#1328 I Don't Understand... Jenny Three

October 10, 2024Scott Benner

Scott and Jenny don't uderstand vanilla diabetes content.

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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
Friends, we're all back together for the next episode of The juicebox podcast. Welcome

everybody. Jenny is back. We're going to do another I don't understand today. Today, the topic is about entities, diabetes, organizations, companies, etc, and why the information that they kind of give out about diabetes and social media is so basic. 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. Don't forget, if you're a US resident who has type one or is the caregiver of someone with type one? Visit T 1d exchange.org/juicebox right now and complete that survey. It will take you 10 minutes to complete the survey, and that effort alone will help to move type one diabetes research forward. It will cost you nothing to help when you place your first order for ag one with my link, you'll get five free travel packs and a free year supply of vitamin D drink, AG, one.com/juice box. Don't forget to save 40% off of your entire order at cozy earth.com All you have to do is use the offer code juicebox at checkout. That's juicebox at checkout to save 40@cozyearth.com%

Did you know if just one person in your family has type one diabetes, you are up to 15 times more likely to get it too. So screen it like you mean it one blood test can spot type one diabetes early, tap now talk to a doctor or visit screen for type one.com for more info, today's episode of The juicebox podcast is sponsored by the contour next gen blood glucose meter. This is the meter that my daughter has on her person right now. It is incredibly accurate, and waiting for you at contournext.com/juicebox, this episode of The juicebox podcast is sponsored by Eversense the Eversense CGM is more convenient, requiring only one sensor every six months. It offers more flexibility with its easy on, easy off, smart transmitter, and allows you to take a break when needed. Eversense cgm.com/ cgm.com/juicebox,

Jennifer Smith, CDE 2:23
I feel like we haven't talked in a long time. We

Scott Benner 2:26
haven't. But why is that? Because Arden's I went on vacation, and then Arden had to go to college, and then I had to cancel with you a couple times.

Unknown Speaker 2:35
Yes,

Unknown Speaker 2:35
that's my fault. I apologize. No, I

Jennifer Smith, CDE 2:37
hope your vacation was lovely.

Scott Benner 2:39
It was actually that was our first family vacation together in six years, and it was warm, and we did some cool things. We went out on a boat and did some like snorkeling, like out the sea snorkeling, that was cool. What else did we do? We did a paddle board. Well, not paddle boat, like, clear bottom boat tour through through these, like, mangroves. It was very, very cool. Arden's blood sugar really played nicely. That was great. So we had a good time. We really did. Yeah, thank you. I'm sure I said to Kelly this morning, like, we can't wait that long to go on vacation again, again, yeah? Like, you just worked too hard. So, but yeah, thank you. Good. Well, I want to keep going with the I don't understand fabulous, okay, and I'm going to bring the I don't understand today. Oh, yay. So this is blended from a couple of things that happened to me over the last couple of weeks involving diabetes. Okay, I don't understand why

Unknown Speaker 3:40
entities share

Scott Benner 3:41
such vanilla information with people, whether it's in their social media where they're teaching. And I'm not just saying companies now, I'm not saying like, I'm not specifically saying a pump company or a CGM company in general, pharmacom, not just saying in general, the content that people get is often like, Hey, here's a recipe for a cake that you can take to your July 4, blah, blah, blah, and diabetes. And, you know, like, does diabetes do this? And like, it's the same stuff regurgitated over and over and over again. And I'm always stunned, because they have an audience, and they could help them, but instead, they just churn out the same crap over and over again. I don't know why people do that.

Jennifer Smith, CDE 4:32
I think if we're talking in general statements again, not about a product in general, or, you know, in specific, or anything. I like the term vanilla. I really do. I

Scott Benner 4:44
usually say banal, but I think people don't know what that means sometimes, and then I throw off the conversation with

Jennifer Smith, CDE 4:49
them. No, vanilla is perfect in this I think it's because people are so scared to be what I think should be truthful and in the truth. Statement offending somebody. Okay, we are so worried in today's society that something you say, or the way that you tell somebody, the real, right way to do it, is gonna make them, Oh, my goodness, like you're saying this against me. My good. Do you know many times a day I could be offended if I really chose to be, come on, let it roll. I just

Scott Benner 5:26
come on. And so there is that, I think, that people's concern about making their content, you know, okay, for everybody, yeah, so that no one could possibly get upset ever. Does keep it very surface then, because you end up saying things that you're just like, well, this can't possibly make anybody upset. But I think the joke's on them, because, yes, someone's still going to be upset. What's

Jennifer Smith, CDE 5:52
still going to be angry? I mean, it's kind of like the whole concept you mentioned recipe, right? You can put a recipe out, and you could even put into it in terms of just the diabetes angle, right? You could say, and in this, I choose to use this product, and I choose to use this and it, it seems to do this for my blood sugar, but I think it's beneficial to follow up and say, but you know what? That's my n of one. You go ahead and you give it a try. And if you can't use this, or you don't do this, go ahead and do something else. I'm just telling you what works for me, right? But just be honest about it. Yeah.

