#521 Drive My Car

Stefan is an adult living with type 1 diabetes.

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

Scott Benner 0:00
Hello friends, and welcome to Episode 521 of the Juicebox Podcast.

Today, we're gonna speak with Stefan. He's had diabetes for a couple of years. It's actually an adult in grad school. So it's not that old. And he's not that young. But he is just starting to get used to type one. I love this conversation with Stephen. It's got a really interesting job, and some great insights. While you're listening, if you would do me the favor of remembering that nothing you hear on the Juicebox Podcast should be considered advice, medical or otherwise, I would appreciate it. And further if you'd remember to always consult a physician, before making any changes to your health care plan. were becoming bold with insulin that I would appreciate as well. I have a little time here. So I don't I want to remind you that the podcast is full of series, how we eat with different people's eating styles, defining diabetes, which are diabetes terms easily and simply defined in short episodes. That's with me and Jenny Smith, Jenny's a CBE, and she's had type one for 30 years. She's also with me on the diabetes pro tip episodes, which I think we should all listen to.

This show is sponsored today by the glucagon that my daughter carries, g vo cuyp open, Find out more at G Vogue glucagon.com forward slash juice box. We're also sponsored by the Contour Next One blood glucose meter if you're using a blood glucose meter, and I think that's all of you, you all have one, right? Please tell me you all have a meter. Anyway, if you're using a blood glucose meter, you want one that is accurate, easy to use, and easy to hold. If that's the case, look no farther than the Contour. Next One blood glucose meter. Learn more at Contour Next one.com. forward slash juicebox.

Stefan 2:17
I'm Stefan powerblock. Um, let's see 20 years old now. I've had Type One Diabetes for two years. I don't know I'm a mechanical engineer. And I'm a grad student while currently in grad school. So working on a master's degree well with Type One Diabetes, which is still relatively new to me. It's awesome.

Scott Benner 2:43
That's awesome. Well, first of all, let's put that degree into practice and get that sound to stop happening. I was still happening. You're talking I'm like, you know, for a guy with a mechanical engineering degree. I would think he could get that sound to stop.

Stefan 2:59
Man, she I unplugged it now. Maybe now I just got to stand like Stockstill. Are you talking

Scott Benner 3:03
with your hands? Or? No, I'm, well, I'm shaking my head. I don't know. Maybe that's it. Sorry. Don't Don't, hey, here's my direction. Don't overthink it. And please stop doing that at the same time. Just don't move. There's only been one noise. In a recent episode. It actually went up today that I found kind of soothing while I was listening to it. And it was someone. I put up an episode today with Shirley and she's from South Africa. By the time someone hears me say that it'll be like last year, probably. But there were crickets in the background. And I was like, This is lovely. Like, there's just this like, quiet blend of crickets behind me. And I thought the whole time we were recording I thought I'm going to leave this and this is great. And in the middle, I sat to edit it in every quiet space where she wasn't talking. I just chopped the crickets out. I hated it. Like this is like go and I'm just imagining myself editing your show six months from now. And just taking out the make me cry me cursing at you and you don't even realize. But but so you're 28 you're diagnosed and you're 26 you're obviously getting a fairly advanced degrees that are going on for for some time, your professional student at the moment or do you work as well? I work full time. Geez, what are you super smart? Stefan? What's going on her? Oh, heck no. Are you kidding me? That's my assumption. If you can go to grad school, be a mechanical engineer and be working at the same time that your three brains and they're all working simultaneously. What How do you find yourself doing that? Are you just Is there something you're striving for? Do you like being in school? what's the what's the draw?

Stefan 4:43
Oh, yeah, no. So my my undergrad I loved my undergrad. And I just wanted to continue. You know, I was thinking like research in the end item. I'm an automotive engineer specifically. And you know that space is getting more and more interesting. As time goes on with fully electrics and hybrids coming out, so

Scott Benner 5:04
yeah, do I want a Tesla truck? Stefan Yes or no? What do you think? Ah, depends on if you like the way it looks. Here's what I want. I'm going to be 50. So my wife tells me I'm going to be 50 in the summer, which is now not a running joke throughout the years of the podcast, but just a really great indication that I lose track of my age every once in a while. So I was really sure I was going to be 49 Kelly tells me I'm going to be 50. I did the light math. I think she's right. So I'm sure we could do the math together if we needed to, but I'm pretty sure she's right. And I found myself thinking, I want to own and drive daily an electric car, even if it's just once just to have the experience. So I don't know what one would be affordable for me. But I definitely just want the experience one time, I don't even know if I like it or not. just seems like it seems like the world took a big leap ahead. And I'd like to, you know, I'd like to walk alongside it for a little bit and figure it out. I kind of similarly have thoughts about rap music. That I don't understand that I'm still like, this is a very popular, I should try to understand this. Oh, yeah, no, you should. Absolutely. Right. You know, I don't want to be that old guy who's just like, that's not how we used to do it, and then sit down and just watch reruns of football games from when I was 30. I want to try to keep up a little bit. Tell me, can we go into your job a little? What do you do? That's I find that really interesting.

Stefan 6:33
Yeah, so I work with internal combustion engines. So they all run software, basically, that tells the car, like, how it's running, what it's doing. So I calibrate that.

Scott Benner 6:48
If I gave you a 327, small block out of a 60s, Chevy, would you have the first faint idea? How it works? Or what to do with it? Like, do you have to learn it from the ground up? Or can you come into something like this, like, do do classic combustion engines really not exist anymore in someone like yours thinking?

Stefan 7:08
Well, so the the principles have remained the same, right? So you just have spark air and fuel that hasn't changed, but the way it works? Now, you know, with electronics and fuel injection, there's sensors on everything, hardly anything is really mechanical anymore. It that's definitely not something that you can just jump into. I mean, I'm not even two years into this job. And it's like, it's like the learning curve is so steep, everything's a whirlwind every day. It's like, you feel like you're drowning and slowly clawing your way out of some hole. And you still and then, you know, you go to a meeting with all these other people, your managers, your supervisors, and you realize that they are head and shoulders more knowledgeable than you. It's pretty incredible. Just you start feeling the sunshine on the crown of your head coming out of the hole. Someone just jams you back down again. Yep, absolutely.

Scott Benner 8:04
That kind of sounds like diabetes a little bit. Yeah, learning curve on diabetes, like, Oh, I think I'm getting it and then all of a sudden, your honeymoon and you're like, Oh, I didn't understand this at all. And yeah, I just got a note from a person who, this morning. And it's a mom of a younger boy. And she's like, I don't understand, like, everything I do doesn't work down. I was like, yeah, there's not enough insulin. She's like, why not? I was like, I don't know. Like, you definitely need more though. And, you know, you got to, you know, keep turning it up. like something's changed the kids growing, you know, puberty. I don't know what, you know, I have no idea. But obviously, you're right. It was just interesting how she was thrown right back to where she started. And even though she had all the tools to handle it, the one leap she couldn't make was the more than doubling of the Basal insulin. There's something about 100% in people's heads that make them feel like that's the biggest number in the world. So if your Basal insulin, what's your Basal it's on our currently about 30 unit today. Okay. Hold on a second, divided by 24. All right, that goes on once Oh, boy. Here we go. We've six I'm getting to it. I've already read like one probably like 1.3 an hour or something like that. Right? So I'm like that. So if if your needs suddenly doubled, for some reason to three units an hour it that stops most people like they could somehow understand if it went to 2.6 but there's something about more than doubling were interesting enough if they've set a max bazel range in their pump, which is usually just done for safety reasons. Like you have a max Bolus and Max Basal right if they've set a max so you know the doctor says look your bait your your kids basil rate is point two. So I'm going to set the max basil it I don't know One, because we don't want you to mistakenly give the kid two units an hour, right? And then a couple of years later, suddenly the kid needs 1.5 an hour and they hit the max, it stops them. Why is that? Stefan? Why am I asking you? And why is that? I don't know. But I totally get it.

Stefan 10:17
I mean, I remember Oh, man, when I, when I saw when I first was diagnosed, sent out of the hospital, like, Oh, we could go into that experience, too. Because, wow. Like, I don't know, if it's different when you're younger, or Well, it's gonna be different, right? Because I think your parents get the download of knowledge versus you. But like, for me, it was like, here's a book on diabetes more catered towards type twos. Here's your insulin, take this much. Good luck. You know, yay,

Scott Benner 10:50
they probably thought you're an engineer, you'll figure it out. Oh, my God. Heck now. Well, that's interesting, too, because there are segments of people that I see handled diabetes differently. I've been saying this a lot lately, but nurses who are parents of children are kind of traditionally not good at it originally, because there's something about their training that doesn't jive with how diabetes is actually managed day to day. And so they hit this kind of this firewall, but engineers seem to really get it in a different way. And most of them can put it into practice eventually, but it takes them a little longer. It's just very interesting getting to start meeting more and more people who fall in the buckets. And to see the similarities between them. It's so I imagine one day you're a one C will just be 5.3. And there'll be nothing you can do that will stop that from happening.

