Five Point Fives

When I was at Friends for Life a few weeks back I learned a new diabetes expression.

Five point five.

At first I didn't know what it meant. I overheard a few people saying things like "he's a five point five" or "you hang out with a lot of five point fives".

Being a fan of the art of figuring things out on my own, I didn't ask what they were talking about. I tried to guess.

Why would one person be a five point five and another person not be one? What makes someone a five point five?

It wasn't a gender thing. Or a height thing. Or a body shape thing. Or a shoe size thing. At least it didn't seem to be.

Any guesses?

Perhaps it's easier if you see it written as 5.5 rather than five point five.

Someone who is a 5.5 is someone who doesn't have diabetes. It's a funny thing to call them but makes sense because every time you check their sugar, even after a tray of maple fudge and baklava (mmmmm, maple fudge and baklava!), their blood sugar will be 5.5. Or thereabouts.

(Oh, and apparently my American friends call these folks ninety-nines. Same idea, different system of measurement). 

Being a five point five isn't a bad thing. At least I don't think people were saying it was. I certainly don't think it is. In fact 95% of my friends are five point fives so, if it's a bad thing, I'm so oh elle in the friend department.

I think that I'm going to add my own little caveat to the definition. For me, a five point five is someone who doesn't have diabetes but who also recognize that some people do have diabetes. They might not get all the ins and outs of it but they know it exists.

So I'm happy to add five to fives to my vocabulary but I'm making a point of distinguishing between them and the folks I like to call the don't get its.

Back to Life...Back to Reality

Friends for Life 2014 is over. I just have to get over it and move on. Good things must come to an end and all that jazz.

I have to go back to my regular life where people wear watches on their wrists rather than green bracelets.

Back to reality where I work for a living. Where I have to figure out carb counts because no one else will do it for me. Where no one leaves bowls of emergency carbs in each room just in case I need them.

*sigh*

Yesterday I got up early and went for a run before work. It was hot. My body felt stiff and sluggish. I set off with a goal of doing 7k. By the end of the first kilometre I was struggling so much that I had dropped that to 6k. By the end of the second kilometre I had dropped it to 5k. By the third, I was back up to 7k. Not because I felt any better. Not because my pace picked up. Because I wanted to do intervals on Thursday morning and I knew my body and my mind would do better if I pushed through  on Tuesday and did the distance. I ran 7k as originally planned and the last two actually felt like they should have.

This morning, I will have gone swimming by the time this post is up. The second swim in 5 weeks. The first one in July. It will be tough. I will be slow and sluggish. I will be tired and probably be ready for bed by lunch. But I want to go swimming on Friday and the only way that will go well is if I push through on Wednesday and remind my body what it means to be a swimmer. By next week I'll be good to go and within a few weeks I will (hopefully) have regained a semblance of the speed I used to have.

I'm back to having my regular breakfast shake and my body feels better for it. Fibre is important. Just saying'

I'm back to making my own lunches and eating serving sizes and foods that my body and my insulin routine are used to.

I'm back to eating dinner early enough to see what my blood sugar is going to do before I go to bed.

I'm back to one coffee every morning. And perhaps a cup of tea in the afternoon.

Routines are comforting and easy enough to slip into.

But it doesn't mean I don't miss the craziness of sharing breakfast with 2000 other people. Or dinners that start at 6:30pm and end at 9pm. Or having desserts with both my lunches and my dinners. Because with those things came the people I shared them with. The Animas crew I got to hang out with. The strangers I met. The kids who made me laugh with their quirky charm.

I'm back to reality but a little part of my apparently stayed in Florida and has no intention of coming home.

Friends for Life 2014 - the second half

The second half of Friends for Life was even better than the first.

Faces that were strangers were becoming familiar. Shy smiles exchanged on the first day turned into broad grins by the third as the same people kept crossing paths with me. I never did learn most of their names but our eyes met and we seemed to share a feeling of kinship.

When I got there, I thought I would seek out people like me. Athletes. Adults. Pumpers. CGM'ers. Diagnosed in adulthood. Doing most of it on our own.

Instead, I felt myself drawn to families. To parents of little kids with type 1. To siblings of someone with type 1. To hopeful moms sitting alone in the session hosted by JDRF where they talked about the quest for a cure. To dads siting at the back of the room who told me about their grown daughters with Type 1 that they still worry about. To groups of kids wearing orange or green bracelets all hanging out together. To teenage girls who seemed to hide every sign of Type 1 but who wore their green bracelets in plain sight. To others who kept their pumps in plain view with the tubing hanging out for all to see.

The first day of the conference I played spot the famous people. I spotted so many people whose blogs I read. Most of them probably have no idea that I read them. Or who I am. I recognized them from their photos. I recognized their children and their partners from their photos. I felt like I knew them all already. I wanted to go up to them, say hi, tell them how much I enjoy reading their stories and then ask to take a photo with them as proof that I did indeed meet them.

