How do you measure a year?

It's world diabetes day and I've decided to try this whole blogging thing again... No promises but maybe once a week? Or every other week? Hopefully more than once a year.

Last year when I was testing my blood sugar one night before bed my husband asked me, "I wonder how many times you test your blood sugar in a year." Sooo, I decided to keep all of my test strips for one year, and well, you can see the results. I kept almost every test strip from November 1, 2010 until October 31, 2011. (I threw some away while on vacation and some of those suckers fell out of my little black meter bag, but for the most part I kept every one of my test strips.) Looking at all those little butterflies on all those little test strips, it hit me (again) how much living with diabetes affects us everyday. This is just one piece of the daily work it takes to manage this disease and gets me thinking... How many infusion sets for my pump, bottles of insulin, sensors do I go through in a year? How many times am I poked between blood sugar tests, inserting new infusions sights, sensors, and not to mention the blood draws for my A1C, cholesterol, etc...

I'm reminded of that song from the musical Rent "Seasons of Love"

In daylight, in sunsets, in midnights,
in cups of coffee, In inches, in miles
in laughter in strife,

In Five hundred twenty five thousand
six hundred minutes
How do you measure a year in the life


Somehow we manage to do it, squeeze in this very demanding disease into the busiest of days. I've been humming the "Seasons of Love" song to my own lyrics lately... "In test strips, in sensors, in cups of coffee, in lullabies and laughter, in hopes for a cure. In five hundred twenty five thousand six hundred minutes, How do you measure a year in the life?"