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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
Hello friends. Welcome back to another episode of The Juicebox Podcast.

Joining this three part series on going off to college with type one diabetes today is part three. If you've missed the first two, they're right before this one in your podcast player today, Andrea and I are going to talk about the thing I'm assuming most of you dread the most your child having low blood sugars at college. 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, 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 juice box at checkout. That's Juicebox at checkout to save 40% at cozy earth.com Are you an adult living with type one or the caregiver of someone who is and a US resident, if you are, I'd love it if you would go to T 1d exchange.org/juice box and take the survey. When you complete that survey, your answers are used to move type one diabetes research of all kinds. So if you'd like to help with type one research, but don't have time to go to a doctor or an investigation and you want to do something right there from your sofa. This is the way t 1d exchange.org/juice box. It should not take you more than about 10 minutes. Today's episode of the juice box 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 contour next.com/juice, box. Today's podcast is sponsored by the insulin pump that my daughter has been wearing since she was four years old, Omnipod. Omnipod.com/juice, box. You too can have the same insulin pump that my daughter has been wearing every day for 16 years. This show is sponsored today by the glucagon that my daughter carries, gvoke hypo pen. Find out more at gvoke glucagon.com. Forward slash juice box. Andrea, welcome back. I appreciate you doing this with me. Hey, Scott, it's great to be back. Awesome. I am excited because we're going to do an entire episode here today, just about managing lows at college and being ready for them

Andrea Lafleche 2:31
exactly they're going to happen. So why don't we be prepared as best as we can for them? So yeah, I really want to kind of help all of our young adults and the caregivers, especially, kind of a background on what might happen if you're going low. And we'll get really in depth and give you some tips and suggestions, hopefully to give you some more comfort and be able to get your own information to feel more comfortable sending your student off to college knowing that they're they're going to go low.

Scott Benner 3:03
Yeah. I mean, we don't want to not be trying for it not to happen, but we also don't want to pretend like it's not going to happen and then not be prepared for it. And there's exactly more here on your your notes are great, because there's more here than I think I would have thought to say. So dive right in, please. Wherever you want to start,

Speaker 1 3:19
sure, let's just start with lows in general, not like, life threatening, but like, Oh, I'm walking to class and I'm 65 right? It's gonna happen. You're gonna go low on campus, whether that's in your residence hall with all of your things, or when you're out with friends, and in a million other scenarios that could come up while you're off at college. Really, it's your job to be prepared. The number of times I've seen somebody post about not having low snacks or say they never carry sugar with them, I don't want to be judgmental, but also just makes me nervous, like I as a person with diabetes, 99% of the time, always have something on me, because I don't want to be in that situation. And I think college, with everything else that's going on, this is one thing that you can prep for. You can prepare for. Think about how you can be the most on top of this when it comes to having some sort of glucose, some sort of supply with you, as well as wearing a Medical Alert Bracelet. I feel like in one of our previous episodes, we might have mentioned this. I know for many of you listening, this is probably not something you want to do. Maybe even thought about it, especially with the rise in diabetes tech you're wearing it, people see it. Maybe you're making the assumption that people must know I have diabetes because they can see my Dexcom on my arm. They can see my Omnipod. That's not necessarily the case. One the general public might not know what those things are, even though they're becoming more and more prevalent in the media in everyday life, they might not know, and EMTs aren't trained to look for those things if they're coming to help you, whether that's because you've passed. Out, or whether that's because you just need a little extra support with your low blood sugar, people aren't going to be looking at those things to know you have diabetes, which is why I'm very much suggesting finding something that works for you, that either goes on your wrist, your neck or your ankle, because that's where as I've learned this past week, EMTs are trained to look yeah, that you wear something for me, I just have a little tiny thing that goes on my watch band that says type one diabetes. Super simple. You wouldn't notice it.

Scott Benner 5:30
I had an episode a long time ago now with an EMT, because everyone's like, Oh, I have a tattoo that says I have type one diabetes. They do not look at your tattoos. They only run like Andrew just said, your neck, your wrists and your and your ankles. They're looking for that jewelry. That's the only thing they're trained to do. Yeah. Do that right? It's yeah. Do you think you would have resisted it when you were younger? If somebody said, I want you to wear a bracelet or something, if you take insulin or so final ureas, you are at risk for your blood sugar going too low. You need a safety net when it matters most, be ready with G vo hypo pen. My daughter carries G VO, K hypo pen everywhere she goes, because it's a ready to use rescue pen for treating very low blood sugar in people with diabetes ages two and above that. I trust low blood sugar. Emergencies can happen unexpectedly and they demand quick action. Luckily, GEVO kypo pen can be administered in two simple steps, even by yourself in certain situations. Show those around you where you store GEVO kypo pen and how to use it. They need to know how to use GVO kypo pen before an emergency situation happens. Learn more about why GEVO kypo Pen is in Arden's diabetes toolkit at gvoke, glucagon.com/juicebox, gvoke shouldn't be used if you have a tumor in the gland on the top of your kidneys called a pheochromocytoma, or if you have a tumor in your pancreas called an insulin OMA, visit, gevok, glucagon, com, slash, risk for safety information.

