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Scott Benner 0:00
Hello friends, and welcome to episode 1032 of the Juicebox Podcast.

On this episode I'll be speaking with Liberty she has type one diabetes. She also has an interesting story about her husband, who passed away just prior to us recording this episode. While you're listening, please remember that 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. We're becoming bold with insulin. If you're looking for Dexcom you're looking for dexcom.com forward slash juice box. If you'd like to get yourself a nominee pod Omni pod.com forward slash juice box to save 40% off your entire order at cozy earth.com Just use the offer code juice box at checkout. And of course, five free travel packs and a year supply of Vitamin D is what you get with your first order at drink ag one.com forward slash juice box. If you're looking for community around diabetes, I hope you check out Juicebox Podcast type one diabetes on Facebook. It is a completely free but private group that has over 42,000 members.

Today's episode of The Juicebox Podcast is sponsored by the contour next gen blood glucose meter contour next.com forward slash juicebox get the same terrific meter that my daughter uses. It's accurate and lovely. And after you see it, you're gonna ask yourself why delay wait so long contour next one.com forward slash Juicebox Podcast is also sponsored today by better help. You can save 10% off your first month of therapy with my link better help.com forward slash juicebox it's time to take care of yourself get better help.

Liberty 2:08
My name is Liberty. I've been type one diabetic since I was 14 years old back in 1989. So that was 33 years ago. I don't want to have to make you do math so that I know how bad you are at it.

Scott Benner 2:21
It's unfair. Are you 45? Okay.

Liberty 2:24
No, I wish Wait. You're a couple of years. You're a couple years off. But I'm not going to tell you which way

Scott Benner 2:30
right that's fine. I think you're older. I just tried to do the math because I knew when I graduated. So anyway, not the point. You're

Liberty 2:37
I'm 47 but there there's the answer. But anyway. Yeah, so I've had diabetes for 33 years. My I actually grew up with it in my house, because my mom was diagnosed with it when she was pregnant with me. Unfortunately, she was misdiagnosed and didn't find out. It was type one until maybe 10 years ago, but she took care of it like it was type one. So I've been around the needles and insulin my whole life.

Scott Benner 3:08
Did they tell your mom Originally she was gestational?

Liberty 3:11
Yes, they did. And then she went into a coma six months later passed out for three days. She was in the hospital in a coma for three days. And after that they told her she was type two. Oh, he was only Yeah, she was only 30 years old at the time.

Scott Benner 3:26
As you heard earlier, this episode of the podcast is sponsored by the contour next gen blood glucose meter. But when you get a contour meter, what you're really getting is their test strips. Contour next test strips feature remarkable accuracy as part of the contour next blood glucose monitoring system. They're the number one branded over the counter test strips. And they of course have Second Chance sampling. Second Chance sampling can help you to avoid wasted strips, contour next.com forward slash juicebox. Near the top of the page, you'll see a Buy Now button it's bright yellow. When you click on that, you'll get eight options of places online to buy contour meters and test strips walmart.com Amazon Walgreens CVS pharmacy, Meijer, Kroger target Rite Aid. These are all links you'll find at my link linking the link links blink blink blink link. I'm just getting head over there. Now once you please listen, the contour meters are incredibly accurate. They are simple to use. They're easy to hold, easy to read, and they have a bright light for nighttime testing. Part of me wants to say that the second chance sampling is the biggest deal but honestly, it's the accuracy. These meters are accurate. And I know a lot of people like to think well I have a CGM. I don't need a meter. You do. You need a meter. You need to be accurate. You deserve it to be accurate contour annex.com forward slash juicebox. Take a look at the contour next gen and the other meters available from contour. We use my links you're supporting the production of the Show and helping to keep it free and plentiful. And so she lived with a type two diagnosis but used insulin.

Liberty 5:08
Yep. Yeah, you wouldn't believe how hard it was for her to get the type one diagnosis to, because I kept telling her because I'm like, Mom, you know, you got it when you were 30. You know, it's so common for people to get it when they're pregnant just because of the stress on the body. You know, and she wasn't like, you know, her diet wasn't bad. She wasn't overweight, or you know, there was no really reason why she should have been type two and just the way it came on with the sudden. And so I told her to tell her doctor to get tested. And he wouldn't do it. He said, I was playing Dr. Google.

Scott Benner 5:43
I think I think doctors get nervous that we can actually be decent doctors with Google Now.

Liberty 5:49
But she, she put her foot down. She was a strong woman. And she put her foot down and got the the tests done, and the doctor had to eat his words. With the antibodies. Yeah.

Scott Benner 6:00
What did you give her a C peptide test?

Liberty 6:02
Yeah, something like that. He gave her the test. And it came back that she had the antibodies and she wasn't making insulin. And yeah, basically, she was type one diabetic.

Scott Benner 6:11
And that was just recently that she got that? No, no,

Liberty 6:15
that was about 10 years ago. But you know, what's funny is her brother got diagnosed correctly with type one diabetes when he was 50. And I had it and they still didn't think she had it. Yeah,

Scott Benner 6:28
that just sounds like hard headed.

Liberty 6:31
That's crazy. Yeah. So anyway, we're here to talk about my husband, my mom, my late husband. He was also a type one diabetic. He was also diagnosed. Yeah, I've got a lot of good diabetes stories.

Scott Benner 6:44
Liberty. Oh, hold on. Let me let me let me walk you through it. Let's take our time. Okay. All right. So you're 14 When you're diagnosed. And you meet your you meet your husband, when How old were you when you met?

Liberty 6:57
I was 30 years old are 3232 when we met at work, yeah.

Scott Benner 7:03
Okay, so you had had diabetes? almost 20 years when you met him? Oh, yeah. Okay. How would you say that those first 20 Years went for you?

Liberty 7:11
Not good. Yeah, I was really against the diabetes diagnosis. I did not accept it. I even went for a period where I didn't see a doctor for seven years, I would get all of my insulin over the counter. I would get regular and mph and just take it how they told me how to take it. And I didn't even check my blood sugar or anything through that whole time. I don't think it just went by how I felt. Yeah, it's amazing. I'm not as messed up, as you know. I think you know, yeah. Could be Yeah,

Scott Benner 7:43
I am going to say I want the newer, newer, newer diagnosed people listening. Do you think they just heard that you used to be able to buy insulin over the counter, and they were probably freaked out? What was it like? $20? A vial?

