Yesterday...
The checker~outer~bagger~guy was eye-ing Joe. Joe had found me in checkout lane #8. "Mom...I feeeEEEL LOw." I know that climbing and descending octave voice. It is Joe's low voice. I could not reach Joe, as I was pinned-in my lane by the shopping cart. I tossed Woodchuck (Joe's diabetes supply bag) over to checkout lane #7 and instructed Joe to do a check.
Joe had just spent the last four hours swimming and biking on a pump track. Swimming rarely causes Joe blood sugar issues. He keeps his Ping on. No decrease in basal...bolus as normal for food...minimal free carbs are needed to keep him euglycemic. Pump track riding may be a different story though, as we battled many lows yesterday afternoon, evening, and on through the night and into this morning.
Enough about numbers, let's get back to the checker~outer~bagger~guy and the grocery store blood sugar check...and the blood...oh yeah, the blood....
So, checkout lane #7 was vacant. Joe walked up to the "conveyor part" of the lane and started unzipping Woodchuck. Now ... I don't give the whole blood sugar procedure a lot of thought. You know, the blood borne pathogen business. I don't really think about the "biohazardness" of our day-in-the-life. With Joe's Woodchuck splayed out all over lane #7, I started dreading a "gusher" (yes, at times Joe's finger can spew like a volcano..now no one is gonna come over for dinner). The thought of blood splatter on the conveyor belt and the sequella of that splatter ... blood droplets smeared all over not only the black belt but being smeared all over the hard~to~reach~to~sanitize conveyor parts underneath the checkout counter ... and the possible tainting of fresh produce ... the thought of the blood on the belt and the look of the checker~outer~bagger~guy taking in Joe's predicament had me take pause and instruct Joe to move his procedure to a less traffic-ed spot. He did it by the checkout lane #7 bagging station. Not sure if that was much better.
His number? It was 59.
A day-in-the-life of trying to manage diabetes in the checkout line in a "socially acceptable" manner.
6 comments:
You gotta do what you gotta do when you gotta do it right? (Not much sleep here either.) I don't give much thought to the blood borne pathogen thing either. I'm sure people don't care to see my daughter's blood all the time either, but they are just going to have to get over it because I don't want her to ever feel ashamed or like she has to hide what she is doing to stay alive.
I was just thinking about doing a grocery post, tho don't know that it would be worth a whole one. I always find it rather funny to set up a blood checking station right on top of the groceries on our cart. Because you almost always need to blood check in the checkout. Such a weird thing, really. Like doctor's surgical tools all laid out right there on top of the eggs and cheese. (PS Biohazards always make me nervously crazy. Except when they come from my own kid. Hopefully most people aren't as weirded out by the whole thing as me, because our test strips really get around.)
Gives a whole new meaning to wash ur veggies. I had a blood tainting convo with the karate instructor; who was not pleased with Justin whipping his blood from his puncture wound to his opposite hand and not washing. I get it, I am just a little oblivious to the blood myself.
I try to keep Bean from wiping her extra blood on places that weird people out...though that's not always possible!
I think my favorite is when Ubergeek has her wipe it on his sock!!
i shouldn't laugh...but i totally am giggling...emma is a fan of using the check writing shelf platform thingy at the register....who writes checks anymore, anyway?...in any case...that's where she does it...and it brings quite the looks from the cashier at Walmart everytime.
My husband and I were just talking about this, not really the grocery checkout, but about Kortnie checking her BG in public and people staring at her. You can usually tell if they are grossed out and nervous, or curious and sympathetic. Our daughter keeps a folded up napkin in her case and she wipes her blood on that, so after a couple days she has a gross bloody napkin and Brian says that's what he thinks people stare at and when he sees them staring he thinks, "oh we need to give her a new napkin" I don't think about the blood much either until I see someone staring, but thankfully she seems oblivous to the staring most of the time.
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