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#476 Common Sense v. Fear

Podcast Episodes

The Juicebox Podcast is from the writer of the popular diabetes parenting blog Arden's Day and the award winning parenting memoir, 'Life Is Short, Laundry Is Eternal: Confessions of a Stay-At-Home Dad'. Hosted by Scott Benner, the show features intimate conversations of living and parenting with type I diabetes.

#476 Common Sense v. Fear

Scott Benner

Deva was diagnosed as an adult but she's seen type 1 before.

You can always listen to the Juicebox Podcast here but the cool kids use: Apple Podcasts/iOS - Spotify - Amazon MusicGoogle Play/Android - iHeart Radio -  Radio PublicAmazon Alexa or wherever they get audio.

+ Click for EPISODE TRANSCRIPT


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 and welcome to Episode 476 of the Juicebox Podcast, I have a treat for you today.

Today's episode is with Deva. And I'm just gonna say it, she's my best friend. But this episode comes with more than just a pithy little opening, it comes with a money back guarantee. If you don't love Deva, and this conversation, everything you paid today to listen to the podcast, will be refunded back to you 100% in the form of an expired gift card. But if you love this episode, do something for me. I'll ask him one second after the music. First, let me tell you a couple of things. Here's the big one. Nothing you hear on the Juicebox Podcast should be considered advice, medical or otherwise, please always consult a physician before making any changes to your health care plan. We're becoming bold with insulin. Alright, the person you're about to hear was diagnosed as an adult, but they have an incredible attachment to type one diabetes and their childhood. It's an amazing story. And somehow around the one hour mark, we just really get into it. I hope you like this.

So when this is all over, if you enjoyed it as much, as I said, Please take five minutes to go to T one d exchange.org. Ford slash juice box, click on the link that says join our registry now. And then fill out the simple survey. That's it. You have to be a type one, or the caregiver of a type one. And you need to be from the United States. If you are those things, were one of those things, I guess you could be both. You could have type one be from the United States and be the parent of a kid with type one. I don't get bonus points for that if you are but still, I guess you could be we're getting away from the point. The point is if you are one of those people going clicking on join our registry now filling out that simple survey will do huge things for people living with type one diabetes, and it helps the podcast so it's a real bonus. This is going to be 100% anonymous, so none of your answers will be attached to you. It is HIPAA compliant. It does not require you to ever go anywhere, right you just do it from your couch sofa. Some people call it a sofa. Some people call it a couch. I'll let you wonder what I call it. But right now in your mind, you know what you call it? Right? Again, we've gotten away from the whole thing here. Anyway, from wherever you're sitting right now iPad from your phone from the computer, T one d exchange.org. forward slash Juicebox. Podcast participants like you have helped to bring increased coverage for test trips, Medicare coverage for CGM, and changes to the ADA guidelines for pediatric Awan seagulls. This is a big thing that you can do in a tiny amount of time. T one d exchange.org. forward slash juicebox link in the show notes, links at Juicebox podcast.com. We'll start with you just introducing yourself, you know, pretty basically, and I'll ask some questions, and we'll talk and that'll sort of be it. It'll come out the light for you.

Unknown Speaker 3:35
Okay, I love it. use

Deva Katz 3:36
that word I want I want you to describe me as delightful. You say that so nicely when you introduce other people.

Scott Benner 3:42
If you if you force it, I don't know what I can do. But I'll see what happens and what happens now. Now this part is gonna end up in the podcast. What happens if you're not delightful? And the whole time I'm like, I gotta wait for this lady to say something reasonable. So I can

Deva Katz 3:53
then maybe then maybe you will post it. I don't know. There's always there's always that option. Not delightful. We have a deal. You don't have to post that. How's that?

Scott Benner 4:00
I've never not put up one episode that I recorded except for to where the people who I recorded with later, I think realized that they maybe had been much too honest. Oh, not a health issue. But other than that, it's never one one person had what I consider to be an actual breakdown while we were recording. And I suggested that we don't let anybody hear.

Deva Katz 4:25
Wow, wow. I imagine you get that a lot people get very emotional.

Scott Benner 4:31
You know, I think I think people do get emotional and and that's interesting, isn't it that you would unburden yourself to a stranger. But I'm assuming have all kinds of people around you that you know and never and never say anything to. I wonder if the podcast doesn't make people feel closer to me, because they hear me so much.

Deva Katz 4:54
Oh, that is for sure. True. I feel like you're my best friend because I don't talk to anybody about my diabetes. Everyone who knows me I was diagnosed two years ago at age 47. I'm now 49. Everybody who knows me knows me already. I don't have new friends. Now. My social group is my social group. And it's not like this is been a topic that we grew up with together. So it just never comes up. So I feel like you're my best friend, your podcast, and not exaggerating safe my life? Oh,

Scott Benner 5:21
well, we'll get to all that. And by the way, our friends were really good friends, one or two of them would get diabetes, so they could be.

Unknown Speaker 5:29
Yeah, good point.

Unknown Speaker 5:30
I don't know how we would do that. But you know,

Deva Katz 5:33
although I imagine given my age group, I imagine if anybody else got diabetes, it would more than likely

Scott Benner 5:38
be type two. You might think, right? It's crazy that Well, alright. We're getting ahead of ourselves. Introduce yourself.

Deva Katz 5:44
Okay, my name is Deva Katz. And I am a type one diabetic diagnosed two years ago, misdiagnosed, I should say, as type two at first, and three months later, properly diagnosed as type one. And I mean, what else do you want to know? I, my particularly emotional side, all of this is that when I was 14, my 12 year old sister died suddenly from type one diabetes. And that just hit like, all that just came crashing down like a ton of bricks when I got diagnosed, even though logically I know, nowadays, it's very different. I mean, we're talking back in the 80s. You know, nowadays, it's very different. I don't put on dying in my sleep. I plan on living to ripe old age of 100, you know, but it's still in the back of your head, like, Oh, my God, this is really serious. And I'm not sure how much the world really understands that. I mean, your group, your listeners know that. But let's say in my social group, I don't think people understand that this is really serious.

Scott Benner 6:46
Okay, so you've said a lot, we're gonna get and figure things out. So don't say your first name. Again. I want to make sure I pronounce correctly. Deva Deva. Okay. Eva, given where do you Where do you live? I live in Israel. born there.

Deva Katz 7:01
I was not born here. I moved here in I want to say 2000. So I've been here 20 years.

Scott Benner 7:08
Wow. Move for Can you say from where where you moved from?

Unknown Speaker 7:10
I moved from

Scott Benner 7:12
lower Manhattan. I wasn't sure if you were running from like organized crime and you didn't want to say or anything like that.

Deva Katz 7:18
I would make a fun story. No, no, no, no, I moved here. Just you know, I'm Jewish. And I just wanted to be with you know, in this room, so I'm here. Even the best health care system ever. I paid 35 bucks a month for all my diabetes needs. Wow. Yeah. No. Right to reason to move here, you

Scott Benner 7:36
know, oh, and Lieberman's lives there he has type on the CNN CORRESPONDENT for Israel.

Deva Katz 7:42
I should know him. But I don't see

Scott Benner 7:44
why he's been on the show. Maybe you could find a friend and his

Unknown Speaker 7:50
friends.

Scott Benner 7:50
Imagine. Imagine if you're crazy. And oh, and sends me a note. He's like, hey, thanks a lot for saying Dave over. There you go. Hey, she seems okay. Oh, and don't worry about it. And we're best friends. So it'll be fine.

Unknown Speaker 8:04
Exactly. I told you my best friend.

Scott Benner 8:07
Alright, let's let's go a little slow here for a second. So you brought it up. So let's figure this out. You're saying about 35 years ago, your sister passed? And so was she undiagnosed as type one? No,

Deva Katz 8:20
she was properly diagnosed. She was five I was seven. We were driving down from Manhattan to my grandparents in DC for Thanksgiving weekend. And she we stopped the car so she can pee on the side of the road. I want to say every 20 minutes. It's a long drive from Manhattan to Washington DC. And I remember it like yesterday and we got to DC and it was obvious something was wrong. And she was diagnosed here she went straight from DC they flew to Joslin she was properly diagnosed and she was taken care of to the best of you know, my parents abilities back in, you know, back in their late 70s. You know, whatever was available then she did. Of course it was urine sticks, but she was definitely being taken care of.

Scott Benner 9:06
Yeah, people weren't ignoring it. I wasn't sure if because she said she passed in her sleep. I wasn't sure if she maybe just went to DK before she was diagnosed or if she was living with it.

Deva Katz 9:15
I obviously don't know. I was young myself. So I don't know the exact details of what happened. It could have been a insulin shock. Who knows? Who knows? She was definitely managed. She was being managed to the best of my parents abilities at that time.

Scott Benner 9:32
Gotcha. So you don't know if it was a situation where it was too much insulin or not enough? I don't know. You were young. Yeah.

Deva Katz 9:41
I was young and my parents at the time we the doctors would have been okay, you know, doing more research and autopsy whatever my parents is that like, what's the difference at this point? She was gone at that point and it didn't matter and and they decided not to pursue it further. So I'm not even sure they didn't know and if they did, they just really didn't share it with me. So I have no idea. Yeah.

Scott Benner 10:00
People might not understand the 70s was a significantly different time I try to explain to my children some time as they're voicing their opinions. And I'm listening and we're having a conversation like once in a while I want to say to them, you realize my dad, mom would have never listened to anything that I thought right like I would, I would have started making a noise and they would have been like a and then just walk away from me. Right? Yeah, it's and you had a you have a lot of siblings. Is that right?

Deva Katz 10:25
Yes. I'm one of seven.

Unknown Speaker 10:27
Wow. Yeah. Your parents were probably tired.

Unknown Speaker 10:32
My parents were tired. Indeed. Indeed. No kidding.

Scott Benner 10:35
Your poor mom's uterus. You are feeding?

Deva Katz 10:41
God God bless.

Unknown Speaker 10:44
Do you have any kids? Up to two? Okay. Yeah.

Deva Katz 10:47
My son is 15. And my daughter's 10.

Scott Benner 10:50
Gotcha. Oh, wow. So they've grown up? exclusively. You had both your children in Israel. They're Israeli? Oh, that's really cool. Yeah. All right. So you, nobody else your family's ever had diabetes with the exception of you and your sister?

Deva Katz 11:06
In my immediate family? No, I have some cousins with diabetes. Some are better taking care of themselves and others. But it isn't the family. The fact that I have it wasn't a huge surprise because it is in the family. My grandfather certainly died from diabetes. It wasn't a surprise. What was so surprised for me is my age. You know, I was diagnosed at 47. Right? That I think is I mean, do you hear about that? among your popular among your listeners is that? I feel like that's pretty rare.

