Insulin Resistance and Hormone Drugs

INSULIN RESISTANCE = Craptastic!

 This is what I've been dealing with for over a week, maybe 2 weeks now. I've done everything I should, I've switched out my insulin pump infusion sites on my stomach more frequently, I've changed infusion sets, I've changed insulin, I've waited 15-20 even sometimes 30 minutes after giving a mealtime insulin bolus before eating…. None of it has worked. Since I don't know what is going on with my cycle and I'm really not sure when or if I'm going to start I thought maybe it was because I would start my period in the next week or so, over the weekend I played it off to maybe it’s cause I was getting a cold, (it hasn't really turned into anything). Also over the weekend we were out of town visiting family and I played if off to being off schedule and maybe lack of sleep. Today, being back and on my normal routine and after evaluating everything that I've done since these stupid highs have kicked in and going over my meter logs and my Dexcom logs I decided it was high time to contact my diabetes BFF, my CDE. From somewhere around 10:30 this morning until after 3:30 this afternoon I was high, as in 200’s almost 300's high. I felt like crap, tired, groggy, emotional, head kinda heavy and foggy, and sick to my stomach, peeing like a racehorse and wanting to chug  enough water to fill the Mississippi. I needed to take action because nothing I have been doing is working. I've been kicking up the temporary basal rates on my pump anywhere from 30-65% higher than normal and the highs are still really ugly. I sent my, Dexcom logs, my meter logs, and my daily insulin totals over to my CDE and told her everything I've been doing. Even though I had told her two weeks ago when I last sent in all my logs that my infertility specialist, Dr. O, had put me on Letrozole, I reiterated this again. I heard back from her almost immediately, she had missed it two weeks ago when I told her I had been on Letrozole and she apologized  profusely. Even though it’s been 3 weeks since I was on it and I only take it for 5 days it apparently wreaks havoc on my BGS and will make my need for insulin increase, it causes an increase in insulin resistance!!! Oh joy! This is what I have to deal with now for a bit each month now until I do get pregnant and while taking Letrozole once a month. She says she can see the huge difference for my need for more insulin since I talked to her two weeks ago. She increase my basal rates and my lunch and dinner time insulin to carb ratios drastically. I’m to touch base with her every few days now to get things tight and were they should be again and she said to check, check, check my BGs often.  I felt relieved that I now knew I had really been doing everything right and like I should, but I felt guilty for letting it go for so long and not contacting her sooner. As excited as I'd be to find out I'm pregnant I'm not sure if I'd scream and laugh with excitement or burst into tears of frustration and fear of what these highs may have done to a baby. When I say that I've been running high I don't mean just here and there, I mean it's the majority of the day for hours on end. I can wait the amount of time that I should between taking insulin and eating and once that food kicks in it's almost as if I've not taken any insulin. Maybe not quite to that extreme because if that were the case I'd have ended up in the hospital I'm sure. I guess this is just a tiny sneak peak of what the later part of a pregnancy for me will be like. I was feeling quite discouraged this afternoon with all of this and had sent out a text to some good close friends that I could use some prayers cuz I wasn't doing so hot with all this. I got some nice encouragement back and even when I got home from work Brad offered to stay home with me tonight from the worship band that he plays on on Monday nights, if I needed emotional support and because I wasn't feeling so great. It was very sweet of him but I told him no, no need. I'm thankful that I have these people in my corner. It was a day I needed to know that even though no one I know understands, they are still there cheering me on and rooting for me as I fight this fight.

Continuation: T1D, PCOS, Hypothyroid....& A Tiny Human???

Elation, excitement, joy, tears, relief…. All things I felt at the end of my lunch break yesterday when my doctor’s office called me right as I was about to walk back into work. After getting off the phone I couldn’t help but break down crying. I apparently didn’t realize just how anxious I’ve been. I could have cried way more but had to go back to work. What did the nurse say that would cause all of this?

I OVULATED!!!! THE MEDICINE WORKED!!!!!!!!

My BFF said she doesn’t think she has ever been so excited for ovulation before. No joke!

