Scott Benner 8/5/25 Scott Benner 8/5/25

#1593 Two Toasters

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Stephen, 55, has lived with diabetes for 41 years and now drives innovation as the COO of a fast-moving startup in central PA.

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DISCLAIMER: This text is the output of AI based transcribing from an audio recording. Although the transcription is largely accurate, in some cases it is incomplete or inaccurate due to inaudible passages or transcription errors and should not be treated as an authoritative record. Nothing that you read here constitutes advice medical or otherwise. Always consult with a healthcare professional before making changes to a healthcare plan.

Scott Benner 0:00
Welcome back, friends. You are listening to the Juicebox podcast.

Steve 0:14
Hello. I'm Steve. I'm in central Pennsylvania. I am 55, years old, been a type one diabetic for 41 years. If

Scott Benner 0:26
this is your first time listening to the Juicebox podcast and you'd like to hear more, download Apple podcasts or Spotify, really, any audio app at all, look for the Juicebox podcast and follow or subscribe. We put out new content every day that you'll enjoy. Want to learn more about your diabetes management. Go to Juicebox podcast.com. Up in the menu and look for bold Beginnings The Diabetes Pro Tip series and much more. This podcast is full of collections and series of information that will help you to live better with insulin. Nothing you hear on the Juicebox podcast should be considered advice medical or otherwise, always consult a physician before making any changes to your healthcare plan or becoming bold with insulin. This episode of The Juicebox podcast is sponsored by Omnipod five. Omnipod five is a tube, free, automated insulin delivery system that's been shown to significantly improve a 1c and time and range for people with type one diabetes when they've switched from daily injections, learn more and get started today at omnipod.com/juicebox of my link, you can get a free starter kit right now. Terms and Conditions apply. Eligibility may vary. Full terms and conditions can be found at omnipod.com/juicebox, the episode you're listening to is sponsored by us. Med, us, med.com/juicebox, or call 888-721-1514, you can get your diabetes testing supplies the same way we do from us. Med, I'm having an on body vibe alert. This episode of The Juicebox podcast is sponsored by ever since 365 the only one year where CGM that's one insertion and one CGM a year, one CGM one year, not every 10 or 14 days ever since cgm.com/juicebox

Steve 2:24
Hello. I'm Steve. I'm in central Pennsylvania. I'm a CEO and VP of sustainability for a startup here in in Central PA I am 55 years old. Been a type one diabetic for 41 years. So wow,

Scott Benner 2:45
41 years. How old were you like in your teens, like 14 when you're when you're diagnosed, my 14th birthday present, literally, on your

Steve 2:52
birthday, I had the cake, and the next day felt terrible. Was drinking a lot. Of course, the typical story you hear, drinking a lot, peeing a lot. Lucky for me, my older brother had type one, oh, and so he immediately was like, I think you're type one. And so went to the endo and was diagnosed. So for him, he's about, what is he about? Nine years older than me, eight years older than me. He was diagnosed when he was 11, but essentially, they didn't catch it. He was in a coma for three days and survived. So, so, yeah, so, so yeah, that was my, my 14th birthday. And yeah, yeah. So it was obviously not a, not a great birthday president. So,

Scott Benner 3:43
yeah, geez, I'm sorry your brother is okay afterwards. Yeah,

Steve 3:47
yeah, he's, he's still alive and kicking and doing well. I'm trying to think now he's probably had type one for 50 some years. So, so, yeah, yeah.

Scott Benner 4:00
How long had he had type one before you did

Steve 4:03
trying to think 11, I would say probably 1112, years.

Scott Benner 4:09
Okay, so he'd had it for a decade or more by the time you were diagnosed, yeah, all right, yeah, I believe so. And your parents saw it coming maybe a little better the second time.

Steve 4:19
Yeah, yeah. I mean, he saw it like, you know, immediately. And then my mom's like, oh yeah, this is a problem, yeah. And then went to the Endo. So for me, luckily, at least they knew the routine. Had an endo already, because my brother John had already, you know, gone through this routine. So, yeah,

Scott Benner 4:37
okay, okay, all right, so your diagnosis. Do you remember much of it at all? Or is it a thing that's kind of lost in your memory? It's, it's

Steve 4:45
pretty lost. I mean, I remember doing the, you know, the injection in an orange and that kind of stuff, and the mph and regular routine and that kind of stuff. I think we remember correctly. I think we, we start out. We both were kind of doing the peace stick, and then we just got a blood glucose meter, like, right around when I was diagnosed, and it was like, looked like a brick. It would take, I don't know, a couple minutes for it to actually read your your blood sugar. So, so yeah, I was kind of the front end of it when it comes to technology. So okay, did you find it difficult to grow up with? You know, I did at the time, because I've got three older brothers, so my the next oldest who is not a type one, playing football, baseball, other things. And at that time, without CGM and without pump, it was, you know, most kids, you're type one, you're not playing sports. So that was somewhat of a disappointment, but, but outside of that, I think I did a pretty good job of just, you know, making it through with did a lot of hunting, fishing, that kind of stuff, outdoor stuff, yeah, instead of the typical sport route, for the most part, I kept it under my, you know, I didn't really talk much about it with other people, except for close friends, and then it was a little easier to keep it somewhat under the radar, because you didn't have a pump and those types of things beeping and, you know, make alerting people to it. So was

Scott Benner 6:15
it important for you that people didn't know and, I mean, is that something that you learned from your brother, by any chance?

Steve 6:21
No, I, I mean, I think it was from a standpoint to keep it quiet. Was was in my head, just from the standpoint of I didn't want people to think less of me or think that I couldn't do things because I was type one. So I kind of, you know, that wasn't the first thing that came up. Now, once I get to know somebody, and, you know, had a conversation, I had no problem telling them, but it was more of a, you know, just someone new you talk to, I'm not going to throw it out there and start talking about my type one and what I'm doing.

Scott Benner 6:53
So I never know exactly how people mean it, like, you know, I've super closed off. Nobody ever knew. I wouldn't tell anybody. Or I just, you know, you're not one of those people who runs up to somebody. I was like, Hi, it's nice to meet you. Guess what? I have diabetes, right? Yeah,

Steve 7:07
yeah. And even, I mean, I was, I was kind of interested. I haven't listened to the podcast you had you posted, or the person who did it, woman did a recording not long ago about living in corporate America. And I did that as type one, yeah, and I, I did still. I mean, I keep my pump, my sock, I don't, you know, have it hanging off my bell. I don't try to show it off. And part of that is, I think, because I'm I don't want the first thing to we talk about to be about, you know, oh, what's, what's wrong with you, what's going on, what's that thing attached to you? So I'd rather meet the person, talk about me, and then, you know, as they get to know Him, then, yes, yeah, yeah. And type one, get

Scott Benner 7:49
them to know you before you start introducing this thing that they don't have any context for.

Steve 7:55
Yeah. I don't want a pity party. Is mainly what it comes down to. I don't want people thinking, Oh, poor you so, yeah, that's so I don't, I don't know if it's, it's not that I'm ashamed of it, and in many ways, I'm proud of it, just from the standpoint of, you know, I, I know I lived through it. I've got a BS, I've got an MBA, almost an MS. Been in corporate America, and so it didn't inhibit me from, you know, from doing anything I wanted to do, from a, you know, a career standpoint. But I just don't like it being the first, first thing out of the gate. It makes a ton of sense. I completely understand. And then later it's okay you can like you, let the people in you want to let in. Yeah, exactly, exactly. Is it that after they know you, you feel like, after they know you, they see you're a capable person, that maybe they won't jump to those same conclusions. Yeah, I guess that might be part of it. Not even a thing you're thinking about that closely. No, no. I mean, you know, once I'm, you know, once I get to know you and we start talking, I might, I might talk to you about it the first time I meet you. If there's something that pops up that, like, of course, if, if the CGM is screaming and, you know, there's an alarm, oh yeah, by the way, you know, type one. But it might be a couple weeks if, until, you know, I get to know the person we're talking at work, or whatever, and I might just mention to him, like, look, type one, if you hear beeping, that's probably my pump or my CGM. And you know, just, you know, also, just know if, if I'm incoherent, you know, you probably need to call someone or please help. Yeah, yeah, although my wife would probably, you know, get the alert and be, you know, texting me. Are you okay? So I've got a funny story about that. It was, I had to fly to Italy for for work, and got there, and I don't know what happened. I think was just wonky where I don't know if Arden has dealt with this, or if you you've run across it, maybe you've heard stories of it, but, but the time change, the time change going from here to Italy, and then the pump, you have to reset the time. And I think I have the dawn phenomena. So I have. Got a lot of basal in the morning, and I think it hit me, and then I reset the time, and it just screwed up my my blood sugar, so I just crashed. I was like, you know, like 50, and I'm sitting on a train and Italy, and everything's beeping. I'm down in glucose tablets to try to get back up. And it was like two in the morning in the US, and my wife's, like, texted me, are you okay?

Scott Benner 10:26
Oh so, so you had a more aggressive settings for morning time that suddenly it wasn't morning time anymore for you. Yeah, yeah. Well, that's interesting, because, because those impacts come from your your sleep rhythm, yeah, oh, yeah. I never thought of that before. That's really interesting. Yeah.

Steve 10:45
What was cool to me is like, okay, my wife's sitting in Pennsylvania, and I'm in Italy, and she knows what my blood sugar is, and you know, it's telling me I need to eat something. So

Scott Benner 10:56
I know I'm on a train. I'm eating a seat in front of me. I don't know what to do.

Steve 11:01
Yeah, that was about it. That was one of those real lows where you're like, sweaty, you're you're shaking, you're like, Okay, this is, this is a bad one. I need to start, you know, settling up and getting the sugar in me. So,

Scott Benner 11:11
yeah, wow. That's interesting. It really is. I was gonna ask that was gonna be my next question. When you met, when you mentioned your wife, like, we talked about, like, how do you tell people around you, but like, how do you decide when you're dating people? Like, is it a similar cadence about, like, let them get to know you a little

Steve 11:26
bit first? Yeah, yeah, I think so. I mean, it's, you know, it's been so long since I've dated someone so but, yeah, I'd say that in the early days that was, that was part of it to, you know, kind of somewhat keep it on the down low initially, and then, and then bring it out and make sure they're aware of it for many reasons. One, just because they they need to know and and you need to be honest with them. But two, also from, from a medical, you know, emergency reason. You know, back then I've had lows. So

Scott Benner 11:54
did Lowe's used to come more frequently before CGM and stuff like

Steve 11:58
that. Yeah, before I got on the pump and had CGM back in the mid trying to think now, mid 90s, I had two significant, significant events where one, I was unconscious. My wife had to call the ambulance, and that's a funny story, because we were on a third story of a house, and they came up. My wife had already started giving me sugar, and I was eating it. And by the time they got to the house and came up, I was conscious, and I was feeling fine. I think it was up to like, 60 by the time they got there. And they're like, Well, we have to stick to the hospital. I'm like, No, you don't like, I'm fine. And they're like, No, but it's, it's, it was, I don't know if it was a legal issue back then or if it was just their liability side of things. But anyway, so they put me in a stretcher and took me down three flights of steps, and I'm like, Look, I can walk down by myself. You guys are gonna drop me down the stairs, yeah. Also, I think you're just taking me so you can bill me for the ride well, and that was, that was an insurance story, and that back into that one word. So they did that. I get a $600 bill in the in the mail for the ride, yeah, and so, and I have insurance, so I called the insurance and I'm like, this should be covered. And she's like, Oh, explain it. And she's like, Oh yeah, that should be covered. And that was my first, you know, dealing with the insurance company deny first, and hope you, you know,

Scott Benner 13:22
yeah, hope you go away. But also, at $200 every flight of stairs is a little steep, and

Steve 13:30
that was like, probably 90 what? 96 maybe. So I would have told

Scott Benner 13:35
the insurance company, listen, you do what you want. I'm not paying it. But I told him I didn't want to go. So you want to fight with him. You can go ahead and fight with him about it. You it. Yeah, exactly. That's crazy. You have some notes here that are interesting, like you have a bunch of different allergies. Today's episode is brought to you by Omnipod. We talk a lot about ways to lower your a 1c on this podcast, did you know that the Omnipod five was shown to lower a 1c that's right, Omnipod five is a tube, free, automated insulin delivery system, and it was shown to significantly improve a 1c and time and range for people with type one diabetes when they switched from daily injections. My daughter is about to turn 21 years old, and she has been wearing an Omnipod every day since she was four, it has been a friend to our family, and I think it could be a friend to yours. If you're ready to try Omnipod five for yourself or your family, use my link now to get started. Omnipod.com/juicebox get that free. Omnipod five Starter Kit today, Terms and Conditions apply. Eligibility may vary. Full Terms and Conditions. Can be found at omnipod.com/juicebox, you've probably heard me talk about us Med and how simple it is to reorder with us med using their email system. But did you know that if you don't see the email and you're set up for this, you have to set it up. They don't just randomly call you, but I'm set up to be called. Old if I don't respond to the email, because I don't trust myself 100% so one time, I didn't respond to the email, and the phone rings the house. It's like, ring. You know how it works? And I picked it up. I was like, hello, and it was just the recording was like, us. Med doesn't actually sound like that, but you know what I'm saying. It said, Hey, you're I don't remember exactly what it says, but it's basically like, Hey, your orders ready you want us to send it? Push this button if you want us to send it, or if you'd like to wait. I think it lets you put it off, like a couple of weeks, or push this button for that. That's pretty much it. I push the button to send it, and a few days later, box right at my door. That's it. US, med, Comm, slash, Juicebox or call 888-721-1514, get your free benefits check now and get started with us. Med, Dexcom, Omnipod, tandem freestyle, they've got all your favorites, even that new islet pump, check them out now at us. Med.com/juicebox, or by calling 888-721-1514, there are links in the show notes of your podcast player, and links at Juicebox podcast.com to us, med and all the sponsors,

Steve 16:07
yeah, and, and that was the primary reason I wanted to get on, you know, mainly just to kind of inform people, just if they run into something similar, because it was pretty crazy for me. Fast forward, so 90s, I late 90s, I went on, I think was IRR 1000, the Animus, the first animus pump on several animus then jump to T slim and CGM, so Okay, was monitoring and doing pretty well of my my blood Sugar over the last probably 1012, years and in 2000 I suppose 2019 late 19, I started having situations where, like I would go out to eat or even eat at home, and like my blood sugar would spike to 300 400 like after dinner, and I could not get it down. I was dosing and dosing and dosing. Finally, I realized that the the inset site was just getting overloaded, so I started actually adding shots to the, you know, I use the pump and and shots to try to get me back into, you know, somewhat a range, but it would, it was almost impossible. And it was the first time in my life where I felt like, okay, there's something wrong, like, insulin isn't controlling this that went on for about two months. And then I started out some other symptoms, and I started writing them down. And so then I started Googling, like, okay, high blood sugar, diabetes, these symptoms, flush. Remember what else I typed in and up, pop celiacs. And so it's like, Oh, that's interesting. So did some research and cut out gluten immediately. Okay? And, like, a week in two days, and boom, blood sugar is fine. I thought, Well, I must have celiac. So, so went to my Endo, who I had, really good endo at the time, he tested me for everything. I didn't have the genetic markers for celiacs. Tested me for a million other allergies and different issues. Couldn't find anything. And he's like, Well, if cutting out gluten is working, that's good. But he said, I don't know what what the issue is okay. So went gluten free, and was doing really well in about, like, right five, six months later, I started have issues again, and they weren't as drastic, but still having situations where I'd eat, it would spike, it'd be bad for a couple days and then come down, okay. And then finally I figured out a I made myself pesto and had gluten free pasta. It was basal garlic and olive oil, and I put walnuts in it, and I knew I had eaten basal garlic and pasta all time, gluten free pasta, and had no problems. So then cut out tree nuts, and it reduced the problems further. And then I've been really good for the last, I'd say, four or five years, but once in a while get I'll have some issues where I'll go out to eat and something will happen, and I'll think I've gotten glutened, and then it'll be a couple days and it'll go away. And finally, figured out from another experiment that it was also onion powder, which made absolutely no sense to me, because I eat onions all the time, and that doesn't impact it.

Scott Benner 19:29
But the powder, like just bought at the store, shake on onion powder, yep, okay,

Steve 19:33
yep, yeah, and it just is bizarre, but, but yeah, so. So from the standpoint of, like, if I eat at home most of the time and I regulate everything I put in my blood sugars are, are great, you know, probably be below the sixes. Anyone see right now? I'm in mid sixes, and that's because once in a while, yeah, I got to eat. I get something that. Doesn't agree, and then I'm for like a week, I'm fighting it, you know, bring it back down. So a week, it's, if it's gluten, it's a week, it's like, I could almost time it. It's like a week in two days, and I'll be dosing a ton of insulin to keep it in check, and then I'll send them crashing, because at that point where I go from having the gluten impact to it finally going away. Then, of course, then I'm overloading, you know, because I actually up. I have a different basal program setting for from when I get gluten and then when I come off it. I gotta make sure, you know, of course, I go back to the original program. So,

Scott Benner 20:40
that's really interesting, that you have it down to such a science when it happens. This episode of The Juicebox podcast is sponsored by ever since 365 and just as the name says, it lasts for a full year, imagine for a second a CGM with just one sensor placement and one warm up period every year. Imagine a sensor that has exceptional accuracy over that year and is actually the most accurate CGM in the low range that you can get. What if I told you that this sensor had no risk of falling off or being knocked off? That may seem too good to be true, but I'm not even done telling you about it yet. The ever since 365 has essentially no compression lows. It features incredibly gentle adhesive for its transmitter. You can take the transmitter off when you don't want to wear your CGM and put it right back on without having to waste the sensor or go through another warm up period. The app works with iOS and Android, even Apple Watch. You can manage your diabetes instead of your CGM with the ever since 365 learn more and get started today at ever since cgm.com/juicebox, one year, one CGM.

Steve 21:53
Yeah, it is. And the interesting thing about is, when I think about the fact that if I didn't have a CGM, I'd have no clue what the heck was going on?

Scott Benner 22:00
Well, you lived without them, you know what it is to Yeah, yeah.

Steve 22:05
So, so that's and that's the thing like you you're doing three, four sticks a day, and you wouldn't see the ups and downs and where things are dropping and and where I could look at the clarity and, like, watch it, you know, and look at what the data says, and say, Okay, I ate at this restaurant on Sunday night. It spiked to 300 and then I'm fighting it for the next week and couple days. The other thing that I haven't figured out yet, and I think this is the case, is all it's it's almost like it delays both the insulin and the sugar acting. And so, you know, I'll eat a 40 carbs, and, you know, put in, you know, depending on what what it is, put in, you know, four units to offset, and then it'll spike. But then also, no, go low later. It's like the insulin doesn't actually hit my bloodstream till later.

Scott Benner 23:05
But it also feels like the carbs aren't doing it as well. Yeah, yeah. Everything feels like it's happening more slowly.

Steve 23:13
Yeah, yeah. It's weird. It's weird. Have you ever spoken to

Scott Benner 23:17
other people like, do they signal to you that that's happened to them?

Steve 23:21
No. And I've, you know, I've, I'm trying to think about, I've talked to, I guess, two different endos and a couple primary care people, and I, you know, they don't, they've never heard of it. And essentially, what, what I've come to is, I think I'm gluten intolerant, because I actually did go through the endo endoscopy and, you know, and verify whether there was damage, and they didn't find anything. And so, so I believe it's not celiac, I think it's a sensitivity, which a lot of people, I guess, for a while, were questioning whether it was real or not. But I you know, clearly, there's data that shows there's something going on with my body that's real,

Scott Benner 24:01
yeah. I mean, it's not your imagination. Like, especially when it's so repeatable, like that, I would imagine, yeah, you feel like, you feel pretty confident you're seeing what you're seeing. How often does that happen to you? Like, are you able to avoid the gluten for the most part, or is this the thing that happens with some frequency? For

Steve 24:16
the most part, I can, and it's, it's something that I've become, like fanatic about it, like we have two different toasters. We've got two different jars of peanut butter, different butter, because my wife, you know, of course, eats bread with gluten in it. I do not and and it's the with gluten free. The definition is below 25 parts per million, which is a very tiny, tiny amount of gluten okay? And so I just have decided I've had issues the those first couple of years where I think I'm I'm gluten free, I'm gluten free. Why am I having problems? And I start thinking about, like, okay, she just put her bread in that toaster, and I put my bread in that my gluten free bread, and the same toaster right out. After irwal, it's actually getting contaminated. Yeah, it's getting cross contaminated. So we just need to be cognizant of that and put together the right ways to get around it. So yeah, I'd say in the last two to three years, I it happens maybe once every four months or so where I'll go out to a restaurant and you say it's gluten free or whatever, and most likely it's cross contaminated somehow. So you

Scott Benner 25:25
know from your blood sugar first,

Steve 25:29
yeah, yeah, yeah, that's, that's the teller. Is

Scott Benner 25:33
that exhausting? Or have you set up a system that pretty much allows us to not be overwhelming in your life?

Steve 25:39
That part is exhausting, from the standpoint, I have not figured out yet how to adjust the pump to counter the what happens, right? Yeah, so that week, in a couple days, it's a Yo yo, of like, you're, you're, you know, you're 300 you're, you know, you're 40, year, 300 year, 40 year. And in trying to get the right insulin to carb ratio, or time it the right way, like I Pre-Bolus. I was Pre-Bolus, and well before I listened to the podcast, and I still do it, but then when I do it with when I'm gluten, I don't know that might be the wrong thing to do. I don't know. That's and that's

Scott Benner 26:23
all over the Yeah? Like that Katy Perry song, you're right when you're wrong, you're you're out, you're up when you're down, you're black, when you're white, you're wrong when you're right. Is that Katy Perry? Sorry,

Steve 26:33
I don't know, but, but I that is, that's how it feels. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So, so, yeah, it's definitely a roller coaster of, hey, do you

Scott Benner 26:44
have kids? Yeah, yeah. How many kids

Steve 26:47
you got? One? Zach, he's, he's 31 Oh,

Scott Benner 26:52
does he have any issue? I don't know why I thought your kids would be younger, but okay,

Steve 26:56
we, I hadn't had him when, when was young. So he's, he's He's fine. He just had his daughter's two and a half years old. So we're, I'm kind of like, holding my breath right now with that, because obviously nervous about, you know, it will it manifest with her. I mean, I think that the weird part with us, within the family is we never looking back, both on my dad and my mom's side, we can never figure out what side it came from, because no one had type one that we know of. And even on the you know, I listen to the podcast pretty, pretty often, and I know your typical questions are like, okay, but you know, what about other autoimmune and I, other than arthritis, I don't know of anything else on either side that

Scott Benner 27:44
no one else has, like the celiac stuff or the sensitivities,

Steve 27:47
none of that. None of it. And that's what's it's just bizarre. Yeah, yeah. So my assumption is my parents mix some genes together that usually don't get mixed together and cause major problems.

Scott Benner 27:58
So listen, of all this. All I hear is that when you're toasting bread, you don't have to wait. Like, you have two toasters. There's no waiting. Oh, do

Steve 28:08
you're trying to spin the positive on it. Scott, yeah, that. I mean,

Scott Benner 28:11
honestly, like, there's got to be some good that comes. Also, what a great title for a podcast episode, two toasters, no waiting. Stevo, you have to say something pretty good to get me off of that. All

Steve 28:22
right? Well, I'll try to think about something as something to come up with that's, that's sexier, yeah,

Scott Benner 28:27
it's wordy, so it might get me, but, um, but that's just, I mean, I just, I feel terrible, like, when you hear people talk about their other issues, I'm not ordering them in my mind. Like, this one sounds worse than this one, but eventually, like, you've got diabetes, it's enough already, you know what I mean. And then you mean, and then you got, you know, another thing, and I got two toasters, and you're getting gluten, I mean, you know, and then you got to live with people who don't believe that's true. I would imagine, right? Like, there's enough people in your life for been, like, you're not a large gluten Shut up. Like, right? Doesn't that happen too?