Scott Benner 6:28
So what brings this up for me is that, did you know if just one person in your family has type one diabetes, you're up to 15 times more likely to get it too. So screen it like you mean it one blood test can spot type one diabetes early. Tap now talk to a doctor or visit screened for type one.com for more info. In a professional setting, a person asked me, but the conversation started with like, what are you most proud of about the podcast? And it was a business question, not a like a helping people question, because my answer is always going to be that it helps people. It helps people. But yes, they meant business wise. And I said longevity. I said that, you know, open your Instagram up today, see who's talking diabetes. Wait a calendar year, go back and see if you can find them again, right? Like that's, you know, keeping, you know, current and keeping your popularity up. And they said, well, then how do you do you do that? And I said, Oh, that's easy. I said, I genuinely get up every day, and I think what would help people with diabetes? Like, what could I offer them? What could I pull into the conversation that would help them? And they were like, Oh, okay. And I said that that's where the rest of you go wrong. I'm like, You're always saying things that are just like, I don't know. Like, oh, you know, insulin is too expensive. Great. Well, we all know that that doesn't help anybody's blood sugar be stable. You know what I mean? Like, here's a recipe. Have you tried this? I don't. I'm not angry about it. I'm just confused about it. Like, they never seem to say anything. And then I realized, as I was talking to them, a lot of doctors do the same exact thing, right? Just surface, always surface, never deeper.

Jennifer Smith, CDE 8:08
Yeah, I was just gonna say exactly that it's, it's almost like they're afraid to dig down and look for what do people really want a discussion about? And sometimes, I think you may not know until you hear discussion about something that, gosh, I had some of those questions too, yeah, and I wouldn't have even thought to ask, or they were subconscious, something like nicking at your brain to gosh, you know, but you couldn't put words to it, but somebody else did right? And you need to dig into people's life when you have conversations in order to get the wealth that can help somebody else, and it's not going to help everybody. I pick and choose things I listen to all the time, yeah, what

Scott Benner 8:57
I realized is I was doing this thing recently where I asked somebody to kind of expound on their experience, and it was a professional thing, and they just didn't, or they couldn't, I wasn't sure what happened. Like they defaulted to some pre written conversation that I could tell while they were saying it they had said 1000 times in their life, right? Like they went back to their script, and I re asked the question. I was like, No, how does it make you feel? And they couldn't, like, I was stunned. I was like, you don't know how you feel about this. And they're so professionally focused on, like, say these things, use these words, don't say this part. A lawyer told me not to do this, like, right? And I was like, I know there's knowledge inside of you. You don't even know how to let it out, right? And then I changed up the focus a little bit, and I thought I could get them to a moat, and they still could. And then I started wondering, like, is it just, are some people just better communicators than others? Like, if I said, Jenny, you and I have done this together. I know, you know, for people who don't like, maybe don't have context for. This, Jenny and I spoke together in Austin at a live event like last year, and we did, we speak for five or six hours to a group.

Jennifer Smith, CDE 10:08
The long time it was several hours before lunch, and then it was a couple of hours. It was a couple of hours after lunch as well. So I'd say probably six hours

Scott Benner 10:18
the extent of our preparation was standing outside of the door of the auditorium five minutes before it started, and I said, Hey, do you think we should talk about what we're going to talk about? Then we kind of like, giggled a little and went inside, and I was like, okay, diabetes, go. I never once looked at you and thought, oh, Jenny's stuck. She doesn't know what to say. She doesn't have anything for this moment, and it made me wonder, like, do people not have the information, and that's why they're not sharing it? Are they gatekeeping the information? I feel like I've seen both. I feel like I've seen people who find themselves. Today's podcast is sponsored by the Eversense CGM, boasting a six month sensor, the Eversense CGM offers you these key advantages, distinct on body vibe alerts when high or low, a consistent and exceptional accuracy over a six month period and you only need two sensors per year. No longer will you have to carry your CGM supplies with you. You won't have to be concerned about your adhesive not lasting, accidentally knocking off a sensor or wasting a sensor when you have to replace your transmitter. That's right. There's no more weekly or bi weekly hassles of sensor changes, not with the Eversense CGM. It's implantable and it's accurate. Eversense cgm.com/juice, cgm.com/juicebox, the Eversense CGM is the first and only long term CGM Eversense sits comfortably right under the skin in your upper arm, and it lasts way longer than any other CGM sensor. Never again will you have to worry about your sensor falling off before the end of its life. So if you want an incredibly accurate CGM that can't get knocked off and won't fall off, you're looking for the Eversense CGM. Eversense cgm.com/juicebox, the contour, next gen blood glucose meter is the meter that we use here. Arden has one with her at all times I have one downstairs in the kitchen, just in case I want to check my blood sugar, and Arden has them at school. They're everywhere that she is, contour next.com/juice, box, test strips and the meters themselves may be less expensive for you in cash out of your pocket, than you're paying currently through your insurance for another meter. You can find out about that and much more at my link, contour next.com/juicebox contour makes a number of fantastic and accurate meters, and their second chance test strips are absolutely my favorite part. What does that mean? If you go to get some blood, and maybe you touch it, and, I don't know, stumble with your hand and, like, slip off and go back. It doesn't impact the quality or accuracy of the test. So you can hit the blood, not get enough, come back, get the rest, without impacting the accuracy of the test. That's right, you can touch the blood, come back and get the rest, and you're going to get an absolutely accurate test. I think that's important, because we all stumble and fumble at times. That's not a good reason to have to waste a test trip. And with a contour next gen, you won't have to contour next.com forward slash juicebox, you're going to get a great reading without having to be perfect in a position where you would expect they know what they're talking about, but when you start talking to them, realize they don't have a lot. And I also feel like I've been around people who know the answer, but they want to be the ones to have the answer, so they don't want you to have it. Have you ever seen that like gatekeeping the information? Yes,