Liberty 7:55
Yeah, yeah. 25 Yeah. $25 for my end, $25 for my car. You know, the insulin syringes? I just reuse them.

Scott Benner 8:05
What did you do for syringes? Because you needed back then you need the script for the orange but not for the insulin right?

Liberty 8:11
No, I never needed a scrip for anything. No, the but I had a big ol box of syringes that I would make last anyway. But the if I would show them I had insulin and I took it and they would give me the syringes. But I grew up in a small town too. So

Scott Benner 8:25
yeah, okay. You said you were I guess what do you mean by your ignoring the diagnosis? Is that like a psychological thing? Like you just didn't want it to be true? Or I

Liberty 8:36
didn't want it? Yeah, I didn't want to be different. So I just wanted to think about diabetes, like twice a day when I take my insulin and that's it and then just live my life. Okay, like I didn't have it

Scott Benner 8:46
and somehow going to a physician would have would have been you agreeing that you had it?

Liberty 8:54
No, when I was first diagnosed, I was my mother had me go to this primary care physician and she was a general practitioner. What she wasn't it endo or anything like that. And when my blood sugar's were all off the charts and all over the place. And I was having problems managing it, she would reprimand me, she would tell me that, I'm not going to be able to have kids and I'm going to lose a leg and all that gloom and doom stuff that they always tell you, so I didn't even want to hear it. So it got me to the point where I didn't even want to go to the doctor because that's what I thought what I was that that I was going to hear. I see. I see. You know, and I just didn't want to deal with it. So

Scott Benner 9:36
were there any junctures where you got an A one C done or anything like blood work, or you just No,

Liberty 9:43
no, the first day you want to see I got done actually. I did go on the Medtronic pump back in 2000. The 506 I want to say, and then at work, I changed jobs, and I went you union and the union insurance surprisingly, was worse. So they didn't cover an insulin pump back then. So I actually part of that reason where I didn't go to the doctor was I got pissed off at the insurance companies and the doctors and I was like, you know, I was young and stupid. So and I was like, Well, you know, they want me to dive in. So I'm just not gonna look after it, then, you know, this is ridiculous. They don't want to pay for the stuff I need. You know, I just got mad and stupid about it. I got my agency done the seventh back then, when I was on the Medtronic, Medtronic pump for the first time. The only time I ended up going back to the doctor was when I was with my husband the first year and we wanted to have kids, and I couldn't get pregnant. So I went back to the doctor, and he says, Well, you gotta get your blood sugar's under control in order to conceive. So you're just gonna have to, you know, deal with it. And by then I was older and more willing, and that's what started my journey to better health.

Scott Benner 10:57
give any other autoimmune diseases? Yes, I

Liberty 11:00
have Hashimotos give ADHD? I might. I already. I've never. I've never been diagnosed with

Scott Benner 11:08
it. I already wrote down thyroid and ADHD, I was building my own list of what I thought you might have while you were my

Liberty 11:16
daughter was actually just diagnosed with it. And I even told the therapist, I said, I might have it, but I've never been diagnosed with them. I know. It's hard for them to diagnose adults, so I just deal with it.

Scott Benner 11:29
So what's your like lineage? What's your background?

Liberty 11:33
I am mostly German, English a little bit. It's Swedish. Not not much. But it's mostly German. My my, in fact, my grandparents came over from the homeland. So I'm like, third generation.

Scott Benner 11:47
Gotcha. And so obviously, you were able to get things together. You just said you have a daughter? How many kids do you have?

Liberty 11:52
Just the one one,

Scott Benner 11:53
how old? Is she? Yep.

Liberty 11:55
She's going to be 13. In May.

Scott Benner 11:58
That's a great age. Okay, so I guess now that I feel like I understand your background a little bit. We'll move on to why you want to come on the podcast. Okay, so I'm so sorry. Like, already. I feel badly. But you reached out to me Let everyone remember that. While they're listening that while liberty is talking, she asked to be on the podcast, right liberty, but that's Oh, yeah. Well,

Liberty 12:17
you know, people should know about this aspect. You know, it's hard. This stuff happens, you know, and it's, it's just something you need to know if you got to, you need to know this stuff to live with this disease.

Scott Benner 12:30
So you're at work one day you meet this guy. You start having a relationship. How long did you date?

Liberty 12:36
We dated about a year. And he was a quick relationship. Yeah, he had. He told me he had type two diabetes. He was diagnosed with type two diabetes. He was in the army. He was a paratrooper.

Scott Benner 12:46
Okay. How old were you? When you guys met? How old were you? I was 32. How about him?

Liberty 12:54
He was 39.

Scott Benner 12:56
I had you pegged as being with an older guy. I don't know why.

Liberty 13:00
That's perfect. Oh, nice. Yeah. You started nine years older?

Scott Benner 13:03
Yeah, no, I'm just saying I'm impressed with my introduction. About you, Liberty, I'm telling you that I'm

Liberty 13:12
looking put your crystal ball away.

Scott Benner 13:15
You'll just tell me. So you guys just tell you you meet your data for you got married? Yeah, what year did you get married?

Liberty 13:24
We got married in 2008.

Scott Benner 13:27
Okay, so at the moment you meet him? He says he has type two diabetes? Did he figure out? He didn't have type two? Or did you figure it out?

Liberty 13:34
No, that was me. So he he was on Metformin. He wasn't even on insulin, when I met him. And the doctors were putting him on all these different drugs. I had no clue that he had type one at first, just because the meds seemed to be kind of working for him. You know, he was they put them on glipizide. They put them on all these different drugs to try to and then most of the doctors thought he was non compliant, which I could see why because he was kind of pigheaded. And he was non compliant for the most part, but there was one time where he was really wanting to get his stuff under control. So we went on the keto diet, I even went on it with him. We went on the keto diet, because I'd read it was really good protect us. We were on that diet for two years. And he actually got his blood sugar to kind of normal levels. And so we thought it was working. And then all of a sudden, it just stopped working. We switched endos because then I started getting suspicious. I'm like, maybe they should check you for type one. And all this time he would they would suggest that he go on insulin to help bring the sugars down, but he would refuse. So he was going all this time. I think we were about seven or eight years into our marriage when he finally got the correct diagnostics and got put on insulin but by then it was kind of late. He already had started having issues with neuropathy and his feet Eat and, or neuropathy and he got retinopathy in his eyes as well.

