June 14, 2020 • 56 mins
Two dads of T1D daughters, on a podcast, trying to figure it all out. Well, actually, THREE dads this episode.
While Alan sets the financial world to rights, Mark hosts our first ever Dad Panel. We’re delighted to welcome to the show fellow T1D dads Rob Namnoum and Steven Truitt. The three dads share their experiences, highlighting similarities in their kids T1D stories to date, as well as those divergences that make the Diabetic lifestyle so 'interesting' and keeps us parents on our toes!
Please do check out our wonderful Dads and Diabetes show sponsors...
Glucose Revival @ https://glucoserevival.com/
Dia-Be-Tees @ www.Dia-Be-Tee.com
While Alan sets the financial world to rights, Mark hosts our first ever Dad Panel. We’re delighted to welcome to the show fellow T1D dads Rob Namnoum and Steven Truitt. The three dads share their experiences, highlighting similarities in their kids T1D stories to date, as well as those divergences that make the Diabetic lifestyle so 'interesting' and keeps us parents on our toes!
Please do check out our wonderful Dads and Diabetes show sponsors...
Glucose Revival @ https://glucoserevival.com/
Dia-Be-Tees @ www.Dia-Be-Tee.com
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:21):
I just want to remind you,guys, this is just me and Mark
telling stories and that nothing that wesay here is intended to be medical a
basis is strictly from our point ofview as two dads telling the stories of
our T one D kiddos. Wealso want our listeners to know that we
try to maintain a perspective recognizing them. Whatever Alan and I or our families
are dealing with, it doesn't amountto a hill of beans compared to that
(00:42):
which our daughters or anyone diagnosed withtype one diabetes has to contend with on
a day to day basis. Welcometo Dad's and Diabetes. Just two dads
and T one D kiddos on apodcast trying to figure it all out.
Although we don't have two dads ona podcast today, at least you don't
(01:04):
have the same two dads that youcome to expect. We have one of
them of course here. I amHey, it's Mark, no Alan today.
Unfortunately, he has been absolutely slammedat work, as you can imagine
with the whole coronavirus chaos that's beenhappening. With Alan being in the financial
markets. He is working Morning NewmanNTE right now, and so he'll be
(01:26):
producing this episode, but unfortunately wewon't have the benefit of his dulcet tones.
However, we're not going to shortyou with just one dad. In
fact, we're going to up theante. We're going to give you three.
Today is our first ever dad panel. We've been talking about doing this
for a while and even though Alancouldn't join, he told me to go
(01:47):
ahead and get it done. Hewas excited to hear this episode, and
so I am excited to introduce twodads to new dads to our listeners,
at least of t one d kidosjoined today by Rob Namnum and Stephen Truett.
Hey, guys, how's it going. I'm doing all right, yourself?
(02:07):
Not too bad? Yeah, that'sdoing pretty good. Lead to be
here. So the first voice youheard there was Rob. And Rob is
in Colorado. Stephen, where areyou? Oh? Where a huh?
About a hour and a half outsideof Atlanta. I'm in Columbus, Georgia.
Okay, very good. So soyou're on the Eastern time zone right,
(02:28):
yes, just barely? Yeah,okay, So I think this might
be the first time we've got apodcast with three different time zones. Whoa
oh, Wow, that's crazy.We have Eastern represented, Central and of
course Mountain where Rob's at. Hey, Rob, let's go ahead and start
with you. So tell us alittle bit about yourself. Those those of
(02:49):
our listeners from Colorado may be familiarwith your unique name, Rob Namnum.
It's not one you can easily forget. But for those of our listeners aren't,
it's familiar with you. Tell usa little bit about what you do
well. I work at a TVstation in Colorado Springs, the ABC affiliate
Kardio TV News Channel thirteen. AndI've been doing sports there for twenty years.
(03:10):
And I'm originally from the East Coastfrom Hartford, Connecticut. And yeah,
I've been out here for two decadesand don't think I'm leaving. And
Rob is a legend. So allthe time I lived in Colorado, he
was my favorite sports journal, favoritesports casting. Has a great sense of
humor, he does an amazing job, and he's loved in the community.
(03:34):
So awesome to Rob. Thank you. I'm good to be And finally,
now, Stephen, tell us abit about yourself. I know a little
less about you, but you areperhaps one of our most fervent listeners.
You are one of those guys whoengage with us regularly on social media,
which Alan and I always appreciate.But tell our listeners a little bit about
yourself. M not a famous asa famous TV people, but I uh
(04:01):
that of three we'll get into alittle bit later. My oldest as well.
He is the one that is diagnosed. UM that I work for a
large insurance company. UM. Usuallyall out today is says I worked for
the Duck and everybody knows who Iworked for. UM. No, just
trying to figure this all out,like you guys say, And I mean,
(04:21):
I think I think one reason I'mso I follow you guys so much
is because all of the stuff thatyou've talked about so far is it's it's
my life, it's what we liveso um. And that's why I wanted
to reach out about my diagnosis story, was it's it's the one thing that's
pretty different from a lot of others. So we don't why don't we start
with that? So Steven, whydon't you kick us off? I want
(04:43):
to hear both of your diagnosis storiesbecause you oftentimes it's commonality, right,
And when we become ons talking aboutRob's story here in a couple of minutes.
I'm actually going to share a storyof my own. Um Uh.
Even though Rob and I aren't reallyconnected in terms of our diagnosis stories,
there is a connection and I'll comeon tight in just a secon here.
But Stephen, um, you knowyou you mentioned the fact that they were
also differences. Right, everybody goesthrough goes through a slightly different experience.
(05:06):
So why don't you go ahead andshare yours out? Okay? Um,
So the story that I'm used tohearing a lot is, um, kid
get sick or wasn't feeling right andgo to the hospital, go the doctor,
and then they're quote unquote diagnosed andthen they're sent to either into phrenologists
or emergency room or something like that. So, um, four years ago,
(05:27):
almost to the day, um today, Um, my oldest will he
was lieutenant at the time, andI was steel a little sick. We
thought it maybe the flu and gethis stomach bug. But he was playing
baseball at the time, and um, it was just lagging. He didn't
want to hustle, he wasn't beinghis normal self. And um they were
on spring break. So my wifeworks at a school, so she said,
(05:51):
you know, if you're not feelingbetter in the morning, we're gonna
we're gonna take in at the urgentcare. And he woke up, of
course, throwing it up, notfeeling not be on himself. So they
went to the urgent care. Iwent to work, UM, and I
get a call. They went inabout nine. I get a call about
ten o'clock and said that he theythink he's a type one diabetic and I
(06:15):
can look back now and my firstresponse was, but he's not overweight,
um, and that that just showsthat, you know, we we don't
know what we don't know, um, because at the you know, at
that time, I didn't know therewas a type of one versus type two.
I didn't know all the differences that, you know. Really, the
first thing I popped in my mindwas, you know, Wilford Brimley on
TV talking about the beds, andI'm like, no, he can't.
(06:38):
That's how it works. So theyfor some reason, they did the flu
test. They did everything like negative. So they decided to do a urine
test and his pleasure came back aboutseven fifty wow. So and that's that's
when the doctor brought my wife Karenout into the hallway and said, we
(06:59):
need to talk about this for amoment. So that's kind of how we
were introduced to talk one diabetes.So Karen called me. I was there
within probably twenty minutes, and wespent the next four or five hours,
for lack of a better term,being educated, but looking back, it
wasn't really being educated. Yeah,we were told how to how to give
(07:23):
an injection and how to kind ofcount carbs and you know, what the
numbers should be, what they shouldlook like. But after about five or
six hours at the urgent care,we were sent home. We were told
to go home and then follow upwith it in new chronologists. So the
(07:43):
problem was this was on a Thursday. This was March twenty fourth, twenty
sixteen. That following weekend was Easterweekend. So the plans were to go
visit my parents six hours away,and the doctor said, you know,
there's really if you follow these steps, you will be okay. You know,
we still again we don't know whatwe didn't know. Um, so
(08:05):
we decided to go. We decidedto take that six hour drive and um
Karen stayed here. She she foundsomebody that has a local diabetes page and
she connected with her, which wasprobably a godsend. I mean that was
very emotional, but those two connectingkind of brought it, brought it down
a notch. And it helped becausethe next day, on Friday, Karen
(08:28):
called an inner chronologist and they said, we can't see you for two months.
You know, we're swam pack befull. There's no way you're gonna
be able to get in um.And then after Karen met with this person,
Wendy, Wendy with all the workthat she does, she called the
innerchrenologist and they were able to seeus on Monday. So, um,
(08:48):
when we get to the innochronologists,I mean their JOLLI just dropped. Why
did they send you away? Youknow you should have that. We we
didn't know to say, hey weshouldn't we go to the emergency? Should
we do this? We were justlike okay, So they sent us away
with I want to say, aninsolin pin um, a blood checker,
(09:11):
and then some alcohol swamps. Wow. So I mean we we really I
made the drive, me and thethree boys made that six hour drive and
we would stop at like a reststop, and I'm just thinking the whole
way, you know, what whatdo we do? You know what I
don't want to do the wrong thingand you know, have will found or
have to rush him to the burgencyroom or you know, can't you eat
(09:33):
this? Or can you eat head? Or um. I mean every time
we would stop or he would havea stack or something, I would just
I would just kind of stare athim, like, how do you feel?
Okay, you're good? Yeah,And that was probably the longest weekend
I've ever had because I didn't knowwhat to think. You know, I
didn't know how Karen was doing backhome because now she's in a house by
(09:54):
herself. She's you know, notalways that good. But it's um,
yeah, it's it's a spery thatyou don't know what you don't know.
And uh yeah. When we didget to the interochronologist, like I said,
they were a little surprised and umbut they were great. They they
explained everything to us. They gotus on a dext com and a teas
(10:16):
lamb with then with them probably acouple of weeks. Wow, that's now,
that's that's something we look back andsay, that's really positive. That
yeah, that absolutely because some peopleare saying they've had to wait for a
long time, months, months,time, We lucked out on that one.
And I mean, just to kindof fast forward a bit, we
started the control like you here acouple of weeks ago. Okay, well
(10:39):
come onto that. Yeah that's beenamazing. So yeah, yeah, we'll
come onto that. Yeah. Ican't imagine having to go a whole weekend
like that. I remember doing theshort drive in Colorado Springs to Denver,
which was less than an hour,and I think I was looking at my
shoulder the entire time I was driving, staring at my daughter. Yeah,
like I'm gonna be able to monitorher blood sugar levels, you know,
by sight or something. I don't. Um, that's that's insane. That's
(11:01):
insane. So Rob talked to usabout Grace, who, of course I
know somewhat. But tenas Hes story, well, first of all, that's
Stephen's stories in Kinder goes to showyou, and this a little bit later,
how little even people in the medicalfield know about diabetes. And I
(11:26):
was just like Stephen, when um, eventually Grace was diagnosed with type one,
I was like, well, it'snot my family, you know.
