#623 Josh Has Even More Feels
Josh (from ep 435) and some of his children have type 1 diabetes. Today he shares more about the impacts of autoimmune disease on his family.
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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 623 of the Juicebox Podcast.
I posted an episode on February 1 2021, called Josh has all the fields and without any planning whatsoever, on February 2 2022, Josh is back to talk more about how he feels. If you haven't heard Josh's first episode, it won't really matter if you hear it first or second. So you could listen to this and decide you want to hear more and then go find episode 435. Where you can go to for 35 right now listen to that, and then come back to this any way you decide to do it, just remember that nothing you hear on the Juicebox Podcast should be considered advice, medical or otherwise, always consult a physician before making any changes to your health care plan, or becoming bold with insulin. Please remember, also, if you're a US resident who has type one or is the caregiver of a type one, I would love it if you took the survey AT T one D exchange.org. Forward slash juicebox.
This episode of The Juicebox Podcast is sponsored by Dexcom. Head over to dexcom.com forward slash juicebox and say hello to Dexcom. The podcast is also sponsored by arm the pod makers of the Omni pod dash and the recently announced Omni pod five. To get started on that Omni pod dash right now go to Omni pod.com Ford slash juice box, you may be eligible for a free 30 day supply of the Omni pod dash.
Josh 2:10
Hi there. My name is Josh Taube. And I am not good to introduce myself apparently. I am Josh Tabi. And I was on an episode previously and I'm coming back to do an update. I have type one diabetes and I have children with type one diabetes.
Scott Benner 2:32
Ah, Josh, your episode was called Josh has Josh's all the fields all the fields. Josh has all the fields. Yes, you. You certainly did that day. Do you? Generally speaking? Yes.
Josh 2:43
Yeah. And I'm really, um, I was. I was very nervous on that episode. And this episode, I am just scared of what I'm going to say. So I just don't know what I'm going to say.
Scott Benner 2:57
So the first time nervous, but then you got through that. Okay. Now this time, because you're more comfortable. You feel like you might say things you don't mean to say?
Josh 3:06
I definitely. I definitely. I didn't hold back or anything in that first episode. It's just life has gotten even more complicated and even more feely that, you know, it doesn't do the first episode title doesn't do a certain good service to me because I have even more fields now.
Scott Benner 3:28
Alright, well, perfect. Everybody get your tissues out. We're gonna talk.
Josh 3:32
And maybe that's the title. Josh has even more fields. Josh found
Scott Benner 3:35
more fields. But that sounds creepy. So we'll probably not go that way. But anyway, so real quick, your background, your professional background.
Josh 3:44
I am a licensed professional counselor, here in Texas. I enjoy my job, but to VA that I guess that's my professional background. I work with
Scott Benner 3:58
mental health. Perfect. And you've had type one for
Josh 4:01
since I was in kindergarten. And so I think I'm actually coming up on 30 years now. Wow. Roughly, that's a big number. I want to say next Mother's Day will be 30 years.
Scott Benner 4:15
You got type one on Mother's Day.
Josh 4:18
I got at least I got diagnosed on Mother's Day. Yeah, yeah.
Scott Benner 4:20
Right. Well, you probably got it sooner. And yeah, yeah. I did you say that the last time?
Josh 4:26
I think so i There's a story of of a baseball game. My dad wanted me to go or I was at a baseball game. And after the baseball game, we were going to go to the hospital because you know, I was urinating in the middle of night and all that sort of stuff. My mom's a nurse and she she knew the signs and symptoms had called my pediatrician pediatrician said Yeah, bring him in. And it ended up being a Mother's Day. Wow.
Scott Benner 4:50
We just got my mom at TV on Mother's Day. But you were really, you're really on the edge of the of the cutting edge right there with that. Absolutely. Now over how many children you have.
Josh 5:02
I got three kiddos. I've got Jack who's 10 Lily, who's seven. And Olivia, who just turned three. We just turned in June.
Scott Benner 5:12
Wow. Happy birthday, when? When you were on last time, which wasn't all that long ago.
Josh 5:18
And I was gonna say it was actually Arden 16th birthday.
Scott Benner 5:22
You were on 16th birthday. Oh, so it's about a little over a year, a tiny bit over a year since you recorded the last time. And we're still in the midst of COVID Yeah, it's just here. It just lives here. Now. It's, it's not I, my son's like three weeks away from going back to college. And I will tell you, and not that this maybe is a surprise to you or anybody listening. But if people didn't believe it at the beginning, my children need to go back to some sort of a an existence that mirrors what they expect, very, very badly. The the boredom is we've gone somehow around boredom and come back around the other side of it again. It's just it's it's absolutely impactful on them in ways that I don't think I understand yet.
Josh 6:12
It's I mean, in terms of development, kids and adults, it's just stunted development and in life.
Scott Benner 6:19
Yeah, we're just literally standing still waiting for somebody to say it's okay. Go back again. And it's terrible. When I spoke to you last time, how many if any of your children had diabetes?
Josh 6:33
Is that a question you ask everybody? Jeez, no, um, I, my seven year old was diagnosed. And I think we were we were worried about my, my 10 year old and I think I even gave an update, right before you posted the episode. But um, but now my 10 year old as a of three or four months ago, maybe a little bit more time. Time is another thing that COVID has messed up. He has been diagnosed with type one. And he very quickly went from thank yous within a couple of weeks went from just doing a long acting Joseba into doing a Novolog
Scott Benner 7:21
for me allowance on he said he didn't have much of a honeymoon at all.
Josh 7:24
Well, he's still honeymooning and like, you know, it almost felt like for a few weeks there a couple weeks ago that we could even pull back all of them the Nova log and he would be alright. But um, but it just kind of comes and goes,
Scott Benner 7:38
yeah, it comes it goes diabetes, it comes and goes. And which ends up being worse than Yeah, it just being consistent. Because, you know, as everyone can imagine, you you come out in the morning doing what you think is right. And suddenly your body's like, oh, I can help to today. And you're like, No, I already put insulin in there. And then you're fighting lows all day long. Yeah, so now your 10 year old your seven year old. You anybody else dog have diabetes parakeet or anything like that?
Josh 8:07
No, not that I know of. Yeah, we we ended up getting my my three year old tested through trial. What's that? trauma? Yeah. And, and she does not have the any of the genes or whatever it is. So we're hoping that sticks?
Scott Benner 8:28
No antibodies are markers for her. Okay, well,
Josh 8:32
she's only three. And there's research, you know, out there that, that, uh, you know, three is kind of the young point in in testing. So,
Scott Benner 8:41
you go do it again, at some point.
Josh 8:43
Probably not just gonna it was it was it was kind of a, you know, one of those personal ethical things of like, do we even want to do this right now? Yeah. So
Scott Benner 8:55
was getting the test like a drunk dial? Almost we like just
Josh 9:02
No, no, hey, I mean, it was it was a concerted, you know, yeah, we should just because, I mean, obviously something some sort of gene something is against us. And so we got a we got to get tested just to kind of see, so we can at least prepare.
Scott Benner 9:21
Yeah, well, I'm glad you got the news you did. I guess I'm just gonna outright ask you like, what's the impact when a second child's diagnosed?
Josh 9:33
Well, it was interesting, because the seven year old, she took it really, you know, really pretty well. Like her biggest memory of that time of going to the hospital. She just stayed one night was finally getting to have her first insulin shot because she got a really, really good hot dog at the hospital. So that's kind of her personality and She takes the both the kids take the shots, just, you know, easy, but my seven year old lives in the moment and my 10 year old has a little bit bigger perspective. So, you know, he's thinking about school because he hasn't been to school with diabetes yet. And so he's thinking about school and friends and you know, having to leave the classroom, whether he wants to do that or not, and all this sort of stuff. So the emotional impact has been bigger with him. But when it comes to, you know, just making more room in the, in the diabetes closet and more room in the refrigerator for insulin. It hasn't been that big
Scott Benner 10:43
of a deal. Yeah. So your son has a, like a wider view. And so he's planning for things and that means worrying about things that he can't quite see completely yet, where your daughter's more like a fruit fly. No offense, like, she's just Yeah, yeah.
Josh 10:57
Absolutely. You know, she understands and like she'll, even if she, you know, is on her phone. So both the kids now have phones, because with Dexcom, we got to, so they, you know, they, they have their phones, and she'll bring it to us and say, Hey, we're, I'm getting higher, I'm getting low. Usually it's low so that she can have some candy. But, uh, other than that, she's kind of just take every moment as it is.
Scott Benner 11:25
She like, Oh, bad news, low blood sugar, I'll go to no worry. I figured this one right out. There personalities like this prior to diabetes.
Josh 11:37
Yeah, yeah. You know, if if Jack was on an episode with you, it would be Jack has all the fields as well. So he, um, he's, he's a lot like me. And it's one of those sorts of things where it's, you know, 111 bad thing will kind of mess up his day. He'll let one bad thing kind of make it make it all bad. And he really has to work hard to, for his mind to change his heart. But his heart does the does the talking. Yeah, it's interesting. I might be a little like that. So I'm definitely like, yeah,
Scott Benner 12:16
I don't know that it'll ruin my whole day. But I can, I can start having fairly existential conversations with myself where I'm like, there's no answer to any of this. And I don't even know why I'm bothering to think about it. But sometimes it seems. I guess to me, as an adult, it seems like if I can use this opportunity to think about what happened, like maybe I'll make a different or better decision. In the future. If something like this comes up, I try to think of it more pragmatically like that. But there are times where if I just, if I was, it happened to me when I was a kid, like as an adult, now I'm better at it. But if I just like when my heart starts pulling me if I let it go, like, it's gonna definitely end up with me crying somewhere. Like, I might not be for long, but I'm gonna be upset by the time it's over. I can remember, even the planning for the future stuff that you talked about when I was little, eight, 910 I would sometimes make up scenarios of things to happen so that I could figure out how to handle them in case they happened.
Josh 13:20
Oh, absolutely. Yeah. Yeah. And when you're eight, 910, sometimes those things are are nice and fun and fanciful. But then when you get to be a grown up, you know, I, you know, sometimes go to bed thinking okay, if someone were to break in my house right now, what would I do? You know, where's my nearest safety point? And it's just stuff like that. That, uh, I guess maybe, maybe it's just me, but my adult brain starts to do at night.