Speaker 1 7:07
I think the hardest thing for me, I believe I had one, if I'm remembering, and it was not a cute one, like the standard. I don't know if anybody listening to this remembers the like commercials. I think that you could like medical or commercials or, like, I think I got brochures when I was younger, of like, here's all your options, like, the shape that you want and like, but they were all basically the same metal, yeah, with a little cross snake. I can't remember what it's officially called, Caduceus. Yes, that on it. So not great. I think I wore it. The problem for me growing up was I was really into athletics and sports. You can't wear jewelry when you're playing sports. The ON OFF, ON OFF, ON OFF. Thing was difficult, really, the putting it back on. So I think now there's so many other options, like, I wear my watch, my Apple Watch, every day, for the most part, it's already on there. I don't feel it. It's part of something I'm already wearing. So I like that option for me to

Scott Benner 8:07
something that is going to drive you to wear it, not something that every time they look at it, they go, this thing's horrible or shiny or, yeah, right?

Speaker 1 8:16
There's so many other options these days, right? If you're not wearing it, nobody's gonna know you have diabetes, so they're not gonna be able to necessarily think to look for your glucagon if you're having that, or be like, Oh, you need glucose, or let's check your blood sugar, they're gonna probably go to something else, like, Are you on drugs? Are you intoxicated? These types of things, because there's only

Scott Benner 8:35
one college campus that might be more you're on a college campus,

Speaker 1 8:39
and the percentage of people that have diabetes is so low, comparatively right to the regular population, that that's not going to be there. Like, oh, you probably have diabetes. Like, no, you probably have something else going on, right? So this is why we need to, like, let them know. So figure out what makes sense for you. Is my number one tip. But then the sugar thing, like, stash it everywhere, whatever your favorite low blood sugar thing is. Or if you like to have different types of things based on what you're doing, like, if I'm going out and I don't want to bring a bag, I have a small tube of glucose tabs that I can shove in my pocket. I don't really notice it, but you have it and I'm good to go, or if I'm going on some other trek, or I'm bringing my regular everyday stuff, I have a little stasher bag of Skittles in there that's more has more carbs. So like, figure out what works for you. But like, have them everywhere, right? Put them on auto ship, yeah.

Scott Benner 9:36
Juice boxes for are probably easier for women because they have purses, pocketbooks, generally speaking, but guys have to have backpacks too, right? Like at college, right? I'm gonna give you my best tip, and don't all of you buy this and ruin it for me. Okay, do you know Albany's gummy bears? No, they're awesome, okay? And you can buy a five pound bag of them on Amazon for like, 15 bucks. Ooh. So Arden has in her dorm room at all times, a five pound bag of gummy bears. Now you'll never get low enough to eat all these gummy bears, right? So when you go to visit your kid at school, there's always gummy bears there too, which is kind of awesome, but she has them in her room. She knows how many of them fix how low of a blood sugar. Not great at night because, you know, teeth and cavities and stuff like that, but for most of the day, it's pretty awesome. They are soft. They're easy to do while you're half asleep. And then juice boxes, like, we have the kind that Arden like, My best tip about juice boxes is the most sugar you can get in the smallest amount of liquid. Like, that's, you know what? I mean, it's like, I want you to be able to get 15 carbs with, you know, two ounces, if you can, not super healthy, but great for a low blood sugar. I sent four little bricks of them to school with Arden weeks and weeks ago, and I visited her last weekend, and I looked up and there were three bricks, and there were like, three missing. And I was like, Oh, she's not really even, like, using them, you know, she's got a pattern right? Like, things are working the right way, but when she needs them, they're in her purse, they're in her bag, they're next to her bed, not like, across the room, like that kind of stuff. Yeah,

Speaker 1 11:13
no, totally. I have a, literally, just like, an open bowl of Skittles next to my bed, so all I have to do is reach over, half asleep and grab a few. Like,

Scott Benner 11:24
just very Daisy, yeah,

Speaker 1 11:26
literally, just half roll over. Okay, here we go. And I like Skittles, because they're, like, one carb a piece. So if I really want to when I'm awake, know how much I need? Yeah, I can count them out, which is nice, right? Other things, glucagon, glucagon, yeah, go ahead. I mean, I'm gonna be honest. Do I always have it with me? No, do I suggest you do? Yes. I think this is one of those things, like, you know yourself in a lot of ways, or like your experience level, like, had diabetes for 26 years. I've never needed to use a full glucagon. I don't think now is the time I'm going to probably start. But if I'm traveling or I know I'm going to be doing, like, a newer activity, or being very active, I definitely bring it with me. But in college, everything's so new, right? And you really don't know how something that you might typically do at home could impact to be compounded by other new things you're doing that having that on you, because you're going to be away also from home, if you will, like your residence hall room, which would be your home while you're at school. Like having the extra supplies, I think is important, yeah, to have have that with you.

