The Corner Booth

Take note: "It's the job of journalists to afflict the comfortable and comfort the afflicted." - Paraphrased version of wha t Mr. Dooley said. If y ou can't take the heat, get out of the damn kitchen... O r at least s top tossing grease onto the open fucking flame, you idiots. Otherwise, stop your bitching and moaning about ne gative news coverage . #vagueforareason

Sitting at a restaurant the other night, I overheard a conversation between two men who were obviously not happy with the healthcare law or the recent ruling by the U.S. Supreme Court. They talked for a good while on this, and I didn't interject. I just sat there listening, drinking my beer and eating my penne pasta while observing the after-work discussion between these two average guys. One made the point: "We're all human beings, and I feel bad that everyone doesn't have insurance. They should. But it's not MY responsibility to pay for them." This comment made me cringe. To me, that illustrates the disconnect we have as a people on this topic. We claim to be wanting what's right for our fellow human beings, but we're too selfish to pay for it. To recognize that we ALL have the duty, as fellow people, to help each other out. At the foundation, this isn't about taxes or politics or whether one person is lazy or not and deserves...

The 22 nd Annual Ice Cream Social on the Circle is happening Friday! Sponsored each year by the American Dairy Association of Indiana, this event celebrates National Ice Cream Month and recognizes the Hoosier State’s #2 ranking in U.S. ice cream production. It happens on Monument Circle in downtown Indianapolis from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. For just $3, guests can indulge their taste buds with gigantic sundaes made from Edy’s Slow Churned Light Ice Cream and drizzled with Smucker’s chocolate, strawberry, caramel, or butterscotch syrups. Sundaes will be served by more than 30 “celebrity” scoopers that include local media personalities, sports notables and business dignitaries - including Tony Hoard of America’s Got Talent . All the proceeds this year go directly to the Diabetes Youth Foundation of Indiana, which runs the only D-Camp in Central Indiana and supports, educates and encourages young people with Type 1 diabetes. ( Disclosure : I am a DYFI board member. ) So, if you ha...

First, it’s Thanksgiving week so I’m very much appreciative of the fact that 1.) I have health insurance. 2.) I have “decent” enough coverage that means I can basically get what I need to survive. 3.) I've got a job that allows me to at least try to pay for the supplies and prescriptions needed to survive this Life With Diabetes. But that’s about as far as my gratefulness goes on that point at the moment. Especially when said insurance company and pump supply supplier decide it’s a prudent business decision to fib on what they have and haven’t done and whose fault it is. The details: an issue with Medtronic Minimed over a recent pump supply order that has prompted this post. I ordered new supplies in late October, receiving them without issue at the start of November. I did this for a reason – to get them before the year-end deductible resets so that I’d be able to calculate what remains and what else I might be able to use before that amount returns to $0 and I must start over...

I’d meant to have a recap today on the wonderful Teen D-Camp experience this past weekend. You know, the one previewed late last week by the Diabetes Youth Foundation of Indiana D-mom who'd dreamed up the idea. That was the plan. But plans have changed. You might think that all the fellow diabetics, Ammo Cans of D-Supplies, Chili-In-Pumpkins, D-Supply Decoration of Pumpkins, Deep and Reflective Talk on Teen Topics, and talk of candy corn and cider for treating Lows has just zapped whatever energy I might have had to blog about the weekend. Or zipped, based on the Zip-Line and paintball that ensued. Nope. That’s not the case. Rather, it’s a darned tooth ache. A darn painful one. (And “ darned ” is the censored choice of my censored censoring.) It also comes as I try to hold a makeshift-office icepack to the right side of my mouth, while juggling work duties and trying to not make eye contact with the aspirin bottle that’s already rattled in my hand a f...

