Planning Our Family Vacation with T1D


Oh family trips, what good times to be had by all J  Normally you have the general stress of planning your family vacation but throw a T1d kid into the mix.  So currently I have been planning our family vacation to the lovely Walt Disneyworld.  While we planned on waiting till Cole was older, I decided that his love for Mickey Mouse and all Disney characters he might enjoy seeing them in real life (well real costumes) now.
So normally one would think about the following things when planning their family vacation:
1. when to go
2. where to stay
3. what to pack
4.  snacks
5. how far can we drive with kiddo
6. money
7. etc…

 You know the normal family vacation stuff, but this is what is on my mind:

 1.  Call doctor to get extra insulin just in case a bottle breaks or goes bad
2. make sure we have enough test strips, infusion sets for his pump, sensors, sensor charger, sensor inserter, meter, spare meter, meter charger, ketone strips, syringes incase pump malfunctions
3. glucagon in case of emergency
4. pump holder to sleep in
5. pump holder for the day
6.  is his insulin going to get to hot during the day and become useless (will we need to change his site every day instead of every 3 days or maybe every 2 days …. Ugh this will require even more supplies)
7.  should I try the frio bag for the pump to help it stay cool… how will it stay on he doesn’t wear a belt
8. need to buy more frio bags for his insulin to carry with us so it stays cool
9.  wonder if the heat will raise his numbers high or will he drop low
10.  how much juice are we going to need to bring in case of lows
11.  need to get 10g snacks together for trip
12.  alcohol wipes… I need to bring lots of these
13.  medical alert bracelet
14.  bring fans for stroller to keep Cole cool to help with blood sugar
15.  making reservations to eat at the parks so that Cole can stay on his regular eating schedule
16. need to order extra pump holders in case something happens to the other one
17. bring his MySentry for the hotel from (monitor for glucose)

Ugh I can’t think of what else.  On the plus side I can now reference this when I pack our bags in June  : )

So this trip will be our first real vacation since Cole was born.  So not only are we going to be figuring out the joys of traveling with a toddler, we will be figuring out the joys of traveling with at Type 1 Toddler.  We have done mini vacations that went ok.  Of course one of them ended with Cole throwing up on the first day there and us driving through the night to get home incase Cole needed to go to the ER.  (with Type 1 we are told that if Cole throws up more than twice we are to take him to the ER). 

So here’s to hoping the vacation goes smoothly.  I will let ya’ll know how it goes when we come back in June.  Wow it’s still 2 months away and I am already stressing : )

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