Scott Benner 13:48
Oh, Josh, I don't understand people who don't think for most of us. I don't I don't what would I pick up? What can I hit them with what I tell the kids which way to go to get out, like, you know, this whole thing. And that's just on like, one little idea. I once had this conversation with my brother in law and I was like, you've never thought about what to do if your house catches on fire. And he goes, No, I was like, Oh God, I have like multiple plants. case the fires on one side and cases on the other side. I was like, why I can't that's interesting to me, but I sometimes feel very jealous of those people because my house probably isn't going to catch fire. And it's fairly likely that no one's ever going to break into my home. Although I do have a plan I also know what I'm going to do if I find a genie bottle so I don't understand all you who don't have that thought out either because you know you're gonna get in the moment screw it up and end up with a giant penis and no money and it's gonna be so big you're not gonna be able to walk off the beach and I know that's where you're gonna find it on the beach because that's how it wasn't a cartoon when I was little so yeah, I don't I don't get any I don't get they're not thinking things through. Now. I'm not I'm There's a word, there's a technical word that I don't know, like obsessive, I'm not obsessive about it. I don't really think through what's going to happen if someone breaks him. But I've had the conversation with myself, like, what am I going to do here? How far would I be willing to go to help people? Like, I don't? Yeah, you know what I mean? That kind of thing.
Josh 15:18
I tend to I can, I can usually shut myself off after long enough in and being able to say, you know, is there any? Is there any good to this line of thinking? You know, that's, it's a counseling. Trick. Not really a trick, but you know, something, just to be mindful. It's like, is this line of thinking? Helpful? No,
Scott Benner 15:43
it's not? Are you at least not? Are you able to use that with your son?
Josh 15:49
We have broached it. He doesn't hate. We've We've certainly broached it in, in a sense of like, don't let this ruin your day. Is this is focusing on this helpful for having a good rest of your day. But I don't think he I don't think his his worries would be so chronic. That he would, that it would benefit that much. But yeah, in terms of letting something ruin his day, or, or even. It was actually last night, it was about, about all the school stuff and being like, look, you know, history has shown that your worries are always worse than things that actually happen. So you know, it doesn't, it doesn't help to worry about it right now. We still got, you know, how long we had until school starts. So
Scott Benner 16:56
yeah, that's the, the when I when I try to tell people like I've worries a waste of your imagination, because you just start making things up that may or may not ever happen, and now you're stressed or anxious about things that very likely will never occur.
Josh 17:12
And like that, worry, worry is a waste of your imagination.
Scott Benner 17:16
I mean, you really are just making up things in your head at that point. I mean, let's don't get me wrong, if you know, seven days in a row, someone hits you in the head with a stick, that you go to bed on the seventh day, you're like, Yeah, I think that guy's gonna hit me again, with a sick tomorrow. Like, that's, that's a different thing. But when you have no reason to think this other than your own, you know, made up concerns and it's hard to to explain to a child, but you're, you're making things up, you know, that that may or may not ever happen, like wait to see if they happen, then be upset if you want to be or, or come up with a plan. That something is good, I'm sorry, you're gonna say something.
Josh 17:56
But to think about, you know, kind of going back and looking at it in a bigger perspective, right. We were actually also talking yesterday, there's, there's a lot of deep conversations yesterday, about, you know, people don't usually live through a pandemic, this is not a usual thing. You know, and, and so everybody has had to deal with these, these things thrust upon them. And, and, and having to relinquish control of certain aspects of life. And, and for that's what, that's kind of what being diagnosed with diabetes. And lots of other chronic illnesses. Is, is, you know, where you you relinquish that control you? You no longer get to? I don't know. I don't know what I'm trying to say there. But it's it. The week, the COVID thing has affected everybody like it's a chronic illness.
Scott Benner 19:03
Yeah. So there's, I don't know if it's a saying or something. It's an idea or concept. I don't really know. But the idea of that the worst thing that's ever happened to you, is the worst thing that's ever happened to you. And so if you've lived through I mean, listen, I'm 50 right? If I look back over my life right now, what do I remember? Cuban Missile Crisis? Nope. That was before me. Really. I remember gas shortage. I remember the space shuttle blowing up. I remember Reagan getting shot. You know, like, these are things that never really touched me. I grew up in a part of the country. I didn't see bad weather. That was frightening. So for me the world was a place that was about getting up, taking a shower, going to school or playing with my friends. Trying to keep my parents off my back. Trying to find a Playboy magazine in the woods somewhere like this was pretty much my existence, right like it was that 1980s version of standby me for the most part, like nothing too terrible was happening. And now all the sudden, not only is that been our existence, that's now the vibe I laid on my kids when they were little. And then they got computers and cell phones and the internet like I had the internet a little bit when I was younger, I'm talking about the real internet, you don't I mean, like, yeah, I can get like, I could send my desk through my my internet connection. At this point, it's so fast, and it's a different world, everything feels possible. Everything feels like you can get to it. I grew up thinking that I could never write a book, because I didn't know someone that wrote a book. But when my son wanted to play baseball, he immediately had contact with a number of people who had played baseball, in college and professionally and all of a sudden, this feels real. And that makes the world feel at your fingertips, it makes you it gives you a feeling of control. That is not true. It's not really true. And I hate to say something like we're all on a rock that's hurling through space. But we're all on a rock that's hurling through space. And so once things got so like that, once, people's lives, could even get segmented. Like there are plenty of people who don't live the life I've described, right? But because of the way society set up, I don't see them. So they're a story, or an idea, right? There's a town somewhere where nobody has money, or nobody works, or drugs are really huge problem. That's not where I live. And it suddenly feels like I can bring the parts of life to me that I need. And the parts that I don't want to see, I don't have to see. And then this thing happened. And you're like, Oh, I'm not in control of anything. This could have happened at any time. And it's, it's, I have to say it's a huge adjustment is an understatement. People are still adjusting to the idea. And you and by the time a generation of people realize that sometimes I have a mask in my pocket, and I need it and sometimes have a mask in my pocket, I don't need it. And that there's times of year when things ebb and flow and rules change. Once that becomes so normal, you know, it's gonna stop. And then you'll have a generation of people who are just like, constantly thinking, it's coming, it's coming, it's coming. And then one day, it won't come we'll get through a whole nother generation and those children will be like, Oh, it's not gonna happen. And then, I mean, then who knows? It could happen again in five minutes. Or it could be a distance of time, like between now and the Black Plague. So, yeah, yeah. It's an overwhelming that lack of the fallacy of control is now suddenly tangible for for literally, for everybody. That's how I That's how I see it anyway. And now I see. And I see your son's situation as, like a micro cosmos of that issue.
Josh 23:03
If that makes it 100% is I mean, about I would think about six weeks ago. Maybe Okay, yeah, about six weeks to go on Antiques take a step back. So when they diagnosed my son, you know, he didn't do any hospitalization, he didn't do anything like that, because we kind of knew it was coming they did run a test for that celiac. And come to find out, he has celiac. We had to we did the endoscopy to to verify and that was the at that point, the most frightening thing in my in my in my life, have you seen my son, you know, go under and that sort of thing so life, but like that feeling of Okay. Okay. He has type one, we got this. And, and that control being ripped again? Or that feeling like okay, I have things under control being ripped again. It's kind of you, you led me right into that turn that that celiac has has really messed with with any sort of security that we had been building because it's so recent. We're still you know, adjusting our kitchen and, and all that sort of stuff to dealing with that.
Scott Benner 24:49
It's almost like it's almost like you're being attacked by multiple sides. And you start fortifying like First you come to the conclusion that I met this happy person who We live in a house in the middle of the woods and everything's great. I smell flowers and sunshine. And then somebody comes from the east. And you're like, oh, no, we're being attacked by the east, you know, from the east and then you fortify, fortify, fortify. And then you get to the point where you're like, Okay, we can withstand this onslaught. Great. And before you can breathe again, somebody is coming from the west. And you're just like, oh, okay, okay. Okay. Except it's that added level of it's happening to your kid, which is contextually something that no one who doesn't have children can understand. Like, I, I tried to I was telling my wife the other day, my son has an an injury, right now, it could end up being pretty impactful on his baseball life. And I was talking to my wife about it. And I said, I can't decide if I'm more upset that his, his path has been diverted. And the all this effort he's put into something could have could end up feeling wasted, which would be a shame. Or if I'm more upset that he's actually physically hurt, or if I'm more upset, that of the things that won't happen for him, or just that my son's having a problem. I was like, it is so confusing inside of me. But all I can tell you is that I'm always worried about all of you. Like, I'm worried about him, I'm worried about you, I'm worried about my daughter, I said I think about my brother, I think about my mom, like my mom is 78. And I don't think a day goes by where I don't think like, I should call my mom or go visit my mom. And I can't most of the time, like most of the time, I can't do that. And then I think of her being by herself. And that makes me think about that, you know, when she had an opportunity, she didn't leave us. And I know all of this is fairly unreasonable, and that people grow up and get older and that children don't have as much time to talk to their parents. But I still think about it fairly regularly. Not for long. It's doesn't hurt me, it doesn't crush me. But I'm always aware of it. I'm always aware that I could have done something else. Or maybe I should have said a thing here or zigged and zagged. And I again, I think them as it was growing ideas. But I realized as I was talking to my wife, like she does not think like that at all. And I think she looked at me for five minutes. Like I was unwell. And I was like, no, no, I'm like, I think you're, you're seeing it too harshly. I'm just saying, I, you guys seem to be the most important thing in the world to me. And I take that job. I fortified my, my my flanks all the time, I'm always trying to help them or put somebody in a good position, or something like that. And I realized as we were sitting in the doctor's office waiting for my son to talk to this person, that it was the third most scared I've ever been in a medical situation in my life. One of them was Kelly, they thought Kelly might have a blood clot in her lung when she was pregnant the first time which she ended up not having, but just the time where we thought she did was the was the most scared I've ever been until somebody told me Arden had diabetes. And then as I sat with my son just waiting to hear about the health of his elbow, I realized that I was more frightened than than I was when a doctor kind of said out loud. I my iron had gone way down. Yeah, and the doctor said this is a sign of cancer. And I of course don't have cancer and that didn't end up being like thankfully what it was but I can tell you that when he said that, to me, was not as frightening as sitting in waiting to find out about my son's elbow.