Scott Benner 15:06
How long before you met him? Did he think he was type two? Do you know?

Liberty 15:11
He was diagnosed with it? In the army? The TRICARE diagnosed?

Scott Benner 15:15
Is that right around the time you met, or was that prior? No.

Liberty 15:18
It was about a year or two before we met, right? So yeah, he was he was walking. He was walking around with us for a long time. Yeah.

Scott Benner 15:25
So it rough math. He had type one he had probably Lada Right. Like

Liberty 15:31
Yeah. Oh, for sure. Yeah, sure. Because it came on super slow. It had to have been that's why I was never, you know, suspicious of him having type one. But they did test him and he did, you know, have the antibodies. And it does run in his family. It runs in his family more than it does in mine. He's got so many people in his family have type one. It's insane.

Scott Benner 15:52
So he was lot of being treated like a type two for almost a decade. Yes. Yes. Okay. Okay. And by the time you start, you figure out that he's type one. He's already seeing issues with his eyes and his circulation.

Liberty 16:05
Yes. Okay. Yeah, I think he'd already had a couple toes amputated, too.

Scott Benner 16:09
Wow. So what was it like, with you, having type one watching him have problems but not thinking he was a type one. Did that have any impact on you and how you took care of yourself?

Liberty 16:22
Oh, yeah. That's why I did all that research on how to because bomb me, take taking care of myself. That's when I had my daughter that switched me around I that flipped a switch in my head and changed the whole way. I thought I took up, started taking up running. Well, actually, first of all, after I had her, it was a very easy but difficult pregnancy in the fact that I already have complications from that stint where I wasn't taking care of myself, like I have stage two. At the time I had stage two kidney disease. It's gotten to stage three. But I also had retinopathy and high blood pressure. But when I was pregnant with her, it was super high risk. In fact, when after she was born, the doctor had told me that out of all his high risk patients I was the most high risk of all his patients. And he and my Endo. They told me that I should not have any more kids because I am really lucky that it turned out the way it did because it really did a number on my kidneys. It actually pushed me into Stage Three kidney disease the pregnancy, even though I kept my ailing cf 5.5. And also it caused my retinopathy to go from my mild to moderately severe, towards the end of the pregnancy to the point where I started to go blind. And I was blind. Yeah, I was blind for three months. I had to get vitrectomy in one eye. And then a year later, I got a check to me and the other I haven't had any issues with it since and the last retinopathy appointment I had was, there was no retinopathy at all in my eyes anymore. I completely went away.

Scott Benner 18:00
So first, for three months during this is during your marriage?

Liberty 18:04
Yeah, yeah. This was during my marriage. My daughter was only 14 months old. I didn't even get to see her first steps.

Scott Benner 18:10
So your husband's kind of taking care of both of you at that point? Yes, yes. Yes. Yeah. Wow. She's Is there ever any conversation between the two of you after he realizes he's type one? Like, I can't imagine that there's not a moment where you don't feel a sense of, like dismay, that it didn't get figured out sooner?

Liberty 18:31
Yes, I felt like that all the time. Yeah, even when I thought he was type two. I was always trying to help him to help him fix it. That's why I did all that research. We went on the keto diet. And then when he was diagnosed with type one, I say, Okay, we got this. I'm like, I've got this figured out. Now, you know, I might even see consistently at six, you know, the whole time, the rest of the time we were in the marriage. I got him books, told him to read some stuff, you know, asked him if he wanted to try insulin pumps. We tried to T slim at one point, but that was a disaster.

Scott Benner 19:04
Why? Why? Why was the Why was the pump a disaster?

Liberty 19:07
I think the settings might have been wrong for him. I don't know because he kept getting these really crazy loads from it. And he would have insulin on board to the point where we had to actually call the paramedics to resuscitate him one time, and so he didn't want to be on the pump anymore because he figured that that's what was causing it.

Scott Benner 19:27
He said no thought about just changing the settings.

Liberty 19:31
No, he wasn't the type where he'd if if something wasn't working, he was done with it. Okay, very stubborn. Yeah.

Scott Benner 19:39
How about you with your sense of like, did you ever sense of loss that you that it took you as much time as it did to want to do better?

Liberty 19:48
In some ways I do. But I don't at the same time because I learned a lot of things in that time. Where I was ignoring it like it If I were ever to be in a situation where, you know, the shit would go down, you know, I know how to take care of myself and survive without having to rely on the normal paths.

Scott Benner 20:14
And would it be? Is it fair to? I'm asking because I don't know. But also, is the decision you made? Like, is it easier to accept? Because it was a decision you made versus with him? It was just a misdiagnosis? Or does that not come into play?

Liberty 20:29
Yeah, I guess. Yeah, I'm not really sure what you're getting out there.

Scott Benner 20:33
What you decide, I mean, you said to yourself, I'm going to ignore my diabetes, I'm going to do the bare minimum of what I need to do. I'm not going to a doctor. I'm like not doing those things. Because I don't want to think about at least you dislike, even if it's not ends up. If it doesn't end up being a good decision. At least it was. At least it was a choice. Right? Like he didn't he didn't have a choice to be misdiagnosed, I guess, is what I'm saying. Right. But I don't know if that makes a difference in how you feel once you start using hindsight to look back at your situation.

Liberty 21:01
Yeah, I'm not sure I kind of I kind of try not to look at that as, as, you know, is anything to regret in my life, though? That's the thing.

Scott Benner 21:10
Yeah. So that's, that's your I can't

Liberty 21:12
really explain that to you. And then with him, I you know, we we would have to ask him, and we can't so.

Scott Benner 21:20
So once the retinopathy starts for him and the the circulation stuff, do things just keep going wrong from there? Or does it? Yes,

Liberty 21:30
it does. Yes, he actually got blind in his left eye. And they did the vitrectomy on him. And it didn't work. Okay. You lost he completely lost his sight. Now. You know, when the retinopathy usually you can still see you can still see the light you just can't see cuz there's all this blood in your eyes, you can't see through it. It's like a really super dirty windshield. When you when you go from blind from retinopathy, now he had the same thing. But after he had the surgery, it didn't work, I think because they had to put a gas bubble in there. And when you put a gas bubble in there, you have to walk around for two weeks with your head down, you have to sleep on your stomach. But he didn't do that he wasn't very compliant with that. And I don't know if that messed up the surgery and and made it so he was completely blind where he can't even see light. He told me he could look right up at the sun with that eye and it wouldn't do anything.