I was ignorant. I didn't knowanything about it. In fact, my
sister in law we knew she haddiabetes, but much like Stephen said,
I didn't realize there was type oneand type two, and we didn't even
(11:46):
know she had type one well anyway, so it was about it would be
three years. Next is when Gracewas diagnosed. She was nine years old,
and she loves Easter. It's favoriteholiday. And Grace is a very
charismatic, very joyful child. Andlong story short, my sister was visiting
(12:11):
from the East Coast and she hadn'tyou been out here in fifteen years or
what have you? And she washere with her fiancee. And so starting
on Friday, Grace started to havesome of the symptoms, you know,
her stomach hurt, she was reallydehydrated, and she is a child who's
(12:33):
not a huge fan of water.And one of the first things I remember
was my son came home from baseballpractice and it was warm that day and
he drank about halfways wat and hewas coming outside because we were getting inside
because it was a nice day inour backyard, and he had half the
bottle off the port on the grassinstead of you know, just wasting it.
(12:54):
And Grace said, Robbie, isthat is that? Is there water
there? And he said yeah,and it was warm. You know,
I've been sitting out in the sun, and she took it and she chugged
it. I thought, man,that's really weird. And during that time
that we've been sitting outside, likeshe was drinking gatorade or what have you,
(13:15):
and she just couldn't get enough.And anyway, so we get to
Saturday and she's feeling worse and we'renot really quite sure if she just has
like a stomach bug or what's goingon. Then Easter comes Sunday morning,
and you know, the Easter bunnycomes and hides the eggs and we you
know, comes and hides him inour backyard, and you know, a
(13:35):
typical Easter for Grace's getting out ofa six am and it's excited as much
like a child on Christmas. Shecan't wait to find all the eggs.
And she's just kind of drudging along, no enthusiasm, and that doesn't have
the same you know, vigor thatshe has for life. And I was
like, man, there's something wrongwith Grace. So that night we have
(13:56):
dinner. She barely eats. She'sin a room and I think she had
gotten I think she had vomped ittwice so of course, now we had
called the doctor, we'd set somethingup for Monday morning, and me and
my wife and I are not sleepingat all. You can't. And the
other thing is Grace had been amodel of health like up to that point
(14:18):
and really had ever gotten sick.So we it's like two in the morning,
and my wife and I think we'rejust keeping an eye on Grace.
I think she had gotten sick onemore time. And so all of a
sudden, we just kind of turnedto each other and and my wife said,
I think she might have diabetes.And I was like, that's crazy.
I was thinking the same thing.Weird, And back to my sister,
(14:45):
like Grace was kind of baking herenthusiasm for life the whole time my
sister was there. That's how Iknew something was offered her. You just
know your kid, right. Yeah. So anyway, I so nine appointment,
going to the doctor. She's stillfeeling like you know what. And
I'm just like, oh, man, I hope they can figure this out.
And I get there and her doctor'snot there. So we meet with
(15:09):
another doctor and I tell them allthe symptoms she had, and of course
they check her blood sugar and Iwant to say it was around like five
thirty five something like that, andthe doctor looked me straight in the eye
and he goes, you need toget your daughter to the emergency room right
now. And I'm like, now, inside, I'm just like panicking,
(15:33):
but I don't want her to knowthat I'm worried. So we're driving the
hospital and she's feeling lethargic and sluggish, and she just is like, Dad,
am I gonna be okay? AndI'm like, you're gonna be okay.
We're gonna figure this out. We'regonna get you better. We get
in the hospital, they start doingall the tests and before you know it,
there you know, Grace's an ICUand she spent two days in ICU
(15:58):
and you know he was diagnosed withtype one and it, uh, it
was pretty sobering, to say theleast. And what is um really strange
is it seems like there's this certainage group of when it happens. I
(16:18):
know, Ella was about nine correct. Steven just said his son will with
n correct. So it's like thatthere's something, there's something there. So
there's a in Colorado, there's thisgreat probably a prop from what I've been
told the best center for diabetes researchin the country. It's called the Barbara
Davis Center. It's in the Aurora, Colorado. We ended up going up
(16:41):
there for education and I was talkingone of the doctors and I was kind
of like, why do I hearof these cases more and more? Because
just within our school district there wereabout three or four girls around the same
age as Grace who were diagnosed withtype one. He said, this is
what we're trying to find out,figure out what's causing this. This portion
(17:04):
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(17:27):
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that's glucose revival all one word,glucose revival dot com. But he said
(17:49):
that he thought it perhaps was environmental. And one of the research that they
did was over eight or nine spanJapan in Finland. Now those are two
relatively healthy countries and for some reason, Finland has a high number of people
(18:11):
with type one. Japan has avery low number of people per capita with
type one diabetes, but during thateight or nine year period the percentage increased
the same amount. So just it'sa maddening disease, as both you gentlemen
know. Yeah, that's grace thestory. Yeah, yeah, absolutely is.
(18:33):
Well, we want to spend thetime talking about our kids and how
our kids are dealing with T oned of course, but the title of
this podcast is Dads and Diabetes,and the reason Alan and I came up
with this podcast is to try andgive our dadas someplace to engage, to
listen, so, like you said, Stephen, to hopefully have a connection
(18:56):
to their own experiences from a dadperspective. So I'm gonna ask you guys
just to set your kids aside fora moment and to think about what impact
T one D had on you asa dad. So that moment your kid
was diagnosed and kind of the immediateaftermath, what were you thinking, What
was it, I mean psychologically,what was going on? And how did
(19:18):
you How did you deal with that? Stephen want to go first, Um,
yeah, yeah, first. Um, the thoughts I had in the
in the days after the diagnosis.Um, it was everything from how it's
going to impact him for the restof his life. Yeah, we're gonna
go the doctor. Yeah, we'regonna make you better. We're gonna do
(19:40):
this, We're gonna do that.But he's gonna deal with us the rest
of his life. And it's notjust you know, before I sit down
and eat, you know, Ihave to think about what I'm eating.
Um, you know, before hegoes to parties. When he's in college,
he's gonna ask to remember this beforehe goes on you know, meets
people, going dates and stuff.We'll have to take this into consideration.
Um. He's still at the stage, Um that he wants eat pursue baseball,
(20:06):
maybe as a professional career. Um. I'm not a scout. I'm
not gonna say that's going to happen. But that's something to take into consideration,
is um, you know, couldit be done? And I know
that yes, everything could be done. So it's still I'm supporting him and
I'm gonna push him, but Ihave to stop and say, you're gonna
have to do this because when you'reout on the hot baseball field, remember
(20:30):
when all this started, That's that'sexactly what was going on. So um,
we look at um players like baseballplayers like Jordan Hicks and Adam Duvall
and a little bit differently now becausethey we joke and say they play with
a pump. So I mean,it's it's entirely possible, but it's it's
(20:51):
it's thinking about this all the time. And as a dad, you know,
I'm thinking, you know, whatis my now fourteen year old kid
eating, because we all have afourteen year olds can eat like you know,
you know all of this and youknow all of that, and um,
you know him out think twice aboutit. He might fall asleep about
it. But you know, I'vehad a dex com beeping in the middle
of the night. Yeah, andmy wife and I joked sometimes I've heard
(21:15):
others say this too, But sometimesit's like having a newborn again. Oh
yeah, just you know, gettingwoken up in the middle of the night
and um, you know, takinga juice into the other room. And
I mean I remember one of theone of the worst, remember the lowest
points was probably a few months aftera diagnosis, and we have juice that
(21:36):
we have in our room and inwild room. Someone he goes low and
I was two in the morning.He was having a juice. I didn't
do anything, so he had anotherone a few minutes later, and he
looked at me, he goes,Dad, I'm just I'm just tired of
eating and drinking in the middle ofthe night. I'm like, well,
I told you we're gonna do whateverit takes, and juice is what it
(21:57):
takes right now. So and it'sI don't think it's had a bigger impact
on Will's two younger brothers. Um, but his conversations that that me and
my wife have. I never thoughtI'd have to have the conversation with the
little brothers of what do you doif if Will passes out? You know
(22:18):
what to do when you call nineone one? Do you know what to
say? Um? Two of them, the oldest in the middle when they
were at the same bus in theafternoon, I said, what would you
say to the Bucks driver? Um, so it's thoughts like that. It's
it's you know, having to beaware of those type of situations. And
I never thought I'd have to goto a five before meeting at a school
and say this is what my kidneeds, because, honestly, if you
(22:42):
look at Will, just like prettymuch all other T one ds, he
looks like a normal kid. Helooks like a normal fourteen year old.
Granted he's almost sixty one at thispoint, but other than that, you
know, everything is is normal.So yeah, but I can sit here
relate to what you're saying about teenageboys. Ella's obviously that focused on this
(23:03):
podcast. Ella and Anna more oftenthan not. Every now and then,
I mentioned Ethan Ethan thirteen years old. I'm one seventy, he's one ninety.
I'm a size ten shoe, he'sa size thirteen shoe. Yeah,
in this at our house at home. It's interesting as well. I point
you make about the juice because Idon't have to wake up too often anymore
to give a juice, but occasionallyI do. And she never remembers,
(23:25):
like I joke with her in themorning. I'm like, do you remember
me waking you up at two inthe morning to give you juice? No?
But so it doesn't really I don'tthink it really impacts her that significantly.
But I have huge gilt about inthe middle of the night giving my
kid juice and the effect it's havingon her teeth, which is completely inane.
It's like, all the things toworry about, that's the least important.
(23:47):
You know, Well, we'll justamput the dental insurance if needs be.
But I can certainly relate to afew of those points. Rob the
same question to you, What canI impact you feel like the diagnosis had
on you in the immediate aftermath andso sequently, I think the first year
was the toughest because you and Italked to that first year and I come
(24:07):
back to my story about you herein just a second. But I'm sorry,
Oh no, it's okay. Ithink, um, pardon me.
I think the first year was thetoughest because there's that fine line of you're
dealing with this, you're learning asyou're going along, and you still want
your kid to feel like a kid, you know, so how do you
(24:30):
do that? And I just rememberand I still have a lot of conversation.
I've actually done a few stories onathletes who have Type one, whether
they're in high school and having successor in college having success. I think
for me it was more of like, soon as you diagnosed, I was
(24:52):
like, all right, well,this is it's your kid. You love
your kid anyway, so I'm goingto it's just another added responsibility because let's
be real, are other children whodon't have Type one. You're still going
to worry about them even when they'rein their forties and fifties, if God
willing are around, you know whatI mean. So that the way I
(25:15):
look at it is I have toworry about Grace anymore. And I will
say her doctor, a gentleman bythe name of doctor Nayak, has done
a great job of kind of reassuringme when I've gone to the doctors that
a lot of it is the technologyis making a heck of a lot easier
(25:36):
because and I'll talk about this later, I've been doing a fundraiser for the
last couple of years trying to raisemoney for the JDRF, the Juvenile Diabees
Research Foundation, and I've talked toa wide range of people older people who
are diagnosed forty years ago and thestuff that they have to go through.
I mean, basically it was archaicand they were doing things hind They had
(26:00):
no idea. You know, porkinsulin and you know, just drink a
lot of juice, keep your bloodsugar high because it's the lows that will
get you, which is very true. And I just remember one of the
first times we went with the doctor. I was so concerned because at night
Grace was, you know, gettingup two fifty and sometimes two seventy five
(26:22):
and even three hundred. And hewas like, you know what, he
goes, if you didn't have that, the the monitor on your phone and
the app on your phone, you'dhave no idea unless you woke up every
hour and pricked her finger. Hesaid. So I'm not saying it's not
a concern, because obviously the longterm effects can be devastating, but he
(26:45):
said, worry more about the lows. And you know, Grace has been
got on a deck com pomp amonth after she was diagnosed. That's been
a godsend. In fact, wejust did an upgrade yesterday where now once
she gets above two hundred, itwill it's more intuitive, it will start
giving her corrections versus manually giving hercorrections. So I don't I'm not a
(27:10):
cynical person at all. And Idon't know if they'll ever find a cure,
because I think it'd be tough topinpoint. But I will say the
technology has made it a lot morereassured. It's more it's reassuring at night.