Scott Benner 12:37
I want to be honest, prior to Chivo kaipo Pen being available, and you know, it. Just want to be clear, they're a sponsor of the podcast. That's not why I said it out loud. But prior to that being available, we didn't carry glucagon anywhere when it was the red box, like it was at home and at school. But you know, that was kind of like it. This is very carriable, though, so it's in Arden's bag. She does not leave the house without one. She has them in her room. There's an extra one there. I always think of this way, eventually they go bad. It's the happiest I've ever been throwing anything out in my life. You know what I mean? Like, Oh, we didn't need this awesome and then, you know, like, bring in another one. I'm a fan, and I think too few people even understand what it is. That's why I mention it so much. So, I mean, if you're me, I leave hypo pens around, like a like, Andrea leaves Skittles next to her. They're everywhere. Yeah,

Speaker 1 13:27
I think another kind of thing to think about, and this might be harder for maybe, like, a first semester, first year student. If you end up having a job on campus, or maybe you're you got super involved, maybe you're part of student government or a student activity, or you're often hanging out in x location. So like when I was at school, we had these different centers that you just kind of could go hang out with there open like nine to nine. You could community space, really, but they were staffed. Think about if there's places on campus that you're spending a decent amount of time per week talking to the staff there, especially if it's a job or, again, you're involved in like, a leadership activity, being like, Hey, I'm here 10 hours a week. Would it be okay if maybe it's in their office because they're your advisor or your boss at that job, to be like, Can I leave a set of supplies here? Yeah,

Scott Benner 14:23
what if I just put a juice box and a bag of gummy bears right in this drawer right here? Yeah, exactly.

Speaker 1 14:28
Yeah. So even if say you forget, or you ran low in your backpack, you're going, you know, you have it somewhere on campus, whether you're going there that day or not, just think something to think about, like, what are the spaces that you're in a lot and is that a potential place that you could ask a staff member, who most likely will say yes, if you have that relationship with them, to leave some supplies there that you have access to, whether you're there officially for work or your activity, or that you can stop in during work hours that they're open and. Grab something if just in case you need it.

Scott Benner 15:02
What are your thoughts about and what do you find when people talk about this, their willingness to describe to friends or staff about how their glucagon works and how to administer it if they need it. That's a great question, because I can see people being like, I don't want to tell anybody, and I can see other people not caring and like, you know what I mean? How do you talk about that? Yeah,

Unknown Speaker 15:22
I think it's all related to

Scott Benner 15:24
my daughter. Is 20 years old. I can't even believe it. She was diagnosed with type one diabetes when she was two, and she put her first insulin pump on when she was four. That insulin pump was an Omnipod, and it's been an Omnipod every day since then. That's 16 straight years of wearing Omnipod. It's been a friend to us, and I believe it could be a friend to you. Omnipod.com/juice box, whether you get the Omnipod dash or the automation that's available with the Omnipod five, you are going to enjoy tubeless insulin pumping. You're going to be able to jump into a shower or a pool or a bathtub without taking off your pump. That's right, you will not have to disconnect to bathe with an Omnipod. You also won't have to disconnect to play a sport or to do anything where a regular tube pump has to come off. Arden has been wearing an Omnipod for 16 years. She knows other people that wear different pumps, and she has never once asked the question, should I be trying a different pump? Never once omnipod.com/juicebox, get a pump that you'll be happy with forever. Far too often, we accept the blood glucose meter that someone hands to us. The Doctor reaches into a drawer and goes, Here, take this one that is that is that the one you want is it accurate? You have no way of knowing. But if you want accuracy, and you want to be confident in the blood glucose readings that you're getting from your meter, you want the contour next gen. It's incredibly easy to get the same meter that Arden uses. Just go to contour next.com/juicebox that's all you have to do. The contour next gen is easy to use and highly accurate. It features a smart light that provides a simple understanding of your blood glucose levels, and, of course, Second Chance sampling technology that can help you to save money with fewer wasted strips. Contour next.com/juice box. You Well,

Speaker 1 17:22
we've talked about before, like your general willingness or comfortability with talking about your diabetes in general, it's actually now that I think about, I'm like, that's not a conversation I've ever had with somebody. Again, I think because I've never really had to use it, so in my head, the likelihood that it will be needed to be used isn't necessarily there.