Stefan 11:43
But I can only hope I can only hope. What's your setup? What are you using? So I'm on deck, I have a Dexcom. And then I'm on the tandem t slim

Scott Benner 11:53
XCOM. And t slim. Got it? And are using an algorithm with the T slim or no?

Stefan 11:58
Yeah, I have the control IQ set up on there. Is it working? Yeah, yeah, it's working. There's some cheat that I've had to do, you know, off the book, to get it to work better for me.

Scott Benner 12:13
You want to share them with me? is one of them. Leave it in sleep mode all the time. I

Stefan 12:16
hear people talk about that a lot. Absolutely. 100% This thing is in sleep mode.

Scott Benner 12:21
Why what what's the difference between the two.

Stefan 12:24
So I don't know, I was finding that in normal mode. So in normal mode, it will give you those correction boluses those mini correction boluses. But by the time you get them you're already at like 180 or above. Whereas in sleep mode, it kind of it jams your range tighter. So I don't remember the exact numbers, but I won't let you go above a certain amount. It will but you know, it starts to feed in more basil above a certain amount, and then take it away a certain amount. And those numbers are tighter.

Scott Benner 12:59
I it makes me feel like this is conjecture completely. But it makes me feel like they were looking at the algorithm. They're like, Alright, well, this works. But we'll call this sleep mode because it works really well. It'll be more aggressive when you don't have foods we can keep somebody lower and more stable like this. We probably should just call it more aggressive mode. But we won't do that. We'll let people figure it out for themselves. Like Don't you feel like there's two settings like one for everybody and one for the people who want to be like aggressive?

Stefan 13:29
Yeah, it's it's like, normal mode is like the wonky line mode. And for me sleep mode is the let's keep it nice and straight. No, no.

Scott Benner 13:38
That is that simple. Like so you get the rises that food in normal, that take forever to come back down. But then when they do come back down, they come back pretty level.

Stefan 13:48
Yeah, in sleep mode, if I'm in normal mode, I'll get those rises, then it'll do the correction Bolus. They won't move. It won't move. It won't move. And then, you know, inevitably I pick up the pump fiddle with it. give myself a Bolus. And then like, you know, turned around and I'm in the 50s.

Scott Benner 14:03
So for you normal mode should be called What if I only ate 30 carbs a day mode? This would be great. Alright. Normal mode, or please don't have a slice of pizza mode. Right? Don't you even think about that Chinese mode? What did you want them? What again? No, no, no, no, you need sleep mode for that. Right. Anyway, that's why I think they should go back to you know, ridiculous speed. What was that movie that oh my god. Do you ever have half a thought pop into your head, but not the whole thing? That just happened to me? Oh, you mean? Is it Spaceballs? Where they have plaid? And then ridiculous. It's Spaceballs, right? I think so. Yeah, ludicrous. speed. It's ludicrous speed. There you go. I was so far off on all of that. My God. Someone will email you know, that was wrong. You know, there's part. So there's part of you that's like, oh, people are listening. Like it really feels good. And then there's part of you. That is like, please leave me alone. I gotta get you to get your phone to stop. Beeping. Can you do that?

Stefan 15:08
Yeah. Sorry. Give me one second. Listen, do whatever you have to. Yep. Well, you're gonna hear the wonderful swish noise. That's fine. Oh, you know, it's not my phone. It's actually the you can hear iMessage

Scott Benner 15:23
Yeah. Wow. So ready, top left corner, apple, sell System Preferences. Yep, sounds, sale. Under sound effects, play sound effects through headphones, turn the volume all the way down. Play sound effects through headphones, see the slider for alert volume? Yeah, just turn the volume all the way down the slider all the way out. Oh, my God, that's amazing. That's what I was talking about, about, they only want you to use these things if you really, really want to use them, because it took me about four hours one day to figure that out. Just like people asked for transcripts of the show. And I'm in my third month of adding transcripts to the website. And the process is just arduous and painful. And it takes up so many hours. And I'm almost done. And if it doesn't help get a scrape. Like if some if I don't get an email from somebody media is like, thank goodness, you added transcripts to this show. I'm gonna be pretty disappointed, I guess. And if you're doing that, then I got to see the ones for this one, just like bing, bing, bing. That's a lovely. So what I was, I guess what I was getting at is it's interesting, right? These algorithms are coming out. That are being you know, our news is loop right now. But we're super excited to use Omni pod five. But there is that part of you that's like, I hope it's gonna let me be aggressive. Like I want to be aggressive. Like I hope it doesn't. And I can't see how they don't know that. That there's probably two different segments of people using it. But anyway, that's what I think of when I see sleep mode. I think sleep mode to me seems like, yeah, here, here's your cheat to be more aggressive. We'll call it sleep mode. But it sounds like it works great. It really does. I think algorithms in general, are. I don't even know how to say it. But but for people who have pomps, who can afford glucose monitors, that whole setup. I can't imagine anybody wouldn't want it. At least from my perspective. Jenny and I were talking the other day. It's December right now 2024 perspective. And Jenny and I were talking about, I was telling her what I wanted to do with her in 2021 on the show, cuz she only has a limited amount of time. And you know, we're trying to figure out how to use it. And then I started talking about what I want to do in 2022. And she's like, are you planning for two years from now? And I was like, Yeah, because everyone who's paying attention to algorithms and pumps is super excited for it once it today. But the majority of people don't know what's coming, don't know what it is and wouldn't use it if somebody told them. And so I think of it as a an education process that will go on for years. Really, you know, I mean, just keep in mind that right now more people use MDI than use pumping into in 2020. And not that I'm saying you have to use one or the other, I'm just saying that the adoption of things is very slow. And that there's an argument to be made, that you're really only reaching newly diagnosed people because people who are settled with something that they believe is working, are very, very, very scared to change. So and change has to be super simple. And I mean, honestly, Stefan, was it super simple to learn how to use that Tucson? Oh, yeah, absolutely not. That's what you want. Right. But now people have to believe that that's true. So I think that's a bigger hurdle is reaching people who are already set. And, and making them believe that it would be reasonably simple to change to something that would end up being monumentally better? I don't know. That's, trust me, that's a harder thing than then you might think.

Stefan 19:13
And probably some of it, too, I think maybe comes from maybe, you know, distrust of computer algorithms. But like, from my perspective, it's something that I work with all the time, like you would be if you don't like computers, and you don't think that, you know, they can do stuff, then man, you want to stay away from cars, because everything that we do now for how the engine works is run through a computer and we build model after model after model after model with it. And it's absolutely incredible. I mean, you can give it you know, back to, you know, engines again, you can give it a certain amount of air a certain amount of fuel and this model will tell you Alright, here's the speed you're at, you know, here's how much torque you're making. Here's what You need to do with it.

Scott Benner 20:02
When you know why the car I have currently has collision avoidance, right? And so when you're buying it, the guy says his car is collision avoidance. And I'm like, what does that mean? He goes, Well, theoretically, you shouldn't be able to drive into a brick wall. And I'm like, say it again. And so he's like, I think he goes, I think, right? I think if you went outside and drove at the building, the car would stop. Even if you had your foot on the gas. And I'm like, should we go try that? You know, I think it's like, I'm up for this, you know. And he laughed a little. And he's like, it's a new feature. I honestly, I've never talked, anybody's used it by law. And the number of months later, my wife and I went to DC, actually, to see yo yo ma play. And we were coming home, and I was getting back up on the highway in a place I'd never been before. And it was this sort of long on ramp that merged up onto a roadway that of course, was that was over my head. So I couldn't see what was ahead of me. But more importantly, you were coming through trees on your left, so that you couldn't even see what was coming from behind you. So I'm picking up speed, picking up speed thinking I'm about to merge onto this, you know, probably fast running highway. And as I'm coming up, everything is just stopped in front of me. And I take a split second to see Can I just get over now. So I checked my mirror, I realize there's a car there that I can't get over. And I'm making the decision to put my foot on the brake. And everything in front of me was closer than I thought it was. Now I want to be clear, I believe I would have stopped the car. Like it wasn't that it wasn't like the car was eight feet in front of me. But before I could get my foot off the accelerator onto the brake, I could feel the break get sucked out from underneath of my foot. Some alarm went off in the car. And it came to an abrupt stop it never tailed it didn't fish tail, it just room and stopped. My wife yelled, what was that? I was like, wow, this car really can stop itself. And that was pretty much the end of it. It was startling. But it was fascinating how well it worked. You're telling me that that was done with a computer algorithm? And little and little cameras?