 As I wrote about here, it’s been a rough go of things. After almost a month now of trying to get correct test results on my hormone levels I received those on Monday. They are fine. Last week after I got a positive ovulation test both Tuesday and Wednesday I called the doctor, nurse said to get blood drawn  the day before yesterday, Tuesday, to confirm if I had or had not in fact ovulated. With the way things have gone trying to get test results over the last couple of weeks I had honestly not given it much thought that I’d hear anything yesterday. I was trying to have faith but at the same time trying to mentally and emotionally prepare myself to hear that I had not ovulated. Once I heard the news from the nurse and got off the phone I really had never expected to break down like I did. But it was such a huge thing lifted off of me. I am able to ovulate!!! With a little help, it happened! Praise God! I have no idea when my next cycle should be starting since I’ve been so irregular and I had to get a different phone and my old phone had an app that I tracked everything in so I really and truly can’t even remember my last period was for sure. Hmmmm…. Well…. I’m wondering if I’m going to start next week because BGs Monday, yesterday and this afternoon have been a jerk face. I’m trying to keep at bay, now that I know I did ovulate, any fears that if I am pregnant what these craptastic BGs would be doing to a little person developing. Between reading “Balancing Pregnancy and Pre-Existing Diabetes” and now “Think Like A Pancreas” and knowing that so many woman have had healthy pregnancies and babies without the help of insulin pumps and CGMs and top perfect A1Cs’, I’m trying to just not think about what a few crazy highs could possibly do. Now that I know that this baby thing is even more of a reality of happening I think it’s time to crack down even more on myself and really get to watching what I eat and looking at patterns and what certain foods do to my BGs. I have to admit, I’ve slacked off a bit, but must not be a slacker no more! 

P.S. Yesterday was our 3 year wedding anniversary, this is such a great anniversary gift!!! I think that the only thing I may ever be more excited about in my life is a positive pregnancy test. EEEEEKKKKK........

Pump Malfunction, User Error or Just Dumb Diabetes???

Yesterday was a rollercoaster of BGs that led into a fantastically craptastick night of a stubborn, unknown reason of a high. I have no idea why I stayed like this from about 10pm to about 5am when I finally dropped below 150. I calculated carbs correctly at dinner, which was not a fatty meal, didn’t splurge on a snack, drank lots of water and yet at 9:30 I started to see the arrow on Lexie slightly go up. By 10:30 I was at 179 and even though Lexie’s arrow had flattened out I still had a feeling that I wasn’t going to go back to a happy range any time soon.  I jumped on the exercise bike at 10:45 and rode my heart out for 20 minutes until I saw a decline start to happen on Lexie’s screen. She showed that I was starting to go down so I stopped ridding when she was showing that I was steadily dropping below 163. Went to bed with my high alarm still set at 150 and high snooze at 30 minutes figuring that I was heading in the right direction and would even out soon enough and that I wouldn’t get woke up by the high snooze. WRONG! First time I was woke up I figured no big deal, I was right above 150 and had to be dropping. I had insulin on board still in my body from the correction bolus and with just getting my sweatabetes on I had to be dropping at a safe pace. At least that is what sounds pretty logical but not what really happened. 12:30ish woke up again and this time I was back to 160’s. I laid in bed wondering I should change my infusion site, I had been putting it off because I had forgotten that I should do it that day and had decided to wait to the morning, but laying there wondering what was up I decided to go ahead and switch things out. I grabbed my “D” bag next to the bed, grabbed a new set and alcohol swab and did my thing praying that this would take care of things. I changed the high alarm to go off every 45 minutes instead of 30 and tried to go back to sleep. 45 minutes later and I was still climbing. Long story short, this is how my night went, correction bolus after correction bolus every couple hours and still I got up to just under 200. At one point, half asleep and tired and getting frustrated and straight up pissed, I don’t know what time it was but when trying to give myself a correction bolus through half asleep fogginess it seemed that the ACT button on my pump wouldn’t work. Not sure if that was really the case since I’ve had no issues as of today, but I couldn’t seem to actually get it to do anything and give the bolus after I saw the unit needed. It seemed to freeze. I never saw it pop up on the pump screen that insulin was being delivered, screen just went blank. I went to the main menu, looked and it had given the correction, but then of course I stayed awake for a while wondering if the issue was my pump not delivering my basal rates or something. I eventually fell back to sleep for a bit thinking that if I kept getting high Lexie would wake me up and then I know something was seriously wrong. Instead I think I woke up maybe one or two other times and I was finally starting to go down. No pump issues I guess. As usual, diabetes has to be a royal pain and a mystery and make no sense whatsoever and just mess things up.