Scott Benner 11:35
Well, the people are diagnosed, I think at this point, I've spoken to someone diagnosed at every age between, you know, zero, and I think 66 at this point. Wow. You know, so it does happen. I don't know that. I mean, I'm sure it's more or less likely, in some, you know, swaths of of age, but I also think it's so much to do with, you know, genetics and everything. I'm gonna ask a question, if I mispronounce a word, you'll forgive me. Are you orthodox or Hasidic by any chance? I was the family

Deva Katz 12:07
being if being pinned into a corner, I would say orthodox? Oh, of course, I have no way of knowing how you are defining the word.

Scott Benner 12:13
My question is really just it's not about religion. It's it's about smaller communities where people may be married a little closer to their Oh,

Deva Katz 12:23
so you're talking about the community? And you know, the answer to that is no,

Scott Benner 12:27
gotcha, because I have a very close friend, who's a nikkie, nurse at a major major hospital. And she says that most of like, seriously, most of the real malformations that they see with newborns come from that population.

Deva Katz 12:45
Yeah, yeah, that's what would what would be called inbreeding is Yeah.

Scott Benner 12:49
I was just, I was just wondering if it was possible that I don't know why I just, I'm picking through things. So

Deva Katz 12:55
I don't think that's a factor.

Scott Benner 12:57
Gotcha. Okay. All right. So you in your note to me, you know, it was very passionate, I very much appreciate it. And you really seem to, to want to talk about the passing of your sister a little bit. And if I'm not wrong about that, I'd appreciate hearing the story, I guess. Am I wrong? Or am I wrong? You're just hard. I

Deva Katz 13:23
know, you're not wrong. That is, that is when I initially reached out to you. Because just because it was I guess I was having an emotional day, which, you know, which happens. But overall, it's not just her passing, because I've been getting with that for 40 years. But the this in general, the emotional side of diabetes, like the technical side, the medical side, what your teaching spot on, I feel like I got it, you know, my my agencies, and I want to say high fives, it's good. And it's been that way since, you know, three months after diagnosis, like it's all good. But still, I feel like I don't know if this is because I'm still dealing with the shock of it. But the motional side of it, and I don't know if that's typical for everyone who gets newly diagnosed, or I'm adding the layer of my sister dying to the south. I'm so emotional about like, someone starts talking to me, I will probably start crying. And there's no reason to, um, well, I'm healthy. I'm well taken care of. We've got excellent medical care here. Like I said, My agency is awesome. Like, there's no reason why I'm taking this so hard. And that's, I don't know what it is. It's a curse. It's just like a major change to my life, or is it the fact that I'm just like reliving my sister dying? I don't know. I don't have an answer. So it could be. You're asking me Oh, is that what I'm talking about? I have no idea. I don't know. Well, I have some general questions for you. But we don't get to that now. We have a few minutes. So anyway,

Scott Benner 14:48
I'm excited. You have questions?

Unknown Speaker 14:49
Well, obviously list.

Scott Benner 14:52
Thank you. I appreciate you being prepared. I hope you don't mind that I'm not prepared. No, but I like talking about Like this better I like kind of picking through things. Because I mean, obviously it would at best be pop psychology to say that, you know, your sister died under what probably felt like reasonably mysterious circumstances, although you could point to the diabetes and add such a formidable age for you. And you listen, you told a story in the email that she and you were in the same bedroom and had my god I said that you had? Do you want to tell me about that? Because it's private, but I mean,

Deva Katz 15:36
how many listeners Do you have these days, but we up to 3 million

Scott Benner 15:38
people are gonna hear about it. So go ahead

Deva Katz 15:42
and be open book. So we were she, she, um, she shared a bedroom, that is true. And we got into this fight. I don't remember what it was about. Although if I had to guess I'm sure it was because I was just picking a fight for no reason, because that's very much my personality. And we were fighting. And I basically told her that she can't sleep in the room, she has to go sleep in the classroom. And because she was so sweet, and just younger and just wanted to keep the peace. She left she left the room. And then she went to sleep in the guest room. And I went to wake her up for school the next day, because he did have to make the bus and, and she was obviously gone. Now I didn't know that at 14 that she was gone. I I had no way of really telling him I went to my to my mom and I said, Listen, she's not waking up. But I got to go get ready. So you deal with her. And and then the next thing I know the paramedics are in the house and you know, and that was it. So the fight was very unfortunate. My mom in a few minutes of complete lucidity, lucidity. Is that a real word? That's a word, right? It is no, it is now sadness, whatever. She was lucid for those few moments. She turned to me for the funeral. And she said there was nothing you could have done. You wouldn't have heard you wouldn't have known. This had nothing to do with her sleeping alone. And whether it's true or not, who knows? My mom said that to make me feel better. It worked, you know, and made me just take a deep breath and realize maybe she's right. Maybe she's not I don't know. But I had the opportunity to feel like maybe mom was right. Maybe there was nothing I could have done. Who knows? I'm not a doctor. I don't know. But it put it to put it to rest for at least that initial. That initial time, which was so difficult. But looking back years later, I'm not so sure. You know, people don't have seizures. I don't know what happened to her. They're not so quiet. I'm not sure what happened. Who knows? Yeah. 50 5050

Scott Benner 17:42
your head that if she had a seizure, you might have heard it and woke her up. And it definitely would have gone to your parents, maybe

Deva Katz 17:48
I maybe I definitely would have heard it. There's no way I would have slept with seizure because she said she had had some of them. She should have them. I would have known I would have known for sure.

Scott Benner 17:59
Well, I mean, listen, I this is not apples to apples, I don't think but I was incredibly close with my grandmother as I grew up. And I had a job after school. And I got home from school one day, and I was in my bedroom, changing my clothes from school to what I was going to wear to work. And I was late and not late like I was, you know, not paying attention. It was late. But it was that hard to get from school to home and then to this job on time. And the phone rang, and I picked up the phone and it was my grandmother who wanted to chat. And I would have talked to my grandmother, always, you know, and so I started to talk to her. And I just said, Grandma, I'm sorry, I have to get the work. But I don't work tomorrow. I could call you tomorrow after school. And she's like, that's great. Call me tomorrow after school. And then the next morning while she was getting ready for work, she had a stroke and she died. Wow. And I just never, you know it. It's something that bothers me to this day. And I don't know if I, you know, I understand academically that you don't control when people come and go out of the world. And there's no way to know like, you know, there's no, there's a light on your forehead that says tomorrow is your last day. So you know, but I still just think that's stupid job. Or I was making $3 an hour working at a pet shop so I could buy gas for my car so I can afford to drive to work. You know what I mean? Like it just, I could have been 15 minutes late to it. But then I stopped and think about how much amazing time we had together. And we were very close. And I mean 15 more minutes wouldn't have changed that. I don't think you know,

Deva Katz 19:39
yeah, we're all a lot smarter. In hindsight. Yeah. You know, in hindsight, we're all less smarter you you know, my kids fight now and and I bite my tongue from saying you guys shouldn't be fighting because you don't know what's going to happen. I never never said that to them. But in the back of my mind, I feel like oh my god, I wish I can give them that wisdom, you know that they should know that their behaviors. Now you If it could affect you later on, failing and being mean, and I don't say anything, because they have to figure out their own path and then let them do their thing, but but I wonder, I wonder, like, How much could have been prevented for me if my, you know, if my mom had stepped in, like, Okay, you guys have to figure this out make this makeup or figured this out, you know, we're not sleeping in the guest room. Like, I wonder my mom was hands off with all of our fights. And I understand why. But I wonder, you know, how life would have turned out differently, you know, had she not had not passed so young. But anyways,

Scott Benner 20:33
I hope you can find a way not to wonder so much because yeah, you know, stop wondering. Because you're never gonna figure it out. And it's just never gonna

Deva Katz 20:40
figure it out in the world is too busy anyways, my goodness, we're living in crazy times.

Scott Benner 20:44
Your hearts gonna be beat up worse than your mom's uterus was? Yeah. So

Unknown Speaker 20:49
good point. Good point.

Scott Benner 20:50
Well, I am sorry, that happened to you. But I do think it's important to understand cuz I'm imagining it's, it's, you know, at least imprinted on you enough that the rest of the conversation, it'll be valuable for people to know that as we move forward. So you, so you grow up and make babies and move away and do all these things. What do you do for a living?

Deva Katz 21:14
I am a logistics manager for a food import firm.

Scott Benner 21:18
Is that like a lot of making sure the trains run on time?

Deva Katz 21:23
trains is boats, like we import food from all over the world? And we supply to the major food manufacturers here and as well. So it's it's a it's boats basically.

Scott Benner 21:36
Got to be incredibly important. I mean, do you have any natural resources in Israel to to create food with

Deva Katz 21:44
to create food with? We do, we do have? We also purchase a lot we export quite a bit. I mean, my company doesn't do any export, but the country, the country does export goes, sure we export quite a bit of fruits and vegetables. That's pretty big for export, but we import whatever we need, you know, fair trade,

Scott Benner 22:01
you know, it's amazing. So not that this has nothing to do with the topic. But the way Israel has figured out how to move water around the country is Yeah, yeah. It's crazy. It's absolutely otherworldly. It's amazing. So I mean, that you can grow fruit there is kind of insane, right? Yeah. Wow. That's something okay. So that's it's an important interesting job. It did you it's important. It's

Deva Katz 22:27
also considered essential because it's food. So I've been working straight through this whole COVID thing.

Unknown Speaker 22:31
You didn't get a COVID break?

Deva Katz 22:33
Nope, not get a COVID break because people have to eat even if they're stuck at home.

Scott Benner 22:36
Yeah, no kidding. My wife has been working non stop in my dining room for seven months now.

Unknown Speaker 22:42
Seven months. Yeah, that's what we're up to her company

Scott Benner 22:44
has one of the one of the vaccinations that that they're working on. And she's Oh, wow, very diligently working on making sure that it will be safe and reported correctly and stuff like that.

Deva Katz 22:57
Let me on behalf of the entire planet. Looking forward to the vaccine. Yeah.

Unknown Speaker 23:00
I look over there. And oh, my God, I hope they're getting close to this. But anyway, okay, so you.

Scott Benner 23:10
You're diagnosed with type one at 45 years old?

Unknown Speaker 23:13

  1. I appreciate you making me younger

Scott Benner 23:16
than I am. Listen, you can be however old you want, if you want, but 47 I'm sorry. What were the first signs

Deva Katz 23:24
for signs, you know how everyone says how they don't notice the signs in their, in their kids, when they like as a parent, notice the signs. Everyone on your podcast said that they missed all the signs, you think you'd think that I would have noticed the signs in myself. But my, my son, who's now 15, at the time was just turning 13. So we were planning his Bar Mitzvah was a big glorious affair. And I was just really, really involved. And I work full time at a very intense job. So everything was just really busy and stressful and hectic. And I felt quite rundown. And they blamed it on my poor kids Bar Mitzvah and the athletes Bar Mitzvah. And I just like I'm not covering how people make affairs all the time. People throw parties all the time and why but just not feeling recovered. I just felt like I was rundown. I kept blaming this poor kid. And and I just didn't, I felt like I was just run down from working too hard. Yeah. And then the night that I got up four times to use the bathroom. I said, that is not okay. I'm finished nursing. There's no reason why I'm up four times in one night, I'm done with that I'm done with infants. And that day, went to the doctor and I said, You know, I think I diabetes. He said, Well, what do you think that and I said, because I got up last night four times to be and he said, well, let's have a look. And it was four seconds later and it's like No, you do have diabetes. How much

Scott Benner 24:43
of the of the road trip to Washington from when you were a kid? Did you remember that? We're now

Unknown Speaker 24:49
remember that? Oh, yeah. That was very vivid.