Josh 28:53
There's certainly a you know, a parenting aspect of that and a personality aspect of that. And I think you know, I share that same thing. When you know we're we're sitting there in the waiting room during this endoscopy we're kind of I'm you know, I'm kind of worried about the, the the immediate thing of you know, what is what is this going to happen to him today like how is he going to take this today? What are we going to all those things of what are we going to do? And I know my wife was worried about that as well but then she she sometimes can have an even bigger you know perspective of like, you know, he he's not going to be able to in like going to to someone's wedding and if they don't have you know, a gluten free cake then these these little things in life that that continue to remind, remind us of these illnesses and. And it took me back to when I was diagnosed. So well, for last last episode I had, it took me about two weeks from my, my, my daughter's the very first in the type of diagnosis that we had for the kids to realize, Oh, um, at first, I was really scared that my daughter was going to have the same sort of upbringing with diabetes that I did. But it took me a little bit to realize on the way things have changed a lot. You know, thank goodness, for Dexcom and, and things like and, and carb counting. So, things have changed a lot and really nothing in her, like we talked about, you know, in her day to day life has, has affected her, you know, I get less sleep, because I'm constantly monitoring blood sugar's my wife gets less sleep. But um, it was, it was nice to kind of have that peace. Okay, this is what it's going to be like, you know, there's, there's future worries about, you know, having children and, or, you know, for her and, and all that sort of stuff. But then now, celiac comes, and celiac pretty much does exactly what it changes exactly, that part of life that I had to change whenever I was young with type one, and that's that diet. And so it's like, it's okay, sense of comfort, and then the carpet pulled out again. And you're right, that, that I I am infinitely more upset that it's my son. And not me. We, we, you know, we were told by his Endo, nice endo his gastro doctor to, you know, have everybody in the family tested just because it's genetic, and that sort of stuff happens. And so I got tested. And if you want me to go on a long rant about the state of health care again, I'm pretty sure I did the last time I can, because it was trouble enough to get me to get a doctor to approve my test. But, um, so I got tested for celiac. And when I got tested, I was wishing that I had it. I wanted to, I wanted him to not be alone. Because that's what I felt when I was younger of this. Because I didn't know any type ones. I, you know, all this diet stuff was was new and changed for me. And I wanted to be, I wanted him to have someone just to that, that he wouldn't be the only one. But I guess fortunately, I'm negative for for celiac. Unfortunately, my youngest, my three year old is positive for celiac. So we have to, we have all three of our kids have chronic illnesses, and then split up. So
Scott Benner 33:34
I forget does your wife have anything?
Josh 33:36
No, she hasn't been able to get the test yet. But she she'll be hopefully getting that ordered in the next few months to see John, but she she doesn't have any celiac symptoms right now. But she doesn't she doesn't have any sort of chronic illnesses or anything like that. You know, you get success. She has scoliosis, but that has not affected her.
Scott Benner 34:00
I feel like that's something you would all trade for right now. Like I'll take that and that's fine. You know, it's funny, you're you're so sincere when you're talking that I thought of a weird joke to make a second ago that I held in because I
Josh 34:17
felt in so many jokes so far. Yeah. Because because I want to know what sort of woods up there and it was Pennsylvania or Pittsburgh that you grew up. Pennsylvania near Philly, Pennsylvania. What sort of woods in Pennsylvania grows play playboys?
Scott Benner 34:30
I don't know, but but people just leave them in piles. I mean, they did back before the internet at least. So you know, I spoken to a little bit on off off the show as well. So I know you're you're a well natured, like funny person. And when I asked if your wife had anything I was gonna say besides horrible taste in men.
Josh 34:53
I mean, for sure. I mean, it's it that was that was that it was and continues to kind of, to irk my, my own mental health of, of that these are all, you know, genetic things and you know, I'm pretty, I'm pretty stable in the it wouldn't have changed probably anything that we would have done or anything like that. And, you know, it doesn't change how we interact with the children except for probably probably increases our patients in some other aspects of life. But um it it. Yeah, I mean, I don't
Scott Benner 35:38
mean this, like you should feel this way or that you should even do it. I'm just asking the question. Have you ever apologized to her?
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Have you ever apologized to her?
Josh 39:58
To to my wife Yes, yeah. Yeah. Oh, and you know, and I guess in my, my deeper into the that spiral that, that well, you know, just kind of said, you know, you should have married somebody else.
Scott Benner 40:17
But that's I didn't talk about with my son though you can't really know what to do or what not to do in I mean, honestly, before the even though you had type one, did you really when you were in your 20s think that any of what's happening to you right now is going to happen? No, no, he would have no way to believe that this was gonna happen. Right. So
Josh 40:38
when I was in my 20s, um, let's see. I mean, it was it was still early 20s. Um, so we would have been, you know, 10 years ago, right after we had my oldest that we went to a geneticist. And I guess, you know, I don't know, the timeline of of research and how they have the education that has evolved with how type one comes about. But they told us that, because I don't have I don't have anybody in my family. I don't know, I don't know, anybody, at least at that time, that has type one diabetes. That there was some sort of some sort of fluke, and that we shouldn't worry that the the, the, the chances for type one in our kids is much less because I don't have any genetic link. Huh?
Scott Benner 41:33
Yeah. Well, I didn't work out. I know.
Josh 41:37
Because this is like the internet. It's like giving us false control of your life. Yeah.
Scott Benner 41:43
Oh, it's Oh, I I think that all the time, that when someone tells you like, Oh, your one kid has diabetes, that's only a 10% greater risk for someone else to in your family. I always think like, that's something they tell you. It's almost like the there'll be a cure in like five years. Don't worry. Like it's there's there's like hope nuggets that people like to try to sprinkle on you. I like how people will come on here and say, like, my doctor doesn't seem to meaningfully understand diabetes at all. But I do really believe this thing that they said it I was like, Yeah, cuz it's confirmation bias. You're like, you want to hear that you want to hear that you're not, you know, at any greater risk. I'll tell you that. Prior to us having kids, you know, I remember my wife saying people in my family are in the bathroom a lot. Right? But okay, who knows what that means? Well, it takes you know, then suddenly, the grandmother gets a celiac diagnosis. When that happens, I don't think Oh, geez, we shouldn't have children, because one of our kids might have an autoimmune disease. Like, that's not where your brain goes, you're just like, Oh, grandma can eat bread. And you know, and like, that's sort of how it is like you. We understand celiac now, much, much better than we did even 20 years ago. And so you're just like, okay, whatever. And no one else in our family has any real history of anything like that. I'm adopted, of course. So who knows? Right? My irons probably been an issue my entire adult life. I didn't know about that. And Kelly, you know, gets thyroid issue after having Arden. But we didn't even understand the connections then back then either it took Arden's nurse practitioner years and years ago to say, because we couldn't get anybody to give Kelly a diagnosis on her thyroid. And so I was talking about it one day, so that so then that's me, like, this podcast shouldn't be any surprise that people who really know me like I have a problem. If I can't figure it out, I start talking to other people. Yeah, until somebody just goes, Oh, I know what that is. Like, to me. That's like the human internet. Like you just keep pinging people until they have a response. It's valuable. And so we find out for that. And now, Cole has Hashimotos you know, which isn't diagnosed, he's 21 years old. And I don't know what's coming next or isn't coming. But I can tell you that yesterday, I spent a number of hours meeting with people from prevention bio, which if you listen to the podcast is the company that came on here and talked about Ms. A blob, if I'm saying it wrong to Ms. A blob, I don't know how they maybe should have picked a different name for that truck. But and I and so I had to sit down with them about how maybe they you know how maybe the podcast could help them get the word out about what they're doing or something. And it was a very preliminary conversation. And at the end of it, I said, Listen, I think what you guys are doing involves science we understand. Which means that you don't need to invent something for the next thing to happen. This thing's either going to work or it isn't right. And you're going to while you're trying to prove it out and get it rolling. If I can be helpful with that, I will be because I think it's valuable. whether it works or not, the Endeavor is very valuable. And then I said words I've never said before I said, because, you know, my children's kids could have diabetes. And I never thought that out loud before my life. But it's completely true. It's completely true that my children might have children who have celiac or a thyroid problem, or diabetes, or any number of issues like that. And there are times when Arden's like, I think I might just adopt if I have kids. And it seems like a very, it's not a scared statement, it seems like a mature statement. Like, you know, she's never said, I don't want to keep this train going. But I think right now, because she's young, it's more like I do not want to have to help a kid with diabetes might be her, I'm sure that will change as she gets older, like her feelings around it. I'm never going to really know until she's older. What this is about, when she can maybe more fully contextualize it for me. But I just found myself at that meeting, thinking maybe I could do something today that might help family members. I never know, you know what I mean? And so let's see what that does. But let me because what's the other option, you just stop living? And that doesn't seem valuable, either. You know,
Josh 46:25
you know, I guess my my thoughts had never gone. I guess they don't they don't stay on, you know, the health of grandkids. But certainly we have talked about and thought about, you know, the the genetic joining of any of our kids in someone else. And how, you know, letting, letting any any of my kids future partners know about me being a alpha one antitrypsin deficiency, I don't know if you remember that from the episode. But um, and that causing can cause more acute issues. Early on in life. So that idea of passing it on, it's, it's scary, and it but you're right, in that it can't, it can't stop us, when you said that what Arden said, you know, the first thing that came to my head was you know that that usual, I say usual, but oftentimes with chronic illnesses, you have this lower self esteem, you have this, you know, mild depression can happen. And so it was kind of screaming of that, but if she is, if she is thinking of it in in a different way, then then yeah, that can be a very mature aspect of her personality.
Scott Benner 48:03
Who knows, she doesn't seem depressed to me, and she doesn't seem burdened by diabetes to me. But, you know, I don't know, like, you know, we'll see, I'm just trying to be aware of things I can tell you that, even though I said it out loud for the first time yesterday, privately in my mind, and this is way pre planning but we talked about pre planning in the beginning. I've won I've often thought that if one day one of my children has a baby, the first time I hold it, I don't want to think please don't have diabetes one day when I when I hold the baby for the first time. And I'm wondering if I'll be able to, like consciously not have that thought. Because I feel like that's gonna be the first thing I think when my skin touches their skin, you know, and you feel the first connection of it. I feel I feel like please just don't have to deal with this. But I don't know You
Josh 49:00
know, you think you think Arden you know when it when it comes to taking care of a kid or diabetes? Do you think Arden thinks you have to start a podcast and you have to interview people daily and, and all that sort of stuff?