Scott Benner 17:43
Isn't that funny, like, you wear your seat belt, though. Andrea, right?

Unknown Speaker 17:46
I do. I

Scott Benner 17:47
know you have a car accident.

Speaker 1 17:49
Rarely ever, I don't know. Yeah, right, no, it's the same concept. I think the difference there, right? Is like, there's a social norm associated with safety belts? Yeah, everybody who gets in a car should be wearing them, right? Not everybody has a chronic illness that they have to manage with potentially life threatening fluid and have to manage all these things, right?

Scott Benner 18:12
I'm with you. I like my opinion about glucagon is probably because I'm worried about another person. But you know, I've also been on an airplane hundreds of times. I've never been thrown into the roof of the plane by turbulence and had my neck broken, but I still wear my seat belt every time I'm on the airplane, because I'm like, I I've heard that's happened, just in case. I wonder if we couldn't make it the norm by talking to people over and over again about it, which is why I bring it up so much. Just like I really think if you have, if you're using insulin, you should have it on you. I'd

Speaker 1 18:39
agree with that. I think maybe the difficult thing, or a barrier in these situations is the expectation that conversation might put on that person, or they might feel like, is there, right? And I think, yeah, that depends, right? Am I talking to my best friend who already carries I don't even ask her, but she's like, I got a granola bar in case you need it, because I know, you know, like, she's already thinking about that. And if I was like, Kelly, if I pass out, like, I need you to stick this up my nose and squeeze she'd be like, cool, I got you. But if I'm telling my boss that at my brand new job, I know, right, like, and I'm not necessarily expecting you to do it. But if I, even if I'm just like, hey, I have this. If I go low, it's one of those. You can use this. So some of the nuance of like, how you say or explain, right? And I think like, what setting up expectations of like, if you're not comfortable with that, it's okay, but please call 911, or whatever it is, figuring those nuances out, I think is some of the barrier with the glucagon piece.

Scott Benner 19:41
I don't think you want on your move in day free to look over and see that your mom or dad has like your new roommates pinned on a sofa. Is explained now she passes out. I want you to jam this in her ass. I don't think that's what you want. Obviously, I can just tell you, like briefly, when Arden went to college as a freshman, we took her roommates out for dinner. Yeah. And we said, like, you know, hey guys, look, Arden's going to explain her diabetes to generally speaking, it's going to be a lot of stuff you don't understand. It's some of it's going to be scary. I don't want you to be scared. We brought their parents along, you know what? I mean, yeah. And they said, but this is it. Like, mostly, you're not gonna have to ever worry about this, ever. And we said, what you said, like, Arden's had diabetes for this long, she's only ever needed glucagon, you know, this many twice, and the truth is, we didn't use it. She was saved by juice both times. But if this thing should happen, we don't want you guys to be sitting here thinking like, if this thing that we're almost 100% sure is not gonna happen, happens. The worst I could imagine is them standing there feeling hopeless and helpless, and then something bad happened in art and them feeling like responsible. You're now finding yourself in this situation, whether you wanted to be or not. Your roommate has type one diabetes. I'm trying to prep them for feeling triumphant if something goes wrong. And so we just pulled out a trainer pen, which I was lucky enough to have, it's on my desk somewhere. I don't know where it is or, like, this is how it works. And you know, if Arden's passed out, take this thing, open it up, find a fleshy spot, put it in and then call 911, and then you go, that's really probably not gonna happen, like, you know, like, but here's how it works. It's important. The truth is, Arden said that, as much as they nodded along. They didn't understand, but they did come back to her some weeks later and say, Hey, we don't think we we were talking, and we don't think we understand this whole thing correctly. So Arden went over it with them again, and then they would have Friar drills. So Arden said that sometimes she'd be studying in her room, and everyone would run in. One of them would pretend to make a noise, and then they'd yell, Arden's having a seizure. And then they would pretend like a, you know, and then one of them would go find the pen, and one of them would get to her, and like, they made, like, the dumbest world game in the world, out of it. But then two years later, Arden switched schools, and she moved in, and she was an older person, and she's like, I don't want to tell my roommates about this. And so it was hard for my wife and I, but we said, Okay, if that's what you want to do, then you don't have to tell them. So I've done both things and anyway,

