vorsprung durch technik

A few weeks after L was diagnosed, I was eating lunch at IKEA with a friend. A young family sat down at the table behind me and suddenly, through the ambient noise and chatter of the restaurant, I heard these words as if they were said using a loudspeaker: "Oh, you're low. Do you feel low? Here, have some juice." It was so surreal; I actually thought I was imagining things.

Picture this: One day, someone informs you that you have to learn how to speak German. Fluently. And if you don't, Bad Things Will Happen. And you're like, "Bzuh? German? Never really thought I'd have to learn that but...okay?" And everyone is telling you, "German is not as hard as you think und bevor Sie es kennen, sind Sie ein Fachmann" and you're all, "Um, what?" But sure enough those people were right, and before you know it you're sprechender Deutscher like nobody's business. And one day, you're at a restaurant, surrounded by people who never give German a second thought and through the buzz of regular conversation you hear the person behind you speaking German but you think, "There is no possible way that person is actually speaking German, I mean, maybe I am mistaken" but before you can stop yourself you are turning around in your chair and saying, "I am sorry to interrupt, but I couldn't help but overhear, IS THAT GERMAN YOU WERE SPEAKING?"

Well, that's what happened in IKEA a couple of months ago. The family behind me was speaking my language. And not only that, but they'd been fluent for like two years. They told me about a group of people who meet every month to share ideas to make speaking German a natural part of your daily lives and if you don't mind, I'm gonna drop the foreign language metaphor because I have no clue how I'm going to work insulin pumps into the whole sprechen Sie Deutsch gimmick.

So yeah, this young family in the IKEA restaurant postponed eating their tasty meatballs to tell me about a local support group for families living with diabetes. There is a meeting this weekend, and it happens to be the annual vendor expo as well, so not only will L hopefully meet some kids her age with T1D, but she'll also get a chance to check out the different kinds of insulin pumps on the market. Since our insurance does not cover pumps until six months after diagnosis, she won't be able to try them out for real until February at the earliest, but at least this will give us an idea of our options. Needless to say, we're all pretty excited about it.

Also this weekend, we will finally get around to taking our Christmas decorations down. I'll be happy to see them go, even though they look pretty cool in the snow.



Stay warm! :)