If you wake up at three inthe morning and look, okay,
you know her blood sugar's ninety,she's gonna be okay. I can't imagine
(27:32):
what it was like ten years ago. In fact, to tell quick story,
the last time she had a doctor'sappointment, her A one C was
six eight and I said to thedoctor, you know, he was praising
aarontoner, What a great job she'sdone, staying healthy, staying on top
of it, exercising, what haveyou? And he uh, I said,
(27:55):
well, I said, you seemto be pleased. It's like it's
outstanding. He goes, you don'tunderstand. I've been doing this for twenty
years and I've seen kids' health getsso much better. I said, well,
ten years ago, what would havebeen good? He said, ten
point five? He said, Isaid, I get a kid, we
had ten point five. He goes, I would have dumb backflips down the
(28:18):
hall. I'm like, are youserious. I'm like, if you told
me that now, I probably wouldn'tsleep for a month, you know.
I mean it's getting better. ThankGod for technology. So I think for
me, I just take myself outof the equation. I don't care if
I have to get up at night, and it's the lows that that's what
gets me. Um, that's whenI get a little uh, you know,
(28:44):
concerned, and you know that keepsme up versus when she's high.
You know, a lot of itis you can't you have no idea what's
going on in their body. Youknow, she's twelve years old now you
know it's going through. She's aboutto enter puberty and hormones are going crazy.
Her doctor even told me he studiedthat even thinking about food can make
(29:08):
your blood sugar go up a littlebit. I mean, it's just it's
just truly incredible. So yeah,I think they're worry more about when she's
older, kind of like Stephen said, and she's in college, you know,
and nobody knows anything about it,and she'll be uh, you know
(29:30):
a little bit alone in that.He has even said to me, She's
like, what's gonna happen when Iget older and I'm in my own place
and I get low and I don'tknow, you know, at night,
And I'm like, that's a,you know, a scary thought for her.
Um And hopefully when she gets tothat age, technology will be even
better and they'll figure that out.But I think I think that's what it'll
(29:53):
be harder for me is when she'sout of the house and she's not sleeping
across the hall from us. Yeah. I know you've not been able to
catch every episode we've done, Robert, you have a crazy schedule, but
you should check out the last onebecause Alan and I we decided to hearn
in on the things we most hatehim out diabetes. Typically we're very super
positive Steve and I hopefully will attestmost of the most of our episodes have
(30:17):
that kind of a vibe. Butthis last one we're like, you know
what, let's just lean into this. Let's just talk about the things that
just piss us off when it comesto d and one of the things that
Alan was most concerned about, oneof the things that really does upset him
is just what you described it wasthe whole you know, what do I
do when she leaves home? Whatdo I do when she's out on her
own? She's you know, ifshe didn't have T one D I would
worry every night about my daughter,right absolutely, But the fact she does
(30:41):
as a whole of the layer toit. But hey, my favorite things
doing these podcasts and yes, inour house we say every well when grays
and heaven you know her moments whichshe hasn't read too many of. But
I'll just say, we're just goingto kick it right in the butt.
We're gonna kick that right in thebutt to keep doing it, you know,
So just kind of that positive reallyenforcement help sometimes and you are a
(31:06):
super positive guy. I want tocome onto that here in just a second,
which is what I was just gettingready to say, which is my
favorite thing to do, is tosay, hey, we'll come back to
that in just a second. Iforget to do it. But you said
something a moment ago that I dowant to just quickly circle back to and
I'm gonna spend too much time onit, Rob because I'm going to link
it out in our social media postwith this episode. And that is the
fundraising you've been doing for Grace eachand every year since she's been diagnosed.
(31:30):
So obviously you can give a bitmore detail here, Rob, But listeners,
Rob, there's a twenty four hourWell you're in a basketball court right
just shooting hoops for twenty four hoursstraight, and he has some of the
local sports teams donate paraphernalia and signeditems and just really really needs to have
(31:51):
some local businesses as well, allin an effort to generate funds to raise
money to go to JDRF SO andI went out there too one of those
couple of years ago, Robin checkedin with you and embarrassed myself on the
basketball court for a couple of minutes. I told you if it was sock
amount, we'd be okay. Buthow did I just quickly? Rob?
(32:12):
Again, because we're gonna link ountto this, I want folks to go
and check out the funding page thatyou have in preparation for this year's round.
But what was your inspiration? Imean, obviously I know what your
inspiration was, but what made yougo, Hey, you know what,
we're gonna go the basketball court fortwenty four hours? Well, I just
wanted to turn the negative into apositive first and foremost reached out to some
people whom one she used to bea doctor study research diabetes, and I
(32:38):
just asked her who's the best group, and she said the JDR and she
was involved with them. So let'ssee. Grace was most in April,
and I think, let's see major. About three or four months later,
I started this fundraiser which I shootfree throws twenty four straight hours. People
can donate, you know, adollar for each hour whatever, and then
(33:00):
I also get UM. I alsodo a sign of the Denver Nuggets,
the Colorado Avalanche, the Colorado Rockieshave been really gracious and given me awesome
items, and UM Air Force Academy, Colorado College and local colleges UM,
and then of course the Rocky MountainVibes and Colorado Spring Switchbacks as well.
(33:22):
And I just roll in that,Rob, You've got the wall in that.
Yeah. Well they've all been great. They have, Yeah, I
mean really just yeah, I meanvery great. Because I'm en count to
that on on on the post forthis episode because it's really neat, Rob,
what you do UM. And itwas fun when I came down the
gym to what you do it becauseas I was there. Other people will
(33:44):
come in. People will come into check on you in person, which
is really neat to see. Thisportion of the podcast is brought to you
by Diabets. That's d I Adash Bee dash t e e S Diabets.
It is the child of the topone diabetes survivor and mom who wanted
to increase awareness and visibility of diabetesthrough cool, funny, unique T one
(34:08):
D themed clothing. Diabets also supportsfellow survivors and fighters with JD or ever
saving a donation for every shirt sold. We need a cure, but until
then, why not have some funwith our shirts and raise awareness at the
same time. Check out diabets dotcom again that's d I A Dabe dat
(34:30):
ees dot com, diabetes dot comand share the diabetes love. Yeah.
It's a great community event. Um, and people are you know. One
of the nice things about it isis our friends are great. They come
down, they donate and they supportme and bring me whatever. But um,
(34:51):
it's the people that have had typeone for thirty forty years that come
down, write a check and thankme. But that's not the part.
Is I find out their stories andone of the suckest things about it is
is I've met every year I meeta mom whose child has passed away from
it, and it just you know, and you start thinking, gosh,
(35:15):
this poor lady, and you cansee the pain in her face and in
her eyes, and you know,so it's just it's something that you know
that it's just near and dear tomy heart. Yeah. Yeah, well
I'll make sure I encounts that forsure, And Steve, I'm gonna come
back to you just just a secondbefore I do. I keep referencing this
(35:36):
story I have about Rob. Sofolks who listen to this podcast from episode
one will be familiar now with withour diagnosis story with my daughter Ella.
A little piece of the story thatfolks won't be familiar with, perhaps is
when Rob found out that Ella hadbeen diagnosed. I think your daughter,
Rob was an Hey maybe you weresix or seven months into your journey,
(35:59):
but he immediately reached out to me. I don't know I post on social
media. I'm not sure how youwere made aware of it, Rob,
but anyway, you reached out tome immediately. I'm like, really sorry
to hear this. My daughter's tone D. Whatever you need, I'm
not joking. Rob's kind of abig cheese and Colorado springs. I mean,
he's a legit SI lab and yethe immediately gave me a cell phone
(36:22):
number. Hey, he go callme anytime, text me anytime. Just
the kinds he showed is something Inever forget. And yeah, we went
out and had lunch subsequently, andhe's been a great resource to me and
a great a great source of strengthto those first few weeks. So definitely
appreciate you for that, man.Thank you. Yeah, of course.
Well, you know, it's oneof the reasons why you're doing this right
(36:45):
is to help people who maybe arein the infancy stages of this sucky disease
and paying it forward. You know, you can meet a perfect stranger who
could come up to be like,I don't I'm my kid. Just you
would give them every bit of resourceand anything you could um because and maybe
(37:05):
I could talk about this a littlebit later on. It's kind of like
I started off with, there's alot of people out there and I was
in the same boat. They justdon't know anything about this disease. And
I you know, Grace went intoketo acidosis two weeks ago. She was
hospitalized for it, and uh,there were some people in the hospital who
didn't know much about it, butI won't get into that right now.
(37:30):
Yeah, it sounds like you awhole of the podcasts right there. Yeah,
it was you have to be anadvocate for your kid, let's put
that right. YEA. Luckily,luckily it was a mild by their standards,
mild. So literally within the firstthirty to sixty minutes of heard being
on an insulin drift and um thesaline for the dehydration, she was already
(37:55):
back to herself. I won't getinto the whole story because it would take
up whole podcast, because it waswe end up in three hospitals. Yeah,
it was. It was be gratefulyou're buddy. So, um,
Stephen, when I come back toyou here for just a second. So
we've obviously talked I say negative,but we talked about just the realistic impact
(38:21):
of T one D and the impactthat has on our kids of course and
um on us as dad's as well. Um. I mentioned I wanted to
circle back to our kids, andI want to do so in a positive
fashion. So share out if youcould some things you think have been positives
from the whole t one D experience. So I'm just gonna say there are
(38:44):
no real positives, right, Itis like false negative, no positive.
I don't know you want to lookat it. It's hard to really take
a silver lining from this cloud.But but we have to, right,
we have to be upbeat about it. And there are things I think that
that have impacted our kids in positiveways. So which have you seen those
things manifest with Will? Um?It's in a way it's kind of almost
(39:09):
forced him to grow up a littlebit, which isn't exactly fair because you
know, he's still fourteen. Um, but he does see some responsibility in
everything from you know what am Ieating? Where's my pump? Did ill?
The whole everything to do with it? Um, he gets it.
Um, he's fourteen. He doesn'talways do it, but he understands.
(39:31):
Um. He he kind of he'llI don't want say he'll take up for
others, but he's he'll he'll tellpeople, you know, what's going on.
He's he doesn't shy away from anything. He Um, he'll be right
out there and tell people what's goingon and what he's doing. Um.
(39:52):
And I think one thing that's it'skind of led to is. I think
it's in a way it's shown himthat we are there to support him,
um, regardless of what happens,whether you know, two o'clock in the
morning or whether we're sitting in arestaurant, whatever the case may be,
that we've got his back, andwe will always have his back. Like
(40:14):
we mentioned earlier, I mean,he'll be forty and we'll probably still be
doing the same thing. It's interesting. So obviously Rob and I are having
girls. In general wisdom is girlsmature more quickly than boys. Right,
so you'll comment about him having togrow up more quickly, not not really
being fact he's fourteen years old,but you you really are seeing a different
trajectory for him in terms with hismaturity than your ordinarily would have expected.
(40:37):
You're you're ready seeing that. Youthink, yeah, I'm seeing that because,
like I mentioned earlier, he wasbig into the you know, I'm
gonna play baseball when I grew up. There's no there's no other option.