Steve 28:56
I have not heard anybody say that directly your face. And I think usually when I tell people about it, I tell them, like, look, here's what happens with my blood sugar when this happens. And it's, you know, here's the real data. It's not, yeah, me just saying, Oh, my stomach kind of hurts, right, right? And I'm sure that happens to people, and they're being totally honest, but I think it's a little harder say, oh, what happens? Oh, my stomach hurts when that happens. Well, I just,

Scott Benner 29:20
you know what I mean, man, like, it's like, it's like, one of those things. Like, it's bad enough. Sometimes you say diabetes to people, and they go, what'd you do to get that? And then, you know, you're not really alert. Nobody's allergic to bread. Shut up. Like, there's people who think that. Like, even, like, you know, I've had conversations with people I'm like, Look, you know, unmanaged thyroid could really lead to, like, you know, some depressive stuff. And like, you know, I don't even know how to put it, like, you can make people short tempered stuff, like they have no that's just them, not like taking responsibility for themselves. Like, it's just, it sucks having so many things that open you up to that stuff, even if you don't get doesn't get said to your face, you know, at some point somebody's turned their back and been like, Steven thinks he can't eat

Steve 29:59
bread. Yeah, it's. Yeah, that's well, and that is the thing with type one is, as you know, back when I was first diagnosed, there wasn't many people had type two. You didn't hear much about type two, right? So to back then, it was like, Okay, you have juvenile diabetes. You know what they called it then, and versus type one today. But as you got into the 90s and early 2000s it was like, Oh well, you're a diabetic. Oh well, you should, you know, eat better and lose weight, and you'd be fine. You'd be like, Yeah, awesome. Not, yeah, it's not,

Scott Benner 30:31
that's great. So my life's not taxing enough. I gotta listen to this from you now. Yeah, thanks, doctor, whoever. So, so you're a grandfather. That's crazy because you, I think it's that you sound young, Steve, that's what's throwing me off a little bit.

Steve 30:45
I yeah, I there are times where I pinch myself and say, oh my gosh, I'm a grandfather, but,

Scott Benner 30:52
but it's in your head you're worried about that baby. Now, is your son worried? Or do you think it's a thing that's on you? Mostly

Steve 30:59
they don't seem as worried as I am. And I think both my wife and I were both like, Oh, are you going to have kids? And you know, they're like, oh, yeah, we're

Scott Benner 31:08
Why don't you just get a parrot?

Steve 31:12
Yeah? So, so yeah, they seem to be fine. And you know this, I think the cool thing now is the fact that, like, when I think back with my my a one, CS, when I was, you know, first five to 10 years, were probably in the sevens at best, and probably the eights. But it was mainly because you're testing three times a day. I didn't take the glucose monitor with me because was a big, you know, machine, and hump it around, yeah, yeah, yeah. And I was taking two shots a day, and, like, I think about that now and think this is just nuts that I survived. So I think now if, if she were to get it, at least there's the solutions, there's the devices, the technology to to make the Yeah, yeah. Because I think about, like, I'm, I'm starting to see some of the wounds don't heal as quickly, and my my eyes aren't as good. I go every year, and they say they look great. But I think about, you know, like, like, with Arden it, you know, the way you've, you've treated it, and she's treating it, she's not going to see any of the complications that that I could see. So that's where I don't get as nervous about it. Now,

Scott Benner 32:29
yeah, you don't have any, like, diagnose complications. No,

Steve 32:33
no, but I've got the typical stuff where, you know, it's just things don't heal as quickly. I get sick easier it I don't get as well as quickly. And some of that's just getting

Scott Benner 32:44
old. Yeah. How old are you? 55 so I don't know, like, it could just be that we just went on this cruise together, like a bunch of listeners, yeah, I saw it was awesome. Yeah, it was awesome. But, you know, like when we were setting it up, it was, hey, you know, people would like to sit and have dinner with you. And I said, Yeah, I'll sit every night and have dinner with people. And we did right like i Five o'clock rolled around, and I sat down at a table with 10 people, got to know them, and ate. And you know, a sit down meal. It was, you know, five o'clock to is about two hours. Usually, you sat there, and then, you know, the person coordinating the trip said to me, Look, there's more people that want to eat with you than we have space. Would you eat twice a day? And I said, Well, I'm on a GOP. Like, I'll sit with them, but I don't think I can, like, I can't eat, and then just like, pretend I didn't eat and eat again. Like, I can't do that. So, you know, I said, but yeah, let's do that. Right? So turned out, then it was five o'clock, sat down, spent a couple hours talking to people. Get a 15 minute break. 715 sit down. Another hour, 45 minutes talking to people like, and I was like, that'll be great. Like, I can absolutely do that, but I would get up, like, I got up on Monday morning. We got on the ship, right? You hustle on. You set, set up your table. Intake, people, see everybody, blah, blah, blah. Like, do all that stuff, meet out on the deck, like, you know, chat with people everything. I was tired when it was over, but it was fair enough. It was good day. I got up on Tuesday, I spoke for three hours, then I went to lunch, sat with some people at lunch. Then I went out on the deck, sat with a family for a little bit, just chatting like it wasn't crazy. Then I had a two hour talk, and then I went right to dinner, and then I did the second dinner, and I got back that second night, and I thought, Uh oh, 30 year old Scott answered the question, are you going to be okay doing this? Not 53 year old Scott. Because in my mind, I'm like, Yeah, I'm just, you know, I could do that. Well, man, by Friday night, we were talking, like, privately, and she's like, Hey, listen, you know we're gonna do this again next year. We're gonna spread your time out a little better. And I was like, yeah, she's like, You look tired. And I was like, I'm exhausted, and I'm just talking, and you know what I mean, and it still takes a lot out of you, like, sitting, engaging people. You. Really listening to them, accessing your memories, talking, et cetera, like I felt like, if there was a meter on me that said calories on it, you could have watched it drop while I was speaking. And normally, you lay down, you wake up the next day, and you're like, right on, let's go again. But I got zapped, I guess is the way to put it so then, in the middle of the trip, when everybody had time off, and they're like, we're gonna go aboard, like, you know, we're gonna go here, we're gonna go there and do their excursions. I gotta be honest with you, I canceled my excursion, which broke my heart, because I was going with people I really wanted to be with and meet and spend more time with than I was able to so far. But I slept the whole damn day instead, like everyone's running around all over Mexico. I'm in that cabin just asleep, like trying to catch back up again. So maybe it's just, you're old man. Well,

Steve 35:48
there's the age thing. The other thing I'm assuming you're probably pretty extroverted. I mean,

Scott Benner 35:54
yeah, being around people doesn't make me tired. No,

Steve 35:57
not at all because, because that's I'm I'm kind of more introverted. We do, yeah, well, we do some testing on the business side of like, okay, what are your temperaments? And I'm kind of right in the middle. And I do know when we go to conferences, and there's just conference we go to in San Francisco, and it's like three days of it's like speed dating, but you're like, you're going talking to investors. So you do, like, 20 minute, you know, gig with an investor, tell them what you're doing with what you need. That, by the way, in my boss is, is one of the best in the world at it. But even he at the end of three days, and he's a lot younger than than me, actually, he's the same age as my son. He's exhausted too. Like just kind of talking to people constantly, just tends to

Scott Benner 36:46
take it out of you. So on the last night, they moved the meal times, and this one couple didn't get the text, so I'm done with my meal. I'm gonna go up to my room, pack my bag like it's over, like I'm gonna go pass out, wake up, get off the ship the next day, and I'm walking out of the restaurant, and they're walking in, and I made eye contact. I was like, Hey, what are you guys here getting dinner? And she paused, and she goes, Yeah, with you. And I was like, Oh no, no, no, no, no. But I was like, okay, like, let me go up to my room. I gotta pack my bag up real quick. Let me get changed. Let's go meet like, I think there was a Starbucks on the ship. I'm like, Let's go sit like, I can sit like, let's talk. You know. I'm like, you guys go grab something in the interim, because I I'm not eating again. And so we did that. And when I got down to them, the first thing I said to them was like, Look, I'm running on adrenaline at this point. I was like, so I'm gonna say some crazy while we're sitting here, maybe, and maybe not. I was like, just take it all with a grain of salt. Like, if I say something crazy, wave a flag at me or something. I was like, because I am now just, like, I'm on autopilot now, like, just running, like, purely on adrenaline, I take your point. Like, it's, it's not easy, yeah, yeah. All right, well, you're old. That's what we got to on

Steve 37:59
that. Yeah, old and diabetic. I think the diabetes does have something.

Scott Benner 38:04
I'm sure they both are having an impact. But what are your outcomes like now? Like, where does your a 1c sit? Like, what are your excursions look like after your meals? The

Steve 38:11
last one was six, five. I'm typically in the low to mid sixes. If I keep, you know, if I keep the gluten in, in control? Yeah, I can dial probably some things in better, probably just the basal better. I'm got some wonky stuff with it in the afternoons. Right now, I'm trying to figure out. But you it's just, you know, you just gotta keep playing with stuff and trying to right, nail it down. You've

Scott Benner 38:35
said a number of times, like, I listened to the podcast, or before I listened to the podcast, like, when did you find it? What is it brought for you?

Steve 38:42
I probably maybe it was two years ago. I don't know how I ran across it might have been. It was either Facebook or, I don't know. I can't remember for sure. Yeah, I started listening to it, and it was kind of funny. And then hopefully you don't take this the wrong way. But when I listen to some of the early ones, it's like, Wait a minute. Wait a minute. You haven't dealt with a diabetic that's, you know, in his in his 50s, and some of the stuff going on, I can't remember what the exact one was you're talking about. And then, as I've listened to the later ones, you definitely have have, I think after you've probably talked a lot of people that have had diabetes for a long time, you know, make better, understand some of the long term issues, but, but, yeah, I listened to it pretty consistently when we were redoing a house that we were moving into. And then now, like every day, what I try to do, I try to walk three times a day, because that also helps the blood sugar, breakfast, lunch, dinner. And usually at lunch, I'll do an like, a half hour walk and listen to, you know, the next podcast. So, I

Scott Benner 39:47
mean, I know that when I started, I really just thought, if you've heard this, I'm sorry. But for other people, like when I started making the podcast, it was January 2015, and my. Initial idea, which was terrible, was that I was going to take my most popular blog posts and just read them into a microphone. Because I thought, like, Oh, these blog posts, everybody says these are the helpful ones. Like, these are what really helps. Like, I'll just make them available on audio. That was my first thought. I did it. It was stupid. Like, I think I got 20 minutes into the first one, and I thought, oh my god, I wouldn't listen to this. Why would anybody else listen to this? Like this is just ridiculous, you know? And then the kind of Craziest thing happened before I could even re consider what I wanted to do, I got a guest. This guy, Adam Lasher, was on American Idol, and he had type one, right? And his uncle's, like, Carlos Santana, and I somehow got him to be on the podcast. And so then I was like, Oh, I I talked to I don't know how good or bad it is, like, I have no idea it's, like, the first time I've ever interviewed anybody in my entire life. And so, like, I did that, and I thought, oh, there's value there. Like, he said things I didn't know. But I think that if you go back from the beginning and listen through it, which, I mean at this point, might take you a bit, yeah, but I think what you hear is me just, you know, like a stone, like rolling down a hill, collecting moss. And, you know, I'm just, I'm hearing things and expanding what I understand about all this. And just happens. It happens almost a little slowly, but hopefully, if people came along for the ride, then they they learned right along with me. I almost sometimes see myself as like an avatar, like, for you guys, I'm learning while you're learning. Like, yeah, you

Steve 41:35
know. And I agree. I think the big thing that I typically, I mean, what I like about listening to it is stuff. What I was hoping with, what I brought up today is just some person out there that's like, you know, people think they're crazy because they're talking about gluten. They're like, Yeah, this is happening to me, and maybe have some better ideas how to handle it or what to do with it, but, but it is, I think that's what I like about listening is you hear different type one stories about how they're diagnosed, what their agencies are, how they're managing it, what's working for them, what's not working for them. And I think you ask the right questions. And, you know, to your point, I think it's with any job, it takes you a good year or two to kind of get your feet, you know, settled, and figure out exactly how best to do it, and then you start really, I think, excelling. And probably that that was the same with you of when you went from the blog to the podcast and took you a while to get settled and figure out, oh, how do I really run

Scott Benner 42:31
this? Yeah, what is all this? It took me, I'm going to tell you, like, it's 200 episodes. And when I got 200 episodes in, I thought all the information, generally speaking, people need, you know, to take care of themselves at a base level, is in these conversations somewhere, yeah, you know. And then basically, I pulled them all together, and I just made that Pro Tip series, because I started thinking like it's unreasonable to ask somebody to list the 200 episodes, to call out all the information they need. And I started becoming aware that some people are podcast listeners. They just like hearing people talk to each other. Some people are just like, No, I heard, if I listened to that Pro Tip series, like my a, 1c, will go in the sixes, like they don't give a about the podcast. They want to hear that information. And I was like, Oh, we got to start gathering that together in places. And now, you know, I looked up the other day, I have 26 different series that are filled with different information, like in places, and I'm proud of that. I can't believe that it's come as far as it has. As a matter of fact, Steve, I'll tell you something, you know, sometimes I say something while I'm recording, so that I'll actually do it all. Right? So here's the thing only you're gonna know until it happens. It happens. Ready, okay, all right, I'm gonna start a second podcast that just going to have the management stuff in it, and I'm gonna make each season of the podcast one of the series to try to get around the limitations on the Apple podcast thing. Because right now, you'd have to go find episode 1000 to hear the first episode of the Pro Tip series, and then the next one, the next one, the next one. You know they're in a line because I reposted them in order, but most of them aren't like that. They're spread out. So there'll be a second feed that will probably start with bold beginnings, I think, and I'll put that series up maybe twice a week until that whole series is up. I'll call that season one, then I'll go to season two, put up the pro tips, they'll go to season three, put up a different series, and I'll just keep doing that, like moving forward, and then people can just go back to their app, go to the different season and that's how they'll be able to get to the different series.

Steve 44:40
I think that will be helpful. Matt, just, just with gluten and celiac, I was trying to, like, dig through what you had. I don't have enough, by the way. Yeah, there was, I think I only found, like, three or four episodes,

Scott Benner 44:54
people come on to talk about it, yeah. I wish more people would, hopefully they'll reach. Out, that's what I

Steve 45:00
was curious, whether they have similar issues as me, if they do get glutened, I just, you know, I don't know it's, it seems like probably do, but, but I don't, I'm not sure, yeah, so

Scott Benner 45:12
tough, because it is, I mean, it's a niche inside of a niche inside of a niche, you know, yeah,

Steve 45:16
exactly. There's probably, like, point 00, 1% of people you know that have all the same issues. So us lucky ones, I'm not lucky. So, yeah, so, well, I think that's good idea. I think it'll be interesting to to follow it.

Scott Benner 45:33
Yeah, no, I just think it's going to be also for the people who really don't want to hear me talk into you know, they don't want an after dark episode, like, right? They don't care. I know you like it. I think you're smart, by the way. I think this is a pretty good podcast, whether it's about diabetes or not, you know. And I do hear from a lot of adults who tell me that just listening keeps them the way they keep putting it to me is it connects them to diabetes without making them focus on diabetes. And they find that their outcomes are better, but they don't feel like they're spending a lot of time thinking about it, and that listening to the conversation somehow makes that whole thing cohesive for them. And it sounds like you might be doing the same thing actually, because you listen pretty regularly.

Steve 46:15
Yeah. I mean, I think there's just just a lot of different ideas. I mean, everybody thinks no one knows all the answers, right? And, and I think the, I think you, you probably know it well, is that there are so many variables in this thing we try to control that it's, it's almost impossible, right, to address everything. And then you start hearing different ideas about, like, Okay, this how I handle stress, versus this is how I handle gluten, or whatever the topic is, and you get different ideas, and you're like, oh, yeah, I never thought about that. I need to adjust my whatever basal Bolus carb ratio. I think that the one thing I didn't really fully understand my new protein actually, I guess I knew more about fats than protein, and like listening to that stuff, like, oh, okay, I didn't even think about, you know how to adjust the for protein. I just did my carb counts. And, yeah, it wasn't really fatty. I'm good, right? Then you end up like, you're high or you're low, and you're trying to figure out, like, why? Yeah, I did the carb counts. What's going on. So

Scott Benner 47:16
it's always something like, listen, the other day, Arden was like, I'm not a tic tac bender. I'm like, you know, they have carbs in them, right? Yeah. And she's like, what? And I'm like, she's like, they're just, they're little. I think she said they're little. And I was like, I know, but there's a, there's a, there's some car value for each one of them. Like, don't get me wrong, like, pop in three Tic Tacs in your mouth is, you know, I'm really not going to be a big issue one way or the other. But if you get on, like, a, you know, on a Jag, and the next thing you know, over the next handful of hours, you've done a box of tic tacs. I was like, which, by the way, now, you remember Tic Tacs used to be 79 cents. They're like, three bucks now, or something like that. But, um, so if you can afford Tic Tacs, and you're and you're going crazy on them, I was like, you know, that box could end up having a fair amount of car presented. And, yeah, you know, so yeah, if you don't hear somebody say stuff like that, you don't always think about it. It is,

Steve 48:08
yeah, it is. It is kind of interesting. Because, I mean, when I think about my parents weren't, how do I put it? They weren't that involved in my, you know, my treatment. Maybe, you know, they took me, the endo said, Okay, you got to take your shots. Here you go. Yeah. And the way, my mom, my mom's Italian, so of course, she's all about the food and so the way, instead of, like, trying to figure out, okay, how better do I adjust your insulin or make sure you your blood test, your blood test is right, or whatever, she would just cut sugar from everything, oh, probably saved me from a lot of complications later in life, because we couldn't, you know, you couldn't control it as well then, because you didn't have the pump and didn't have the CGM. But that was her method. Is like, Okay, cut sugar out everything. You're not eating sugar. And I remember probably the early 90s, I ran into a kid who had just gotten a pump, and he was, like, drinking a sprite. And I'm like, What are you doing? He was type one. And he's like, Oh yeah, he could eat sugar. You just gotta, you know, dose, right? And I'm like, You're crazy. Like you're gonna die young. You're kind of, it was my thinking, you know, and, and really, of course, he had probably a good Endo, and kind of pushed him on the pump early and understood carb counting. Yeah, exactly, exactly. So, yeah, it was kind of interesting, living across these different segments of the research going well, then the doctors catching up to it, the endos finally starting to push it, and then, you know, gets to the patients. But that's, I mean, the endos I've had, of the what five I've had, like, only one of them was good, you know, the other, the other ones were either marginal or just terrible.

Scott Benner 49:53
So did you learn things like listening to this podcast? Did you like learn management stuff that you're like, I've never heard of that before. Sure. I think

Steve 50:00
by the time I started listening a lot of it, I had down. I think there's just different nuances. Like I said, the with, like, the protein, the fats, that kind of stuff, that's a little more on the edge. But I had the carb counting down. I had the basal down. My basal is pretty good. And as you know, if you get those down, that's at least, it's the baseline

Scott Benner 50:23
game, yeah, I mean, I It's my expectation, because you just said you started listening maybe a couple years ago. I'm like, I don't know how, like, a guy in his mid 50s diabetes, since he's 14, like, at some point this has got to, like, intersect you somewhere. You know what? I mean,

Steve 50:36
what's ironic is the one end of who was a real asshole, like he would, he would just you go in and be you know, why aren't you doing this? Why don't you do that? You're gonna die. You're gonna it was just like, by the time I left the doctors, I just felt like, well, I was gonna just go put a bullet my head. Because, you know, this guy says I'm gonna die next week, because I'm I'm not doing it exactly his way, you know. And and in some ways, I couldn't stand the guy, and the other ways it did kind of push me, like, to start thinking about this stuff and and probably about that time was when I got on, done on the Animus and started that, and I did the I had Dexcom two for a while, and I'm so mad that I didn't stick with it. I had it for I tried it for a couple months, and I just like, I'm so I hate having one thing. You had an early CGM, and you bailed on it. Yeah, yeah. And I kicked myself to this day, because that was probably late 90s, early 2000s so if I had stayed on and I definitely would have been in much better management shape. And then, from the pump side of it, I was on the pump for quite a while. And I kept, I kept harassing my brother. I'm like, Look, you got to get on a pump. He's like, you know, he's still doing, doing the shots. And finally, I think I got the CGM. And then I went like, Sean, I'm like, Look, John, this is, you know, you got the CGM communicating with a pump. It's, it's like, this is rocket science compared to what we were dealing with. And he finally jumped on and I think he got a Medtronic and

Scott Benner 52:08
he's still using stuff now today. Yeah,

Steve 52:10
he jumped over the T slam because he was having a lot of problems with the glucose sensors the old Medtronic one. Yeah, I called him the one day, and he's like, Yeah, I finger stick myself like 15 times today. And I was like, Okay, I'm on the Dexcom, and I think that last time I fingers stick was, like, three months ago for calibration. But like otherwise, I very rarely have to get, you know, a blood sample.