Jennifer Smith, CDE 13:56
absolutely. Like. But then who are they going to share it with? You can you can keep the information, but I mean to your beginning statement is, who's it going to help? Yeah, right. Well, that's not to help. Yeah, that's not their concern. But there are people who

Scott Benner 14:11
you would think that that was their concern.

Jennifer Smith, CDE 14:13
You would hope, yeah, right, aren't we in this too? I mean, my, my joy every day that I get to work with somebody is truly that I have given them as much as like at the end of my day, my brain feels done like because of all the little bits, the digging and the talking and the digging out the right information from what I know And what I can apply to that particular individual discussion and need, and it's different for every single person, right? But you have to be willing to say, why would I hold on to this information if it can help somebody else? Like, why wouldn't I share it? Yeah,

Scott Benner 14:55
I don't know that's for a psychologist to figure out for those people, but I've definitely seen. People gatekeeper information, like I'm the person of power. I want to stay like this, and I've always taken the the opposite approach. And you people have heard me say this on the podcast for years, like I actually believe that the hardest part about my job is that I have to find you, make you believe that I might know what I'm talking about, actually get the information to you, and then be willing to say goodbye at the end, right? Because you might not need this anymore, right? And, you know, in any other media situation, they get a listener, they want to hold on to them. My goal is for you to feel like, Man, I don't really need this podcast anymore. Like, you know, like, that big picture, that's what I'm hoping. I'm hoping you feel comfortable enough to your life and be happy and live, right? Yeah, yep, if you want to keep listening like, God bless you. Thank you. But like, you know, I I just find it. I don't know it's frustrating for me, because as much as that person who started that conversation with me was like, Scott, you're so your thing is so popular, tell me how you did it, I sit there and I think I'm stunned that more people can't figure out a way to do it. They either don't want to share it all or and then this is another part of it. I think it's possible. I want to be completely clear, like, I couldn't make this podcast if it didn't generate an income for me, right? Sure? Like, it just, it's just too much time, and it's all my time. Yeah, so I understand that if people are like, look, I can make this content, but I'm gonna also have to run a coaching service, or I'm gonna have to do something, because they're not big enough to draw in advertisers, and they're not small enough for it to be a part time thing. So they have to find a way to make money so they can't give you all the information, because they need you to pay them to give you the information so they can keep doing the thing, sure. So that's possibly part of it as well.

Jennifer Smith, CDE 16:46
And I think sometimes there is also just the want to be truly involved in a community effort of of bringing people together in maybe a different way and and that's okay, right? And I think your goals aren't truly to be successful for, hey everybody, look at me and look at what I did, but to be successful for the give to the to the broader community of people with type one and type two diabetes, truly to be able to gain information that they're not getting from someplace else, right? And so I think all the communities certainly have a pull for certain people, yeah, and I think there's value in all of the different avenues of getting it for sure. And the effort that you know the other you know, bloggers or podcasters or whatever their effort is, their own effort, for whatever reason they have behind what they're doing? Yeah,

Scott Benner 17:43
I don't listen. You make the point that if you want to reach a lot of people, you have to reach people. Yes, there's like, a I don't know. You have to strike a balance between not being a clown to get eyes and at the same time be entertaining enough that it draws in a massive amount of people so that it can help a mass amount of people correct. And

Jennifer Smith, CDE 18:02
though keep supplying enough information that is building on what's already there, it's not just rehashing it is getting more and getting deeper and having further conversation. Because despite having one same diagnosis, let's say type one diabetes. Everybody's life with type one diabetes is very different. We all have different diagnosis stories. We all have different experience with healthcare practitioners, medications, other conditions in life that we live with, crappy situations we've lived through. You know, you