 See the dip and then rise  above the12 am mark?That's the beginning of my fabulous night.

One of Those Days

This has just been one of those days……..It started going in a southwardly direction just a few minutes before heading out the door for work this morning. I’ve already been a “little” stressed due to the whole PCOS/ovulation/BG saga. According to the Clear Blue test kit yesterday and today I should be ovulating. We’ll see how true that is when I get my blood drawn next week. Yay! Anyway, back to today’s loveliness. I’ve been squeezing into my jeans for a while now and the other day I broke down and went through what I have, a lot that I haven't worn in ages, and tried them all on. I now have a stack of what I can’t possibly squeeze into any longer. Talked to hubs this morning about needing to get new ones that actually fit comfortably and discovered that apparently I’m in the double digits of sizes now. Really?! Sigh… Okay, not going to let that get to me. I eat healthy, I work out pretty good including cardio 4-5 times a week and I have been for 3 months now. No weight loss,(dang low blood sugars before/after work out or any other time of day causing me to consume calories) but ya know what, I’m healthy. So keeping with that positive attitude onto the next lovely downer. My phone decided to completely crap out on me just a little past 10:00. I have a month, 1 MONTH until I can upgrade and it totally goes capoot! I had our IT guy at work look at it and he said it’s done. Darn it! I don’t want the crappy loaner phone from Best Buy (cuz that’s where I bought it and have insurance through. Never getting their insurance again. It sucks.) Really bad timing, going to visit my in-laws and new niece next week and I really want to have my phone to take pictures. This leads to the third thing that just really really really burns me up. Remember in my last post (in case you didn’t read it link is above highlighted in blue), I mentioned that I had to go get blood redrawn for the BIG hormone imbalance test because the lab messed up? I was really hoping to hear from the nurse today with the results. I called and left her a message with my work number to call. She called back fairly quickly and said that she had just called the lab and they hadn’t processed my labs until the 17^th and I should have the results tomorrow! Really? I went in on the 13^th and the lady said that since they messed it up they would put it on a rush and results would be in the next day. When I called my doctor’s office on the 17^th the nurse told me that this test takes longer and that it would be a few days. Now I find out they didn’t put a rush on it and it will be a week since getting blood drawn once those results are in. Stupid lab, stupid doctor’s offices, stupid dumb body of mine that just doesn’t want to work right! Ugh, having a dead organ-pancreas, and two lazy working glands- thyroid and pituitary just bites.

 To just relax and distress I’ve discovered that I can’t even break down and have a glass of wine occasionally without feeling gross afterwards. Since trying for a little human I’ve cut out caffeine and alcohol and discovered that my body hates both. Any time that I have splurged and had just a glass or two of wine or a cup of real coffee I end up regretting it. Both make me break out (even worse than I already am since being off the pill for the past year), make me miserably bloated and just do awful things to my stomach/insides area whatever that area may be. I started feeling this way a couple years ago and thought that it could be a few different things, tried cutting those out and when that didn’t work gave up. Now that I’ve given up caffeine and alcohol I know what it was, weird.

