I got my divorce in Oct of 2010. Custody was a nightmare. The judge we had, retired in Dec and we got a new judge. Let me just make this very clear, I hate the state of North Carolina! The only good things that have come from me moving here are Sierra, Caden and Daniel. This state claims to be for the children and what is right for them, bullsh*t!!!!!
How can a state give 50/50 custody to a father, where you have shown then pictures of him drinking and smoking pot? How is it the a judge does not listen to a child when she tells you she does not want to be with her father? This man has countlessly left our daughter up at night, from the age of 5 watching horror movies alone, while he passed out in his bed from drinking. It's not hard to see that there is a big problem here. Not only that but you also have the child's therapist telling you that "If it's not broke, don't fix it." like 3 times in court. No the 3 restraining orders I had gotten on him did not mean a thing. Him coming to our house at 9:20pm demanding I let him watch baseball with the kids was no big deal. He was drunk and pounding on my door and then would not leave. It was a school night and the kids were getting ready for bed, not only that, but they don't like watching sports on tv.
This same man, who went out to lunch with me, a friend and our son, had 2 very tall glasses of beer (each glass held at least 2 beers each), wanted to drive our son home. Clearly there is nothing wrong with that in this judges eyes. All because he passed the alcohol assement test. Yeah, well I could walk in there drunker then a skunk and still pass it with flying colors. When you lie your whole life, saying "No, I'm not an alcoholic." There is no problem passing this test. Really, take a hair follicle sample. I had a digital voice recorder with messages from my ex, threating to come up to my house and take my kids from me. was able to prove him calling me over 100 times on my home phone and cell in one night. Him telling me I need to be at home with HIS babies. I was at work and went out for a bite to eat afterwards. I was home by 11:30. He left a message saying he knew I was not home all night long, he drove by. And yet, this judge seen nothing wrong with this type of behavor.
This new judge was a DA and only too the position of family court judge, until a spot opened for criminal court. She had not clue at all about family laws and never should have been in the position.
I got pregnant again in Oct of 2010, and with all the stress I was dealing with and my diabetes, I lost this one as well. My endocrinologist, had put me on insulin shots. Novolog and Lantus. It killed me to have to give my self shots, something I never wanted to do, but I had no choice. One morning while I was at work, my blood sugar crashed. It dropped down to 37. I am surprised I did not pass out. A girl I worked with was a diabetic as well and she passes out when her blood sugar is not even that low. I called my endocrinologist's office to let them know. The nurse called me back and said my Dr wanted me to increase my inuslin in the morning. I asked her if she was sure about that. I mean I know I am new and all to diabetes and insulin, but that just did not sound right. Why, would I increase insulin, if it was already causing me to crash. I aske her to make sure the Dr understood that I just had a low of 37. She calls me back later and said, that is what he wanted and he knew I had a low. This was not my first low I had, but it was the lowest I dropped, and I had breakfast 2 hours before that. I told my mom what the Dr wanted and told her it did not sound right at all and she even agreed it was not right. I decided I was not going to do it and I would just make adjustments myself.
Now remember, this is the same Dr who said no that uncontrolled diabetes will not cause a miscarriage and this is the same Dr, who I never seen for my GD after I had my son. He knew I had a family history of diabetes as well. I guess because I did not fit his profile of HIS typical looking, overweight and old person, that it meant I did not stand a chance of having diabetes. He also did not have diabetes his self, but hey he studied it in school, so you would think he would know what the heck he is doing. Oh and also when he put me on the insulin, he said he would have to guess how much I needed to start with because he was not sure to to calculate it. This should have been a dead ringer for me, that this Dr didn't know his a** from the hole in the wall, but hey, what did I know. I was brand new to all this diabetes stuff.
While writing my custody case, I researched diabetes myself. I was worried about the chances of my kids getting it and what to know what I could do to either help them not get it or at least not anytime soon, plus I thought it would help my case as to why the kids needed to be with me full time. I learned about the signs to watch out for, that if you have this, this, and this, it's probably diabetes. I knew now why my eyes were blurry, causing headaches, thirsty, frequient bathroom trips, tired all the time, hot/cold flashes ( I really thought I was going through menopause, scary thought for me).
