Living with Gestational Diabetes... and counting down

Me and my boy at the park - Dec 09 - counting down....

So, it's been AGES since my last post.

What can I say?

I've been busy.

Tired.

Sore.

All of the above in varying combinations. I still have to say that I *hate* being pregnant. At least now I'm counting down and the end is in sight.

I've been good at managing to control the gestational diabetes (GD) with just diet and exercise. And on the up side I don't think I've put on any weight at all since my last post because I've had to be very careful about my diet and very good at exercising to keep the diabetes under control. On the negative side I'm developing calluses on my fingertips from poking them with a needle 4 times a day to measure my blood sugar.

It's funny, reading back on previous posts how much I had to say, but that now, 6 weeks after my last post I'm struggling. So I think I'll just write about a few things that have happened in the past 6 weeks and see how we go.

A Very Hot Day and a Wedding
A few weeks ago one of my colleagues got married. There were a bunch of us at work who had been invited to the ceremony and we'd arranged to leave work at lunch time and make the journey to the outskirts of Sydney to see the wedding ceremony. This particular colleague has been counting down to the wedding from the time she got engaged, at one point there was a number well over 500 on the countdown board - so for many of us it's something we'd been looking forward to for some time.

Unfortunately the day of the wedding also happened to be a day where the weather forecast was for an incredibly hot 42 degrees Celsius. Yes, you read correctly 42 degrees. Hubby suggested to me the night before that I just decide not to go and that people would understand, I am very pregnant and it is going to be very hot. I didn't like this idea as it was something that I had been very much looking forward to so instead I put my thinking cap on and tried to come up with some solutions that would get me through the day. I came up with:

1. Soaking some hankies in water and then freezing them so I could drape them around my neck and wrists
2. Filling a water bottle with water and freezing it so I had a source of cold water
3. buying an "instant cold pack". This is one that you buy from a chemist and when it's ready to use you just snap something inside and shake until it's cold.
4. Wear a dress that would keep me cool and tie up my hair off my neck
   

Here is a picture of the result - hankie on neck and water bottle in hand!

The goods was that I survived, despite the pastor going on and on and on and on.... after the ceremony was complete. It was beautiful and my colleague is (so far) loving married life!


One of the other things that I've been quite pleased with is that so far (touch wood) I've been managing to keep my fluids at levels that mean I've still free of "cankles" - this is a technical term that describes when your ankles disappear and instead you just have calves and then feet. One of my friends was so impressed with my ankles that she took this picture of my ankles at 33 weeks pregnant and posted it on facebook.

A Trip to the Train Shed with our Boy

Another highlight of the past 6 weeks was a very special morning out with our son. He is a bit fond of "Thomas the Tank Engine" and so we wanted to go and do something special with him before he's overcome with the craziness of a new baby brother. So we took him to The Train Shed. The Train Shed is located at Vicary's Winery which is about 20 mins from Penrith in Sydney, about an hours drive from home. It is home to a miniature train track complete with trains from the "Thomas the tank Engine" series. It was a bit overcast the day we went (which kept the temperature down, and we were joined by my parents for the day out. Our boy had the time of his life - unlimited rides on the trains and a hot dog for lunch. It was definitely worth the trip and I'd highly recommend it for any parents of toddlers who are fans of "Thomas". Beware that it tends to get crowded the closer you get to lunchtime, but because it was a morning trip for us it wasn't too bad at all.
The rest of the past 6 weeks has been devoted to trying to finish up all the stuff at work and ensure that we hired someone to do my relief for the next 13 months who is (or will become after some learning) competent so that I come back to a job that hasn't turned pear shaped. It's also been filled with appointments at the hospital. Unfortunately due to the GD I wasn't able to continue with the shared care with my GP and am now back at the hospital for all my appointments.

We had our son through the public hospital system and I couldn't have been more impressed, and I have to say that even now that I'm not using my preferred choice of care (due to the GD) I have still been nothing but impressed with the standard of care - and I do wonder why people spend thousands upon thousands of dollars using the private system when our public system is so good.... oh well. Each to their own.

Anyway, during the past 6 weeks I've seen:

• Midwives
• Obstetricians
• An Endocrinologist
• A dietitian

and a diabetes educator.

I've also had just a phone call away both the dietitian and the diabetes educator who have been invaluable in helping me manage the GD. I even got to go out and enjoy a high tea with my friends and manage it (sort of) without the help of insulin.

The high tea with friends was a wonderful way to come to the end of my pregnancy. We had an indulgent afternoon tea at the Swissotel in Sydney and I think them all (you know who you are), particularly my good friend Kylie who pulled it all together for me.

I'm pleased to say that on this, my first day of leave I managed to sleep in, update my blog, and now I'm just about ready to head to the hospital for another round of appointments. Hope to update more often now that that pesky thing called work is over with for a good 13 months!