Deva Katz 24:53
When I woke up that morning, after going to the bathroom four times that night, I knew well, it would have been better had I noticed You know, four weeks prior, because I wouldn't have felt so lousy but Tom, I actually got to the doctor, and I lost 30 pounds, which, for the dress I was wearing in the apartments folk was awesome. I looked amazing, which was lovely. But I should have realized that this is not okay. It's not okay. So last time I went to the doctor, I was really feeling very lousy

Scott Benner 25:22
30 pounds. Is that a significant amount off of anyone's frame?

Deva Katz 25:25
Yeah, well, I'm four foot 10.

Scott Benner 25:28
Well, but it still it just doesn't matter. It's, it's a big chunk of weight in a short amount of time. And if you didn't make some significant change to your couch, your caloric intake. I don't think that you would see that I got so

Deva Katz 25:40
I was exercising like crazy because I wanted to fit his cats. Okay, so I was exercising quite a bit. So I thought, okay, great with a good job. And I was watching what I ate, because like I said, I was planning for this party. So I, I assumed I was doing a really good job. And obviously, looking back now that's ridiculous. No one, no one looks back at it doesn't make any sense. It's just,

Scott Benner 26:03
you know what you can tell you're from another generation. Because if you were younger, you'd immediately put yourself on Instagram and call yourself a workout influencer?

Deva Katz 26:11
No, no, no, I knew something was wrong. But I didn't connect the dots because I was so I was busy and work was very busy. Work is always busy. And, and. And I went to the doctor, and when he said, Oh, yeah, you have diabetes, and like, Okay, I'm not at all surprised what happens now he says, well, that you have to go to the emergency room just to make sure you're not in decay, which I wasn't. But he just needed to rule that out. And apparently he couldn't do that in his office that has to be done hospital. I don't understand that. But apparently that's the case. And the hospital was within two days stay in the hospital. And they were convinced it was type two. And they said Why are you convinced of that? Like I'm presenting as type one. I'm not stupid. Like, I know what the signs

Unknown Speaker 26:52
are? My family? Yeah.

Deva Katz 26:55
Yeah. I like arguing with the doctor and like, why, why you're saying that I need it. Like, I know what I need. I need insulin. No, no. Metformin will be good for now. You'll see your family doctor, he'll follow up.

Scott Benner 27:08
Do you think just based on your, your body construction and your age? They just assumed it was type two?

Deva Katz 27:14
Yeah, yeah, for sure. For sure. For sure it was the age, because the presentation was completely type one. So because the medical system here is all connected. My GP who sent me to the hospital, saw my discharge papers The next day, like they get electronically transferred. So I saw them right away. And he called me he said, You need to see an endocrinologist immediately. I've sent your file over, he's gonna call you for an appointment. And it was it was clear and acknowledges right away said no, no, we have to test you for antibodies. This is this is probably not type two. And right away, it was properly diagnosed

Scott Benner 27:51
that quickly so the hospital got it wrong. And

Deva Katz 27:57
because it was a weekend, and if you know a little bit about Israel, it was a weekend during the high holiday season. So it's like Christmas in New York. No one's working between Christmas and New Year's. It's the same thing here during high holiday season. And it was a regular doctor on call wasn't an endo in the hospital who saw me and what took so long here. And this is I don't want I don't want to say it's a flaw on the system. But although the endocrinologist over the phone had ordered the antibody test because he he guessed that that what was going on. I didn't actually see him for another two months. It took a long time because our government collapse that we have immediate elections, they also seem and then he got sick and I'm sick a whole story. So took two months and every and I'm just feeling worse and worse and worse. And two months later that it was off. So you're saying quickly, I wish it was quicker, but I guess I can't complain. Cuz I know people have it much worse,

Scott Benner 28:53
though, like so it went from Hey, you have type two to immediately No, no, that's type one to two months to get insulin.

Unknown Speaker 28:59
Yes.

Unknown Speaker 29:00
Were you in da by then?

Deva Katz 29:02
I was not. I guess I must have been honeymooning. Huh. Well, that's been I don't know. I don't know, because I was definitely not in TK Definitely not.

Scott Benner 29:11
So this $35 healthcare, cheap, but not quick.

Deva Katz 29:16
So it's it's Yeah, exactly. I should say that it? Yes. Yeah, it's not quick. It could be quicker. I think because the discharge papers said type to the medical system, the way it's written into the system. Didn't take it as urgent. had anybody written down on any paper. This is a definite type one, it would have been treated with urgency. It would have been dealt with much, much quicker but because the system is all connected. Anybody who looked at my file scope like to Okay, whatever shall wait another week, and then that just kept happening and the equipment just kept being pushed off until I finally got to see him. I'm always so I got to see him after two months, not even not three months. When they wanted me to come in, because at that point I had gotten the antibody blood tests back and it was well over 500. And I and I knew what that meant, because I had been, you know, online reading and I've been listening to you and I knew what that meant. So I call the nurses office and I said, I need to see this doctor immediately because I need insulin now should know you on Metformin, it takes a while you'll still feel better. It's okay. And I still listen, sweetheart, open up my phone, because I know you have access to it. Tell me what you're seeing. And then she's like, Oh, you're right. You come in today, one o'clock.

Unknown Speaker 30:32
No kidding. I was there. There's a you found a podcast before you found insulin.

Deva Katz 30:36
I found a podcast before I found insulin. How'd

Unknown Speaker 30:39
that happen?

Deva Katz 30:40
How did that happen? Because, um, had that happen? I guess I wanted to learn as much as possible so that when I would get to this appointment, I would be prepared with all my questions. Because otherwise you go in and you feel like you're being talked at. And the doctor was just telling you what to do. And I didn't want a situation where now you have to wait another two months before get to see him again. With any follow up questions. I just wanted to have everything straight in my head, so that I could ask the right questions. And thank God, you know, I went in there, I probably had four or five pages of notes of questions. And we just bang them all out. Because I want you to really understand because that is why six weeks later, I had an emergency that went down from 9.5. That diagnosis to 5.7.

Scott Benner 31:28
That's really good. Because I knew what I was doing it because you you had practice ahead of time, like you really made sure you understood long before you got there. That's it. That's it That's really industrious, love you seriously, because I think it's where you I don't know what to say here. Like, I don't know how to guess. Were you more or less afraid of it because of your sisters.

Deva Katz 31:50
I was I was more afraid of it. I was sure I was more afraid. I was 100% more afraid. And I said it is it's an I have small children. And it is my responsibility to see them to adulthood. I cannot afford not to be around for them. And and I was for sure from fear that I needed to make sure that I was very well, I'll tell you what else helped me because the hospital was convinced I was type two, I went to see a dietitian for type two, within two days of being in the hospital. So she gave me a whole regimen of of how to treat type two in terms of low carb and low glycemic and all that stuff. So right away, I was eating in a much in a much better way. No insulin, but I was eating so much better. Right away. So I just jumped right in. Yeah.

Scott Benner 32:42
Is that something you kept up the kind of dieting style? Yeah,

Deva Katz 32:45
yeah. Yeah. Because it was I was doing it for two months before I got the insulin. Okay, two months, I can do it. And you know what it's working. And every so often if I if I'm like, I have to have a piece of cheesecake, I do it but it's really not the norm because it's not worth it. It's not worth the headache, the hassle, and it's just not worth it. For me. I prefer eating low carb and low glycemic although I do eat but I it's just easier to calculate and among MDI also, and I don't know if that would be different. If I switched to a pump. I don't know, what do you hear from your listeners you

Scott Benner 33:17
feel like? So you're doing you're doing lower carb, you're saying more out of a management style that it's easier to control because there's not as much fluctuation and glycemic load from foods. But you're wondering if you had a pump and you could inject more frequently. If you try more cheesecake, I'm assuming cheesecake is the thing you miss the most.

Deva Katz 33:39
They can miss the most indeed. So yeah, so that actually was a question on the statement. So do you have an answer? Well,

Scott Benner 33:45
I think that it's interesting. I just yesterday, I've been doing this series of like how he conversations getting people on that have different dieting styles. And I just interviewed Mike yesterday. It'll be up before this, but hasn't been up yet. Who is eating in a completely keto lifestyle. And he described that he had had diabetes, you know, his whole life. And it was fairly poorly controlled. He was diagnosed a very long time ago. And you know, insulin wasn't the same and testing wasn't the same. And he got to a point where he said that his doctor told him he was diagnosed so long ago that he wasn't going to live past 30. That was his prognosis, getting diagnosed. And when he got the 30 he was out of shape and not doing well. And a new doctor said to him, like, you know, basically, man, you got to pull this together, you're not going to make it much longer. And so he got serious about it. dieted himself down, you know, took care of his blood sugar's more accurately, but it wasn't until he found the podcast that he really figured everything out. And then he got to the point where he really understood his insulin was doing great had a very much lower a one C, but then made a switch to keto. And, you know, which is you know, the way he described it. It's You know, there's, you know, he's I think he's got 29 carbs a day he eats and it all sounds like it comes from from vegetables. And his blood sugars now are just much more stable. And he says he doesn't miss those foods anymore. But But the minute that some of the that he tried to introduce something Maxi didn't even feel well. So I don't know, I think it's person to person like he doesn't seem to miss it. But if you did, then, you know, if you find yourself missing certain foods at some point, and you need to be more aggressive or or stagger insulin differently through meals. I mean, maybe I don't know you maybe if you had a pump on you'd take a shot at it? I'm not sure.