Stefan 22:17
Yep. Little cameras and a computer algorithm.

Scott Benner 22:20
No kidding. You understand how that works?

Stefan 22:23
Not quite, because that's not that's not in my department. But I mean, so I don't know how deep you probably not that deep. It's basically looking at how far away what's in front of you is how close it's getting and how quickly it's approaching. And then it makes that determination. Oh, there's a car there. Let's break and there's no, because this guy's not doing it.

Scott Benner 22:45
So there's a drop dead moment where the algorithm decides if we wait past this line. We're not we're gonna hit this thing. So I'm taking over now. I don't I have to tell you it worked spectacularly well. And when I the next time I went in for service to guys like any problems the car and I recognize them. I was like, No, but hey, interesting story. And I told him about yo yo Ma, not about the concert, but about coming home from it. And he said that really worked. It was funny, how astounded. He was the salesperson, like wow, that really worked. And I was like it worked. I said, I don't know if I was going to hit them or not. I don't think I would have crushed the car in front of me. But I do think I would have impacted it. You know what I mean? And and so what you're saying is, if we can do that, then an algorithm can definitely change your Basal rate with a little bit of predictive information. Yeah, Yeah, no kidding. Yeah, it's super, I can't imagine. Listen, I'll tell you that Arden started using. So again, I have to say, poor Arden, I imagine I'll die one day, Stefan and my children in a way to connect with me. We'll go back and listen to this podcast. And then Arden is going to start making a tick sheet on the side every time she heard the words Arden's period. But Arden gets her period too long, right, she gets it for too long. And sometimes it's heavier than it should be. So we made the decision at the beginning of her last period to put her on a really low dose of birth control pill to see if the hormones couldn't regulate this like no lie today. She came in and said to me, I'm not bleeding anymore, but I still have a little bit of blood. And this is the 11th day of my period. So by the time this ends, she'll get like a week's respite, and it'll come back again. So she's not just getting it for too long, but she's sometimes getting it twice in a month. So anyway, a very reasonable reason to try this because we've done a lot of other things that haven't impacted so we're trying this Arden's basil rate right now is a unit and a half an hour since she started taking the pill, but was point nine an hour before the pill and It took me a day or two to see that, okay, the pill started to impact or that my settings weren't going to, to be able to overcome this. And I just zoomed, I zoomed it right up. And I have to be honest, I just looked at the graph. And I was like, the outcome I'm having here to me seems like she needs about a half unit more an hour. And I threw it in and saw what happened, I then turned her insulin sensitivity stronger. by a couple of points, I think we went from 42 to 40, maybe. And she's very settled. Now, like her blood sugar has been like 88. For, I'm going to lock it because I've been astonished how long it's been since I made the settings. So I made the setting changes last night around nine. It took until about three in the morning to work. So from 450 this morning till now, which is now like 1230, in the afternoon, her blood sugar has been between like 80 and 95. So my new settings are working. And now I'll make decisions about carb ratio at meals, like let's see if that changed or not. That'll be the next thing. But point is, because of the algorithm, I really was just pushing up gently on some levers, basically, just I'll just make this stronger. And I know this is going to work. I don't know how long it would have taken me to figure the same thing out without an algorithm. I'm guessing about three weeks what it took me. So I think they're just astonishing. And really exciting. Come Yeah, got Oh,

Stefan 26:35
no, no, I was gonna say and once you get over that, like, initial fear of changing settings to I think that, yeah, it the algorithm coupled with, you know, that willingness to experiment safely. Like, that's that that was a game changer for me, you know, like listening to this podcast, kind of the, you know, deciding, yeah, let's be bold, and, you know, like, so my first big change was, I don't know if it was the end of the honeymoon or coming like out of. So I was diagnosed in March. So coming out of the winter and into the summer, like I was having, you know, I was at initially maybe nine units of basil a day. And I was going low, like crazy. And then I pushed it down to four, you know, and slowly it's been creeping back up. So you know, that I remember that first change was like, let's do this, see what happens. And then the next change when I went back up, that that was really scary, like, you know, from four units, then to, I think it was like, I doubled it to eight units a day. And now here I am at like, 30.

Scott Benner 27:43
Yeah. And can you imagine if you were stuck in your head with like, we'll try moving at 20%. And then wait a few weeks and see what happens. And then try it again, we would take you years to get to where you are right

Stefan 27:56
now. All the while you'd be raging at people with your high blood sugars and lows and not having a great time. Well, and not

Scott Benner 28:03
only that, but I'll tell you that the the weird cyclical, merry go round you get on is that you push the basil up not enough. So your blood sugar gets high. So you make some grand correction to your blood sugar at some point, which drives your, your your blood sugar low, then you show it to your endocrinologist who sees a bunch of lows throughout the day. And you know what they do? They make a base agent, they take your basil away, because like, oh, you're getting low all the time, we'll make your basil lower. When the truth is, you need the basil higher, so that you have better results around meals. You're not rage Bolus and high blood sugars, not creating adenomatous deficit of insulin away from active food in your system crashing low. And that's that's it, it literally the outcome tricks most people into doing the exact opposite of what they're supposed to do. You need more basil so you don't get high so that you don't have to over Bolus so that you don't crash low, not you're not getting low because of the basil, you're getting high because of the basil being off and too weak. That is I'm always astonished and how even doctors don't get that like because I get to hear from a lot of people. I'm not saying all doctors but I get to hear from a lot of people who are having incongruous experiences between the podcast and their doctor. And the doctors trying to push their basil down while the podcast is leading them to believe that they should probably have it a little higher. And you can't make those people believe that you just can't. It's impossible for some reason. And then you get stuck, you know, and it's a it's a stock that could could be on you forever. It's really yeah, sad, you know?

Stefan 29:52
Yeah, I mean, it took me I think I rotated through two endocrinologist so far, like the first one was I was like, No, no, I got this. It's my steering wheel. You know, it's your diabetes, but my car that we're driving kind of a thing is it was a little odd.

Unknown Speaker 30:08
As I use that metaphor, yeah. Oh, well, it sounds fun.

Stefan 30:15
But, uh, and then that my second endo, she was like, you know, I want to work with you. Let's see. And then, you know, three months later, I was like, No, you got this, you know, keep on keeping on with what you're doing. Excellent. And that was like that. For me still being new at this hearing, you know, the, like, You got this, you can do this, you kind of know what you're doing. That was like really big, really, really big confidence booster. That's not to say that, like everyday is perfect. Some days definitely suck. But yeah, I know, I

Scott Benner 30:52
know. I don't know if I ever said it here. But I'd say to people a lot when I'm speaking to them privately. And you know, at the end, I'll say, look, nothing I told you, while we were talking today was advice. Like, I'm not a doctor. And please don't take this as medical advice. I said, but I can give you one piece of advice. I say, I think you understand this better than you believe you do. You should trust your gut a little more. And basically, it's like a verbal pat on the ass. Like before they run out on the field. Like, I think that's something that people desperately need at times, which is just the idea of like, maybe I am right about this. Instead of living in that flux, where the information coming from your physician is so different than what you're seeing in your real life, that you just make the assumption that you're misunderstanding what you're looking at. And it's so frequently the opposite. Although there is a kind of inverse to that, which is, when people are making decisions with their settings are so far off, I do tell people a lot. Look, we just made a big change to your basil, a big change to your carb ratio, we've changed the sensitivities, you're going to start seeing things. And you're going to try to apply what you know about diabetes. And what you know about diabetes is often completely wrong. Because your settings were so wrong. You're having these outcomes, not unlike the low Basal causing low blood sugars, the kind of thing you've been having these outcomes for so long, you don't understand what you're looking at anymore. I sometimes say please just forget what you think you know, and start over from day one. Now that your settings are much closer to where they need to be. You know. Anyway, a married dating. No, single Good for you. No dog, no dog. Look at you're really listening to this show. I appreciate that. Tried to joke about this with my wife's somebody that my wife worked with over zoom the other day when they were kind of talking at the end of the meeting. And Kelly just says it all wrong. She's like Scott tells people don't get married till you're 30 and don't get a dog for sure. And try not to have kids. My kids are in the room. My dogs looking at me. My wife's there. I'm like, it's not what I mean. Exactly. I'm saying you don't really know yourself into your 30s dogs are a lot more work than you think they are. And you know, the kids think I'm joking about because I love having kids, but they really don't pay back in any tangible way. It's all very feely, you don't I mean, if you're looking for a boost from having children, it's it comes in ways that you can't trade in for other things, just in case you're wondering. But but that's uh, you sound like you're hard at work. How do you work full time and go to

