Imagine me standing on the kitchen table in my pajamas strumming on a ukulele and belting out
Sarah Brightman's rendition of "Time To Say Goodbye....." Now keep that picture in your head for the following announcement. (Unless of course you went to college with me and then there's no need to imagine, I'm sure you can all remember just fine!)
I flunked my glucose test. You mothers understand exactly what I'm talking about, but for the rest of you, when you're pregnant they give you a disgusting sugary drink which you must gulp down in less than 5 minutes and then sit around for an hour while your body figures out what to do with all that glucose. Then they take your blood. One's body is supposed to process the sugar, break it down with insulin, yada yada, but unfortunately mine didn't. So then I took a THREE hour test where they drew my blood, made me drink twice as much icky liquid, and then drew more blood every hour on the hour. I didn't ace that test either. But I also didn't fail. I'd call it a nice sturdy C-, (which if I'd ever scored that mark on a test growing up I would have been kicked out of my family!).
Why, you ask, is my body betraying me? Well, pregnancy does fun things to a woman. Hormones from the placenta block the action of the insulin in the mother's body. MOST women have scrappy little pancreases that adjust to the problem perfectly fine and pump out lots and lots of extra insulin. My pancreas used to be scrappy, but not any more.
Apparently my pancreas gave up. Now it's sitting somewhere, no doubt up by my shoulder with all the internal organ shifting, doling out the regular amount of insulin with a cocky air of indifference for whether or not its input is actually effective.
So I'm broken. It could be worse, I could have full-on Gestational Diabetes, and I don't. Instead I have a glucose intolerance. (which will be rectified once I have the baby).
Sadly that means no sugars, no simple carbohydrates, no juice, no ice-cream, etc..... You get the point. This is a somber time, filled with great mourning and heartache. I must now say good bye to some of my dearest companions:
Good bye Dark Chocolate Truffle Cheesecake....
Good bye Chocolate Crackle Cookies, made with a half pound of expensive chocolate melted right into your batter.....
Good bye Raspberry filled doughnuts.....
Good bye thick and chewy brownies......
And hello vegetables, and fiber, and whole wheat, and something called a bran muffin.......
I just have to keep telling myself that it's only for 4-6 more weeks, and then I'll be able to resume my love affair with chocolate, only 28 more days........
Pray for me!