I was shocked when I had toalked to my new OB about my first miscarriage and found out that oh yes, diabetes most certainly can cause you to miscarry. I researched it online as well and found out any time your blood sugar is over 200, it will cause your embryo to deform, which in return will cause your body to reject it. Hmmmmmmmm, funny how my endocrinologist had no clue what so ever of this. I was not his first pregnant patient and I am sure I won't be his last, but you would think during his training for diabetes that it would have been mentioned some where. Maybe he was out sick that day of class.
Well in Feb of 2011, I found out I was pregnant again. I thought 3rd times a charm. I really wanted this pregnacy because I really wanted to baby born in Oct. I love the fall season and Halloween is my favorite holiday. Plus I already have one kid who was born in the other seasons. My OB put me in the hospital that day, because my blood sugar was still not under control. During my stay, I found out that stress is not a friend to diabetics and will cause your blood sugars to go way up. I met a new endocrinologist, who was in the same office as the one I was already seeing. He was great and a type 1 diabetic, which as of Jan we found out I went from a type 2 to a type 1, guess my pancreas just could not keep up any longer. I mean it was over 6 years since I had GD. I also found out that my endocrinologist should have tested me after I had Caden to see if the GD went away and it was just pregancy related or if the GD triggered my diabetes. You can guess which one it did.
So I talked with this new Dr and it was clear I had to get on an insulin pump. He showed me his pump. I had heard about the OmniPod and while I was at the hospital I researched it and thought it would better suit my lifestyle. I also like the fact that I did not have a tube hanging off me, which with Caden, I could see him pulling it way more then I would like. Ahhhhh Caden, he is a sweet, loving and great kid, but I swear he waers side blinders and he is still trying to get back inside of me. When ever Caden lays in bed with me to watch tv and cuddle, his feet are all over the place, including my stomach. Which is where I would have to wear this pump, so you get the picture of Caden yanking out the tubing all the time.
I asked Dr. Russell if he would be my new Dr. I told him of the problems I had with the other one (Dr. Speed). He agreed and told me to call his office to set it up.
I was taking Sierra to a therapist to help her deal with the divorce and custody since 09. I would talk to him sometimes as well. He suggested that I take stress tabs and super vitamin B complex to help reduce the stress my body was under. So I did and I noticed a difference, unfortunatly it was not soon enough. My custody date was the beginning of March and I found out a few days after the hearing that the baby stopped growing on that day. It was also decided that we would get 50/50 custody and he would gethte kids the first full Monday of the first week of the month to the next Monday and then the 3rd weekend of the month, plus holiday's and vacation time. Then in March of 2012 he would get them every other week. I was fursious. How could this woman who has children herself not care about the well being of my children. The stress way more then I could handle and one of the causes I lost the baby. I was the furtherest in this pregancy at 9 weeks. I was so heart broken. I was also dealing with more then my share of problem at the time as well. Daniel and I had to move out of our apartment
because we could not afford it and we had to move in with his mom, who was lving in the house he was renting before he met me.
In May of 2011 I finally got on the OmniPod and I can tell you it has made a world of difference. I decided to set my blood sugar goals to that of which they would be if I were pregnant, just incase. I figured if I was already at those levels then when I do get pregnant, I would able know what to do.
In Sept of 2010 my A1c was at 10.7. In Oct, just 1 month later it was at 8. By Jan, I got it down to 6 and by time I got pregnant the end of June 2011, it was at 5.6. I had my blood sugars very much under control. As of Oct 2011 my last A1c was at 5.1. My mother who has been a diabetic for over 20 years has never had her A1c below 8, not that she was controlling her diabetes in the first place.
I am now as of Nov 16, 2011, 23 weeks pregnant with a very healthy little girl. My OB wanted me to see a high risk OB, due to my diabetes and my age (40). When I first met this lady, I did not like her. I found her comment of me being too old to have more kids offensive, and trust me I told my regular OB what this lady said to me when I went to see her back in Feb of this year. I mean, I am not the first woman to get pregnant at the age of 40 and I will not be the last. Plenty of older women have healthy babies at my age or even older. This Dr was going off of just my age and the fact that my diabetes was not under control at the time. Well I will show her and I did. I worked my a** off to get control of my diabetes, but I have to admit, it's not hard with being on the pump and I have gotten really good at guessing the amount of carbs I eat at each meal. Once I seen (here is where the visualiztion things helped the most), what a serving size looked like and how much carbs it was, it was locked in to my memory. I also got into the routine of look at the total amount of carbs on the labels when I go grocery shopping. Being on the OmniPod has made having diabetes a piece of cake.