Stefan 33:37
school? Ah, it's time management, which I'm terrible at. It's it's kind of it's a haphazard I think, for me. Yeah. Like, if I manage my time, then I make a plan and then I find 50 ways to kind of blow that plan up. And I excuse it all. So it's it's the it's haphazard,

Scott Benner 34:02
you know, for sure in the 70s people would call that common sense. And in the 2000s here, they would tell you have ADHD. Right? I think not working makes a lot of sense. I'm always looking for ways to get away from this. And by the way, this Coronavirus thing has been terrible because the days are blending into weeks. And I'm in the hours. I don't even care about the hours anymore. So I'm doing these things were like at nine o'clock at night. I'm like, well, I've done everything I meant to do for today. I just sort of restart the next day I'm like well, I guess I'll go work somewhere like I can edit a show for next week I guess or instead of just taking time for respite because there's no respite because my whole life is respite. It's just I'm all in this house. The house doesn't seem like relaxing home base anymore. Does that make

Stefan 34:54
sense? No, I get that there is like no more. I think work life balances is is not a thing. Any more?

Scott Benner 35:00
No, no 24 hours a day, you just put stuff where it fits. And I'm not 100% Sure, it's a bad idea. But I don't know how it would work. If the world opened back up again. I could say like, you know, go outside or go do different things. Like the other day, I was driving past this thing. And it was like an indoor indoor skydiving, I was trying to imagine it must be fans blowing up from the floor. I don't know. I was like, Yeah, I would do that. And then I thought, well, that's not going to be open. I can't do that. And by the time I can do it again, it's probably gonna go out of business. Right? Like, how is that gonna make it through a year of not operating? But yeah, it's something about the home, like my home has become. This, this is close to what I imagined it must feel to live on the International Space Station, I guess is just sort of like everything's utilitarian at this point. You know, well, how does how does? How long did you have diabetes before your algorithm?

Stefan 36:01
So I, before I started pumping, I was on MTI for a year.

Scott Benner 36:12
g vo hypo pan has no visible needle, and it's the first pre mixed autoinjector of glucagon for very low blood sugar in adults and kids with diabetes ages two and above. Not only is chivo hypo pen simple to administer, but it's simple to learn more about, all you have to do is go to G Volk glucagon.com forward slash juicebox. g Vogue shouldn't be used in patients with insulin, Noma or pheochromocytoma. Visit g Vogue glucagon.com slash risk.

The word meter has a number of different definitions, the rhythm of a piece of poetry, the basic pulse and rhythm of a piece of music. It's a unit of measurement. And it means a device that measures and records the quantity degree or rate of something. That Contour Next One blood glucose meter is a little bit of all that kind of smushed together, it's a little bit of poetry, it's got a lot of rhythm, it's definitely going to measure the glucose in your blood. And it's going to measure it very accurately and easily. And whilst doing it, it's gonna feel nice in your hand, and the lights gonna be bright, and soft and loving. I don't think the light is loving, but it does really illuminate where you're trying to get blood from at night. so damn handy. Seriously, though, there are a lot of meters available. Very few of them are actually accurate and easy to use, I think you should take a minute to look at Contour Next one.com forward slash juicebox, just to see if maybe you maybe picked the wrong meter. And now you'd like to update yours with the better one, which by the way may be cheaper in cash than your current meter is right now through your insurance could be true for the strips as well, you may actually be eligible for a free meter. And they have a test trip savings program. These sound like things you should know about. And that's why I'm here to tell you about them today. And to ask you to go to Contour Next one.com Ford slash juicebox and educate yourself. You're carrying a meter anyway. You might as well carry a really good one. What are the main differences between the first and second year?

Stefan 38:40
So for me, it was flexibility. That was the big one. Part of my job is driving cars around, you know, testing them and like it was, for me at least it was very, very scary. The thought of having a low when I was on MDI and driving around, because I was on MDI and I also didn't have a Dexcom I was doing you know, finger sticks. And you know, the thought of being on a test track at 100 miles per hour trying to calibrate a car and your blood sugar goes low. And you know, by the time you go low some sometimes those lows on MDI would happen like that. Those would be like crazy scary, because, you know, I was honeymooning too. So, you know, get in the car test here. I'm at 150 Okay, that's fine. I'm not gonna correct it. And then you know, 15 minutes later that 150 take the one away. You know, here's a 50

Scott Benner 39:36
your pengurus decided at one to work again. And yeah, there we go. squirt a little more in. And oh, wow. So what did you do in that situation?

Stefan 39:46
For the ones that I would feel like I'd feel them at 50 it's, you know, pull over pound some gummies fruit gummies and then just wait.

Scott Benner 39:57
Do you ever get done and go look at your notes and your notes said you Equals Mickey Mouse and you're like, oh,

Stefan 40:03
like, yeah, it was bad. Like, I would look back at what I was doing or whatever. And I would have like no idea what I was thinking. Like, even in meetings if I go low in a meeting, it's like, I'll email everyone afterwards. Like, I apologize. I was rambling. I have no idea what I was saying. I must have sounded really stupid. Don't pay attention. Please.

Scott Benner 40:24
If Christopher Columbus had pistons, let me tell you something right now, where we be. And they're all just messaging each other like in the room. Stefan's blood sugar's low. Should we do something? What the hell is wrong with this kid? Again, this guy would the Columbus thing. You won't let go of it. Well, that's frightening and not funny at all. By the way, just the idea that you know, you could be I mean, honestly, you're incapacitated, but you don't look so. Right. Right. Yeah. And then the next step from that is, hey, did anyone else see Stefan have a seizure today in the meeting that you know, you don't? You're trying and I guess you're trying very desperately not to be thought of that way at work as well. Right?

Stefan 41:09
Yeah, yeah, that's so um, I am one of two type ones in our department. I only ever knew this one other, this one other co worker, and I knew him before I was diagnosed. So now there's two and yeah, I just don't want to be stuff on the diabetic, you know?

Scott Benner 41:28
Yeah, I feel that I very much. use that as a guiding light. When Arden was younger, I didn't want Arden to be the little girl that passed out at school. You know, and at the same time, I didn't want her to be walking around with these insanely high blood sugars.

Stefan 41:47
Right. And I mean, like, the other the, my coworker, too, you know, it's before I was diagnosed, people would talk about how he's, he's had episodes at work. And, you know, people don't know what to do. They just kind of like, what they found him seizing at his desk, and they had no idea what to do. So they just call 911. And by the time, you know, they came and gave them his glucagon. You know, he lost three months of memory. Wow,

Scott Benner 42:17
really? Oh, that's terrible. Oh, he just killed me. That was really terrible. That sounds like it went on for a very long time. Yeah, yeah. And and he had never, and probably for similar reasons that you just described, probably didn't want to tell people like, Hey, listen, if this ever happens to me, because it freaks people out. You know, hey, if this ever happens to me, can you just open this red box, and there's a needle? Yeah, now the needles pretty big. Don't let that bother you. You're gonna squirt the water into the powder. Now I want you to take the powder in your hands and rub it back and forth dissolves. Now we're gonna redraw the powder out into the needle. I just like you to stick this in the deepest part of my ass and push this plunger down. And then and by the way, please don't pay attention to the needle because it's gonna hurt me. Not you. Yeah. Blah, blah. Meanwhile, I'm holding a demo of the G vote hypo pen right here. And I see why that was a good idea. I just kept it on my desk. For some reason, after I was talking about it one day, it just reminds me of what an amazing idea it is that it's just cap off, pushed down, done like that. That's the kind of thing that you need, especially in that stream. Because imagine if your co worker could have said to somebody, hey, listen, I've got this pen here. You know, this should ever happen. Just you know, anywhere. Just hit me with it real quick. And it will save them. Did he have any other long term deficits?

Stefan 43:36
Now now it just took them a while to kind of remember like who he was and what he was doing at work. Wow.