Deva Katz 35:42
I don't know, I can't handle even wearing earrings. So I can't imagine walking around with a pump. That's what's stopping me unless it was a great benefit towards for it. Like, what I have to be able to know what problem I'm solving that a pump would actually be better because I don't mind them the I the mind shots, you know, I can give six, seven shots a day and I'm okay with that. If I need it, you know, I actually don't mind the shots. I'm if the pump would help me keep better control than I would then I would absolutely try it. But I'd have to really be convinced to that. And that's why I'm looking to ask you to convince me but I am still trying to figure figure that out. Because I really, like I said I can't even stand wearing earrings. I really find anything attached to me unpleasant and I do wear I wear a Libra How do you pronounce it? So I do wear that which is what they call here a CGM. And and and I feel like I can't live without that. And I'm not willing to give that up. So I kind of suffer through that even though I find it very unpleasant. But I do it because I I feel like that's the best way to manage. Yeah, there's

Scott Benner 36:43
a trade off you feel like that you don't like wearing something but the benefit outweighs your desire, not the worst. I mean, I mean, listen, I think I think a pump is is, you know, isn't it gives you a couple of advantages that you can't have over MDI, right, it gives you the ability to manipulate your Basal insulin. So right now you're putting in your Basal insulin probably once a day, and it's just working the way it works. But with a pump, you don't take that insulin, that slow acting insulin anymore, you have your fast acting insulin that's working both as your meal insulin as your basil. And so you can tell it, you know, between this hour and this hour, I get, I don't know, point five units an hour of basil. But, you know, my blood sugar tries to get high every night between 3am and 5am. So maybe from 2am to 5am. I'm going to raise my basil from point five 2.8. I don't know like something like that, you'd have that control over that. You'd also be able to take in protein. I don't know if you're noticing that protein as its digested gets transferred into glucose.

Unknown Speaker 37:49
So much later,

Scott Benner 37:50
right. So you could you know the way Mike described it in a way others have in the past. He eats his whole go keto meal and doesn't Bolus till he's done, but sometimes has to create what they call an extended Bolus to stretch that insulin out over kind of the impact time of the of the protein rise. And that's one thing you can't do with MDI. MDI, you'd have to inject in a little bit and inject a little bit later and try to,

Deva Katz 38:18
you know, for the meals I inject could be multiple times for one meal based on what I'm eating, I get that for the Basal Is there any way to manipulate Basal with MDI? Not possible? Well,

Scott Benner 38:30
there is if you It depends on which based on which one you're using. So the much newer ones are so effective, like baz lagar, Bayes lagar. And there's a couple of them but if you're using like leaven, Mir Lantus, the older ones, do you know which one you're using,

Deva Katz 38:46
I'm using something called TJ Oh, I don't know if that's a brand name,

Scott Benner 38:49
or it's a newer one. And so if it's covering real well, for you over 24 hours, then there's not much to do those older bezels don't seem to last the whole 24 hours, even though they're supposed to serve some people split their dose every 12 hours to create a more kind of even blanket of Basal insulin. That was really the only thing about manipulating basil that I would consider and it would be with those older insulins not the one you're using. I don't think so. I don't know. I guess I don't I don't think I could talk you into wanting to pump. I don't I don't think you need to be talking to it.

Deva Katz 39:24
I I want to I'm still looking into it. I'm so I'm thinking about it, because I'm wondering if there will be unreal benefit, then I would do it. But I'd like to see my graph even better. How do you when you define, you know, in range,

Unknown Speaker 39:39
are you if it's

Deva Katz 39:41
going up and down, but it's within the range? You call that a spike?

Scott Benner 39:46
So what's your Okay,

Deva Katz 39:48
what's your um, set at um, set between 70 and 130? That's my high mid low 70 to 130.

Scott Benner 39:54
And your would you consider your bouncing meaning? Do you have to stop the rise with insulin and then stop the food with or non stop the fall with food? Or is it

Deva Katz 40:04
in within within that range within 70 to 130? Would you? Would you consider that at all a spike?

Unknown Speaker 40:13
I mean, how often how frequently I'm

Deva Katz 40:15
trying to avoid spectra, you want to be as straight as possible. So when you define a street is the street mean anything within my my range that I've set? Which street mean, a straight line with a ruler? Like my Basal overnight is a straight line like a ruler, obviously, during the day, is my goal even to get to that point? Is that possible?

Scott Benner 40:35
So here's how I think of it. And Jenny, if you've listened, any of the pro tip episodes in general, say the same thing you're looking for gentle rolling hills, not sharp ups and sharp downs. And a person whose pancreas does work could see a spike, you know, 130, after a particularly heavily heavy carb meal could even go to 140 if there's like a lot of sugar in there. But of course, their blood sugar is gonna go up and kind of gently roll back down again and get flat. So the variability, the up and the down is not great for you. But up and down between 70 and 130. I mean, I have to be honest, I think Arden's graph, mimics yours in that times away from food, she's incredibly stable at, you know, lower blood sugar's 85. Overnight, usually. And then when she gets the food, you know, depending on on the impact of that food, we could see a spike. I don't think of a spike. I think a spike in my mind is 160. So the numbers not maybe as important as the percentage it moves, you know, so if she's from 80 to 160, all the sudden her blood sugar has doubled. And that to me is a spike. You know what I mean? Like anything that you can use on after that is still a spike. It's just more drastic. If Arden is at when she eats and rolls up to 120 and comes back to 80. Again, I'm okay with that. And I think there are people who would tell you no, you can accomplish that absolutely flat, straight line. And I think they're right. I think if you don't eat carbs, you absolutely can. I think if you are managing blood sugars in a younger person whose body maybe doesn't have all the hormones and other things going on, I think you can I you know, but so is it, I think then that becomes a life balance for you. And you have to say, Do I want to not eat carbs ever again to have this if I'm okay with that, then that's the right thing. If I want cheesecake sometimes then maybe I'm low carb most of the time, but not, you know around this and I have to understand that that cheesecake is going to try to make my blood sugar go up, and I'm going to have to counterbalance it with more insulin. Like it's a personal preference, honestly.

Unknown Speaker 42:54
So here's your question,

Scott Benner 42:55
please. I think that's what we're gonna do, guys.

Deva Katz 42:57
That's what we're doing. No, no, you've answered a bunch of them so far. Straight out. One, how could you say you don't you hardly think about diabetes, you say oh, no, with my Dexcom and my Omnipod? Are? How do you think about it at all? what you're describing out? In my mind feels like to keep that line really straight? You have not you one would have to be thinking about diabetes all the time.

Scott Benner 43:19
Well, how long have you had type one now?

Unknown Speaker 43:23
Exactly. Two years, two years?

Scott Benner 43:24
Is it my today's not your day? Is it?

Deva Katz 43:26
No, no, September 13. So just two years at one month

Scott Benner 43:30
times people end up on on their anniversary date. And so that's why I like to use my anniversary when you set that up on purpose.

Unknown Speaker 43:39
solely. How how indeed.

Scott Benner 43:45
I think it's, I mean for speaking for myself. There certainly has been many points in my life when I would not have been able to say that and and saying that would have been a lie. Now it's not but it's it's just it's an amount of time that I've been doing it for so long that it just does what I what I want it to do because I'm not making a lot of mistakes. And I don't mean mistakes in a judgy way. I just mean you know, we get the insulin right for foods. The basil settings are where they belong. We see things coming like stress and anxiety and handle them prior like Arden took a PSAT the other day. And she's been you know, going to school from home for ever now it feels like it's but she had to go into the building yesterday for the PSAT. So now all of a sudden we experience feet on the floor like she got up in the morning. She had some adrenaline going tissues rushing around going to school. We Bolus right away a little bit of insulin coming out of bed for that that little bump, and a short time later when we were in the car. And heading to the school. I looked in her blood sugar was 115 ish, like in that area. And I looked and saw an up kind of motion in her blood sugar, and we put more insulin in. So I put in insulin with a 115 blood sugar going into a sap. And I guarantee you most people wouldn't do that. No, right? No. And but if they didn't, what would happen is her blood sugar would keep going up. And it would end up be 150 or so. And then it would sit there for a couple hours because I'd say What would I say, Oh, well, she's taking her sad. I don't want to bother, right? Like it would be that whole kind of freefall happens then? And none of it happened. Because I did the right thing at the right time. I know what the right thing at the right time is because I have a ton of experience. And no, I didn't think about it until the exact moment where we were driving down the street. And I thought, Oh, this is the part in the drive to school where we usually look at Arden's blood sugar. And so I said, Hey, you'll pull your phone out real quick, what's your blood sugar? And she told me, I was like, let's put some insulin in. And she did it. And that was it. I think that whole exchange took 20 seconds. And I didn't think about it after that, because I know it's going to work. And I have settings on her Dexcom in places where it will alarm before anything goes wrong. So that we can, if there are smaller adjustments still left to be made, they can be made before things get out of whack. So I never let them get to that point. And if they do, and they will, at some point, at some point, I will mess up or just something happens. When things get out of whack one way or the other. I'm incredibly good at fixing them quickly. But you will be too at some point.

Deva Katz 46:45
I hope so I feel like it's taking up a lot of my emotional headspace. And, again, I don't know how much of that is related to my sister. And how much of that is just because I'm new. And I'm learning. And maybe I'm learning a lot all at once. You know, I was on your podcast. Like I said before I even had insulin like right away. am I learning everything? And it's just taking up a lot of my headspace. And I hope that goes away. Because it's, it's too much.

Scott Benner 47:08
Yeah, no, and I think it does, I think it lessens as it as time passes, I think it's about having experiences, I genuinely believe that you have an experience, you react to it. The worst thing you can do is say to yourself, oh, like that's just diabetes, that's going to keep happening, I'm always going to have these experiences. Because if you look closely enough, you'll see what happened, you'll see that you have to Bolus a 115 going into a test because the test is going to be here there's going to be some anxiety with the test. Or how about the fact that she's rolling into this test, and it's just gonna be sedentary for a while. I know sedentary takes more insulin. You know, there's there's all kinds of like little things that you don't have to like, I'm not looking up into a mental whiteboard to finish that figure things out anymore. It's just the scenario tells my brain what to do. I don't know if that makes sense or not. It's like two plus two out in the in the background, a conversation that you weren't in, you'd think subconsciously for, you know, like so I think, go into school for a test early in the morning insulin. And I know how much to use, because I've done it before. And our bases are really great. And that is a part of it.

Deva Katz 48:30
Right? Well, I know my I feel like my Basal is correct, because like I said, I can measure it with a ruler, like it is a straight line overnight. And I wish I could go all day fasting, you know, I wonder if that's

Unknown Speaker 48:41
a possibility. You

Deva Katz 48:41
know, I wonder about that. But that's what your podcast has given me. It's given me the courage to know, you know what you're doing like that in the back of my mind. It's, it's like I say that I have all this anxiety, but I also have a certain calmness that comes from

Unknown Speaker 48:57
some knowledge,

Deva Katz 48:59
feeling like, I know, I know what I'm doing. I and you just sit down. And you reminded me You just said now two plus two equals four? Well, because everyone knows that. And when I was first diagnosed, you didn't

Unknown Speaker 49:09
know that.

Deva Katz 49:10
I was not I had, I was listening to five different podcasts. And two years later, yours is the only one I'm still listening to. And one of them I dropped when she said, Oh, it was diabetes, two plus two doesn't equal four. You know, two plus two, I think what was it you one of your guests said someone said it two plus two equals a banana. And I just felt like, Oh no, that doesn't make any sense at all. Like, that's just not true. Like sometimes things go wrong, but there's always a reason why it goes wrong.