 How is all this stress affecting my BGs you may ask? Well, not as awful as I would think. Thank the Lord!!! We made Rubin sandwiches on Monday for dinner and then I brought one yesterday for lunch and I’m pretty sure that the carb count on the rye bread wrapper is WRONG! I was stinking high all night Monday and yesterday afternoon. I thought maybe Monday was a fluke so I brought the same thing for lunch yesterday and that just confirmed my suspicions. Today I was hanging around 140 all morning and couldn’t get down until after lunch, but 140’s are better, much better than 180-220’s from Monday night and Tuesday afternoon so I’ll take it.  

 On the brighter side of things, and by brighter I mean literally, since it was hovering around 50 degrees today and although it was cloudy, I was wearing a bright coral sweater cardigan thingy. I know, kinda lame way to be more chipper, but since I’m wearing it and it’s been months because of the cold and I haven’t worn it this just means we are that much closer to spring right? Also, Lexie, my Dexcom CGM has been spot on with my meter and it’s 10 days that I’ve been sporting this sensor so that’s a really bright spot . Yay for that! We’ll see what tomorrow brings, praying I really do get a call with test results from the nurse tomorrow and praying that they are good. Sitting on pins and needles………….

 

 

Openly Open: T1D, PCOS, Hypothyroid &…… A Tiny Human???

I’ve been debating lately if I should write about this. I’ve thought about waiting until I’m actually pregnant, but then I probably would never get around to writing anything or even be able to remember timelines.  In the beginning when we started down the baby road I didn’t want to broadcast anything because I didn’t know how long things would take and what road it would lead down. Now, that we are heading in the direction that we are the more I think about it the more I feel like I should share for the sake of maybe someone else out there going through the same things. Maybe they will find this blog and it will help them to know they are not alone. For my own sake, maybe someone will see this and encourage me that I can do this, that I’m not being crazy or selfish trying for a baby…………..

I’ve touched base a bit in the past on my PCOS, polycysticovarian syndrome and my hypothyroid, but now that I’m going to be writing about this journey that we are on,  I guess to better understand the situation and how it all ties in with type 1 I should go over things….. If you are a man reading this beware, I’m not going to spare any details so you are now forewarned.

