New Beginnings

by kerri morrone sparling

With 2009 coming to a very fast close, many are starting to draft their resolutions for 2010. You know, what they’ll take on or give up, how they’ll improve their days, and what parts of their lives will be different in the new year.

I’m already getting a good sense of what will change, as my first baby is due to arrive in the beginning of May. Yes, after over a year of preparation, my husband and I are expecting a baby.

We’re so excited. And nervous. And eager to meet our little girl.

Being pregnant is an adventure all its own, with food cravings and my body taking on a new, potbellied shape, but adding pre-existing type 1 diabetes to the mix is a whole new ballgame. After a lot of time attempting to lower my A1c and to get my body ready to take care of this baby, it’s “go time” now, and all of my previous medical routines are out the window. I’m five months pregnant – monitoring diabetes is now a full time job. Blood sugars that were once reasonably stable are hitting all-time lows without warning. My hypoglycemic unawareness is in full effect, and I’m relying heavily on my continuous glucose monitor (CGM – for our review of DexCom’s SEVEN Plus system, see Test Drive from diaTribe #15) to warn me about any fluctuations I’m not sensing myself. My insulin to carbohydrate ratios are shifting every few weeks, in addition to the weight being added to my once-athletic frame, making blood sugars much harder to predict. Pre-pregnancy pants won’t do me the courtesy of even pretending to button, and my growing belly is making it a little difficult to reach around and put new infusion sets and DexCom sensors on my lower back. My whole body is changing, inside and out, and what I’m doing every day now to manage my diabetes is completely different from how I was doing things even a month ago.

So do I have changes in mind for the New Year? Well, I’m changing as we speak.

Two thousand and ten (or if you’re super cool, “twenty ten”) will play host to the biggest new beginning I will ever experience: the beginning of a new life. My daughter will, I’m hoping, arrive in our lives in the spring, with this little soul depending on us for every single thing she needs.

And honestly, while I can wax on about how beautiful the experience is going to be, I’m a little nervous about this new beginning.

I worry about how I may be as a mother. Specifically, as a mother with diabetes. Part of my relationship with my husband, Chris, was to teach him about life with diabetes, so that he could comfortably become part of mine. Diabetes, as I’ve said many times before, isn’t the core of who I am or what I will become, but it is a huge part of my life and requires a lot of attention at times. Chris and I, throughout the course of the last five years, have learned to manage diabetes as a couple. He trusts me to take the best possible care of myself, and I trust him to help me when diabetes throws curve balls. He has rushed for juice in the dead of night to treat a low of 31 mg/dl, helped me through the frustrations of a nasty high of 300 mg/dl, and he’s been at every doctor’s appointment he could attend since we started dating. He’s my best friend, and a wonderful caregiver in the moments when I need him most.

My worry is teaching my baby girl about this disease. I don’t want her to view her mommy as “sick” or to worry about me. While I would like to fool myself into thinking that my diabetes will be perfectly controlled after she’s born, with nary a low or high, I know that diabetes won’t stop because my family is growing. I will give birth to my baby, but I hope that my diabetes isn’t a factor in her delivery. I will hopefully breastfeed my daughter, but I am already concerned about the low blood sugars I’ve heard can be a result of those feedings. Will I go low while taking care of her? Will I have trouble bringing down any high blood sugars when I have a newborn to tend to? How much will diabetes affect my transition into motherhood? I just don’t want my baby to be scared of my disease.

I want her to have the same level of understanding and realistic expectations about type 1 diabetes that I have tried to have for myself – that it might not be “normal,” but it’s our normal. And it’s okay. I want her to know that even in those moments when her mommy might seem “sick,” she’s not. Her mommy is just fine, and she will be there to take care of her for a long, long time. I’m not going to let diabetes keep me from taking care of my daughter.

I firmly believe that 2010 will be a banner year for the Sparling family, with so many wonderful things on the horizon and with our daughter on the way. Despite the fears and anxieties that come with parenthood, we’re ready to deal with anything. Even the issues that may come as a result of diabetes – because no matter what it may bring to the table in 2010, our daughter is joining a family that loves her very much and has been waiting for her for a long, long time.

She’ll be the best new beginning I’ll ever have.

Editor’s Note: Pregnancy brings a number of changes, including changes to your diabetes management. A number of organizations publish treatment guidelines for people with diabetes during pregnancy, some of which are listed here: Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation, International Diabetes Federation.