A semi-rant about pumps....

Lily had her 3-month check-up November 15th.  I absolutely adore her endo!  She's fantastic!  In one-hour, she managed to "fix" all the things that had me pulling my hair out for a month before the appointment.  Do you ever feel like the whole diabetes thing snowballs on you?  You start with one minor change...your child catches a bug or puts on an ounce of weight and you need to tweak things.  As you're tweaking one thing, five others pop up and require more tweaking.  Before you know it, you're looking at this huge mass of tweaks that need to be done and you have no idea where to start!  I wonder some mornings how it is that I still have hair on my head.  Anyway, the big old snowball....the endo fixed it, for the most part.  She made some changes, simplified some things for us, and then, after discussing the possibility of upgrading Lily's pump with her, she sent us on our way.  We've just had one problem since then....Lily is slowing trending downward at night.  It means I get no sleep because I'm busy worrying that she's dropping all night.  I adjusted her night-time rates down just that little teeny tiny 0.05 less.  Now she's trending upward.  Way upward.  She runs in the 300s all night long.  Drives me nuts because I know it's not a comfortable place to be.  So, we're trying to get her the new Medtronic pump that allows for 0.025 increments.  Sounds like the perfect thing for fixing this issue of Lily's night-time blood sugars.  And here's where the rant starts....the endo put in the paperwork and sent it off to Medtronic.  Medtronic Rep calls and says: Your case isn't strong enough for us to put it to the insurance company, but we can offer you an upgrade program that will only require you to pay $495 for the new pump.  Would you like me to start the paperwork?

Now, $495 isn't a ton of money, but we have insurance to cover it.  Why in the world would they not put our case in to insurance to see if the insurance company thinks it's worth upgrading Lily's pump?  It shouldn't be Medtronic's job to figure out if our case is strong enough or not!  My reply to the rep...."No.  Insurance should cover it.  There's no reason for them not to.  My daughter has a legitimate reason for upgrading her pump.  Not to mention that my husband works for Medtronic and I'm pretty sure they have some agreement worked out with the insurance company that they cover Medtronic devices pretty well for employees and their families."  Off the Medtronic rep goes to look into insurance benefits for employees in Minnesota and how that would affect "our case for a new pump".  Meanwhile, I'm freaking out and frustrated beyond belief because I haven't slept in weeks and I want what's going to be the absolute best thing for my child.  So, I call the endo's office and leave a message detailing what the Medtronic rep is telling me and asking if there's anything the endo can do to push this thing through.  It's so frustrating when you know something is going to help your child and the Powers That Be make it clear that you're going to have to fight to get it.  I put my psychological armor on and prepped myself for battle.

And then today, the rep called me back.  Less than 24 hours later.  And guess what?  Insurance covers the pump at 100%!  No cost to us.  They've faxed a prescription for the new pump to the endo for a signature and as soon as they get that, we'll be sent a new pump by 3-day FedEx.  All that mental prepping and now there's no battle to be done?  Great....but now, how do I get my armor back off?

Okay, quick question for all of you....I'm starting to get a little sick of my workout music.  I listen mostly to Black Eyed Peas.  Their album, The E.N.D. (energy never dies), has a great beat to it and keeps me going.  But I need some variety!  I did just download their new album, which just came out on Tuesday (yay!), but I only got to listen to 35 minutes of it during workout today before a low blood sugar hit and convinced me I'd better hop off the elliptical and find some sugar quick.  Anyway....question:  What workout music do you LOVE to listen to?  I need suggestions for new music to keep me going!  I'm hoping to make it out to the gym early tomorrow morning.  We're expecting more snow, which is so much fun and absolutely fabulous to have (because it covers up the gunky, funky, gray, exhaust-riddled snow that we've got along the roadways).  It's supposed to hit tomorrow afternoon and it'd be great to have the rest of the day to bundle the kids up and head outside to play and catch the flakes on our tongues!

Okay, off to test Lily again and then head off to bed.  Sweet Dreams, everyone!