That's what I'm gonna do. U. And one day we had a conversation
about he said he may want togo into the medical field and becoming intechnologist.
Wow, like, well, youcertainly have the experience. So y
(41:00):
Um, it's, for lack ofa better term, outside the box of
your typical fourteen year old of thetypical careers. It's it's kind of making
him look, Okay, if Ineed, if I want to do this,
where do I start? When doI start? Um? So I
would like to say that he's takinglike grades and school a little bit more
(41:22):
seriously. Um. He's a prettysmart kid anyway. Um, but he
now knows that stuff he does nowcould impact him down the road. Yeah.
So he's not thinking outside of thebox, Stephen, he's thinking,
if you will, outside of thediamond. Here you go. I did
that just for you those English guys. And stick to the pitch. I
(41:46):
don't mean a pitch in baseball.Okay, saying question to you, my
friend, what positive side effects doyou think t Wend's had on Grace?
Um? You know Grace is Uh, she's always been a very just delightful
(42:07):
kid. I mean she just youknow everyone, she's well liked, She
has a pretty good sense of humor, she's always happy. Um. So
I'm just glad that this hasn't hadum, hasn't really killed her spirit.
Although she a handful. You know, there's been a handful of times when
(42:28):
she said, and it's understandable.You know, I hate diabetes. Why
do I have to have this?Why me? Yeah, so it's uh
and that's pretty normal. UM.And talking to either young adults or people
are parents who have children who arenow young adults. UM, they've kind
(42:52):
of prepared me for the um,the denial part of their life when they're
teen agers and they really don't wantto be different from everyone. And I
would say Grace is now. Ithink initially she was embarrassed that she had
it. She didn't. In fact, one of the first things she said
to me after she was diagnosed wasam I going to be different from everyone
(43:15):
else? And I said, well, in some ways, yes, but
you're a kid just like every othernine year old and when you're ten and
that sort of thing. So Ithink for UM, I think for Grace,
I'm glad her spirits has maintained herlove for life, for zeal for
(43:36):
life. You know, she's sheshe like she before. When she played
sports. I would always coach herteams. She plays basketball, soccer,
tennis, and and I just alwaysfelt like I got a coach her because
no one's gonna understand, and itwould be a burden to that coach to
(43:58):
be like, hey, if thishappens, make sure she drinks shoice.
They don't know what the hecks goingon. And now she's starting to own
it. And this is the firstyear she played club basketball, and her
coach is great and he understands everything. And now my wife and I don't
feel like, gosh, if we'renot there and something happens, Grace won't
take care of it out of embarrassment. Now she'll just take care of it
(44:19):
in a very sly way to speak. But there are definitely moments when I'm
like, you know, I seeeating like a cinnamon roll? Have you
dosed for it? Because our friendsaround, I'm like, I don't care
either, I'm gonna embarrass you takecare of it. And she chooses to
take care of it most of thetime. So I guess for me,
(44:42):
the positive for me would be I'mjust glad she still has the same spirit
that she had before she was there. Yeah, that's important. That is
important because you know, we've allheard those horror stories of how I think
it's particularly girls can be negative beingimpacted. And then of course she had
the extent into body image and everythingelse, and helloa, evidently that wasn't
(45:12):
at my head. I think Iwas stupid. I was unexpected, but
I guess it could be worse.It keeps keeps it real, It keeps
it real. Guys. Well,I can't let you, guys go without
talking about the fact that, ofcourse we are recording this in the eye
of a storm. I mean,something significant in human history, with a
coronavirus running rampant across the planet.I mean absolutely astonishing times, astonishing period,
(45:38):
right, full stop, end ofstory. But when you have a
kid who has compromised immune systems,as as our kids do, it certainly
gives you greater pause for thought.We're all hold up again, I mentioned
earlier on video here. We're allhold up in our respective guest rooms.
Yea quarantining by the looks of things. I was traveling, actually rolled,
(46:00):
I was traveling in Colorado. Wasrecently his last Friday. So when I
got home, Yeah, I immediatelywent straight to the guest room. So
I haven't been in my own bedroomnow for a week. Kind of crazy
times, guys, What how isthis at? You'd been thinking more about
this for the coronavirus. It's interesting. When Grace was in the hospital for
(46:20):
that day, they tested her foreverything under the sun. I mean literally,
because when you go into keto acidosis, from what I was told,
typically it's due to an infection andthey couldn't find Then they kind of determined
that she might have had a mildurinary track infection and which might have triggered
(46:43):
the keto act versus. But literallythe next it was about three days later,
was when this all kind of orit was really gosh, I think
about it was the next day becauseit happened on the Monday. We left
Tuesday afternoon, and Wednesday night waswhen the NBA said this is our last
game. And then when they didthat, everything just kind of went into
(47:05):
well, we're done, We're done, We're done, We're done. Um.
So it did cross my mind whenwe were in the hospital, like
I wonder if she has the coronavirus. But obviously there were no tests because
they're very limited right now. Sowhen all the sports shutting down, roll
but you had to start doing youmeet your meteorology degree or whatever. No
(47:30):
weather guy, I've actually still beendoing my job. They did that.
I probably will go back and forthbetween sports and news for the you know
time being so um yeah, Imean there's there's been well NFL free agency
in the Broncos, there's been stuffto talk about. So I lucked out
(47:52):
there. Plus, you know thishas been moved back and pushed back,
you know the Pike speak kill climbor uh you know the Major League Baseball
Opening Day or you know the Yeah, you know, there's still stories out
there. It's just a little moredifficult to get to people. Yeah,
one of the things you're well mostwell known for is your sense of humor.
(48:13):
In those little less segments do youcome up with? So I think
you need to come up with asegment where you're out in some random parks
somewhere in Colorado Springs just playing sportson your own so you can report on
yourself. Well, what I wantedto do was I wanted to do a
segment called what do we Do WithoutSports? And I was gonna do one
installment like dudes in a man cavenot being able to have conversations with one
(48:34):
another because the talk about sports,And I just thought there's a why you
could do that. Now you can'tgo on the barbershops, but I thought
that would be one, and thenI thought even like going you know,
kind of tugging cheek to a beautyslot talking to women and having them be
like, oh my god, ifwe don't get sports back, I'm gonna
kill my husband. You know.Yeah, I think right now, my
(49:00):
bosses are you know, they don'twant to offend anybody, understand, like
yo, which it's you know,obviously not a joke for many people.
Yeah. So Steven, what impactof any has just head on you and
your family? And terms are beingkind of more heightened, more aware precautions
you're taking. About two weeks ago, I got sent home from work.
(49:23):
So I've been working from home fortwo weeks. And last week I think
the schools they send everybody home kidsare working from home or learning from home
doing e learning stuff. Um.And we found out today that as of
midnight to night, restaurants, bars, all these places they will be closed.
(49:45):
Um. So well that plus alittle bit more cleaning here at the
house and just you know, livitingwho goes where or who comes over or
anything like that, because you know, we still got some some neighborhood kids
that are out playing and stuff likethat. So um, that's it so
far, but we'll see where thistakesas Yeah, yeah, it's crazy,
(50:06):
and it's interesting to see every statedoing its own thing. Texas well often
at least shut bars and restaurants andall those good things a couple of days
ago now, and I guess thereare strong rumors that the whole state,
you know, they're going to rollup the host whole state here, probably
in the next twenty four hours.So yeah, yeah, it's gonna interest
frollowing California's lead, of course,So yeah, it's gonna be interesting.
(50:29):
Gents, this has been fantastic.It's been wonderful talking to another couple of
dads. Stephen again, really haveappreciated your support since since pretty much episode
one, and Rob, as Imentioned earlier in this episode, you've been
a great support to me personally.So to have you both on talking to
you one d talking about your kiddos, providing the outlet for other dads who
(50:51):
maybe listening, has been fantastic.In case dads want to reach out to
you independently, maybe something you saidspecifically really touched them or resonated with them,
or they want to follow up withyou on a on a particular experience
you guys had. Do you wantto go ahead and share out your respective
Twitter handles? Stephen, how canfolks get hold of you? Um?
You don't believe it or not?I am not on Twitter really, okay,
(51:13):
I am not right. This mightmake me get to Twitter, but
I am on Facebook. Um,and as people that will see UM for
any kind of dad's in diabetes post, you can I sue me reply or
UM. I don't know if youfund me as a fan, but I
mean you can always first and findme. Um. But about your last
name, Stephen, uh truett tr u I t okay, there you
(51:36):
go, so you should be easyenough to find. And like you said,
you comment on several of our posts. So folks and go find you
in the comment section and reach outto you there. Rob, you're everywhere.
Oh yeah right. I wouldn't beon it if it wasn't for work.
I'm not a fourteen year old girl, you know. Um, I'm
on Twitter at Rob nammum, whichobviously namnum is not like Smith or Jones.
(52:01):
So namnum is U n A mn O U m as and mary
um. And then I'm also I'mon Facebook. UM and I guess Instagram,
which is basically pictures that is,it's more of a work thing.
It's our newmat care deio. Ithink it's my handle for Instagram, but
(52:25):
um, yeah, when I useTwitter and my professional page for Facebook,
um for work, and most ofthe time I don't. If I'm not
at work, I'm not really payingtoo much attention to it. But you
can still reach out to me connectif if you would like to do so
good stuff. Well, certainly hadencourage our listeners to do so if they
(52:46):
want to, particularly in Rob's case, because you know, you thought,
well label you to stay on someof what he's doing and his it's called
shot for Grace, right, AShot for Grace will be year four?
Okay, fantastic. You think it'sgonna be impacted by all this Corona craziness.
Typically I do it um. UsuallyI do it um early to mid
(53:08):
August. So let's hope, bythe grace of God, this will all
be you know, rectified well beforethat. Yeah, but then again it
perhaps it may not. I mean, all of our schools have been are
shut down and you can't even getinto the building if you're an administrator.
Right, So we'll see it's March. You know, obviously there's a great
(53:32):
unknown out there. So if um, if that is the case, we'll
just have to push you back lateron in the year. So a final
quick question for you. Maybe I'lldo it outside by myself. I don't
know. I mean in Colorado andold because you certainly could. Yeah,
you can do that in austed butmay not get a lot of people out
to bid on silent auction items.But I also use an auction page and
(54:00):
quickly people go to that page justto see what the items are and then
go up on that sort of thing. I did that. So one last
question for you. So Stephen,you mentioned Wheel as a strapping young Matt
he had aspirations to be a baseballplayer. So I'm going to assume he's
a better baseball player than you are. Will that be fair? Um?
(54:20):
Yeah, that would be fair,But don't tell him that. Okay,
I'm going somewhere with this. SoRob mentioned that Grace is now playing competitive
basketball. I've seen you shoot hoopsroll, but she's got to be better
than you. She's getting pretty good. But honestly, and and this is
just my feeling alone, it's notright or wrong. I think and I
(54:42):
know, um um, I knowthat your daughter plays competitive soccer year around.
But for me and I hope youguys don't think um um sliding you
in any way. But after shewas diagnosed with type one, the fact
that she's on any plane feel whetherit's basketball, playing lacrosse or you know,
(55:04):
tennis, what have you, it'sa win for me just to have
her out there. M Yeah,I mean it's just well, thank god
they're able to just be normal kids. That's you stuck them landing my friend.