Scott Benner 18:39
also have to have a vision for what I hope I say this correctly, but somebody asked me one time like they kind of insinuated that my job was to tell people what they wanted to hear. And I said, I think my job is to tell people what they need to know and might not know that they need to know. Yes, yeah, absolutely. They say one of the jobs in the future might be as much as chat GPT. Will you know as AI will know things, asking it the right questions in the right way is going to be an art, right? And so I ask myself, what are these faceless people who I know are listening like, what is it that I'm seeing in the community that they don't understand? And I don't need to make them comfortable. I need to give them good information or lead them down a road that they might not think to look down and and you also have to stay ahead of the curve, like, just thinking back quickly over the years, I take it hard when I do things and people don't like agree with it, so I've taken it over. Well, back in the day, I was like, these CGMS are amazing. And I know that seems really obvious right now, but there was a whole faction of old heads before who wanted to say, like, my kid grew up without a CGM and they're fine. And I'm like, Yeah, it's fine. Good for them. I'm glad you know this data seems really important. And so for the first two years, while I'm out there going, like, these CGMS. Are awesome. People are like, he's a shill. He blah, blah. I'm like, and now it looks like common sense, right? Present day, same thing's happening with GLP meds. I'm like, I think there's something here. And people are like, one guy, one, I swear to god, somebody said to me, you're pushing the GLP agenda. I don't know what, like, Looney, like, I don't know what you think. You know? I

Jennifer Smith, CDE 20:23
think that if there weren't enough people who are experiencing the benefit of this particular medication, right, that you wouldn't have people coming and saying, Hey, I'd like to tell you my story with this, right? You'd have silence. You'd have, okay, well, it sounds great, but I don't know anything because I don't want to try it myself, you know. So, yeah, I don't think that there's necessarily an agenda, I mean.

Scott Benner 20:47
But this person was like, saying, like, you know, basically, like, you're Strapping, you know, pharma to your back and carrying them on this. They're trying to sell this GLP thing. And I was like, Listen, what I'm telling you is, I'm seeing people with diabetes using this, and a lot of good things are happening for some of them. I think we should look at it more. And again, it'll be one of those things that two years from now, it'll see like common sense, and no one will remember this part. But again,

Jennifer Smith, CDE 21:09
what you're talking about is already, it's already being studied. So you're, you're not ready, like I want to make research out of this and put together all of this information to put out there as a whole, you know, whatever. If it wasn't actually happening, then they would not be studying the use of it in people with type one. Now, right? It's

Scott Benner 21:31
not like I took an aspirin for a headache in my toe nail screw fashion. I was like, I think somebody should look into this connection between nail growth and aspirin like, you know, am I the only one saying this? Like, plenty of people are seeing what's happening, but it's when you're talking about it out on the bleeding edge of of this community connection. Like, there's a couple people talking GLP, and other than that, everybody else is like, Are you sure? Like, does it make you sick? Should you be doing it? What about muscle wasting? Like, it's a lot of fear mongering around it, or being so careful that they're not willing to look at some of the positive things that are happening and, or

Jennifer Smith, CDE 22:06
even do their own research? Right? You can hear something about and, or you can hear somebody's 1n, of one, again, kind of story. If you really are concerned, then do your research. Look outside of this person's story. Look at what is actually in the research, what's being done, why they're considering the potential use of this, beyond just type two, and beyond the weight management, you

Scott Benner 22:33
got to pick through what you're what you're hearing like I listen, I'm pretty comfortable saying to you, I think if you pre bullish, your meals consistently, your a 1c, could come down a full point, right? Yeah. But I've had people come to me and say, Listen, I pre bolus, and I get low every time. So I'll say, Well, if your basal is right, if your settings are correct, if your insulin sensitivity is right, and that's happening to you, it sounds like you don't need to pre boss, yeah, you know, like, I'm not saying, like, do it anyway. I'm saying, This is what I've noticed. You go check into that for yourself. Is it valuable for you? Great. Is it like even with the glps, some people have stomach issues. They can't take it correct. It's not for you then. And yeah,

Jennifer Smith, CDE 23:13
absolutely. I have no need or desire to personally use it. I don't need it. So I can talk about it. I can tell people about it. I can talk through in the avenue of their individual could it be useful? Why are you considering it? And if you are, are there other things in place already that we haven't adjusted, or they're not in place yet, that we haven't adjusted? We could go those there first and then revisit this conversation, right? I mean, just like you're pre bolus well, you're pre bolusing for grilled chicken, that's probably why you're going home.

Scott Benner 23:47
Yeah, we don't need that. And that's the point, right? That's the bigger point around all this. This is there's an example of where you need more information, and it can't just all be dumped onto you in one second. So I'll make the point there, that maybe that's why people don't give more specific advice, because they can't give enough of it to make sure they've covered the whole thing. Whereas, if you have this platform that I have, it can be spread out, people can take their time to absorb it and hopefully get enough of it to put together that puzzle for themselves. Yeah, I would agree. I get frustrated when somebody says, like, I'm a professional, I know this stuff. And then you listen to them, and they speak for 20 minutes, and when they're done, I think they didn't even say anything. They just talked and talked and talked, and there's nothing left here. If I ask you five minutes from now what that person said, you won't remember anything from it.

Jennifer Smith, CDE 24:39
You know, how many conferences that I've gone to with the hopes of a topic being really, like, dug into, like, the nitty gritty of information that I want to pull more out of than the surface level, and I walk away thinking I could have read the PowerPoint presentation in five minutes.

Scott Benner 24:59
Yeah, I. Flew here for this. Flew here, and it feels like their presentation is made from a Google search that just returns the basic ideas of the of the thing, right? And when you go to dig down, they go, what? Yeah, we don't have time for that right now. Or

Jennifer Smith, CDE 25:15
they're constrained by some other disclosure, like they they have an association with somebody and they can't, as you were saying, they're sort of contained into what they can say, and they do know more that they can't say more because somebody told them that they can't.