Scott Benner 43:44
Hmm, yeah. So now that sticks with other people, and then they never let go of it. And then like you said, You're all of a sudden your stuff on the diabetic and expectations for you are lower, unnecessary, you know, unreasonably so? Or you're stuck doing a campaign of, you know, education throughout the building to bring everybody else up to speed. And I mean, how are you going to do that? Even? You know,

Stefan 44:07
yeah, yeah. Good. Yeah. So reasonable concerns. Absolutely. Yeah. And now and to is it was MDI was just, yeah, the lack of flexibility. Okay, that's what was killing me. But at the time, when I was on MDI, it was definitely the more affordable option because I didn't have insurance when I was diagnosed.

Scott Benner 44:32
Oh, because you were still a student and you just got this job not that long ago. Okay. Yeah.

Stefan 44:36
aged out of my parents plan. I you know, I thought I'm healthy. I don't care. I can wait until my job kicks in. I don't need health insurance.

Scott Benner 44:45
Yeah. Yeah. Teenagers. Then your pancreas kicked out. And then yeah, yeah. So you were just so when you talk about that you didn't have a job at the moment, right, but you had diabetes.

Stefan 44:57
So I was I was still Working the same place I'm working now, but I was a co op, I say,

Scott Benner 45:03
okay, so no insurance yet. Right? And so how do you make those decisions? So you've got you have an income, but you don't have insurance, you just get the needles and the insulin and that's it some cash

Stefan 45:15
trips. So what really so I say, I don't have a dog, but now you can hear my sister's dog.

Scott Benner 45:22
Don't feel like you have to explain your lies to find just tell me about this.

Stefan 45:27
So yeah, for me, it was honestly I like, Oh, man. This is gonna sound so silly. But like the first script that I got out of the hospital, I completely like broke down crying. So like 27 year old in the hospital crying like in this nurses lap, basically. Because that that though, was $700 for a bottle of Lantus and one, vial of humor log, and then some syringes. Honestly, what I did, I relied on my endo for samples. I explained the situation and it's like, I you know, can you samples?

Scott Benner 46:13
samples? samples? Yeah. Put your hands out, please. Yeah. Because $700 was not something you had?

Stefan 46:23
No, not not. And that was, you know, $700 a month.

Scott Benner 46:27
Right. But would that have done? So be clear for a second net without telling us your net worth or something like that, but, you know, a large chunk of your monthly income $700? And yeah, what would you have had to Did you have anything big enough in your life to cut out to make up that money? I don't even imagine you did.

Stefan 46:45
At the time. Yeah, that was that was huge chunk. I mean, I could have given up my like my car, but then I wouldn't be able to go to work.

Scott Benner 46:53
Or your I'm sure all of your charitable giving, you could have just cut back on. Yeah, I do wonder what they think when they're like, it's just $700. Like, what do you think I'm doing over here? Exactly. Right. I just stopped writing my big check out to United Way like I always do, and it's a it's a it's a very strange space when you are one of those people, the people who are not covered by insurance, and don't have just scads of expendable cash, I don't know anybody that feels like they have scads of expendable cash. My brother and I were talking recently, you know, in our, our financial structures are pretty different from one another, but in the end, at the end of the month, he's got no money leftover and I got no money leftover. It's just, you know, it's it's not like, it's not like suddenly you make a little more money. And while we it's it just sits in a pile at the end of the day, you know, yeah.

Stefan 47:48
And, you know, I coupled that with like, student loans and, you know, living by myself, I moved back in. Yeah. With my parents. That was the only way I could make this work. These weren't and then, and then it's not only that $700 a month for the insulin, it's the hospital bill. Yeah.

Scott Benner 48:05
Yeah. How much was that? Do you remember? Oh, man. 300,000. Okay. Yeah. Hold on a second. So, after you filed for bankruptcy, tell me what a $300,000 hospital bill first you negotiated it down, right?

Stefan 48:21
Yeah, yeah. Well, they there was some. I remember like in the ICU, they were trying to give me like, there was heparin shots every day. They were trying to give me these like laxatives. I have no idea why.

Scott Benner 48:37
Because they were $1,000 a pill.

Stefan 48:39
Yeah, like the nurse would come in. She's like, a heavier heparin, and I have your laxatives, I'm like, What do I need that for? You know, go away?

Scott Benner 48:46
Yeah. You know, I, um, when my iron got very low. A couple of years ago, I took myself to the emergency room. Now, the oddity was that I had been working with a physician for almost a year, we were just up to the part where I was about to get the iron infusion, and I almost fell over. So I ended up in the emergency room. And they kept me overnight, which I was like, fine with. And the next day, this woman walks in the room like, Hi, I don't know you. She goes, I'm the neurologist. I'm here to check you over. I'm like, no. And she's like, well, you almost passed out. I'm like, you need to get out of here. I was like, my irons low. And she goes, you have insurance. And I went I don't care. Like get out. I was like No, like, don't I get why they were doing it. And I even get that I wasn't gonna really it wasn't gonna hit me out of pocket. Like maybe it would ended up costing me $50 more to have her do it. But I'm like, I'm here because I have low iron. I almost fell over because I had no ferritin in my body whatsoever. And my red belt blood cells were not carrying oxygen any longer. So I don't I'm good. And and then she was literally on the heels of a cardiologist who wanted to do an EKG and I was like, No, like, I mean, who else is out there trying to get paid is how it felt like you don't I mean, like I was like, is it Is the candy striper gonna come in and tell me about our Etsy store in a minute? Everybody get out of here, you know, like I got the iron I'm leaving now.

Stefan 50:10
Oh, yeah, no, absolutely. It was like the guys at the endocrinologist that I saw for 15 minutes a day sent me a bill. And I was like, You didn't even like talk to me. You just said you're doing well keep it up. And then the diabetic educator would come in and let's go through your booklets

Scott Benner 50:25
Way to go, buddy. That's gonna cost you three grand. Oh, yeah. We I used to have a joke. I would tell my wife, I was like, I think the endocrinologist only touches Arden once a year, because there must be a law that she has to physically contact her. Because, you know, we, you know, our visits are always with her nurse practitioner. Yeah. And it was like that for a long time. And the doctor never came in. But once a year, the doctor would come in and literally, like, put her hand on her shoulder or something. And I'm like, I think there's something going on here that I'm not aware of. And then we'd see her once here. Now the The hospital has now changed since then you actually see the doctor at every visit now, which was not the case in the past. But back then. That was always my thought. I'm like she's just touching her so that she can legally say I touched her. Because she didn't do anything. Like she was just like she'd come in and put her hands on her somehow. And then ask her how she was feeling. And then look at the chart and go oh, you're doing great. You have any questions? Yeah. Yeah, what I know the questions they asked, by the way.

Stefan 51:28
Yeah, I totally get that too. I say endocrinologist. Like I've been moving around endocrinologist. I think I've met the endocrinologist once, and it's Yeah, it's been the nurse practitioner who helps me.

Scott Benner 51:38
Yeah, no, no, the whole system's a little weird, obviously. But yeah, it's just, I'm always baffled when they're, they're like, do you have any questions? That would be like, literally, if you put me on a rocket, and you were like, hey, you've got to figure out how to fly this rocket to the moon. Go ahead and ask your questions that will get you to that end. Right. I'd be like, I don't know what questions to ask about that. Because I've never flown a rocket before. And by the way, spaces in my head a lot, because I'm going to interview April next week. And April works at NASA. And she was super excited for that. That's so cool. Yeah. But anyway, I guess that's just in my head for some reason. But yeah, I am. I'm fascinated by that. Like, what questions do you have? Like, could you not like if, if, Stefan, I'll tell you right. Now, if you put me in a room with somebody who was just diagnosed with Type One Diabetes, I would not need them to speak. And I could, I could have them leave that room better off than they were when they got in. They don't need to ask, I don't need to know what they don't know. I know what I know. And I know what they need to know. I don't understand why you have to know what's in their head Exactly. About management stuff. I'm not saying you shouldn't talk to people hear their fears. Understand stuff like that. I'm just saying like, it's an odd thing to say you're the teacher and then not want to say anything. So it's like a Can you really not. I sounds pompous. But I could explain diabetes to you in 45 minutes in a way that would put your agency in the sixes? Like, how is that not? Like how this works? freaks me out a little bit. Anyway, I'm sorry, did you have anything you want to talk about? We're like an hour and I should probably have asked you was there a reason you're on the show?