Scott Benner 52:38
They were so far ahead of the curve with that CGM they they got out there, and it changed so drastically when Dexcom came so and they were kind of, yeah, they were up behind for a while. I guess right now they're getting ready to, like, launch that simple era CGM in in, yeah,

Steve 52:53
the endo just told me, he's like, I he's like, I'm not gonna tell you what pump to use, but he said, I really like the Medtronic. And I was like, wow, I, you know, I like the T slam, I'm good. Where I'm at, I'm, you know. And it was funny, because I was talking to him about, and there's, you know, it's, this is consistent, I think, throughout your show. So I forget what I was asking him about, I guess we were talking about GLP and and some other things. And he's like, Well, look, Steve, you don't need to do anything like you're, you're great. And I'm like, Well, I'm, you know, in the mid sixes, I'd like to be below six. He's like, look, anything below seven, you're, he's like, you saw the one sees of mostly other people that come here, like, you're like, knocking out of the park. And I'm like, Well, I don't feel like, I

Scott Benner 53:37
don't play. I don't understand that at all. I'll tell you, like, I don't understand the idea of like, Don't worry, there are people doing worse than you, so you don't have to try what exactly, yeah, also, you know, God, you said something a minute ago that, like, really made me think about something, and then I didn't want to cut you off, so I let you go, and I let you go, and I'm not going to be able to remember what you said immediately, just how it made me feel. So I am always thrown off by the things I don't know, like, I don't understand, if you're not sitting here right now thinking, like, there's so much happening that I'm unaware of, like, how to do things, different ideas, better thoughts, like that kind of stuff, like, and then you learn something in the future. I think it was probably about the CGM, right? You said, like, oh, I kick myself now because, like, you had that thing in your hand, like it was there, you know what I mean, and then, okay, you made a decision, like you didn't have enough information. Maybe it wasn't where you thought it was supposed to be yet, and then you lose all that time in between. I find myself thinking about that so much like, what could I be doing right now that I am going to regret not knowing about the future. I don't know if that's a mental illness or what it is, but like even that's why I think when and now I'll open myself this up to somebody complaining at me on Instagram or something like that. I see all the bad parts about what AI might be like. I really do. I promise you, I could sit and complain about it and tell you it shouldn't be another thing. Control of rich people and blah blah guy. I have all the complaints everybody else has too, but when you stop and just think about it, like, imagine knowing more. That's all I'm saying. Like, and being able to integrate it quickly, like we all think we know everything. Like, that's a human it's just a human fact. Like, no people walk around doubting themselves all the time. When they do, that's almost a mental illness. You know what I mean? Like, yeah. Like, you just, you believe, you know everything. Just like when you reach 16, you're like, I'm the best I've ever been. This is awesome, yeah? And I just think, like, can you try to imagine how your personal conversations, how your business life, how decisions about things you're doing around your house? Where to hang out. I don't know where to hang something. Where to, you know, put up a new wall. If you're putting up a wall. Like, if you had all the information and it was quickly accessible to you and made and you could just have a question, and the answer would come, how much better things would go, or at least how much more accurate they might be. And, like, just imagine, like, back then, if you would have, like, I don't know, said, like, Hey, I'm gonna stop doing this now, and a voice would have come to you and went, No, no, no, no, keep doing that. Yeah, yeah, that's that's a bad idea, yeah, yeah. And here's why I know you think you know you know everything, but, uh, here's four things you don't know. And I don't think that's very specific to diabetes. It is just sort of the way my brain works. I'm always wondering, like, what is it I don't understand, you know,

Steve 56:28
and I'm the same. I'm the same way. Now, in that that case, what exactly turned me off? I can't even remember at this point, and I think my maybe part of it was and I do get annoyed with it. Now, my wife was asking me something the other day, like, Okay, what, you know, I was, I think it was, it took shower, and I had to change out a sensor or something. She's like, how do you, how do you, like, they track all this and like, well, you know, the the insets you're, you know, three days, maybe you could stretch to four that, you know, the sensors are 10. If I fill the T slim, it's 300 and I go through this a day. So that's like, you know, six or seven. She's like, do you have like, a spreadsheet? No, I don't, but my

Scott Benner 57:14
blood sugar starts going up, and I think my sets getting old.

Steve 57:19
But that's I do. I do, I tend to wonder whether that was part of it, where I was just like, I just don't want another thing to have to, like, track to me. And at some point you just mentally get exhausted of like, Okay, I gotta, I gotta do this. And when I travel a lot, it was, it was a real pain in the butt, because I worked for a Sugar Company, and I was traveling all over in Europe and US and and like, it's like, okay, what do I need to pack? What do I need to take with me? And I had a couple issues where, actually, this one was more recent, where i i went to Canada grab the bottle of Novolog. But I had grabbed the the new bottle, and I had grabbed another bottle that I had taken it down to, like, I don't know, like, 40 units in it. Okay, so get to Canada, my pumps just about out. Go to refill. I'm like, Oh, I don't have enough insulin to get me, get me through the week. So I'm freaking out. Call the endo in Baltimore, he calls up to a pharmacy in Montreal and and says, you know, puts in the prescription. And this is the cool part. I heard you talking to Canadian last week on the podcast, and you were kind of harassing them about, you know, what, what insulin do they have? But on the other side of the coin I walked down, bought a month supply of insulin cash, yeah, for like, 50 bucks. And I was like, you know, this shows how crappy that old medical debacle is in the United States

Scott Benner 58:59
of America, that it's so, just so inexpensive, right? Yeah,

Steve 59:03
it just shows you, like, if they can make a profit off 50 bucks, and they're charging 300 you know, to insurance carriers, and yeah, it's just,

Scott Benner 59:12
it's just, yeah, my daughter's had diabetes for a long time now, and I've been around in this space for a long time here in that complaint, the same complaints, like, they're very valid complaints, you know, about how everything works. And there's people like, oh, it's gonna change this time. It's gonna change that time. I remember, was it back in 2016 or 2020 when did they screw Bernie Sanders? I forget, but like, Bernie Sanders is getting ready to run for president. He's out, like, stumping about, like, insulin prices. People like, now it's going to change. I'm like, No, it's not. It's not, you know, like, it's just it should, and I want it to, I'm with you, but it just doesn't seem to work that way, you know, like somebody, somebody is going to get in the way of this and put a stop to it along the

Steve 59:58
way. There was, I won't say, the. Company, so I don't get myself in trouble. But one of the insulin companies posted something on LinkedIn. This is only, like, five years ago, six years ago, and this woman, you know, was like, Oh, we get affordable insulin to people who need it. And and I, I got it, and I was like, Look, I've been a type one for what at that point me, it was probably, like, 35 years, or whatever, and this is BS, because you you guys, are taking advantage of people. And you know, you've got lobbyists in place that that influence the politicians who put the laws in place that allow you to overcharge for for insulin, and the post was taken down like within seconds. And I never saw anything again of that company trying to say they were, you know, they were taking care of people, because I was right after that. I don't know if you heard about the kid who was, think he was a dishwasher, like Perkins or something, didn't make much money. Was type one couldn't afford insulin.

Scott Benner 1:00:59
He's the boy that tried to move, he tried to move to Florida, and he and he passed away there, yeah, yeah, the young guy, yeah, he's, I remember that,

Steve 1:01:06
yeah. And it's like, it just that just makes you sick, like you just think about the fact that, because of the way the laws are written and what the companies are allowed to do to make massive profit, you're killing people literally.

Scott Benner 1:01:22
And my point is, is that if you think that that's just, that's just a switch, somebody has to throw, like, there's a tangled web around that, around everything political and, like, I mean, all this stuff, like, to your point, like there's money and power at the top of the of the pyramid, right and then, and it's just so convoluted, purposefully convoluted all the way down to us that you start thinking like, well, if I unravel this, all this has this has to happen. That happens. You can't make all those things happen. Because every time you try to push a lever one way, there's somebody else on the other side of it making money, who's like, oh, no, you can't do that. Well, I make money there, or that's what's keeping this business open. And then, I bet you, if one of them was willing to come on here and speak freely, they'd say, look, we got to make money too. Like you want the medicine. Like, I bet you that would be the argument at some point. Like you want it, we got to make it, and I got to hire and also you got to hire bright people, and those people want more money. And, like, it's, I mean, you could probably argue with six different ways from Sunday. Is my point. That's not my point. My point is you're not changing the way this works.

Steve 1:02:24
You could say it's the DS or it's the RS or whatever, but it's, it's all of them, and it's the lobbyists that are able to do what they do, and no one's going to change the laws because they are. Whoever's in power gets the benefits of that. And so yeah, that's why I said

Scott Benner 1:02:41
power and money, because the powerful people want to remain powerful, and people with money want to keep their money. Yes, yeah, yeah, and make more of it. And there's no end to more. And if you and listen, I agree with you, like the success of etc, but if I came to your house today and I was like, Steve, hey, I'd like to give you $1,000 you'd be like, All right, that's awesome. I go. Unless you want 2000 you wouldn't go. No 1000s. Good. No two makes sense to me, and I will, would you like $200,000 now here's the catch, if I give you $200,000.55 people you don't know are going to lose, you know, money, you might be like, Oh, no, I don't want that, but I do need $200,000 like, it's just everyone's got a line. And I think when that's the truth, like thinking that you're going to stop the way this all works is like saying you're going to stop people from wanting money or power. And I think the whole world's run off of money and power. So yeah, it is. I just think it's, I think you're, you're saying, If only those people who were powerful and rich would stop wanting to be powerful and rich. But I also think if I made you powerful and rich, you'd be like, I want to be powerful and I want to stay like this. So I don't know like, I don't know how to like. And there are some people who don't feel that way. I saw an article the other day about some woman, old, old, old lady in her 90s. I wish I knew any of her details, but I guess her husband was a billionaire, and he's gone, and she left like his money to some medical facility, medical school, and now people who need it like perpetually, forever and ever, will go to the school for free because of that. And I was like, Man, that's awesome, but you notice, but you notice she didn't do it till she was 90, yeah, which

Steve 1:04:32
is, which is kind of funny, because that's where you start. Like you started thinking about, if I had a billion dollars, like you could, there's no way you could even spend it within the rent of your I do

Scott Benner 1:04:43
really believe that. I think there's a I'm gonna sound like a hippie for a second here, but like I do think there's a cap on how much money makes a difference to you. Yeah, you need to be able to pay your bills. I think most people would agree. If I could pay my bills, have enough of a cushion where I wasn't worried, maybe I could go on. A vacation once in a while, maybe my car doesn't have a big hole in the floor. My people around me are safe. We're eating quality food that we can afford. I don't need more than that stuff, you know. I want a safe place to live, like, that kind of stuff. Like, I'm not saying like, I don't think people are like, No, I want to go out and buy a Lamborghini tomorrow, and then next week, when I get tired of it, go buy a different color Lamborghini. I don't think most people care about like that. Yeah, you know, yeah, but I don't know, but, but enough people do. And those people are, man, they're playing for keeps. They got it all, you know,

Steve 1:05:35
and they're in the news every day. So, yeah, it's hard to ignore. It really, is it, is it, is it is, oh, I the one thing I was kind of laughing about when you're talking about, ai i, one of the talents I had and still have, is I am very good at figuring out what keywords to put into Google to find something quickly and accurately. You

Scott Benner 1:05:57
have what they call Google. Foo, yeah, yes, yes. And

Steve 1:06:01
my, my boss is, like, the one day we were this is, you know, four or five years ago, he's, like, it was just amazed. I just like, you know, did something, found it so quickly. And so we were talking about AI a couple months ago, and we're talking about how to implement it at the company here. And I said, you know, my one talent is being taken away,

Scott Benner 1:06:24
because that's No, no, no, your your new talent is going to be talking to AI in a way that gets you way quicker, gets you Yeah, it gets it doing what you want it to do. You can talk to it wrong and not end up where you want to be.

Steve 1:06:36
That is true. You get, you got to say no hallucinations, so you make sure it's actually accurate information and not just what someone typed

Scott Benner 1:06:42
in. Don't make anything up. Don't do this, but not even that low. Like, I don't mean ask it a question to get the answer you want. Like, I'm not trying to say, like, trick it into saying what you want it to say. I'm telling you. Like, there's a way to, if you use it enough, you'll see there's a way that you have to talk to it to make sure that it's thinking the way you're thinking. It's almost like, how do you translate your desire to it, to understanding

Steve 1:07:05
the way our IT? Guy explained it to me is, is, is, have a conversation with it. Don't, don't be doing keyword like, you know, yeah, talk to it like you would talk to a person, which actually, then you should be pretty good at it too. But that's, you know, that's, that's what he said to me, like, you know, look, you want to ask it questions, like you would, uh, you know, you're, you're across the table and, you know, having a cup of coffee, versus, here's the five keywords I want to I want to know.

Scott Benner 1:07:32
So I agree with that. I think that's kind of a beneficial way to do it, all right. Well, I'm going to stop the recording, but I have another question for you about about something and then we won't bore people with but I appreciate you doing this very much. And thank you very much. I think it was awesome. I appreciate you reaching out if other people have knowledge about celiac or want to talk about it. I hope they reach out and come on. So

Steve 1:07:52
yeah, yeah, great. Talking to you, yeah. And definitely, all the people who have gluten issues definitely call Scott. Speak up. Yeah, tell our story.

Scott Benner 1:07:59
Awesome. Hold on one second. For

me, the podcast episode that you just enjoyed was sponsored by ever since CGM. They make the ever since 365 that thing lasts a whole year. One insertion every year. Come on. You probably feel like I'm messing with you, but I'm not, ever since cgm.com/juicebox this episode of The Juicebox podcast is sponsored by Omnipod five. Omnipod five is a tube, free, automated insulin delivery system that's been shown to significantly improve a 1c and time and range for people with type one diabetes when they've switched from daily injections, learn more and get started today at omnipod.com/juicebox of my link, you can get a free starter kit right now. Terms and Conditions apply. Eligibility may vary. Full terms and conditions can be found at omnipod.com/juicebox this episode of The Juicebox podcast was sponsored by us, med, us. Med.com/juice, box, or call, 888-721-1514, get started today with us. Med, links in the show notes. Links at Juicebox podcast.com. Thank you so much for listening. I'll be back very soon with another episode of The Juicebox podcast. If you're not already subscribed or following the podcast in your favorite audio app, like Spotify or Apple podcasts, please do that now. Seriously, just to hit follow or subscribe will really help the show. If you go a little further in Apple podcasts and set it up so that it downloads all new episodes, I'll be your best friend, and if you leave a five star review, ooh, I'll probably send you a Christmas card. Would you like a Christmas card if you're looking for community around type one diabetes, check out the Juicebox podcast. Private, Facebook group, Juicebox podcast type one diabetes. But every. Everybody is welcome. Type one, type two, gestational loved ones. It doesn't matter to me, if you're impacted by diabetes and you're looking for support, comfort or community, check out Juicebox podcast. Type one diabetes on Facebook. Hey, what's up everybody? If you've noticed that the podcast sounds better and you're thinking like, how does that happen? What you're hearing is Rob at wrong way, recording, doing his magic to these files. So if you want him to do his magic to you, wrong way. Recording.com, you got a podcast. You want somebody to edit it. You want rob you.

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Scott Benner 8/4/25 Scott Benner 8/4/25

#1592 After Dark: Tripping Through Type 1

Ashlyn, 27, returns after 3–4 years; she first shared on After Dark 450 about psychedelics, concerts, and diabetes—now reflecting on how they’ve helped her.

+ Click for EPISODE TRANSCRIPT

Scott Benner 0:00
Here we are back together again, friends for another episode of The Juicebox podcast.

Ashlyn 0:15
Hi, I am Ashlyn. This is my second time on the podcast, I just kind of wanted to reach back out, because I feel like I've come a long way in, like my own understanding of type one

Scott Benner 0:29
if you're living with type one diabetes, the after dark collection from the Juicebox podcast is the only place to hear the stories that no one else talks about, from drugs to depression, self harm, trauma, addiction and so much more. Go to Juicebox podcast.com. Up in the menu and click on after dark there you'll see a full list of all of the after dark episodes. Nothing you hear on the Juicebox podcast should be considered advice medical or otherwise, always consult a physician before making any changes to your health care plan. This episode of The Juicebox podcast is sponsored by the contour next gen blood glucose meter. Learn more and get started today at contour next.com/juicebox this episode of The Juicebox podcast is sponsored by Medtronic diabetes and their mini med 780 G system designed to help ease the burden of diabetes management, imagine fewer worries about Miss boluses or miscalculated carbs thanks to meal detection technology and automatic correction doses. Learn more and get started today at Medtronic diabetes.com/juicebox this episode of The Juicebox podcast is sponsored by the twist a ID system powered by tide pool that features the twist loop algorithm, which you can target to a glucose level as low as 87 Learn more at twist.com/juicebox that's twist with two eyes.com/juicebox. Get precision insulin delivery with a target range that you choose at twist.com/juicebox. That's t, w, i, i s t.com/juicebox.

Ashlyn 2:18
Hi, I am Ashlyn. This is my second time on the podcast. I just kind of wanted to reach back out, because I feel like I've come a long way in, like, my own understanding of type one. And then I just wanted to kind of talk about something that I love, which is concerts, music festivals and stuff like that. I'm really active on, like, a lot of different diabetes forms, and I see this, like, question asked a lot, so I just kind of wanted to put my two cents, even if nobody really wanted that, that's

Scott Benner 2:51
okay. I wanted it, or you wouldn't be here. What was your episode? It was the after dark about psychedelics. Yes. Okay, hold on one second. I'm gonna pull it up so people know which one it was? 450 does that sound right? Okay. Episode 450 after dark, psychedelics. Do you remember what we talked about? I mean, beyond the obvious? No.

Ashlyn 3:10
I mean, I, I had reached out to you around this time because I was, I had moved to Colorado, and I was having, like, an extreme amount of lows from just the altitude change, and then I pushed me to get a pump. And now I've been on a pump for, like, I just did my first renewal. So like, five years, four years,

Scott Benner 3:29
that's a while then, right? Are you still using psychedelics?

Ashlyn 3:33
I do on occasion, I just, it's not, it's not something you do frequently. So I have here and there, but not a lot.

Scott Benner 3:42
So can you tell me how you got from in 2021 when we recorded, I guess we probably recorded in 2020 probably went up in 2021 and how did you get from there to where you are now? Like? What was your experience using them that, and how did it shift to this? What are you like, done? Or are you like, No, I

Ashlyn 4:03
don't. I don't think anyone. I mean, you can be done. I don't view my relationship with stuff like that as like, Okay, now I'm done. I mean, if I wanted to, I would, it's just not. I've been so busy as a person that it's just not at the front of my brain. Yeah. So to just like recap, in the last, like, however long, because I think it was 2021 when we recorded, I was living in Colorado, kind of doing, like the bud tending, like working in the weed, cannabis industry stuff. Then I moved back into to Miami. Around 2022 I got into this, like, Music Festival stuff. I ended up landing a job at, like a company that does, like music festival merchandising, so I have to go to a lot of these shows and events

Scott Benner 4:50
for work. Okay, nice. That actually sounds fun. It is

Ashlyn 4:53
fun. My day to day job is emailing, a lot of emailing, but the concert tickets are great

Scott Benner 4:59
because. Yeah. So, okay, so back then you're smoking weed, doing psychedelics. Sometimes, could you tell somebody, like, what got you going with them? And besides your life being busier, what changed?

Ashlyn 5:12
I'm old or older, and I'm also, like, working full time going to school. So that's like a 60 hour a week workload. So less time for fun, less time for psychedelics, I guess still time for weed. I moved back to Colorado, and I work remotely now. So we are in a weed friendly place. We

Scott Benner 5:33
certainly are, and Miami, it does not sound like a place I'd want to live. For some

Ashlyn 5:37
reason, it's terrible. I moved back just to be closer to family, and within like a like, five seconds, I was like, Oh, I can't do

Scott Benner 5:45
so what were you getting from the usage that you either felt like you needed and learned you didn't need or needed and got like, do you see what I'm saying? Like, if it was, yeah, I feel like I remember our conversation. If I would have asked you back, then you would have told me how important all of this was and what it was doing for you. Like, so did that stop, or did you change?

Ashlyn 6:06
No, I think in like, I'm probably not the only one that feels this way. I've seen a lot of people say that you kind of just get to a point where you you kind of know what that does and where it brings you, if that makes sense, like, I feel like a lot of the stuff that I wanted to get out of that, or the things that I was trying to process Emotionally, I kind of processed them in a way, and that couldn't have been done without a the psychedelics and B therapy from, like, a real licensed therapist,

Scott Benner 6:38
right? That is what I'm leading towards, like I'm trying to figure out, because I, you know, I watch from a distance the conversations around like psychedelics for trauma therapy, and I don't know a ton about it, but I am super interested in whether it all works out. And, you know, becomes kind of publicly available easily, so you feel like you had stuff and you got through it.

Ashlyn 7:01
I have been diagnosed with CPTSD, and I do feel like psychedelics and talk therapy and time really helped. And honestly, a lot of that was surrounding type one, so I just kind of had to the only path through that kind of stuff is

Scott Benner 7:21
through it, yeah, yeah. You don't get to skip right or go over, no.

Ashlyn 7:25
And so honestly, what psychedelics did for me is just kind of, like, I wouldn't say, like, remove blinders, but you're able to be in your brain in a way, like it's like a vacation from yourself, is how I've described it. Okay, I'm still me. I'm still, you know, I still have the same problems, but sometimes you're able to see things from a different light and correct me if I'm wrong, like somebody fact check me. But I have seen people saying that it does increase the amount of dendrites in your brain, which is something that, like a lot of people are theorizing that it helps your brain make different connections. Okay? And I feel like a lot of the experiences that I've had, taking psychedelics and dabbling in other things would support that, and I still do psychedelics. It's just not, I'm not sitting there being like, Okay, I need to think about these things. Like, most of the time I'm at concerts, I'm partying.

Scott Benner 8:25
When you say psychedelics, like, specifically, what are you taking?

Ashlyn 8:28
I mean, I've done psilocybin, LSD, MDMA, the only things that I haven't really wanted to try or touch is any kind of ketamine. DMT, anything like that. I feel like anything that messes with, like, my field of vision, like that, I just

Scott Benner 8:44
don't want it. And it's interesting, isn't it, because there are ketamine clinics now, yeah,

Ashlyn 8:48
I know a lot of people who use it recreationally, and they it just, I would do it in a clinical setting, but it just doesn't look like a good time. I mean, you're taking, like, cat tranquilizer.

Scott Benner 9:01
You're like, you found my line I asked our overlords to describe, actually said, explain, in an elementary way how psychedelics can aid in trauma therapy. It specifically points out psilocybin. It talks about what trauma is about, like a deep emotional mark, like you're stuck in a moment, that kind of thing. And it says it gives you four ways that psychedelics may be able to help, and it talks about like helping the brain unstick the trauma. Trauma can get stuck in the brain like a scratch record. Psychedelics may help lift the needle, so to speak, so the brain can play like a new tune. Psychedelics often make people feel more open, safe and connected. This can make it easier to talk about scary memories and therapy without shutting down or panicking. Some psychedelics seem to quiet down the parts of the brain that scream like danger. So even even when you're not in danger, which can help people feel calmer while processing old pain and it helps, it says, to build new pathways. Psychedelics can help the brain build a new thought pattern instead of always thinking, I'm not safe. My fault and things like that, is that your finding

Ashlyn 10:03
so I feel like the last bullet point you just stated is most of what I feel. So it has really just helped me, like, see things in a different perspective, like, something that happens, especially with LSD, is you get this feeling of epiphanies, so you'll you'll have a thought, and you're like, Wow, this is really profound. This is really you know something, and then it kind of leaves you. But I do feel that it allows you to, like I said, like when you when you take a vacation, and you come back and you, you, you walk back in your house, and you're like, damn, as my house always smells like this, like it's very similar to that where you're like, This is the same place I've always been, but now I can kind of see small differences which allow me to process this fully.

Scott Benner 10:48
Yeah, I hear what you're saying that's pretty awesome. I have to tell you, like, I don't feel like I'm burdened by trauma. But every time I hear somebody talk about stuff like this, I think, like, it does sound interesting. I have to admit, it really does sound interesting anyway. So you wanted to talk specifically today about going to concerts with type one and Is that, am I right? I have that? Yeah. Okay, all right. So tell I mean, this is your idea. So tell me why, what made you feel like it needs to be talked about.

Ashlyn 11:16
I, like, I said, on, like, a lot of different like, type one diabetic forums. I'm on your Facebook group, Reddit, other Facebook groups, and I just see this question asked over and over and over again. And I've gone to legitimately 15 or more music festivals, and so I've had everything that could go wrong go wrong. I had a security guard accidentally, like, break a vial of insulin when they was going through security one time. Like, I just anything that could have happened. I've probably

Scott Benner 11:49
done it. You have, like, a checklist. Do you have rules? Do you have things you know to do that help people? Like, what is

Ashlyn 11:55
it I I definitely do feel like I have like a ritual in a way of of what to do, and like, how to prepare, how to pack. I do feel like a lot of people don't realize that they can reach out to like, Ada coordination and stuff like that before an event. I didn't know that for multiple years, and so I until I started working in this field. Now, I kind of do reach out to ADA coordinators just to be like, hey, like, Hi, I'm gonna be there.

