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Living alone with type 1. Any advice please?

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This thread is now closed. Please contact Anna DUK, Ieva DUK or everydayupsanddowns if you would like it re-opened.
Austin Mini

Austin Mini

Well-Known Member
Relationship to Diabetes
Type 1
My eldest son has decided to move out of his shared flat and into one by himself. Thats OK but what of hypos? When my mum was ill I lived at her home so I could visit her in hospital every day, we live 200 miles away. I placed Coca-Cola in every room, on the floor, near the door. This did work on one occasion after I had walked from the hospital, for the third time that day, as I hypoed and dropped to the floor and drank a bottle which did the trick! However have any members any more suggestions we could implement? We do live 90 miles away from him. Thanks AM.
 
This is one of my anxieties for the future when my son moves out! Like you say, being organised and having hypo remedies close at hand in every room is important. Would your son be interested in (and could he afford?) using a CGM? Dexcom can be used with pump or MDI and alarms if BG level drops to hypo. I'm hoping my son might wear full time sensors, but there's the question of funding them.
 
Thanks Redkite (we have Red kites flying overhead and feeding from gardens where we live) I have not heard of CGM Dexcom I will look into that. He is not a pump person.
 
. Just be sensible make sure there is always glucose in the house and on your person. Can't see a problem myself.
 
I agree with the others regarding having glucose/sugar all over the house. Also, you need to drill it into your subconscious to be safe at all times. By this I mean testing if you wake in the night for no apparent reason (or even if you do have a reason, like needing the loo, at least until you are confident that a night hypo is highly unlikely). If you feel odd, test so that it becomes an ingrained habit. I've had a couple of very close calls over the years, but through these incidents I have known that I must take on some sugar and keep checking until I am sure I am OK.

The effects of alcohol also may need to be borne in mind, and again it must be ingrained to test before bed and have some extra carbs if alcohol has been consumed (depending, of course, on your own particular tolerance for it - it doesn't actually seem to affect me much).

Don't be complacent and skip tests or guess insulin doses! Perhaps you could have some sort of texting arrangement, at least in the early days, so that you know he is going to bed OK? Also (although I'm not following my own advice!) some people think that even a single person should have a glucagon kit in the house should paramedics ever need to be called, so it is readily available - hopefully, will never be needed.
 
We are arranging for him to call us every evening at say 9pm, just three rings on the phone, to let us know he is OK. We did this for ten years with my mum and it worked great. Also we are going to 'skype' over the internet when he gets home from work every evening too before dinner.
All his friends live close by and they are all the sort who will go and call on him (they will have a key too) and being in the same band as him they are really close friends. Thanks for the help so far. We are looking at August this year for the move.
 
I lived with only my small daughter for a while and kept dextrose all over the house, car, bags, everywhere and was ok.
My brother, also T1, lived alone for a while and all his nearby friends knew he was diabetic and if he was late for work or meeting up with them would call him or go to his flat. This worked well. Pre Skype days! It didn't stop my mum and dad worrying about both of us, but you do have to let grown up kids get on with it. I'm sure worrying about our kids is in the parent job description, even if they have no medical condition. 🙂
 
I'm confused Austin, sorry. Are you talking of your son being alone and having hypos - or you doing ditto? Or both of you?

Cos one thing I have to say about your son is, that it doesn't matter what age he is or where he lives or whether he has diabetes or not - you will ALWAYS worry about him.

It's called parenthood. Most things infer it's only the female of the species that this type of thing applies to - but it isn't. It's a HUMAN characteristic - not a FEMALE one !

(Our eldest is 45. She's been married 20 years and living elsewhere for longer. 3 kids of her own, youngest 17. One grandchild. Right now this minute she's in hospital and under anaesthetic having a planned operation that isn't life threatening or an emergency - just necessary. We're BOTH worried! - yet our son-in-law is at the hospital and isn't going home until it's over.)
 
Has your son ever needed the help of any of his flat mates, Austin Mini? If he's always dealt with his own hypos, then it's no more likely that he'll need help when living alone.

Although I've lived with various people since diagnosis as an adult, about 20 years ago, only once did someone try to intervene - my partner, who was home and in same bed as me, and noticed me trying to open sweets from windowsill. He helped, then tried to give me some Hypostop and when he realised I was objecting, tasted it, realised it was disgusting, and never tried again. Often he was away in Antarctica or Arctic or Scotland for months on end or I was working away, so I was well used to dealing with hypos alone.

Key point I reckon is, if in doubt, better to eat some sugar than waste time testing blood glucose levels, plus have sources of sugar in every room, and particularly each floor, so you don't have to use stairs when hypo. Plus have sweets in all pockets for out of home self care.
 