Stefan 53:24
I don't know that. That's it's the big thing was like, I wanted to give back a little bit. Your show helped me a lot. It was basically like what? So like I said, I left that hospital with like a pamphlet that was very generally written and then like some booklet from I think, Eli Lilly, or something like that. And it was like this podcast and some YouTube videos, which that was my diabetes education. Because, you know, they tell you, you get out of the hospital, they say, oh, by the way, make an appointment with your endocrinologist as soon as possible. So then, you know, you call up your endocrinologist and it's like, yeah, we can fit you in three months from now.

Scott Benner 54:05
Well, might be dead in three months.

Stefan 54:07
Yeah. Yeah. That was like, Well, I'm just newly diagnosed. Can we push this up? And she's like, well, we can try for something in like a month and a half.

Scott Benner 54:18
Yeah, right. Like, my mom had to have surgery one time, and it was really important. They're like, we can do this in eight weeks. I was like, Can she last eight weeks? like is that the play here? Really? So I had to find the podcast.

Stefan 54:31
Ah, Google. Honestly, it was just googling, like, how to type one diabetes.

Scott Benner 54:39
stuff on you're telling me you even lost your Google skills when you got type help. stuff on type one help now? How to question mark,

Unknown Speaker 54:52
please, please.

Scott Benner 54:56
This is Google Search effort just like type one diabetes. Please help me. By the way, if I thought that's what people googled, I would set my SEO up on it. But I'll tell you search engine optimization is ridiculous. It is fascinating to see that when put to it, how similarly most people ask questions. It really is interesting. Like the Way questions are asked are here, I'll give you a little inside baseball on the podcast, right? Did you ever hear the 911 episode where the person came on? Who was a paramedic? I don't know. I don't think I've listened to that one yet. So it's true. It's a terrific episode. And it absolutely worked out completely opposite of how it was supposed to. And here, here's how I explain it to you. through understanding SEO, because there is a listener of the podcast, who does it professionally, who was very kind and helps me with it. She told me, hey, people abundantly. Google about diabetes, tattoos, type one diabetes, tattoos, she's like, you should do an episode on that people were really interested in it. And I was like, Huh, I don't know how interested I am in it. You know what I mean? Like, I was like, I don't know if there's like a whole light conversation in there. So I started thinking about it. I thought, well, why do people have these tattoos? Mainly, they have them because they want you know, EMTs, or paramedics to see that they have type one diabetes in the event of an emergency. So then I started researching, and I found this person who has just this fantastic paramedic podcast. And I reached out to her, and I got her to come on the show that took months. Like this whole process, like I know, it feels like I'm just like, Hey, I just talking to the microphone, but like, so I'm doing all that. I get her on. I don't know her thoughts or feelings at all, on any of this. And I asked her this question about, you know, type one diabetes. tattoos, they must be really helpful. Like, that's the vibe I'm coming from. And she stuns me by saying, No, you should not rely on those. And I was like, oh, and so the entire episode that you hear, which I think turned out really well was not nearly what I expected it was going to be when I started it. Like, if you really listen back to it, you'll hear a pause, where you hear my brain go, Oh, good. Scott, what are you going to do now? She just said those are not a good idea. And then I leaned on other questions I hadn't we end up having this great conversation about what it's like to be a paramedic or an EMT in an emergency situation with a type one, what type ones could do some things that they think they you know, that people might think are obvious things to do that aren't. And she was it ended up being terrific, but it all came from search engine optimization.

Stefan 57:45
So I'm not so funny that you bring that up too, because that like before this whole Coronavirus hit that I was planning on going and getting a debt it was gonna be a type one debt not not like a emergency tattoo, but just something like type one related like, Hey, you know, you know, commemorative or I don't know,

Scott Benner 58:05
well, you can still get a tattoo but from what I understand, don't expect that that means a paramedics gonna know you have Type One Diabetes from your tattoo, even if you like people listening now might be like, well, what if I just put it in an obvious place? You should go listen to her conversation. It's when she describes what it's like to be a medical person in that situation. And what goes through her head. Her name is ginger lock. She's fantastic. It's Episode 387. But But you'll you'll believe when you get done that a T one D tattoo is not an absolute slam dunk or maybe even close to letting an emergency services person No, you have diabetes,

Stefan 58:47
that basically unless you put it on your forehead,

Scott Benner 58:50
you will you know what, it's funny. She I said to her like, well, what if you put it in a really obvious place? And she said, Do you really think I'm looking at your tattoos while I'm trying to save your life? And I was like, that's a good point. You know, like, like, that would be like if you were having a heart attack. And at the end of it, you were dead on the floor and the EMT looked at your wife and said, the artwork in this room is lovely. Know, you're like, you're like Why are you looking at that like Couldn't you have been paying attention to his EKG, maybe that would have saved them. And so the idea is, is that if they look for the the bracelets, and the a necklace, I think she said but they're running their hands. It's not as visual as you would think. It's very interesting. She explained it obviously way better than I could. But I'm lucky to have that episode as part of the podcast, I feel like but it happened almost by mistake. So I was just trying to, you know, find content that people would find interesting that I thought they wanted and instead I ended up giving them something they needed. They didn't know they needed and I didn't know it existed, which I think harkens back to something I said earlier, you know which is why would you Put a person in a room and ask them what they need to know. They don't know if they knew they wouldn't be there asking, you know? Anyway, okay, so what kind of tattoo where you're gonna get?

Stefan 1:00:12
So it was kind of dumb, but you know, it probably like a syringe or something. Yeah,

Scott Benner 1:00:19
I would put you in a car, a test car hanging out the window crazed big bug eyes, writing down gibberish on a clipboard. That's what I would do with a blood glucose meter, just flashing flow. Yeah, I'm now expecting that three years from now a car is going to hit the it's going to hit the market, and people are going to get in and be like, this car works terribly. Like, like, I wonder, I wonder if the guy who was working this all out his blood sugar was 45 while he does this thing hesitated all the time. So I can I ask, we're over your hour. But can I keep you for a little bit? Yeah. Oh, cool. I have questions. So if cars are this specific, and they work this well, how does sometimes they not work? Like my computer either works or it doesn't. There's no middle ground. But how come once in a while, my car still, like feels like it didn't get a chance to warm up on a cold morning. Like it's reminiscent of a carburetor and 1985 or something like that. Is that? Is that the mechanical stuff not operating the way it should even though? You know I'm saying?

Stefan 1:01:30
Yeah, so I guess it could be one of two things either. Yeah, the mechanics or something's broken mechanically, but there's also like, engineering is really the art of I guess, good enough. And fudge factors. Like we there's still a lot that we don't know how it works. And we can't really reduce it into a mathematical equation. So you kind of fudge factor stuff. And this is close enough. And it works most of the

Scott Benner 1:02:01
time. Yeah, that kind of stuff. how impactful is it? Are you were you a mechanic before you did this? Like, are you a grease monkey? And like, like, privately or no, and if not, is that harmful to your job? Or? No,

Stefan 1:02:15
no, I was I think it helps like, for being an automotive engineer to have an interest. Um, so my dad, he's a mechanic like full out mechanic owns a shop wrenches. And you know, I would go in on summers and help.

Scott Benner 1:02:30
He owns wrenches. I have an app. How does your dad See that? Does he look at you like, what a letdown? Or is he amazed by like I am. I'm amazed by what you do. But I'm just I'm wondering if he's so steeped in like, just let me get my hands in there. I'll figure out how to make it work.

Stefan 1:02:47
Yeah, yeah. Usually the mechanics harbor disdain for the engineers.

Scott Benner 1:02:54
So so we did attempt to follow in your father's footsteps. You made him hate you. Yeah, there you go. Ever the disappointment against the farm again? Wait, what's wrong? No, that's just really it's interesting. Because, I mean, I had a, like, I have a seat that goes up and down right in my back seat folds down. And it just sometimes would go down and get stuck. Or sometimes it would go down and it felt like it hit a limit. It wasn't supposed it would pop back up again. So I told them, you know, hey, this happens. Oh, yeah, we'll take care of it. We'll take care of it. The third time, I was like, Look, you gotta fix this. Like, they just don't tell me you're gonna take care of it again. Have a keep happening. So I came back in the guys like, Oh, it's gonna work now. And I was like, What did you do? He goes, Oh, we just swapped out the whole seat. Yeah. Which to me sounded like we don't know what's wrong with this thing. So maybe a new seat will work better? Yeah, pretty much. Is this why mechanics look so clean? Now when I see them at like, when you go into a car dealership, the guys that work on the cars are clean as clean as the salespeople they just don't have a title. And yeah, it's swapping parts. It. So do you think so? So a person now is more of a technician than a mechanic?