If you're not reading this at The Diabetic's Corner Booth , then you're reading content that has been stolen and is being used without permission. Any unauthorized re-posting of this content will be considered a violation of my intellectual property legal rights and will be dealt with accordingly. Someone is stealing my blog content. Is "stealing" too strong a word? No. I don't think it is, because what I am writing here is being re-posted somewhere else without my permission. That's stealing. More accurately, I'd dub it online plagiarism. In my world as a journalist, this flies in the face of that cardinal rule of not lifting other people's writing even with permission. People lose their jobs over this in the business world. You get a failing grade in the academic world. It's the No. 1 No-No, and yet it's happening here in the online world. Specifically, a site called Clean Natural Living is the culprit. Hey, Clean Natural Living: I...

Recently, I was pondering funny names and an idea came to my mind. I could change my name to Glucose. Mr. Glucose Hoskins. Friends might call me Sugar, for short. At this point, I honestly don't remember what spawned this train of thought. I'd been reading a court decision that day that delved into this history of surnames, so maybe that was a part of it. But I really don't remember. Just that it was pretty funny to my sleep-deprived, coffee-craving mind. Tweeting this, the Diabetes Online Community got some laughs and someone observed how wrong it sounded on so many levels. Bernard also opined with a laugh while making the astute observation that it would be a cold day before he'd ever refer to me as "Sugar." We all got some laughs for a few hours, and then the funniness and novelty of it began to fade. That is, until a news story came across my screen and made the whole name-change phenomenon more timely and pertinent. My mind began swirli...

Should zombies ever attack, I have an unlimited supply of weapons to ensure survival. Here's why. You may recall my recent post about my fight for and victory in achieving my three-month supply of One Touch Ultra blood test strips. Late last week, the nine boxes of strips arrived at my home. Finding the box on my porch when arriving home from work, I took them inside to investigate. Honestly, I expected some extra issue that I'd have to battle the insurance company or medical supply company about - I'm cynical like that. Inside the box, I found the nine boxes. The invoice told me that the 900 strips cost $813 total, which thanks to my insurance coverage only means a $25 co-payment for me. That's sweet. However, there's more. In addition to the strips, Medco also sent me nine boxes of Lancets - lancets I didn't request or want and do not need. Of course, the statement shows me that apparently my insurance does not cover these lancets. So, that means I must...

I came home from work on Tuesday to a letter from my current insurer, United Healthcare. Suzi had the day off work, and had alerted me to the letter after finding it in the mailbox that afternoon. She'd phoned to tell me earlier what the letter basically said, but I was curious to read it for myself. The letter involved my coverage for One Touch Ultra Blood Test Strips, which I'd learned upon my new insurance beginning in June were "limited" according to the terms of my policy. I wrote about this back in June . Basically, my insurance policy allows for 102 test strips a month of this particular "preferred" brand. Math dictates that's 3.4 tests a day, significantly less  than the 8-10 tests a day that my Endo agrees is the amount needed to best manage my diabetes.  Back in mid-June, a kind representative explained that it was possible for this larger amount to be obtained, and that my Endo would need to contact UHC and specifically request an "...

Stepping up onto My Soapbox. Offering a warning that you may not agree with what I say here, and so this is your chance to simply go away. If not, don't whine later about being offended by what you chose to read. Thank you, kindly. I promise to return to your regularly-scheduled D-Blogging soon enough - with a fun D-Feast Friday post on the way tomorrow! The Fourteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution says: “No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.” Passed in 1868, this constitutional amendment came on the heels of the Civil War. But it echoes sentiments that were debated and discussed back by the Founding Fathers, particularly Thomas Jefferson. He saw slavery and equal rights an issue that he wasn't ever persona...

  Our annual week-long camping vacation just ended and I'll be playing catchup for a little while, so I'm tapping some of the archived posts from back in the days when you might have just seen this as The Corner Booth, without a specific D-focus. This one originally appeared March 31, 2007 , but remains relevant today as many studies continue to provide nothing more than a reassurance of what's already out there and known. Not all, but many. Have you observed any particular studies (mice or pigs or otherwise) that might tickle a comment? Let me know, and of course thanks for visiting! Breaking news: "Sedentary behavior linked to high blood sugar." Another one this week: "Active Self-care Improves Blood Sugar Control." Really? Are you kidding me? We had to spend valuable time and resources on studying this? As if no one could have guessed this from talking to a person who's EVER BEEN TO A DOCTOR before??? Or actually lives with diabetes, or kn...

