Dexcom: the first few weeks

I've been using my Dexcom  for a few weeks now. I'm in love with it. Love. The very first night it woke me up at 4 AM with a low. It said I was 68, meter said 65. So I grabbed some tabs and went right back to sleep. Now, my body will wake me up when I'm low but it waits until I'm at about 50. At that point I feel much, much worse than I do in the mid 60s and I stay awake for much longer treating the low if I have to treat a 50 vs a 65.

I did a TON of reading before I got the Dexcom, and I did even more reading while I was waiting for it to ship to me. I prepared myself mentally for the onslaught of information and numbers. I told myself over and over to not fall into the newbie mistake of overreacting to every change I see on my graph. For the first three days, I just watched it. I lived my life as I usually would, but I had this thing squealing at me all the time for being too high/low. After the first three days I took what I'd learned from my graphs and applied it to my bolusing habits. I'm so, so much more likely to prebolus for meals now because I've seen the difference it makes on my graph.

Probably 90 percent of the time I have a peanut butter sandwich on whole grain bread for breakfast. I love peanut butter. I love sandwiches. What I love the most is that it is like glue for my BG. As long as I wake up in range, I can stay in range until I eat something else. On the days I skip lunch altogether, my sandwich keeps me going until dinner. We're talking 12 hours here, folks.

I'm a numbers person. Numbers, graphs, charts... I love it. I love when I can visualize my BG numbers. I feel like Dexcom Studio is much better at doing this for me than CareLink. Here is my first few days with Dexcom:

I just like it. Not the numbers, but this is a beautiful representation of what's going on. Just because I'm proud, here are the most recent three days:

This is a miracle, I know, and I don't think I'll ever repeat it. I fully expect to mess this up over the weekend. 

If I Could Change Something About my Pump...

I'm usually the type of person who accepts her technology as it is. I don't bother to think about what I'd like in a device, because nobody is asking, and my dream device is never going to materialize. With that being said, I do have a few things Medtronic could tweak.

Appearance. I've been on a Medtronic pump since 2002, and all of my pumps have looked the same. Exhibit A:

Haha, yes, the '90's called and they want their beeper back. I know. This isn't really a huge deal to me, because my pump still does what it needs to do. It's also really, really hard to break. I drop my pump wayyy more than I'd like to admit. I'm also the type of person to trip over absolutely nothing. Its beauty isn't that big of a deal to me, but I can understand why people are moving to the flashier t:slim to avoid talking about their pager. 

Functions. There are a few features that I would really like to see on my pump. For instance, I like that I can set a temporary basal pattern when I'm sick or exercising. What I don't like is that it reminds me every 30 minutes that I'm using a temporary basal pattern. That gets really annoying, and I wish I had the option to turn that off.

 I like that I can have different basal patterns. For instance, my basal pattern A is all of my usual basal settings, but at 120%. This is useful during PMS, stress, and illness. What I'd like to see is a temporary setting for my bolus wizard, so I can also change my correction factor and insulin:carb ratios for a period of time. Otherwise I end up doing math in my head to add additional insulin, or I bolus for way more carbs than I'm actually eating, in hopes of keeping my BG out of the stratosphere. It would be useful right now, as I just had a steroid injection in my foot and my BG keeps heading into the stratosphere....or the ionosphere. 

More Beauty. This last one is just me being completely vain. I'd love to see the Silhouette infusion sets come in the same colors as the Mio! Oh, and while we are at it, I'd like to have the green color that Animas has. And some purple, because purple is the best color ever. I used to use the Mios, and I would order both pink and blue. I had two bathing suits: one with pink and one with blue. I could match my sets to my bathing suits. That was rad. I really prefer using the Silhouettes, but I'd love them even more if they came in more colors! If I'm going to have something taped to my skin for 3 days at a time, it should at least be pretty. :) 

So this post is just me lamenting on what I'd like to see in my pump. What about you? Which pump do you use, and what would you like to see it do (other than function more like a pancreas)?