Scott Benner 49:13
She's like, I don't have the stamina for that. I don't think she thinks that at all. Actually. I said to her one day I was like, Would you like to take like say I get too old one day do you? Would you like to try to just take the podcast over and she goes that's your thing. I'm okay. I was like, Okay, fine. I don't think she sees it like that at all. Actually, she's if you haven't heard the episode with her yet? It's eye opening.
Josh 49:37
i i You know, Josh has even more fields. I have not not just your podcast, but honestly I have not listened to any podcasts in probably three months.
Scott Benner 49:49
Yeah, your life upside down.
Josh 49:52
moments that I have earbuds in I'm usually listening to. Either really sad me music or heavy metal? So just kind of keeping going. That makes
Scott Benner 50:05
sense to me. Maybe I should just have a whole episode of sad music and heavy metal maybe people like that a little bit.
Josh 50:12
I mean, it could be sad heavy metal. So most, most of it is probably sad. So
Scott Benner 50:19
Well, yeah. Wait, hold on. We're not getting past that without finding out like, what are some of your favorite metal bands?
Josh 50:25
Oh, man. So I go back to this, go back to a comfort area of whenever I was younger, and definitely listening to, to corn to some, some Metallica that sort of era of things. Something like if I'm in the car, and I'm really having all the fields, you know, I used to be big into car audio until I realized it was a waste of money. And and so I'll just you know, belted out and and scream and annoy everybody on the road. But then, when I get home I can be, you know, the call, Mr. Dad? Yeah. Yeah,
Scott Benner 51:11
do that a little bit. I might have a couple of playlists that fit that. That feeling. When I missed my son, I listened to rap music, which I don't predict which I don't particularly love. Although some of it I do.
Josh 51:25
I'm guessing it's his rap music.
Scott Benner 51:26
It's a listening to music that so we drive to so much baseball together. I am because we are the kind of parents which if you listen to this episode, you'll see like we don't stifle the kids really. So, you know, when it's his turn to put music on. And it's, you know, pop smoke Meek Mill Davies, like stuff like that. I just, I tried to find something that I like, it turns out the things about it, I like he doesn't even know I'm like, I like the guy's like, the guy's got, like a really great resonance in his voice. And he's like, What are you listening to?
Josh 51:56
I wonder what microphone he's using.
Scott Benner 51:59
I just, I'm like, It's comforting. Like, I show me a picture of him. He's like, why do you need to see him? I was like, is he his biggest his voice and he's like, who cares? Like, alright, but you know, once he's off at school for a while, if I find myself missing him, I put his music on. i I'll go through, like rolls through like old Metallica. And stuff like that. I'm not a person who puts on music, like from when I was a kid too much. Like, I remember how much I love Guns and Roses, but I don't really need to hear it anymore. Feeling if I get I'm trying to calm down, I listened to the cello. And I've started to like more 70s I mean, which stuff that I would have thought was oldies when I was in the 90s. But now you realize how good it was like Crosby, Stills and Nash and stuff like that, like he didn't, you know, I mean, like so there's always a place in my heart for Crosby, Stills and Nash and Ted Stevens and Paul Simon and Neil Diamond, all that sort of stuff. So I'm so glad that radio is not really a thing anymore, because the last time it was, they were playing Guns and Roses on on an oldies station one time and I was like, Alright, I'm done paying attention to the lineage of this now I'm like, I do not need to feel badly about this. But yeah, just that all makes sense to me. You know?
Josh 53:19
Slightly, not really off topic. What genre do you think ABA is? What would you consider ABA?
Scott Benner 53:27
I mean, ABA is pop, isn't it?
Josh 53:31
My wife and I were discussing it so I didn't really know. I didn't know what I was kind of putting it into where did you have it? You know, in between like a disco rock sort of thing?
Scott Benner 53:45
Yeah, I guess that it had that flavor. So if you just Google it, it comes up rock rock pop. I don't think I would not see it as rock
Josh 53:57
by sounds like the categories that BestBuy used to put their CDs in
Scott Benner 54:01
exactly. There's a picture of them on stage here in these white robes and the be honest they look like a Christian band it this is this they really do look like they're gonna tell me the I should listen to Jesus in this in this one here. And then they get a little more hippyish at times in their photos. It's interesting. I only know the one song so although I have seen the musical. I can't believe I just said that. What was it called? Was that Mamma Mia? No, yeah, no, there was an album. Oh god.
Josh 54:44
I'm gonna Nia is a musical bound think it was
Scott Benner 54:47
it wasn't the album. They did like a stage thing was just Abba music. I really don't remember my wife took me to it. I will be 100% honest about that. And Oh my god, that, wow, here's a weird memory. Okay, I don't want to bum everybody out, but you're on so it's okay. It was. We had tickets. And the night before my father passed away. I spent the whole night in the hospital, I came home, I got a few hours of sleep, woke up, gotten a shower, got on a train and went to Manhattan. And I remember sitting in that musical like, numb and exhausted. And but I didn't want to let people down that you know, we had this thing and we went anyway. Maybe that's why I didn't enjoy it. I guess now that I'm looking back,
Josh 55:40
certainly can have some repercussions of what you what you're doing around such a dramatic time. Yeah,
Scott Benner 55:47
I couldn't even believe that. I. I didn't remember that until just now. Actually, I wish I could remember the name of that damn musical because it wasn't Mamma Mia. Was it? Dammit, I'll find out. But anyway, musics incredibly helpful at different times. And you don't like see, I actually like to hear people talk when I'm upset, though. But but I like to hear them talk about something that has nothing to do with me.
Josh 56:13
Now, I think I probably am usually the same way. And then that's, I mean, I love podcasts. But something I don't know, something just kind of shook me out of that. Yeah. That, I guess, that need at that time. And just needing to just needing to be more ever present.
Scott Benner 56:38
Yeah. Yeah, that makes sense. You don't want to disappear too, right? Like you don't wanna you don't want to have a situation where you find yourself, like retracting from the family either. Which that would be, I guess, kind of understandable. And at the same time, it's hard to reverse once you start doing stuff like that. So I guess he got to kind of stay in it. I mean, the truth of it is to like to unpack it a different way. You've had diabetes for 30 years. You okay.
Josh 57:12
Yeah, I mean, yeah.
Scott Benner 57:13
Yeah. I mean, honestly, you're okay. Right. Like, get up and work. You have a car, you listen to music, you buy food you eat like, the truth is, is it's a disappointment, and shaking of expectation, but it's not really the end of anything. It's just the change of, of, from what you expected to what you got, like, that's how I was thinking about my son the other day, I was like, If this ends up, like sidelining him for a long time or stopping him. He's still a really bright, happy, energetic person who's smart and like, it's, it's gonna be this one little aspect of his life that's going to be different. And I I'm not minimizing diabetes, certainly I'm as impacted by it as anybody else in my situation. But it mean, Arden got up this morning, she got in the shower, she got dressed, she went off to her high school to do some community service and, and she'll spend four or five hours there by herself. She come home. I haven't heard from her. I mean, I could pick up her thing right now. And I don't even know what her blood sugar is. But I'll look for you. It's like 97 It hasn't been over 110 In the last three hours. She's been out of here for quite some time. I don't know if she's eaten, or she hasn't eaten today.
Josh 58:41
Her life she's still doing the the Why am I blanking on it? I'm doing it as
Scott Benner 58:48
well. You want to say loop? Yeah,
Josh 58:50
she's still doing the loop.
Scott Benner 58:51
She is doing the loop right now. I am. We're, I think we're so close to Omnipod five right now, but I don't know. And so we are going to try it. And we're very hopeful for it. Just because it's less, you know, it's more off the shelf and less, you know, DIY for certain. But, uh, yeah, I mean, that's what she's doing. It's, you know, I had a long meeting yesterday, I was out of the house for four hours in the afternoon. I met them for dinner when I got there. She was having nachos like you know, they had water ice afterwards. I mean, her life doesn't look me with the exception of picking up her cell phone and pushing a couple of buttons last night. I mean, I don't see that her life looks any different than anybody else's.
Josh 59:36
And when you said he said something where it doesn't you know take anything
away you know that that's that's where that that that thing of pulling me back to when I was six and and stuff like that happens because It's been six weeks since my son has had a happy meal. Right? You know, and, and it's just those, those double Whammies, my, my, my seven year old who, you know, might guess I'm not saying she started all this, but her diagnosis started all this she's she's living the repercussions of, you know, a family member with celiac. So her diet, I'm changing some too, and just kind of learning how to appropriately deal with my own guilt of, of, you know, going and, and wanting raising gains or something like that, you know, and, and my son not being able to. So it's been those there has been a lot of day to day changes that we still have not we still haven't figured out. Let me I'm really hopeful that there might be people that might listen to this out there that can help. Because I we've talked to people or adults with celiac, but it has never been how we I haven't really found anything good about how to deal with I guess what I was just kind of talking about some of that guilt in some of the, you know, the day to day changes.
Scott Benner 1:01:32
So if if, excuse me one second. If I was you, I put myself in your shoes now. And I have all your credentials and your backgrounds, and now you're the people you help. Explain to me why. Explain to me why I can't just say to you, Josh, stop it. I know that's a weird thing. Because I understand bigger, why can't Why can't I just say, Josh, stop? isn't your fault? You didn't do this? This is the situation? Are you telling me the worst thing in the world as your kids not going to eat McDonald's? That might even be a good thing. Like, like, like, you know what I mean? Like, like, let's move on man. Like, is there something wrong with that approach?
Josh 1:02:21
That approach is a is much more of a confrontational approach. It's a reality therapy approach. It's what? I hate saying his name, but it's what Dr. Phil does. You know, and, and there's there There isn't anything wrong with that, especially if when if if someone is is stuck, you know, if it's been a long time, and they're stuck at that, yeah, that feeling that, uh, that there hasn't been any sort of change any sort of, of movement in, in, you know, their behaviors, their, their, their emotions.
Scott Benner 1:03:02
So how long? How long? Would you as a professional, how long would you say if you were treating yourself? I know, that's not how this works. But if you were seeing somebody with your situation, how long do you let them stay in this situation before you say hey, it's time to start moving?
Josh 1:03:17
That's a really good question. And I was, as I was talking, I was asking myself that because that's like, man, that's the next that's the next thing to say. Okay, how long is is is too long? And I wonder, you know, I think a very clear example would be that, if if I noticed that minor my wife's mental health is, is preventing the kids from from moving on. You know, we, we definitely, I feel like are taking it harder than doing the kids but we, you know, again, are having that longer perspective.
