Today’s Tip: Something for an Other

This past Monday, readers wrote moving and thoughtful responses to the momentous nature of a T1D diagnosis.

Of the 16 people who specified the date on which the diagnosis was made, 11 named dates in the fall and winter.

Evidence for the increase in diagnoses of T1D during the holidays is largely anecdotal, but our little sample is pretty compelling.  Some people believe the car rides to the mountains when your kid needs to stop every half hour to pee is your first tip.  Others say that a night in a hotel with a kid who’s guzzling gallons of water is what made them stop and think.

Whatever the reason, if this trend holds true, then more parents of kids with T1D will be getting phone calls in the next couple of months.  You know the calls I’m referring to—the one from the friend who has a friend, who sometimes has a friend, whose kid was just rushed to the hospital.

Only parents of a child with T1D know how harrowing that trip can feel.  Only we really know how hard the first months after diagnosis are.

So here’s something that only a member of the T1D community–with twenty bucks and about an hour–can do to ease the challenge:

Head to the nearest stationery store or Target or wherever and buy half a dozen plastic pencil cases.  We like the kind that are about five by eight by two inches and have a hinged lid.

Buy a big bag of Smarties (my son Will’s favorite “low” treatment—12.5 carbs in two rolls).

Buy some Airheads candies, which have 14 carbs in one stick (check the package to be sure you have the right size) and are FLAT which make them easy even for a style-conscious, teenage girl with T1D to store some fast carbs unnoticed in the pocket of her skinny jeans.

Buy some juice boxes.  There are smallish ones with exactly 15 (or some with 17) carbs per box.

If you can find it, pick up some of that disgusting gel candy that comes in a toothpaste-like tube because this stuff is perfect for the very rare occasion when a hypoglycemic kid might become unconscious and need glucose applied to his or her gums and inner cheek.

Back at home, print out half-a-dozen copies of this Word document, substituting the name of the newly diagnosed person for “Will.”

Cut the label out and tape it–I like lots of clear packing tape–onto the top of the box.  The cut-out text about “lows” can go inside the top cover.

Other families can bring meals and take care of siblings.  Only a family who knows the disease well understands how thoroughly the newly diagnosed family—the poor people—will need these “Low Boxes.”

If they have a “Low Box” in their car they won’t make the mistake I made in the hospital parking lot the day we were discharged and Will had a BG reading of 41 and all I had in my purse were graham crackers because I simply hadn’t understood how frequent and how sudden lows could be.

The parents will have no idea how much better they will feel when their kid makes it back to school knowing that each of their child’s classrooms has the “Low Box” that might prevent a scary hypoglycemic episode.

Grandparents’ houses, cars, school offices, gymnasiums, soccer backpacks . . .    You can suggest that these parents stash their “Low Boxes” everywhere.

When the call comes, this is a simple, heartfelt act that can make a real difference.

Tagged as: diagnosis