Scott Benner 22:23
Oh, gosh, I get not wanting to look down for two weeks. But what do you think about him? kept him from being able to say, alright, well, I'm just going to do this if it's going to help.

Liberty 22:32
stubbornness. I mean, I don't know. I wish I knew the answer to that, because then it might have been easier for me to fix the problem with him because I you know, I would just try everything to get him to be more compliant. And it just didn't seem it seemed like he just kind of given up like he didn't believe that he could get better. Like, maybe he was too far gone.

Scott Benner 22:56
I see. And but you felt, do you feel responsible for him? Like you needed to figure it out?

Liberty 23:02
No, I I just try to help them. And there's only so much you can do you know, you can't control people?

Scott Benner 23:10
How does the medical situation and his lack of desire to help himself like how does that impact your personal relationship?

Liberty 23:20
It actually did make it worse? Yeah, we had a better relationship at the beginning. And he had the last two years before he passed away were really, really hard because it just was a downward spiral. His personality was all messed up because his blood sugar was always high. God Scott the last day when see that he took when he was going to the doctor's like every week, he kind of deep really gave up then he had his essay once he was like 15

Scott Benner 23:56
G's. So he's not taking insulin, or was he just doing Basal insulin?

Liberty 24:01
I don't I think he might end towards the end, the last couple of months might have stopped taking his insulin.

Scott Benner 24:08
Was he trying to die? I think so. Because

Liberty 24:11
he would, he would talk about it. He was in so much pain because he had the neuropathy, right. And then he started getting these ulcers in his feet that wouldn't heal. And the doctors kept telling him and I kept telling him that the reason they're not healing is because his blood sugar is so high and the blood just can't flow. It's like syrup. You know, so that the infection just sits there. He would just get in the more and more pain and then it came out the last year, it was harder for him to get pain meds. We started using marijuana to help him with the pain, you know, because it's legal. I live in Nevada, so it's legal here. And that helped for a little while, but he didn't like how it made him feel. So he would just sit there and deal with the pain and he would literally sit in bedroom and just green. The pain was so bad. And at first I would try to do stuff to help comfort him and but nothing would help. And all I could do was just sit there and listen to it. And yeah, it got to the point where it was so bad for him. He would start talking about suicide.

Scott Benner 25:21
Did he describe the pain this feet as a burning? Like what have you put words to it?

Liberty 25:28
He drew a picture of it once, you know, we used to paint our, our on our my, my AMI pods. I used to paint the Omni pods. And he was kind of an artist. So he would paint them with me. And he did one where it was kind of fiery and orange and black. He called it my pain. He was like, This is what it feels like my pain here the way he would draw it out. And yeah, it was kind of a dark painting that he drew. Has sistent

Scott Benner 25:59
I think it was What's that? Was the pain consistent? Or did it come and go?

Liberty 26:06
It came and go. It came and went. It was it would come and go faster together towards the end. And he's out he was he was more in pain than he was not towards the end.

Scott Benner 26:18
Blind as well at that point.

Liberty 26:20
Yeah, just the one eye. Yeah, he could see through through his right eye.

Scott Benner 26:25
Could he walk?

Liberty 26:27
Just barely he would he would walk around, the doctors didn't want him to walk around, I would usually put him in the wheelchair. He would insist on walking around because I think it made him feel like less of a man to be helpless like that. Because, yeah, he wasn't able to work. He lost his job. And then he tried to get other jobs in, you know, he just couldn't find work because he was basically disabled. And we just started the process to get him put on disability. About a year before he passed

Scott Benner 26:59
the same impacts that are affecting his feet. Did they affect anything else? I'm thinking specifically like sexual function like,

Liberty 27:07
yes, he had EDI. Yeah, he had EDI. That was like the first thing that showed up actually,

Scott Benner 27:14
really? Were the other stuff. Before the

Liberty 27:17
other stuff. Yeah, okay. Yeah. And he was he wasn't comfortable going to the doctor about that. So we had had that discussion. Yeah,

Scott Benner 27:25
yeah. Is it? What's it like to? What's it like to know what's best for a person? And have them not respond to that?

Liberty 27:37
Scott? It's so frustrating. It's so frustrating.

Scott Benner 27:43
I mean, does it feel like you're? I don't I don't know. Like, what did it? Did it make you feel like you were failing him? Or did it make good feel like he was hurting himself on purpose? Or do you mean? Oh, yeah. Give me a sense of time you meet at your job, and get married a year later. And then the erectile dysfunction happens? What's the span of time between getting married and the dysfunction?

Liberty 28:11
That dysfunction happened about the time that Well, it started happening around the time we were trying to have the baby, our daughter, and after she was born, you know, I wasn't really interested in sex anyway. And then right about the time we started trying to get physically active again, it became like impossible, you know, we there was nothing that we could do to you know, make it feasible to have actual sex. That was about when she was around one or two, I think, after I'd gotten healed up from the, the AI thing.

Scott Benner 28:45
So how long is that since you met him? About four years, four years? Okay. That's what I was. Okay. So you guys were together for about four years, you go from dating and married to having a baby and him seeing his first signs of problems? Right, and those things, okay, how, and then it happened quickly. So it was the IDI then the

Liberty 29:09
then he started having issues with the feet and he got the toe amputation. So that was pretty quick after that. And then it kind of got slow, it got slow after that he would be in the hospital maybe once a year for the infections. And then there was one time where he got a really bad one where it just they had to go in and remove his metatarsal and basically reshape his whole foot because it was so messed up in there. They were going to take his leg that time and he was adamant about them not you know, do not take my legs. He's like his that happened to his father. His father was the same way. He had type two diabetes though, and he lost his legs because he went take care of himself. So I think a lot of it comes from him being a lot like his dad.

Scott Benner 29:57
Yeah, I have to say like, I don't want to I'm not I'm Not being flippant, right? But and this is gonna sound like I'm trying to be. You can totally.

Liberty 30:03
It takes a lot to get me offended, so don't worry about it

Scott Benner 30:08
liberty. What I'm trying to say is that I don't I can't imagine what I wouldn't do if my dick stop working. And I'm trying to figure out why that didn't snap him into taking better care of us diabetes.