So, if, if we are if we're really dragging the house down, I would say that, it can be, it can be too long, but certainly like, you know,
I can tell you though, with with with depression, that when when, when individual symptoms start becoming even more of an issue, you know, like, for me, it really became sleep. Sleep has been an issue lately that you know that okay, your body is not going to be I can't handle this much longer. I need to find I need to find a way out emotionally. Yeah, so that's why I listen to corn. Yeah,
Scott Benner 1:04:57
no, I listen. I I don't think I mean, I guess there's to contextualize it in a completely farcical way. In every zombie show. The people who stand around and go, Oh my God, they're eating Katy get eaten, too. So it's the people who go up Katie's down, let's get the hell out of here. Those people are always okay. Like the people who move forward, don't stop. And don't get me wrong. Eventually, in later episodes, they're very sad. But it's just like, maybe this is a moment in your life that will feel differently in a year. Like, I think from listening to you, and from understanding your background. And from having spoken to you in the past, you have a firm grasp of what has happened here, you understand the impacts of it for your son, for your wife, for your children, for yourself. So cognitively, you have it. Now staying here is just torture after that, and are you making that decision? To feel badly a little longer? Because it feels like it's your fault? And is it because you're connecting? Having diabetes 30 years ago with having it today, which it's not like but then all of a sudden becomes like because of the celiac diagnosis? Except I don't know, man, like what are you missing with a celiac diagnosis really, like bread and pasta and like, I don't know, like, I've never looked into it. I do know, by the way for people listening that episode. 439 is part of the how we eat series, which is about being gluten free. I just want to throw a plug in there for the podcast. I'm actually really proud of the how you eat series. There's God, maybe 10 of them now. Plant based gluten free low carb, vegan carnivore flexitarian intermittent fasting keto FODMAP people who eat the Bernstein way. I'm enjoying talking to people about how they eat. But what I can tell you about every one of them is that every one of them is doing something that is in some way restrictive. And no one feels that way. Yeah. And that's, that's one of the things that's been the most fascinating about talking to them, is that from an outsider's perspective, or from a perspective of someone whose son was just diagnosed, it feels like it's all about the things you can't have. But the people who've been living it for a while, don't feel that way. And that would make me feel better. If I was you.
Josh 1:07:32
I wonder, you know, going back to control and choice, you know, and I don't know, I have not listened to those episodes. I know that my wife Listen, went back and listened to particular episodes and annuals in your, in your series of, of different things that might be helpful for the celiac diagnosis, but I want you know, I would like for I would like for me and my son, because there's, there's times just kind of seeing him to have, you know, that option.
Scott Benner 1:08:10
Does he look like you Josh?
Josh 1:08:13
Because my son look like me. Yeah, I'm a little I would say so. I think my mom would probably say so in some ways.
Scott Benner 1:08:21
I wonder if that bothers you, too. I feel like you're looking at yourself sometimes.
Josh 1:08:26
He he likes Legos. He like he likes video games. I don't think he likes corn. I don't think he's listened to it. But you know, he we are very, very similar, you know, and also it's it's one of those things where it's like you know, where the where the two boys here.
Scott Benner 1:08:47
So if your son came to you in a moment of clarity and maturity and said Dad, are you happy with your life, you will start
Josh 1:08:54
crying immediately because he asked me that.
Scott Benner 1:08:59
But what's the forget? I'll ask you overall, like, is it a good life?
Josh 1:09:12
It's been
Scott Benner 1:09:15
Yes. Okay.
Josh 1:09:17
But I don't know how long it took me to answer that question. Right and how many seconds that was because I've been in a bubble. You know, I've been I've been very, I've been very deep in that in that spiral.
For for a while. And in terms of depression, I think it's interesting that you kind of think of you know what hopeless means I have no hope. But sometimes it feels like there can be something beyond even hopeless where it's just where I guess it's almost like a like a, like a giving up any sort of idea that I have control over good or bad outcomes that are that are happening to me and my family,
Scott Benner 1:10:24
you don't have any control over it at all. It's all random. It's nothing, miss. It's just what it is. And if you are, if you're listening, I'm on a completely different level. I, you know, in the similar situation, I was telling my son last night, there were two Hallmark moments where I said, I think I should have said this too. And maybe this wouldn't have happened. And he's like, nod, but he was gonna happen anyway. And he started laying out why he thought it would happen anyway. And I think he was right. And yet, my clinician was to say, Yeah, but what if I would, and then I'm what effing. And then I'm like, this is just ridiculous. It's, it's, it's meaningless. It's fruitless. You'll never if I can't go backwards, like, I cannot go backwards. I cannot take him backwards. All I have is what we do next. And I'm either going to take him in the back, I told my wife, I said, while we were sitting there waiting for the doctor to read the MRI. I thought to myself, I know what kind of parent I am. But let me just double check in a second. Am I about to be very upset? Or am I going to be stoic and pick the best path? Because there was like a child inside of me that wanted to just cry, and just just give up? Like, he's like, just give up? You know what I mean? Like, there was a voice in my head, it was like, This is it. Get Scott, like, just let's cry and wallow and tell the kid how sorry we are, and tell him his life's changed, and it sucks. And let's really dive into it together. And then when the doctor said it, I put my hand on his shoulder, and I was like, we're gonna work this out. Like, we'll do everything we can. We'll do everything that medicine understands. And we will get you as far along this process as we can. But I wanted to just be like, Man, I'm sorry, like, and just fall into it. But I don't think we lost yet. And I don't know that. I don't know that short of dying, there is any losing. Right. There's just recalibrations and changing paths and living with the zombies. And you know, just just keep going like because there's no alternative, Josh, like, there's literally no alternative, like you're either going to like, look yourself in the mirror one day and be like, Dude, that's it man pulled together, let's go, right, or you're going to be in this space. And the longer you stay in the space, the more likely it is that your son will find this space. So if you can't do it for yourself, fake it till you make it and do it for him. Like, I don't know that. I don't know that I've ever thought about it this much before. But like that's how it occurs to me in the moment. And if that makes any sense. Also, your Texas came out a minute ago. You refer to the podcast episodes as yours. I never heard it out of you before that was the first time I heard it.
Josh 1:13:31
Yeah, yeah, my my phone now doesn't care if I type out y'all or not it. lets me do it. So I I'm in that fake it till I make it zone. Yeah. But um, you know, I was I was actually is I was realizing this the other day that when when I was younger with type one diabetes, we did not have the continuous glucose monitor. And I did not want to check my blood sugar. But you know, I kind of taught myself or, or was tight in some ways to continuously monitor how I felt. Do I feel low? Do I feel high? Am I going low? Am I going high? What do I think? What's happening to try to stave off any, you know, ups and downs that probably came, you know, even even more so, when doing carb counting but still without the continuous glucose monitor. And so I think unfortunately, that has continued on in my life when instead of instead of knowing how I'm I'm feeling I can just look and say okay, see what my blood sugar is. I'm 157 I'm actually coming and down a little bit. And And okay, so I'm still having I'm still doing that. How do I feel? How do I feel? How do I feel? How do I feel? And, you know, yeah. And I kind of realized it's it. It's it developed this anxiety feedback loop. Yeah. And before and you know, I want I want to shut it off. But it's, it made me realize that like, you know, in the morning you know, depending on how I slept, I can I feel energized Let's go, I've got these things to do. I'm going to take care of the day. And then you know, around 11 I you know, if I'm checking in myself again, it's like, oh, man, I'm not really feeling that good. Okay, maybe I need something to eat. Maybe I'm, you know, have too much caffeine. My me. I'm not proud of caffeine, all these sorts of things are going through my head to try to I guess, maybe fake it till I make it.
Scott Benner 1:16:06
You're not using an algorithm though. Right? I am. You are using a loop. Using control kill.
Josh 1:16:15
Loop. Okay. loop with the auto Bolus.
Scott Benner 1:16:20
Your children using the same thing?
Josh 1:16:22
No, no, none of them want the want the pump on?
Scott Benner 1:16:27
Okay. So they're just doing MDI those? Yeah. Okay.
Josh 1:16:31
I would love to I would love to give them the pump. But then if want to get mad
Scott Benner 1:16:36
one day, they'll ask about it. Yeah.
Josh 1:16:40
Yeah, so that takes a lot off of me until like, you know, the the cannulas, cannula or whatever, you know, comes out or whatever and then I have to come back to my own. My own health but like, also the I don't remember I was gonna go with that feedback. It just it. It keeps me I don't know what it it kind of keeps me in that probably in that what we were talking about that.
Scott Benner 1:17:19
You're in, like an anxiety feedback loop where you're like, I wonder if I'm okay, I am okay. Oh, good. I wonder if I'm okay. I'm not okay. Oh, good. But are you really but, but let's just talk like, like, there's by the way, before I ask you this question. I have thought for the last 15 minutes. I wonder how a job change would impact your personal life. I wonder if you're just too involved in how people feel.
Josh 1:17:44
I would love to make furniture and bass guitars and work with wood. For the for the rest of my life. I say that but then I'd probably get annoyed and you know, a little bit too much of a perfectionist and wouldn't be able to produce anything or something.
Scott Benner 1:18:05
You know, I mean, listen there. I know men who in in their entire life haven't had as many deep thoughts as you had in the last 25 minutes. And they just move along like a train. You know what I mean? I'm not saying that's good or bad. I'm just saying like maybe like you don't have an escape because then when you go to work you're going to delve into somebody else's thoughts and issues and then you see I'm assuming you see parallels between your personal life and how other people feel and you probably mix and match and and hold things up for assessment and there's no downtime then for that it would seem to me but anyway What the hell was my question? That was stupid of me to cut myself off everything you just said about the anxiety the feedback Oh, okay yeah I'm sorry. What's your anyone say
Josh 1:19:00
You know, that's something I again, because of of our lovely health insurance conundrum, I keep on missing this gap of getting my I have to order my labs to quest diagnostic rather than do it at the hospital and then I keep messing up and not getting it done. You know, honestly, because I value the the Dexcom information even more. Yeah. And let me pull up my clear what
Scott Benner 1:19:29
is that what is clarity? And clarity is not going to show you anyone see there? They call it something else. Now let's say yeah, I forget what it is.