Speaker 1 22:14
and I would hope that every student gets roommates like that, but that's not the case, right? And not to say that they would have bad roommates. It does happen, but they just might not be interested. They might just be roommates. Yeah, right, not all roommates turn into friends, and so the expectation that that is what your student is going to experience that like that have that expectation, but that's a pretty high expectation to go in with,

Scott Benner 22:41
right? You could also get a partially mentally ill person as your roommate, and things go crazy. I've seen, by the way, I've seen that too. So it's a coin flip, just because the thing went well for Arden doesn't mean otherwise, but I really do take your point. It's an incredibly uncomfortable thing, because you don't know who you're talking to. You don't know their level of understanding or their desire to help, and now you're putting something on them and opening yourself up in a way, because you mentioned at work. I mean, that's the other piece of it, right? Like, are you going to on day one in a new situation, signal to people that you're weaker sick, like, you know what I mean? Like, some people will treat you that way, then that's tough, I don't know anyway,

Speaker 1 23:26
right? And it's finding the balance that works for you, and fortunately, slash unfortunately, every situation you step into is going to be different on what that balance looks like.

Scott Benner 23:36
Okay, all right. I'm sorry, you can move on to your to part B, which is labeled worst case scenario.

Speaker 1 23:43
It is right well, because that's what I hear. And I think you've said this as well, Scott, that caregivers and parents and loved ones are like, Oh my god, I can't get in touch with them. Their Dexcom is at what does it even say? Low, double arrows down. They're not responding to me, and I'm 50 miles, I am in no place to help them physically, right? Like, even if you live down the road right, too late, right? You're not getting in that building. You're not getting like, you don't have access. So what's going to happen? What do I do? So I want to walk everyone through, kind of some players, or some people that might be involved if this situation comes up, and then kind of go through what I would suggest doing during and even before to get some more information. So let's say your student is in the residence hall when this happens, because we're usually people are usually worried about this at night, when their student is asleep and they're not responsive, right? So people that potentially will either be around or involved at some point in the scenario, peers, other students, roommates, depending on kind of what the situation is, there's probably other students around, yeah, again, remembering they are also students. We don't know what their relationship might look like. They might be a roommate, they might be good friends. Ends, they could be both. They could just be walking by the room and the doors open and they realize something's wrong. We don't know what that relationship is. We don't know their comfortability or their knowledge around glucagon. Maybe you had that conversation, but they're like, Nope, I don't do needles. I don't care that it's encased and I can't see it. Like, I can't Yeah, maybe they have no idea that your student has diabetes. Hopefully they're going to call someone. Most likely, in a situation like that, they've been told to call the RA on call, or call campus police or 911, so most likely, hopefully, if a peer is involved, they're going to do one of those three things. If they don't know or don't feel comfortable, actually doing something about the low your resident assistant, potentially will could be involved in the situation. They are students as well. They are trained to respond to conflict, conduct violations and emergency situations, along with other more fun things, like community development. What might they do? They're going to gather information in that moment of like what's going on, determine what needs to happen, and take the next appropriate step, which is typically going to be to call their campus police or safety in a situation like this. From my experience working in Res Life and being on call as an RA and as a professional in something like this, I'm going to call campus police and be like, This is what's going on, or 911 again, this will vary depending on the type of school you're at and the resources that are there. And they're going to let them know what's going on. They're going to stay on site until that help arrives, and then they're going to notify the housing professional that's on call, which is typically a resident director or hall director. They have different names, and let them know what's going on and pass on whatever information they have. Housing professionals. There's a few different ones that could be involved in this type of situation, but they're typically when they're rds, full time staff that run a building or an area on campus, and they're the supervisors of an RA staff. If there are students on campus living on campus, there's going to be a professional on call. Doesn't matter if it's Thanksgiving Day, Christmas Day, if a student is living in a residence hall, there will be a housing professional that is on call. Again, from my experience being that person, the protocols for what the rd do does with that information will vary school by school, and we talked a little bit about previously. You might be able to find some of those steps in the clear report that's published online. But in the case where your student is transported to the hospital, either the rd is going to potentially notify you, if that's part of their protocol, or they might be calling the administrator on call, which is typically their boss, or somebody at like an associate director, director or dean level, depending, again, on The School, and they might be the one to notify you again. Potentially, this all varies based on the state of the student, why the student was transported to the hospital, and in general, again, what is the protocol if you are being called? Most likely, all they're going to tell you is that your student was transported to x hospital. They might give you the number to call. Might give you a number to call. We tried to do that, but I'm really not going to give you any other information, because, again, FERPA, yeah, you're not going to get a lot of information. And then, of course, potentially EMTs campus safety or police, and because of FERPA, we're not, none of these entities are going to be telling you what happened, the state of things, they're going to just let you know that your student was taken to the hospital. Ideally, the number to reach the hospital out to try and get more information, right? So those are the players, and it can be really any kind of amalgamation of those, depending on who's notified, where the situation happens, what's going on.