Scott Benner 12:20
So at each event, like you're talking about festivals, not necessarily just like a concert at a BAS a basketball stadium or something,

Ashlyn 12:28
I thought, I mean, no, there. There is an ADA coordinator for those as well,

Scott Benner 12:31
everything. So how do I go about that? Let's say I'm gonna go see a comedy show in Jersey. And the venue, you know, I'm is gonna tell me, I don't know. I'm, they're going to want me to put my phone in a bag and lock it up. And I'm like, oh, no, I need that because, you know, it has my CGM on it. What are the steps I take to work that out?

Ashlyn 12:48
So you can definitely just, I would just call the venue and just be like, hey, you know, I have a couple questions. I have a disability, and I'm going to need, like, X accommodations. Do you ever run into a

Scott Benner 13:00
situation where you start explaining it to them and they're just like, them and they're just like, I don't know what you're talking about. And no, we don't do that. And then you or do you find mostly that they understand and and they can help you through it. Today's episode is sponsored by Medtronic diabetes, who is making life with diabetes easier with the mini med 780 G system. The mini med 780 G automated insulin delivery system anticipates, adjusts and corrects every five minutes. Real world results show people achieving up to 80% time and range with recommended settings, without increasing lows. But of course, Individual results may vary. The 780 G works around the clock, so you can focus on what matters. Have you heard about Medtronic extended infusion set? It's the first and only infusion set labeled for up to a seven day wear. This feature is repeatedly asked for, and Medtronic has delivered. 97% of people using the 780 G reported that they could manage their diabetes without major disruptions of sleep, they felt more free to eat what they wanted, and they felt less stress with fewer alarms and alerts you can't beat that. Learn more about how you can spend less time and effort managing your diabetes by visiting Medtronic diabetes.com/juicebox the brand new twist insulin pump offers peace of mind with unmatched personalization, and allows you to target a glucose level as low as 87 there are more reasons why you might be interested in checking out twist, but just in case, that one got you twist.com/juicebox, that's twist with two eyes.com/juicebox. You can target glucose levels between 87 and 180 it's completely up to you. In addition to precision insulin delivery that's made possible by twist design. Twist also offers you the ability to edit your carb entries even after you've bolused. This gives the twist loop algorithm the best information to make its. Decisions with and the twist loop algorithm lives on the pump, so you don't have to stay next to your phone for it to do its job. Twist is coming very soon, so if you'd like to learn more or get on the wait list, go to twist.com/juicebox. That's twist with two eyes.com/juicebox. Links in the show notes, links at Juicebox podcast.com. I

Ashlyn 15:20
reach out prior to an event, usually the admin, who run, you know, whatever email or contact, they'll sometimes they'll be like, Oh, I don't know, or, you know, they'll just bounce me around. The only problems I've ever experienced is, like, going to the event with, like, specific security

Scott Benner 15:41
people. What do you mean? I'm not sure what you mean by

Ashlyn 15:44
that. So like, let's say I'm going, like, one time I went to like a club in Miami, and we went to go, it was like an outdoor event. And so the the lady was like, oh, you know, I have to check your bag, and I have the insulin pump. And then they kind of look at that, and they're like, oh, you know, they don't, they don't experience that often. And so the woman kept telling me, you know, you can't bring that in. You had like, what is that? And so I got into an argument with her, because I was like, No, this is a medical device. Like you I can't take it off. You can't look at it like, you know, like, right? Just let me through. And she was like, No, you have to leave. And I was like, Are you sure you want to do that right now? And so then I was like, let me speak to a floor manager. And so as soon as the floor manager walked over, I explained, and he was like, oh, and he just raised her hands up at her, like, come on. And then I just went through,

Scott Benner 16:30
right? So you just find that you can, if you don't pre plan, there is a possibility you're going to run into somebody that just doesn't get it. And they're just, they have a, you know, they have a thought in their head, like, I'm not supposed to let anybody in with, you know, electronic devices or something like that. And you

Ashlyn 16:45
honestly think it's the holster that makes them nervous,

Scott Benner 16:49
really, on your pump, which, which pump was it? So

Ashlyn 16:52
I had the type one tactical like, holster on my T slim when I had it, I have a Moby now, right? And sometimes they would look at that, because I sometimes they'll be like, oh, you know, like, let me like, when you go to the airport, and they're like, Oh, let me swab it, or whatever, that clicking sound of the holster. Like, I think sometimes that one looks kind of like a gun holster. So it depends on like, the individual person, because 95% of the time I don't need to contact anybody, I just walk through and they're like, go, go, go, right,

Scott Benner 17:21
you know, but sometimes you bump into somebody that's maybe a little more gruff about it and doesn't understand,

Ashlyn 17:27
right? And it's like, I kind of understand from their perspective too. Like you're dealing with so many people that are probably not in the greatest of headspace,

Scott Benner 17:37
yeah, so talk about that a little bit like even you, like you're pretty you're pretty you're pretty reasonable person, but you got into an argument pretty quickly over it. Are you high already when

Ashlyn 17:45
you get there? No. I mean, probably just weed.

Scott Benner 17:47
But I like how you don't, you don't count weed. You're like, no, just weed. That's awesome. Yeah, just just, but you are, like, you're a little altered, and now, I mean, did that help you get into an argument quicker? Do you

Ashlyn 17:58
think? No, no, no, I sober. He probably would have strung the lily

Scott Benner 18:03
up. Oh, you think the weeds, the only thing that saved her is what you're

Ashlyn 18:07
saying. I mean, pretty much I was like, Listen, you know, I'm not trying to be a problem. Let's not make this a problem. And I'm, I don't I listen. I do not have a temper at all. But with stuff like this, because my brain instantly goes to not me, but the newly diagnosed, like family that's going to go to some like baseball event, and then they have the same problem, and I'm like, they don't know how to advocate for themselves in the same way, because I'm an asshole.

Scott Benner 18:36
I watched Arden's bag get tossed in an emergency room the other day she needed IV antibiotics for something that's not really important right now. But like, you know, we came into the ER, her and I, and the guy pulled her aside, and she's like, look, there's, I have diabetes. There's juice boxes in there and, you know, insulin and stuff like that. And he like, took his stick out, and was like, sticking around in it and everything. And he's like, all right, and that was it. But, you know, using that as an example, even though you're at a hospital, he's not a doctor, he and he's the security guy at the door, you know. And you know you're going to, you know, I don't know you're going to a concert. And the person at the front, like they're not the floor manager, they're the person they hired to stand at the front. They gave him a short list of rules. They said, Don't let people in with this, this and this. This and this. And that's what, that's what the person's doing. They don't know, and they don't have what I would call, um, decision making power. Do you know what I mean?

Ashlyn 19:29
No, not at all. And that's what you have to understand. Like, even, you know, working from this side of things, all of those people are temps. Oh, yeah, right. It's,

Scott Benner 19:36
I got a list of 10 Things I wasn't allowed in here. This seems like it falls on my list. I'm gonna make 400 bucks tonight. I just want to get in. And out of here, want to get in and out of here and get this done. They're not looking to understand your insulin pump contour. Next.com/juicebox that's the link you'll use to find out more about the contour. Next Gen blood glucose meter. When you get there, there's a little bit at the top, you can click right on blood glucose. Monitoring. I'll do it with you. Go to meters, click on any of the meters. I'll click on the Next Gen, and you're going to get more information. It's easy to use and highly accurate. Smart light provides a simple understanding of your blood glucose levels, and of course, with Second Chance sampling technology, you can save money with fewer wasted test strips. As if all that wasn't enough, the contour next gen also has a compatible app for an easy way to share and see your blood glucose results. Contour, next.com/juicebox and if you scroll down at that link, you're going to see things like a Buy Now button. You could register your meter after you purchase it. Or what is this? Download a coupon. Oh, receive a free contour next gen blood glucose meter. Do tell contour next.com/juicebox head over there. Now get the same accurate and reliable meter that we use.

Ashlyn 20:56
No, no, no, we don't need to. It's just like, it's a medical device. Let's move on. And it really depends. I would say that happens at maybe one out of 30 times. I mean, I've had other times where it's like, they have a metal detector, and I'm always like, Hey, I can't go through the metal detector. And then they're like, oh, just come around. You know, most people are cool. Yeah, most people are cool. The only other thing that you can have to explain sometimes is I tend to bring so much food and that that's something like pre packaged food, like you can't have anything open. And so sometimes they'll be like, Why do you have this whole bag of quest chips with you or whatever? And I just have to be like, Oh, it's medical, you know.

Scott Benner 21:41
And if they give you a pushback on that, it's likely about money. They're trying to sell food is what they're getting.

Ashlyn 21:46
Oh, I'm not paying $20 for a quesadilla. Well,

Scott Benner 21:50
pre case. Oh, well. I mean, listen, when food is medicine, you need to have it with you. That's fair. Like, I mean, if you're in the middle of a concert full of people and you realize you're low, you can't make your way through the crowd. Stand in the line, you know, hope you have $20 it's a long way to go to save your life when your blood sugar is low, you know, it's not a And

Ashlyn 22:10
so no, but I will say, like any bigger event like there, there was a time where my fanny pack got, like, stolen from me, and they do have glucose tabs at the Medical like, tents at all of these events, they have glucose tabs. Yeah, that's nice. The worst comes to worst. I mean, I

Scott Benner 22:27
love that. I think that's great. I just think that again, if you're in the middle of a crowd and you're having an emergent situation, like, going to find the medical tents not exactly the way to go, like, I mean, it's your own, yeah, you want to have it with you, and so you have to be able to explain to that person coming in, this is not me trying to avoid spending money today on food. You have to think of this food as medication for me, because my blood

Ashlyn 22:48
sugar and I, I've gotten extremely petty with people. I remember one time I had a woman kind of just have the whole thing about the food, of like, you know, like, well, you can bring in food, but not this much food, because I bring in so much food, and I literally, like, lifted my skirt, showed her the infusion set. And I was like, Do you think this is a joke?

Scott Benner 23:10
It would be a long way to go to put an infusion set in yourself to get a bag of chips into a

Ashlyn 23:14
concert. Yeah? Usually they, they pipe down real quick, yeah. Well,

Scott Benner 23:19
it's just, you're just pointing out that, like, everybody can't know everything about everything,

Ashlyn 23:24
no, and like, if you don't have to know about diabetes, like, God bless you, live real life,

Scott Benner 23:28
good for you, right? So what happens is, when you're watching people online, you get like, a pang of, like, guilt that you feel like some people aren't going to notice the cup for themselves or not be able

Ashlyn 23:37
to. Well, I think a lot of it is just you're excited, you're going somewhere you really want to be, and then it's like, it's a, it's a temper. It's like, it's a, it's a, it's something you have to consider with type one, and it

Scott Benner 23:50
sucks. Yeah, do you prefer festivals where a bunch of bands come up? Or do you like going to concerts where you just hear a band or two? It

Ashlyn 23:57
depends on who's going to what. You know, like, if it's a bunch of people I like, then it the festivals are great. I will say concerts. Usually, if it's like one specific artist, the crowds are a little bit better. The festivals now it's just they can attract, like, the wrong types of people.

Scott Benner 24:15
What types of people? What are they doing? The people that shove you? Oh, people just pushing and shoving. And, yeah, people who are

Ashlyn 24:22
pushing shoving, they drink their little beatbox juice and they're gonna shove

Scott Benner 24:26
you, and they go crazy,

Ashlyn 24:29
yeah. And, you know, it didn't really, like bother me about the shoving until I got the insulin pump, and it's just something to consider. You know, when you're in a big crowd, I'm always like, honestly, half the time I try to get, like, a fanny pack that has, like, a little bit of a shell to it so it doesn't just, like squish, so if I get shoved or like something, my my insulin pump is a little bit more effective protection.

Scott Benner 24:50
Yeah. What's the best band you ever saw alive?

Ashlyn 24:53
The best band I've ever saw? Yeah, that

Scott Benner 24:55
really did the music justice live. That you were like, wow, this is awesome. That's

Ashlyn 24:59
a hard. Question, I've gone to a lot of red rock shows, and I do think that anyone who enjoys concerts go to Red Rock.

Scott Benner 25:09
It's a great like, it's a great venue. Yeah? The venue is great. Yeah, dead

Ashlyn 25:13
mouse does like a Halloween show every year. It's called a day, day of the dead mouse or something. That was an amazing show. How long

Scott Benner 25:20
does that go for?

Ashlyn 25:22
Maybe, like, four or five hours. Okay. And the great thing about Red Rocks is is they have like, accessibility shuttles and everything to the top. You don't have to do the whole stairs if you don't want to. And you get like, accessibility parking and stuff

Scott Benner 25:35
like that. Okay, I have to tell you, like, how old are you? I just turned

Ashlyn 25:39
27

Scott Benner 25:40
Okay, yeah, I just know that we're, like, significantly different aged, because I know Red Rock is, like, a really cool venue, and, like, I've seen, you know, I've seen enough video of it to know how interesting it is. And I just like to go somewhere for four or five hours to do anything with a bunch of people. I'm like, I wouldn't want to do that. And I don't know if that's personality or age, that's what I can't figure out. Because I love that. You love it. I think it's awesome for anybody that does. But like, it's not, it's so not my vibe that it's hard for me to, like, wrap my head around that you'd want to go to a music festival. I know that sounds crazy.

Ashlyn 26:14
I'm so zero or 100 that I do maybe one or two of these a year and half the time. The other half of my life is just I am

Scott Benner 26:22
so I gotcha. Okay, that's interesting. See, that's an interesting stretch for you. Then what do you think it is about that setting that allows you to break free of how you normally feel, to go do it like, what is it that draws you to

Ashlyn 26:34
it? I like, for me, I'm somebody who like, I'm very drained by socializing, very drained by people. So it has to be an experience that is adrenaline or, like, I, I'm somebody who's zero or 100 for most things in my life. So this is a 100 moment, and after that, I'm going to go home and not talk to somebody for like, a month. Or anyone.

Scott Benner 26:56
Are you getting, like, an an energy in and out thing? Like, is being around the people draining you, but the but the event is so high energy that it's you're not losing. Does that make sense? I just

Ashlyn 27:07
really love music. Like, even if I'm home, working, cleaning, doing anything, I have headphones on, I'm listening to music almost constantly. So just seeing music live is something I've always really enjoyed, even like when I was younger, and going to concerts with my parents and stuff like that. It just, I've always really liked it, and then I got into festivals and stuff like that, and now I go for work and stuff. And it just, it's been a part of my adult life. I think the first festival that I went to, it was like, the week after I turned 18. What kind

Scott Benner 27:40
of concerts did your parents take you to when you to when you're young? My

Ashlyn 27:44
first ever concert was Linkin Park in 2012

Scott Benner 27:50
are your parents the way I picture them? Does your dad have a small goatee and a motorcycle and your mom? Or do they not fit a mold?

Ashlyn 27:57
I don't think my family fits a mold.

Scott Benner 28:01
I mean, Lincoln Park said that's a hell of a first concert.

Ashlyn 28:04
Yeah, it was great. I loved it. And I'm honestly now, with everything that's transpired, I'm so glad I got to go before. You know, people

Scott Benner 28:13
pass away. Yeah, how? How old were you? Then you remember,

Ashlyn 28:19
what? 20? Maybe I it had to be anywhere between 12 to 14.

Scott Benner 28:24
Okay, all right, did their music taste shape yours? I

Ashlyn 28:29
think so. I my dad was really into Lincoln Park, and he's a big like rock, classic rock, like we did Linkin Park. And then that same year, we saw Blues Traveler at Red Rocks.

Scott Benner 28:40
So that sounds like a good concert, actually.

Ashlyn 28:43
Yeah, they do like a fourth of July thing, like almost every

Scott Benner 28:47
year. Okay, see that. I think that I might enjoy. No, it was

Ashlyn 28:51
nice. I mean, that was a little bit more laid back. It was during the day. I love day parties. I really wish that every party was a day party, because I hate being out late.

Scott Benner 29:01
You're like, I like all this excitement, but Why so late?

Ashlyn 29:05
For real, I my energy peaks at like, 2pm and then they're like, oh, this goes until 2am and I'm like,

Scott Benner 29:12
Ashland, like, I'd like to have this concert, have a nice meal around five, and I want to be in my jammies by 730

Ashlyn 29:18
Yeah, I see the like, the day raves for like, kids, and I'm like, I'll go,

Scott Benner 29:23
do you think you'll ever have kids? No, no, why

Ashlyn 29:27
not? I don't see that for me. Honestly, I don't I think that it, it just, it's never been something where I'm like, Yeah, I really want to do that. And I think that for that, I think you have to be one of those. I really want to do that kind of people.

Scott Benner 29:42
Oh no, for sure. But I was just wondering, like, you don't have any desire to take your like, eight year old to dead mouse one day or something like that.

Ashlyn 29:49
I actually have a half sister who is six so But nope,

Scott Benner 29:55
you'll just take it on her. I got you. Well, I will tell you that the best. Live performance of music that I've ever seen in my life, like meaning that I felt like I was listening to the record, even though they were playing it live. In front of me was Guns and Roses, like they did, like an exceptional concert when I was younger, I've seen Metallica do a good job of representing the music on stage, heart and black crows. I really remember going, well, Black Rose was really good. When I got a little, like, older, my wife liked different music, so we ended up at a lot of more, like festival seating stuff to see, like Sting and things like that. Like, more like ballet stuff. He was really good. I like, 100 years old now, I don't know if he can

Ashlyn 30:36
still do it or not. My parents would have loved to go to a sting concert. Yeah,

Scott Benner 30:40
no, it was really mellow and and just like, like, grass seeding and stuff. I know I said I don't like this stuff, and now I'm telling you all the concerts I've been to, but I think it's me as an older person. I'm like, Oh, I don't know. Could sting come to my house. Like, I guess that'd be okay. I don't want to go out anymore. It's been very interesting to grow up with musicians that were so super famous, that are still super famous, and it makes me wonder if more modern music will I don't think I'll live long enough to know like to stand the test of time. Do you know what I mean? Like, like, 85 year old may be like, Oh my God, this dochi is still on the radio. This is crazy.

Ashlyn 31:15
I thought about this, and I don't think that's going to be the case. I think that the internet in the pace that media moves now is so fast. I don't know if you saw but do she has already been, like, having issues like, I don't think, yeah, their video just came out this week of her like, screaming at like her assistant or something before some like event.

Scott Benner 31:39
No one needs to yell on their video cameras. It's not a good idea. Everybody. You don't think the Beatles yelled at somebody. Nobody was filming it. You understand? But I take your point like my kids listen to The Beatles still. Do you know what I mean? It's not because I pushed the Beatles on them. I didn't like my parents didn't like the Beatles. What do you think of that? Like I grew up, my parents thought the Beatles were too like crazy. So I find them in my 20s, my kids, you know, listen to it now. I got in the car the other day and I and Arden is bouncing around on the radio, and she puts Vienna on from Billy Joel, Yeah, but

Ashlyn 32:13
see, I have Vienna on a playlist. I think that because of the way the internet is and especially through like music streaming, like you can find whatever artist so quickly, and it's not like it used to be, like you

Scott Benner 32:26
can, yeah, there's too much, and it's, oh my god, ready, Ashley, this is great because I won't sound like an old man, because you're in your 20s. There's too much and it's too fast. You don't have time to marinate in it and really appreciate it, and you don't have to go to Tower Records on a Friday night and pick through 10,000 CDs to find one that you're gonna take home and try. And by the way, spend your only $20 that week on hoping you're gonna like this damn CD. Like, right? Like, because you don't get to try it first. You don't get to hear it on the internet. You heard one song on the radio, you think maybe the rest of this will be good now that you paid for it. You don't just listen to it once ago. You listen to it a number of times because you're like, Well, I like, let me make sure, you know and you know what I'm saying. Like, sometimes it takes a few times through a song before it really hits you. And you're like, This is awesome well, and I think that's

Ashlyn 33:15
also why we're not seeing, like, albums being released, that you can sit down and listen to the first song all the way through the last song, and it's like a continual album straight through. Feels like there's just now artists release a bunch of different singles, unless it's like something that's purposeful. But I was about to say, like you said the thing about the records, and my brain went to Limewire,

Scott Benner 33:38
yeah, right, because you were downloading music that way, yeah,

Ashlyn 33:42
yeah. And then you'd have to go and be like, Okay, I want this specific song. And it was very, like, purposeful, like, I use a software now, because I track what I listen to, and it tells me that, on average, I listen to 90 different artists a week or something. And I just don't think that people consumed media or music in that way previously. Yeah,

Scott Benner 34:04
no, yeah. You're not gonna get to that, right? Like, it's gonna be three or four. In the past, it was three or four things that you listen to. Also, sometimes you just put a CD in your CD player, and you didn't have the energy to take it back out again. So you're just like, All right, well, I guess I'll listen to this now. Or, I mean, like, if you were really fancy, you'd have, like, a five CD changer. Have you ever seen those? Yeah,

Ashlyn 34:23
where it would be like, push one and then the disc would like, move, yeah. You're like,

Scott Benner 34:27
Yeah. That sounds like it's out of a movie to you, but like, I had one of those. And so you'd throw five in, and you'd hit shuffle, and it would like, spin them around and, you know, pop them in and out and play different tracks.

Ashlyn 34:36
But I also think this is why we saw this resurgence of vinyls for a hot minute,

Scott Benner 34:42
yeah? But even that seems like it's gone now too. No, it is, you don't, yeah, you know, it's funny. I brought up doji because I, like, she found me through Tiktok. Like, that's, which is crazy. Like, there's one of her tracks is being used on Tiktok. I don't know how I landed on it, but, like, I'm like, oh, that's catchy. And then. And not five seconds later, my son said, Hey, there's this girl, docci, like, some of her rap is good. Like, check it out. But then he came, but this was six months ago, and then he came to me the other day and he said, Oh, my God, she's so captured by making Tiktok music now, like, she's already gotten away from the rap she was making that I found that I liked. So, like, this is not years. This story goes on. This is like, 18 months, two years. And she went from a more what he would consider, like hardcore rapper that he thought was good to, you know, I guess I'll just make tracks at work on Tiktok, because that's where the money is. Somebody gets a video of her, like you're saying, like yelling, and now, like, people will, like, walk away from her. It's that easy to walk away. I swear to you, if Paul McCartney walked out in the street tomorrow and started running people over this car, I'd be like, All right, yeah, but let it be, but I don't have that feeling if I see, if I see was that, oh, that was sexual. I was going to bring up the thing that was, that girl did, God, who am I thinking of? She made her backup dancers do weird stuff. Lizzo. Lizzo, right? That's a great example. Like, Lizzo is super famous. She's got this song, like, blah, blah, blah. Next thing I know, I'm hearing like, like, famous artists talk about Lizzo. Lizzo plays this thing. She's awesome, you don't know. And five seconds later, there's a story about her being weird with backup dancers. And now, boom, she's gone. It's like that fast. It's insane, how fast it happened.

Ashlyn 36:24
It's cancel culture. And part of it, I feel is justified. Part of it I feel is just out of control.

