You Still Have Diabetes At the Happiest Place on Earth

My hubs and I are going to Disneyland on a work trip. I know the hard life right? This is not my first trip to Disneyland as a diabetic; we actually go quite a bit. My first trip to Disneyland as a diabetic went ok, but I had low blood sugars all throughout the trip. I ran out of glucose tablets because I wasn’t prepared for all of the lows I would encounter. I had to buy juice and soda for the rest of the trip just to keep my sugars under control. I hate the taste of real soda especially when it is lukewarm/hot. Then there is checking your blood sugar, I decided to see where my blood sugars were at while in line for the Jungle Cruise. Not my best idea, I ended up dropping my finger pricker thing causing the top to pop off and land right in the water. I spent the rest of the trip being a real BA and just pricking my finger with a quick jab of the lancet. I know most normal people would just go buy a new one, but I didn’t want to lose any of my time in Disneyland. Over the last few years I feel like I have enjoying the park and controlling my diabetes down to an art.

Packing is the beginning to my madness. I lay everything out on my bed and make sure everything is physically there. Then, I pack my clothes, comfy shoes that won’t blister my feet (don’t want to chance losing these beauties), and two emergency kits. One emergency kit is for the hotel room, the other is for the Park. I always make sure that I have everything physically on me and not stuck in my luggage, especially my insulin, I don’t want to chance it over heating so I keep it on me at all times.

My carry on pack usually includes:

·      box of infusion sets

·      reservoirs

·      my insertion device

·      an extra vial of unopened insulin

·      glucose tablets

·      juice boxes

·      syringes

·      alcohol swabs

·      an extra finger pricker

·      AAA batteries

·      Extra test strips

When I was packing for this trip, I realized I was going to run out of test strips. I called my pharmacy first to see if I could get a refill. Unfortunately, I couldn’t refill my test strips until Thursday (the day I will be on the road to Disneyland) instead of panicking I called my doctor. You see diabetes companies usually give doctors samples of products to hand out to patients. It’s really a smart marketing strategy patients will usually stick to something their doctor gives them creating a new customer for that company. Sorry, getting off topic. Anyways, knowing this information I called my doctors office explained my predicament and by the end of the day had a bag of sample test strips to last me through my trip. Problem solved.

A lot of this stuff goes into a backpack that I take into the park. As a family we always carried a backpack on the trip. My dad always has his old man bag (sorry dad) when I started to go to Disneyland with my new family (ie the hubs and I) I got a sweet Toy Story backpack that looks like Woody’s shirt and vest. I am not going to lie it’s pretty sweet. My hubs doesn’t mind carrying it either which makes it an even sweeter deal. The nice thing is that if something goes wrong with my pump, like it runs out of insulin, or the infusion set needs to be switched out while in the park I have everything ready in my backpack to grab and go. If you’re wondering where a clean place in the park is for the injection process. Believe it or not I use their nurses station located on Main Street. I usually go in and explain that I have diabetes and need to change out my insulin pump the nurse there will usually give me my own little room where I can put my sharps and have a clean and private environment.

I mentioned earlier that I have to set a temporary basal for my insulin pump while in the park. Because running around Disneyland is so active I have to lower my basal insulin dosage to avoid low blood sugars. I usually switch it that morning before we get into the park and put it back to where it needs to be when we get back to the hotel room. My standard basal amount per day is set at 23.175 units. When I am in Disneyland I drop it down to around19 units. Not only do I have to pay attention to the amount of basal insulin I am getting I have to remember to constantly put food in my mouth. I’m not sure if you know this, but I handle Disneyland like a champ, I have a plan on what to hit when and I refuse to let diabetes ruin my execution plan.

I have gone through my check off list for our trip and have everything I need to control my diabetes. Most likely I will unpack and repack tonight because I am beyond paranoid about it. I’m off to the happiest place on earth, see you soon!

One last thing. For any of you traveling to Disneyland in the near future and have diabetes check out Disneywithdiabetes.com for some more great advice!