Not Prepared.

Usually, I am so on the ball when it comes to making sure I'm prepared for whatever diabetes-related situation may arise. Spare battery, check. Ketone meter (which also doubles as my back up glucose meter), check. Back up insulin, check. Needles, in case I have to manually inject, check. Glucose tabs, check. Spare cannula, check.

More often than not, I'm pretty on it! I'd much rather carry everything on me, knowing that if my best friend calls and wants to go for an impromptu dinner, I can. Or go to the pub after work with my colleagues. Being prepared means I can be spontaneous when it comes to those decisions.

Last Friday, however, I was only partly-prepared!

I noticed that my insulin cartridge was running low. Not a problem. I grabbed the vial of insulin from my bedside table before I left for work and put it in my bag. I knew I had enough insulin left in the pump to last until lunch. Lunch came round, I checked my blood sugar, and saw I had 3 units left, so I bolused that to cover some of my lunch (I do my very best not to waste insulin - it's precious stuff!). I took my insulin vial from my bag, and then looked into my diabetes bag for my spare insulin cartridge.

Except I didn't have a spare insulin cartridge. And I'd just bolused the last 3 units I had in my pump, something I wouldn't have done if I had checked for the pump cartridge first. Because that 3 units could have been my basal insulin until I got home, and just done an injection to cover lunch.

But, feeling like a bad-ass and using up the last of the insulin in my pump, I didn't check, and this afternoon saw me doing a few injections, something I hadn't done since I started on my insulin pump back in June of last year.

Going back to injections, albeit for only a few hours, felt strange. It's weird how something that was my normal for four years suddenly feels alien to me. It's also made me very aware of the fact that I'm not actually confident anymore when it comes to injections. I wasn't entirely certain how to calculate my basal rates for the time I was disconnected from my pump, and I also didn't know if my insulin to carb ratios would be affected, as the way the insulin is absorbed is different. 

Perhaps I'll go on a pump break in the near future. For me, it's important to feel confident with your method of insulin therapy. And when using an insulin pump, like I currently am, it's important for me to feel comfortable with both my pump and injections, in case my pump ever breaks. 

A lot of this disease is out of my control. But knowing, understanding and feeling confident with my insulin therapy is.