Josh 1:19:50
Do GMI
Scott Benner 1:19:52
whatever that stands for cost management indicator
Josh 1:19:55
is a 6.9. Okay. The average glucose 148 standard daeviation 57, which is a little bit on the high side, but
Scott Benner 1:20:03
yeah, so do you are you forget the numbers? Are you happy with the numbers? Or do you want them to be different?
Josh 1:20:10
I'm happy with my numbers. Okay. I'm happy with my children's numbers too for the most part. Yeah, we have this really late night slash early morning rise that we are trying to, to figure out with my daughter, but the thing with their their numbers is that it's constantly changing, like we talked about with honeymooning. You know, I, I fluctuate, you know, at a plus or minus three, with their, with their receiver, you know, kind of making adjustments as we go.
Scott Benner 1:20:42
Well, well, I, my point of asking was, is if you're comfortable with where you are, why do you care about? Like, why is it an anxious thing? Like it's going the way you want to go? Like, where's the anxiety from? You see, I'm saying like, if I wanted to paint a wall blue, and I was painting it, it was blue, I wouldn't be like, Oh, my God, I'm very worried about the painting of this wall. It's working out exactly the way I thought it was going to. So your diabetes is going exactly how you thought it was going to end exactly how you want it to go. Why was it why is it upsetting to you? Or is that just your general state? And it applies to everything?
Josh 1:21:24
I think it's, I think, in the past two months, it's been the celiac part of it.
Scott Benner 1:21:32
Okay, so you're having like, you're literally having like trauma from your childhood? Around the eating, because it's been brought up to you because of your son's eating change? Yeah, yeah. All right. I don't need to charge you a copay for to make this legal die.
Josh 1:21:53
But do you? I mean, if we tried to make it legal, I think there'd be issues in terms of the the cross state boundaries. And
Scott Benner 1:21:59
I also barely got out of high school. So there might be some issues with like, regulatory commissions and things like that, too. But that's not the point. The point is that, do you think you don't need me to tell you that like, you know, this already, right. Okay. Right. So then the question is, and you haven't been listening recently, but I have a couple of different like, people coming on with with similar backgrounds to yours. And we're just talking things through diabetes wise. And one of them, Erica, I said to her, you know, we always do this stuff, right, like magazines put out lists of like, the top 10 things you're supposed to look for. And you know, we get together on podcasts and tell people what the, you know, what they should be concerned about what they should change. And so but in the end, like, can anybody really take that advice? Like, is that is that the secret part of all this, that we don't say out loud, that it doesn't matter if you know, that you're being controlled by a force that's bigger than your knowledge? Like, if you can't figure it out? Who the Who the hell can? And like, what do you say to people in this situation? Like, if you were if you were helping you, like, forget, it's you for a second, like, what do you do next?
Josh 1:23:23
There is part part of the grief process is acceptance. Right? And grief doesn't necessarily have to be someone dying. It can literally be losing your ability to go and have happy meal. Yeah, I'm using that as an example. A funny example, because called a happy meal, I didn't think about that part. So, by the
Scott Benner 1:23:55
way, if he eats it, it'll be an unhappy meal because I'm in the bathroom.
Josh 1:24:00
I didn't even add that but that's the other thing is like, he he doesn't have symptoms.
Scott Benner 1:24:04
He doesn't have you eating gluten free thing. Right?
Josh 1:24:07
So we're eating gluten free because there was there was damage to his intestine, okay, okay. In the vacancy in the endoscopy? They did they did the biopsy. But he he doesn't have at least strong you know, sick symptoms, you know? And so, instead of being like, okay, stop eating pizza and you're gonna feel better. It's just like, Nah, stop eating pizza.
Scott Benner 1:24:35
So nothing's changed for him.
Josh 1:24:37
Correct. Besides him not being able to have pizza meals. There's there's a whole bunch more, you know, like just going to Olive Garden. Granted, we don't, we wouldn't go to Olive Garden because of COVID but like getting Olive Garden to go, right? There's just things like that where How to we found our stance? But the question is like, how do you even weigh? Like? The idea of okay, my son's at a birthday party? He doesn't even have celiac symptoms. Can you just have the cake? Oh, but wait, my adult perspective is thinking, Okay, well that could put, you know, damage on his intestine, which, you know, maybe it takes him up from a 30% to a 31% chance of colon cancer at some point, you know, just
Scott Benner 1:25:32
birthday parties, this kid going to? Man not
Josh 1:25:35
not very many No, no, I should think I should think of another example.
Scott Benner 1:25:40
Like this kid's birthday party every other day. Just let them have the cake.
Josh 1:25:48
I think that's, that's what our GI doctor would also say, yeah.
Scott Benner 1:25:53
I don't want to tell you, I don't have any other thoughts that aren't fairly common sense. I don't know a lot about anything. So. I mean, that just makes sense to me. I, I would just try that if I wish you I, you know, like, I mean, listen, if if the kids 65 years old one day and ends up with some, you know, colon cells growing in a stomach, and he gets something I'm like, that's really going to be terrible. But I only got to kind of something that happens to him now. And I hate to say this, but something's got to kill him. So you know, like, like, Why ruin everything to avoid something that you might not be able to avoid anyway? Or that might not even be a concern? Because that's the I have the thing. I don't even know what it's, I don't know what it's called. I got an endoscopy. And it's this thing that can be pre cancerous, but isn't necessarily and if you know, I'll go back every three or five years or something. And if they find the cells, they'll just like, scrape them out and keep going. And, like that kind of thing. Like, I don't know, man, like, what am I gonna do? You know what I mean? Like, like, something's got to give somewhere, you can't, you can't be fortifying every direction, including up down and coming from the center constantly. Because you guys might as well just go in the garage and start the car and, you know, go to sleep like, what's the point of this? Unless you've got a mad you have an Eevee? And like, three hours later, you're like, it's just not working? I would feel I would feel really dumb. Yeah, you'd be like, God, I'm I'm distraught and stupid. What a man and
Josh 1:27:37
and I just ruined the environment, a little bit more
Scott Benner 1:27:41
electricity. Anyway, I don't think we should joke about suicide. Just want to say that right now.
Josh 1:27:48
I have a mental health condition choking him. So
Scott Benner 1:27:51
it's probably not the right thing to do is what I'm getting at. But I'm just I'm just trying to make the bigger like argument that it's possible that if you ship me, your kids, they'll have a view on them. No, I don't want my own. That's not that. Let's not be ridiculous. Okay, I just can I tell you that as we were logging onto this, my son's tuition, hit my credit card, and it popped up on my screen. So I put my son's tuition through a credit card, so I get points. So it's not like I'm not charging his college education. But I'm doing it so that I can, you know, so I get points. And it popped up. And I was mortified. Because, oh, oh, god knows, like, right before you came on. I was like, Oh, my God, this is horrible. I don't want your children I barely want my own. Don't say that. What I'm saying is, is unless your kids a big dummy, you don't think he's gonna need any secondary education after high school and then maybe handle him for a little while, but you got to send diabetes supplies. But But my point is, you know what, I've been thinking while we were talking. Listen to one podcast today, listen to art and talk about diabetes. I think it will be so incredibly 180 degrees from how you think about it, that it might help you a little bit. She doesn't think about it at all. Like ever. It's almost stunning to hear her talk about it. And I wondered if you took me those two kids and shipped them up here and lived here for a month? If you would notice that? I don't feel the way you feel. I'm a little I can be dispassionate. They're not my children. But I also I don't think about diabetes the way you do. And I understand why you think about it the way you do, like, don't get me wrong. You have a history with it. That I don't have, but also it's a personal history. I don't not have a history when you think of my friend Mike I, I literally know that diabetes can kill you if you don't manage it well. And so I have that in the back of my head constantly, and I still don't feel the way you feel. And so you could just I don't know, like maybe you can't like, don't get me wrong, but but if it's within you, you could just shift your paradigm, you could just be like, This isn't how we think about this anymore, we're gonna do this, you're gonna have a cupcake at a birthday party. And we're not going to worry about that ever. Once ever again, that is just going to happen. Some things are beyond control. And I'm going to be happy with my a one, see where it is. And I'm not going to spend every day going, how do I feel? How do I feel? How do I feel? Because you're running an algorithm, just set alarms, set alarms on your Dexcom. And if the alarms aren't going off, promise yourself not to think about your diabetes. I mean, that to me, like I don't know if that's doable, but that's the only answer. If it's gonna work. That's the only answer. Because you're not gonna. You're not gonna talk yourself out of this. Yeah, you know what I mean? Like, there's always going to be a reason to sit next year kid in office and cry and go, man, we got screwed. We really got screwed. Like, Josh, I don't know how meaningful this is the other people, but my son was throwing a baseball 92 miles an hour off the mound, five weeks before this happened. And now, he's not supposed to move his arm in a forward motion for the next eight weeks. So I don't know if it's gonna, it might work out fine. And it might not be a big deal to people who don't understand. But my kid's been playing baseball, since he's foreign. He's 21. And it's a big chunk of his life. If it goes away, he'll have to meaningfully redefine who he is.
Josh 1:31:35
And it's it's like it. It is him not having a happy meal again.
Scott Benner 1:31:42
Oh, yes. Except, except if your son ate Happy Meals, 24 hours. And when he did well, let's say,
Josh 1:31:49
you know, like, in a way, celiac, if you if you think about the foods that we have, I know that there's lots of gluten free foods out there. But if you also get into the nitty gritty, you know, with restaurants and with how gluten free foods are packaged, there's the contaminant levels and stuff like that, but that's much more than the nitty gritty. And I know there's lots of gluten free stuff, but my we live in a a wheat based society. You know, it would be an interesting idea if, you know, if we went back, you know, 1000s of years and kind of encouraged rice more than we there's so much stuff,
Scott Benner 1:32:37
or you can just put him in front of a deer and let him not like a weed man. Yeah. Listen, I'm going to give you some advice from a classic film, The Lost World Jurassic Park, where they said don't go into the long grass. So you got to stay out of the weeds a little bit. Yeah, you know, stay out of the wheat. Yeah, stay out of the wheat because the kid doesn't even have any symptoms. So, I mean, you found out because he has diabetes and because people tested which I don't think is bad information to have, but I don't know that it feels actionable at this moment. You know, like, I mean, if you want to avoid, listen, if I'm you, based on my experiences, I'd avoid processed foods. Listen, forget Josh. All you listening. You want some great advice? Eat as few processed foods as you can. Try not to take in too many processed oils either. Your life will be better. That that's all like you're you're focused on one thing cupcake, it's what it's not the food. Like if you if your son never ate a cupcake in his entire life, it wouldn't matter and he wouldn't care it's it's your it's the meaning that you're attaching to the food wow, I didn't realize this. This should be a whole episode about food. It's the meaning that you're attaching to the food that's the problem not the food. Right? Yeah, yeah. It's It's meaningless like it's literally just a it's a false idol like the cupcakes a false idol for you. It's something that you're you're ascribing more meaning to than it exists. And I mean, people will be like, oh, there's great celiac you know, friendly cupcakes and I'm sure there is by the way, but who cares? Like never eat a cupcake again? Like what is it? Like why would that matter even you're not thinking about this right? You need more context you need a zombie chase you you really do what you need something where you're just like, oh, hell I don't give let's get out of here.