Stefan 1:04:09
Yeah, absolutely. There's like so much electronic parts. And some of the systems are so complicated, like a turbocharger for, you know, smaller turbocharged engines. If something goes wrong, just replace it, you're not going to either it's not going to work right? If you rebuild it, or you're just never gonna find what's wrong. Well, we're like transmissions transmissions are like this big, magical black box that hooks up to the engine and makes wonderful things happen. Make cargo magics. Make cargo. Like I can't explain those to you. But

Scott Benner 1:04:40
those get replaced. I had a new car once it had an issue. They came in and they replaced the part. The issue persisted. It happened again, the third time it went in. I said to them when I sent it in, I'm like, what's going on? And they're like, we have a bad batch of parts. And it was the thing that kept the car from operating right? It's not driving the car. And so, in 24 hours, the company contacted me and said, We are not going to try to fix your car again, because the New Jersey lemon law states that after the third fix, if this breaks again, we just we have to take the car back and we have to designate it as a lemon, which means we can't sell it again. But one day, we'll get through these bad parts. And this will never be a problem and your vehicle, right? They bought the car back for me shelved the car. And with a with a business plan of sitting on the car until the parts were good again, and then they would put the part back in and then resell the car. So I'd like 25,000 miles on a car and they just said Do you still want the same color? And I was like, yeah, and they just gave me a new car,

Stefan 1:05:42
man. Yeah. And either Yeah, either they'll keep it and resell it, or it'll go to you know us and we'll tear it apart and try and figure it out. And if we can't Well,

Scott Benner 1:05:52
yeah, it was fascinating. Like, it wasn't the dealership anymore. Like I got called by the parent company. You know, they were like, We don't want to fix this car again, we know what's going to happen. So are you okay with just taking a new car? I was like, yeah. I am. Thanks for asking. And then nothing happened. Like my, my loan just kept going the way it was. And it was really interesting. You know, and it all did stem from that idea of like, Look, we can't fix the part. So we'll just wait until those parts work better. It's like, wow, that's interesting as hell. combustion engines. The physically don't look anything like. Like the engine. I remember in my car, like a Ford straight six or Chevy 350. Like that stuff. They don't physically look. They're just aluminum boxes now, right?

Stefan 1:06:45
Ah, no, not all of them. No, no, not all of them. Some of them? Yeah, for sure. But, but you know, the way they work is still the same?

Scott Benner 1:06:54
What's the reasoning behind? Trying to keep it looking? Somewhat recognizable to the user? Is that the idea? Or is it that the form factor still works? So why change it? Like why are some so different than others?

Stefan 1:07:10
Definitely, for some of it is it's the form factor that works. The ones that are different, those are going to be like your four cylinders, and stuff like that. keyed. So here's a interesting concept. A lot of engine design is either tied to packaging, because you got to fit it all in there, or actually making the engine more efficient. So you want to keep it as small as possible. And they actually believe it or not as hot as possible within the limits. Right? Because you so work the heat part for Yep, they keep part. It's basically how it works, right? So you have a temperature difference. That's what drives the work. So the more temperature you bleed off into the coolant system, that's more temperature that doesn't go into driving your pistons up and down.

Scott Benner 1:08:03
So energy in general, you're trying to maximize the energy that it's creating, even if that energy isn't motion, it's heat.

Stefan 1:08:11
So yeah, and you want to keep that heat in the motor, okay. Within the, you know, within the limits have the parts that you're using. So for aluminum, you can't overheat your aluminum, but you want to keep it pretty hot.

Scott Benner 1:08:26
That's interesting. I don't know that I'll ever understand completely what you're saying. But it's it is, it's fascinating that that's even a consideration, especially within my lifetime. You know, if you really think about what an engine is, in my lifetime, it's the block and the heads and some pistons and some spark plugs and, you know, a reservoir for oil and not much else. You know, like, there, there was a time when that's really all it was. And to think that you're having considerations like that, and back then they were just trying to get the heat out of it. Right. Like you, you if those motors warmed up too much. They just, they blew up. That's really cool. Wow, what do you think cars are going to look like in the future? Like if you had unlimited resources, financially? If a company did would cars just look completely different? Are we stuck building on top of a an antiquated system?

Stefan 1:09:21
I think some of it Yeah. A lot of it is the limits of materials, like you can eat certain shapes for bodies and things like that you have to have for crashworthiness, or because the parts need to be strong with the materials that we have. You know, you look at some of the cars that push the limits of technology, like those solar powered cars, or those cars that go 300 miles per hour. You know, they look really cool with their shape and their aerodynamics, but they're extremely fragile.

Unknown Speaker 1:09:54
So, so bumping into something at a high rate of speed. Not a good idea.

Stefan 1:09:58
Yeah. You know, it's, it's It's actually really funny you bring that up, I was reading on my window sticker to one of Mike like a car the other day. I didn't know you know how it like, it seems like you get in a fender bender, and it's like 1000s of dollars worth of damage. Yeah. The Federal crash standard, or for bumpers is two and a half miles per hour. So any speed above that is like, disastrous to your pump? gonna wreck it? Yeah.

Scott Benner 1:10:30
My son's pulled forward in his car. And it kind of went over top of like a, like a parking block. And when he backed away from it, it did some damage, pulled it off, it was not even pulled it off. It just did some damage. And I think we ended up paying like 16 $100 to repair the car. Yeah. And it was just swapping parts out. Like there was no structurally nothing, you know, they took some stuff off and threw it away and put other stuff on it. And it was when I saw the bill was like 1600 bucks. Now, I said to my son, like don't pull forward as far as next time.

Stefan 1:11:04
We call that the the parking sensor. Yeah,

Scott Benner 1:11:07
people do that. I found that bang. Yeah. Well, I have to say that I even like the way seating happens in a vehicle. I'm even confused why that's that way. I guess there are real reasons. But there's part of me that wonders like, why can't we all face in towards each other? Or why can't the seats turn 45 degrees at a time? Like, why do I have to face forward? can I face to the right, can I face backwards? You know, like in a van situation like, couldn't that move around? And if that's the case, then does the car really need to be that shaped like there, there's just a lot of ways to go, that I think are too far outside of the of what people expect. And when you get away from their expectations, then that seems ugly or wrong. And then they won't buy it. So you're not incentivized to be too forward thinking, right? You know, I can remember getting a magazine once. And I think it was around 2001. And it was like in 10 years, your transmission will be pushed button. You won't have to move a stick any longer to move your automatic transmission in and out of gear. And then they showed a demo of it. And I was like, I stuff on I'll just beat this out. Because when I saw it, I was like, Mother, you can do it. Now. Why do I have to wait 10 years for it? Like you're doing it right in front of me right now. And then you start thinking about like, well, we have stock, we need to sell that stock. And then we got to make change overs. And we got to make some money, right? There's r&d, we got to sell some cars off of that for a few years to get our money back and to make a profit. And when you really look at the business of it, like once the business shakes out, we'll be able to get this in like 10 years. And now my transmission is a dial. Yeah, yeah, it's not even a button. I just turn it. And I'm starting to wonder how necessary that is. Like, couldn't I yell? gocar? like the way you Google?

Stefan 1:13:01
Yeah. I think yeah, I think you hit it on the head, because it's like, you look back at some of the, like, advances in automotive technology, like, seatbelts. You know, and you see the pushback that there was to seatbelts. Turbo motors, you know, everyone said, oh, they're unreliable, you'll you'll buy, it's just going to be a piece of, it's just gonna blow up on you. You know, and now everything has a turbo, everything has to have seatbelts.

Scott Benner 1:13:31
Yeah, oh, I got it. There are no like, large block engines anymore. In most, you know, most generalized vehicles, like I have a pretty big vehicle and it still doesn't have a huge engine, like by the standards I grew up with. The, I guess it's this is a cubic inches is that how motors are measured in liters, liters. So it means way off. Like, from my understanding of when I was a child to now like my, my vehicle should need a bigger motor in my mind. But the motor that's in it does a great job for it. And, and it's also you know, I see my wife's car or my son's car has like turbo in it. Like I don't even think he's got a motor in his car. Like I think there were like three mice burning cardboard in there. And then on top of it, there's a turbo You know, this magic thing that just makes energy when you need it, not when you don't. It's really is I find it all incredibly fascinating. But like I said, Yeah, I will. So what do you think about what I said about wanting an electric car once? You know I want one? Yeah, that's that easy.