Liberty 30:18
Yeah, I have no idea because it bothered him. Yeah, well, I bet it Did it bother. It bothered him a lot. Yeah. And he got to the point where he started thinking about going to the urologist, but it was kind of too late. And I kept telling him, like, he's like, Well, I'm gonna go to the dick doctor. That's what he called it. The addict doctor, I know the tick doctor now. And I'm like, well, don't you think you should get your diabetes under control first, because I don't think the addict doctor is going to be able to do anything for you. Because you're all messed up from the diabetes. I mean, that's a big cause of Edie. Yeah. And he could you wouldn't hear out now just go to the doctor and get this fix. That's all I care about is the tick Doctor thing. I don't know what his thinking was. It was completely illogical. How

Scott Benner 31:00
high do you think his blood sugar's were then?

Liberty 31:03
Probably run. And he was probably walking around with 434 hundreds, or

Scott Benner 31:07
maybe do you think that was it? Like he just couldn't think straight?

Liberty 31:11
Yes, yes. Because the Yeah, his personality changed. He was very negative. He started to become very negative. very grumpy at my daughter, and I had to walk around glass around him. I mean, we were actually talking about separating, because he passed away. Yeah, cuz I couldn't handle it anymore. I got you know, I can put up with a lot of Scott. But it's like it got to the point where it's affecting my daughter. Yeah,

Scott Benner 31:38
no, I understand. So is he been gone for? Has he been gone for a long time now? How long?

Liberty 31:44
It's been since July fifth last year? Oh, not long? No, no, it's been six months ish. All right, hold

Scott Benner 31:53
on. I'm ready. I'm just pulling myself together. It's a lot. It's a lot going through. Was it? Was it hard to see him pass? Or was there any relief for you? I don't want to ask you that. But did it?

Liberty 32:07
Oh, no, you can ask all that. Because I actually have been asked that before, because I have friends who saw me go through it. We me and my daughter and I had actually left him here about two months before he passed at the house. And I moved in with, you know, it was kind of a temporary separation thing, just to keep my daughter away from him for a little while while he got it together. So I moved in with her to a friend's house. She saw the whole thing, all this stuff going down. And she asked me the same question after he passed. But yes, I did feel some relief. I did. And in some ways, my life has been a lot better. The last six months, my daughter's has as well. There's a lot less stress. But I get times where I really missed the old him. You know, especially when Facebook memories come out up. Just saw a picture come up from about five years ago, we went shooting in the desert together. And man that just brought back a whole bunch of memories because he loved to go shoot. And yeah, he was in the military. He taught me how to shoot. We would always go out to the desert, you know, not even he hated going to the shooting range, say like to go out in the desert, you can do that legally here in the state. Yeah, just stuff like that just pops up randomly. When I was going through his stuff, I think about the old times, and I miss him. But the last couple of years, where it was really hard. I am relieved. It's over because, you know, because I I tried so hard. I tried so hard to get him to see the light. And every once in a while it would click it was like you would come back from that Jekyll and Hyde state Mr. Hyde would come back and talk with Dr. Jekyll would be gone and he'd be that guy I knew again. And he would actually be listening to me and he'd be like, he's like, I'm so sorry, the way I've been and I just really want to change this. And tomorrow we're gonna, you know, right now we're gonna start this and then the next day Dr. CHIEKO will be back and it would start all over again. It was a cycle.

Scott Benner 34:22
So it mimics mental illness. The high blood sugars.

Liberty 34:27
Yes. Yes, it does.

Scott Benner 34:31
Okay, got it. It's a shame guys. I'm so just disappointed that this isn't a lighthearted story so I can make the title Dick doctor but that's never going to work. So

Liberty 34:41
well, you know, it is kind of funny.

Scott Benner 34:44
I mean, I'm really focused on this part of it, which is, is that you can get your blood sugar into a place where you're just not yourself. And you know that most people who are already managing type one and are around somebody else, you know, you think about your kid it like has type one and they get, you know, their mood changes with a high blood sugar. But you're there with them to be like, Alright, we're gonna get your blood sugar back down, but by then they turn back into themselves again. But when you're an adult, and that happens, and you don't have any agency over him, you can't force him to take insulin like, right, you can't do those things. But it's interesting, isn't it? Because if he was mentally unstable, like if you could have a doctor say that he can't make his own decisions, then you could help him. But no one would do that around a blood sugar, but look at the same exact things happening. You couldn't get

Liberty 35:37
away, I could get anyone to sign off on that. Because he was not he would be normal to other people. For the most part. No, I was really the only one who saw it. You know, even when I was talking to his sister, after he passed, she's like, because she knew that we were going through, he was being kind of abusive to us. And she asked me if I missed him. I'm like, No, I don't I couldn't lie to her. And she kind of looked like she got offended by that. And I'm like, Well, you don't need to get offended by that. Because I do miss him the way he was. But the last two years, it wasn't him. It was had lost him a couple of years ago. I mean, I already mourn that loss, I think.

Scott Benner 36:18
Yeah. Now it all makes sense. I appreciate you. I really appreciate you share. This also means difficult because you Was this your first marriage? Yes, yeah. So you waited a while to meet a person. And then for I mean, for this to be how it unfolds? is it's got to be heartbreaking in itself. I would imagine if you didn't have your daughter, it would feel almost like a waste of time. But I'm assuming it doesn't because of her. How hard was it? Well, you don't have anything to hold it up against because you have this one child, but I was gonna ask like, how is what's it like growing up with a parent in such a in a medical situation like that. So consistently, like it has to have clouded who she is, too, I would imagine.