Scott Benner 25:32
So I use chatgpt all the time, so I asked it this question, and it says that for reasons of professionalism and ethical standards, this might be one reason why a healthcare professional wouldn't give more, but also fear of misinformation and liability. It goes on risk of reputation and damage. Like, if I tell you something and you get it wrong, even if I'm right, and then you go off and you say, Oh, my doctor said this, and he doesn't know what he's talking about. And then you're screwed in the community, like, that's understandable. There can be institutional guidelines that they have to follow. But they also talked about a conservative culture in medicine. Traditionally, medicine is a conservative hierarchy with a strong emphasis on adhering to established norms and protocols. That's something too it's like, you know, as treatments move forward, you're still talking about whatever you heard in medical school and whatever, whatever the writings say. And I actually heard a doctor talking about this recently, like there's all these advancements, but the papers don't reflect them, like the paper and the papers reflect them, right? So the research reflects it, the papers reflect it, but it never gets moved back into the teaching at the medical school. The Medical School's teaching off of papers from decades ago. Sometimes,

Jennifer Smith, CDE 26:46
yeah, absolutely. And the unfortunate thing about teachings in medical school now, of course, we have so much that's being taught that's relative to medicine use and I'm trying to be careful. I'm trying to be vanilla.

Scott Benner 27:08
Well, you don't want to insult anybody, and it's not my, it's not my desire to insult anybody. Yeah,

Jennifer Smith, CDE 27:13
I don't want to insult but truly and completely, the majority of information that is taught and given and where they where they get their information that then gets fed into the patient, and what the patient is going to be provided with in terms of a medication. It comes from research that's been conducted by the companies that want their product to be the one that's put out there. I hate that, because I think medication is an important piece of of navigating health conditions in some circumstances. But if that's all you're using as your basis, and you're not going to the first step, the first line, which is more preventative, there are so many lifestyle things that could be being taught to incoming doctors in medical school to be able to say, this is the first step to teach the patients you work with, you want to care for people. You want to do no harm, teach them to live a healthy life. If that isn't working and they've put that in, then move into this researched potential use that could benefit their efforts that are already in place, right as

Scott Benner 28:28
you're talking, I thought, Is there just a way to, like, tax everybody, 50 cents per person, put all the money in a pile and then use that money to pay researchers and lawyers to be on the side of the people, not the side, not side of the government, not the side of a company, but but the people like, right? Just people, because that's what, that's what you need, is you need someone out there doing this research for you, yes, and then throw it all out into the world and let it shake out where. And then

Jennifer Smith, CDE 28:55
it would be honest, right? It would be not vanilla. It would be this. These are the ground rule facts. This is what you should know and move forward.

Scott Benner 29:06
Yeah, no, I just, I'm saying that

Jennifer Smith, CDE 29:08
live long and be prosperous. Yeah,

Scott Benner 29:11
get out though. Well, you made a point a second ago, right? Like, if you, if you can by eating well and exercising and living a life that your body needs, live healthy, then great. And if you have processes in your body that aren't working well enough that that's not enough for it, then let's see if there's a pharmaceutical or something else that can help you with it, right? So, I mean, it makes a ton of sense to me to start at that basic but as soon as you do that, you're going to get argued with by 17 different people are going to tell you the way to eat is everything you open your mouth with becomes some sort of a fight. I'm answering my own question, by the way, why companies don't get involved in specific? Yes, yeah, there's no way to win if you said hey, even if you said eat, well, someone go. Well, what does that mean? And then now we're arguing. About that for 10 years, and then that pisses away, and people finally stop arguing about that. And then you move on to the the next step, and then it starts all over again. There's five different opinions, five different financial perspectives, and everybody wants their thing to be the thing

Jennifer Smith, CDE 30:16
right? And I think what you know, what it honestly brings in that you're kind of skirting around is that we need discussions to happen. We should not shy away from discussion. We should not shy away from bringing up hard points, like uncomfortable discussion points. We should be happy to be able to talk about something that is not vanilla. Yeah,

Scott Benner 30:42
right. Let's have a deeper conversation and disagree. That's fine. Be nice, like, that's even like, I listen, I cultivate what I think is maybe the kindest Facebook group around diabetes that I've ever seen, but it's based on you're all adults. I'm not going to tell you what to say, just however you eat, however you feel, love, I don't even care. Like, go ahead and have your conversations, but then be nice. And it's interesting. I had this thing happen the other day. I can talk about this, probably right. So there was a post, there's a, I don't want to out anybody, there's a post that comes up and somebody says, this is one of the most controversial posts in diabetes. What would you bolus for this? Like, you know what I mean? And it's a photo, yeah, yeah. And eventually,

Jennifer Smith, CDE 31:23
in a million different places, not just Yes, people post all the time. Look at the bowl of ice cream and all the toppings, and it looks like, like a kitchen sink full of stuff. Like, well, that's a wide guess.