I've never been a fan of the term "pre-diabetes." Of course, I'm no medical professional. I'm not able to dispute the scientific validity of this term and how it's utilized. Online research tells me that the CDC has reported that one in four people (roughly 57 million people) have pre-diabetes and therefore have a higher risk of developing Type 2 within 10 years. But as a jaded and skeptical Type 1 for now more than a quarter century, I have reservations with this "diagnosis" and how the existing medical establishment throws this around in what I'd describe as a reckless manner. For example, take my wife who was recently told at an employer-offered health screening that she has "pre-diabetes" because of a single fasting blood glucose reading of 113 mg/dL. Yes, that's right. 113. One one three. (Waiting, allowing that number to process...) This is where I let Suzi jump in and tell the story, as it happened to her... The h...

The CDC reports that more than 70,000 people Americans die from diabetes each year, and it's currently listed as the fifth-highest killer in the States following heart disease, cancer, stroke, and respiratory illnesses. But diabetes is under-reported in causing deaths, and one industry leader has pushed to change that in order to more accurately portray the impact of this chronic condition. A recent Bloomberg BusinessWeek story ( thanks for pointing me to this,  @sstrumello ) tells us that world-leading insulin-maker Novo Nordisk pushed the U.S. Congress recently to put a provision into the health reform law that requires coronors and doctors to more-frequently list Diabetes as a person's cause of death. That underestimates and changes the overall number-based impact of diabetes, one of the company's Washington D.C. lobbyists says, and having a higher death toll means more government spending and private funding for treatment, detection, and prevention of diabet...

Our insurance company changed on June 1. The small business that my wife works for switched to United Healthcare, which was only raising rates 14% rather than the 40% hike predicted by Wellpoint Anthem. In many ways the coverage was similiar to what I've seen in the past, but this new policy brought a new element I'd never experienced before: Blood Test Strip Supply Limits. The formulary booklet lists all three tiers of test strips, and magically the One Touch Ultra test strips that I use fall into that first category. Lucky me. Of course, there was a fun little code of "SL" in bold behind the brand name. The key at the bottom revealed this to mean, "Supply Limit." It almost brought a smile to my face, as I'd never lived with this type of limit before but had heard the stories from those who have. There's probably no way to avoid a fight on this one, I thought, so bring it on! In calling UHC on Tuesday to discuss my policy coverage and what thi...

There is no reason that obtaining basic living supplies should take 28 Days. Unless, of course you live in a Zombie World. Obviously, we do live in this Diabetic Zombie World. This has been written about before. Some of us have Lows, causing us to behave like rambling incoherent zombies out in search of glucose brains. Sometimes, we have Highs that make us feel like we're stumbling through molasses, or moving as swiftly as a zombie does. Yet, there are other Zombies in this D-Zombie World of ours - the stupid, rambling, unproductive zombie-like fools who have one basic mission in life: to make your brain hurt and give you the desire to just give them a quick shotgun-blast to the head to stop the craziness. Insurance companies. Medical supply companies. Mail order suppliers. Local pharmacists. Billing reps. They invest our lives, and force us to go all zombie-killer Woody Harrelson on them. That's how I've been in recent days. En...

We People With Diabetes often voice our frustrations with Diabetes Police, who are those typically well-meaning and nice people who think they're the resident experts on everything related to diabetes. As with all D-Police Force members, dealing with these individuals one-on-one or in mass can be frustrating and require diplomacy, usually in the form of biting your tongue and instead responding with education or information about whatever the topic might be. Hopefully, it sinks in. But sometimes that isn't the case. That response can be even more tricky when those people are family members or close friends, and it requires a bit more delicacy than strangers or even more casual acquaintances. In my own D-Life during the past decade, the person who I've come to label as my Chief of D-Police is none other than my mother-in-law. A pleasant woman, she is herself a Type 2 diabetic - which means that her view of the D-World is gospel. I do my best to maintain composure, balanci...