Scott Benner 49:35
But you understand why people feel that way. And so to why and then with with limited knowledge and a vast misunderstanding of how insulin works, it would be very easy to think that it's completely random. And it's it has been I think until this podcast, very un-pc to suggest otherwise. I think I am the first person that I know in a modern diabetes space who said, Look, you, you can't just sit here and act like this is all random and you have no control over it whatsoever, because then it just gets worse and worse and worse. And I'm not saying that you can be completely in control of diabetes or insulin. That's obviously not what I'm saying. What I'm saying is there are a lot of things that are happening to people that they don't know why. But that doesn't mean that there isn't a reason why. And they often make incredibly reasonable decisions that are 100% wrong. And and my best example of this is always a person comes, you know, onto the web board, or they contact me privately or something. And they're like, look at this graph, my kids blood sugar, I'm always low. And then you look and I say, well, we're all these lows after meals. Yes. All of your stability time is high. Like, whenever you're stable. You're stable in the 140s, the two hundreds, and they're like, yeah, I said, well, you you seems like you need more basil and so on. No, no, no, you don't understand. I'm always low. And I'm like, No, that's not what I think is happening. Here's what I think is happening. I think you don't have enough Basal insulin, because you don't have enough Basal insulin. You're overcompensating at mealtimes with way too much meal insulin, you're putting it in Miss timing it using too much your blood sugar shooting way up. And then it comes crashing down. For some reason. The only part you see when you're trying to diagnose it is the crashing down part. Why don't you see the way up part. And so the lows, so make people frightened that they can't possibly believe it. And then I just did this this week with an 11 year old boy doubled his basil. Kids. Basil is point five, we made his basil one. Mom's like, No, no, that's not gonna work. I was like, Look, you don't have to do it. It's your kid. I was like, but what I'm telling you is want to try and see what happens. By the time we had it all figured out in 36 hours, by the way, remotely, I'm not with them, okay. 36 hours later, this kid's blood sugars are terrific. They are amazing. And all of the extra insulin she was using correcting around meals and causing lows. That's all in the basil now. And now she's not using that much insulin at meals, and everything is better. And it turned out, it's the same amount of insulin in a 24 hour period, it was just all in the wrong place.

Unknown Speaker 52:28
Wow. So

Deva Katz 52:30
I hope to get I want to get to a point where it's seamless, because what you're describing just sounds like an incredible amount of thought process which we do what we have to do, but it's it's taken up too much of my wife and and I don't want to be that person who's completely consumed by by that.

Scott Benner 52:46
But here's the good news. And I think I mean this. I already put the effort into it.

Unknown Speaker 52:54
sharing it, and I

Scott Benner 52:54
just explained it, I think as simply as it can be explained that

Unknown Speaker 52:58
that's true.

Scott Benner 53:00
And so if someone hears that, and says, Well, no, that's not right. I mean, there's nothing I can do about that. And I might not be right. And by the way, that might not be everyone's situation. There are some people whose, you know, Basil is way too strong. And they're constantly eating and causing spikes with the eating. But it's all about the same six problems just jumbled around in different places. And I can see it now because I've looked at it so frequently. And I think the podcast, I think the pro tip episodes of this podcast, are about the best information around about using type one dive about using insulin for Type One Diabetes that exists anywhere, I think it is the most digestible and easy to consume. And I I would think that anyone who listened through those protip series got a firm grasp of it could have anyone seen the sexes in literally no time?

Unknown Speaker 53:56
Yeah, for sure.

Scott Benner 53:57
Yeah. So that but the other thing here is to you seem like a bit of a perfectionist. Could that be true?

Deva Katz 54:05
I wanted my daytime to be like my my daytime graph look like my nighttime drive, and it doesn't Far from it far from it. And I don't know if that's even attainable. Maybe have to just focus like what you said down which is new information for me on the percentage of the jump and not drop itself. Maybe that's worth focusing on.

Unknown Speaker 54:23
Well,

Unknown Speaker 54:24
I'm what's interesting,

Scott Benner 54:25
I want to say like, it doesn't look like overnight, but you're not going above 130 Is that correct?

Unknown Speaker 54:33
Ah,

Deva Katz 54:34
I'm about 7078 or 80% in range. So I am a little bit over 130 but not not a lot but I am sometimes I'd like it to be less I'd love to be 90% in range I want to be 100% range. You

Scott Benner 54:48
know what I think you will I think that you absolutely well, but it's it's gonna if I'm guessing I can't see your your your numbers right? but my guess is Is that if you concentrate now? Well, let me ask this question first overnight, you said you're nice and steady, nice and steady were

Unknown Speaker 55:08
What? 1995?

Scott Benner 55:10
Okay, so nice and steady. 95. Beautiful. Let's assume that that basil is really pretty close. Okay, I could make an argument for 85. But whatever. Now, we're next morning, we show up your your 9095 95. You eat, you go to 131 4150. You come back down again. You're 95 again after the meal is over two, three hours later. Yes. Pretty much. Yes. Hello, yes, you probably just need a tiny bit more insulin for your meal. Maybe it needs to be timed slightly better. But you're very close to begin with. Can you picture that rolling Hill in your mind?

Deva Katz 55:48
I'm trying to

Scott Benner 55:49
Yeah. And you just if if, if you eat and your blood sugar shoots straight up, comes back down and goes right back to 95. Again, later, you did not Pre-Bolus the impact of the of the carbs well enough, right? You didn't give the insulin time to get working before it had to fight with the carbs. If you put your insulin in and eat, and your blood sugar goes up very gradually, very gradually and it kind of stays up there and never comes back. And you have to put in a little more insulin to bring it down your Pre-Bolus was probably pretty good. He didn't use quite enough insulin.

Unknown Speaker 56:25
Right? Wow. Yeah, I hear you.

Scott Benner 56:28
I hear if it shoots up and stays up. Not enough insulin, not enough. Pre-Bolus. It's just there's and these aren't hard and fast concrete rules. They're just great places to begin diagnosing what's happening.

Deva Katz 56:42
Wow, okay, I wrote that down.

Unknown Speaker 56:45
Oh, yeah,

Scott Benner 56:46
you take notes, you blow my ego way up. Don't do that. Or just don't tell me at the very least,

Deva Katz 56:49
oh, I shouldn't know why you're busy saving lives here. And I'm serious. And, and I have an excellent dietitian. And I have an excellent and I'm really happy. But somehow this doesn't come up in those conversations, you know, the look of my graphic like, Oh, you know, 78% of means you're doing awesome, you know, good for you gold sticker, which is nice. But why can it be better? Yeah, well, I wonder if their standards are too low. Like,

Scott Benner 57:12
well, don't you? I mean, for you, because you have, you have more desire, right to do better. But you have to always have to think that those people are, they're dealing with masses of people at a time. And they don't have they don't have a way to know who they're speaking to. Right. So it's it's a, it's a much different situation. They can't just give, you know, they can't give. I usually say ninja level information. But I was thinking maybe Israeli army level situation for this. But they can't give ninjas information to people who would know how to use it. And they also don't know if their basil is correct data. And they don't know sometimes I hear back from people who are like, I talked to my doctor, you don't understand what I'm saying. I moved my basil up, he yelled at me, said you're going to get low, but I'm not low. Then I showed him I'm not low. And he still said, you're going to get low. This person now I believe is working with outdated information or doesn't have a good firm grasp about how insulin works. How is that doctor going to give you good advice about how to change your Pre-Bolus time by a few minutes to stop at 130 spike, they're going to look at a 130 spike and go this is perfect.

Deva Katz 58:29
And because that's exactly what I'm being told this is perfect. And I appreciate it. You know, I love a little gold sticker. It's adorable. But it just and I wonder if part of him is also feeling like okay, because of my age, you know, by the time the negative effects of you know, high glucose really affects me, you know?

Scott Benner 58:46
I don't know. Oh, you feel maybe you might he might be thinking it won't matter.

Deva Katz 58:51
Exactly. I wonder what exactly this might like maybe with a kid, you'd be more aggressive because you want them to have a really long full life and you don't want the effects of you know, the high blood sugars to hit them when you're still you know, in the in their prime but by me, so I guess she'll be at what's the difference? Yeah, I wonder if that's like the attitude for older people?

Unknown Speaker 59:10
I don't know. I don't know.

Scott Benner 59:11
I can tell you this. I've spoken to I believe I've spoken to 1000s of people about their blood sugar's at this point. And you're going to be okay. I can tell when I'm talking to people six months from now, you're gonna send me another note and you're gonna be like, Oh my god, Scott. I listened to more of the podcast and you're still my best friend. And my blood sugar's I figured out how to stop that spike now. And I'm still on MDI and it's going great or I got a pump and I that's how I you're you're going to figure it out. I think most of this is is information and drive like a drive to do it. And avoiding the the drama that comes with it because I think that every time you get sucked into the drama, you miss you miss the lessons. You know what I mean? Like when you're busy running around yelling, oh my god, my blood sugar, it always does this, this sucks. It's terrible. I hate diabetes. While you're doing that you're missing what's happening right in front of you, that is the answer to how to fix it next time. And then you just have to have that experience again until you finally shut up and pay attention and, and see what happened.

Deva Katz 1:00:19
So here's what we're, I don't get billed well enough on my experiences, which are right in front of me. And I'm gonna be actively working on this going low. And I'm sure this is across. I'm sure this is for other people as well. I can't imagine I'm only not out there who feels this way. It's terrifying. But feeling low and struggling to shake. It's so unpleasant. And so scary. I always now is I don't say always, I'm getting better. But I often overcorrect. It's like, okay, because I'm not feeling well in that moment. And so okay, if I don't eat all this, right, now, I'm gonna die, which is, of course, the feeling, you

Scott Benner 1:00:53
know, go into your body telling you, we need carbs, do it now Hurry

Deva Katz 1:00:57
up, if you don't eat so much. You know, this little bit there, there's a limit. And I'm still trying to like, sit on my hands and like, tell my husband, okay, hold me back. Because I don't want more. Because I know I ate enough. And I just need to wait 10 minutes, I'll be fine. And I'm still working on that. But there's a good example of, you know, what's going to happen. And you've been through this and you should learn your lesson. And yet here I am intelligent adult, not learning my lesson. And and I would like to feel like, wow, experiences should be imprinted in my brain. So they don't have to think about it so much. And I'm not there yet. I'm still thinking all the time. And experiences are not a seamless, and I want to get to the point where they will be and hopefully so

Scott Benner 1:01:37
yeah, and I have to say that if you're going to be slow. On one aspect of this, that's a good one to be slow on. You know what I mean? Like it's a real case, it could be a real safety situation, you don't want to just like, Can you imagine sitting there with a juice in your hand going now? I'm not going to and then pass out? Because you know what I mean? Because you're not you're not sure how to handle it yet. I mean, listen, at this point, I've seen my daughter's blood sugar tried to get low, so many times that I can like, you know, when people talk about, like I was low all night, I couldn't get up. That only happens like, twice a year here. Because when I see the low, I know how to impact it. And so once you learn how to do it, and when I say learn, I mean 100% understand how to do it, not just like I've done it three times, and I think I'm good at it now. You know, but like, really, you've got six, eight months, you've stopped dozens and dozens of lows. You can see on your on your data, especially if you're in a glucose monitor, right? You can see the pitch of falls. And you can figure it out, like, Listen, I can, I can correct an incredibly high blood sugar with a massive amount of insulin and introduce food that stops the insulin from creating a low. And I didn't learn that in two years, just so you know. It took it took longer than that.

