also

Yeah it makes sense to keep your others as spares!
 
The expert downloads (I think!!) It also works out your insuling doses for you once it is programmed! A huge step forward from the good old clintest tablets!!!

Lorna
 
ljwilson said:
A huge step forward from the good old clintest tablets!!!

Happy days Lorna ;)

Seems I have 6 meters, but I'm a bit of a hoarder. The oldest is a Glucotrend 2
 

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I have 3 meters in total, if the same happened to me Marybadlady I would have been straight out to the local pharmacy to purchase one, I test every-night before bed knowing that might I sleep well if my bg is normal

I've once went out with my dog for a walk in the countryside and left my glucose behind, like you I started to panic being 2 miles from home in the middle of nowhere, had my mobile with me so felt reasonably safe in the knowledge that I could ring my Mrs if I started to hypo, not a great feeling just the same but just shows how dependent we on these things to keep us safe and well.
 
I've been a mum of a diabetic teenager for...all of 3 weeks... and I'm so glad I found this thread!!
Spares - my mum has some testing stick things, needles, insulin etc as does her school. But what did I forget to do today? collect her prescription for more glucose sticks and we don't have any at home as she ran out at dinner time tonight! :oops: Where's the doh smilie when you need it :lol:
 
I have 2 One Touch metres. One in the kitchen and one in my bag. Only recently got the paraphernalia for computer and haven't tried it yet but apparantly I can use 4 metres for the same graph which sounds handy.

Sent from the Diabetes Forum App
 
Wish I understood all this downloading business :) I was given a touch screen meter but discarded it after a couple of days as it kept popping off to other screens. I'm very happy with my Contour meter and have just got a Contour X as a spare. I write all my readings down in a notebook. I can see them at a glance. It would take me ages to find anything on a computer !!


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Mary Phone Abbott Diabetes Care for strips for the Freestyle LITE. [number on-line]
Hana
 
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