Scott Benner 28:39
You were an RA in college. I was way back in the day. What's the likelihood that if I, if you know, I knocked on your door during moving I was like, hey, my kids in this room, and she has type one diabetes. Can I get your phone number in case there's an emergency? Would you be like, go away, old man, or what? How would you respond to that? Yeah, I

Speaker 1 28:58
would never give you my number. Yeah, the students, some of them might do it, and then eventually they're going to be like, I shouldn't have done this. No offense to parents, but ones that ask for the RAS numbers typically are going to call, using that are going to call, gonna do things and again, FERPA, we can't tell you the RA, can't tell you what's going on with your student. They'll probably tell me when I was their boss, so and so's mom, so and so's dad asked for my number. We would probably, during training, tell them, point them to us, and we'll have a conversation with them, of, like, why you ask? Like, what do you feel you need the RA's number for? And kind of see what's going on from there. Yeah, please don't ask for the RA's numbers. Again. They're so they're a student too. Yes, they've been trained to support and build community and handle situations. But first thing they are, as a student, I

Scott Benner 29:47
had all of Arden's roommates phone numbers. I never, I never had to contact them. But there was, like, a comfort level, like, you know, in that situation where you think, if you were to get into a situation where, like, there's something wrong, like. It's not just like, you know, I'm imagining someone calling the RA and be like, You tell her to Pre Bolus for her food. Like, not like that. Like, I mean, like, Hey, can you go to that room? I think she's dying like that, right? Like, but if you thought that, people might say, Well, if you thought that, then call 911, except you do not want to be the parent who sent an ambulance to the dorm room for a compression low there's this dance that happens inside of you as a parent, where you're constantly I just a caregiver in general, right? Like, also, I want to say I understand why the RA wouldn't give out their number. I didn't ask the RA for a number, but I understand why they wouldn't. What I'm saying is, if you if everyone could put themselves in the position of, I think it's possible that someone I am charged with caring for is in a dire medical situation. I know it's happening and I'm powerless to do anything about it. If everyone could feel like that for a second, we'd all just hand each other our phone numbers in this situation, like, you know what I mean? Like it's, then it comes down to the one person who would misuse it, and then that's, I guess, why it's, you know

Speaker 1 31:06
that? But also, think about it, they're a student, so they're not unless they're on call when this is happening. They might not be in the building, yeah, they might not be on campus, they might be in class, like, they might not be available, right there. They might not answer their phone, right? They have their own lives, their own things that they have to do. So it's not part of it is, yes, the misuse and the burden of that student potentially dealing with just any sort of question or response, responding to caregiver or parent, but it's also the idea that they might not actually be able to physically help because they're not in that location, right? They might not answer the phone, right? So they're not a reliable resource in the sense of, their job is not to just be available for students. Their job is to be a student and support other students during certain times that they're scheduled, right?

Scott Benner 31:58
So fire extinguisher, they're not hanging on the wall waiting for a problem, right, right?

Speaker 1 32:02
Exactly. Which is more of the bigger reason really, that I'm like, don't rely on them as somebody to be able to communicate back and forth or do these things, because they're not, they're not there. I'm also assuming

Scott Benner 32:13
that at three o'clock in the morning, if you call the RA and you're like, oh my god, I think my kids nine, and the person on the phone goes, Hey, man, what's up? You'd be like, Oh, okay, I've, I've found a high person at a party, and, like, now I'm trying to tell him, my daughter's having, she's like, right on, like,

Speaker 1 32:28
they have their own lives and nothing, right? Like, if they're not supposed to be working, they can go do most things. Yeah,

Scott Benner 32:35
no. And I think it's important to bring up, by the way, to get to that point, which is, it makes sense when you're thinking about it, until in practice, you realize when push comes to shove, it's probably not going to be valuable to have it set up that way.

