Life with diabetes — a never-ending game

I’ve been back on a continuous glucose monitoring system — the DexCom Seven Plus — for almost two weeks, and for the most part, it’s been great. Sure, I have my frustrations and complaints about the system, but I can’t deny the utility of being able to see my blood sugar in near-real time. I already feel like my control is better.

But I’ve been experiencing an unexpected side effect of wearing a CGM: the renewed realization that there’s no cure. One of my favorite things to do with my CGM is to scroll back in time to see how good/bad my glucose levels have been (which is why I’m particularly frustrated that the DexCom only lets you see the past 24 hours). Whenever I have a particularly good day — one where my graph is pretty flat and I haven’t gone too far out of my target range — I feel a sense of satisfaction. It’s kind of like I’ve been playing a really complicated video game and have gotten past a tough level.

But whereas most video games eventually have an endpoint, the problem with the DexCom is that the information it’s tracking — and the disease that necessitates it — doesn’t have a final level. There will be no triumphant moment where I successfully “beat” diabetes, where my graphs are so good that I no longer have to keep track of them. And that’s a really depressing realization, one that’s almost worse when my trend lines have been great. I want to feel pride and satisfaction — and in a small way, I do — but then I’m smacked with reality: I’m going to have to keep going. With this disease, there is just no way to “win.”

I’ll admit: it’s been getting me down. What’s more, this morning as I was getting dressed I caught sight of myself in the mirror and noticed all the crap that’s on my body right now. I’ve got my pump site, obviously, with a cord leading to my pump (at that moment clipped onto my underwear — watch out, Victoria’s Secret). Then I have my big CGM patch, the adhesive currently coated in a layer of red lint from my tshirt. And adding to the fun: a big, dark purple bruise on my stomach from Monday, when I hit a blood vessel while giving myself a shot of Symlin. It wasn’t a pretty sight.

Don’t get me wrong: I’m grateful for all this equipment. As awkward and frustrating as it is, it makes my life with diabetes inestimably easier, and I wouldn’t want to live without it. But I do think it’s important to occasionally recognize the difficulty of all this, and give ourselves some credit. Forget the mental burden of diabetes — there’s a lot of physical burdens to carry around, too.

Catherine Price

Catherine Price (www.catherine-price.com) was diagnosed with Type 1 diabetes when she was 22 years old. She has written for publications including The Best American Science Catherine Price is a professional journalist who was diagnosed with Type 1 diabetes when she was 22 years old. Her work has been featured in publications including The Best American Science Writing, The New York Times, Popular Science, The Los Angeles Times, The San Francisco Chronicle, The Washington Post Magazine, Salon, Slate, Men’s Journal, Health Magazine, The Oprah Magazine, and Outside, among others. A graduate of Yale and UC Berkeley’s Graduate School of Journalism

View Author Blog

Catherine Price

Catherine Price was diagnosed with Type 1 diabetes when she was 22 years old. She has written for publications including The Best American Science Catherine Price is a professional journalist who was diagnosed with Type 1 diabetes when she was 22 years old. Her work has been featured in publications including The Best American Science Writing, The New York Times, Popular Science, The Los Angeles Times, The San Francisco Chronicle, The Washington Post Magazine, Salon, Slate, Men’s Journal, Health Magazine, The Oprah Magazine, and Outside, among others. A graduate of Yale and UC Berkeley’s Graduate School of Journalism