Way before I was ever diagnosed with T1D I’ve had issues with having a “normal” cycle. Too often, too long, too uncomfortable. When I was a preteen and early teen my mom was hoping that my system was just trying to get things normal and under control and that eventually things would work their way out on their own and I would end up with a regular 28 or so day cycle. That never happened. I started when I was 12 and by the time I was 14 it just increasingly got worse. I had been having what I thought was a period (I found out recently that’s really not the case, but I’ll explain in a bit.), every 2 weeks or so when at age 15 I bled for 30 days straight, no stopping. Mom took me to the doctor, I don’t even know what they put me on at the time, to try and stop the bleeding. Doctor said I was too young to go on birth control so they put me on some other hormone pill for a few months. That made things stop for a bit, but I remember that by the time I was 16 I was put on the pill for a few months and then taken off. That’s pretty much how things in my teens went. No blood work was ever done or an ultrasound, mom was worried, but a the same time we didn’t have health insurance for most of my teen years and since I didn’t necessarily seem to be bleeding to death or have severe pain other than severe cramps every few months my mom didn’t press for too much to be done especially since the doctors didn’t seem too worried. I had another month of torture when I was 17, went to another doc who put me on the pill for I think about a year that time and then took me off. I didn’t like the pill because back then the ones that I was always stuck on messed with me so emotionally I was a nut case and a half. Depressed, moody, angry, just a real fun person to be around. Early twenties I kept with the same thing, off and on different pills that I hated. Longer periods and hell. Exactly a year after being diagnosed with diabetes, when I was 26  I went to a doc that my aunt highly recommended. At this point in time, believe it or not, I had been bleeding almost consistently for 6 months straight, no joke. When I saw this doctor, Dr. Green who is now my OB/GYN, she was the tenth doctor I had seen about my issues in a 12 year time span.  I never even had to insist on blood work or an ultrasound being done. She was the only doctor that looked at me as a hurting scared woman and not like a three headed monster or as if I was delusional. She was the first doctor that seemed to believe me and that didn’t just want to put me on some sort of hormone and shoo me out the door. She was the one that brought up running tests and looking at my insides, I didn’t have to press for it or even bring it up.  When she saw the ultrasound, there it was! All the cysts from PCOS. Unfortunately only thing to do was put me on a BC pill. She listened to my concerns and how miserable I had been before on all the others and she worked with me to find one that would help, and we did. It was amazing!!! I had tried diet and things that I had read would help, but nothing ever had, only the pill worked and it was a beautiful thing. Fast-forward to about 4 ½ years later and going off the pill and trying to get pregnant. Dr. Green was pretty optimistic that we could get pregnant, I have believed her. After all, she is the only one who would ever do any kind of tests and didn’t treat me like a freak. In February 2013 we had a consolation with a perinatologist that she referred me to for the T1D, he was pretty pleased with my A1C and management, I’ve had a few follow ups with him since and kept in constant contact with his CDE to get tight control of my BGs as best we can. At the end of March 2013 I took my last BC pill and we officially started trying. Things didn’t go wonky at first. We knew that things might, especially considering how my body was up until I went on the pill, but we were optimistic that we would be pregnant before my body had a chance to act like a mess. Each month went by, nothing happened, no baby. For 4 months my body stayed on the 28 day on the spot schedule that it had for the past 4 ½ years that I had been on the pill. Then I was late, really really late. We were hoping and praying that that was it, it had happened………. It was going on 40 days since my last cycle,  I had taken 4 pregnancy tests over a 2 week period and all negative. I called Dr. Green’s office. Her nurse said those tests are accurate, she would see what my doc wanted to do. 40 days and no period not normal. She called back, they put me on some hormone for 10 days that would jumpstart things and then they would do blood work to see if I had ovulated. I started on day 10 of the meds, had a 12 day period and then it stopped. Labs were done, no ovulation. Next cycle was about 21 days later, okay, we are back on track kinda, so I thought. Checked a couple of other times for ovulation, and nothing. October I had my yearly, and I talked to Dr. Green about how I was starting to have 21 day cycles. She decided to try putting me on Progesterone to get my cycles to lengthen so that I would have a better chance at getting pregnant and staying pregnant. First month, that didn’t happen. I still had a period beginning of November, then 21 days later again. Trying to give it some time I didn’t call her right away, but then I had it at 17 days. Called, talked to the nurse, and of course this med could have reverse affects. Give it another go around and see what happens. Tried that and well, guess what?! I had another so called period 17 days later. Ugh! Called and talked to the nurse and this time Dr. Green was at a loss and had to tell me it was time for me to go see an infertility specialist. Oh joy!!! Merry Christmas and happy new year to me. Of course I was devastated, another doctor, another specialist, more co pays, more tests and no baby. It was the end of December when I made the appointment for February 27^th.  We went to the appointment and thankfully we both really like the doctor. He was very thorough, he spent 1 ½ hours with us, going over both mine and hubby’s medical history, what tests he would run, our options for medicines for me to go on if all the tests came back negative for any imbalances like he believed they would. He made us feel like we were included in the decisions which was great, he didn’t just say this is what’s going to happen. He went over ultrasounds that Dr. Green had sent over to him, one of which was very recent. He said from looking at those that the lining in my uterus is very thin, it looks like nothing builds up, it all just comes out whenever instead of building up for a menstrual cycle, and lack of ovulation will do that. He isn’t even sure that I have ever ovulated. He was very optimistic that we will have a positive outcome, and we left the appointment with a game plan and feeling encouraged. I went the next day to get the blood work done that he ordered and then this past Wednesday went for me to get another ultrasound and for more testing for both of us. One of the tests that I should have gotten that day was a CF screening, but due to my health insurance switching over and issues due to that I had to leave without it. After a very stressful day due to those insurance issues and a new endo appointment that I wasn’t thrilled with, (you can read that here) and all the stress that circles this whole situation I received a call from the nurse that same afternoon that all my blood work and ultrasound came back looking great. I started meds Wednesday night to get me to ovulate so that’s where things are at with all of that.