Speaker 1 32:48
Exactly Okay, which is why I want to go over, what should you do if your student, or if you believe your student is having an emergency is unresponsive? You've done all of the things that you have set up. You've done the Find My Phone, the sugar pixel, whatever the system is, you've done it. You're not getting a response from them. Call campus police or safety. They are going to be the ones that have somebody available to pick up the phone, 24/7 and take your call, look into what your campus has, right? But they should have somebody available at all times. You don't have to necessarily go right to 911, right, give them all the information. You can explain what's going on, and they're going to take it from there. And this is the part where, like, you're going to have to wait, right? They're not going to keep you on the phone. They're not going to necessarily call you back afterwards and say this is what happened. And we found Susie, like, again, FERPA kind of prohibits all of this, so it's gonna, it's gonna be the, probably the longest X many minutes of your life while you're waiting for this to happen. But they're going to take that information and they're gonna go from there, right? Typical protocol, like, if I'm thinking back to my days as campus professional, typically, if it's in the middle of the night, campus police is probably just going to go to the room and knock on the door. They can't get in, they'll have called a housing staff member to come meet them so that we can unlock the door and go in and see what's going on and take it from there and then, depending on what happens, like we've said before, you may or may not be notified. So if they're going to the hospital, and part of their protocol is to notify you, you're going to get that call that says they've been they've been taken to x hospital. Here's the number. Most of the time if the student is not needing to be transported, we're going to tell them to reach out to you. We're not going to call the Yeah,

Scott Benner 34:39
call your mom back, because we're not calling her, right, exactly. Yeah, I would just like to remind people that in this scenario now, this is emergent care. This isn't prophylactic, like you're not trying to stop a bad thing from happening. Once a bad thing has happened, the handling of that thing in a college setting is going to take the time that it takes. It's not. The way you were going to handle it at home, you're going to be in an emergency situation now, and you're going to rely on, you know, 911, type responses, those take time, even campus security. Like, they're not going to they're not Superman, they're not going to fly right over there, right you call, you explain it. They have to get there. They've got to knock on the door. They've got to wait for campus house. Like, it's sad, but you're now in the middle of an emergency situation. It's no longer, I think I can stop my kid from having, you know, XYZ happen to them, right? It's a tough pill to swallow to think that you're not going to be able to get in front of this thing, especially if you've been raising a kid with diabetes for 20 years, and you have over and over again, stepped in front of those bullets and stop those things from happening like you feel like, I know I could get this set up to fix this before it collapses. But you have to understand that you're you don't live in that situation anymore. This is a completely different ecosystem, and this is the best ecosystem will do for you,

Speaker 1 35:55
right? Because, again, if you're trying to rely on roommates, other students, things like that. One, they might not be there when it's happening. Two, we can't really force them to say, Oh, you have to, you have to do this for Arden, let's say, like, yeah, your roommates, like, you have to do No, no. That's not something we can require of them. That's also not something we can require even ask our staff to do I had, actually, when I was a graduate rd in my master's program, I had an RA that had diabetes. I was like, Oh, yeah. Like, and she was somebody that sometimes would have morning lows and wouldn't necessarily wake up. I believe her mom had, like, asked me, or even she had asked me, like, Oh, can you, like, check on me? And I brought that, I felt comfortable with it, right? Like, I have diabetes, like, I get it, like, making sure you're okay. And I brought that to my supervisor as a as I should, and just as a conversation, I was like, I'm good with that. Like, that's right. And they're like, no, like, liability wise, like, that can't be on you, right? Right? Like, just as a school thing, so, like, that's the other thing, right? The liability of putting that on either other students or on really untrained professionals, right? Is probably something the school is going to be like, no, like, that's not. We have to follow our protocol. Martin

Scott Benner 37:07
has three friends. She's grown up with forever, right? And for the entire time that she's been has had diabetes and known these kids. I thought these three girls know what they're doing, but there was a moment when the four of them were together and Arden had a seizure. Like, one of them literally froze. One of them was lost, and one of them was like, I know what to do, but it took three people being there for us to come up with one who was like, Don't worry. I remember this and like, you know, like, did the thing like, but I wouldn't have known how to bet on which one of those it was going to be. In case you're wondering, you know what I mean, like, when it was the one it was, I was like, Oh, interesting. So, yeah, yeah. So even, even if you as a roommate, you allow someone to put that on you, you don't know how you're going to respond in the moment. You really don't exactly, yeah, yeah.

Speaker 1 37:51
And that's why it's called the trained professionals, right? They're trained and have done handled these types of situations that they're not going to freeze that they're going to be able to think through it right and do what needs to get done. While that might take a little longer, it's still a better option than calling the roommate who isn't there, or calling the roommate who's like, I don't know what to do, and just freezing and then you've now taken x amount of time to get to the people that will actually be able to support your student.

Scott Benner 38:20
But this is an upbeat conversation.

Speaker 1 38:21
I know Yes, and I'd rather you have the information and be prepared right then also feel flustered when you're getting a response you weren't expecting. Yeah, it's not what you want, but it's what to expect. This is an

Scott Benner 38:39
accurate representation of what your experience is going to be like in college with this situation.