Scott Benner 31:35
A lot I'm guessing, but so, but somebody will come in and say, hey, well, you know, I see this in there, and that you're going to get an impact quickly from this. There might be some fat in there. You get a lot of thoughtful answers, but there's always one person that can't stop themselves from saying, I just wouldn't eat it. Well, no one asked you. That guy didn't ask you the question. Question wasn't, Hey, would you eat this? And so something like that happened where a person came in and said, like, yeah, you know, I just, I think that if you ate a different quality of food, and blah, blah, blah, and then someone got insulted by that. And I'm like, okay, that's legitimate. I have a one of my rules in my Facebook group is, don't tell people how to eat. And so this person gets very angry that this person told another person how to eat. Now we've got three people involved, and the person who gets angry about it then fires back at that person, very rude. And I removed the rude comment, and I said, please be kind like you know, I next time somebody does something like that, report that comment. I will take care of it. Because I would have taken that comment out and said, Please don't tell somebody how to eat. So all I would have done, right? Well, you know, that person left the group in anger because they didn't want to be told what to do. And I was like, you just got mad because that person was cruel. You were three times crueler to them in return. And now you're mad at me. I was like, and then I'm dumb enough to get on here and ask you this question when the obvious answer is, you can't win.

Unknown Speaker 33:04
No, you can't win. There you go.

Scott Benner 33:07
So Jenny, I think we're getting back to what you started with. If people want to know why they're not getting straightforward information from companies and entities, it's because they're scared to talk to you all,

Jennifer Smith, CDE 33:17
yeah, yeah, pretty much they're they're scared, and companies, especially, they're scared to be sued if they get back to you with an answer that's 100% the nitty gritty truth of what they're doing. I mean, it is the reason that today I am so not in love with all of the pharmaceutical commercials. I mean, I grew up with Band Aid and I think an aspirin. They are aspirin and band aids. Those were the commercials for medical care on TV right today. It's not this and not that, whatever it is, but they have to put in some of those sort of things that could be symptoms after because, you know what? They don't want to get ground out for not stating, well, you could have headaches with this medication because one person had it. In a study of 300,000

Scott Benner 34:06
people, yeah, if your eyes start bleeding and fall out your asshole, please, yeah. What did that happen to one person? But, yeah, so you have to disclaimer everything, which I'm not against, but, like, no, it's just very by the way, now I have the I am stuck on Band Aid brand because Band Aid stuck on me. That's got stuck in my head, and now I feel very old. But here's the problem, okay, so if, whether it's a diabetes website who's captured an audience and is feeding you information, it ends up being just this banal, vanilla information, or it's a company who's not willing to say, you know, maybe you should look at this if my our product's not working for you, what it ends up leading to is, people with diabetes are misered, right? They have a difficulty managing their blood sugars. They get increased anxiety. They're frustrated, they misinterpret things. They. Make self management errors and then misinterpret why those errors happened. Then it's just a tumble, right? You just you lose empowerment, you feel disengaged, and before you know it, you've got a nine, A, 1c, and you think, Oh, this is the best I can do. And so isn't it interesting, if that is that loop, which is people won't speak up and say what works because they're afraid of all the things that we discussed. In the end, it doesn't hurt those people. It hurts, it hurts the audience and those, those people have diabetes. It's the one thing like I know I've, I've told this story on the podcast before, but I wrote a blog for a long time, and it was popular. It was really, really popular. And one day I just realized I'm just saying what everybody else is saying. This is silly, like I'm gonna start sharing directly what's helping Arten, right? And when I did that, the blog got massively more popular. But I'm also, at that point, a blogger. I can say, hey, there's a disclaimer page on here that says, don't listen to me, anything you read here is for entertainment purposes, like that thing, right? A company, a company, can't come out and say, hey, you know this information is for entertainment purposes, but I would change your basal if I was you, like, like, that's not gonna work, right? But, but when I saw that help people, and then when I moved it to a different medium, where it's easier to reach people, and it's easier for people to, like, absorb the information. The amount of people I saw help with it exploded. And then that's what frustrates me. I'm like, I don't reach everybody, and some people don't like me, which is totally cool, yeah, but if you don't like me, but you still don't know how to pre bolus, I want someone else to be telling you how to do it, if it's not me, right? And that just doesn't happen. And then I get super frustrated about it, because I want people to be well, whether they get the information here or somewhere else. Yeah,

Jennifer Smith, CDE 36:47
I think the other piece, in terms of companies, especially diabetes companies, that is frustrating from the the coding of what you get told when you call in with a complaint is that they're choosing to use your product to benefit their life in a really significant way. Right? So if each individual person uses a product and has some minor things that are easy to overcome, but some people have more specific, really considerable issues, but you're still feeding them the same response. That's what also makes people really, really frustrated, right? You know, if you're going to replace something, replace it because you've said you're going to replace it, if you're not going to replace it, then you don't replace it for anybody, no matter what. But you can't, like cherry pick, so to speak, who gets something who doesn't get something? What you say to somebody, and I think that is where, on that end of calling into customer service, you get a little bit more. Get the tip of the iceberg. You get the person who's reading off of the form that says, This is how to answer this type of question that comes in. But in diabetes, especially with products, again, we need more than that, because this is impacting our life. If