That's the perfect place to end theepisode. Fantastic. So Stephen Truett
again, thank you so much forjoining me today. Mate, sure,
(55:25):
I appreciate it. Thank you.And Rob Namnam thanks so much. I
appreciate you making some time in yourbusy schedule. It's been fun catching up.
Yeah, I've been awesome. Thanksfor having me. And that's it.
That's our first ever dad's and diabetesdad's panel. Ordinarily two dads on
a podcast trying to figure it allout. Today you had three. I
hope you enjoyed it, and we'llcatch you on the next episode and hopefully
(55:47):
Alan will be out of the financialmaya and able to re engage with us.
Thanks for listening,
I just want to remind you,guys, this is just me and Mark
telling stories and that nothing that wesay here is intended to be medical a
basis is strictly from our point ofview as two dads telling the stories of
our T one D kiddos. Wealso want our listeners to know that we
try to maintain a perspective recognizing them. Whatever Alan and I or our families
are dealing with, it doesn't amountto a hill of beans compared to that
(00:42):
which our daughters or anyone diagnosed withtype one diabetes has to contend with on
a day to day basis. Welcometo Dad's and Diabetes. Just two dads
and T one D kiddos on apodcast trying to figure it all out.
Although we don't have two dads ona podcast today, at least you don't
(01:04):
have the same two dads that youcome to expect. We have one of
them of course here. I amHey, it's Mark, no Alan today.
Unfortunately, he has been absolutely slammedat work, as you can imagine
with the whole coronavirus chaos that's beenhappening. With Alan being in the financial
markets. He is working Morning NewmanNTE right now, and so he'll be
(01:26):
producing this episode, but unfortunately wewon't have the benefit of his dulcet tones.
However, we're not going to shortyou with just one dad. In
fact, we're going to up theante. We're going to give you three.
Today is our first ever dad panel. We've been talking about doing this
for a while and even though Alancouldn't join, he told me to go
(01:47):
ahead and get it done. Hewas excited to hear this episode, and
so I am excited to introduce twodads to new dads to our listeners,
at least of t one d kidosjoined today by Rob Namnum and Stephen Truett.
Hey, guys, how's it going. I'm doing all right, yourself?
(02:07):
Not too bad? Yeah, that'sdoing pretty good. Lead to be
here. So the first voice youheard there was Rob. And Rob is
in Colorado. Stephen, where areyou? Oh? Where a huh?
About a hour and a half outsideof Atlanta. I'm in Columbus, Georgia.
Okay, very good. So soyou're on the Eastern time zone right,
(02:28):
yes, just barely? Yeah,okay, So I think this might
be the first time we've got apodcast with three different time zones. Whoa
oh, Wow, that's crazy.We have Eastern represented, Central and of
course Mountain where Rob's at. Hey, Rob, let's go ahead and start
with you. So tell us alittle bit about yourself. Those those of
(02:49):
our listeners from Colorado may be familiarwith your unique name, Rob Namnum.
It's not one you can easily forget. But for those of our listeners aren't,
it's familiar with you. Tell usa little bit about what you do
well. I work at a TVstation in Colorado Springs, the ABC affiliate
Kardio TV News Channel thirteen. AndI've been doing sports there for twenty years.
(03:10):
And I'm originally from the East Coastfrom Hartford, Connecticut. And yeah,
I've been out here for two decadesand don't think I'm leaving. And
Rob is a legend. So allthe time I lived in Colorado, he
was my favorite sports journal, favoritesports casting. Has a great sense of
humor, he does an amazing job, and he's loved in the community.
(03:34):
So awesome to Rob. Thank you. I'm good to be And finally,
now, Stephen, tell us abit about yourself. I know a little
less about you, but you areperhaps one of our most fervent listeners.
You are one of those guys whoengage with us regularly on social media,
which Alan and I always appreciate.But tell our listeners a little bit about
yourself. M not a famous asa famous TV people, but I uh
(04:01):
that of three we'll get into alittle bit later. My oldest as well.
He is the one that is diagnosed. UM that I work for a
large insurance company. UM. Usuallyall out today is says I worked for
the Duck and everybody knows who Iworked for. UM. No, just
trying to figure this all out,like you guys say, And I mean,
(04:21):
I think I think one reason I'mso I follow you guys so much
is because all of the stuff thatyou've talked about so far is it's it's
my life, it's what we liveso um. And that's why I wanted
to reach out about my diagnosis story, was it's it's the one thing that's
pretty different from a lot of others. So we don't why don't we start
with that? So Steven, whydon't you kick us off? I want
(04:43):
to hear both of your diagnosis storiesbecause you oftentimes it's commonality, right,
And when we become ons talking aboutRob's story here in a couple of minutes.
I'm actually going to share a storyof my own. Um Uh.
Even though Rob and I aren't reallyconnected in terms of our diagnosis stories,
there is a connection and I'll comeon tight in just a secon here.
But Stephen, um, you knowyou you mentioned the fact that they were
also differences. Right, everybody goesthrough goes through a slightly different experience.
(05:06):
So why don't you go ahead andshare yours out? Okay? Um,
So the story that I'm used tohearing a lot is, um, kid
get sick or wasn't feeling right andgo to the hospital, go the doctor,
and then they're quote unquote diagnosed andthen they're sent to either into phrenologists
or emergency room or something like that. So, um, four years ago,
(05:27):
almost to the day, um today, Um, my oldest will he
was lieutenant at the time, andI was steel a little sick. We
thought it maybe the flu and gethis stomach bug. But he was playing
baseball at the time, and um, it was just lagging. He didn't
want to hustle, he wasn't beinghis normal self. And um they were
on spring break. So my wifeworks at a school, so she said,
(05:51):
you know, if you're not feelingbetter in the morning, we're gonna
we're gonna take in at the urgentcare. And he woke up, of
course, throwing it up, notfeeling not be on himself. So they
went to the urgent care. Iwent to work, UM, and I
get a call. They went inabout nine. I get a call about
ten o'clock and said that he theythink he's a type one diabetic and I
(06:15):
can look back now and my firstresponse was, but he's not overweight,
um, and that that just showsthat, you know, we we don't
know what we don't know, um, because at the you know, at
that time, I didn't know therewas a type of one versus type two.
I didn't know all the differences that, you know. Really, the
first thing I popped in my mindwas, you know, Wilford Brimley on
TV talking about the beds, andI'm like, no, he can't.
(06:38):
That's how it works. So theyfor some reason, they did the flu
test. They did everything like negative. So they decided to do a urine
test and his pleasure came back aboutseven fifty wow. So and that's that's
when the doctor brought my wife Karenout into the hallway and said, we
(06:59):
need to talk about this for amoment. So that's kind of how we
were introduced to talk one diabetes.So Karen called me. I was there
within probably twenty minutes, and wespent the next four or five hours,
for lack of a better term,being educated, but looking back, it
wasn't really being educated. Yeah,we were told how to how to give
(07:23):
an injection and how to kind ofcount carbs and you know, what the
numbers should be, what they shouldlook like. But after about five or
six hours at the urgent care,we were sent home. We were told
to go home and then follow upwith it in new chronologists. So the
(07:43):
problem was this was on a Thursday. This was March twenty fourth, twenty
sixteen. That following weekend was Easterweekend. So the plans were to go
visit my parents six hours away,and the doctor said, you know,
there's really if you follow these steps, you will be okay. You know,
we still again we don't know whatwe didn't know. Um, so
(08:05):
we decided to go. We decidedto take that six hour drive and um
Karen stayed here. She she foundsomebody that has a local diabetes page and
she connected with her, which wasprobably a godsend. I mean that was
very emotional, but those two connectingkind of brought it, brought it down
a notch. And it helped becausethe next day, on Friday, Karen
(08:28):
called an inner chronologist and they said, we can't see you for two months.
You know, we're swam pack befull. There's no way you're gonna
be able to get in um.And then after Karen met with this person,
Wendy, Wendy with all the workthat she does, she called the
innerchrenologist and they were able to seeus on Monday. So, um,
(08:48):
when we get to the innochronologists,I mean their JOLLI just dropped. Why
did they send you away? Youknow you should have that. We we
didn't know to say, hey weshouldn't we go to the emergency? Should
we do this? We were justlike okay, So they sent us away
with I want to say, aninsolin pin um, a blood checker,
(09:11):
and then some alcohol swamps. Wow. So I mean we we really I
made the drive, me and thethree boys made that six hour drive and
we would stop at like a reststop, and I'm just thinking the whole
way, you know, what whatdo we do? You know what I
don't want to do the wrong thingand you know, have will found or
have to rush him to the burgencyroom or you know, can't you eat
(09:33):
this? Or can you eat head? Or um. I mean every time
we would stop or he would havea stack or something, I would just
I would just kind of stare athim, like, how do you feel?
Okay, you're good? Yeah,And that was probably the longest weekend
I've ever had because I didn't knowwhat to think. You know, I
didn't know how Karen was doing backhome because now she's in a house by
(09:54):
herself. She's you know, notalways that good. But it's um,
yeah, it's it's a spery thatyou don't know what you don't know.
And uh yeah. When we didget to the interochronologist, like I said,
they were a little surprised and umbut they were great. They they
explained everything to us. They gotus on a dext com and a teas
(10:16):
lamb with then with them probably acouple of weeks. Wow, that's now,
that's that's something we look back andsay, that's really positive. That
yeah, that absolutely because some peopleare saying they've had to wait for a
long time, months, months,time, We lucked out on that one.
And I mean, just to kindof fast forward a bit, we
started the control like you here acouple of weeks ago. Okay, well
(10:39):
come onto that. Yeah that's beenamazing. So yeah, yeah, we'll
come onto that. Yeah. Ican't imagine having to go a whole weekend
like that. I remember doing theshort drive in Colorado Springs to Denver,
which was less than an hour,and I think I was looking at my
shoulder the entire time I was driving, staring at my daughter. Yeah,
like I'm gonna be able to monitorher blood sugar levels, you know,
by sight or something. I don't. Um, that's that's insane. That's
(11:01):
insane. So Rob talked to usabout Grace, who, of course I
know somewhat. But tenas Hes story, well, first of all, that's
Stephen's stories in Kinder goes to showyou, and this a little bit later,
how little even people in the medicalfield know about diabetes. And I
(11:26):
was just like Stephen, when um, eventually Grace was diagnosed with type one,
I was like, well, it'snot my family, you know.
I was ignorant. I didn't knowanything about it. In fact, my
sister in law we knew she haddiabetes, but much like Stephen said,
I didn't realize there was type oneand type two, and we didn't even
(11:46):
know she had type one well anyway, so it was about it would be
three years. Next is when Gracewas diagnosed. She was nine years old,
and she loves Easter. It's favoriteholiday. And Grace is a very
charismatic, very joyful child. Andlong story short, my sister was visiting
(12:11):
from the East Coast and she hadn'tyou been out here in fifteen years or
what have you? And she washere with her fiancee. And so starting
on Friday, Grace started to havesome of the symptoms, you know,
her stomach hurt, she was reallydehydrated, and she is a child who's
(12:33):
not a huge fan of water.And one of the first things I remember
was my son came home from baseballpractice and it was warm that day and
he drank about halfways wat and hewas coming outside because we were getting inside
because it was a nice day inour backyard, and he had half the
bottle off the port on the grassinstead of you know, just wasting it.