Josh 1:34:37
You're right yeah, um, it but it's, it's tell a seminar that I guess a three year old and a 10 year old. Never eat a cupcake
Scott Benner 1:34:48
again. I tell you something, let me write down the time here because off to go back and delete this out. I wouldn't tell him I grew up in this 70s My father never one time explained anything that was happening to me. He didn't even he didn't even care how I felt the tiniest little bit. Is that right? It is not. But it's just it's also not wrong. Sometimes make some time. He's 10 Man, stand in front of them and be like, Listen, brother. No more sucks, right? We're not doing it. Three weeks from now, you will never remember. Let it go. We're out here. Let's move on to something else and get out of here. And don't ever Don't tell him anything. Like I this is probably completely backwards to your training. But oh, yeah.
Josh 1:35:32
Oh, yeah, totally. And to all the in, in antithetical to our parenting style, and who he is as a person. I can do that to my three year old. Yeah, cuz she's not gonna remember. She's not gonna remember good times and gluten. So, yeah, well, while
Scott Benner 1:35:49
I was lamenting with my wife the other night about how I worry about everybody. I told her, I was like, I'm less. It's funny. I'm less worried about the children than I am about you. And she goes, why? And I said, Well, I met you as an adult, I never got to tell you what to do. And she's like, what I'm like, so I backed up. And I said, parenting to me is a little bit like bumping and nudging with insulin, like so. To me, it's you, you have control of people when they're younger. And so you can point them in a general direction, like, and you can pick the direction, this is a good direction for them. And then if they start veering away, you can kind of just like, stand behind them, and just kind of nudge him back a little bit. Oh, head back that way. Don't talk to Katie, I think she's gonna do heroin one day, like, you know what I mean, like a little bit of that stuff, and you just kind of Oh, not that boy over here, you know, and you just you do that a little bit a little nudging a little bumping, and you don't do it like that. It's not out loud. It's sort of, you know, I mean, if you don't see yourself a little bit like a puppet master is apparent. I don't I don't know what you're thinking. But you've got a little bit of a little bit of control over what they think about what they care about. And so you nudge them around. And I said, with you, I said, there are things like not that this wouldn't be true of everybody, or that somebody couldn't do it for me. But I said for my wife, I was like, there have been times, where if you would have taken my advice, you'd be better off now. And she goes, Well, I agree with that. I was like, okay, cool. I was like, but I can't help you. Like, you're beyond help. Like you're an adult, you have your own thoughts, and I can't bump and nudge you. Every time I bump you you swap my handle, I guess your son's only 10. Man. You could just point him in the right direction and be like, This is it man, this is the world in front of us like that other stuff over there. That doesn't exist. So we're not going to look at that anymore. And before you know it, he wouldn't care. But he wouldn't think about it anymore. I just don't think there's people on the walking dead or missing cupcakes. As I'm saying. And I know that's a completely made up thing. But it's it's also if I took you guys out in the woods and left you there and you couldn't find your way back. I mean, you'd have about 1000 thoughts before. Can you believe there's no cupcake today? Like and maybe the worst thing that's ever happened to you is the worst thing that's ever happened to
Josh 1:38:04
you. I guess these are the same boys that grew up playboys.
Scott Benner 1:38:07
Well, playboys and dinosaurs apparently. Listen, I gotta just ask you a question. How old are you?
Josh 1:38:16
36 about 3036.
Scott Benner 1:38:18
So you were 1620 years ago in 1981? No, 1991 Yeah, when I was like 10 years old, it was 1981. And the biggest mistake we ever made in my life. We found those 30 books in the in the woods, is I gave them to my dad. I was like, We found these and I don't think we should keep them. You know, after we left them, we gave them to him. And now I realized as an adult, he was probably like, ah, free nudie books. Cool. I don't know whatever happened to them. But apparently there were like, you know how kids drink in the woods? Hmm, I guess they I'm gonna have to write the time down again. Hold on a second. 33 I guess they off in the woods. I don't know. I never did. But I mean, I couldn't think of any other reason now. Looking back while they were there. Aren't you happy with the internet as a child?
Josh 1:39:25
That's, that's an interesting thought. I never really thought about that. I know. How pregnant is this? But my friend said he had a naked picnic in the woods once with somebody not by himself. So I don't know.
Scott Benner 1:39:39
We'd like a friend or like a. It was a female friend a sexual acquaintance. Okay.
Josh 1:39:46
I don't I don't think anything happened. They just closed off and ate lunch? I guess so. I don't I don't know. Honestly, I
Scott Benner 1:39:53
don't think it was gluten free. I want your son to be able to do it. Sure. Oh my god. Yeah, go ahead. I'm sorry.
Josh 1:40:07
I was gonna I was gonna start thinking about like the price of gluten free food and, and all that sort
Scott Benner 1:40:12
of stuff so expensive. My goodness. And when I had to eat gluten free for a month so the doctors could check something. I gained weight too. Because but this was different. Because I in my mind, I commingled gluten free with healthier. Yeah, I was like I can eat as much as I wanted this is gluten free. Turns out that was not the that's not the case.
Josh 1:40:35
It certainly can be because it's interesting. So it really kind of pushes things out to the edges because gluten free can be met Mediterranean style, fresh vegetable, you know, sort of food. Or it could be a super processed foods that Oh, you have to add this and this and this weird thing and this weird thing to make it chewy, kind of like there would be gluten in it. Right? So
Scott Benner 1:41:03
yeah, do Jake I just want you to get the kid a bunch of barbecue and be done with it.
Josh 1:41:08
I mean, we certainly do that. And and things would be a whole heck of a lot easier if we lived in Austin. We're about an hour away from Austin. Because, you know, Austin is the land of trendy eating.
Scott Benner 1:41:23
Yeah, no kidding. There would be more options, I guess. Well, how about this? I thought of this earlier. Like, maybe you guys should learn to cook.
Josh 1:41:32
I've got great beans and rice going right now. So it's my wife's recipe.
Scott Benner 1:41:36
Nice. Yeah, I mean, I just listen, man. Here's the truth. Is is gonna be okay. And if it's not, you're stopping it from being okay. That's it. I don't see any I don't see any way around. That being the truth. Do you?
Josh 1:41:53
I mean, it's going to be okay. Because it has to be okay.
Scott Benner 1:41:55
Yeah. Right. It is just going to be okay. I listen. I I'm I'm adopted. Someone had me and gave me a way. And then I was adopted by people who got divorced. And my father left on my 13th birthday. We lived on $70 worth of food a week. It was me and my two brothers. And my mom. At one point it got so bad the State offered to take her children off her hands for her. She declined. I thought I was going to live you've heard me talk a lot, right? I thought I was going to work in a sheetmetal shop my entire life. Like that was no one educated me. No one had any hope. For me. The idea was go to school because the state makes you and then go get a job with your uncle and pay attention. And maybe I'll let you run a machine one day and pay us some extra money. Like that was my whole life. That was the entirety of my expectations. I had to teach myself to drive when I was 13 because we couldn't go get food. And my mom didn't drive. So we took in a border to make an extra $50 a month. And this guy had a car which I am certain was not registered or insured that I taught myself how to drive when I was 13. I lived through my mom deciding one night that drinking would be her way out. And I stopped her. My mom went bankrupt when I was a kid and I facilitated the bankruptcy. I was like 15 years old. I never thought I would have two nickels to rub together. Never. And then I met a girl who saw me and not my situation. And that allowed me to dream about more stuff. And then today, as crazy as it sounds, because we've said a lot of stupid things on here. I make the most popular diabetes podcast in the world. And it helps so many people that if I told you how many people it helps, it would embarrass me. And if I look back on my life prior to that, how could I have expected any of this to happen? And the only thing I can tell you the only thing I can believe that got me from where I was to where I am, is that I wake up every day incredibly hopeful, even when is really, really going wrong. And there have been times in my life where it has been going really really wrong. And so I don't know another way where if my way helps anybody else. But to me, we're all running from zombies. And if you stopped to see what happened to Katie, it's gonna happen to you next. And they're very well maybe something better over the ridge. So you're either gonna die here or keep going might as well keep going. Got nothing else to do. That just to me like life feels like that. It just feels like walking forward. And sometimes you're, you know, you're walking into a field of flowers. And sometimes you walk into a, a bunch of weeds and you start thinking about the calorie counts of celiac items in the grocery store. And I just think that you can't stand still. Like, that's it. And you're such a smart, thoughtful person, like I am. In the two times that we've spoken, I have found myself equally, very much liking you, finding you incredibly affable, and smart and feeling. And then there's part of me that feels badly that you you're stuck in your own head. And that that's it, and you don't deserve to be felt badly for. Like, that isn't who you are. In my estimation, of course, a person has known you for three hours. But
Josh 1:45:57
I like the way that you just put in you know, I don't because I don't want I don't want people to feel you know, badly for me. And I don't I don't want to feel badly for me. So why would why would I feel badly for me if I didn't want people to feel badly for me? And I think that take away of that thinking about okay, how long is too long? To to sit and stew before the zombies get me? Which by the way, do you have something against Katie's? is like the third Katie. The name
Scott Benner 1:46:38
that popped up the first time and I just wanted consistency.
Josh 1:46:43
That's all and me too. Yeah, no. More of a more of like a chat or a cooper. They get eaten.
Scott Benner 1:46:51
Yeah. Yeah, I don't I don't I don't like the pretty boys in the monster movies aren't aren't really my style. So I in my mind, by the way, Katie is in a tied up top. It's plaid and she's wearing cut off shorts, just so everybody knows where I'm at.
