More Derby

I think I'm in an abusive relationship with roller derby, and I love it.

I am sore like you wouldn't believe it today, not because I took some massive hit that is worth talking about or that I skated my booty off.

noooo

I got new wheels. It's exciting. The ones that came with my skates were not appropriate for the floor we skate on so I bought better, more maneuverable, way way pinker wheels and I fell on my butt in the middle of my kitchen floor 15 minutes after I put them on.

Can you say ouch boys and girls?

Practice today was pointless. I only lasted an hour and a half.

My ribs hurt, my shoulder is never going to heal, and I have a giant bruise on my right butt cheek.

However when I gave up on practice my blood sugar was 92.

So yeah, that's good.

oh and I finally picked a Derby name.

Black Islet

kinda has a ring to it, no?

Dinner, Polymer Chemistry, and yay! I managed to not puke. ;)

So the dinner for The Chicago Diabetes Project was awesome. When I got there the first thing I saw was a bigass camera and thought "oh crap" but lucky me they were gone by the time I spoke and poor Sandy, one of my fellow islet recipients had the joy of being followed around by CBS Chicago. You can read the brief article and watch the video that was aired in Chicago Monday night here.

Speaking was easier then I thought it would be and I was just so honored to be there and be able to talk to the people that make everything possible. At dinner I sat at a table with one of the researchers from Slovakia. He's working with polymers for islet cell encapsulation and he talked a little bit about both primate and human trials being done with encapsulated islets around the world.

The dinner was very nice, I especially enjoyed meeting all of the amazing scientists, donors, researchers, doctors, and other islet recipients and I didn't puke or cry while I was up there speaking.

so proud! ha

go cdp!

What I thought about right before I started speaking. ;)

Oh yeaaah,

That's me.

In a mermaid costume...

To puke or not to puke, that is the question.

Sooo, I got a phone call today from one of the nurses at UIC and was asked if I'd speak at the Chicago Diabetes Project's dinner on Monday.

Of course, I said yes, but usually when I'm in front of a crowd, the crowd consists of kids age five to ten, and I'm making balloons animals.

So yeah, I'm already nervous.

I think I'm going to puke

or cry.

probably cry, cause damn, I'm like that.

*sigh*

Long Time No See

I can't believe it's been over two months since I've posted. Yikes! Time flies when you're uber busy with, um, stuff.

In August my A1c was back down to 6.0, exercising has paid off. Big surprise eh? Yeah, the hard part was finding a form of exercise I really enjoyed cause I've always been the "running is for when scary people chase you" kind of gal.

That being said, I discovered skating and I've become a tad obsessed. Now when I say skating I don't mean the Dorothy Hamil kind or even the skateboarding kind, which I do enjoy, I mean the put on some quad skates, a short skirt, a bad attitude, and knock your fellow roller girl over kind of skating. Yep, I joined my local roller derby and I think I'm in love. ;)

Skating on an almost daily basis however has done some weird things to my blood sugars. I've started having random lows in the range of 50-70 about once a week and I have to stop to eat after skating an hour or so to refuel or I definitely feel low. Power bars and Taco Bell have become my best friends.

My shoulder is still screwed up, it's not as painful but I still don't have full range of motion. I have an appointment with an orthopedic doc in a couple of weeks. Hopefully he'll have something new to suggest. If not I guess I'll have to try PT for the third time. Or I could just ignore it and hope it goes away. I'm sure the latter would not be approved by Dr. Transplant and the folks at UIC. ;)

and speaking of approval, I haven't mentioned the whole Roller Derby thing to them so, yeah, shhh! cause exercise, good, track rash from not so sanitary track floor, not so good.

In other news

October 11, I'll be in Chicago for "dinner and dialogue" with the folks at the Chicago Diabetes Project. I'm looking forward to it. In addition to being able to meet my fellow islet transplant recipients, and learning something new about the whole process, I'll also be able to talk to the research scientists that make it all possible. That, to me, is the best part cause how do you say thank you for something like that? For the most part they're behind the scenes and don't get to see the results of their efforts. Hopefully being there to say thank you in person will make things more tangible.

what I'd like to do is line them all up and hug the shit out of 'em.

woot!

yay scientists!

and I'm off

cause I'm late and there's a pair of skates and wood floor nearby that have my name on them....