(12:54):
And Grace said, Robbie, isthat is that? Is there water
there? And he said yeah,and it was warm. You know,
I've been sitting out in the sun, and she took it and she chugged
it. I thought, man,that's really weird. And during that time
that we've been sitting outside, likeshe was drinking gatorade or what have you,
(13:15):
and she just couldn't get enough.And anyway, so we get to
Saturday and she's feeling worse and we'renot really quite sure if she just has
like a stomach bug or what's goingon. Then Easter comes Sunday morning,
and you know, the Easter bunnycomes and hides the eggs and we you
know, comes and hides him inour backyard, and you know, a
(13:35):
typical Easter for Grace's getting out ofa six am and it's excited as much
like a child on Christmas. Shecan't wait to find all the eggs.
And she's just kind of drudging along, no enthusiasm, and that doesn't have
the same you know, vigor thatshe has for life. And I was
like, man, there's something wrongwith Grace. So that night we have
(13:56):
dinner. She barely eats. She'sin a room and I think she had
gotten I think she had vomped ittwice so of course, now we had
called the doctor, we'd set somethingup for Monday morning, and me and
my wife and I are not sleepingat all. You can't. And the
other thing is Grace had been amodel of health like up to that point
(14:18):
and really had ever gotten sick.So we it's like two in the morning,
and my wife and I think we'rejust keeping an eye on Grace.
I think she had gotten sick onemore time. And so all of a
sudden, we just kind of turnedto each other and and my wife said,
I think she might have diabetes.And I was like, that's crazy.
I was thinking the same thing.Weird, And back to my sister,
(14:45):
like Grace was kind of baking herenthusiasm for life the whole time my
sister was there. That's how Iknew something was offered her. You just
know your kid, right. Yeah. So anyway, I so nine appointment,
going to the doctor. She's stillfeeling like you know what. And
I'm just like, oh, man, I hope they can figure this out.
And I get there and her doctor'snot there. So we meet with
(15:09):
another doctor and I tell them allthe symptoms she had, and of course
they check her blood sugar and Iwant to say it was around like five
thirty five something like that, andthe doctor looked me straight in the eye
and he goes, you need toget your daughter to the emergency room right
now. And I'm like, now, inside, I'm just like panicking,
(15:33):
but I don't want her to knowthat I'm worried. So we're driving the
hospital and she's feeling lethargic and sluggish, and she just is like, Dad,
am I gonna be okay? AndI'm like, you're gonna be okay.
We're gonna figure this out. We'regonna get you better. We get
in the hospital, they start doingall the tests and before you know it,
there you know, Grace's an ICUand she spent two days in ICU
(15:58):
and you know he was diagnosed withtype one and it, uh, it
was pretty sobering, to say theleast. And what is um really strange
is it seems like there's this certainage group of when it happens. I
(16:18):
know, Ella was about nine correct. Steven just said his son will with
n correct. So it's like thatthere's something, there's something there. So
there's a in Colorado, there's thisgreat probably a prop from what I've been
told the best center for diabetes researchin the country. It's called the Barbara
Davis Center. It's in the Aurora, Colorado. We ended up going up
(16:41):
there for education and I was talkingone of the doctors and I was kind
of like, why do I hearof these cases more and more? Because
just within our school district there wereabout three or four girls around the same
age as Grace who were diagnosed withtype one. He said, this is
what we're trying to find out,figure out what's causing this. This portion
(17:04):
of the podcast brought to you byGlucose Revival, did you know that seventy
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(17:27):
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that's glucose revival all one word,glucose revival dot com. But he said
(17:49):
that he thought it perhaps was environmental. And one of the research that they
did was over eight or nine spanJapan in Finland. Now those are two
relatively healthy countries and for some reason, Finland has a high number of people
(18:11):
with type one. Japan has avery low number of people per capita with
type one diabetes, but during thateight or nine year period the percentage increased
the same amount. So just it'sa maddening disease, as both you gentlemen
know. Yeah, that's grace thestory. Yeah, yeah, absolutely is.
(18:33):
Well, we want to spend thetime talking about our kids and how
our kids are dealing with T oned of course, but the title of
this podcast is Dads and Diabetes,and the reason Alan and I came up
with this podcast is to try andgive our dadas someplace to engage, to
listen, so, like you said, Stephen, to hopefully have a connection
(18:56):
to their own experiences from a dadperspective. So I'm gonna ask you guys
just to set your kids aside fora moment and to think about what impact
T one D had on you asa dad. So that moment your kid
was diagnosed and kind of the immediateaftermath, what were you thinking, What
was it, I mean psychologically,what was going on? And how did
(19:18):
you How did you deal with that? Stephen want to go first, Um,
yeah, yeah, first. Um, the thoughts I had in the
in the days after the diagnosis.Um, it was everything from how it's
going to impact him for the restof his life. Yeah, we're gonna
go the doctor. Yeah, we'regonna make you better. We're gonna do
(19:40):
this, We're gonna do that.But he's gonna deal with us the rest
of his life. And it's notjust you know, before I sit down
and eat, you know, Ihave to think about what I'm eating.
Um, you know, before hegoes to parties. When he's in college,
he's gonna ask to remember this beforehe goes on you know, meets
people, going dates and stuff.We'll have to take this into consideration.
Um. He's still at the stage, Um that he wants eat pursue baseball,
(20:06):
maybe as a professional career. Um. I'm not a scout. I'm
not gonna say that's going to happen. But that's something to take into consideration,
is um, you know, couldit be done? And I know
that yes, everything could be done. So it's still I'm supporting him and
I'm gonna push him, but Ihave to stop and say, you're gonna
have to do this because when you'reout on the hot baseball field, remember
(20:30):
when all this started, That's that'sexactly what was going on. So um,
we look at um players like baseballplayers like Jordan Hicks and Adam Duvall
and a little bit differently now becausethey we joke and say they play with
a pump. So I mean,it's it's entirely possible, but it's it's
(20:51):
it's thinking about this all the time. And as a dad, you know,
I'm thinking, you know, whatis my now fourteen year old kid
eating, because we all have afourteen year olds can eat like you know,
you know all of this and youknow all of that, and um,
you know him out think twice aboutit. He might fall asleep about
it. But you know, I'vehad a dex com beeping in the middle
of the night. Yeah, andmy wife and I joked sometimes I've heard
(21:15):
others say this too, But sometimesit's like having a newborn again. Oh
yeah, just you know, gettingwoken up in the middle of the night
and um, you know, takinga juice into the other room. And
I mean I remember one of theone of the worst, remember the lowest
points was probably a few months aftera diagnosis, and we have juice that
(21:36):
we have in our room and inwild room. Someone he goes low and
I was two in the morning.He was having a juice. I didn't
do anything, so he had anotherone a few minutes later, and he
looked at me, he goes,Dad, I'm just I'm just tired of
eating and drinking in the middle ofthe night. I'm like, well,
I told you we're gonna do whateverit takes, and juice is what it
(21:57):
takes right now. So and it'sI don't think it's had a bigger impact
on Will's two younger brothers. Um, but his conversations that that me and
my wife have. I never thoughtI'd have to have the conversation with the
little brothers of what do you doif if Will passes out? You know
(22:18):
what to do when you call nineone one? Do you know what to
say? Um? Two of them, the oldest in the middle when they
were at the same bus in theafternoon, I said, what would you
say to the Bucks driver? Um, so it's thoughts like that. It's
it's you know, having to beaware of those type of situations. And
I never thought I'd have to goto a five before meeting at a school
and say this is what my kidneeds, because, honestly, if you
(22:42):
look at Will, just like prettymuch all other T one ds, he
looks like a normal kid. Helooks like a normal fourteen year old.
Granted he's almost sixty one at thispoint, but other than that, you
know, everything is is normal.So yeah, but I can sit here
relate to what you're saying about teenageboys. Ella's obviously that focused on this
(23:03):
podcast. Ella and Anna more oftenthan not. Every now and then,
I mentioned Ethan Ethan thirteen years old. I'm one seventy, he's one ninety.
I'm a size ten shoe, he'sa size thirteen shoe. Yeah,
in this at our house at home. It's interesting as well. I point
you make about the juice because Idon't have to wake up too often anymore
to give a juice, but occasionallyI do. And she never remembers,
(23:25):
like I joke with her in themorning. I'm like, do you remember
me waking you up at two inthe morning to give you juice? No?
But so it doesn't really I don'tthink it really impacts her that significantly.
But I have huge gilt about inthe middle of the night giving my
kid juice and the effect it's havingon her teeth, which is completely inane.
It's like, all the things toworry about, that's the least important.
(23:47):
You know, Well, we'll justamput the dental insurance if needs be.
But I can certainly relate to afew of those points. Rob the
same question to you, What canI impact you feel like the diagnosis had
on you in the immediate aftermath andso sequently, I think the first year
was the toughest because you and Italked to that first year and I come
(24:07):
back to my story about you herein just a second. But I'm sorry,
Oh no, it's okay. Ithink, um, pardon me.
I think the first year was thetoughest because there's that fine line of you're
dealing with this, you're learning asyou're going along, and you still want
your kid to feel like a kid, you know, so how do you
(24:30):
do that? And I just rememberand I still have a lot of conversation.
I've actually done a few stories onathletes who have Type one, whether
they're in high school and having successor in college having success. I think
for me it was more of like, soon as you diagnosed, I was
(24:52):
like, all right, well,this is it's your kid. You love
your kid anyway, so I'm goingto it's just another added responsibility because let's
be real, are other children whodon't have Type one. You're still going
to worry about them even when they'rein their forties and fifties, if God
willing are around, you know whatI mean. So that the way I
(25:15):
look at it is I have toworry about Grace anymore. And I will
say her doctor, a gentleman bythe name of doctor Nayak, has done
a great job of kind of reassuringme when I've gone to the doctors that
a lot of it is the technologyis making a heck of a lot easier
(25:36):
because and I'll talk about this later, I've been doing a fundraiser for the
last couple of years trying to raisemoney for the JDRF, the Juvenile Diabees
Research Foundation, and I've talked toa wide range of people older people who
are diagnosed forty years ago and thestuff that they have to go through.
I mean, basically it was archaicand they were doing things hind They had
(26:00):
no idea. You know, porkinsulin and you know, just drink a
lot of juice, keep your bloodsugar high because it's the lows that will
get you, which is very true. And I just remember one of the
first times we went with the doctor. I was so concerned because at night
Grace was, you know, gettingup two fifty and sometimes two seventy five
(26:22):
and even three hundred. And hewas like, you know what, he
goes, if you didn't have that, the the monitor on your phone and
the app on your phone, you'dhave no idea unless you woke up every
hour and pricked her finger. Hesaid. So I'm not saying it's not
a concern, because obviously the longterm effects can be devastating, but he
(26:45):
said, worry more about the lows. And you know, Grace has been
got on a deck com pomp amonth after she was diagnosed. That's been
a godsend. In fact, wejust did an upgrade yesterday where now once
she gets above two hundred, itwill it's more intuitive, it will start
giving her corrections versus manually giving hercorrections. So I don't I'm not a
(27:10):
cynical person at all. And Idon't know if they'll ever find a cure,
because I think it'd be tough topinpoint. But I will say the
technology has made it a lot morereassured. It's more it's reassuring at night.