Austin Mini said:
Thanks Redkite (we have Red kites flying overhead and feeding from gardens where we live) I have not heard of CGM Dexcom I will look into that. He is not a pump person.
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Ooh are there red kites in Lincolnshire now? I love that they are spreading themselves all over the country and repopulating their old haunts. We are in the Chilterns, so lots of red kites here. There's one who often circles very low over our garden (nearly down to wall height) 🙂
 
Redkite said:
Ooh are there red kites in Lincolnshire now? I love that they are spreading themselves all over the country and repopulating their old haunts. We are in the Chilterns, so lots of red kites here. There's one who often circles very low over our garden (nearly down to wall height) 🙂
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We have had Red kites in Lincolmnshire for at least 25 years. They were introduced into Kings Cliffe forest at least 25 years ago. They have bred and where my brother in law lives feed from his garden. My sister in law who died recently had a red kite which would wait for her each morning and as she scattered food onto the lawn flew down just a few feet from her and feed. Most kings cliffe residents have red kites feed from their lawns, quite spectacular to see.
 
trophywench said:
I'm confused Austin, sorry. Are you talking of your son being alone and having hypos - or you doing ditto? Or both of you?

Cos one thing I have to say about your son is, that it doesn't matter what age he is or where he lives or whether he has diabetes or not - you will ALWAYS worry about him.

It's called parenthood. Most things infer it's only the female of the species that this type of thing applies to - but it isn't. It's a HUMAN characteristic - not a FEMALE one !

(Our eldest is 45. She's been married 20 years and living elsewhere for longer. 3 kids of her own, youngest 17. One grandchild. Right now this minute she's in hospital and under anaesthetic having a planned operation that isn't life threatening or an emergency - just necessary. We're BOTH worried! - yet our son-in-law is at the hospital and isn't going home until it's over.)
Click to expand...

Its my youngest son who is 35 yrs old and a lecturer in Nottingham. He has had hypos and his friends know how to cope very well. Thanks TW.
 
Austin Mini said:
We have had Red kites in Lincolmnshire for at least 25 years. They were introduced into Kings Cliffe forest at least 25 years ago. They have bred and where my brother in law lives feed from his garden. My sister in law who died recently had a red kite which would wait for her each morning and as she scattered food onto the lawn flew down just a few feet from her and feed. Most kings cliffe residents have red kites feed from their lawns, quite spectacular to see.
Click to expand...

That's really lovely to hear! 🙂. I don't think my garden is big enough for a red kite to feel safe landing in it, but we are treated to some aerial acrobatics, especially when the local crows are chasing off the kites.
 
We were staying on a farm in Leicestershire last week - not actually ever so far off the A14 - and saw red kites, they are beautiful. Mind you a few weeks ago my husband saw something in the cherry tree over the fence in the neighbour's garden - got the binoculars out - a sparrowhawk eating his dinner.

We live on a main road, a bus route, in Bedworth about 100yds from the M6, which is in a 'cutting' and goes under the road!
 
How's you daughter Trophywench, did her op go Ok?
 
Its my youngest son who is 35 yrs old and a lecturer in Nottingham. He has had hypos and his friends know how to cope very well. Thanks TW.
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He's 35 and a university lecturer????

Unless there's something else going on that I've missed, I've no idea why you would feel it necessary for him to Skype AND call you every single evening to reassure you he hasn't had a bad hypo. Isn't he an adult? I get that as a parent you worry about your kids (even when they are nearly middle-aged adults themselves) but this all seems a bit much.
 
She's fine - doesn't seem too bad at all. Doesn't know yet whether they have been able to remove any of the internal scar tissue or adhesions from the 3 previous caesarians though. She should find out more tomorrow.

She ain't a pretty sight when she shows you which isn't frequent cos she hates it - but at least she isn't in agony now - and able to toddle to the bathroom on her own OK.

Thank you for asking - and apologies for hi-jacking Austin's thread !
 
trophywench said:
She's fine - doesn't seem too bad at all. Doesn't know yet whether they have been able to remove any of the internal scar tissue or adhesions from the 3 previous caesarians though. She should find out more tomorrow.

She ain't a pretty sight when she shows you which isn't frequent cos she hates it - but at least she isn't in agony now - and able to toddle to the bathroom on her own OK.

Thank you for asking - and apologies for hi-jacking Austin's thread !
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Oh good, hope she feels much better soon and they've managed to get all that scar tissue. Getting to the bathroom unaided is a milestone 🙂
 
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