How does any of this tie in with T1D? All these hormones are so tied together! Unfortunately they jack with my blood sugars and I never seem to be able to get a feel for what is going on due to the wonkieness. If I’m going high for several days straight at random times I wonder if I need to keep an increased temp basal setting on my pump due to highs because am I going to start in a week? I’m not seeing that as being the case. Everything that I’ve read or heard from my CDE on BGs and menstrual cycles does not jive with me therefore causing some real issues that I’m not sure how to correct due to the fact that I don’t know how long/many days the highs are going to last. If it’s going to be several days because I’m going to be starting, or is it in fact what I ate and I counted carbs wrong, or is it bad insulin or a bad sight. I’m praying to God that this new medicine will get things on track. Doctor seems to think that it will make me ovulate and I’ll have normal cycles. If that’s the case then that would help figuring out BGs at certain times of the month. Then again, God willing we get preggers right away, that’s a whole other rollercoaster ride! Wonky BGs and increasing thyroid meds and who knows what else. It’s a lot to handle, and I’m a mess internally.

Update to add since I've been writing this over the last 5 days... I got a call today from the nurse at the doctor's office regarding one of the hormone tests that they said was all good. Apparently the lab is now informing them that they screwed up and that one of the tests was done incorrectly. I have to go back to have my blood redrawn and tested. I already finished the ovulation meds for this cycle and I told the nurse that, she said that it won't hurt anything. Just when I was feeling sure about things.

Endo Search... Will it end?

I finally had a new endo appointment yesterday and not really sure how I feel about her….

 

What I liked about her:

 I didn’t spend two hours at the office with the first 20-30 minutes in the waiting room, 10 minutes with a nurse and 10-15 with the doctor and the rest in the exam room or hall way waiting to be seen. That was how it was every time at my old endo’s. Her staff was all very friendly and helpful. I got to my appointment 15 minutes early to fill out paperwork and didn’t even sit there the full 15 before being called back. Nurse did her thing and then the doctor came in within 5 minutes to see me. She was very friendly and detailed, she communicates with her patients via email she said and will respond after hours including weekends. Ok, that’s pretty cool as long as it’s true. She did a very thorough physical exam which my old doc never did. I was there for about an hour and a half and she spent  95% or so of that time with me. Maybe because I’m a new patient and because she asked a ton of questions and input lots of information into the computer, maybe she wouldn’t always spend so much time with me, I don’t know.   She sounds like she really knows what she is talking about regarding my thyroid and Diabetes Insipidus (DI) issues as well and will treat me for the DI and I can stop seeing the nephrologists once a year.

 

Don’t like AT ALL…

 When I told her that before having my Dexcom CGM that I checked my BG 10+ times a day on average and now that I have it it’s a bit more like 6 or so times a day that I check she called me “a bit obsessive compulsive” and that I’m letting "diabetes overrun" my life. I need to step back and enjoy my life, not obsess over numbers.

  She wasn’t thrilled with my basal rates that my CDE at my perinatologist set, she thinks they are wrong and wants to do a 12 hour basal test where I eat breakfast at 6:30am and skip lunch and snacks, drinking only water and eat dinner at 6:30pm. I don’t think that’s a good idea while trying to get pregnant….
  She made me feel awful about my carb counting abilities and when I talked about SWAGing (scientific wild a** guess) said I need to stop SWAGing and start eating meals where there is no guessing. (I don’t do prepackaged/boxed anything, most things are from scratch with the exception of breads and tortillas and of course pasta and rice.) She also said that I’m not eating enough carbs. I need to eat more than my normal average of 90-130 carbs for all three meals combined.
  I’ll give it to her, that maybe I need to stop overriding what my pump says on how much insulin I need, she didn’t like at all how much I tend to override my pump, but I feel like I know my body pretty well and don’t quite trust the machine as much as I should.
  When she saw graphs from my pump, she really wouldn’t look at anything on my Dexcom graphs even though the nurse printed them out, she didn’t like any of the highs and lows and when she asked about them she didn’t like that I couldn’t remember what I had eaten or activates I had done 24hours before those rises and dips. She straight up told me that if I can’t remember what I did 24 hours before the high or low she can’t help me get things corrected. Really?!!! She was asking about things from a month ago!