If you wake up at three inthe morning and look, okay,
you know her blood sugar's ninety,she's gonna be okay. I can't imagine
(27:32):
what it was like ten years ago. In fact, to tell quick story,
the last time she had a doctor'sappointment, her A one C was
six eight and I said to thedoctor, you know, he was praising
aarontoner, What a great job she'sdone, staying healthy, staying on top
of it, exercising, what haveyou? And he uh, I said,
(27:55):
well, I said, you seemto be pleased. It's like it's
outstanding. He goes, you don'tunderstand. I've been doing this for twenty
years and I've seen kids' health getsso much better. I said, well,
ten years ago, what would havebeen good? He said, ten
point five? He said, Isaid, I get a kid, we
had ten point five. He goes, I would have dumb backflips down the
(28:18):
hall. I'm like, are youserious. I'm like, if you told
me that now, I probably wouldn'tsleep for a month, you know.
I mean it's getting better. ThankGod for technology. So I think for
me, I just take myself outof the equation. I don't care if
I have to get up at night, and it's the lows that that's what
gets me. Um, that's whenI get a little uh, you know,
(28:44):
concerned, and you know that keepsme up versus when she's high.
You know, a lot of itis you can't you have no idea what's
going on in their body. Youknow, she's twelve years old now you
know it's going through. She's aboutto enter puberty and hormones are going crazy.
Her doctor even told me he studiedthat even thinking about food can make
(29:08):
your blood sugar go up a littlebit. I mean, it's just it's
just truly incredible. So yeah,I think they're worry more about when she's
older, kind of like Stephen said, and she's in college, you know,
and nobody knows anything about it,and she'll be uh, you know
(29:30):
a little bit alone in that.He has even said to me, She's
like, what's gonna happen when Iget older and I'm in my own place
and I get low and I don'tknow, you know, at night,
And I'm like, that's a,you know, a scary thought for her.
Um And hopefully when she gets tothat age, technology will be even
better and they'll figure that out.But I think I think that's what it'll
(29:53):
be harder for me is when she'sout of the house and she's not sleeping
across the hall from us. Yeah. I know you've not been able to
catch every episode we've done, Robert, you have a crazy schedule, but
you should check out the last onebecause Alan and I we decided to hearn
in on the things we most hatehim out diabetes. Typically we're very super
positive Steve and I hopefully will attestmost of the most of our episodes have
(30:17):
that kind of a vibe. Butthis last one we're like, you know
what, let's just lean into this. Let's just talk about the things that
just piss us off when it comesto d and one of the things that
Alan was most concerned about, oneof the things that really does upset him
is just what you described it wasthe whole you know, what do I
do when she leaves home? Whatdo I do when she's out on her
own? She's you know, ifshe didn't have T one D I would
worry every night about my daughter,right absolutely, But the fact she does
(30:41):
as a whole of the layer toit. But hey, my favorite things
doing these podcasts and yes, inour house we say every well when grays
and heaven you know her moments whichshe hasn't read too many of. But
I'll just say, we're just goingto kick it right in the butt.
We're gonna kick that right in thebutt to keep doing it, you know,
So just kind of that positive reallyenforcement help sometimes and you are a
(31:06):
super positive guy. I want tocome onto that here in just a second,
which is what I was just gettingready to say, which is my
favorite thing to do, is tosay, hey, we'll come back to
that in just a second. Iforget to do it. But you said
something a moment ago that I dowant to just quickly circle back to and
I'm gonna spend too much time onit, Rob because I'm going to link
it out in our social media postwith this episode. And that is the
fundraising you've been doing for Grace eachand every year since she's been diagnosed.
(31:30):
So obviously you can give a bitmore detail here, Rob, But listeners,
Rob, there's a twenty four hourWell you're in a basketball court right
just shooting hoops for twenty four hoursstraight, and he has some of the
local sports teams donate paraphernalia and signeditems and just really really needs to have
(31:51):
some local businesses as well, allin an effort to generate funds to raise
money to go to JDRF SO andI went out there too one of those
couple of years ago, Robin checkedin with you and embarrassed myself on the
basketball court for a couple of minutes. I told you if it was sock
amount, we'd be okay. Buthow did I just quickly? Rob?
(32:12):
Again, because we're gonna link ountto this, I want folks to go
and check out the funding page thatyou have in preparation for this year's round.
But what was your inspiration? Imean, obviously I know what your
inspiration was, but what made yougo, Hey, you know what,
we're gonna go the basketball court fortwenty four hours? Well, I just
wanted to turn the negative into apositive first and foremost reached out to some
people whom one she used to bea doctor study research diabetes, and I
(32:38):
just asked her who's the best group, and she said the JDR and she
was involved with them. So let'ssee. Grace was most in April,
and I think, let's see major. About three or four months later,
I started this fundraiser which I shootfree throws twenty four straight hours. People
can donate, you know, adollar for each hour whatever, and then
(33:00):
I also get UM. I alsodo a sign of the Denver Nuggets,
the Colorado Avalanche, the Colorado Rockieshave been really gracious and given me awesome
items, and UM Air Force Academy, Colorado College and local colleges UM,
and then of course the Rocky MountainVibes and Colorado Spring Switchbacks as well.
(33:22):
And I just roll in that,Rob, You've got the wall in that.
Yeah. Well they've all been great. They have, Yeah, I
mean really just yeah, I meanvery great. Because I'm en count to
that on on on the post forthis episode because it's really neat, Rob,
what you do UM. And itwas fun when I came down the
gym to what you do it becauseas I was there. Other people will
(33:44):
come in. People will come into check on you in person, which
is really neat to see. Thisportion of the podcast is brought to you
by Diabets. That's d I Adash Bee dash t e e S Diabets.
It is the child of the topone diabetes survivor and mom who wanted
to increase awareness and visibility of diabetesthrough cool, funny, unique T one
(34:08):
D themed clothing. Diabets also supportsfellow survivors and fighters with JD or ever
saving a donation for every shirt sold. We need a cure, but until
then, why not have some funwith our shirts and raise awareness at the
same time. Check out diabets dotcom again that's d I A Dabe dat
(34:30):
ees dot com, diabetes dot comand share the diabetes love. Yeah.
It's a great community event. Um, and people are you know. One
of the nice things about it isis our friends are great. They come
down, they donate and they supportme and bring me whatever. But um,
(34:51):
it's the people that have had typeone for thirty forty years that come
down, write a check and thankme. But that's not the part.
Is I find out their stories andone of the suckest things about it is
is I've met every year I meeta mom whose child has passed away from
it, and it just you know, and you start thinking, gosh,
(35:15):
this poor lady, and you cansee the pain in her face and in
her eyes, and you know,so it's just it's something that you know
that it's just near and dear tomy heart. Yeah. Yeah, well
I'll make sure I encounts that forsure, And Steve, I'm gonna come
back to you just just a secondbefore I do. I keep referencing this
(35:36):
story I have about Rob. Sofolks who listen to this podcast from episode
one will be familiar now with withour diagnosis story with my daughter Ella.
A little piece of the story thatfolks won't be familiar with, perhaps is
when Rob found out that Ella hadbeen diagnosed. I think your daughter,
Rob was an Hey maybe you weresix or seven months into your journey,
(35:59):
but he immediately reached out to me. I don't know I post on social
media. I'm not sure how youwere made aware of it, Rob,
but anyway, you reached out tome immediately. I'm like, really sorry
to hear this. My daughter's tone D. Whatever you need, I'm
not joking. Rob's kind of abig cheese and Colorado springs. I mean,
he's a legit SI lab and yethe immediately gave me a cell phone
(36:22):
number. Hey, he go callme anytime, text me anytime. Just
the kinds he showed is something Inever forget. And yeah, we went
out and had lunch subsequently, andhe's been a great resource to me and
a great a great source of strengthto those first few weeks. So definitely
appreciate you for that, man.Thank you. Yeah, of course.
Well, you know, it's oneof the reasons why you're doing this right
(36:45):
is to help people who maybe arein the infancy stages of this sucky disease
and paying it forward. You know, you can meet a perfect stranger who
could come up to be like,I don't I'm my kid. Just you
would give them every bit of resourceand anything you could um because and maybe
(37:05):
I could talk about this a littlebit later on. It's kind of like
I started off with, there's alot of people out there and I was
in the same boat. They justdon't know anything about this disease. And
I you know, Grace went intoketo acidosis two weeks ago. She was
hospitalized for it, and uh,there were some people in the hospital who
didn't know much about it, butI won't get into that right now.
(37:30):
Yeah, it sounds like you awhole of the podcasts right there. Yeah,
it was you have to be anadvocate for your kid, let's put
that right. YEA. Luckily,luckily it was a mild by their standards,
mild. So literally within the firstthirty to sixty minutes of heard being
on an insulin drift and um thesaline for the dehydration, she was already
(37:55):
back to herself. I won't getinto the whole story because it would take
up whole podcast, because it waswe end up in three hospitals. Yeah,
it was. It was be gratefulyou're buddy. So, um,
Stephen, when I come back toyou here for just a second. So
we've obviously talked I say negative,but we talked about just the realistic impact
(38:21):
of T one D and the impactthat has on our kids of course and
um on us as dad's as well. Um. I mentioned I wanted to
circle back to our kids, andI want to do so in a positive
fashion. So share out if youcould some things you think have been positives
from the whole t one D experience. So I'm just gonna say there are
(38:44):
no real positives, right, Itis like false negative, no positive.
I don't know you want to lookat it. It's hard to really take
a silver lining from this cloud.But but we have to, right,
we have to be upbeat about it. And there are things I think that
that have impacted our kids in positiveways. So which have you seen those
things manifest with Will? Um?It's in a way it's kind of almost
(39:09):
forced him to grow up a littlebit, which isn't exactly fair because you
know, he's still fourteen. Um, but he does see some responsibility in
everything from you know what am Ieating? Where's my pump? Did ill?
The whole everything to do with it? Um, he gets it.
Um, he's fourteen. He doesn'talways do it, but he understands.
(39:31):
Um. He he kind of he'llI don't want say he'll take up for
others, but he's he'll he'll tellpeople, you know, what's going on.
He's he doesn't shy away from anything. He Um, he'll be right
out there and tell people what's goingon and what he's doing. Um.
(39:52):
And I think one thing that's it'skind of led to is. I think
it's in a way it's shown himthat we are there to support him,
um, regardless of what happens,whether you know, two o'clock in the
morning or whether we're sitting in arestaurant, whatever the case may be,
that we've got his back, andwe will always have his back. Like
(40:14):
we mentioned earlier, I mean,he'll be forty and we'll probably still be
doing the same thing. It's interesting. So obviously Rob and I are having
girls. In general wisdom is girlsmature more quickly than boys. Right,
so you'll comment about him having togrow up more quickly, not not really
being fact he's fourteen years old,but you you really are seeing a different
trajectory for him in terms with hismaturity than your ordinarily would have expected.
(40:37):
You're you're ready seeing that. Youthink, yeah, I'm seeing that because,
like I mentioned earlier, he wasbig into the you know, I'm
gonna play baseball when I grew up. There's no there's no other option.
That's what I'm gonna do. U. And one day we had a conversation
about he said he may want togo into the medical field and becoming intechnologist.
Wow, like, well, youcertainly have the experience. So y
(41:00):
Um, it's, for lack ofa better term, outside the box of
your typical fourteen year old of thetypical careers. It's it's kind of making
him look, Okay, if Ineed, if I want to do this,
where do I start? When doI start? Um? So I
would like to say that he's takinglike grades and school a little bit more
(41:22):
seriously. Um. He's a prettysmart kid anyway. Um, but he
now knows that stuff he does nowcould impact him down the road. Yeah.
