Mom Wants A Diabetes Cure

Tuesday, September 01, 2009

I'm Not a Doctor, But I Play One When I Watch TV

I'm a regular viewer of Army Wives. It's a cheesy, soapy kind of series on Lifetime, but I like it.

A couple of episodes ago, Claudia Joy would mention how thirsty she was and take a swig of water. It was very subtle and not much attention was brought to it on the show. Not another mention was brought about it following her swig.

But, I immediately zoned in on it and thought, "Ha, I bet she has diabetes."

On the next episode, they alluded to her being told devastating news after a car accident.

I thought, "I'll bet she's diagnosed with diabetes. Now will it be Type 1 or 2. What a cliffhanger!"

During that episode, she complained she wasn't feeling well. And then she asked someone for some water because she was thirsty.

She and one of the Army Wives were driving at night and her vision blurred. They got into an accident after she swerved out of the way of a car whose lane she passed into.

At the hospital, they did regular blood work that night. The next morning, the doctor mentioned that they saw her blood sugar was high and thought maybe stress from the accident caused it, so they did another blood work up that morning and found it to be high again. He told her to follow up with her physician.

I was like, "Damn! I should be a doctor! I'm feeling so House right now."

So, at the end, she's diagnosed with Type 2. It was an educational scene for the viewers. I was impressed that the TV doc was very thorough and pretty accurate with the info she gave Claudia Joy about Type 2 and the fact that even though she is thin and fit, she could still get Type 2.

This past episode shows Claudia Joy taking insulin because the doc wanted to get her started on that therapy right away.

So of course, I'm making sure that the technical part to this scene is accurate, LOL.

She didn't exactly get the air in correctly, but I'll let that pass. No biggie.

She did draw out the insulin correctly, did not tap out bubbles though, and she didn't go nuts over pushing out the insulin to get the correct dosage.

I remember eyeballing the bejeesus out of that syringe to make sure the plunger met up with the correct markings on the syringe. I was always cross-eyed.

OK, anyway, not much TV time can be taken up measuring out the insulin.

But when she injected it into her stomach, she rubbed the spot afterwards.

I was thinking, "Don't rub it! You're not supposed to rub it!"

Anywho, yeah...I'm a stickler for accurate diabetes portrayal. This will probably play out for a few episodes and then be forgotten about. But, I will watch like a hawk in the meantime to see if they do the Type 2 justice.