Liberty 37:04
She's been in therapy for the past, since he started going, his personality changed, I started putting her in therapy. And that's another reason why we had separated ourselves from the house because the therapist had recommended it, because she didn't think it was a healthy situation for her to be in because at that time, he had been getting kind of verbally abusive, not nothing physical or anything. But some of the stuff he would tell her that he wanted to kill her kill himself in front of her. He would say horrible things about her dog, and it was getting so bad. So that therapist was like, this isn't a toxic situation for her. You need to get her

Scott Benner 37:41
out of just lashing out at that point. And yeah, yeah,

Liberty 37:45
he was lashing out at every little thing. I mean, she wouldn't even be doing anything and it would piss them off. So

Scott Benner 37:51
Wow. Nobody in this extended family tried to help his the

Liberty 37:58
way he hid his family lives. You know, we're over on the West Coast. This family lives in the Midwest. Okay, so they weren't around. They didn't. The only time he got they got a taste of him like this was he had went over to visit for a couple of weeks. And they hadn't mentioned to me about how he had changed a little bit and how they noticed that he was a lot more angrier, less willing to, you know, get along with people while he was up there, in fact. Yeah, I think they might have been a little glad that he left. In a way, you know, I don't know. I'm not for sure. Nobody told me that but just kind of got a feeling.

Scott Benner 38:40
We'll see active duty military like the DC war.

Liberty 38:44
Yes. He was in South America fighting the drug lords.

Scott Benner 38:50
And yeah, he any of that impact? I mean, not that I couldn't but

Liberty 38:54
Oh, yeah. Oh, it did. Yeah. He was telling me a couple of stories. They were getting ready to defend the place or I'm not sure exactly what but he laid down to get ready to you know, put his gun and hide behind whatever they do in the military, I don't know. And one of his supervisors said, Hey, man, I wouldn't I wouldn't lay there if I were you. I'd pick a different spot. So he picked a different spot and when the shooting started, it went right to that spot that he was in the guy saved his life. You said that really touched him and he was also in security in the casinos down here. And he was first on the scene for there was a little bombing they had at one of the casinos he was at where there was a love triangle. A guy had made a little bomb with nuts and bolts and screws in it and a cup and put it on a car and it blew up. When the guy you know that he was detonated when the target grabbed the cup and blew his hands off and that's it. My husband was like, one of the first on the scene for that. So he had to seek jet like that all the time, his father was pretty strict as well, to the point where I finally convinced to go to psychiatrist, a few months before he died, I had been on him for months and months and months to go to the psychiatrist because I thought he needed some help when they finally got him to go, and they diagnosed him with PTSD, mostly from his childhood, though, and partly from the military. Okay. So that was, that was also a factor that contributed to his personality disorder. Right. And maybe I don't think the diabetes was helping it, though.

Scott Benner 40:43
Yeah, I'm also trying to imagine like a layering of problems, you know, like one thing, right, and then another, and then another, then you see what you see at war, and you see what you see at home, and then you get diabetes, and then it's misdiagnosed for so long. And it's just, it's overwhelmed. Yeah,

Liberty 41:00
he got he pretty much got the short end of the stick, I think. Yeah,

Scott Benner 41:04
yeah. I mean, it's almost like if you, you know, if you kept putting a if you put a weighted blanket on somebody, you could expect them to walk around with it. But when they have 10 on, you can see where they'd be like, Look, my legs are tired. I gotta, I can't I can't hold this up anymore. And then if you can't figure out a way from underneath of it, I don't know how you stand back up again.

Liberty 41:23
Yeah. And he used to say that a lot, too, because he did have a couple of strokes there towards the end as well, he lost the use of his left arm. I mean, it was a ton of things. And it was exactly like that. Blankets and blankets getting put on top of them to the point where he'd look at me and he says, I don't know how much longer I can go on, like this. Just bad that keeps happening to me, and I don't know what to do anymore.

Scott Benner 41:48
What made you want to come tell the story?

Liberty 41:52
I don't know. I just want to talk about it. I think that's a good part of me healing. I don't think there's a lot of people out there that are willing to talk about it like I am. Well, it's something that I don't know, I think it's just something that people need to hear.

Scott Benner 42:10
Yeah, I'm happy to hear your story. Because I what I imagine is that no one thinks that could happen to them. And I just I can't guarantee I could have went and found your husband at a point in his life. If I would have told him this story. That's it, this is going to be you that he would have said that there's no way that could happen to me. Right, you know, like, nobody thinks this can happen. And and it is a slow, like those blankets. They don't all like somebody doesn't yell, I'm gonna throw 10 weight weighted problems on you right now. Like the one goes on. You're like, oh, this is too bad. I can handle this. And the next one comes in, you're like, I can handle this. And then one day, all of a sudden, you're like, I'm doing great, and then the one hits you, that just knocks you over. And now you can stand back up again. In that's how it's a slow. It's a slow death. You know what I mean? And it's so slow that you don't know it's that. And that's, that's what I want people to hear. Like, that's my reasoning for wanting you on the show.

Liberty 43:07
Is that Well, it's funny. It's funny you say that because when he died? I wasn't expecting that at all. I figured it out a few even with all the crap. You know, he had wrong with him. I figured he still had a few years. I mean, I knew he wasn't gonna live a long time. Yeah. He went to the hospital. He was in DKA. I go to the emergency room. They say oh, he's, yeah, he wasn't DKA. But we got him stabilized. Now his organs are fine. That's that's the first thing I asked him like was are his organs failing? They're like, No, no, he's fine. We got him down. We just need to observe him for a while, you know. And then he wakes up. And he was weird. I think there was something wrong with his brain because he couldn't even talk to me anymore.

Scott Benner 43:49
Stroke, maybe?

Liberty 43:50
Yeah, they, they had him in the ICU. And I never really got to talk to him before he died. It was kind of sad that they had called me and told him that he would need to go to a rehab center because they thought he might have had another stroke. Then it was literally like an hour later, the doctor called and said that he had had a heart attack. And they couldn't revive him. And when she said that, I couldn't believe it. Because I'm like, Oh, they just called me and said that we were going to put him in the rehab center and it was all fine, you know, and what the hell. And it took me a while for it to sink in until I finally went back to the hospital and, you know, went there to see him lying there. So

Scott Benner 44:34
wow, Jesus. I just want people to understand that it's important that you have to write that you have to you have to you get diabetes, you don't get to ignore it. This is the end of what happens when you ignore diabetes. Yes, yeah. And there's no there's none of there's no magic person who ignores her diabetes and doesn't end up like this. We don't talk about it. It's not, you know, no, they're they're not P there's not a Facebook group full of people talking about I ignore diabetes, and I'm fine. Like, that doesn't happen those people are live isolated lives as they get sicker and sicker. And it's just, there is even some of me that says that, like, you know, I even understand that a podcast is you have. I mean, I don't love the word and I, but there's some privilege to just listening to a podcast, right? You you own a phone, you have internet access, you have time to listen, you can pay for headphones, there are plenty of people who don't even have those things. And, and so sometimes the stories you hear are more framed from people who have this privilege already, right. So I can only have the people on who want to come on, then we kind of lose this part, this last part of of type one, and type two diabetes, the people who don't have the right support, and don't have the right knowledge, or get misdiagnosed, or have other issues going along with it, and they just get sucked down this, this drain of despair. And that happens to more people than you think. That's sort of my that's what I take from being involved for this long and watching people for this long that this stuff happens. Like, this is not an uncommon story you're telling. It's just this, it's just uncommon for it to be told. Right? Does that make sense? Yeah, it does. Yeah.