So he's not thinking outside of thebox, Stephen, he's thinking,
if you will, outside of thediamond. Here you go. I did
that just for you those English guys. And stick to the pitch. I
(41:46):
don't mean a pitch in baseball.Okay, saying question to you, my
friend, what positive side effects doyou think t Wend's had on Grace?
Um? You know Grace is Uh, she's always been a very just delightful
(42:07):
kid. I mean she just youknow everyone, she's well liked, She
has a pretty good sense of humor, she's always happy. Um. So
I'm just glad that this hasn't hadum, hasn't really killed her spirit.
Although she a handful. You know, there's been a handful of times when
(42:28):
she said, and it's understandable.You know, I hate diabetes. Why
do I have to have this?Why me? Yeah, so it's uh
and that's pretty normal. UM.And talking to either young adults or people
are parents who have children who arenow young adults. UM, they've kind
(42:52):
of prepared me for the um,the denial part of their life when they're
teen agers and they really don't wantto be different from everyone. And I
would say Grace is now. Ithink initially she was embarrassed that she had
it. She didn't. In fact, one of the first things she said
to me after she was diagnosed wasam I going to be different from everyone
(43:15):
else? And I said, well, in some ways, yes, but
you're a kid just like every othernine year old and when you're ten and
that sort of thing. So Ithink for UM, I think for Grace,
I'm glad her spirits has maintained herlove for life, for zeal for
(43:36):
life. You know, she's sheshe like she before. When she played
sports. I would always coach herteams. She plays basketball, soccer,
tennis, and and I just alwaysfelt like I got a coach her because
no one's gonna understand, and itwould be a burden to that coach to
(43:58):
be like, hey, if thishappens, make sure she drinks shoice.
They don't know what the hecks goingon. And now she's starting to own
it. And this is the firstyear she played club basketball, and her
coach is great and he understands everything. And now my wife and I don't
feel like, gosh, if we'renot there and something happens, Grace won't
take care of it out of embarrassment. Now she'll just take care of it
(44:19):
in a very sly way to speak. But there are definitely moments when I'm
like, you know, I seeeating like a cinnamon roll? Have you
dosed for it? Because our friendsaround, I'm like, I don't care
either, I'm gonna embarrass you takecare of it. And she chooses to
take care of it most of thetime. So I guess for me,
(44:42):
the positive for me would be I'mjust glad she still has the same spirit
that she had before she was there. Yeah, that's important. That is
important because you know, we've allheard those horror stories of how I think
it's particularly girls can be negative beingimpacted. And then of course she had
the extent into body image and everythingelse, and helloa, evidently that wasn't
(45:12):
at my head. I think Iwas stupid. I was unexpected, but
I guess it could be worse.It keeps keeps it real, It keeps
it real. Guys. Well,I can't let you, guys go without
talking about the fact that, ofcourse we are recording this in the eye
of a storm. I mean,something significant in human history, with a
coronavirus running rampant across the planet.I mean absolutely astonishing times, astonishing period,
(45:38):
right, full stop, end ofstory. But when you have a
kid who has compromised immune systems,as as our kids do, it certainly
gives you greater pause for thought.We're all hold up again, I mentioned
earlier on video here. We're allhold up in our respective guest rooms.
Yea quarantining by the looks of things. I was traveling, actually rolled,
(46:00):
I was traveling in Colorado. Wasrecently his last Friday. So when I
got home, Yeah, I immediatelywent straight to the guest room. So
I haven't been in my own bedroomnow for a week. Kind of crazy
times, guys, What how isthis at? You'd been thinking more about
this for the coronavirus. It's interesting. When Grace was in the hospital for
(46:20):
that day, they tested her foreverything under the sun. I mean literally,
because when you go into keto acidosis, from what I was told,
typically it's due to an infection andthey couldn't find Then they kind of determined
that she might have had a mildurinary track infection and which might have triggered
(46:43):
the keto act versus. But literallythe next it was about three days later,
was when this all kind of orit was really gosh, I think
about it was the next day becauseit happened on the Monday. We left
Tuesday afternoon, and Wednesday night waswhen the NBA said this is our last
game. And then when they didthat, everything just kind of went into
(47:05):
well, we're done, We're done, We're done, We're done. Um.
So it did cross my mind whenwe were in the hospital, like
I wonder if she has the coronavirus. But obviously there were no tests because
they're very limited right now. Sowhen all the sports shutting down, roll
but you had to start doing youmeet your meteorology degree or whatever. No
(47:30):
weather guy, I've actually still beendoing my job. They did that.
I probably will go back and forthbetween sports and news for the you know
time being so um yeah, Imean there's there's been well NFL free agency
in the Broncos, there's been stuffto talk about. So I lucked out
(47:52):
there. Plus, you know thishas been moved back and pushed back,
you know the Pike speak kill climbor uh you know the Major League Baseball
Opening Day or you know the Yeah, you know, there's still stories out
there. It's just a little moredifficult to get to people. Yeah,
one of the things you're well mostwell known for is your sense of humor.
(48:13):
In those little less segments do youcome up with? So I think
you need to come up with asegment where you're out in some random parks
somewhere in Colorado Springs just playing sportson your own so you can report on
yourself. Well, what I wantedto do was I wanted to do a
segment called what do we Do WithoutSports? And I was gonna do one
installment like dudes in a man cavenot being able to have conversations with one
(48:34):
another because the talk about sports,And I just thought there's a why you
could do that. Now you can'tgo on the barbershops, but I thought
that would be one, and thenI thought even like going you know,
kind of tugging cheek to a beautyslot talking to women and having them be
like, oh my god, ifwe don't get sports back, I'm gonna
kill my husband. You know.Yeah, I think right now, my
(49:00):
bosses are you know, they don'twant to offend anybody, understand, like
yo, which it's you know,obviously not a joke for many people.
Yeah. So Steven, what impactof any has just head on you and
your family? And terms are beingkind of more heightened, more aware precautions
you're taking. About two weeks ago, I got sent home from work.
(49:23):
So I've been working from home fortwo weeks. And last week I think
the schools they send everybody home kidsare working from home or learning from home
doing e learning stuff. Um.And we found out today that as of
midnight to night, restaurants, bars, all these places they will be closed.
(49:45):
Um. So well that plus alittle bit more cleaning here at the
house and just you know, livitingwho goes where or who comes over or
anything like that, because you know, we still got some some neighborhood kids
that are out playing and stuff likethat. So um, that's it so
far, but we'll see where thistakesas Yeah, yeah, it's crazy,
(50:06):
and it's interesting to see every statedoing its own thing. Texas well often
at least shut bars and restaurants andall those good things a couple of days
ago now, and I guess thereare strong rumors that the whole state,
you know, they're going to rollup the host whole state here, probably
in the next twenty four hours.So yeah, yeah, it's gonna interest
frollowing California's lead, of course,So yeah, it's gonna be interesting.
(50:29):
Gents, this has been fantastic.It's been wonderful talking to another couple of
dads. Stephen again, really haveappreciated your support since since pretty much episode
one, and Rob, as Imentioned earlier in this episode, you've been
a great support to me personally.So to have you both on talking to
you one d talking about your kiddos, providing the outlet for other dads who
(50:51):
maybe listening, has been fantastic.In case dads want to reach out to
you independently, maybe something you saidspecifically really touched them or resonated with them,
or they want to follow up withyou on a on a particular experience
you guys had. Do you wantto go ahead and share out your respective
Twitter handles? Stephen, how canfolks get hold of you? Um?
You don't believe it or not?I am not on Twitter really, okay,
(51:13):
I am not right. This mightmake me get to Twitter, but
I am on Facebook. Um,and as people that will see UM for
any kind of dad's in diabetes post, you can I sue me reply or
UM. I don't know if youfund me as a fan, but I
mean you can always first and findme. Um. But about your last
name, Stephen, uh truett tr u I t okay, there you
(51:36):
go, so you should be easyenough to find. And like you said,
you comment on several of our posts. So folks and go find you
in the comment section and reach outto you there. Rob, you're everywhere.
Oh yeah right. I wouldn't beon it if it wasn't for work.
I'm not a fourteen year old girl, you know. Um, I'm
on Twitter at Rob nammum, whichobviously namnum is not like Smith or Jones.
(52:01):
So namnum is U n A mn O U m as and mary
um. And then I'm also I'mon Facebook. UM and I guess Instagram,
which is basically pictures that is,it's more of a work thing.
It's our newmat care deio. Ithink it's my handle for Instagram, but
(52:25):
um, yeah, when I useTwitter and my professional page for Facebook,
um for work, and most ofthe time I don't. If I'm not
at work, I'm not really payingtoo much attention to it. But you
can still reach out to me connectif if you would like to do so
good stuff. Well, certainly hadencourage our listeners to do so if they
(52:46):
want to, particularly in Rob's case, because you know, you thought,
well label you to stay on someof what he's doing and his it's called
shot for Grace, right, AShot for Grace will be year four?
Okay, fantastic. You think it'sgonna be impacted by all this Corona craziness.
Typically I do it um. UsuallyI do it um early to mid
(53:08):
August. So let's hope, bythe grace of God, this will all
be you know, rectified well beforethat. Yeah, but then again it
perhaps it may not. I mean, all of our schools have been are
shut down and you can't even getinto the building if you're an administrator.
Right, So we'll see it's March. You know, obviously there's a great
(53:32):
unknown out there. So if um, if that is the case, we'll
just have to push you back lateron in the year. So a final
quick question for you. Maybe I'lldo it outside by myself. I don't
know. I mean in Colorado andold because you certainly could. Yeah,
you can do that in austed butmay not get a lot of people out
to bid on silent auction items.But I also use an auction page and
(54:00):
quickly people go to that page justto see what the items are and then
go up on that sort of thing. I did that. So one last
question for you. So Stephen,you mentioned Wheel as a strapping young Matt
he had aspirations to be a baseballplayer. So I'm going to assume he's
a better baseball player than you are. Will that be fair? Um?
(54:20):
Yeah, that would be fair,But don't tell him that. Okay,
I'm going somewhere with this. SoRob mentioned that Grace is now playing competitive
basketball. I've seen you shoot hoopsroll, but she's got to be better
than you. She's getting pretty good. But honestly, and and this is
just my feeling alone, it's notright or wrong. I think and I
(54:42):
know, um um, I knowthat your daughter plays competitive soccer year around.
But for me and I hope youguys don't think um um sliding you
in any way. But after shewas diagnosed with type one, the fact
that she's on any plane feel whetherit's basketball, playing lacrosse or you know,
(55:04):
tennis, what have you, it'sa win for me just to have
her out there. M Yeah,I mean it's just well, thank god
they're able to just be normal kids. That's you stuck them landing my friend.
That's the perfect place to end theepisode. Fantastic. So Stephen Truett
again, thank you so much forjoining me today. Mate, sure,
(55:25):
I appreciate it. Thank you.And Rob Namnam thanks so much. I
appreciate you making some time in yourbusy schedule. It's been fun catching up.
Yeah, I've been awesome. Thanksfor having me. And that's it.
That's our first ever dad's and diabetesdad's panel. Ordinarily two dads on
a podcast trying to figure it allout. Today you had three. I
hope you enjoyed it, and we'llcatch you on the next episode and hopefully
(55:47):
Alan will be out of the financialmaya and able to re engage with us.
Thanks for listening,
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