The Nervous Nurse

I glanced at the caller ID on my phone, which read  'SCHOOL.' It was my daughter on the line from the nurse's office.

"I was told to call you.  My blood sugar is 77.  I was 60 when I got here 15 minutes ago. I had a juice then and couple of glucose tabs just now. Lunch is in 20 minutes. It's Mrs. X.  She's not sure if I should go back to class. I'm worried about missing the final review and study-guide handout for tomorrow's math quiz."

"Mrs. X is the nervous substitute nurse, right?"

"Yup."

"Put her on. I'll tell her to let you go back to class."

Encounters with nervous nurses are, at best, like the one above. But they have also been known to go like this:

OMG YOU"RE 47!  SIT IN THIS CHAIR AND DON'T MOVE UNTIL YOU'VE CONSUMED ALL OF THE JUICE IN THIS OFFICE. I'M CALLING YOUR MOTHER RIGHT NOW.

Or, WHAT DO YOU MEAN YOU DON'T CHECK KETONES EVERY TIME YOU'RE OVER 200? THAT'S A VERY HIGH BLOOD SUGAR. DO YOU KNOW HOW DANGEROUS THAT IS?

Or, I CAN'T LET YOU {PLAY GYM/TAKE THE TEST/WALK HOME FROM SCHOOL} THIS AFTERNOON. YOU WERE 62 AT 9 A.M. YOU'LL GO LOW AGAIN!

Our full-time nurse for the duration of fourth grade was a nervous nurse.

We spent hours over the course of that school year talking her down from the ledge. With each phone call we explained again that every blip on the blood sugar graph was not a full-blown medical emergency.

We indoctrinated her, slowly but surely, into the idea of addressing diabetes concerns in the moment and then letting that moment pass and continuing on with the regularly-scheduled programming.

It was a delicate dance of acknowledging her concerns while inserting a dose of reality. We were unable to completely reprogram her but she became less panicky as the year progressed.

Substitute nurses are trickier- they definitely don't know my daughter as well, and they often have less experience with children with diabetes in general. I do hear we're making progress with one we've known since early elementary school. Generally, though, we resort to phone calls like the one above, on a case-by-case basis.

I absolutely understand the concerns. A nurse's job is to focus on the medical concern of the moment, with a 'safety-first' mentality. Which begets worry. Which I understand.  I know worry. I worry a lot about diabetes. So does my kid. But after 14 years, we've learned when to worry and when not to. We have learned when the time to worry has passed. We have learned how to incorporate life with a chronic illness into life lived fully. So sometimes we need to talk a nervous nurse down from the ledge.