Stefan 1:14:38
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, it's gonna be coming. I think I'm with you. It's on my bucket list by driving one at least once not necessarily owning it, but I would like to drive one. I

Scott Benner 1:14:49
am worried about the like, adding a charger. Yeah, I don't even matter. Like I'm old now. Stefan, I don't have anything to do. So I don't mind the limited like Like 400 miles on a charge or whatever, it ends up being, you know, 300 400 500 miles on a charge that I'm okay with, like, it's the idea of like having to have someone come into the house and like install this thing. And, you know, like that part, I guess is a is a sticking point for me not enough to stop me from doing it, I guess. But yeah, I just, I don't know, it just seems like I used to tell people. When I was younger, I used to say, this is back when I expect that I would live like a 90 years. And now, you know, as I sit here and talk to you for an hour, my hip will be stiff when I stand up. So maybe I was being a little too generous with how long I was gonna make it. But I used to say, like, I would give away the last 10 years of my life, if I could come back for a year, every 10 years, just to see what happens. I do 100 years. Yeah. And then I started thinking about it. Like I haven't, it's not every 10 it's every 100, right? Like I want to I just want to see like, even if it's just for a year, just enough for me to get my feet wet, find a little apartment, and then be like, Alright, let me see what's changed. And then I disappear again for 100 years and come back. Like I think that would be really amazing. Because we just don't have the we don't have the ability to recognize in modern life, how far things have come so quickly. Like it's easy to say. But, you know, people rode horses as a main way of transportation. Not that long ago.

Stefan 1:16:23
Yeah. And I mean, you know, circling back to diabetes. That was the Advent now insulin was discovered, what, 100 years ago now?

Scott Benner 1:16:31
Yeah. Oh, oh, Stefan, you're delightful. My entire conversation about these cars has been about diabetes. You heard it right. So I the podcast is interesting. I'm not just sitting here saying like ham fisted stuff all the time. Yeah. Oh, by the way. So for anybody who didn't get that as you're listening, everything I just said about technology, and about moving forward and not being scared and trying new things. You're supposed to do that with your type one. That was my that was my tip for the day. I was just slightly slipping it in here because the font works on cars for a living.

Unknown Speaker 1:17:03
It's pretty sneaky, right? It's the font, don't you think? Yeah, absolutely. Not like your dad. It just pulls you into a room and remind you what a letdown you're everyone's

Scott Benner 1:17:13
by a wrench, you bastard. design them better like that. I have an air book. I'm good. Okay, thanks. my MacBook Pro takes care of everything your wrenches, though. That's, that's, it's just to me. It's, it's about moving forward. It's about not getting stuck. It's about not having such a preconceived idea that you can't break yourself free and try more or try different. I think you always have to have a little bit of that explorers feeling and you're like, I want to know what this is. And yet to lose the fear to, or at least find a place to pack the fear away. You know, do it Stefan does when he goes over his parents house, just cry in the car and then run forward. Okay. You just dad's probably a lovely man. And I'm just maligning him in your relationship. Are you kidding me? He'd be Catholic. Okay, good. But But yeah, I mean, seriously, it's, it's, you know, in simpler terms, you do not want to look up 10 years from now. Look at your diabetes setup, and think, Oh, well, no one doesn't like this anymore. Why is that? Because what that probably means is that your care is not where it could be. And a lot of times, that also means simplicity, ease, flexibility, use, you know, all that stuff. I'm not saying you shouldn't do MDI. I know a lot of people who inject with pens are syringes who do a really amazing job for themselves. I'm just saying, Look up once in a while and see what else there is. Maybe some of its cool, get into an ugly car and drive it. You know, just because you think it's ugly. Just all that really means is it doesn't look like what you're used to. And now I need people to donate $80,000 so I get a Tesla truck, so that I can really live my dream here. cybertruck That's the one. My daughter's like, That thing is ugly. And I'm like, I don't care. I said the 15 year old boy and me that imagine the future thinks that's

Stefan 1:19:12
right. Absolutely. The thing that thing is like it's like, oh man, I remember when I first saw it when it was being unveiled. It was like this thing is wild. Like forget every Lamborghini this thing is wild.

Scott Benner 1:19:29
I loved it. When I heard the story. It's too big for modern garages. They have to scale it down. I was like, Don't you dare I'll leave it outside. You're telling me it's that big. And it's basically a slot car. I was like, I have to find out what it's like to drive a tri motor cyber truck. Like I want to know why a pickup truck needs to go zero to 60 in under three seconds. I don't I don't know that there's a function for it. But I really want to experience it one that reminds me of is that As a motorcycle rider for a long time, when I was much younger, and one morning, we were I'll let you go after this. I'm sorry, One morning I was, it was I was working, it was a Saturday right? And, and they were selling concert tickets like a half an hour from my job. And I had it in my head that I could sneak out of my job. And I could make it to this place buy these tickets, which I think were Ozzy Osborne, and get back without anyone noticing. Because it was super early, the tickets went on sale at 6am. My bosses didn't come until eight, I had it in my head, I could work this out. So I'm up on this highway 530 in the morning, on my motorcycle, I used to drive a GS xr 750. And so I'm heading down the street, there's no one out there, I want to be clear, no one and I'm on this highway. And I am just going like I am going as fast as I can. And when the cop pulled me over. He said I was going 135 miles an hour over the speed 105 miles an hour over the speed limit. And he seemed very upset because he was screaming a lot. And it's the first time I've ever really thought about it. Because I don't know if people understand speed. But once you become accustomed to it, and you're not afraid of it, you don't feel it the same way. So I was going 105 I was going 140 miles an hour. Like he must have caught me in like the 50 feet of this like highway where it got there was a light. So it went down to 35. You know, like the highway was like 60. But then there was a traffic light in the middle of it. So that's the scam I guess is the pull you over in there, you probably usually gets people going 16 to 35. But he got me going, you know 114 to 35. Anyway, I eventually got out of that ticket, which is a great story. I could tell you another time. But it left me with the feeling of wonder how fast this motorcycle really goes. And so I looked down one day and the speedometer said it went 165 miles an hour. And I was like I'm gonna try that one day. So in the middle of the night out on a lonely highway, I took that bike up to 165. And I held it there for about two seconds. And then I backed it down and never went that fast again in my entire life because it was insane. It was everything about it was wrong. There's just there's no reason to do that. And, but it's fun. I Stefan I couldn't focus on anything. He felt like I couldn't focus a mile down the road. Like stuff was just flying past me like a movie. You know, you couldn't find focus, you were just like I kept thinking if I hit something like a small stone in the road or a pothole like I'm gonna die, you know, but I did it just to see if it would do it. And it was nuts. It really was. And I had that very similar feeling about those about like, the electric cars are fine. Like I understand they work like slot cars, like you just all of a sudden have all the power that you need. But I don't have every design of every Tesla I don't like so I don't think about them. But that truck was just so different. That I thought well that's different enough to I don't care that it's not palatable to me like somehow they went past my expectations for ugly, indifferent. And like loop back around behind me. It's probably

Stefan 1:23:22
it's probably Yeah, it's probably cars are starting to look so alike. You know, like every sedan looks like every other sedan. Yeah, nowadays. That Yeah, that's it's so wild and out there. And it's really like love it or hate it.

Scott Benner 1:23:36
Yeah, no, I agree with you. You can't sometimes you can't tell different card manufacturers apart anymore. They're just they're so similar. And they're they're shapes. And it's almost like they all buy the parts at the same place and just put them together slightly differently is what it feels like. Anyway, all right, I'm going to say goodbye to you. And I'm going to ask you where who you work for after we're not recording anymore, so nobody else gets to know that but I want to know. All right. Thank you so much for doing this stuff. I was really chatty today. So I hope this was good for you. But yeah, no, thank you, Scott. No, really and seriously, I didn't I cut you off from saying really nice stuff about the podcast because it's um, it's lovely, but sometimes it makes me uncomfortable. And, and then I joke my way through it and it just gets weird, but I really appreciate that the show helped you and I appreciate you want to let other people know. But I didn't have it in me today for you to say it. Like I don't know why the douche chills would have been too much for me for some reason. I hold on one second. A huge thank you to one of today's sponsors. Je Vogue glucagon, find out more about chivo Kibo pen at G Vogue glucagon.com forward slash juice box. you spell that GVOKEGL Uc ag o n.com forward slash juicebox I'd also like to thank the Contour Next One blood glucose meter for fitting so well in my daughter's bag in my hand and doing such a terrific job of giving us accurate results that we can make good decisions with Contour Next one.com forward slash juice box. Links in your show notes links at Juicebox Podcast com

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