I didn't.

I discovered that I didn't want to talk to people I already felt I knew. I wanted to meet the quiet people. The ones who don't write about their T1 lives. The families with five foster children who were all there because one of the kids developed T1 in January. They wanted to come to the conference and learn more about what the future would hold. The D-mom who hid her T1 from everyone, who had two children but had always wished she could have had six. The college student who was there on her own and who joined me for breakfast when I was sitting on my own. She taught me that there is more than one place to put a CGM and I taught her that she's not the only person who sweats a lot and struggles to keep adhesives attached. I wished I had talked to her on the first day rather than the last. She was pretty cool.

On the last day, I hugged the moms I met the first morning and I wished them and their families well. We may meet again next year. We may never again cross paths.

At 4am on Sunday morning I walked the quiet halls of the hotel to the lobby. I climbing into a taxi to the airport and looked out the window at the dark streets as we drove. I saw no green bracelets at the airport. I saw no green bracelets on the plane. I saw no green bracelet when I arrived in Toronto. I don't remember the moment when I saw the last green bracelet but it was some point on Saturday night as I headed back to my room to pack. If I had known it would the last - I would have stopped to thank them. I didn't and so I didn't.

I got home and wore my bracelet for the rest of the day. I just wasn't ready yet to take it off - frayed and battered as it was.

I didn't think I would want to wear my illness so clearly on my wrist. I didn't think it would be so meaningful to see others do the same. I have known for years the importance of the Diabetes Online Community. Until last week, I never knew the importance of the Diabetes 'In Person' Community.

Friends for Life 2014 - the first half

Friends for Life is already half over. It's hard to believe and yet not at all surprising. Time usually flies when one is having fun and the more fun one is having, the faster it flies. 

I arrived in Orlando on Tuesday morning. The trip was as easy as it could be, made even more so by the fact that I was on the same plane as the famous Shawn Shepheard from the Diabetes Champions Network and Sugar Free Shawn. He is a wealth of knowledge, hilarious and ridiculously easy to talk to - a great combination in a travel buddy. Especially one that I only met two weeks earlier.  

Tuesday afternoon was pretty low key. Travel, check-in, unpack, explore the Orlando Marriott Resort, watch Belgium beat the US in the World Cup game and enjoy a delicious hamburger for dinner while chatting it up with the Animas gang. 

The best part of Tuesday was getting my famous green bracelet. As soon as I had it on I couldn't help staring at people as they walked by, checking out whether or not they too wore the famous green symbol that showed they were part of the tribe.  

Got my green on! 

Wednesday is when things really began. 8am was the First Timers coffee where we joined a room-full of families, couples and individuals. People with T1 are easily spotted by their green bracelets. First times are just as easy to pick out of the crowd.

One glance and you know I have Type 1, am a first timer AND come from a place called Canada. 

I met one couple who had adopted five children. One of them developed Type 1 in January. All seven of them made the trip to Friends for Life. Seven orange bracelets. One green one. Such a powerful message of the importance of having a support team.

Shawn and I spent most of the Wednesday together. We went to two sessions on Social Media led by the famous Scott Johnson and Kerri Sparling. We explored the expo, taking photos with Sebastien, showing off our Animas Vibe pumps to anyone who asked to see them and trying out cool things like Glucolift glucose tablets (which are hard to get in Canada). 

I tasted-tested all three. Cherry was by far my favourite. 

I raced Sebastien. I felt bad beating him. I mean I have pretty fresh legs and he's been running 40k a day for months now. Probably not a fair fight. 

If I could have described my 'ideal' day at a Friends for Life conference, Thursday would have been it. I got up early and headed down to the fitness centre. I ran on a treadmill for the first time in almost five years. Forty-five minutes later I was drenched in sweat, I had run almost 8k and I felt great. Well great except for the 5.5 with double down arrows the Rose started warning me about. A Larabar and a quick shower later, I felt better and headed down for breakfast. 

After breakfast, I went to a session about Autoimmunity, Celiac and Type 1 diabetes. The speaker was Alessio Fasano and he was brilliant. He was obviously a very intelligent researcher and he could have presented his information using highfaluting mumbo jumbo but he didn't. He presented the research with such wonderful simplicity and eccentric charm that he had me completely enthralled. I took five pages of notes, guffawed more than once and left, an hour later, with a brain full of knowledge about the factors that, when combined, can trigger an autoimmune response that leads to the development of Type 1 or celiac. 

I also headed across the hallway afterwards to buy his book and take part in the Celiac research study. 

Helping out the research project AND checking to see if I've developed celiac since the last time I was tested four years ago. 

After lunch, which I spent with some of the cool folks from Connecting in Motion and Riding on Insulin, I went to a session on the Bionic Pancreas presented by Edward Damiano. Ed's son was diagnosed at a very young age and Ed committed himself to creating a bionic pancreas on time for his son to go to college. His son is going to college in the fall of 2017. If you want to watch something really cool, check out this video on the research they did in 2013 at a summer camp. 