Scott Benner 36:32
Listen, I don't think you should be letting people like act like lunatics. I'm not saying that for certain, but at the same time, like, there's stuff you find out about that you never would have found out about prior, and you would have kept listening to the music and you didn't know. I mean, like, look at like the allegations about Michael Jackson, right? They're insane. No one who grew up with Michael Jackson music is gonna stop listening to Michael Jackson like they're just not that music is burned in you. But I feel

Ashlyn 36:57
like you have to be a certain caliber of artists to have your fans separate the music from you. Like, if your music is that iconic to where it takes on, it's a life of its own right. So be it. But for people who are tick tock rappers and stuff like that, it's just they don't have that star presence, that iconic. You know, where the music stands alone? Yeah,

Scott Benner 37:21
I'm gonna go out on a limb here, like, I'm not excusing anything, but a great example of that, I think, is Kanye West, because, because he has talked to me about, Yeah, but what I mean, just a fall apart breakdown of monumental, like proportions, right? Like, and I think it feels pretty clear that he has, like, some pretty significant mental issues. He's got all the problems he has the world, but some of those songs are awesome and like and like, so now that's the that becomes the new test, like you get in your car. Do you say to yourself, I don't want to be in any way attached to this, this guy and his weird thoughts, or do I say to myself, I do love this song, and I'm gonna put it on like he's really testing that theory. Do you see what I'm saying? Because, by all rights, everyone should just be like, I'm not listening to that. Like, you know, like he's gone too far for me. I don't want to be involved. But will that happen? Is my question, like, is he the Michael Jackson of my time? I think that

Ashlyn 38:26
Kanye is like a really diversive figure, and a lot of people who enjoy him and like, don't come for me, people, the people that like, Yay, are already people who enjoy holding controversial views, and they kind of, from where I stand, they kind of enjoy being a little edgy and cringe like that, like he literally just released a song called Heil Hitler.

Scott Benner 38:50
That's my point. If you're saying you think maybe people want to be attached to controversy, that's that's a different thought than is my head. My head is I hear that and I go, Okay, well, I'm done. I don't I don't need to be involved anymore. Except these six songs are really awesome. Like, so, like, what, like, what does that person do who feels that way?

Ashlyn 39:09
I don't want to dox where I work, but we have, like, we've tried to do, like, work with yay. And it became, like, this big problem. And a lot of the people who like him, I think it's just some people have that cult of personality, and ye is one of those people. And I think that even if he came to your house and lit it on fire, people would be like, yay.

Scott Benner 39:34
That's what he does. It's awesome. I mean, listen, how strange is it that he had that girl walking around naked

Ashlyn 39:40
for a year, oh, Bianca, since sorry or what? I

Scott Benner 39:44
don't even know her name, like, I couldn't be all I know is he's, I don't know if they were married. I don't know if they were just they, I don't know we were married. Okay, I ain't paying attention that close. What I'm saying is he's got that girl naked. And I'm sure some people be like, well, it was her decision. Like, I don't know if it was or it wasn't. I feel like, now. That she's not with him anymore. I don't think I'm gonna see her walking around in a see through dress anymore, but he still doesn't take the hit over that that I imagine that society would give him.

Ashlyn 40:10
There's another name that we could bring up in this conversation, but I won't

Scott Benner 40:14
really. Why not? I mean,

Ashlyn 40:17
look at Trump. It's the same cult of personality. Okay, I see what

Scott Benner 40:23
you're saying. Like, you don't want to be political. Like, right? But, like, yeah, I will tell you that I sat yesterday with a friend, and the two of us have fairly different political views, and they asked me about that, and all I said was funny, because what I said I think fits with I'll just talk about it. Like, specifically, the Kanye is an example. I'm all for people like stretching boundaries and personal freedom and saying, and, you know, saying what you want. I really am 1,000,000% for that. But there is, like, a part of me inside that, like, sometimes when the boundary gets stretched in a certain way. I think, I don't think that's good for society. I want people to speak their mind, and I want people and I think there's freedom of speech, and I don't think it should be restricted. Like I am really, like, an absolutist on, like, freedom of speech. I just think, like, some people are gonna say, crazy, it's their right, you know, people should fight back by saying, you know, opposite stuff, or calling them out on their bull like, that kind of stuff. But every once in a while I don't understand that people don't say, like, Oh, that is going to take us somewhere that's not good. And I know, like, who am I to say? Like, I'm not obviously, I'm not trying to control people, but that's my personal feeling. Like, Jesus is this taking us somewhere that we can't come back from, that's not going to be a negative for humanity. Like, that's the thing I

Ashlyn 41:47
wonder. I mean, that would require people to do things while thinking critically.

Scott Benner 41:52
Yeah, I don't know. Like, that's the kind of stuff that occurs to me all the time. I think

Ashlyn 41:55
that this is more a conversation about people glorifying people who have, like, dark I don't know if you know what dark triad traits are, like narcissism, Machiavellianism, as a society, we kind of glorify those things. And I think that this is just a symptom of that issue. We glorify people who are dog eat dog. We glorify people who, you know, profit at any expense, and we don't prioritize people who value community, and like you said, things that will benefit society long term.

Scott Benner 42:29
Am I hearing you tell me that there are some people who put on a Kanye song and just go, This beat is crazy. I love this beat. This is musical to me. I like it. And there are some people listening to the words going, Yeah, that's right. Like, let's get those people or do this thing, or whatever, like, so maybe people are listening to music in two different ways. Oh, 100%

Ashlyn 42:51
I mean, people are listening to music in a million different ways. Some people are lyrical. Some people it's the beat. I mean, some people it's both. And I do think that there are, as far as probably yay fans, people who have been listening to him for years and years and years, and they're like, oh my god, like, he's just a genius in the way that he structures lyrics and the way that he structures his beats. And then there are, are the people who are like, I want to listen to this person because they're being divisive and hateful.

Scott Benner 43:20
No, yeah, no, I it's funny. I never think. I don't think of things that way. So it doesn't occur to me like that. So that's a really interesting perspective. I don't even know the words to some of my favorite songs. I've tried to explain this, my family laughs at me. And it turns out this is a thing that actually happens to people. I don't hear the words like words. I hear the words like music. I don't know if that makes sense. So, like, I can,

Ashlyn 43:42
I think I listen to music similarly, I take, I view it as, like, the whole picture. You know what I'm saying? Like, I view it holistically. Like, what is the entire song? And a lot of people, especially people who enjoy, like, rap or something like that, they're like, Oh, these specific bars, or I really like this beat, and I don't pick it apart. I either like the whole thing or I'm not

Scott Benner 44:04
listening right? So to go back to the doji thing, there's one of her songs that I think is really great. And I played it the other day in my car, and Arden was with me, and she goes, Are you listening to what she's saying? And I was like, no. She goes, maybe you should try listening to what she's saying. And I was like, oh, okay, there was some fairly, like, vivid imagery in that song I was completely unaware of, because I just like the way it bounced,

Ashlyn 44:28
if that makes sense, I think I might know the song you're talking

Scott Benner 44:31
about, Nissan, Altima, yeah, and I swear to you, like I didn't know one thing she was saying in that song, but I thought it was good, You know, if I listen to let it be, what I hear is a lot of things happen in the world. You can't change everything. Some things you have to just leave alone, let them play out. Like, that's how let it be seems to me, and I don't even know if that's what McCartney meant when he wrote it, but like, that's how it makes me feel. It makes me feel like the. World is what it is, and people are generally good, and you don't need to pick through everything sometimes, just let it be.

Ashlyn 45:08
But this is why there's music for different moods. Like the Beatles are a little bit more contemplative, a little bit more, you know, laid back. You're not going to play doji in the same

Scott Benner 45:18
game space.

Ashlyn 45:19
Yeah, yeah. So I kind of view music as a way to bolster different emotions, and I think that she does a good job at that, actually.

Scott Benner 45:28
So then, does the kind of festival or kind of concert you're at dictate how you have to manage your diabetes?

Ashlyn 45:35
Oh, yeah. I mean, because I'm not dancing as hard if I don't want to, like, for example, I go, there's like, a bigger rap, hip hop festival that I go to every year for for work. And I'm not the biggest rap or hip hop person. Doji didn't go. So I'm not dancing as much. Rap is not as danceable to me, and I'm mainly trying to avoid mosh pits or getting punched in

Scott Benner 46:00
the face, yeah, so, so I'm assuming, right, there's like, physical activity at some of these there's less physical activity. Others, there's adrenaline, probably from your excitement, from finding a band that you like. And there's also can be adrenaline from you being like, please don't shove me over. Do you see yourself changing your management at these things, or do you just use a regular day management.

Ashlyn 46:21
So I have experimented a lot, and I much as I love tandem exercise mode, I've never once been able to use that successfully for anything, any kind of exercise. It drives me nuts. I don't really mess with my basal as far as like the day before, and if I was, if I was MDI, I probably would my strategy and like, everyone's mileage may vary. I like, gorge myself like a snake every event. I try to limit like IO B so the last one I went to by myself. I went to, like, I don't know if you know about, like, the smart buns. They're like, these almond flour like burger buns. And I love them. I buy them so much. And I went to McDonald's and I bought like, two Big Macs. And I think I just I sat there and I ate like, two Big Macs, like the almond flour bun right before I went because the fats and proteins are really going to be crucial,

Scott Benner 47:24
and they hold you up during the event. Oh,

Ashlyn 47:27
yeah, two Big Macs is, like, what, like, 500 calories of fats and proteins, and you're not gonna, you know, dip as easily from movement or dance, right? Yeah,

Scott Benner 47:37
that's smart. Like, so, yeah. So you figured out a way to go to those thick I just interviewed a football player, and he explained to me how he eats before he plays in a professional football game. You're basically doing the same thing. Oh,

Ashlyn 47:47
yeah, you want for me, fats and proteins make my blood sugar more stubborn, right? I'm not gonna have a sudden drop. And even if I do, I have, you know, I carry like, at least, like, 10 rolls of Smarties, like, tucked into every nook and Penny of you know what I'm packing, or I usually bring, like, a full sugar Gatorade and just sip that throughout the night. So you're

Scott Benner 48:13
not driving your blood sugar high. You're just putting your body in a situation where it's processing food that takes longer to process and holds your blood sugar up more stably.

Ashlyn 48:21
No, I went to EDC Orlando last year, and my blood sugar was between like 130 and 119 the whole time. Yeah,

Scott Benner 48:28
that's awesome. Yeah. No. How long did it take you to figure that out? Do you think

Ashlyn 48:32
I don't think I really sat down and figured it out until 2022 I went to a music festival in Miami called three points, and I went by myself, and I was really nervous to go by myself, because diabetes just logistically, yeah, diabetes logistically, getting in and out of Wynwood by yourself is a nightmare.

Scott Benner 48:55
Am I hearing you right or wrong? Tell me going by yourself. Is that part of being a girl. No, no, because I hear my daughter talk about that sometimes, again, I never know exactly like, like, there are some places like you kind of don't want to go by yourself. Sometimes, oh

Ashlyn 49:10
yes, yes. I thought you meant like, so you meant something else.

Scott Benner 49:14
No, not like, Lady time. I meant like, like, physically being a female by yourself somewhere.

Ashlyn 49:18
Oh yeah. I mean that time I went to three points, I had somebody follow me out of the event, and then I had to be like, No, leave me alone. I'm getting an Uber, you know. Like, I've even in clubs, like, I've seen girls get uncomfortable, and I'll be like, Hey, girl. Like, are you you good? Like, you know, try to be like, you're not alone here. Yeah,

Scott Benner 49:39
we can hang out a little bit and again, give you some more numbers, right?

Ashlyn 49:42
Yeah, yeah. I mean, and that's, that's a big thing in a festival culture, too. I Everyone is so nice, like, I've gone up to random people. I didn't just talk to them. And usually, by the end of it, I'm not alone.

Scott Benner 49:55
You bring your own drugs to festivals, or do you get stuff there?

Ashlyn 49:59
Oh, I get. I get the festival provided drug? Yes,

Scott Benner 50:03
no, you know. I mean, do buy that there? Like, because I hear people talking about testing all the

Ashlyn 50:07
time, do not buy your your drugs there. Do not,

Scott Benner 50:10
yeah, come, come prepared,

Ashlyn 50:12
yeah. I mean, they're not gonna be like, there's no free love in that arena. Like, I wouldn't trust anybody, as far as you can throw them.

Scott Benner 50:22
Are there testing stations at all the concerts you go to for your for drugs? I've heard people talk about that too.

Ashlyn 50:27
So there are, and I did talk about this on the previous episode. I remember right there's an organization called Dance safe that does test drugs and stuff like that. I haven't seen them at the last few I've been to, I don't really know,

Scott Benner 50:43
interesting. Maybe the drug problem is fixed.

Ashlyn 50:46
I wish there are test kits you can just order right off of Amazon. I think they're like, anywhere between 12 to $15 which to me, is a very low price to pay,

Scott Benner 50:55
yeah, for not dying of a fentanyl overdose. So you said earlier that you've changed with your diabetes, and it sounds like even with your usage, like, everything's changed for you. Like, how has your diabetes management changed over the last couple of years, since I spoke to you last, when I talked to

Ashlyn 51:13
you last, I was a little bit in a mental breakdown over it. I I have, I've had type one since, like, 2006 2007 somewhere in there. But I didn't really have any like moments that put the fear of God into me until around that time, and I think that it just took me so long to, like, figure everything out, because when I was not really paying attention, I didn't realize how much they had just, like, yanked up my basal to compensate for, like, lack of Bolus insulin, and then just trying to figure all that out on my own. Okay? Was just really demanding emotionally, and it kind of caused me to snap,

Scott Benner 51:51
okay, how did you eventually work through it all? Like, did you where'd you get your information, and what were the reasons you found that you needed to focus on it and get it worked

Ashlyn 52:00
out I couldn't live my life. I mean, I had a moment where I blacked out while driving from a low and the diabetes was coming first, because it was just, if you don't have your basal insulin set right, you can't really

Scott Benner 52:12
live, yeah, I know. And so

Ashlyn 52:14
then going to the flexibility of the pump, where, you know, I wasn't tied to, like, a wrong basal rate for a whole day really gave me a lot of wiggle room to trial and error things. And I'm still trialing and erroring things today. I just got the Moby, like, a month ago, two months ago, and I've had to, like, reprogram my basal rates even for

Scott Benner 52:34
that. Yeah, no, I imagine. And you were coming from which pump prior. I'm sorry. I've only been with tandem. So you were T slim, and even going from T slim to Moby, you had to change your settings. Yeah,

Ashlyn 52:45
my endo warned me that some people were a little bit more sensitive. And I've kind of noticed the opposite. I kind of bumped my basal by 15% and it's been good

Scott Benner 52:54
so far. Okay, awesome. Do you like the algorithm generally, though, how it works is that the new one, the plus,

Ashlyn 52:59
oh, yeah, the control IQ update. Yeah, you did. I love it. I love the update. I didn't think it would change much, but the fact that you can actually set a temp basal with control IQ on is amazing.

Scott Benner 53:13
I think so too. Yeah, I think everyone should let that happen in their algorithm. Actually, I think that's a great idea.

Ashlyn 53:19
Well, I was like the queen of being a little bit too stoned, turning off control like you, and falling asleep and then waking up with like, an urgent load or something, and then just being like, Ah, I didn't turn that back on. So for people like me, the 15 minute timer is, like, amazing.

Scott Benner 53:34
Why did stone dash one turn off her algorithm? Sometimes

Ashlyn 53:38
I don't like, I really wish that tandem would allow you to have a lower, like, target blood sugar, because it'll start suspending my insulin after I dose. Or, like, let's say I eat something, I dose, and then it's like, oh, you're at 110 let's suspend and then that will cause, you know, a high for no reason, because it's like, No, you didn't need to suspend my basal. So you're just

Scott Benner 54:01
trying to get ahead of mistakes you think it's gonna make?

Ashlyn 54:04
Yeah, I I'm really sensitive. I don't use a ton of insulin a day, so I think sometimes it'll it'll want to push my blood sugar up to hit that 120 and I'm like, no, no, I want to stay at 110

Scott Benner 54:17
Okay, yeah, I hear you. Anything they can do to give you, if you want it, some control and allow you to continue to use the algorithm, I think is a good idea. I think people like will grow to know if they don't already know. In this scenario, I need more aggressive or less aggressive, like, you know, and there's no way the algorithm is going to know that it's a great feature. So again, I think everybody should put it into theirs well,

Ashlyn 54:42
and the algorithm isn't going to know that, you know, oh, I've been walking around. I just ate, and now I'm going to go lay down, and I'm not going to need that bent, that basal suspension, like I'm

Scott Benner 54:51
Yeah, or this 40 carbs is Captain Crunch, not regular food, like that kind of an idea. It's not always going to be one to one with your setting. Yes. So, all right, that's awesome. I'm glad you're enjoying it. What else have we not hit that we should have? No,

Ashlyn 55:05
I absolutely love the Moby. Love tandem, like I can't, like they've given me my life back, really?

Scott Benner 55:13
Can I say tandem diabetes.com/juicebox? Support the podcast. Use the link. Thanks. Sorry, just, yeah, just slip that in your job a little easier. Thank you. Yeah, let me just slip that in really quickly. What about like for everything you've shared about concerts and festivals? Like, do you feel like you got through

Ashlyn 55:30
everything? Basically, it all boils down to advocate for yourself. Advocate for yourself in every way possible when it comes to music festivals and stuff like that. The people around you usually are there to help. Like, I have had moments where I've had a low or, like, some random person helps me. The environment there is really welcoming, for the most part, depending on where you are, everyone's there to have fun, you know, except the show people, yeah, except the shovel and they can shove.

Scott Benner 56:02
Have you ever been concerned about somebody like dosing you or giving you something without you knowing?

Ashlyn 56:07
I mean that for the average person, should not be a concern. It has happened to me. It

Scott Benner 56:11
happened to you specifically. I'm sorry to ask, like, what was the scenario? I

Ashlyn 56:18
drank something that I didn't realize had LSD in it. And luckily, it was only a little bit, but that's never a good time. And

Scott Benner 56:25
it wasn't somebody trying to get control of you for like, sexual reasons.

Ashlyn 56:29
No, no, I was at a party, and then it was just kind of like, Oh, that was my drink, and I thought it was your drink. And,

Scott Benner 56:36
you know, yeah, I got you. He picked up the wrong cup. Yeah.

Ashlyn 56:41
Yeah. It was just, it wasn't one. This shouldn't happen to anybody in a normal circumstance. It was my fault. Yeah,

Scott Benner 56:47
I hear you. Okay. I was more worried about, like, you know, have creepy guys try to give you something that doesn't happen. I don't, I don't

Ashlyn 56:53
drink alcohol, like, at all. Okay, so most of the time, if I'm at a party and drinking something, I bring my own diet soda that it comes in a can with my little koozie. I know it's my drink. I'm very weird about that.

Scott Benner 57:06
Yeah, do you ever meet somebody at those events that become friends? Oh,

Ashlyn 57:10
a lot. I have. I I've met, you know, tons of people that I still talk to today. I mean, I have friends all over the world, just because so many people come to these events and you can talk, and it's made like lifelong great friendships. I really think that you can go and talk to anybody for the most part, and yeah, have a friend

Scott Benner 57:30
that's awesome. That really is awesome. Are you, do you date? Or are you, do you find yourself single and go into these things by yourself?

Ashlyn 57:37
I find myself going by myself. I mean, even through work, I get like, a spare ticket, but half the time they like, tell me the day before. So then it's like, nobody has time to go with me. And then I just, I'm like, I just, I'm not gonna look back on this and be like, Oh, I didn't go because I didn't have anyone to go with. I'm not gonna wait for anyone. And that has led to me going to a lot of these things with type one by myself, which was really scary at

Scott Benner 58:02
first. Why do you think you're able to do that? If you talked about yourself as, like, introverted, generally speaking, like, Why do you think you're able to make the leap for these

Ashlyn 58:09
events? My fear of missing out is bigger than my social anxiety.

Scott Benner 58:15
All right? That's awesome. That really is cool. Oh, I love that. Tell me just you know, this is weird. I'm doing this in reverse, but because we didn't, because I've spoken to you before, I try to skip over some things. But how old were you when you're diagnosed nine, nine and you're 27 now? You said, Yep, yeah, okay, any epiphanies? After almost 20 years,

Ashlyn 58:37
I wouldn't say epiphanies. I'm not that kind of person. For me, I've always just made diabetes decisions on a gut level, and I don't overthink it

Scott Benner 58:46
okay, but you have made adjustments and figured out that there are some things you need to know. Where did those things come from?

Ashlyn 58:53
So I feel like I probably in, like the I'm in the the camp of, I want to think about diabetes the least amount of time possible throughout my life. And I know everybody's in that camp, but I'm pretty low carb. I try to just not I really want diabetes to be the back burner of my life, and eating low carb just allows me to set it and forget it in a way, okay? And that's obviously not for everybody. It's just the way that I want to live my life.

Scott Benner 59:22
I gotcha. So you made an adjustment to how you eat. You paid closer attention to your settings, because you were being over basal in the past to make up for bolusing. So you're also paying attention to actually bolusing at this point too,

Ashlyn 59:35
right? I mean, when I first got a pump, my my basal rate was like 28 units a day, and through trial and error, it's really only about 15,

Scott Benner 59:44
okay, and that was because you weren't bolusing for meals correctly. Yeah,

Ashlyn 59:49
my carb ratio was, like, completely wrong, like they were telling me that it was like one to 20. And in reality, through trial and error, again, it's like, actually one to like, eight.

Scott Benner 59:59
Oh, my. On, yeah, how much did your parents help you growing up with your diabetes, don't

Ashlyn 1:00:05
I not sending my mom this link? This is something where, like the podcast, actually made me really emotional. Okay, because when I first joined that Facebook group and everything, I felt really overwhelmed. I didn't. My parents always viewed diabetes as this, like, unattainable goal, and so it really took for me to, like, grow up and kind of be on my own for a while, to realize, no having an A, 1c, in the fives is actually something that's possible. Like, my parents really just were like, who cares? You've got insulin. You know, even now, talking to my my family, I I was visiting my dad, and he was like, Oh, I bought, you know, this fruit, you know, you can eat this fruit. And I was like, oh, you know, I don't want to have a banana. I, you know, I eat low carb. And he was like,

Scott Benner 1:00:49
well, it's fruit. Oh, yeah. He doesn't understand, yeah.

Ashlyn 1:00:53
And so, you know, me and my sister are both type one, and I love my parents. They're not the kind of intellectual people to sit down and say, This is a math problem that we can solve. They just kind of threw up their hands, and they were like, we're at capacity as people are ready. You are alive, and we love that. That's great, and that's all we can give you

Scott Benner 1:01:14
know, I'm not figuring anything out past what was said to me.

Ashlyn 1:01:17
Yeah, they never looked past like the advice that was given, and then it was like, I had to spend so much time on fucking myself, because my parents didn't really advocate for me, didn't really care. And, I mean, even now, my sister, she's also type one. Her a one season, the nines 10s, you know. And then my family, they kind of paint me out to be this, like, type a person that's very, you know, oh, Ashlyn in the food, you know, because I don't eat cart

Scott Benner 1:01:47
so you pay attention a little bit to your health. And they're like, Oh, look at this one. Trying so hard.

Ashlyn 1:01:52
Yeah, this is inconvenient. Oh,

Scott Benner 1:01:55
yeah. Oh No, kidding. All right, I'm figuring out what you're saying. That's a shame. I'm sorry. Like, did you say, like, don't let me put words in your mouth. But did you say the podcast helped you with that?

Ashlyn 1:02:04
Well, it made me feel really emotional. Because, you know, every day, there's so many posts from parents that are like, asking the questions that I wouldn't have even thought to ask until relatively recently, and it's just the relationship that I had with type one was so it felt like I was, it was like, learned

Scott Benner 1:02:23
helplessness, yeah, and so emotional. Like, wow, this is great. I didn't know this existed. I'm gonna help myself. Or, Wow, how come my parents didn't do this for me? Or a little of both.

