Cough, cough, cough. Cough, cough, coughity cough-cough. I am aware of the sounds in the wee hours of the morning, so early that we can really still call it the night. I mumble something along the lines of "are you okay?" and turn over, trying to slip back into my deep, satisfying sleep. Trent has had a cold for about a week now, and it is improving. In typical fashion, it makes its presence known when he tries to sleep. My Gram always said that fevers and other maladies always got worse at night, and my experience has proven this to be true. Maybe it's because our defenses are naturally lowered when we glide into unconsciousness. We aren't awake to fight against whatever pains or ailments are bothering us, so they seem to sneak up on us under cover of the night.
Since I was semi-awake, I decided to step down the hall to the necessary and settle back down for more sleep (after checking to make sure that there was nothing I could do to make things better for Trent). As I was trying to go back to sleep, I realized that I just didn't feel right. I felt sort of weak and thought that maybe I needed to check my blood sugar. This was a good thing because my blood sugar was getting pretty low. I won't get into specifics about the numbers for two reasons. One is that every diabetic starts to feel shaky at a different level of blood sugar. For one person, getting below 100 starts the shaking and sweating, while another may feel that way at 80 or lower. Also, if you read that I was starting to suffer at a reading of xx, you might check your blood sugar and find that it is close to that number. Congratulations, your blood sugar is normal. Normal/feeling-good blood sugar levels for diabetics often come with higher numbers than those of non-diabetics.
The number I saw on my meter, the lowest I have had in more than a year, told me that I needed to ingest some carbohydrates right away. Breakfast was hours away, and my body wasn't going to wait that long. And extremes, both high and low, in blood sugar levels are dangerous. I knew someone who lost consciousness while driving due to low blood sugar. She ran into a signpost, I think, and wasn't injured, but she almost went into a coma.
Trent asked if I was going to make myself some toast, and I told him that if I was being forced to eat carbs, I intended to enjoy them. I was going for the ice cream! There I was, at about four in the morning, shoving spoonful after spoonful of ice cream into my mouth. I ate what seemed to be at least a pint and decided to go to bed because my sugar had come up a few points. I turned to Trent and said, "Thank you so much for coughing! I really mean it. If you hadn't been coughing, I might not have woken and discovered how low my sugar was." Funny thing - after the situation was more stable, his cough went on hiatus for a while.
When we got up a few hours later, my blood sugar was still low. Taking my diabetic medicine was out of the question, and possibly dangerous. I decided to indulge myself with a big bowl of cereal and milk, followed a couple of hours later with toast and my morning pills. We got some things done and decided to lay down for a nap. In fact, Trent dozed off before I even crawled under the covers. Cough, cough, cough. Trent was up again, so I decided to get up as well. We can always go to bed early, right? I decided to check my sugar again, and sure enough, it was running a bit low. I ate some sugary candy and it was still at the same number. I'm just having one of those days, I guess. I'll carbo-load at dinner and have a snack before bed. And before I go to sleep, I'll thank Trent again for saving me by coughing.
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