wait for it

Two days, three instances of diabetes near-breakdowns. One had life-threatening potential; one was an unfortunate mishap; the last, simply sad. No matter how much work we do, diabetes defeats us, at turns random and unpredictable. And sometimes, another force--call it God, or maybe parental instinct--rallies to save the day. Yesterday, I went online for hot lunch carb counts. The numbers there are highly exact--12.2g for low-fat white milk, etc, and though I know there's a margin of error when it comes down to the lunch lady spooning out the one-third cup of peas, I trust in this higher math. Yesterday, though, a count felt wrong to me. 53.6 grams of carbs seemed high for breadsticks at the school, though not, say, at Olive Garden--the school's portions tend to be smaller. Yet I trusted in the math, calculated Theo's lunch shot, wrote it on a slip of paper for the secretaries and sent it, carefully folded, in his pocket. Late morning, my gut told me to do some investi...

Right at this minute, unless you just ate or awoke, your blood sugar is most likely right around 100. That's normal. So when Theo's blood sugar registers around there, say, at 104, it's a cause for celebration. The diabetic, is, for this moment, normal. But just for a moment. Were you to prick his finger a few seconds later, the number might show at twenty points higher. Still good for a diabetic, but no longer nearing normal. There's no landing there, just skimming near and around, with numbers good, bad, and ugly. A friend told me her husband's recent bone marrow test was good. He's been in remission for two years. "But you're only clear 'til the next test," she said. There's no rest, then. How are we to celebrate the good when change, we know, is ahead? And when we know that we won't always know: the twinkies that were abundant on the shelves are now nowhere, without warning. People die. They leave us. We didn't know. If ...