Ashlyn 1:02:39
I think both come in waves, like I do kind of feel jealous, because it's like my relationship with myself, my relationship with food, my relationship with diabetes itself. I had to really carve that out as an adult, and it really broke me to the point where I I've never felt like that before, and so to realize that some people's parents literally care to the point of this level, to where they're sending their kids off to college, and they're still monitoring their Dexcom, and they're still and it's a double edged sword, because sometimes I do see people on there and I'm like, Whoa, you got to chill out. Your kid is not going to live in a bubble.

Scott Benner 1:03:18
I feel you and like some people go too far, but at least they're well intended Exactly.

Ashlyn 1:03:24
And it's like that's a kind of love for your kid that I just I don't think I experienced that even secondhand, until recently, Ashley, you

Scott Benner 1:03:35
almost made me cry. I'm sorry. No, it took me by surprise. I think because of your just kind of, like, laid back hippie nature, you know what I mean? Like, I didn't expect you to like, I don't know why I didn't expect that, but I'm sorry that that happened to you, and I'm

Ashlyn 1:03:50
sure, no, I just I didn't know. Like, you don't know there's another way, until you see it for

Scott Benner 1:03:55
yourself. Yeah, no. And people don't

Ashlyn 1:03:59
realize, especially, I think, for teens, how much like, the ups and downs of blood sugars, cause, like, emotional, like, I feel so much more stable as a human being mentally, and there's no price

Scott Benner 1:04:11
on that. Yeah, no, I agree. And you do, you try to get through to your sister and it doesn't work, or is it not a thing? You approach her about

Ashlyn 1:04:17
my sister is a very interesting human being, and she's going to be the way that she is until she dies. I love her. I sit down with her, and I always tell her, if you ever want to, you know, sit down and talk about this. I'd love to, but she's just not at a point where she's willing to do that. And I honestly think it might be too late for her, and I'm not saying that in like, a morbid way, but she already has, like, gastroparesis. She's at the point now with like, she has like mobility issues in her fingers and hands, like she can't close her fist completely from like nerve damage. How old is she? She's 21

Scott Benner 1:04:53
oh my gosh. And you feel like it's just bad direction. And then a little bit of that. Like vibe from your parents that she has that, that like, I got the sugars, and this is what happens, and there's nothing I can do about it.

Ashlyn 1:05:06
Oh no, she she cannot take accountability for her life in any capacity. And it's not just the diabetes, it's it's more than you would ever believe. But you know, it's just that I refuse to go through life feeling like the things that happen to me are outside of my control. And I think that's really the difference.

Scott Benner 1:05:24
Has your sister done psychedelics or no? Yes, she has. So she didn't get the same come to Jesus stuff that you got?

Ashlyn 1:05:30
No. But we're really, like, fundamentally different people. And I think even for her, like, there's a different motivation for taking these kinds of things, and there's not as much introspection, or even want to have introspection, you have to want, or at least like, be able to think critically and like my sister, she's not somebody who's well educated. I love her to pieces, but she dropped out in the ninth grade. She does not have a GED. She is just raw, dogging life in a way that I could never

Scott Benner 1:06:03
I see. I was gonna, actually, it's funny, that's what you said next, because I was gonna say, does she have a gap somewhere that she can't kind of do all this? And you think that might be it.

Ashlyn 1:06:12
No, she's just not somebody who this is what's valuable to her. Because if it's valuable to her, she'll chase she'll do what she needs to do. But I think in a lot of ways, this is a form of self harm.

Scott Benner 1:06:24
Oh, I see you think she's punishing herself. She

Ashlyn 1:06:27
has a lot going on, like as a person, and I think that she's not somebody who has a good relationship with themselves, and that doesn't mean that can't change, but I think that with the path that she's gone down as a person like she's got a lot going on, and I just think that this is her journey. I'm

Scott Benner 1:06:49
going to say something I have no basis for at all. Do you take after your dad and she takes after your mom?

Ashlyn 1:06:55
Yes. Oh, okay, that's all. Why? What made you go to that conclusion? Oh,

Scott Benner 1:07:00
Ashlyn, are you gonna make me say how my brain works out loud? I don't know if that's important, is it? I don't want to get in trouble. Okay, fair Fair enough. Oh, I don't even know, Ashland, you come off more like a guy that's fair, like a little laid back, like it's gonna work out, man, don't worry about it. Like, that kind of a thing. And then when you started talking about the punishing herself, and she's the way she is, and she's not going to change, like that doesn't seem particularly female to me, but it does seem like I've known a number of people like that, and so far, they've all been ladies. And I also thought that if you're if you went one way and she went another way that you guys must be taking after a parent like one of the other. And I'm trying to imagine what relationship rifts could have happened between your sister and your mom for her to treat herself that way, and I didn't

Ashlyn 1:07:55
feel they have a very like codependent relationship, and it's something that is impacting the whole family. Part of the reason I live so far away is just to kind of have some breathing room with this kind of stuff. I mean,

Scott Benner 1:08:07
yeah, also, your dad tried to help you eat, and even though he was, like, ill, like, his intentions were good with the banana, right? But like, even though he didn't understand it, I have your parents in my head as your dad being the guy who likes Lincoln Park and hanging out and being cool, and he wants to help, but he doesn't know a lot, and he's doing his best, and maybe your mom is a little overbearing and half a teaspoon of crazy. Maybe

Ashlyn 1:08:32
that's a pretty good assumption. It's pretty good. 75% there. They're both crazy. I'm not gonna say better than the other. They're just people, yeah, but no, I had a very divided family growing up, and I think I'm just glad that I am somebody who can function and live and appreciate the days.

Scott Benner 1:08:56
Isn't it crazy that that's the level of success that you got put in, like, you got put into a situation that that description is a level of success to you. I'm grateful to be a person that can function. That really is telling, like, I don't know what we're supposed to do as a society to help people who aren't equipped well to be good parents. But, man, I wish we could try something, because, you know, I just listened to my own podcast this morning. Kind of don't like the way the ads are landing, and I'm listening to it a lot to figure out where I want to put them differently so that they don't break up your listening experience. Like this is literally what I'm trying to do. I was listening to one called, What the hell is it? Called the mom was awesome. Hold on hold on hold on a second. Because, like, people will try to go back, and then they won't be able to find it.

Ashlyn 1:09:45
Yeah, just to, just to give a little bit more context, you do that, I love my sister, but she is currently, like, facing, like, possibly 10 years in federal prison as a type one.

Scott Benner 1:09:56
She's at 21 who'd she shoot? To sell. What she sell? She sold something

Ashlyn 1:10:03
I don't really know. And honestly, I've told her, tell me the least amount of shit possible. Leave me out of this. Well, yeah, leave me out of this. Don't, don't bring up my name.

Scott Benner 1:10:15
Oh, well, she's Listen, I've interviewed people in prison, like, actually, I just interviewed a guy last week who was a little out of control and prison pulled him together. Like, believe it or not, like, and I've also interviewed people who told stories of, like, other people dying in prison because of, like, their problems and having type one diabetes and not being able to get care. Like, it is not a safe place to be, generally speaking, if you don't know how to manage your type one and don't get put into a place that understands and is willing to help you,

Ashlyn 1:10:44
no, and you know, for me, I've done some digging into resources and stuff like that for people who are incarcerated with type one, just out of fear for her. And it kind of seems like it really depends on the individual facility you end up in, and that's kind of the luck of the

Scott Benner 1:11:00
draw. Yeah, no kidding, that's been my finding talking to people as well. It's hard for me to get people on to talk about being in prison. I've had people set up like I get a couple that come in and talk about it, but I've had far more that have set their recordings up and then not done it for a number of reasons. Some of them are for parole reasons. They don't want to admit anything out loud because they're still on parole, so it's hard to get people to share those stories anyway. I'm sorry. Episode 1521 is called fueled by anxiety. That's an hour of just listening to a lady who wants to be a mom, and the it occurs to me, like you could have got her and you didn't, you know what I mean. And I wonder like and I not just not to use specifically, but for everybody, you don't even have to be the greatest mom or dad in the world, right to like really impact your kids. Well, it's not that hard to support people, I don't think, but you really do need to want to do it, or know that it needs to be done. And I think a lot of people don't have that knowledge when they make a baby, and I know it just made me sad, like you made me sad twice. I know you don't mean to like, but just what you said, just now, like that, this is like success to you. Like this should be expected. You shouldn't have to like, aspire to what you just said. It should just be a thing that's, you know, comes at birth, I think, but I know that's not the case.

Ashlyn 1:12:17
No, it really isn't. And half of that is my upbringing, and half of that is looking around at the state of the world, just the fact that, you know, I can support myself think critically, and even the stuff with education being defunded and stuff like that, makes me feel this way. So I'll

Scott Benner 1:12:34
say this Ashton, because I've been alive a lot longer than you have. I know things seem dire sometimes, and trust me, they seem dire to people in every presidency you know doesn't matter, like what side's holding office and stuff like that. There are things that are happening that seem dire. I told you I talked to a friend of mine yesterday at lunch, if we were playing tennis, everything that she said was completely reasonable, and everything I said was completely reasonable, and what we both found ourselves saying is that we wish there was some entity in the middle that people could exist in, so that they didn't have to attach themselves to a side that, you know, goes crazy and, like, in a direction, because it happens on both sides, right?

Ashlyn 1:13:12
Yeah. But I think that the real problem is like media sense, or what is it called, like, centralizing the media, or, like, sensationalism. There we go.

Scott Benner 1:13:24
Yeah. You know what I ended up telling her at the end was that when I was growing up, they they, like, the people in charge, would use abortion as a thing that kept everybody focused right? Like, so, like, don't look at where we're spending the money. Don't look at what we're doing. Go argue with each other about abortion, like that. That's what kind of got I felt like was being pumped into us, like, like, it's not a thing that's trivial. And there are clear opinions on both sides. They both make good arguments. And we'll go send society out to argue with themselves about that, right? That'll keep them off of paying attention to what a missile costs or etc. By the way, I also want missiles, but I'm just saying like, you know, like, that kind of an idea.

Ashlyn 1:14:08
It's the same song and dance. It's just like, different words instead of abortion. It's trans, trans people, and it's distracting us from the 1% versus the 99

Scott Benner 1:14:19
it's another distraction method. Like, you're, you're 100% right? It's either like, like you said, they just pick something. You pick something that both people have good points about, and that makes people upset, and then you just send them off into arguing about it. And then, you know, as the election comes up, you go to your your base, and you say, don't forget, this is what we think. And they're trying to ruin it, and then they do it to you, and they do it through the other side, and you all go, and then everybody votes, that's what this is. And in the end, I don't know that anything oddly different happens from one to the next. It's funny, because during that conversation, this person said to me, there were a lot of illegal aliens that came. Him into the country under Joe Biden, which I believe is true, like I'm not, I'm not arguing with her. And she went on to make the point that, you know, it was her idea, that she thought that if Democrats let in a bunch of illegal aliens, that they would become, eventually, Democratic supporters. And it was funny, because I was watching her make this argument. And I thought I buy into this, but does she know that I heard about this when I was little, when Ronald Reagan did it. I don't

Ashlyn 1:15:27
understand this argument as somebody who, again, like I grew up in Miami, I am still hearing go on down there about ICE raids and stuff like that. If it's between them coming here and becoming a Democrat versus them living in a potentially like, hellscape environment where they're not able to thrive. I really see the problem with that.

Scott Benner 1:15:50
Yeah, like, so beyond the like, the human side of that argument, what I'm saying is, is that every administration does that. It doesn't matter if it's Republican or Democrat. I do think that, like there needs to be, that's

Ashlyn 1:16:03
just, you have to create a call to action, and it always boils down to us versus them, you know, types of messaging. Yeah,

Scott Benner 1:16:11
I think my opinion is, is that the tactics are the same, and both sides use them, but when you're in power, you point to the other one to say how bad they are for doing it, and when they're in power, they point to you to say how bad you are for doing it,

Ashlyn 1:16:25
yeah. But I think that again, if you just zoom out of what you just said, that's the whole problem and the solution. There needs to be more than two people to point a finger. Yeah, right,

Scott Benner 1:16:35
right. Yeah. It would be nice if there was a third party, but that wouldn't help what they're trying to accomplish. So that's not going to happen. And I don't mean this in, like, a, I don't know, like, I'm not crazy, right? Like, I just think that this is what I think people in power do this in all sorts of situations, right? They they want to keep you focused on the thing. They want you to stay on their side, because they need to vote, or, you know, support, or whatever. And you know they're going to use what they know makes you the most upset, and that what makes you unable to even consider the other side's point of view, like they have to say something to you to stop you from even considering the other side. And I think, you know, going backwards to abortion, it's a great example of that, because, yeah, people should have autonomy over their bodies. I 100% believe that. And at the same time, if you don't think having an abortion is killing something, you're not being honest either. Like, so, like, like, so one person just plants their flag in the idea of, like, you can't have an abortion because you're killing a baby, and the other person plants their flag. And, you know, I there's personal freedom, and I should be in control of my body. Those are two honest statements, but nobody is willing to talk to the other person on the other side because.

Ashlyn 1:17:46
But my problem with this is that you but you're right, both sides of this are completely correct. Where I draw the line is where you start telling other people what they can and cannot do with their body. If you don't want to get an abortion, you don't want to live your life a certain way, then

Scott Benner 1:18:03
don't and Ashlyn, there it is that makes you liberal, or it makes you a Democrat, or whatever you want to like say, that's your line. The other person's line is you're killing a baby. So that's their line.

Ashlyn 1:18:14
But then what happened to the America is the land of the freedom, like freedom is for everyone, even if you don't agree with it. Do you

Scott Benner 1:18:20
want me to argue the other side? What about the freedom? The freedom for the baby? It's a clump of cells that you found your line. That's all. That's my point. Like I'm not disagreeing or agreeing with you, I'm saying that's your line, and the other side has their line, and they are so opposite that there it doesn't allow for

Ashlyn 1:18:38
convert. It's just we've forgotten about nuance?

Scott Benner 1:18:41
Yeah, well, actually, the truth is, is that this is already a worked out thing, right? Like, people who are pro choice have abortions if they want them, and people are pro life don't. And that's, that's the fix. The fix is, is that you're never going to tell somebody. There's never going to be a rule that everybody has to follow on anything like that's never going to happen. So you've made your arguments. Everybody knows what the what game you're playing now make your decision about which game you want to play, like, what, what field do you want to play on, and then go play your game. That's how society works. Most people, when you talk about most people are in the middle on abortion. Most people are in the middle. They go and do the thing that seems right to them. It's the argument that keeps going that is really just meant to fuel your fire. So this all keeps going. Because how could we have an election if everybody realized we agreed with each other on most things, most times like, then where do you get all the angst? Then, you know, like, it wouldn't even matter, like, who would even come out to vote? Like, hey, we all under agree. Whichever guy really wants it. Like, let him have it. Like, they'll go do the thing we all think. And meanwhile, those people don't get to run for anything because they lack the ability to make people upset, to motivate them to go. Out and do a thing. It's our fault as humans for needing to be upset to be in action. But

Ashlyn 1:20:08
this is this goes back to what we were saying before, about yay, the cult of person.

Scott Benner 1:20:13
In the end, it is what it is, right? So anyway, I don't know what that's got to do with going to a music festival, although I bet you, if you're on psychedelics in a music festival. You wouldn't give a shit about any of this, and that would be awesome. So yeah, anyway, if you're looking for my political stance, which I wish, I don't think I gave here one way or the other, I wish there was a third party in the middle that wasn't busy arguing about all this stuff. Was just talking about paying bills and filling potholes and stuff like that. But as long as I've been alive, that hasn't really worked out, and I don't imagine it's going to, as long as the game really is about fighting and not about fixing. So and you can take this and apply it to almost any argument you see in a Facebook group about diabetes or anything else. It's all the same. We just like to fight. We're good at it. I think it's how we're wired, honestly. So I don't know. Good luck everybody. And Ashley, it's interesting to talk about it with you, because you're half my age and you're not crazy. So I appreciate that too. So because there are plenty of people who say things like you and I talked about this right before we started recording, right? There are plenty of people who will say, like, this is right, do it. And somebody will say, well, like, I can't get that done. And they'll say, it doesn't matter, it's right. That's like arguing with a 12 year old. And you're not like that, which is awesome, because you have your opinions, and they lean in one direction, but you're not saying, Well, you know, I don't care what the other what everyone else thinks. I don't care what everybody else wants. Like, you're saying like, you know, like, there's got to be conversation in here to try to figure it out. And then we identify your line on a subject, and we know where you stand. And then, you know, people can keep talking about it. But if you heard any of this and you're mad right now for either side, like, you know you should be pro choice or pro life, or you should be like You're not listening to what I'm saying, like I'm not arguing for either side of that. I told you what I think. I think people should have choice, and I think abortion is killing something. Those are two very uncomfortable statements that don't jive with each other at all, but I don't think you can ignore them. They're true. So like, if you want to sit and argue, then go plant your flag and argue. And you can go do that the rest of your life. But if you want to have an actual conversation that leads to something, then you gotta, you've got to admit that both sides are true. You got to admit Joe Biden led a lot of illegal aliens into the country. He really did. It probably wasn't good. And now you're going to get an overreaction from the other side. And then that pendulum that we all just want to settle in the middle is just going to swing far right and swing far left, and it's going to keep doing that. And then you know what's going to happen is, you know, a bunch of stuff over reactionary stuff is going to happen this time, and then the next time it'll go back the other way, and those people be like, Ooh, it's a measuring contest. I'm in charge. Now wait, you see what I push through. And then they're going to say something insane, and then that insane thing is going to be the law of the land for four years, or, however, eight years. And then during that time, everybody on the other side is going to get super mad, and it's going to swing back the other way. What we're trying to do, what we should be trying to do is stop that pendulum from swinging all over the place, because it would be nice if it just sat in the middle, where most of us already agree. But good luck with that. Okay. You were awesome. Hold on one second for me. Thank you very much for doing this. You

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Scott Benner 8/1/25 Scott Benner 8/1/25

#1591 The Sweetest Irony

Renee, 66, has lived with T1D for 41 years—ironically, her dad was a Louisiana sugar cane farmer. She wonders if childhood head trauma from a severe bike accident played a role.

+ Click for EPISODE TRANSCRIPT

Scott Benner 0:00
Here we are back together again, friends for another episode of The Juicebox podcast.

Renee 0:15
My name is Renee, and I've had type one diabetes for 41 years.

Scott Benner 0:21
The podcast contains so many different series and collections of information that it can be difficult to find them in your traditional podcast app sometimes. That's why they're also collected at Juicebox podcast.com go up to the top, there's a menu right there. Click on series, defining diabetes. Bold beginnings, the Pro Tip series, small sips, Omnipod, five ask Scott and Jenny, mental wellness, fat and protein, defining thyroid, after dark, diabetes, variables, Grand Rounds, cold, wind, pregnancy, type two, diabetes, GLP, meds, the math behind diabetes, diabetes myths and so much more, you have to go check it out. It's all there and waiting for you, and it's absolutely free. Juicebox podcast.com. Nothing you hear on the Juicebox podcast should be considered advice medical or otherwise, always consult a physician before making any changes to your healthcare plan. This episode of The Juicebox podcast is sponsored by the twist, a ID system powered by tide pool that features the twist loop algorithm, which you can target to a glucose level as low as 87 Learn more at twist.com/juicebox, that's twist with two eyes.com/juicebox. Get precision insulin delivery with a target range that you choose at twist.com/juicebox. That's t, w, i, i s, t.com/juicebox. This episode of The Juicebox podcast is sponsored by the contour next gen blood glucose meter. Learn more and get started today at contour. Next.com/juicebox this episode of The Juicebox podcast is sponsored by Medtronic diabetes and their mini med 780 G system designed to help ease the burden of diabetes management, imagine fewer worries about Miss boluses or miscalculated carbs thanks to meal detection technology and automatic correction doses. Learn more and get started today at Medtronic diabetes.com/juicebox

Renee 2:25
My name is Renee, and I've had type one diabetes for 41 years. I guess the most ironic part is that my father was a sugar cane farmer in South Louisiana.

Scott Benner 2:35
Your father, your father, farmed sugar cane. Yes. Were you eating it

Renee 2:40
constantly? I would say, every meal in our house had a dessert, lunch, dinner, almost

Scott Benner 2:47
Renee. You can hear the people sitting right now going, sugar doesn't cause type one diabetes. This lady, she's had it for 41 years. She doesn't they don't know you're joking. That is ironic. It really is. It is. What's it like growing up on a farm?

Renee 3:02
You know, when you're young, you don't like it, but in hindsight, looking back, it was really a great

Scott Benner 3:07
life. Yeah, were you involved in the farming at all as the cat? No, no,

Renee 3:12
not at all. I'm the fourth out of five girls. My dad is actually a fourth generation sugar cane farmer, but having no boys, he ended up selling the farm, so it's it, and he's deceased now, so it's no longer in the family, but

Scott Benner 3:26
you're the fourth out of five regrets that he has, because no one can take that business from him, right?

Renee 3:31
Absolutely not he. We always say that we were his princesses and he was our King.

Scott Benner 3:39
That's lovely. Were None of the girls interested in farming, or is it, like, it wasn't a thing, where he's, like, he didn't think, I didn't have a boy, so they can't do it, right? Like you guys just weren't interested, right? Yeah,

Renee 3:49
it's a hard I mean, farming is a hard life, and especially in South Louisiana with hurricanes coming through and, you know, wiping out your crops.

Scott Benner 3:58
So your father's had times where he's seeded an entire crop, brought it up. It's been ripped apart. He's got to take the field back down, put it back together again. You don't make money that time like that. That's happened more than once in your life. Yes, wow, jeez, that's not fun. I do know that I vacationed on St John once or twice in the Virgin Islands, and I think that's they used to grow sugarcane there too. What is it about the humidity? Is that what it likes,

Renee 4:23
it does have to be hot, so like Florida and I think Louisiana are the only states, and maybe a little bit in Texas, that grow sugar in the United States. Now there's lots of states that grow sugar beets, but that's a totally different sugar than sugar cane sugar.

Scott Benner 4:38
Sugar, yep, I want to say, right now, my sister in law's dog is named sugar. Oh, he looks like he's had too much sugar. I just want to say that very fat dog. As a matter of fact, sometimes I see the dog walking around. I think, how is she moving? But that's a different story. 41 years. How old are you now? I

Renee 4:55
am 66 so I was 25 years old when I was diagnosed.

Scott Benner 4:59
First No kidding, did anyone else in the family have type one?

Renee 5:03
No, nobody. My grandfather had type two diabetes, but nobody else in my family has had it

Scott Benner 5:12
other autoimmune stuff. No, not you even. Not any sister, nothing like that.

Renee 5:17
No, now I have. There are 37 first cousins on my dad's side of the family, and one of my cousin's grandsons has recently been diagnosed with type

Scott Benner 5:27
one. How old was he when he was

Renee 5:30
diagnosed? Like seven or eight?

Scott Benner 5:32
Younger child, I'm sorry, how many first cousins? 37 how many of them do you think you could name off the top of your head, if you had

Renee 5:39
to? Oh, well, probably all of them. We just spent some time with one in Switzerland. No kidding.

Scott Benner 5:44
Wow, that's lovely. I don't have that. You're making me jealous.

Renee 5:49
Well, I think growing up on the farm next door to my grandparents, the cousins who lived in California, Wisconsin, we saw them every summer when they would come visit for a month. So and everybody else lived nearby. Oh,

Scott Benner 6:01
so the farm was almost like a resort for the family. Yes, yeah. I guess you kind of come and hang out and do family things that's really, that's really something else that's great. Are all your sisters living?