Deva Katz 1:03:04
But at the low gets corrected much faster because of the large amount of insulin and then you give food how much later

Scott Benner 1:03:13
repeat that I didn't hear the first two words.

Deva Katz 1:03:15
Okay, my question was, you obviously gave a lot of insulin upfront because you wanted to be aggressive to treat the low. But now you have too much insulting now you have to give food, how much time did you wait between A and B?

Scott Benner 1:03:25
So there's the thing, I can't tell you that I can see it. But I can't tell you it's all feeling. I just look at that graph. And I'm like, now, and it's it's, it's just the art, it's it's not science, I'm sure there's a science to it. I'm sure that there's someone who could figure it out, I am not that person. And there's also a ton of variables in front of it that you don't have for your equation. And if there weren't, you wouldn't be 250 to begin with. You don't I mean, because once you're once you're 200, or 250, or 300, or 400, you've bought something so incredible. Incredibly, you can't possibly diagnose what you've botched. And so my idea there is a bunch of insulin for the number. And we all know that even when you do that it takes forever to fall down. But we need food in the future. So why don't we put in the bunch of insulin for the number and the insulin for the food and then catch the drop with the meal. And that's that's one of the ways that I crush high blood sugars. But I wouldn't tell somebody to do that. Unless they were really practiced and incredibly confident. And I also it's not something I would do without a glucose monitor as well. Because but but I can see the pitch in the line as it's dropping. And I have a feeling for time and distance and how much insulin when you introduce the food and you know, and then the goal is to bring that blood sugar in for like a smooth landing like a plane just down and flat and I am I'm pretty good at it. And other people are too who are listening. And you will be one day as well.

Deva Katz 1:05:04
I hope so. That is that is totally my goal. I have a last question on my list, which we didn't touch on. Have you heard of mine, your listeners, that a sensor is more accurate on one part of their body than another?

Scott Benner 1:05:18
I think that people's devices are person to person about where they get their best. Like, you'll hear people say, like, I put my pump on my thigh, it's terrific. And the next person's like, Oh, my thigh doesn't work. You know, I love the back of my arm, I get bad absorption. They're like, it's I think it's, you know, it's about that sensor wire finding that interstitial fluid. And, you know, and working there as best as possible. So you're looking for, you know, Meteor places, maybe places that it's not being pulled and torque laid on those kind of situations. But yeah, I would truly believe that you'll find places on your body where that libri will work better than others.

Unknown Speaker 1:06:00
Yeah, yeah. 100%.

Deva Katz 1:06:02
That's not unusual. I, I've been looking it up. And I haven't seen much written about that. But I was wondering about that, because my my right side is definitely not as accurate as my left side,

Scott Benner 1:06:13
I think it's important to remember that when these products come to market, that the FDA requires them to test it in areas and prove it in areas. And that that is a time consuming process. And if it wasn't a time consuming process, I wonder if they wouldn't test it in more areas. Meaning, I wonder if there aren't areas on some people that would work better than the FDA approved areas for other people. And if maybe you don't have to maybe create your own little science experiment to figure it out. I always bring up Chris Freeman, he's a former Olympic cross country skier has been on the show a couple times. The man has the body fat of a piece of wood. And, and I I've seen him where his on the pod and his Dexcom on his chest. Wow. So that's where he found that it worked for. Wow, yeah. You know, okay, yeah, figure it out. I think that most of this is figure it out. Like when people say to me how long how much I'm like, I don't know, figure it out, try this much, then try more and try a little sooner, a little later. Like, you got a figure if you're waiting for someone to tell you do this, in this exact amount at this exact time. And it's going to go perfectly. If you're expecting that you are misunderstanding how insulin works. You know,

Deva Katz 1:07:31
that was one of the first lines of yours that like that stuck with me where you said, I don't know more. And since I've heard that you you've said it, you know, a bunch of times, like it comes up a lot. Like I don't know, just more Yeah. And that stuck with me, because that's just how you have to do it. Don't be afraid. Be courageous, just do more. And then we'll figure it out later.

Scott Benner 1:07:52
In my mind, David, it just makes sense. If I use, you know, if I use one, and it's not enough, I mean, am I gonna just come back and try one every day and go, huh, don't work again, that that just doesn't make any sense. And maybe my Listen, maybe my arrogance or ignorance or, you know, or just my desire to not see that happen to my daughter allowed me finally to say, I'm just gonna try some more here and see what happens. But I think that for many, many people who are suffering from incredibly high blood sugars, I think it's fascinating that the first thing they don't think is I must not have enough insulin. But I guess what happens is eventually they pile up enough insulin in the wrong place, they crash low, and that's the touchstone on low, I got low today, I can't be low, I'll make my blood sugar even higher. So I don't get low, I see the thinking, but it's flawed and incorrect. You don't keep your blood sugar high, so that you don't get low, you keep your blood sugar stable, and good. So that you don't get high so that you don't get low. That's it, they're taking out the common sense that been just adding the fear. And, and, and all of that, by the way, forget diabetes for a second. The way we think about everything is informed by the generation before us. Right? We grow up with our parents telling us something and we either recognize it to be true. Believe it even though it's not true, or rebel against it, because we've seen it's not right. That's it. And you can apply that to politics, the way you think about civil rights you get and you're gonna you're gonna apply it to insulin. If you ever really go back and listen to this podcast straight through. I'm just living diabetes the way I live everything else. It's it. It's common sense. It's taking out emotion, taking out what I think is right because How would I know what's right? Um, you know, this is my first time with diabetes on my first day You know, like, why would I apply what I think to something I don't understand in any meaningful way. And then somebody comes in a doctor, some, some nice lady in a Facebook page, something like that, and says three random things to you, which now you believe to be absolutely Stone Cold fact, because that person knows more than you do. So now you just believe them word for it, the amount of people I see, trying to apply a statement they heard from someone else to their life, as if it's a puzzle that will fit is fascinating. Like sometimes you just see people read something online and misinterpret it. And then they try to apply it like a rule for the rest of their lives and won't let go of it. We are so indoctrinated into wanting to believe that someone else knows better than we do. It's a fascinating human thing.

Deva Katz 1:10:51
Oh, it's for sure. True, especially in the medical, cuz you're dealing with medical issues, because we want to feel like we're being taken care of like someone's taking care of us.

Scott Benner 1:11:01
Yeah, listen, I don't want to get to, like Wavy Gravy here with you, Dave. Uh, but a lot of the things you're comfortable about is really just, you know, society building up. But don't just think about Linus with his blanket, his line is safe, or is he holding the blanket? Maybe he's no more safe than everybody else in that group. But he feels better, because he's got his blanket, then I'm assuming at some point in his life, his parents told him you'll be safe with this buddy, you know, or he attached himself to it. And I think that, listen, I live in a nice neighborhood, right? You can appreciate this better than anybody probably, I live in a nice neighborhood, it's fairly safe. That does not mean that three guys can't come blowing through my front door right now with guns, right? My wife, steal my kids, take all my stuff and shoot me in the head. That doesn't mean that can't happen. And the fact that I genuinely believe that will never happen, is as much true as it is a fallacy that I've created in my head by telling myself I live in a safe neighborhood. Now, am I going to run around for the rest of my life thinking that this is going to happen? I am not. But a lot of the things that we're comforted by aren't real. And, you know, I think it happens around diabetes as well. I think we tell people things to make them feel comfortable. I think we tell people things to take away their guilt. I think we tell people things to take away their shame. And you know, I think for some people that might be necessary, because they might be teetering on the edge. But for the rest of us, we're hearing like, we're hearing those things. Like there's some sort of rules, and we're trying to apply them to using insulin and our lives. And to me, you know, if fire puts out, a fire is extinguished, is extinguished by water. And I spray a little bit of water on it and it doesn't go out. My first thought is, oh, this must be the special kind of fire. I think more water. And I don't I see this all in a very similar way.

Unknown Speaker 1:13:00
Oh, that's great. It's true. Just more just you just need more

Scott Benner 1:13:03
wood. I somebody said to me the other day, can you help me? When I put my kid in the car and go for long rides? It's blood sugar goes way up. I've doubled his basil and it won't come down. And my response was, why does the percentage that you move the Basal impact your thought process? Because Because now Now she believes? Well, I've doubled it. And that didn't work. So it's not that where I would say well have you tripled it? Have you quadrupled it? Maybe they're the kids body is presenting a need for insulin that you're not meeting. There is no other thing to do in this situation. Your blood sugar is higher, you need more insulin. That's it if your blood sugar's lower, you need less insulin. It's it's a fairly common sense idea. And and but but that percentage thing I want to get back to we all do that. My kid got diagnosed his his Basal rate was point two an hour. And now his blood sugar's to 300 all the time. I don't know I moved as Basal 2.4 I doubled it that has to be enough. Well, it's obviously not. But you get caught up in the number because that number now seems so big. Because you were working with such a small number to begin with. And by the way, if that kid's story was his base rate was two units an hour and now his his blood sugar's 300 all the time, and I moved it to 2.3 Well, it's still not right. And I know and there's, I hear people will type on talking about like, shame around. Like somehow someone said this to me recently. I wish I remember who it was because I thought it was such a great point. She said somehow in the diabetes community amongst adults using less insulin is kind of chic. Or seems like you're doing better if you're using less Have you ever had that thought?

Deva Katz 1:14:56
I not for myself, but I definitely heard it out there. Not for yourself. I feel like Well, that's what I need. That's what I need that actually never impacted me personally, but I've definitely heard it out there. Yeah, it's like a status symbol. Yeah, I'm because I'm a keto. So I don't need any insulin like that kind of attitude. But

Scott Benner 1:15:11
I'm not saying I'm not listening. I'm not saying that there's not some. I don't know, right. I'm not a doctor. And I think there are probably doctors who don't know as well. But I'm not saying that if you had some amazingly perfect diet that was, you know, 100% right for your body that you might not use less insulin. I think that's probably true. But there's a difference between reality. And what would be true in a perfect situation. And not every person can go eat a keto diet for the rest of their lives. Some people just can't pull it together, they can't do it, or they don't want to and, and all that's important, your desires are important. And so if you want to, you know, if you want to eat cheesecake, you need to understand how much insulin cheesecake takes. That's it. I don't I don't play I'll tell you. I don't see all this as being very complicated. Am I? Maybe I'm the one that's messed up. You

Deva Katz 1:16:04
know, it's, it's not complicated, but it's still taking up too much of my headspace.