The project had stalled for the first time due to funding issues. They need to raise funds to finish building the bionic pancreas and, if they want to have it ready on time for to meet Ed's 2017 deadline, they need to raise the funds by September 1 2014. So if you want to help, please consider donating to the Bionic Challenge. 

I met a whole bunch of bloggers whose stories I read every morning while I have my breakfast. It turns out that some of them read Running on Carbs which feels a bit surreal. I went to the You Can Do This booth and added my personal motivational message to the choir. I made friends with the Dexcom folks and I got a copy of Kerri Sparling's new book. 

I spotted a whole bunch of people I had read about or that I know from their online presence that I haven't yet found the courage to walk up to. There are still two days so I may yet do so. 

I'll write about the second half of this great adventure on Monday. In the meantime, Happy Fourth of July to all of my new American friends. 

Zip and the Gang are Going to Florida

Hi kids! It's me Zip. The fitbit.

Omigoodness I am SO excited. Céline, Rose and I are going to Florida today.

We are apparently going to a conference. Called Friends for Life. It's all about diabetes.

Céline is trying to convince me that there are going to be tons of people with diabetes there. She said that they have some sort of super secret way to spot the other people with diabetes. Green bracelets or some sort of thing like that. And people who aren't lucky enough to have diabetes but who are lucky enough to love someone who does get to wear orange bracelets. I asked what happens to the people who don't have diabetes or love someone who does but she didn't answer me. I'm trying not to worry about it.

She is also telling me that there will be other Roses and Lucky's and Dexters there for me to talk to.

I wonder if Rose, my Rose I mean, will be jealous if she sees other Roses. Or if she will think it's fun to compare notes. Maybe the conference is for her too. So she can learn how to be a better pump. Or learn a few tricks for being the best blood sugar monitor ever.

Céline tells me that we're going to spend a lot of time in 'sessions' and talking to people but she promises me that we're going for a run or two (outside if possible but it's apparently really hot there). She tells me that there are three (three!) pools at the hotel so she'll be going swimming too. I'll be safely tucked away in her pool bag though since I'm not that strong a swimmer. Rose is - she's a wicked swimmer and is happy to hang out in the water all day.

The weirdest thing though is that Céline keeps talking about these really big mice. They are apparently the size of humans. They wear white gloves. And they talk. By talk I mean English, not mice gibberish. Their names are Mickey and Minnie and apparently they live not too far from the hotel. Céline said that they and their friends are really cool and we might be visiting them. She's talking about a place called Downtown Disney that has shops and restaurants and other cool things and said we might spot the mice there.

Mickey is apparently on the left. Minnie is one the right. Although rumour has it that she also wears red dresses with polka dots. 

The second weirdest thing is that Céline got her nails done for the trip. She picked a bright red colour because, she said, it's the colour red of the Canadian flag AND it's the colour of Minnie's dress. And then she got white dots painted on some of her nails. She said Minnie would approve.

I think the whole thing is rather strange but who am I am to say? I mean we are also apparently getting into a big bus with wings and are flying through to air to get to Orlando. If that actually happens, I'm happy to believe in talking mice who wear red dresses with white polka dots every day.

I'll make Céline take a lot of pictures and write every day while we're there. See you soon!!

Oh, and Happy Canada Day eh?

Friends for Life 2014

Yesterday I wrote about green bracelets. They are apparently a pretty big thing in the Type 1 world.

The first time I heard about them was when I read about people attending the Friends for Life Children With Diabetes conference in Orlando. They wrote about how emotional it was to be there and spot all the people wearing green bracelets.

People just like them who, while they might look different on the outside, shared the same faulty pancreas. People just like them who, no matter what their job, their background or their favourite tv show, all need to inject insulin just to stay alive.

People who wear that green bracelet understand like no one else what it feels like to be high. Or low. What it feels like to have to eat when you don't want to. They know all too well that sharp pain when the insulin needle hits a nerve. That burning sensation that we feel sometimes when the insulin is going in. The frustration we feel when we are judged by the word 'diabetes'.

For the past few years I have read about people's experiences at the Friends for Life conference.

This year, for the first time, I won't just be reading about it.

I'll be writing about it.

One week today, on Canada Day no less, I'll be en route to Orlando for the four-day conference. When I get there I'll be one of the people wearing that green bracelet. I'll be making conversation with complete strangers simply because they are wearing one too.

I will see, and maybe even meet, some of the Diabetes Online Community powerhouses whose blogs I read every day. I will see a few friends I have already met, on-line or in person.

And who knows, maybe someone there actually reads Running on Carbs and might think it's kinda cool that they get to met the Canadian girl who paints her nails before races, wears a Fitbit who writes blogs and who plays golf with a handicap of 47.

I'll bring my fountain pen to sign autographs just in case.