Liberty 46:29
Well, you know, what, if you're, if you're in that spot, you're ignoring your diabetes. And this, you know, like, a story kind of wakes you up, you know, it's not too late. I mean, I did the same thing. I ignored my diabetes for a long time. And now I turned it around. And yeah, I still got complications. But I have them under control, and they're stable, I feel a lot better. And, you know, my life is a lot better. I know, I'm not cloudy anymore. And it's just, it's better. When you take control of your life, it's just better to just turn it around. And it's possible, it's never too late. As long as you're alive. It's never too late to change your body for the better. It's never to

Scott Benner 47:17
know. And there have been people on who have had fairly significant complications and right of their blood sugars, and seeing some of those complications, like stop, or or recede sometimes. And I'm not saying you can just match, I'm not saying you can let it go. And then just bring it back again, because there are some things you're gonna do damage to that. It's just it's done now. But it people need to understand, like, what you're describing for yourself is is years of, I mean, would you call it neglect? Oh, yeah. Right.

Liberty 47:46
Yeah, it was, it was literally seven years, I counted it out one time, because at the time, I didn't, I wasn't really ticking it off. But I look back and I remember, I remember when I stopped and when I started going to the doctor again, and it was about seven years.

Scott Benner 48:01
So it's not lost on you then that if you didn't make a change, you'd be on the same path as your husband was.

Liberty 48:08
Oh, yeah, I'd probably be dead right now. Yeah. Okay.

Scott Benner 48:13
All right. Well, this is upbeat liberty, thank you. Bringing bringing the axe me bringing the fun

Well, I mean, it's it just, I don't know, it's, it's lovely for you to to spend the time and to describe it. Because, again, I just I'm just gonna reiterate like, there's everyone listening. Like you make enough wrong decisions. This is how it goes. So and I don't want people to run away like crazy like now. Yeah, you know, I don't want you to hear this and be like, flipping out tonight because your your kids blood sugar goes to 140 after dinner or something like that like that. These are not the same thing you were describing. A significant? Yeah,

Liberty 49:01
it takes a long

Scott Benner 49:03
time. Yeah, yeah, you're

Liberty 49:06
you really just have to not care. You have to not care. Yeah. Yeah, he literally when it got bad, he didn't care anymore, right.

Scott Benner 49:15
It's almost like at this point, you're trying to make a bad outcome come like yeah, you're working you're actually working harder to be sick than it might take to. To do better for

Liberty 49:26
yourself. Right? Yeah, that's exactly kind of how I felt like he was he was doing towards the end. Yeah, like he was just trying to make it go away for good.

Scott Benner 49:34
Yeah, yeah. No, I imagine. Well, jeez, this is going to be a shorter episode because there's nowhere for us to go from here. It is really exciting that you that you got got yourself together. And you had all that success and you had a baby and and she sounds like she's doing well and that's all really exciting. So do you worry about diabetes for her?

Liberty 49:56
Yes, I do. I actually have her and had her and trial net when And they used to do it every year. She never got the antibodies triggered. But she does have Hashimotos. Okay, she was, yeah, she was diagnosed with that. So she does. She has the autoimmunity thing going on.

Scott Benner 50:12
She has Hashimotos but she didn't have any indicators through trial. And they never saw.

Liberty 50:18
No, no, they never sign anything. No,

Unknown Speaker 50:21
that's exciting.

Liberty 50:23
Yeah, yeah, hopefully. I mean, she's the, we've had that discussion. I told her that it's, it's, you know, it runs rampant in our family and not to be surprised that she's probably not going to get it. But don't be surprised if she does, and not to be scared of getting it. Because, you know, as I as an example, you know, I'm an example to her and, and I say, I live with it just fine. You know, I live a good life, you know, I'm happy, you know, just, it doesn't. It doesn't need to be a death sentence. And, you know, lots of people live with it. And you don't need to feel different. I mean, she's, she seems cool with that I don't think she'd be afraid of of it. You know, if she ever got diagnosed, so

Scott Benner 51:06
I'd like to applaud you for getting her to therapy, too. Because it's that I mean, what you're describing just couldn't be, it couldn't be easy to grow up with. That's all you know, and for you to what do you do for yourself? Now?

Liberty 51:19
I'm not much of a therapy type of person. I do meditate. I do yoga, I run. Exercise is my therapy. So

Scott Benner 51:28
Gotcha. You were saying earlier, I just want to make sure I understood like, your husband was taking pain medication. That didn't work. Eventually. He tried weed that worked for a while, but then

Liberty 51:38
oh, no, no, the pain medication worked. He wasn't able to get it anymore. Because Because the doctor can prescribe him he had to go see a pain medication doctor. Oh, almost. It was almost Yeah. Because the last change you remember the last change?

Scott Benner 51:53
Yeah. Oh, it's this? Oh, yeah.

Liberty 51:55
This is what happens when the last change about the pain meds. Okay. So yeah, they're keeping the people off of it that have problems with it, but the people that actually need it, they got to jump through hoops.

Scott Benner 52:06
Okay, so this is about the opioid. Yeah, yes. So your husband was a person who really desperately needed it. He

Liberty 52:13
needed it. Yeah. And he couldn't get it. So he was like, Screw it. I'm not gonna you know, I got I'm already seeing enough doctors, he says, and it takes me three months to get an appointment with this pain doctor. And it's like, I gotta sit here three months with pain. I might as well just sit here with pain. You know, he would say stuff like that. Yeah.

Scott Benner 52:31
And in the we'd cut it down, but not for long. And he didn't like being

Liberty 52:35
harmed. Yeah, well, he. Yeah. He said the weed cut it down. But he didn't like being caught. Yeah, you didn't like the feeling it gave me that it gave him to be high. Gotcha. But it did. It did cut his pain a lot.

