Carter's story (Part 2)

It had been a long day. I had spent most of my day with my son at the hospital. I left the room for a quick break and when I walked back in around 7:30, there were several doctors waiting for me, including the doctor from the previous night who told me to go home and rotate Tylenol and Motrin.

An older, male doctor looked and me and said, "He is a diabetic." I was confused. My thoughts started racing. Why were telling me my husband is a diabetic? I knew that. I needed to know what was wrong with my son. I turned to my husband. "Kyle, what did doctor say about you being diabetic?" I saw my husband's eyes tear up as he looked at me.

"Honey, Carter has diabetes."

"No, he doesn't. You do."

"No. Carter has diabetes."

I laid across the table on my baby and started kissing him. I was so over whelmed. I could not believe my son had diabetes. When my husband and I started having children, we asked doctors whether our children would inherit diabetes from their father. We were assured diabetes doesn't carry over from the father. My family doesn't have a history of diabetes. We were not prepared for this.

The nurse who asked all the family history medical questions came in the room. She told me Carter's sugar level was so high, it didn't register on the meter. When we got the results, his sugar level was at 980. The average baby should be between 100-120.

The room began to spin as the doctors and nurses moved into action. Two nurses from the ICU came to our triage unit and started an IV. We were told we needed to consider getting a pic line for him. Carter started an insulin drip and couldn't eat for 3 days till his sugar came back down. We spent the next several weeks in NICU with Carter learning more about diabetes and how to take care of this six month old baby who couldn't even tell us he felt yucky or that the needle hurts.

Since then, I've learned a lot about diabetes. I'm grateful for those who helped take care of my boy. But I'm committed to improving the world for diabetics and their mothers. This is why I started this blog.