A Gathering of a Few of Our Members

The Saturday after our January meeting, Jason, Tim, Brenda, Sue, Allen, A.J, Barry, Ben and I gathered at our favorite restaurant for a brief meeting. Allen was still feeling that we should have been able to do more to help Albert and we knew that he needed our support. After talking with him for about half an hour, he finally admitted that there probably was not much more we could have done even if we wanted to.

Tim turned the discussion to the topic Brenda and Jason had started and suggested even though he wanted to move on and have a nurse and nutritionist speak to our February meeting, maybe we needed to have more on the topics of diabetes self-management that had not been covered. Brenda spoke and said there was a lot of preparation that needed to be done and Jason agreed saying that he thought both were relatives of mine and not just the nutritionist. I said yes, and since talking to her, I have found out that her husband has type 2 diabetes also.

Tim continued that for being a chief surgery nurse, he was very surprised how much she knew about diabetes since she is not a certified diabetes educator. He continued that we should enjoy hearing her. Everyone agreed that Brenda and Jason should have more time and it was decided to have my two cousins do a presentation on February 7 or the alternate dates depending on the weather. Then Brenda and Jason could have March 7 or alternate dates for continuing their topic of diabetes self-management.

Everyone agreed and we asked A.J how he and Jerry were doing. A.J said he is very proud of Jerry and the way he has turned his life around since not living with his wife. His right foot ulcer is gone and the other is almost healed. He is very careful with it and changes the dressing twice a day and will be on once a day next week. A.J said that he has had one blood glucose reading at 66 mg/dl and was going to over-treat it, but asked me before he did. A.J asked him to carefully wash his hands and dry and retest and the second reading was 71 mg/dl. Since they were ready to eat breakfast, he had him count the carbs he would be eating and add this to his reading and he probably would not need any insulin.

A.J continued that at 90-minutes after eating, he had a reading of 102 mg/dl and said he would test at three hours. The reading then was 96 mg/dl and this was after an hour of weight lifting with his arms. At lunch time his before meal reading was 82 mg/dl and the reading after 90 minutes post meal was 112 mg/dl. He said Jerry said he was not going to inject insulin, as he would be doing more weight lifting that afternoon. Jason asked if Dr. Tom had approved his weight lifting and A.J said he had advised doing this, as the ulcer should not bother him since he was not on his feet.

Tim said he would confirm the dates with Beverly and Suzanne for February 7 and we asked Allen if he was going to be okay. When he said yes, we went our separate ways.