Unknown Speaker 1:16:09
Yeah. But the

Deva Katz 1:16:10
idea of like, too much insulin. So that was in my list of five pages of worth of questions that I sold my endo after two months. So one of them was, is there a maximum amount of insulin that I can take a day? Like, is there a limit that I'm allowed in? How my how it impacts the rest of my body and everything. And he was like, you need to take such as you need. Right? That's his answer was spot on. But I wasn't in the system enough to really grasp what he meant. But he meant basically what you're saying, like, you need what you need. And that's what you take. And he didn't put a cap on how much I just have to get better at not thinking about it so much. And we're getting there.

Scott Benner 1:16:46
Well, I appreciate Listen, I again, this would be arm sir. armchair psychology from me. But if I was you, I'd look at myself and say, I'm doing really well. Maybe you should take a day off. Just don't like like you're, you're you're eating reasonably low carb, you're good at your meals. Why don't you just not think about it for a day?

Deva Katz 1:17:07
Are you serious? What not? Not check?

Scott Benner 1:17:09
No, just I mean, just? How does that libri work? Does it have alarms will tell you if you go over something

Unknown Speaker 1:17:15
it does not have alarms Now,

Scott Benner 1:17:18
hold on a second, Well, then let's put yourself on it. Like why don't we say this? What if you said I'll check before a meal. And I'll give myself insulin the way I usually do. And I'll pick a meal that I know I'm pretty good at. And then I will thoughtfully not look at my blood sugar again for two hours. Oh, wow. Right? And then because it's probably going to go the way you expect because you sound like you're pretty good at I mean, how often do you see some

Deva Katz 1:17:46
lady sweating? listening to you say that I am already sweating. But you know what? I take your challenge. I'm gonna do it. Even though I'm sweating.

Scott Benner 1:17:54
Try it. And then what's the worst that could happen? Right? And then look, and then because what it's going to prove is it was okay. Because you know what you're doing? And then you'll be able to stop thinking about it, then you can look to look, not look, because you're afraid you're about to see a clown under your bed with a knife. And you have to look right. So yeah, I will say this. If you had I don't know what the situation is in Israel, but the Dexcom g six would fix your problem.

Deva Katz 1:18:20
I know what the alarms are at the moment, I'd have to pay for it out of pocket. Yeah, I believe it's free. But I would have to pay for the Dexcom I'm

Scott Benner 1:18:27
not telling you to spend money you don't have what I'm telling you is that if you could set an alarm for 130, blood sugar, and eat, then you could say to yourself, I don't have to think about this again. Unless I hear this alarm. Right. And that will take away a lot of that anxiety, I think

Unknown Speaker 1:18:43
Yeah, yeah.

Scott Benner 1:18:44
Yeah. Because right now, you have the same anxiety that people have who just have a meter. You just don't have to poke your finger to, to check on your anxiety to hold the thing up to the thing. So I don't know like if I was you, I would take steps towards trying to alleviate that. Are you checking overnight?

Deva Katz 1:19:06
Am I checking over night?

Scott Benner 1:19:08
You're not waking up to check?

Deva Katz 1:19:09
No, no, no, I I'm at this point I was in the beginning. But now I'm very confident that my Basal overnight is going to be straight line and it is and I can see when I wake up that Oh, look that it's been a straight line. I've you know if something weird happens, there's no reason to check in. I

Scott Benner 1:19:24
know, I would I you know if you can't make yourself do the thing. I said try that first, though. But if you can't, I would go to the weekend and tell your husband, here's the thing to check my Libra check it, write the number down but do not tell me what the number is under this number or over this number. So then you'll know you're safe because he hasn't come to you. And yet you'll have a little little feeling for what's happening. Okay, there's a lot of you have to trick your brain to stop being crazy, David.

Deva Katz 1:19:56
It's amazing how easy it is for the brain to become crazy and I thought it was the company same person. And apparently I'm not listening. But it's amazing how, how insane the brain can make you. Like, yeah,

Scott Benner 1:20:06
I grew up in the northeast, if you grew up in a Jewish household in New York, with nine people, there's no way you're not crazy. You know,

Unknown Speaker 1:20:15
the bedroom and half an apartment.

Scott Benner 1:20:18
My best friend, my best one of my best friends is, is about the most neurotic person I've ever seen in my entire life. And he worries about things that I can't wrap my brain around worrying. And when we talk, I'll be like, Brad, what? Why would you even think about that? And he's like, well, because and then you can see him build a narrative around. What if? And then what if? And then what if? And his what ifs spiral out of control? And I'm like, do any of those things ever happened? And you'll actually say, and he means that he's not being funny. He goes, No, but what if they do? And I'm like, Yo, man, you gotta calm down. I don't know another way to say that. Like, I think there's a way to plan without worry. And there's an episode of this podcast, and I don't want to repeat myself too much. But worry is a waste of imagination. That is literally you making up something that may happen. It's you making up a what if? And that's not, that's not valuable. You also have to be healthy. In your mind, not just your body.

Deva Katz 1:21:23
Yeah, yeah, yeah. So that's my next that's my next step. After I take my effort, take your challenge, to go two hours without checking, okay.

Scott Benner 1:21:33
And then just kind of keep stretching that out. And now it turns out, you cannot be my best friend, because I cannot take one more person who's always what I think. It's I feel for you, because I, he, it seems exhausting.

Deva Katz 1:21:49
It's exhausting. But I think you've given me hope that it's not gonna be forever, like, I'm gonna get a little bit more into it. And it's gonna become seamless, because at the moment, it's, um, well, but it's exhausting.

Scott Benner 1:22:00
I believe that I really do. I really do. I think you can get to it, especially with your you have good focus, you understand the nuts and bolts, you know, the rest of the part is just talking yourself into, into believing that what you know is going to happen is going to happen. That really is

Deva Katz 1:22:17
known as talk myself into being less crazy. We're working on that

Scott Benner 1:22:20
there's a defining diabetes episode called that because I think it's that I think it's incredibly important to just see something happen so many times that you believe it, so that you don't constantly wonder what if that's all right. Yeah, you'll get to it. You really well,

Unknown Speaker 1:22:35
I will. I will keep you posted.

Scott Benner 1:22:38
I appreciate that. I need to apologize to you. And thank you for the same thing. You really inspired me today. I was incredibly articulate. But But I always articulate what I spoke more than I meant to in this one. But you got me rolling on things. And the thoughts were coming freely. And I just didn't want to sometimes I found her through things I understand. And sometimes I don't. But you caught me. Very clear. And, and I think this is going to be a favorite episode for people because I think we'd set a lot of important things in this.

Deva Katz 1:23:12
So do I get to be considered delightful?

Scott Benner 1:23:16
Yes, you are delightful. Delightful. I don't know why it means that much for me, but I definitely found you to be delightful.

Unknown Speaker 1:23:24
I thank you very much. That means a lot.

Scott Benner 1:23:27
I also appreciate you doing this. What it What time is it where you are,

Deva Katz 1:23:30
it is now a quarter to eight the evening.

Scott Benner 1:23:33
am eating up your your your your evening time. I'm sorry.

Deva Katz 1:23:36
It's all good. It's all good. It's nice. Take a break from the kids for a while. So it's all good. I locked the door. No one's bothering me. Our piece. It's been great.

Scott Benner 1:23:45
Yeah, don't tell Kelly this, but sometimes when I'm folding the laundry, I'm just so happy to be by myself. I hate what I'm doing. But I like that I'm doing it by myself.

Deva Katz 1:23:56
Exactly. Sometimes by myself is it's a good thing. Scott, thank you very, very much. You've been you've been a life changer. And and I and I mean that in all sincerity, you know, a life changer. And and I hope that you just get paid no payback thousandfold for what you're doing for the diabetic community.

Scott Benner 1:24:16
I didn't mean that, well, you're kind to say that and I appreciate it. And I, I I feel like I feel like I get more out of this than you guys though. That's for certain. First of all, I've been married a long time. So if I start pontificating, like I did today, Kelly's walking out of the room, just you know, when I started talking about, you know, societal norms and you know, rk she's like, Oh, here he goes. And then then she's, she's out. So I get I get somewhere to stretch my legs. I also get to have I mean this, and I think it's as valuable for you all as it is for me. But having these conversations about what other people would find to be mundane diabetes ideas. They reinforce them for me and I have more than one thought. I've never had before. While I'm on the podcast, I think this podcast is helping Arden as much as it's helping you guys, because, you know, I think we're honing a blade here together. And I think it I think it goes both ways. So I appreciate it as well.

Deva Katz 1:25:15
It's like what we know now about diabetes and everything needs to light years ahead of what, you know, I knew as a seven year old when my sister got diagnosed, you know, it's so I'm so grateful for people, you know, like you out there teaching, because otherwise, you know, we'd still be back using, you know, urine sticks, you know, how helpful would that?

Scott Benner 1:25:34
Well, yeah, I mean, you can't, you can't undervalue the movement of technology. It's

Deva Katz 1:25:40
it's been, it's been incredible. Yeah. But the technology doesn't help if you don't know what you're doing with it. Yeah, I'm wearing a sensor. That's very nice. If I didn't understand it, that wouldn't help me at all.

Scott Benner 1:25:49
I'm beginning to lump I'm beginning to lump this podcast in with that, because it's a it's a tool to talk to people that that just didn't exist before this kind of text. I mean, honestly, I'm sitting with a microphone and a computer and some equipment most people don't have. But other than that, you know, I'm just putting my thoughts online and they're reaching. I am, I think that this is part of it. I think texting is an amazing part of parenting with diabetes. But I think that insulin pumps and glucose monitors and insulin that works better, that kind of stuff, even you know, even to say now, like glucagon, being in a hypo pen like that, that that's a big deal for people who are scared, you know, and there are a lot of people were scared. And then this podcast, being able to talk to people like this, I think is incredibly valuable. I have to say, I was very proud of myself at the point in the show, when you said that you started listening to a bunch of diabetes podcasts, but now only listened to this one. I was proud of myself because I I want very badly to know what those shows are. But I don't want you to say,

Deva Katz 1:26:53
I'm not gonna say the names because you know, that's rude. But I will say what the main focus was just like a lot of all your Okay, you're so wonderful, you're fine, you're fine. You're fine. Just like commiserating and venting, which I guess for some people, that's helpful. But for me, it's like, I don't want to vent. I don't want to commiserate. I want to learn, I want to do better. But that's the whole point how we make this better? Why are you accepting the status quo by venting and commiserating and having everyone you know, hug you? That's not what this is about, you know, this is you need to learn to do this better. And if you're not learning, then I don't have time for you. If you're not learning, then what's the point?

Scott Benner 1:27:34
It's funny, because in my heart, I think I do the comfort stuff, too. I just think I spent about 30 seconds on it, then we move on to the stuff that makes you not feel like you need to be comforted anymore.