Scott Benner 38:09
you're the one giving out that information, you have to understand that whatever is said is going to be received by the person on the other end of the phone, or the other end of your Tiktok, or wherever it is. As all of the information, they're not going to wonder if there's more. They're going to think if there was more to it, you would have said it. And so when you give incomplete answers, the person hearing them believes it's a complete answer, correct? That's why it works so poorly with management ideas, because if you can't give it all, then you're not going to be able to succeed. And even with like, the you know, like you said, with with how to use a device. And I listen, I understand device manufacturers are prohibited by the FDA. They're not allowed to tell you how to use them. That's not allowed, but they find ways to to get good information out into the world. And it can be done. Do? I did it with OmniPod for OmniPod five, we put together a three part series that very completely explains how to use OmniPod five, right? It's awesome, and they should be lauded for the amount of effort and time that a ton of people behind the scenes put into making sure that that content was valuable, right? You don't see that from a lot of places. And I'm not like, I'm not blaming like, another pump company or something. I've even learned to believe it. It's not just because they don't want to. They might not have the staff for it. The staff might not have the expertise for it. There's a lot of reasons why stuff like that doesn't happen, right? But mostly I think it's the stuff we've covered here.

Jennifer Smith, CDE 39:29
I think in what you just said, too, is that I think people get frustrated because they can see that the company isn't being openly honest about what they can tell you or what they know, right? You know, what? If you don't know how to answer a question or you can't answer it because you're bound by legal, kind of, you know, constraints, then tell me that. Tell me that so that I don't remain frustrated with the problem that I'm having. And I've called six times and I get six. Different answers, but the real answer is that you just can't tell me, because you really don't know yet. Miss Smith,

Scott Benner 40:05
I'm sorry, but the FDA precludes us from answering that question. The problem is that the next thing they're going to say is you should ask your doctor, and then apparently, if you're unlucky, you're going to get to your doctor and they're going to go, but I don't know, call the company. Call the company. You see people do that all the time. They bounce them back and forth, because nobody wants in the end. Listen, there are plenty of great people, okay? And this is not a blanket statement, but when you run into those people who aren't great in the end, what you're going to run into with people who are covering their own ass. And that's that like so and you do not know if that's who you're talking to or not, that's always my problem is, like, I don't know. Am I talking to an ass cover, or am I talking to somebody who doesn't know? Or Is there really no answer, you know, right? That's all right. You know, nothing you hear on the juicebox podcast should be considered advised medical or otherwise

Jennifer Smith, CDE 40:54
there No, yes, I have no affiliation for that. I

Scott Benner 40:57
don't know those people. But then you share your stories, and hopefully people can cherry pick and take things out that'll help them or resonate with their experience. They go, Oh, I never thought of it that way. I just helped somebody. The other day, a person emailed me and said, my kids on OmniPod five, they're in college. He's starting to take his health much more seriously. That's awesome. I was so excited, exercising more, eating better, but he's getting low a lot. And I was like, Oh, God, I know the right answer here. The answer is that that algorithm is working, is just over giving insulin based on his needs prior, and it's not shifting quickly enough in this case. So my thought was, you know, so I what I thought was, like, reset it, you know what I mean? Like, figure out what your total daily insulin is and start over. But I can't just email a stranger back and say, Hey, here's medical advice, right? So I have so I go. If this was happening to me, I would wonder if blah, blah, blah, and then I might look into making sure my settings are clear, and then maybe the algorithm could benefit from being, you know, reset with those new numbers. And as I was writing it, I felt ridiculous, because I'm still saying the same damn thing. You know what I mean, but like you are, but you're

Jennifer Smith, CDE 42:18
putting in a disclosure so that it can't come back to you. You're saying, if it were me, this is what I would do. I mean, I'm asked things all the time from a personal as well as a clinical perspective, and sometimes I give clinical perspective based on a professional stance, right? But my personal perspective is because of personal experience. And I can say, You know what, but that isn't what I do, because it doesn't work for you.

Scott Benner 42:47
In the end, I'm looking at my inbox and I'm thinking, Can I really ignore this and let this poor kid who's trying to pull his together? Am I gonna let him give up and live a life of poor health? Because I don't have the balls to answer this question, yeah, so, so I answered them, and I guess that's where my frustration comes from with everybody else. Like, just, like, what if we all just did the right thing? Like, going back to why I mentioned that the podcast is popular. The podcast is popular because it helps people, and then they tell other people I was helped here. Like, imagine if we were all doing that, how much more quickly people would be, you know, brought forward with their outcomes. That's just, I don't know it gets anyway. I understand why you guys don't do what I said an hour ago, but I get frustrated by it, and I'm so sick of seeing your freaking recipes for that cake that I can bring to my July 4 that won't make my blood sugar spike. It's just Jenny, by the way, the secret is using whipped cream for the icing. Oh,

Jennifer Smith, CDE 43:45
whipped cream for the icing. Lovely. So, because it's not real frosting,

Scott Benner 43:48
it doesn't have all that sugar in it and everything. And if I ran a website for type one diabetes, I would probably end up having to do what they're doing. But it still frustrates the hell out of me that that's how they do it. And, you know, I just wish people would just be more forthcoming if they know they should say, and if they don't know, they should stop pretending they know. That's pretty much what I think anyway,

Jennifer Smith, CDE 44:12
stop. Don't put the Fourth of July recipe out anymore. Yeah. I mean,

Scott Benner 44:15
just stop. It's so upsetting.