Speaker 1 38:44
Exactly. Yeah, okay, and so what are some things that we can do, or that I suggest that you could do if you're really if you're really struggling with this, you're really concerned about the schools process, right? Because, again, every there's nuances to every school, the different things that are in place because of size, because of resources, all of these things, right? Check the Clery report. See what information is in there about their protocols, their general protocols for emergencies. If that's not kind of quelling the anxiety or like is not super helpful for this particular type of situation, what I would suggest you to do as, again, a former housing person who met with parents and dealt with parents and walked them through things, is to speak to somebody in the housing office if your student's going to live on campus. And I would suggest looking into that as soon as your student makes a decision, and especially if that's if they decide in the spring that this is where they want to go, reach out in the spring. Don't wait into the summer. Summer, surprisingly, while there's no students, is very busy for us, right? We're prepping. We have all day trainings for weeks with the professionals, with the students, not that we won't get back to you. We will. Yes, but our schedules are much more chaotic than potentially in the spring. So if you have that ability, go look on the housing website. See who's working there. Look for probably an assistant or associate director, depending on what the staff structure looks like if they have training in their title, even better, just because those are the people that are literally in charge of training the staff, training the RAS on these types of procedures, you could go straight to the director. The reason I say assistant or associate, you're probably going to get a response faster just because they're more focused on specific areas where the director is kind of managing a lot of other things. So they're going to give you a faster response. Send them an email and request to talk to them in whichever way you prefer. Maybe that's email communication. Maybe you want to schedule a phone call, maybe you want to go in person, but send them an email requesting a conversation in whatever format you feel most comfortable with. Explain that you want to learn more about the emergency procedure. My child has type one diabetes. They'll check with your kid to make sure that they're okay with that, and you're wondering what like and then list what you're what you're looking for. I suggest this because it gives the staff time to pull the information together in a non rush manner, making sure you're being connected in the best way possible. You know, even during the school year, like we're running back and forth, it's very easy to play phone tag for a while if you're trying to get in touch with an upper level staff member in housing that doesn't help anything on your side or their side. So that's why I suggest send an email outline what you're looking for, and then that way they can get back to you, either schedule that meeting, or if you just want an email response, they can get back to you that way, and they're not trying to answer your question. Because, right, this is a little bit nuanced, right? It's a very specific, well, it's an emergency situation. It's something very specific. That way they can kind of get things together and give you a succinct answer, instead of kind of being caught off guard by this very like, detailed, nuanced question while they're in the middle of everything, whatever else is going on. So I highly suggest figuring out the best person, send them an email and kind of go from there to get a better understanding of what would happen. And they might tell you, like, this is the number I would call, right? They might give you something more specific based on how their protocol works that you wouldn't get otherwise, if you didn't talk to somebody. But we want to support you in whatever way we can. We can't make exceptions for our protocol if you will, like, if you're like, Well, can you give me the rd on calls number? We're not going to do that most likely, but we want to support you in understanding what would happen to you can be prepared as well in that situation. So that's kind of my suggestion, to get that additional information. Once

Scott Benner 42:50
again, you are awesome. That is excellent, very complete, very clear. I love you doing this with me. Are we going to do more of these? What else is on your list? I don't

Speaker 1 42:59
think I have anything right now? Okay, we did almost everything else. There's one more that I hadn't fully fleshed out, and honestly, I didn't really nothing else came to me. But I think, based on what I'm working on for the upcoming you might have another part in the future for me. Yeah, because there's stuff so I want to do. I'm hoping to do some more stuff on, like caffeine and like ADHD meds if you're taking them on prescribed so, like, we could do some more maybe, like, okay, related things.

Scott Benner 43:30
Yeah, sure.

This episode of The Juicebox Podcast is sponsored by the contour next gen blood glucose meter. Learn more and get started today at contour next.com/juice box. A huge thanks to Omnipod, not just my longest sponsor, but my first one. Omnipod.com/juice box. If you love the podcast and you love tubeless insulin pumps. This link is for you. Omnipod.com/juice. Box. A huge thank you to one of today's sponsors, gevok, glucagon. Find out more about Chivo hypo pen at G VOQ, glucagon.com. Forward slash juice box. You spell that, G, V, O, k, e, g, l, U, C, A, G, o, n.com, forward slash juice box. I also want to thank Andrea for coming on and putting together this fantastic conversation over these three episodes. If you'd like to learn more about the diabetes link, the place where Andrea works, go to the diabetes link.org they are there to help your child get through college with type one diabetes. If you're living with type one diabetes, the after dark collection from the Juicebox Podcast is the only place to hear the stories that no one else talks about, from drugs to depression, self harm, trauma. Trauma, addiction and so much more. Go to Juicebox podcast.com, up in the menu and click on after dark there, you'll see a full list of all of the after dark episodes. Hey, thanks for listening all the way to the end. I really appreciate your loyalty and listenership. 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, you.