Deva Katz 1:27:43
Exactly. Exactly. Yeah, exactly. And I'm on like, a lot of these online forums, you see that as well. So I just thought, well, that because I'm not interested in comfort I have, you know, I have that in my life right now. I need to learn how am I making this better? And, and that's what you given us. And that's, that's like I said, life changing, life changing, literally life changing, not just, you know, the fuzzy wuzzy, comfort kind of life changing literally life changing the way I'm gonna be able to live to 100 with both my feet and tech, you know, that's my goal. When you

Scott Benner 1:28:12
hear me say that, it's nice to know, you're not alone at 2am when you're fighting Alo, but it would be better to not be finding a low 2am. That's what I'm, that's what I'm saying. You know, I was approached this week about writing a blog post for a pretty big blog, right? And they're like, we keep hearing about your podcast, and would you come write something I'm like, I don't want to, but alright, you know, so I started talking to them about it. And right away, it's like, well, don't talk about any of the things that you talk about in the podcast. And I was like, I was like, why she's like, we you know, like, you know nothing about how you use insulin or about and I was like, so you heard about me, because the podcast is so popular. But you would like me not to say any of the things in the blog post that we talked about in the podcast, is that correct? And she's like, yeah, that's what I need. And I said, you know, that's why the podcast is so popular, right? And she said, why I said, cuz the rest of you are just pumping out banal bullsh people with diabetes. That's why that's that's why this bar This podcast is popular. You think it's me? If it's me, it's because I'm saying it. But it's, it could be anybody. It could be anybody that understood it was willing to speak up. It could be but now guess what? Now it's too late. Now the podcast is so popular. I'm so far ahead of it. It just doesn't. It's an institution at this point. Like your you know what I mean? It's it's a and and I've always been driven by that. Even when I wrote on a blog. I just would look up and think, why are you all saying the same unhelpful stuff over and over again, people are like, Oh, you know what, it's a great blog. This one does, and you go read it. You couldn't tell the difference between that one and that one. It was all just like you were talking about it. And it's it's really nice stuff. And I and I genuinely think it has an incredible amount of value. But how many people do we need saying It's just the number we need 4000 people saying that, because at some point, you know, in a in an attempt to make people feel better, what you make them is apathetic. And that's not helping them as much as you think it is

Deva Katz 1:30:19
that they stop trying to help themselves. And then before you know it, you know, half the communities, you know, yeah. And that makes no sense to me.

Scott Benner 1:30:26
It's a huge, it's a it's a huge, it really is. It's the communication equivalent of people misunderstanding, the baseline song I saw low. So now I keep my blood sugar at 250. Some people have a lot of anxiety around that number. So I'm going to say out loud to everyone, it's just a number. But what we're really trying to do is protect the people who have like a genuine anxiety issue around it. So is it impossible? Why is it always I keep saying this, but why is everything always one of the other? Isn't it possible to say, Hey, listen, if you're experiencing a lot of anxiety around seeing your blood sugar, I really encourage you to think about it as a number. And for the rest of you who are not feeling that here are some ways to keep that number from being anxiety ridden to begin with, and for you with the anxiety will go slower with you. And we're going to find a way to get this okay for you. And by the way, some people fall through the cracks. And that's no one's problem. No, excuse me, no one's fault. Like why why is common sense? Why do we always dumb everything down to the very bottom of everything? You know, what's incredible at this moment, David? I'm incredibly liberal. And I sound conservative. So but but you can't just say it you can't least common denominators, people's health, that

Deva Katz 1:31:47
well, that's what the doctors are doing.

Scott Benner 1:31:49
Yeah, no, no, they're, they're ruining nine people's health because one person can't handle the information. And then why? That just doesn't make any sense. No, you know, I'm not up for that, I guess. And so if that,

Deva Katz 1:32:04
obviously not, because you putting in all this time and energy and on behalf of all of you, like I said, the diabetic community, we appreciate it.

Scott Benner 1:32:11
I appreciate you saying that. But listen,

Unknown Speaker 1:32:14
I need to leave a positive Have an awesome day.

Scott Benner 1:32:17
Yeah, but no, no, I was gonna tell you, I need to leave a repository behind for my daughter. That's what this podcast is that it's helping all you guys is a nice bonus. But I need to take what's in my head and put it here. Because I think one day I'm gonna drop dead, right? And she's gonna go, huh? How was my dad so good at this diabetes thing? Because she's not me. Right? People want to make that point. all adults love to ask me Well, how are you gonna pass this on to your daughter. That's another fallacy. That's another I live in a safe neighborhood. I don't know how you're gonna pass it on to your daughter, you can't. Because they're little, and their brains are mushy. And they don't have, they don't have any of my life experiences. They don't jump to conclusions about common sense, because they don't have common sense. They're still building all that stuff. I need this podcast to be available that day, my daughter, as an adult realizes, holy, that guy knew what he was talking about. And

Unknown Speaker 1:33:11
about myself. And now

Scott Benner 1:33:13
I'm going to go back and listen to that podcast, I'm going to take 500 1000 hours of my life and make myself as good at diabetes as my dad was. But and maybe she won't do that. But if she has that thought, this is going to be here for it. Because I'm going to pay what I'm my goal was to save up enough money to pay so that the, the podcast can be available, you know, forever. Like I i one of the things I want to do at my death is pay the company who host this podcast to keep hosting. Well, you know, so yeah, it just it it is that it's just, you can't you can't learn life in a day. And my path somehow turned me into the kind of person who sees diabetes, the way I see it, and talks about it the way I talk about it. Just like when you hear Jenny, like you don't think there are other smart people who have had diabetes for 33 years who are into fitness. But why is Jenny so good at talking about it? Right? It's It's her whole life. It's a it's a, it's an amalgam of who she is, when she puts it out there. I think that's the same for me. And for anybody else who's good at something. You didn't just sit down one day, I didn't, if anybody thinks I just thought, Oh, I'm gonna make a diabetes podcast. And I'll just do it really good. So people like it. That's not how this works. I could have started this podcast, and it could have been crap, and no one could have listened to it. And I'll tell you there are a lot of other people out there proven that with a lot of other podcasts, and I don't, I don't just read about diabetes. I mean, just in general, people have that thought like, Oh, I'm interesting. And then they start talking. I'm like, oh, like, I've tried some podcasts and I'm eight minutes into it. I think. No one could be listening to this. You know, like, like, Who would listen to this? I don't think the guy making it would listen to it.

Unknown Speaker 1:35:05
But that again, it's not a it's not a brag. It's, it's just what it is, like,

Scott Benner 1:35:11
I can't, I can't do a high jump, I can't run a 60 yard dash and in, you know, in an incredible amount of time, they're things I'm terrible at. I'm good at this. So that's dumb luck. It really is. I've had people say to me, I'm sorry, Your daughter has diabetes, but saved my life. You know, so,

Deva Katz 1:35:34
I am kind of sorry, she has diabetes, but it's, it's, uh, if she has to have it, I'm glad that she's in your family. Right? You're there for her. I

Scott Benner 1:35:42
think the unspoken part of that sentence is if some kids gonna get diabetes, the daughter of the guy who can talk about diabetes, like,

Unknown Speaker 1:35:51
is that a horrible thing to say?

Unknown Speaker 1:35:52
I don't think so.

Deva Katz 1:35:53
I get at it. It's the reality you You are the best person to be caring for her. So

Scott Benner 1:36:01
let's leave it with on the best person that makes me feel.

Unknown Speaker 1:36:06
I like that.

Scott Benner 1:36:07
I'm kidding. Of course, after all this talking, someone's gonna take that incredibly seriously. But, uh, but But no, seriously, I'm just happy. I'm literally happy that the thing I did helped you. Yeah, that's all. It's and my point, my greater point is that I could have been a person who put this out in the world, and you could have listened to it and gone. Well, this is not valuable, and walked away from it. And I'm just happy that it worked out this way. And by the way, I mean, this, if I if I, if I shouldn't be doing this, meaning if people don't connect with it, I would very much want to move on to something else. Like I would be horrified to think that I was pumping out a podcast for people every week that nobody listened to and nobody cared about. Like, why am I wasting my time with that? You know,

Deva Katz 1:36:55
okay, well, let me put that back at you. How long before this episode airs?

Scott Benner 1:36:59
Oh, well, I really liked it. So it's gonna move way off.

Deva Katz 1:37:03
I'm just gonna save you have episodes three, four months out? Clearly you have What to say? And clearly, people are out there listening. That's what I'm saying. I know, often you um, you have, you know, episodes, you know, far out into the future. So

Scott Benner 1:37:18
you're saying a lot to do. If this went into the general rotation, you'd hear it in March of 2021. But Wow, I had a good time with it. So I think it's gonna go go out sooner. Plus, you're you're in a really unique situation. I've had a lot of men lately, and I need to mix in some women. So that's my super By the way, if anybody's listening trying to figure out the you're like, Oh, I wonder why his podcast is more popular than mine. I mixed men and women back and forth, which by the way, has nothing to do why it's popular. I just think it's a nice thing to do. So you guys don't hear similar voices like week after week, you know? But anyway, alright. You were terrific. You are on fire. By the way if your husband ever goes down, I don't know if I want to live in Israel. But I think you and I would get along. So I'm not taking care of those kids just

Deva Katz 1:38:04
Well, you my best friend. So certainly that has to mean something.

Scott Benner 1:38:07
I do think it does. If by the way, please.

Unknown Speaker 1:38:12
Have a good day. You

Scott Benner 1:38:13
have a great day. I really

Unknown Speaker 1:38:14
did. Are you gonna be lunch? Alright, take care. Okay, bye. Did I tell

Scott Benner 1:38:23
you this was gonna be a great episode. Why would I lie? There's no reason. Thank you so much, David, for coming on the show and sharing your broad expansive story and your heart. It was really lovely. I want to just point out that at the end of the episode, I told her it would be out like a couple of months ago, because I was moving it up. But the great episodes have just piled up to the point where I can't do that. I'd have to start giving you guys like five episodes a week to get them out at the pace that I would have needed to to keep my promise. There are just too many good episodes. I gotta paste them a little bit. You guys can't listen every day. You have lives. I mean, I imagine you have a life.

Don't forget to go to the T one D exchange. That's at T one d exchange.org. forward slash juicebox. Click on join our registry now and fill out the brief survey. All you need to be is a type one, the caregiver of type one be from the United States and have a few minutes to want to do a nice thing for other people. That's all you got to be if you're those things, this is gonna work out great for you. If you're new to the podcast and looking for the diabetes pro tip series, it begins at Episode 210 in your podcast app, or you can find them at Juicebox Podcast comm or diabetes pro tip calm, be defining diabetes series is also there, as well as links to all the things about the podcast that you might care about Juicebox podcast.com Scroll down, take a look. All the after dark episodes are there and all the ones about algorithm based pumping. There's some blog posts that I think are pretty terrific. recent episodes pro tip episodes, so much to choose from. If you're listening in a podcast that please hit subscribe or follow. And of course, if you're enjoying the show, please share it with someone who you think might also enjoy it.


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