I am not longer overwhelmed by all the information I had been given in class. I just took what I needed and tossed the rest. I have had a couple of times when my blood sugar went a little over 200, but it was also later in my pregnacy and only a couple of times and I corrected it right away. I did worry in the beginning about miscarrying again and it was hard not going to the OB like a high risk person would be. I was more like a normal pregnant woman, which is good, but it still did not help calm my down. I made sure to check the toilet paper everytime I wiped to make sure there was no blood. Once I started to feel her flutter, it made things easier and calmed me down. We passed our test for downs syndrom, and she passed all her other tests as well. I ended up with the same high risk OB I had before. The one who said I was too old to be having more kids and blew her away with how great of control I have my diabetes and how well my baby is doing. It's almost like my body is 20 years old again with no health problems at all.
One thing people in my life learn about me is don't tell me I can't do something, because I will prove you wrong. I may not be book smart, but I am smart when it comes to life and how to deal with what it throws at you. I am also good at writing a court case and would have won it, if I had a judge who knew what the hell they were doing and the laws for family court. I won my divorce on my own, granted my lawyer was the one talking, but it was my words he used. I like how my ex tried to say that we did not seperate on the date I had given and I was able to throw it in his face that I was not sleeping with him when he claimed I was because I was seeing someone else at that time. Yeah, that had to hurt. It also helped that I had phone records of him calling me from his parents house which is 45 mintues away from where I was living. Kind of hard to be there calling me and at my house at the sametime. Even my ex's lawyer was impressed with me. My ex father in law, said It's sad that a person with no college degree was able to out do a great lawyer.
I am still learning about my diabetes and figuring out which foods are good and which ones I really need to stay away from. I found that Dreamfields pasta doe not work for me. It's suppose to have only 5g of carbs that your body counts, but it jacked up my blood sugar, so I will just stick with regular pasta. Chinese food is not diabetic friendly. I have to bolus at least 60gs of carbs just to eat not even a plate full of food. So we don't eat that too much.
Daniel and I are still going pretty strong. We have had our ups and downs, but we pull through it together. He has alot of stress as well and does not show it the way I do. Living with his mother was too much for me. I never felt like it my home, even though I paid my share of the rent and the lease is in Daniel's name, not hers. I see thing differently then she did and it's hard to live under the roof with 2 dominant women. So she moved out, well to the house that is literally right behind ours and only has a fence between us. There are hard feelings on both sides. And my ex knows all too well how I am when you p*ss me off and are put on my sh*t list.
Sierra has her days when she if fine and happy and then there are days when she acts up. She tends to take it out mostly on Daniel. I hate it because the two of them used to be very close and he was just what she needed, a loving and caring father figure. We do notice that she acts up mostly when she knows she has to go to her fathers. Caden is a carefree go lucky kind of a kids and just goes with the flow of things. He is very excited to be having a little sister and talks about all the things he is going to teach her.
I belong to a website called Babycenter and I am in the March 2012 brith group, I am also in the groups Diabetic mommies and pregnant with diabetes. I came across a post from a girl who is type 1 like me and she had posted the link to her blog about her diabetes. It got me thinking that maybe I should start a blog, so that I can tell my story and hope that it may help someone out there. Also I wanted to make people aware of what happened to me with my endocrinologist and how I am a type 1 diabetic because he did not do his job as my Dr. It's sad to know that there really is not much I can do leagally. This is something that never should have happened in the first place. Even when I had GD, he never told me that because of my family history, that my GD could become type 2 or the signs I needed to watch for after I had Caden. It was like, Ok you so you had GD and now that the baby is born, you are back to normal. Someone should have told me the risks. I am thankful that I did eat as healthy as I did, because I think that is what saved my life in the end and unfortunately my first miscarriage. Which was totally unnecessary, if my Dr did his job like he should have.
So if you think there might be a chance or you have diabetes in your family. Know the signs and make sure you are being tested for diabetes. If you are pregnant and have GD, make sure you demand them test you after you have your baby.
Thank you reading my story and I will keep updating on my life and pregnacy are going.
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