No Diabetes For You!, or, How I Became a Raving Lunatic

That's right. Raving. Lunatic. You get what I'm saying. It mostly has to do with the fact that my moods are like souffle--I pop anytime, at any stimulus. Mike is the most patient man in the world.

In other news, yesterday was a fantastic day. I'm going to tell you why. And it might end up being a long blog post, so I apologize if you're tired of my writing.

The first reason involves rather a long story. Once upon a time, doctors were really mean and made me take all kinds of yucky glucose tests. I took the routine one first, in which I come in fasting in the morning, they make me drink the flat Seven-Up, and I come back an hour later for a blood test. The next day, I received a frantic phone call from the nurses at my doctor's office saying "Holy bananas your levels were high! We're going to torture more results out of you!" I am not ashamed to say that I had a TOTAL freak out at this. I have ALWAYS been afraid of diabetes. I like food too much.

Thus, I had to take the second glucose test, in which I come in after fasting for 12 hours (not fun for pregnant ladies), get my blood taken, drink the nasty stuff that they say tastes like flat Orange Crush (but really tastes like children's Motrin), and come back every hour three more times to get my blood taken. Summary: fasting for 15 hours + having blood taken 4 times = NOT HAPPY PREGNANT LADY. I was cranky forever. And I missed my religion class because I was so weak and shaky I couldn't get off the couch after I got home the last time.

Anyways, that test was on a Thursday. I had a doctor's appointment the following Tuesday. Well, I say doctor's appointment, but it wasn't really. My doctor was out of town during my scheduled week to need an appointment, so I really saw the nurse practitioner. She's very nice, and I'm sure she knows what she's doing most of the time, but I like my doctor better. He's much more awesome. But I had to see her, and she had my results from the glucose test. She told me that my levels were high, gave me all kinds of scary information about horrible things that could happen to my baby, and sent me to the diabetes clinic at the hospital next door. This was not a good day.

I played phone tag with the diabetes clinic FOREVER, so it was another week before I got there. Then, I had to sit through an hour and a half of this dietician (not a doctor, mind you) who repeated herself at least four thousand times, and spent the first 40 minutes or so telling me all the horrible things that happen to babies of diabetic mothers, and was like "You're going to be miserable forever because having diabetes will hurt your baby lots and you're both going to get Type II diabetes in a few years. Buaha." Then she dictated how many carbohydrates I was allowed to eat each hour, gave me a blood glucose meter, and told me to prick myself six times a day: before and after each meal, which means I could only eat every two hours.

Signs that made me NOT believe her AT ALL: I followed her diet plan. I even cheated most of the time, eating a few extra carbs at each meal and snack, and not eating for two hours between each thing. Result: I was constantly weak and dizzy. I had headaches every day at work and wobbled walking home from school. I stopped any healthy feelings I had been having previous to this instruction. I fell asleep all the time in class. Also, the meals when I cheated the most (like, 15 or 20 extra grams of carbs), my reading was not even close to the high end of normal. I spent most of my time in the 70s, which I don't suspect is healthy for anybody, but REALLY not healthy for someone who's growing a whole nother person. I got a little bit angry with her.

But I did promise to follow the rules until my next appointment, which was a week after visiting the clinic. This was yesterday, and my real doctor was back. I guess nobody filled him in with what happened while he was gone, because he was like, "Oh, we got your glucose results, and you just barely passed, so we're not going to send you to a diabetes counsellor." When I told him we'd already gone, he was like, "who sent you there?" It made me happy. He told me that I am NOT diabetic, I don't have to prick my finger AT ALL anymore, and that the nurse practitioner overreacted to my results. I guess one or two of them were slightly abnormal, but it just means I need to still be careful. But NOT starve myself.

I was so happy I almost cried. I did start laughing maniacally after leaving the office. Mike thought I was crazy.

The second reason yesterday was such a good day is slightly less consequential, but just as important to me right now. It also contains a story, but not a long one. Last week in my fiction editing class (the same day I was tortured by the crazy dietician), as I stood up from my desk, the seat of my jeans caught on a piece of metal and ripped a giant gash across the bum. I didn't make a scene, and it was okay because my coat covered it until I could get home, but still. One thing on top of another, right?

But anyways, because wearing dresses in the winter in Utah is never fun, we decided I would need some new preggy-lady jeans. Monday night we started some pizza dough rising, ran off to Penney's, and found some really cute ones on sale. They are skinny jeans, which I've never owned before in my life, but I've discovered the appeal. Mike says they're flattering (and sometimes I believe him) and they make my legs look less swollen (which they extremely are every single day). AND I feel all trendy, which doesn't happen ever.

So yesterday, the same day that I rediscovered food, not only did I get up on time to do my hair and wear makeup, but I was wearing cute jeans that made me feel good about my blecky swollen legs.

It was such a good day that we decided to celebrate last night by going out and getting a crib mattress instead of doing homework. And that is the end of my extremely long post. I hope you'll still be my friend after this.

Small note: I just realized I spent almost the whole hour between my classes writing this post instead of doing homework. You had better appreciate this, Mike and Mom (the only people who actually check my blog and read the long ones . . . :)