Renee 6:11
Yes. In fact, out of the 37 of us, only one cousin has passed away.

Scott Benner 6:18
My god, you guys are strong. Yes, seriously,

Renee 6:22
yeah. And now I will tell you my dad, there were eight of them, and two of his siblings died of cancer, two females, two sisters, early in life, and then the rest of them have had Alzheimer's. But I personally think that it's we all think it's environmental, because none of us are showing signs of Alzheimer's.

Scott Benner 6:41
How did they grow up on that farm as well? Yes, they

Renee 6:45
did, but you did as my dad and his siblings grew up pretty much on the farm. What

Scott Benner 6:49
do you think is about the is it like chemicals or what do you think it is?

Renee 6:54
Yeah, I do. And I mean, I don't, haven't done a true study on it, but I mean, I think that when they were young, and they were spraying the fields. They played outside when we were young, and they were spraying the fields we were brought inside. We couldn't play while they were spraying the fields near

Scott Benner 7:10
us. Just that one generational of like, hey, maybe we shouldn't let the kids run through that. Yes, hey, that stuff we're spraying on the ground that seems to kill everything. Why don't we keep the kids out of that. Yes, yeah, no kidding, huh? Oh my gosh.

Renee 7:24
And, you know, Scott, one thing too, is, I don't know if you've heard that there's a correlation between head trauma and diabetes.

Scott Benner 7:31
Really, I know head trauma and like, like behavioral stuff, but about between in type one, yes.

Renee 7:38
And I had a nurse tell me that who was drawing blood. This was years ago, like, probably 30 years ago, but normally it's a quick court like, you know, you'll and Mark, my husband has had two patients who, like, one was hit in the head with a golf club, and a few weeks later, diagnosed with diabetes. I can't remember the situation of the other one, but I mean, I did have head trauma. I was in a bike accident, and I had an eyebrow bone shatter into my brain. I was in the fourth grade, and then I didn't have diabetes until it was 25 so I don't know if there's a correlation, but, you know, the nurse shared that with me, and I thought, hmm,

Scott Benner 8:18
I'm watching our overlords go through it right now. It's going to give you an answer in a second. I found a range of articles. Hold on. Let's see what chatgpt comes up with. It's doing a deep dive on the question, What did you run into with your

Renee 8:30
bike? Our little town of Franklin was having it sesque continuum. I was in a bike racing. Somebody's front tire hooked onto my back tire and threw me onto a parked car, and that's when bumpers were made. That's

Scott Benner 8:43
when they make cars out of metal, not now, this is plastic and plastic, and there's like some metal in the middle, and somehow they're stronger. Now, isn't that crazy? You can have an accident in a car now made out of plastic and be better off than when you were in one of those tanks. Don't get me started, Renee, like I will, just because of your age, I will start a 10 minute conversation with you about how much better automobiles are now than they were before, because I think people who are younger deserve to know what it's like to drive in a car where air is coming up from the ground

Renee 9:15
and and you're sitting facing backwards,

Scott Benner 9:20
air just coming through the cracks the doors, like, right now, I hear people say it's almost silent inside of my car. I'm like, Yeah, imagine you would drive on a rainy day, and you'd look down, there'd be water on your hand, you know? And then it'd be like, Why didn't you guys go anywhere? Go Anywhere. Here's what chat GP came up with. It wants you to know that it thought for one minute and 24 seconds. Oh, does seconds. Oh, physical head trauma, concussions, PBI, skull fractures, etc, has not been shown to trigger the autoimmune attack that causes type one diabetes. Head blows can cause a different disorder called Central diabetes insipidus, a water balance problem that happens if the hypoth. Thalamus, posterior pituitary or damage CDI shows up in about one in six acute head injury cases develop hormone problems. It has nothing to do with insulin or blood sugar control. Psychological trauma or extreme stress is another story. Several population studies, including a 10,000 child Swedish cohort, Link several life events, near death, death in the family, serious accidents, with roughly a three fold higher risk of later type one diabetes, presumably by revving up stress hormones and immune pathways in kids who already carry the right genes for type one Okay, there you go. That's a bit of a cancer, yeah, of course,

Renee 10:37
because I will tell you, I think extreme stress is what triggered mine.

Scott Benner 10:41
Renee. A lot of people come on here and tell stories like that, seriously, a 10,000 person study linking death in the family, serious accidents with roughly a three fold higher risk of later type one diabetes, and that's pretty

Renee 10:55
significant. Yes, yeah, I think I mentioned to you I had just moved back to Louisiana from living in Washington, DC, and it was such a stressful time really, in my life, and that's when I was diagnosed. What

Scott Benner 11:06
were you in DC for? For school? Were you lobbying the sugar lobby? What were you doing up

Renee 11:10
there? No, my dad did that. I was up there. I worked. I moved there after college, and I worked on the Hill for two years, and because my dad was up there so much, this is funny. He said, If you're not married in two years, you're coming home. So guess what? Found the guy, I wasn't married in two years and I moved home, you had to come home. Did

Scott Benner 11:33
you look? Did you take that seriously? Do you like it there enough to think about marrying somebody just to stay

Renee 11:38
No, no, okay, no. That's a whole nother part of my journey, Scott, that I'm just not going to share

Scott Benner 11:43
with you. Oh, okay, that's fine. You don't have to. We'll let it go. I'm sure this is gonna be the best part of the story that nobody hears, but it's okay. I'd love to know what this boy did. Do you have your own kids?

Renee 11:56
I do not have children. Okay? On purpose? Yes, it was a choice because of diabetes and the age that I was, and my husband actually had an Air Force commitment and was sent to a small base, and they said they just couldn't handle somebody with a pregnancy with diabetes, that I would have to go to a bigger base. I was probably, I guess, I was 34 and then by the time he got out, I was 39 so, but that's a whole nother story, and I'm fine not having children. I mean, it's what God has given me. But I do think that knowing how well I've done with my diabetes, that I would have taken that chance you would

Scott Benner 12:38
have done is it a disappointment for you? No, no, okay,

Renee 12:42
no, I have plenty of time to invest in other people's children, and it's just so fun for me. Well, you also have

Scott Benner 12:49
plenty of children to invest in. It sounds like running around there. So it's a lot of kids and cousins, and they must have kids. And, my gosh, okay, all right, now that's fair enough. So talk about being diagnosed 41 years ago. What was management like for you? The contour next gen blood glucose meter is sponsoring this episode of The Juicebox podcast, and it's entirely possible that it is less expensive in cash than you're paying right now for your meter through your insurance company. That's right if you go to my link, contour next.com/juicebox you're going to find links to Walmart, Amazon, Walgreens, CVS, Rite, aid, Kroger and Meijer. You could be paying more right now through your insurance for your test strips in meter, then you would pay through my link for the contour next gen and contour next test strips in cash. What am I saying? My link may be cheaper out of your pocket than you're paying right now, even with your insurance, and I don't know what meter you have right now. I can't say that, but what I can say for sure is that the contour next gen meter is accurate, it is reliable, and it is the meter that we've been using for years. Contour next.com/juicebox and if you already have a contour meter and you're buying test strips, doing so through the Juicebox podcast link will help to support the show. The brand new twist insulin pump offers peace of mind with unmatched personalization and allows you to target a glucose level as low as 87 there are more reasons why you might be interested in checking out twist, but just in case that one got you twist.com/juicebox. That's twist with two eyes.com/juicebox. You can target glucose levels between 87 and 180 it's completely up to you. In addition to precision insulin delivery that's made possible by twist design. Twist also offers you the ability to edit your carb entries even after you've bolused. This gives the twist loop algorithm the best information to make its the. Decisions with and the twist loop algorithm lives on the pump, so you don't have to stay next to your phone for it to do its job. Twist is coming very soon, so if you'd like to learn more or get on the wait list, go to twist.com/juicebox. That's twist with two eyes.com/juicebox. Links in the show notes. Links at Juicebox podcast.com.

Renee 15:19
Wow. Wow. It's so different. Scott, as you know, I mean, it was injections. I called it the insulin cocktail. You were supposed to test yourself all the time. In all honesty, I only tested myself about three times a day. I was terrible. I would give myself injections through my pants, and unfortunately, I never developed an infection. But it is so different than having type one diabetes now and how we manage it.

Scott Benner 15:50
Yeah, so you're doing what, cloudy and clear are you mixing like, drawing a little of this up, little that up, shooting it, what, once, twice a day

Renee 15:58
you would combine a long term in a short term,

Scott Benner 16:01
yeah, pop it in, and then you're not really testing, right? You said I tested

Renee 16:06
three times a day with, what, with a testing machine, the good old finger pricks, you

Scott Benner 16:12
needed a bunch of blood. It took a while to come up with it. Like, are we talking about that far back? Yeah, yes. I mean, do you look back now and think, were those devices accurate, or were they good enough? What's the only thing that you knew? Yeah. How would you know? Yeah. Do you know what your outcomes were like back then? How were they keeping track of your health? Well,

Renee 16:31
I mean, we still had hemoglobin a one CS, right? So I'd say back then, my hemoglobins were probably more like, I think the highest my hemoglobin agency has ever been was 8.8

Scott Benner 16:44
Okay, that's not bad at all. I mean, considering the time, right?

Renee 16:48
Yes, yes. But also, I'm fairly active. I think that helps too. But the hard part too is not knowing when you're having a low, because even now, I will be 44 and still fully functioning.

Scott Benner 17:05
You don't have any feeling that you're low that your whole life,

Renee 17:08
none. So that's why the continuous glucose monitor is probably a lifesaver for me at this point. But back then, I would be 40, you know, whatever. I don't even know how low I would get when. Then I couldn't see, I couldn't think, you know where I am. So that was probably, to me, the most scary part. It was the lows, not the highs that were so hard on me before the continuous glucose monitor came

Scott Benner 17:33
about. And how long have you had a CGM for? Oh, gosh,

Renee 17:37
I don't know, maybe just five years.

Scott Benner 17:40
No kidding. Do you think some of the way you came to an eight a, 1c or a seven a, 1c was by being low all the time and not realizing it? Yes, yeah. And I learned that from you. Oh, geez, sorry. Must have been a sad day. No, no, seriously, what does it feel like the day you hear that and go, Oh, I thought I was doing okay.

Renee 18:00
Yeah, I mean, that was an eye opener when you said that.

Scott Benner 18:04
Oh, geez, I feel bad about that, almost. Was it? Did it stick? No, no. Do you have any complications?

Renee 18:11
I have no complications. I was diagnosed in Baton Rouge, and then I moved to DC, and I had a very kind of crazy job there, and my doctor, my endocrinologist there, said, Renee, diabetes is a game, and I can teach you how to play to win. Interesting. What did he teach you? Well, he said, I know. He said, I want you to eat whatever you want. Now, this is probably different than how we would approach it now, but it worked for me back then. He said, I want you to eat what you want. I want you to do. I want you to eat when you want. You should continue being active, he said, but I want you to test more. Wink, wink. And he said, so. I mean, if I was having a late meal at eight o'clock or nine at night, I would wake myself up later, at midnight to see what my blood sugar was. He said, If you're you just need to be testing more after these events to be able to bring it down. Because there was, you know, I mean, it was all testing and adjusting with insulin.

Scott Benner 19:17
So his idea was, live your life, but a couple of hours after you eat, test your blood sugar, and if it's high, give yourself more insulin. Yes, that's pretty thoughtful for back then actually, are you at that point on a faster acting insulin when you or with this doctor, I'm sorry say that again, which insulin were you on at that point? Oh, I was, I was on the cocktail, still the CO Oh, so he would just have you give more of the mix. Yes, okay, yes. This was not like he wasn't talking about Humalog or something like that. Yeah, no, okay, I don't

Renee 19:49
think I went on Huma log until I went on the pump.

Scott Benner 19:52
Really. What would that be like around the 1990 or something like that?

Renee 19:56
See, we had moved to Greenville, so you. No, that would have been probably like 1998

Scott Benner 20:04
No kidding. Okay, so pumps were available for a bit, and that fast tracking insulin was available for a while, and you still weren't using it right. Interesting. So there was no feeling of like I should move up to a faster insulin for the only reason you did it is because you moved to an insulin pump. Yes, interesting, and so did that work? Did the I mean, obviously you're doing well, but like you know, did you keep up with that? I mean, did you wake yourself up after dinner every night? Did you keep testing? Well,

Renee 20:31
not every night, but if it was a late night, there was a big event, and I ate a lot more than I would normally eat. Then, yes, I did.

Scott Benner 20:39
Did you find yourself needing more insulin? Usually, yes, okay, and you gave it to yourself. But did you get low later? Would you wake up in the morning? Low? Usually not. Okay. So not enough to, like, crash down? Yeah. So now, in a more modern world, in 1998 when you get a pump and you're using a fast track to insulin, what's the transition like? Because you did that a good long time with that cocktail. So what's the transition like about counting carbs and covering meals that way? Today's episode is sponsored by Medtronic diabetes, who is making life with diabetes easier with the mini med 780 G system. The mini med 780 G automated insulin delivery system anticipates, adjusts and corrects every five minutes. Real world results show people achieving up to 80% time and range with recommended settings, without increasing lows. But of course, Individual results may vary. The 780 G works around the clock, so you can focus on what matters. Have you heard about Medtronic extended infusion set. It's the first and only infusion set labeled for up to a seven day wear. This feature is repeatedly asked for, and Medtronic has delivered. 97% of people using the 780 G reported that they could manage their diabetes without major disruptions of sleep. They felt more free to eat what they wanted, and they felt less stress with fewer alarms and alerts you can't beat that. Learn more about how you can spend less time and effort managing your diabetes by visiting Medtronic diabetes.com/juicebox,

Renee 22:14
so I went on the mini med originally. I mean, it was just, it was a game changer, Scott, and that was before the continuous glucose monitor, being on a pump was a game changer for me. How just knowing that my body was constantly getting that basal rate of insulin there was it was just a comfort level, I guess, I don't know. I guess I really haven't thought about it, except that, now that you asked me, but it just changed

Scott Benner 22:50
my life, things were easier. Yes, absolutely, yeah, you feel more in control and less like it was happening to you.

Renee 22:58
Yes, and then also, I mean, you know, you're not carrying insulin around with you and syringes all the time because it's on. You get

Scott Benner 23:05
a little pharmacy in your pocket when you were, yeah, before and all that goes away.

Renee 23:10
So much freedom. I just felt there was so much freedom when I moved, even

Scott Benner 23:16
just not having to inject, I would imagine, would have been a big deal, right? Yeah, just to push the idea of pushing the button was probably exciting. Probably exciting. Yes, yeah, I know I hear that. Okay, so that's 98 when do you find the podcast? Oh, gosh. When did you start? I started making the podcast in January of 2015,

Renee 23:36
2015, okay, so let's see. So probably, actually, I think your first podcast I listened to was the third episode. No kidding, a neighbor told me about it. Yes,

Scott Benner 23:50
you've been listening for that long, or you'd started at

Renee 23:52
now, okay, I binge listened. So I listened for a while, then I stopped listening, and then I've listened so but yes, y'all had just, you had just started when I first started listening, and in all honesty, I probably listened a couple of times, and then I didn't listen for a couple of years, and then I would listen again. And I think I told you that I was interested in moving to a keto diet, and I did some research on keto and diabetes, and your podcast was the first one that came up, and that was a year and a half ago, I guess. So I listened by I really binge listened for a couple of months.

Scott Benner 24:31
Oh, so wait, so you listened for a while, stopped, but then, like, looked for information, then found the podcast again and went back to it. Yes. Oh, interesting,

Renee 24:40
yeah. And I do recommend it to anybody I meet with diabetes. I'm like, You need to listen to

Scott Benner 24:45
thank you. I appreciate you running around acting like a crazy person, telling people listen to my podcast. You ever think about it from the other side? They're like, Oh, I have a diabetes. I've had it for 30 years. The lady says a podcast will fix it.

Renee 24:59
I. But you know what, Scott, I think I had told you that, you know, the thing about having diabetes is that it's a disease that you can control. But I want to correct myself on that, because it's a disease that we can manage, not control. Yeah, no, you and Jenny have, I mean, y'all have given me so much insight on the advancements of diabetes and diabetes care and how to play the game to win, you are helping me so much. Just manage the disease in a new way.

Scott Benner 25:38
I'm very glad don't make me cry it's early in the morning. Okay, that's wonderful. I think my motivations, they exist in different spaces, obviously people with kids. I think about us being young and art and being young and us not knowing what we're doing, and I think like, maybe this will stop people from feeling so lost the way we did, and and propel them more quickly into decent information that they can they can figure out and apply to their own lives. But for older people, or people who had type one for longer times, especially those of you who've come out of like, regular mph, cloudy like that world before, CGM before, pumps who were told things like, you know, just shoot it in the morning and then go head up out your day if you get dizzy, you know, drink a coke. Like, if that was your whole life for you guys, I think about my friend Mike, like all the time. Like to hear what you just said is so touching and fulfilling for me, and at the same time it will, like later today, make me feel like, how come I couldn't get Mike to listen to me about this? It's not that I was trying so hard, and he just was like, I'm not listening. I tried a couple of times, and he seemed resistant, and because we had a personal relationship, I did not continue to push him. But I have no trouble jumping on this microphone and being pushy to 10s of 1000s of people listening that I don't have any trouble with, but with him, I I just stopped, you know, like I'd bring something up, I'd give him some good information. And I look back now through the lens of all of you and your and your stories, and I realize, like he wasn't being resistant, like he lived his whole life like that. He didn't know any better. I was saying completely foreign stuff to him, and he wasn't ready to try to do it. And, you know, caught up to it,

Renee 27:21
that's so hard to understand too, because I think I told you that as far as chronic diseases, I just can't complain about having diabetes, because it is one that we can manage. And my friend who diagnosed me when she was in medical school, she ended up dying of lupus. She was diagnosed six months after me, and spent most of her life on disability. And then our 38 year old neighbor next door died of cancer. I mean, those are diseases that you cannot manage, but Scott, you can manage diabetes. Yeah, you

Scott Benner 27:59
have a different perspective. Renee, you have a mixture of personal experience with your friends, and you have the knowledge of like, that hard work that it must take to run that farm. Those are different perspectives, I'll tell you. Like one thing, I was always stunned about Mike. He was so bright and articulate and a reader but but also extroverted, like, he wasn't, like, lost in a book, kind of a guy, you know, like, but he, he read voraciously. Was very intelligent, thoughtfully, had all kinds of good ideas. He never really tried for much. And I think that's the diabetes, and because it hit him when we were, like, right, coming out of high school, and I thought, man, like, Mike was on his way to something, and then all of the sudden, we're adults, and he's working, like in a laboratory, moving results around a computer. And I was like, God, it's weird that this is him, but I wonder how much of that was. Well, there's health insurance here, and it's steady, and I work inside, and I don't have to, like, you know, you mean, like, I wonder, I have always wondered, how much of his diabetes, like, re focused him, you know, and maybe the dumb luck of just when he was diagnosed, right? Like, you're what, you're 19 years old, you don't know what you're doing, like, you know, you're just starting to get out into the world trying to figure stuff out. This gets run over. I remember what he was told, which was nothing. You know, he shot his regular mph twice a day, and Mike was the guy that got dizzy, and we didn't let him drive after five o'clock if we all went out together, because he would inevitably, like, swerve off the road. He just wasn't that person prior to that. And then, you know, there's no, no real good advice from his doctors, no real good advice from his family. They don't know what the hell like. You know, they're not they're not. They don't know what to do. And he just like, I don't know. He just his life changed. And I take hear you say that you know you heard something here that helped you. Makes me think that other people will too.

Renee 29:54
I mean, I think I have a huge responsibility to take care of myself, to be healthy.

Scott Benner 30:00
Healthy, right? I agree.

Renee 30:03
So, yeah, I'm part of that right now. Is listening to your podcast

Scott Benner 30:06
awesome, but, but again, do you think maybe you feel that way because your close friend got lupus and passed, and you've seen disease take people where there was nothing they could do to slow it down? Like you feel like you have an opportunity here that they didn't have, is that, right? Absolutely? Yeah, well, that's

Renee 30:23
perfect, absolutely. And, I mean, I know that there are a lot of complications with diabetes. I told you, I'm 66 and I have no complications. I mean, I've been going to the same ophthalmologist for 3030, years now, and I saw him two months ago, and he goes, wouldn't know you were diabetic. Renee, by looking in your eyes.

Scott Benner 30:45
Say, Thank you. I appreciate that. That's what we're shooting for over here. Yeah,

Renee 30:50
and you know, Dr Weber, when I turned 60, so you know, six years ago, she walked into the room and she said, Hey, I bet when you were diagnosed, they told you that you wouldn't live this long. And I was shocked when she said that, because that is what I was told. And I just looked at her and I said, Yes. And she goes, Well, I'm just telling you, you and Mark, need to continue planning. You've got a long life to live. That's

Scott Benner 31:13
awesome. Hey, listen, there's an episode in this podcast where a lady was, you know, long time ago, decades ago, at college, when she was diagnosed, and her doctor that diagnosed her told her to quit school and go home because she wouldn't live very long. Wasn't going to be part of the workforce, and no man was going to want her. Those are like quotes that's in our lifetime. It's in your lifetime that somebody was told that. So it's just that things change so drastically, you know, and people's understandings, I mean, it's what it is. It's the it's the faster acting insulin, it's better delivery system, and it's glucose monitoring. Those are the things, right? Yeah, yeah. And then now, the idea now is to, like, you have to get that out into the world so that people understand it. That seems to be the slipping point, because, you know, for you and the other people listening, you know, it's great, we all know, but there's far more people living with type one diabetes who don't know anything about this. Like I'm continually stunned by the sheer number of people who tell me that just the idea of pre bolusing for their meals, that how much that changed their life, and that no one ever said that to them before. That means that no one ever discussed with them the timing of their insulin. So they don't know how the insulin works, and they're using it multiple times a day. I don't know how that happens, you know, but it does,

Renee 32:33
right? One of your tips that I use is work from home. I'm not working. I've retired now, but after lunch, if I would get a little bit high, and I would go for what you call free insulin, I would just go for a walk around the block a few times. Yes,

Scott Benner 32:49
take a walk. Let's see the blood sugar come down a little bit. That's something that I'm sure I would have picked up along the way. But I remember the first time somebody said it, and I thought, oh, that really works. That's crazy. Like, I didn't know, like, I didn't know any of the things when it started. You know what? I mean, it's a completely new world. But then there was this guy, Manny, and he starts this thing called the Big Blue Test. And he just went online, said, everybody test your blood sugar, and then go for a walk and then come back and test it again, and then come back online and write it down. And everybody did that. And I was like, Oh, now walking around, major blood sugar go down. Awesome.

Renee 33:22
Yeah. And Scott, you know, of course, you're always talking about Orton's blood sugar, you know, because you follow it. And my husband follows mine too. So he would be at the office at work, and I'm here, and he, he'll text me, your blood sugar's high. You need to go outside for a walk. He's

Scott Benner 33:38
trying to stay alive and do some stuff. I mean, you're you're retired at 66 That sounds nice. I might do that. Can I do that? I would like to do that. How, when did you How old were you when you retired? I was 64 did you do it willingly, like, excitedly, or was it a thing where they were like, Okay, that's enough of you. Renee, no, yes, I did it willingly. Are you enjoying the time?

Renee 34:00
Oh, absolutely. And my husband just retired. Nice, that's lovely. Yeah, yes, he retired a little bit early, just because you never know what's going to happen, right?