 

 I like eating the amount of carbs that I consume. I've seen both a CDE and a nutritionist who specialized in type 1 and both are pretty happy with my diet. I don't know if she is thinking in terms of diet for pregnancy, but if that's the case it hasn't happened yet. I'm sure once it does I'll want to consume everything in sight! As I write this the more I think that this doctor is just not a good fit for me. Then again, yesterday morning was very stressful and I was pretty emotional already by the time I got to the appointment. I had already spent the morning at another doctor’s office for some not really “D” related but kinda related things. (That’s another posting that I’m working on, diabetes of course always comes into play even when it doesn't.) Work’s health insurance just switched over and Anthem doesn’t have their act together yet so things were a mess at the first doctor’s office and I had to leave without getting blood work done. I had taken a half day at work to go to both docs in the morning and I’m so grateful that work was understanding about the issues with insurance and all these dumb appointments. They even said that when I go back to get blood drawn I’ll get paid for that hour I’m gone. Who does that?! That’s a sigh of relief! I know I’m a case and a half of crazy emotions lately due to serious stress so maybe I’m blowing it all out of proportion. I did schedule a 3 month appointment, I have paperwork to get yearly labs that I want to get done since it has been a year and I need to get my A1C done as well. I’m sick of being me and what my body is causing me to go through. I'm trying oh so hard not to let diabetes and everything else with my body make me feel defeated, but it's so dang hard! Someone want to trade bodies? Not forever, I just need a break.

 

 

 

For Real?

I don't get it. How does that work?  How in the world have I had nearly perfect blood sugars all day?  You see that nasty high over night?  That's been my life lately.  Today has been a much needed break. About as close to a diabetes vacation as a person could get,  but it's still never far from my mind. Now I'm praying my late dinner of beef stew didn't mess these beautiful numbers up.

Bomb Digity Black Bean Soup

I made an amazing black bean soup last night, not your traditional creamy based soup but delicious and hearty. I called it the Bomb Digity Black Bean Soup and had a request for the recipe so here it is. I used the original recipe as the base so I'd kind of know what spices to use and quantities, but I played around with it a lot to get it to my liking and I added the carrots and celery to mine. As always, taste as you go along. Unfortunately for any other PWD (Person with diabetes) that would like to make this, I do not know the carb count so I had to SWAG.

Bomb Digity Black Bean Soup

Makes one large soup pot

What you need:

1 medium red onion
2 large garlic cloves
2 seeded jalapenos
3 medium size carrots
4 celery stalks
7 15oz cans of black beans drained
6 cups Veggie broth
1 16oz jar of salsa Verde
1 can of green chilies
Coconut oil - just enough to coat the pot
2 handfuls of dried cilantro
1 lime used for zest and juice
1 1/2 tsp chili powder
1 tsp garlic powder
2 tsp cumin
1 tsp paprika
1/2 tsp cayenne pepper
salt and pepper to taste

If you have any bell peppers on hand I'm sure that those would be great added, but for once I didn't have any.

Coat the bottom of your stock pot/soup pot with oil and turn on medium heat. While that's heating throw your onion and garlic cloves into a food processor until diced. (If you don't have a food processor finely dice your veggies and maybe even let them simmer longer to be sure that they are softened enough.) Add onion and garlic to hot oil and let onions caramelize. Next get the carrots, celery and jalapenos into the food processor until well diced. Add these to the caramelized onions. Add 3 cups of the broth to the veggie mixture in the pot letting simmer for approx 20 minutes stirring occasionally. You want these veggies be cooked very well so that they are hardly noticeable in the soup. Add all remaining ingredients: beans, broth, salsa, chilies, lime zest, lime juice cilantro and spices. Let simmer another 20-30 minutes until beans are softened.

Garnish with additional cilantro, avocado, sour cream and cheese if you like and enjoy!