Jennifer Smith, CDE 44:20
I clearly have not visited whatever you're looking I'm

Scott Benner 44:22
so afraid that the website that does it's going to be like, Hey, he's directly talking about us, but I think they could figure it out too. And I feel badly. But it's so weird that that we live in a world where a person can have a medical question and be better off going to the juicebox podcast, Facebook group and asking a bunch of faceless strangers and come up with a better answer than if they went to their doctor, the company they bought the thing from, or it just, I don't know, I find it weird, like I'm almost here arguing against myself, like I don't think this is how it should work.

Jennifer Smith, CDE 44:54
I think with technology today, if it wasn't you, I think somebody else would have. Likely figured something similar out. Yeah, right. I mean, in whatever way. But I think because you were so quick to the move from just being a blogger into putting that voice specific connection, I think especially in the past several years where we've gone through a lot of poor social interaction, like True Seeing somebody. I think podcasts really have bloomed because it was the closest to socializing that you could get. And with you talking to so many different people all over the world, it was a great way to feel like you were almost having a conversation. No,

Scott Benner 45:43
I agree, but at the same time, it's only working because I'm being so authentic and honest while I'm doing it, because there's other people doing this, and they they run banal all the time as well. Listen, it went all the way back to when I was blogging. What I noticed that was that made me it was confusing is that people would get popular by being a blogger, which is to say that they're speaking to people very genuinely, right? And then when their popularity rose, the first thing they do was make over their website. Then all of a sudden it looked like a pharma website, like they put some money into it, they shined it up. And then they thought, then they took themselves too seriously, and then they stopped saying what they thought, and then they somehow turned into the thing that they were railing against the year before. And I was like, Oh, that was weird. I was I was like, you just stopped doing all the things that made you popular, like, because they wanted to look, I don't know, more

Jennifer Smith, CDE 46:37
professional maybe, or more like a more like a knowledgeable resource, trust

Scott Benner 46:44
me, they did the wrong thing. Jenny, my website looks like a five year old. Made it juicebox podcast.com, go check it out. But it works, and all the information's there. And I don't care if it doesn't look fancy, you know, and by the way, that website gets, it's really great traffic, so I'm sure it does, I don't know Anyway, all right, I appreciate you talking to me about this. Thank

Jennifer Smith, CDE 47:07
you absolutely.

Scott Benner 47:12
Thank you. A huge thanks to the contour next gen blood glucose meter for sponsoring this episode of The juicebox podcast. Learn more and get started today at contour next.com/juicebox your kids mean everything to you, and you do anything for them, especially if they're at risk. So when it comes to type one diabetes screen, it like you mean it, because if even just one person in your family has type one, your child is up to 15 times more likely to get it, but just one blood test can help you spot it early, so don't wait. Talk to your doctor about screening tap now or visit screenfortypeone.com to get more info and screen it like you mean. It a huge thank you to Eversense CGM for sponsoring this episode of the podcast. Are you tired of having to change your sensor every seven to 14 days with the Eversense CGM? You just replace it once every six months via a simple in office visit, learn more and get started today at Eversense cgm.com/juicebox. If you or a loved one was just diagnosed with type one diabetes, and you're looking for some fresh perspective, the bold beginning series from the juicebox podcast is a terrific place to start. That series is with myself and Jenny Smith. Jenny is a CD CES, a registered dietitian and a type one for over 35 years, and in the bold beginnings series, Jenny and I are going to answer the questions that most people have after a type one diabetes diagnosis. The series begins at episode 698, in your podcast player, or you can go to juicebox podcast.com and click on bold beginnings in the menu if you're not already subscribed or following in your favorite audio app, please take the time now to do that. It really helps the show and get those automatic downloads set up so you never miss an episode. Thank you so much for listening. I'll be back very soon with another episode of The juicebox podcast. The episode you just heard was professionally edited by wrong way recording, wrongwayrecording.com I know that Facebook has a bad reputation, but please give the private Facebook group for the juicebox podcast, a healthy once over juicebox podcast, type one diabetes. The group now has 47,000 members in it. It gets 150 new members a day. It is completely free, and at the very least, you can watch other people talk about diabetes. And everybody is welcome, type one, type two, gestational loved ones. Everyone is welcome. Go up into the featured tab of the private Facebook group and. And there you'll see lists upon lists of all of the management series that are available to you for free in the juicebox podcast, becoming a member of that group, I really think it will help you. It will at least give you community. You'll be able to kind of lurk around, see what people are talking about, pick up some tips and tricks. Maybe you can ask a question or offer some help. Juicebox podcast, type one diabetes on Facebook. You.