Scott Benner 34:11
Yeah, you want to spend time, right? Like times, most it's the only thing you really have. Are you guys traveling? Or are you what are you doing? He

Renee 34:19
retired in March, and we just got back from a three week trip to Switzerland and Germany.

Scott Benner 34:24
See, that's what I want to do. That sounds right. Okay, all right. That's

Renee 34:28
my did. Okay. We walked about 20,000 steps a day, so I did pretty good with my

Scott Benner 34:34
blood sugars. Did you have lows you had to work on? Yes,

Renee 34:38
and some highs, just because, just eating different things that I normally don't eat wasn't quite sure about the carbohydrates and so but it was good

Scott Benner 34:48
41 years later. Does that hurt your time, the time you had on your trip? Like, what do I mean? Like, do you sit down at dinner, at lunch in Switzerland and think, oh, here we go. I don't. Out of Bolus for this. This sucks, or Does it almost feel like a game? Are you sort of, like, I wonder if I get this right, like, is it still, is it impacting you? I guess

Renee 35:08
again, I know I would make, I would try to make good decisions about what carbohydrates I was going to eat. I did. It's hard to stay away from breads

Scott Benner 35:19
because you love bread? Oh, I did,

Renee 35:21
but I wouldn't say it's a constant reminder every time I have to Bolus, but I mean, it is part of what you have to do, right?

Scott Benner 35:30
I'm wondering, is it like, is every meal still like, oh, I have diabetes, or do you not think of it that way? No, I don't think of it that way. Okay, Arden and I sat down to eat yesterday together, and we were talking, so, you know, we were just chatting, and, you know, like you would, and we got caught up in the conversation. And the food arrived, and she picked up her fork and she started eating. And I watched her go, uh, and let not like, disgustedly, just like she remembered. And she picked up her phone, and I said, What's wrong? She goes, I have diabetes. I forgot. And and so she gave herself some insulin and put her phone back down, and then we started eating.

Renee 36:07
That's a beautiful thing. I have diabetes and I forgot. Yeah, it doesn't

Scott Benner 36:11
seem like it burdens or now there are times when it does, like, you know, like, there's times when I

Renee 36:16
Yeah, right. I don't want you to think every day of my life I'm like, I have diabetes. I mean, there are definitely times where it's like, Ugh, this grind, right? And it's that's usually spells of, you know, when I'm high for a few days and can't figure out why, or, you know, whatever. But I mean, overall, again, I'm not going to complain about having diabetes, I try not to complain. Try not

Scott Benner 36:44
so you had a nice trip. You walked around. What'd you keep with you? In case you got low glucose tablets, you just go with the tablets,

Renee 36:50
tablets. And I did, I mean, depending on where we were going and what we were doing, I did have protein bars. Okay, okay, I'm gonna conf. I do have a confession? Okay, go ahead in Europe. So I talked to my endocrinologist, I mean, long discussions about, what do I need to bring in case there's failures of anything? So I do have a backup controller. I always have that with me. And we talked about, you know, she said, Now, Renee, if your pod malfunctions, you've got two hours. So she said, if you're going to be hiking, I want you always to have an extra pod with you. So I'm like, okay, so bought a special purse so that I could, you know, have that with me at all times, Scott, we were going to something called Young foul, and it was a two hour train wide up there, and we were going to spend an hour, and then we were coming back down. We were on the last connecting train when my pod malfunctions, and I realized I had switched purses and forgot to put an extra pod. Why

Scott Benner 37:57
do you ladies switch purses so often? I don't understand.

Renee 38:02
So I told I said, Mark, and it's pretty it was, it's expensive to go up to young foul. And I said, Mark, I mean, he heard it. He's like, is that your pod malfunction? I said, Yes. And I said, we need to go back down.

Scott Benner 38:15
And he said, there's a doctor.

Renee 38:19
You we've spent too much money on these we're going up. He said, You're going to have to figure out a way to stay active. Okay, so, Scott, we get on the train, and there's these three steps to the train. For an hour up the mountain. I just walked those steps, and my blood sugar was 140 when I got on that train. It was 80.

Scott Benner 38:42
You're like, I'll get it down, even without the insulin.

Renee 38:45
And I told him, I said, Okay, when we get to junfrau, we're not taking any elevators or escalator like we're taking stairs. I mean, it was crazy. Scott and I was not scared, for some reason. It was probably the stupidest decision we've

Scott Benner 39:02
ever made in my life. How many hours were you out after the pot expired? About three and a half. Well, so listen, had you had insulin recently before the before it aired?

Renee 39:13
No, but I had just bought a sandwich for us to eat on the train up, but I was waiting, you know, we were waiting to get on the train, and so fortunately, more importantly, I had not had any food. Oh,

Scott Benner 39:25
okay, so is it earlier in the day you hadn't eaten yet? No,

Renee 39:29
that was going to be our lunch. So that this is probably because about 1231 o'clock,

Scott Benner 39:36
yeah, which pump are you using, dash or using Omnipod five? Omnipod five. Omnipod five. Okay, well, I mean, listen, you have some active insulin going, I would imagine, right? And you're active and you didn't eat anything, so that doesn't it makes sense to me, but

Renee 39:52
by the time you malfunction, you can't see how much active insulin you have. That goes away. Oh,

Scott Benner 39:56
okay, so you're just like, Well, I hope there's some in there that's worked. Me, yeah, so

Renee 40:01
anyway, I mean, I stayed real. I mean, we took stairs. I was like, you know, if we were waiting for something, I'd run up and down the stairs a few times. It was crazy. And then when we got back on the train, coming down, I think my blood sugar was about 120 and I told Mark, okay, we're two hours. I'm just gonna let it go. And once or twice I did get up because I was like, oh, that's creeping up fast. But I was 220 when I got back to the hotel.

Scott Benner 40:28
Okay, I mean, and that's without and now you hadn't had insulin a number of hours at that point. Yes. And how did you feel? I

Renee 40:34
felt fine. I was actually kind of excited to tell you the truth that I was able to keep it down

Scott Benner 40:39
and manage all that. Yeah, he felt, felt accomplished, I imagine, yeah, yeah. Hey, listen, I've seen Arden do that before, like, half an hour left in a movie, and she's got a good blood sugar, and you get a failure. And I'm like, we can go, and she's like, it'll be all right. And I'm like, yeah. She goes, No, yeah. And I've seen it be all right. I've seen it be, you know, you get home and, you know, you change a pump, and it wasn't bad. And I've, I've also seen it like, you know, in different scenarios, like shoot up, not so good. But in the end, I mean, I'm not, I'm not a person out there advocating for you not having insulin. I want you having insulin constantly. But there's a lot of people on this podcast don't take insulin for days, you know what I mean? And it's not a thing that I would tell them to do, but a couple hours maybe, and you're heading up to the thing, and I think you did okay. You know, were you nervous

Renee 41:30
at the very beginning? I was, but until I started doing those steps and I realized, Okay, I can't keep it down if I stay really active.

Scott Benner 41:39
Like, keep out the carbs stay active, right? Like and do your but hey, it worked out for you. That's

Renee 41:43
awesome. I'm sure people were going, what is that old lady?

Scott Benner 41:48
We were on the train, and a crazy old woman just kept walking up and down these three steps. Her husband just glared at her, like, he must, he must see this crazy activity all the time. You're like, over there trying to stay alive. Where's your next trip to

Renee 42:02
well, I'm heading to Louisiana next week to take care of my mother, and then we're going to Michigan this summer for a month. Nice look at you getting around escape the heat of South Carolina.

Scott Benner 42:13
Honestly, my only goal in life is to just be able to escape the weather. As I get older, I think that really is like the thing I'm working toward. I put no pieces in place yet, but I would like to be able to be somewhere slightly warmer when it's cold and slightly colder when it's hot. These are my only real goals. Obviously, you're retired like but what do you do for insurance? Then, once you're retired? Is it Medicare?

Renee 42:35
Obama, Medicare now, Scott, which, sorry, I'm not giving a plug for Medicare. It was the hardest thing. I wish I had stayed on my husband's insurance until

Scott Benner 42:44
he had retired. Not a pleasant experience. And

Renee 42:48
so I've been on my husband's insurance. And yeah, oh, it was, it was, it's been a nightmare.

Scott Benner 42:53
Why? Dealing with them or what they cover, or what they don't,

Renee 42:57
dealing with them, and it was definitely more expensive, the supplies more expensive than staying on my husband's income. But now the continuous glucose monitor is considered durable medical so now I don't pay anything for it, so that has helped. But the pods, I used to pay $100 a quarter, and now I pay $800 a quarter.

Scott Benner 43:20
Really, wow. Medicare. Way to go. You turned your $400 insulin pumps into $2,500 insulin pumps. Thanks a lot. Is that a thing you found yourself thinking about through adulthood, like, I'm gonna retire one day I'm gonna need like, were you saving money? Like, just for this, or I don't know what your situation was. No, no, I'm sorry I will

Renee 43:42
tell you I have a great supply of diabetes

Scott Benner 43:45
supplies. You've been stuffing stuff in a closet for a while. Yes, sir. You know, I don't know anything about anything, but like I hear you Dad sells the sugar cane farm. I figure you're all just rich southern ladies now running around, but that's not the case. No, okay, you're not in big camisoles, holding umbrellas and sipping tea on the patio. No. Renee, what happened to the American dream? Your dad was not able to sell that to a giant conglomerate.

Renee 44:19
I've had a very good life. Scott, no, I imagine that's one thing I will tell you. When I was diagnosed, I remember the doctor saying, telling my dad, he said, you know, Pete Renee is very fortunate, because diabetes is an expensive disease. To have it, you have to have the knowledge on to be able to manage it, yeah, and, and she has both, so

Scott Benner 44:40
a little bit of luck along the way doesn't hurt. I mean, the expense part, I don't know what to say about that, or what to do about that. You know, like I said earlier, there are people who, you know, don't know anything about the stuff we talk about in the podcast, but some of those same people also don't have any access to insulin pumps or, you know, CGM, but if

Renee 44:59
they're on. Medicare. I mean, Medicare does have a program for low income people, yeah, so if they want to be on it, there's a way for them to I think, but I don't

Scott Benner 45:10
know, yeah, I don't disagree with you. I just think that when things are difficult to accomplish, that a lot of people will throw up their hands and stop before they get to it. So

Renee 45:18
it's a fight. Medicare has been a bite. Yeah, I mean, it's perseverance to say

Scott Benner 45:24
the least. So I want you to be able to go to the doctor and the doctor say, hey, look, you should have a CGM. You should have this insulin pump. I have insulin, and this is just going to happen. Now. You don't have to call an office or fill out a form or, like, you know, like, do a, like, jump through a bunch of hoops, like, just here, here's the CGM. So, like, we'll pay I don't know why things, I mean, I guess I do understand why, but it would be nice if things were just set up in a more automated way.

Renee 45:48
Yeah, and Scott, why? Pre authorization every year? That's ridiculous. I've hit diabetes for 41 years. It's not going to go away.

Scott Benner 45:55
Yeah, every year you have to tell somebody you have type one diabetes again, as if ridiculous. Yeah, now that that's the little stuff that I mean. Like, you think about the people who don't have the tools or the time to fight the fight, and then they don't get a CGM, and look at what it did for you, you know, like, look what that CGM did for you. It showed you a world that you didn't know existed and allowed you to completely change how you took care of yourself for the better, to the point where your doctor's telling you, like, hey, you know you're going to be around a really good long time. Everybody deserves that. Yes, you do. You know, I don't. I'm not a person who thinks everything should be free, but at the same time, like, what is there, like, 1.8 million people that have type one diabetes? Like, we can't just get them CGM. Is it that crazy? You know, everybody's got a goddamn, uh, DVR. Everybody on the on the planet's walking around with a cell phone. We can't get, like, you know, a couple million type ones, CGM or pumps or whatever they want. And if they don't want it, then fair enough. But they should have the opportunity, and it shouldn't be. It just shouldn't be a fight to

Renee 46:59
get to it. Now, I have an acquaintance who she's a little bit older than I am. She's probably 68 and she has had type one since she was a toddler. And Scott, she refuses to get on a continuous glucose monitor and a

Scott Benner 47:16
pot or a pump. Why do you think? Has she told you why? And she is, has

Renee 47:21
every complication that you can think of. And again, she's an acquaintance. I haven't I've had only brief conversations with her, but she's just not interested. She goes, this is how I've managed it my whole life. It's how I want to continue to manage it. Well, okay. Like,

Scott Benner 47:35
I don't get it. Well, yeah, but her perspective is different, like, so she thinks likely that the things that have happened to her, her complications, are what what happens? I bet you, if I talk to her, she'd say, Well, I have diabetes. So this is what happens. Because to her, this is what happens. She just didn't have the same dumb luck you had for a while. Like she didn't get the doctor who said, Hey, why don't you test after you eat and give yourself more insulin? That's probably the whole difference. Like that guy probably saved you back then, just saying that

Renee 48:04
he because he was my endocrinologist for only two years. But I guess that

Scott Benner 48:09
one statement that probably something pretty impactful, right? That's what I think. I think that one statement saved your bacon. Like, the whole way, like, because you didn't, you were bringing high blood sugars down when, when she probably wasn't. And now all these years later, she's like, look, what am I gonna do? Put this sensor on and find out this thing's all over the place. I've got these effects. They're not gonna go back. She probably thinks there's no way to, like, turn the clock back. And there probably isn't, for most of it, although there have been people on here before, older people who, you know, I think a Mike who came on and talked about, you know, his his vision was just shot, and now he He's fine. He said, All I did was find the podcast, learn how to use insulin, you know, got my blood sugar down and, you know, now my site's better, like that kind of stuff is, you know. So maybe she would get some help from it. But, well, thank

Renee 48:57
you for helping me see her perspective. Because, oops, you hear that?

Scott Benner 49:03
Oh, I didn't hear the beef, but something Did something go wrong. I'm 151 I'm a little high. Are you nervous? No, no, well, yes, so I was nervous at the beginning. Yeah, might be a little adrenaline, damn.

Renee 49:16
Was very nervous at the beginning. Now

Scott Benner 49:19
you feel okay, yeah, okay. Well, go back. Then we're ending. Now that it's almost over, I'm like, this is easy. No, but go back. You were, you were congratulating me on helping you. Go back to that.

Renee 49:30
I tend to see everything through my lens, and didn't even think about her lens. So it gives me a I'll just use the word a little bit more compassion for her,

Scott Benner 49:40
I think it's easy to think that people who aren't doing something are willfully not doing it because they don't care, or as much as I care, or they don't understand the way I understand, but everything is perspective, and I think everything is just luck, like who you intersected. I'm telling you you intersected that one Doctor Who. Who told you not to sit around and stare at high blood sugars, get up and test and give yourself insulin if you're high, I guarantee that saved you. And nobody told her that, or they told her. And she was like, ah, you know, like, That's not important. And nobody knows my friend Mike's not like, he's not running around trying to kill himself. He was working really hard at having diabetes. It was a thing he was constantly putting effort into. I never saw him ignore one time he did it. One time he almost went on strike. I don't know another way to say it. I just got a call from his mom. Hey, Mike's in the hospital, and I went and saw him. I was like, Wait, what happened? And he just told me he goes. I just, I didn't want to have diabetes, and I just, I just stopped for a few days. He just didn't take any insulin, and it obviously put him in DK, and caught up to him pretty quickly. He didn't do it again. But, you know, other than that, he was always working at it. He never went out without his kit. Always had his insulin with him, took care of himself, did what he was supposed to do, was doing everything he was being told. The problem was the things he was being told were not helpful. Maybe they were the best that the doctor had at the time. I'm not saying that otherwise, but it wasn't enough, like you got that one extra thing, that one silly thing. And like, now, I hope the podcast is doing that for other people. I hope they're hearing things that just give them another, you know, another chance or another, you know, five years of not having to worry about something down the road, or maybe there'll be a bunch of people one day or being told like, Oh my God, you're doing great. You're 66 go enjoy your retirement. And maybe one of those people will sit there and think like, I found that dumb podcast all those years ago, and it helped me being in the position I'm in, which is trying to deliver and try to imagine this like you're wherever you are right now. I'm in New Jersey. I'm just in a spare room in my house, right? And I'm trying to, like, find a way to find people, to get them to listen, to have them understand, to let them absorb, so that hopefully they'll fold some of these ideas into their day to day, so that hopefully they'll have better outcomes or an easier life. Like the pathway just to try to get somebody to listen is impossible once they listen, to get them to understand once they understand, to get them to incorporate. Like, I don't know how you're supposed to do all that. And you think back 40 years ago, you went to the doctor and what they said a couple of things to you, and it stuck to you, or it didn't, and it was valuable or it wasn't, and then you go off, and the randomness of the world, you know, writes your story for you. So I don't know, you got lucky. What was that doctor's name Weber?

Renee 52:34
Well, no, Dr Weber is my endocrinologist here, and you know, it's as you've been. And I thought, Oh, he was probably in his 60s at the time, and this was 30 years ago. Oh, okay, so no longer than that, probably 35 years ago. So, but I don't remember his name. He's the one endocrinologist that I don't remember his name. Isn't that funny?

Scott Benner 52:54
Yeah. Well, a nameless Doctor, I'm telling you, he helped you, and now you're like, you're awesome. Now he helped you. You're helping yourself. The technology is helping you. Know you're helping Scott I didn't want to say that because it sounds self serving, but obviously I'm helping Renee, thank you. Yeah, I don't know if you hear my sarcasm or not, because you're from the south, I can't tell I hear it awesome.

Renee 53:17
I hear it. I hear it on the podcast.

Scott Benner 53:19
Awesome. Yeah, you. Like the show, right? Yeah,

Renee 53:22
awesome. That's great. I really appreciate it.

Scott Benner 53:25
I appreciate that you that you found it. Hey, can you drive a tractor? I'm sorry, can you drive a tractor? I've never driven a tractor. You've never driven a tractor. You just point out there. You're like, that, man, he he makes the sugar stuff come in the house, and we're all good to have a lot of pets growing up?

Renee 53:42
Not. We had an outdoor dog and two outdoor cats to keep the mice from coming into the house.

Scott Benner 53:50
That was it. How about horse? Were there horse around? We

Renee 53:53
had chickens and cows when my grandfather was alive, but when he passed away, that was that the pasture pretty much sat empty. Gotcha,

Scott Benner 54:03
you were not that connected to the farm, other than living on it. Is that right? Right? Yeah. Okay. How about your mom? Did she care? Like, or was she busy, like, doing the things like, did you grow up in that world where your mom was cooking all the time and taking care of your father and that kind of stuff?

Renee 54:19
Yes, like every day when we got home from school, there was a fresh baked, hot out the oven snack.

Scott Benner 54:27
Every day, every day I would take that, that sounds nice,

Renee 54:33
yes. So my mom was a stay at home mother, and yes, and

Scott Benner 54:38
she's alive today. She is. How old is she? 95 Wow. Like, got her wits about her 95 or he

Renee 54:46
does. Yeah, she has arthritis, kind of head to toe, but, I mean, she's pretty sharp.

Scott Benner 54:51
No kidding, they got her loaded up on stuff. How does she deal with the pain? It's your mom, high as a kite. What's going on over there? Renee,

Renee 54:57
well, actually, I will tell you, it's funny, mom can. She thinks me having diabetes is her fault, and still, I'm like,

Scott Benner 55:05
Mom, really, yes, I'm like, Mom, it's not your fault. 41 years you're gonna go visit your mother, and she's gonna be like, I'm so sorry about what I did deal with the diabetes.

Renee 55:16
Yes, she just can't understand that it's not genetic.

Scott Benner 55:21
Oh, Renee, I'm going to tell you right now that every mom listening right now who thought one day that mom guilt they had was going to go away, they just deflated in their car. They just went, Oh, it's not going to stop ever. Sorry. Sorry, ladies, you'll be 95 blaming yourself for stuff. Go enjoy yourself. Oh, my God. Oh, the one reason I'm happy to be a boy is because I don't have that seriously, I see you ladies struggle with that is, it's terrible. Like, I watch my wife all the time. Are they okay? Is everything fine? I'm like, Kelly, they're fine. Like every day she asks me, like like, every day she asks me about my kids, as if they're two years old and we lost them at the park for an hour and a half. Are they okay? Did anybody say anything? Like, I'm like, no, they're fine. I say he went to work today, he came home. He's okay. How's Arden? She's fine. Did she say anything? Is she all right? Like, I don't that guilt. Dear God, You dodged a bullet on that one. Renee, I'm gonna tell you that right now. Also, I had an aunt Renee. She never had kids either. Think it's the name, maybe it's the name. Wow, does she spell it R, E, N, E, E, she spells it exactly like yours. Okay, good, good. You're like, there the way it should be, damn it.

Renee 56:42
Spell it, that's right. R, E, N, E is masculine.

Scott Benner 56:46
Spell it, right. I'm gonna let you go in a second. But what made you want to do this?

Renee 56:50
There was a stretch where I was listening and everybody was so doom and gloom about having diabetes, and I just wanted, I just want to share my story with you, but again, I feel like it's a disease that we can manage, and there are so many that you can't. And so I just wanted to encourage other people who have the disease to take care of themselves the best that they can, so that they can have a long, full life.

Scott Benner 57:17
So just get out there and keep trying and get good information and do your best to apply it and keep going, yes, yeah, oh, it's lovely. I'm glad you did that. Thank you. I hope you appreciate that. I didn't ask you any of the questions I had about lobbying for sugar, because I had real serious questions about it, but it didn't seem like a thing you would want to share. So I didn't ask you, but I would be super interested

Renee 57:40
sometime. We can take that off record if you want. Excellent. All right, hold on one second for me. Thank you.

Scott Benner 57:52
Thanks for tuning in today, and thanks to Medtronic diabetes for sponsoring this episode. We've been talking about Medtronic mini med 780 G system today, an automated insulin delivery system that helps make diabetes management easier day and night, whether it's their meal detection technology or the Medtronic extended infusion set, it all comes together to simplify life with diabetes. Go find out more at my link, Medtronic diabetes.com/juicebox having an easy to use and accurate blood glucose meter is just one click away. Contour next.com/juicebox That's right. Today's episode is sponsored by the contour next gen blood glucose meter. It was sponsored by the twist a ID system powered by tide pool, if you want a commercially available insulin pump with twist loop that offers unmatched personalization and precision or peace of mind, you want twist, twist.com/juicebox,

okay. Well, here we are at the end of the episode. You're still with me. Thank you. I really do appreciate that. What else could you do for me? Why don't you tell a friend about the show or leave a five star review? Maybe you could make sure you're following or subscribe in your podcast app, go to YouTube and follow me, or Instagram. Tiktok. Oh gosh, here's one. Make sure you're following the podcast in the private Facebook group as well as the public Facebook page you don't want to miss, please. You not know about the private group. You have to join the private group as of this recording, it has 51,000 members in it. They're active talking about diabetes, whatever you need to know. There's a conversation happening in there right now, and I'm there all the time. Tag me. I'll say hi. My diabetes Pro Tip series is about cutting through the clutter of diabetes management to give you the straightforward, practical insights that truly make a difference, this series is all about mastering the fundamentals, whether it's the basics of insulin dosing adjustments or everyday management strategies that will empower you to take control you. I'm joined by Jenny Smith, who is a diabetes educator with over 35 years of personal experience, and we break down complex concepts into simple, actionable tips. The Diabetes Pro Tip series runs between Episode 1001 1025 in your podcast player, where you can listen to it at Juicebox podcast.com by going up into the menu, the episode you just heard was professionally edited by wrong way recording, wrongway recording.com, you.

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