Scott Benner 52:47
That's terrible. All right, I have to tell you, I have to record again in a little bit. And so I'm going to use this as an excuse to say goodbye to you. But in totality, I just don't I don't know how to swing this around and take it in a different direction I am. I'm at the end of my skills right now. But, but I do really appreciate like that you took the time to talk about it. You I'm gonna, I'm gonna make this an afterdark episode. But there's part of me that doesn't want to but there's part of me that. I don't like that. Some of them are after dark episodes. I think they're just, I think they're just people's lives. And I don't think they should be distinguished as like that. But I need to put them somewhere where people who are listening, know that we're going to be talking about some really heavy stuff. So

Liberty 53:32
of course, well, you know, if, you know, I assume that your after dark episodes mean that pretty much adults only and if an adult wants to share it with their kids, you know, it's always the adults choice to sit there listen to with their kids, and to discuss, you know, any questions that come up, that's the best way to bring this up to your kids, is just to be there with them and let them know that they've there's a dark side to this, but not to be scared because, you know, I'm here with you to answer any questions how we can prevent this such

Scott Benner 54:04
and such. I also think there's a component. I was talking about this in a recent episode with Erica in a mental health episode. But there's a component of who you are, like, there are some people who you could go to and say, you know, listen to this lady story about her husband. And they'll be like, well, I'm going to take care of myself. And there are plenty of people who would hear and go oh, I guess then there's no no reason to take care of myself. Because this is just you don't even like people's minds jump into certain directions. Like everybody's so black and white all the time. Like, I don't know why. Sometimes we can't hold two, two thoughts in our head at the same time that compete with each other, but realize they're both to be given consideration. You

Liberty 54:44
don't I mean, yeah, it takes a rare person to be able to do that. Yeah,

Scott Benner 54:47
I don't know why that is. Okay, Liberty. I really appreciate this. I appreciate you sitting in the closet, and so it'll stay quiet. And the whole thing and I have to admit

Liberty 54:57
anyway, that's why you can call the episode

Unknown Speaker 54:59
First

Liberty 55:03
I'm really looking forward to figuring it to hearing what you figured out though.

Scott Benner 55:07
The title.

Liberty 55:11
Title. That's like the most exciting part of your episodes is finding out what the title is going to be. Yeah, I

Scott Benner 55:16
don't know. Like there's something around give give me liberty or give me death but it's all just a so morose. I don't know what to do. So I think it's just the I think it's just an explanation of complications, you know, and just, there's no joking to be made around this. Not that I think that of the title. I don't I don't want to even look like I'm joking. Like, you know, anything, because it's such a serious thing. And I mean, in this poor man's life was How old was he when he passed?

Liberty 55:43
He was 54. Yeah, that's just yeah, he had just turned 54. But you know what, he would have appreciated a dark, humorous title. If you want to know the truth of dark humor. Oh, yeah. Yeah, we wouldn't be listening to you in the car. We would be he would listen to you in the car. And he'd be I like this guy. He's got a dark humor. I like him. You know, he doesn't care. Yeah, he used to love listening to you. So

Scott Benner 56:10
well, maybe out of respect to him. We'll call it shooting cactus. That was that. What you're shooting out when you're out in the desert?

Liberty 56:17
No. targets. There's no cactuses. Here. You're thinking Arizona.

Scott Benner 56:23
They don't give you a cactus in Nevada.

Liberty 56:26
Oh, no, there's no cat and it's Nevada. There's no cap

Scott Benner 56:30
Nevada. Nevada. Nevada.

Liberty 56:34
Although it's not Nevada. It's only Nevada. If you're from Becky's? Well, that's where I'm from here. If you're gonna Yeah, well, if you come out here, you got to stay at Nevada. I gotta say Nevada, just I'm just letting you know, people are gonna know where you're from. Yeah, they're gonna know you're a tourist.

Scott Benner 56:49
Don't worry. I think most places hear my voice and think that guy's not from around here.

Liberty 56:55
Okay, well, we should throw them off a little bit.

Scott Benner 56:58
Well, I'm going to, I'm going to give it some give it some thought. We're going to find something that is appropriately dark and amusing for your for your, your, your husband his past. And and give him a little something you said isn't a month in here. But did you want for me to bleep it out? Or is that okay?

Liberty 57:14
Yeah, go ahead. And bleep it. He was kind of a private person. So Okay. All right. Well, I certainly All right, yeah. Oh, you know, what, if you want to use a plant, the state flowers the sagebrush.

Scott Benner 57:25
You don't shoot sagebrush do?

Liberty 57:28
Probably do because it's everywhere. It's everywhere. Doesn't matter what you're shooting. I'm shooting at the target. I'm still shooting at sagebrush because it's everywhere.

Scott Benner 57:36
Gotcha. All right. Well, thank you. Hold on one second for me. All right.

Huge thanks to liberty for coming on the show and sharing that story. I also want to thank that contour next gen blood glucose meter contour next one.com forward slash juicebox. Get yourself a super accurate meter. If you've ever thought about being a guest and the Juicebox Podcast, boy, are you in luck, I just opened up the calendar. It's gonna be open for a little bit, email me, and we'll see if you'd be a good fit. I'll leave you with two thoughts. If you've never tried the diabetes Pro Tip series. It's been remastered and the audio was amazing diabetes pro tip.com juicebox podcast.com. Or go back in your audio app to Episode 1000. Were all begins. Thank you so much for listening. I'll be back soon with another episode of The Juicebox Podcast. The afterdark series from the Juicebox Podcast is the only place to hear the stories that no one else talks about. From smoking weed to drinking with type one perspectives from both male and females about having sex with diabetes. We talk about depression, self harm, eating disorders, mental illness, heroin addiction, use of psychedelics, living with bipolar, being a child of divorce, and honestly so much more. I can't list them all. But you can by going to juicebox podcast.com. Going to the top and clicking on after dark. There you'll see episode 807 called one thing after another episode 825 California sober. Other after dark episodes include unsupported survivor's guilt, space musician, dead frogs, these titles will make you say what is this about? And then when you listen, you'll think that was crazy. juicebox podcast.com Find the after dark series. It's fantastic.