Josh 1:47:05
Gotcha. So, and just kind of, you know, sometimes that hope part where you like you said you, I would imagine that. You know, in the past 20 years, there's been mornings that you haven't you woke up, you've woken up without the hope that you're talking about. And I guess, remembering that there are days that feel like that. But keep the scales tipped towards hope. Yeah. towards towards thinking about, you know, that my son will have the, you know, the most popular something. diabetes and celiac podcast, right? Conjoined together, or something like that?
Scott Benner 1:47:57
Something? I mean, he's going to have something you don't I mean, listen, on those days, when I wake up, I think to myself, Yo, man, you gotta go. Like, it's time, like, you made babies. You promised that girl, like, go do it. You know, go do it right now. And I get up. I just don't, I don't know one other way. But I grew like, but my existence right now around diabetes, and you know, thyroid and these other issues that people in my family have my my iron thing, like all of that. Compared to how I lived when I was a child, this is a fairy tale. So I have something worse to imagine. And I wonder if you just don't have something worse to imagine. I feel like I do. Do you. But your thing is so connected to your kid though? Yeah. Like, it would be hard for me to like, this is gonna be an extreme thing. But like, you know, I have I'd have a hard time thinking that a Holocaust survivor would be held down by a celiac diagnosis. Yeah, like that kind of a feeling. They'd be like, you just can't have bread. But, like, they have context that I mean, I think of them as people who have contacts more than anybody really on the planet. But even as they are getting older, and there's fewer of them. But I mean, that's a thing. Like I said to somebody the other day, like how can we be a country of people who won World War Two. And so few decades later, be genuinely oppressed by a person we barely know, on Facebook saying something that may or may not be focused at us that we think is focused at us. Like how did that happen? Like how did we go from and I just think that it's it's, it's experiences and and what your what you know, is the bottom and when what you know is the bottom is that your iPhone battery drains faster than you wished it would. Then suddenly, you know someone on Facebook, it's like, I hate it when my friends are not supportive of me and you go, Oh God, I think she means me. She means me. I feel badly, I should call it like, like, I just go back to somebody who lived through the Depression. I was like, you know, your neighbor doesn't like you. And they be like, what? I don't care. No time for that. I'm considering eating a cat today. You don't I mean, like, that's just, we, we don't have that anymore. Our ceiling is so over our head with our expectations. And we don't know anything, nothing bad happens. And not that I'm not minimizing it. Celiac is terrible. diabetes is terrible. Thyroid is terrible. But there's a woman in the community right now that just found out she has brain cancer. And I bet she takes some celiac over that you don't mean and like, but being able to hear that and then making making that meaningful to you. That's the piece about mental health, that I have been fascinated by why I've been making this podcast the entire time, because you are not stopping yourself on purpose. I know that. And me explaining the common sense side of it is valueless to you, I know that tau is a very it's such a confusing problem, like, like anything to do with your brain and how it kind of gets in your own way. Sometimes it's an incredibly confusing problem. And I have nothing but like the greatest amount of empathy for people who are impacted by it in any way at all. I don't know if talking about it helps people or not, I really don't. But there's part of me that thinks that this is a an immense waste of time. And I don't like feeling that way.
Josh 1:51:55
I think. And it's definitely my profession. But I think talking about it is the is always at least the the start of, of helping the problem.
Scott Benner 1:52:09
Yeah, I hope so. I've just, I'm up to have interviewed, I think I've interviewed three people with bipolar disorder now and type one diabetes, or people who have been addicted to hard drugs, people who've been abused. I've gone through real, like real issues in their life. And you get to the end of those conversations, and just like, Where's the light here? You know? What is it that what is the best they can hope for and for you, like the best seems really great. It's the getting you to hope for part that seems like the impediment. But I mean, the best I can say to you, and maybe this will end up being backfiring is like you don't want to be the reason why your son feels like this one day. And that'll that'll crush him. Like, you look back and you see this feeling in him when he's 25. And you're going to blame yourself. And whether that's fair or not, you don't deserve to go through that. So I hope you can do something now that stops you from feeling that way in the future. You know, I don't know what my hope does for you. But I'm hopeful for you. So yeah, you know,
Josh 1:53:22
that's an that's a, I guess, a consistent standard that I tried to keep going, where I don't want to be the I don't want to be the hurdle that my kid has to jump over.
Scott Benner 1:53:39
Yeah. Me either. And I, I struggled for the first, probably 10 years of being a parent with like, my reactions to like how to handle things were so rooted in how my dad treated me. And I would stop myself but it was still like there all the time. Like, you know, you just like, you know, for the first couple of, you know, years like they did something wrong. Like in my mind, I was like smack them. That's the right thing to do. That's what I would have got somebody would have smacked me. And then I'm like, No, that's not right. But it still popped in my head. And I'm proud to tell you that there was a day where it stopped popping into my head. I was like, wow, I broke like I broke a circle. You know, I mean, I was really proud of myself. I was like I can't believe that's not it doesn't come to me anymore. Like I wasn't doing it but I am also not a person who's never like black their kid on the button. You know, like I've I've definitely done that and it was to the such lesser degree that it was done to me but just I think breaking those circles as possible. Just takes a lot of help like a lot of practice and you can't give up and it's also helpful if somebody there for you. Like if you're if you tell your wife to look for things and you know, say a code word when she sees you going down a path or something like that and like anything like that, you know, they can kind of because you're really just trying to reprogram your mind Right. What about that, um, I'm gonna let you go after this. We've been doing this forever. But what is that? I therapy that people keep telling me about?
Josh 1:55:08
EMDR Yeah, I'm motor desensitization something or other, it's for PTSD. Typically, I wonder if they've been trying to do research into other sorts of things where it really is kind of like that reprogramming your mind and, you know, finding ways of accessing. I guess that more internal automatic thoughts sort of part of your brain by using these eye movements to kind of go make you go from left brain derived brain? I think that's my understanding of it. I, I would love to have training on it, but it's expensive. And I don't I would not have any use for it in my current position. So. I don't know. But, but that's but retraining your mind, like you said, is, is you know, is kind of a key tenet of cognitive behavioral therapy is something that a lot of people have heard of, and just doing, you know, reframing those automatic thoughts, you know, today is not going to be a day, today is going to be an OK Day. And, and giving yourself reasons of why that is, you know, and, and making those reasons, more forthright than the reasons why it might be the day.
Scott Benner 1:56:42
Yeah, I gotcha. Well, listen, I love talking to you. I hope you have a ton of success. I hope you come back on a year from now and you're like Sky
Josh 1:56:52
is great. Let's make this a weekly thing. I mean, I'm getting a lot out of it. Yeah, no, no,
Scott Benner 1:56:58
I can't do this for you. I'm very busy. A lot going on. But I don't I don't. I don't not agree. Like I think the Talking is super healthy and, and important for people listening or for yourself even. And, you know, I'm glad you were willing to do this. You're very open minded. I know I say things that fly in the face of your professional training sometimes. And you're just so affable and, and lovely to talk to. So I appreciate your time.
Josh 1:57:28
I appreciate your time. Yeah, good
Scott Benner 1:57:30
luck with your kids, man. And, and everything else. I seriously, if you're if your wife like hits you in your sleep or something, just let her do it. It's probably you probably
Josh 1:57:40
our I'm gonna go hug my kids and apologize to my wife right now. Are you really thinking about it? Yeah,
Scott Benner 1:57:46
yeah. I could use good, Josh. Not that you're, you're not here. But I mean, don't get me wrong. I don't want to have a naked picnic or anything like that. But I if you were here, I would definitely hug you when we were done.
Josh 1:57:59
Maybe, you know, maybe there's a neighbor over some, you know, that I could pick with? No, I was thinking just a hug. If you wanted to ask them to that you
Scott Benner 1:58:09
could Kelly's downstairs. I'll hug her. And she'll be like, Oh, God, what did you guys talk about? I actually have a neighbor who is and I don't want to use clinical terms and correctly but batshit crazy. It's no, it's a, I don't think hugging them would be a great idea
Josh 1:58:26
to get a BSc. It's not in the DSM maybe it should be
Scott Benner 1:58:31
at when I run out of diabetes, things to talk about one day, I will talk for an hour about the people who live across the street from my house. Let me just leave you with this teaser in case that ever does happen. 3am trimming the grass with kitchen chairs. That's all just let it let it resonate.
Josh 1:58:49
I'm not a horticulturist, or any sort of lawn care professional, but I can't imagine any reasons of being out in the line at 3am.
Scott Benner 1:58:57
I think and I don't mean to make light of it, honestly. But I think that might be something we're quieting some voices or something's going on. But they've done so many, like Addams Family level things since I've lived here that it's actually not funny. If I made them a character in a sitcom. You'd be like, Oh, it's over the top. They overrode that. And I wouldn't have to. I wouldn't have to gild the lily at all. telling them stories and you just be like, That's not believable. Yeah. Okay. Anyway, I'll stop this recording. And I'll tell you something that will make you laugh before you go. Okay. Thank you for doing.
First, a huge thanks to Josh for him. First, a huge thanks to Josh for coming back on the show and continuing to tell his story. Again, so bravely and honestly, I really appreciate it. Thank you, Josh. Thanks also to Dexcom makers of the Dexcom G six continuous glucose monitor, go to dexcom.com Ford slash juice box to learn more get started, or to get your hands on that Hello Dexcom kit that gives you a free 10 day trial of the Dexcom G six go find out if you're eligible. And to learn more about the Omni pod dash and to see if you're eligible for that 30 day trial, go to omnipod.com forward slash juicebox. I'm going to run out of music. I'll be ready. I just did it. Why don't I just talk right over now I feel silly. Don't forget also to learn more about on the pod five, which was just cleared by the FDA the other day. To learn more about it right to the to find out more about on the pods. Newest system, their automated delivery system. They call it an AI D automated insulin delivery. I mean, it's it's magical, and you should go check it out. Episode 620. We talk about it front to back top to bottom, you're going to understand everything about it when you're done. Well worth your time if you haven't heard it. Thank you so much for listening. I'll be back soon with another episode of The Juicebox Podcast. This may have been the longest episode ever. If you're actually still listening at two hours in one minute, let me tell you that I think you would really enjoy the private Facebook group for the podcast Juicebox Podcast type one diabetes has over 20,000 members
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