All Out

Last week was a hectic one.  After returning Monday from an extra-long weekend with family on my husband's side, I got right back into the business of helping my dad pack up his house.  He moved from house to condo on Friday. 

In the midst of the packing and moving, unpacking and organizing, there was still school and homework, piano and volleyball, the orthodontist and a weird fast-moving stomach bug, plus a Friday night school social. It was a fast-paced week.

My dad's new little dining set was delivered at 11 on Saturday morning, completing the string of deliveries and installations. My husband, daughter and I were there helping unpack boxes and screw in paper towel dispensers.  We'd brought sandwich stuff with us and by noon we decided to christen the new table. Happily ready for lunch, my daughter entered her carbs into her pump, scrolled up to a dose, and hit 'go.'

Fur Elise played merrily from the pump.  "No delivery.  Pump is busy."  (Which I've always thought was a weird phrase to program it to say...busy doing what, exactly?)

In this case, it was busy preparing to tell us the bad news:  "Empty Cartridge.  No delivery." Oh. Oops. In retrospect she remembered the low cartridge alarm going off overnight but didn't think of it again in the morning.  In retrospect I remembered thinking when I changed the site Tuesday night that if Friday was as chaotic as I imagined it would be we might have to put off site change until first thing Saturday morning before we went to help unpack.  That was the last I thought of it.

Fortunately, Dad's condo is only three and a half miles from our house.  My husband was kind enough to make the insulin run and within half an hour, my daughter was eating lunch.

We had a good run.  This is the first time my daughter has run out of insulin since she stopped making her own in 2002.  But as summer day-trip season approaches, it led me to re-evaluate what we carry with us when we're out.  For a trip within a few miles, like this one, I'll probably still not bother carrying insulin, but we've gotten lazy about bringing it with us when we're headed places farther afield for the day.  What if we'd been an hour away at the beach or at a museum?  This could have ruined a whole day, rather than just delaying a much needed lunch.  

So I've ordered a Frio insulin cooling case to add to the collection of things we bring when we go out.

Choose your closing saying below:

All's well that ends well.  Live and learn.  Better safe than sorry.  Be prepared.