Our Government at it's Worst

    Today I was horrified when I saw a news report of a mother of a type 1 diabetic asking for help from her state government when the systems that they put in place where not working properly. The response that she got from here state representative was beyond rude and demeaning.  Here is the link to the article. 

http://www.foxnews.com/health/2016/06/30/state-lawmaker-tells-mississippi-mom-to-buy-her-own-diabetic-supplies-for-daughter.html?intcmp=hpbt4

I wrote an email to this horribly rude person and I would hope that you would too. It is his job to be our representative and fix things when they are broken. It is not his job to collect a paycheck and be an asshole to the people that elected him. If you would like to let him know what you think here is his email address:

Jguice@house.ms.gov

Here was my email to this jerk. I can only hope that he gets recalled before he can spread more ignorance to others.

Dear Mr Guice,

The sad and dismissive response that you gave this mother that was just trying to take care of her daughter with a chronic disease was horrifying. I am a single parent of a child with type 1 diabetes as well. Let me tell you without insurance to help cover the cost for these supplies I would be broke or my son would be dead because I couldn't afford them. I make good money and have worked as an engineer for over 20 years. I still spend a lot of money every month to keep my child healthy and alive.

It is sad that you spoke with such ignorance and with horrible rudeness. This lady was asking you to do your job and figure out why the system that the government made her use was not working properly.  She was not asking for a hand out. I re posted this on Facebook and I will be adding it to my blog. All I can hope is that you are recalled from office for your lack of concern for the people that you were elected to care for. It must be nice to have all of the tax payers money to pay for what you need without the need to actually work for that money.

Tim Easterling
Concerned Parent of a Type 1 Diabetic Child

I hope that you never have to deal with something like this buddy but if you do I will be right there making sure that you don't deal with this alone.

Your Loving Dad

Summer Started

Watching the Whitecaps

     Summer has kicked into to full swing. William successfully made it to third grade. We started our summer off with a trip to see the Whitecaps play baseball. William, Jen and I had fun watching the game. The sun was out and strong. Even though we used sunblock there was still a few burned spots.  The game went into extra innings and in the 11th inning our Whitecaps lost. It was still a fun day. William had some popcorn and later ice cream with hot fudge. I try to make our trips to the park fun and memorable. Diabetes was quiet for this trip and I really didn't have to think about it except when I gave William his treats. That is a nice day at the park. We did still have to worry about celiac disease. There are not a lot of options at the park for someone with celiac disease which is why we had popcorn and soft serve ice cream instead of hotdogs and hard ice cream. The crowd was pretty boring this day until the seventh inning stretch. I was surprised at how many people were singing when "Take me out to the Ballpark" started. 

What a great day

    We had a visit with my life long friend later on in the week. I have known this guy for most of my life now. He has been there for the good times and the terrible times in my life, and his. My oldest son loves him to death and now my youngest gets to meet him too. My friend travels a lot and moved away from our home state a while ago. We do not get to see him as much as we would like but he is still important in our lives. William really liked hanging out with him. We went to Red Robin for a gluten free chicken sandwich for William and burgers for us. Then we stopped for ice cream at a local hangout. When we finished with our ice cream he pulled out his phone and we took turns playing a game to see who could do the best. I think we all had a lot of fun. I just hope we get to see him again really soon. 

    William started a new daycare for the summer. It started off a little bumpy. I had scheduled a daycare for William and filled out all of the paperwork and even gave them the start date. Then the day he was supposed to start they told me they were not expecting him and he could not stay. I had to scramble to find a new daycare and fast. That can be challenging with William's type 1 diabetes. I did find a new daycare but William could not start for three days so I got an extra three days of vacation with my son. The new daycare seems to be going well so far. It turns out this was a little bit of a blessing in disguise. William's new teacher has type 1 diabetes so it takes a lot of the worry off of me for his care during the day.  I am keeping my fingers crossed and hoping for the best for the summer. Tomorrow is water day and I think William will really love that. 

The weather in Dallas

I do not travel for work very often. I have been working at the same place for almost 17 years now. That is hard to imagine all on it's own but I have only traveled maybe 4 times the whole time I have worked here. I was gone for almost a week while William was at his mothers house. It was a grueling trip and I put in a lot of hours. I had a connecting flight that went through Dallas with only a 15 minute layover and I barely made my connection. Who scheduled this and thought 15 minute layover no problem? It wasn't me. When I looked at my phone for the weather I was glad I was not staying. The trip went well and everything was going as planned. I printed off my return tickets for my return home on Thursday night when around 3:00pm I got a call from my boss that I needed to go to Detroit for Friday for a different issue. I had to scramble to get everything done and we got the tickets, hotel and rental car set up. When I got to the second job I was only there for ten minutes. It was a little sad and funny at the same time. Turns out there was nothing wrong with the machine. I did a little training and left. I do not mind getting out of the office once in a while but the unexpected Friday trip was a little bit of a nerve-wracking experience. I was glad to be home on Friday and I picked up William later that night.

I'm looking forward to more summer fun,

Your Loving Dad

Last day of Second Grade

    We woke up this morning the same way that we usually do. I got a shower and went to wake up William. He was already down stairs this morning. He has been doing that a lot lately. I think he likes to beat me down stairs in the morning so that he gets time to watch some cartoons before I get downstairs. He knows when I get down stairs I am going to change the channel because he get so into the TV that he doesn't east breakfast. This morning was a little different though. William was up and he was down stairs watching cartoons but as soon as I got down stairs he asked if we could got to school as soon as he got done eating this morning. He never asked to leave early but today is special. Today is 2nd grad graduation. They have a half day and then he is done with 2nd grade. I could tell that he was really excited about the last day of school. He was kinda bouncing off of the walls this morning. I suspect that the teachers are expecting that today. I am sure they are feeling the same way themselves.

    This year started off a little rough. We had a few run-ins with the school. William was really pushing to get kicked out again this year. Around Christmas things started to get better. There where a few things that drove this better behavior. The second half of the year went much better and we only had one minor incident with William for the rest of the year. He managed not to get kicked out of school and made friends. So now we move on to third grade. I hope that we can keep up the momentum. I like seeing William being successful. This year was a really good move in that direction. 

Congratulations my third grader,

Your Loving Dad

Our FIrst Ride of the Year

Going for our first ride of the year.

    William has been bugging me to take him for a ride on the motorcycle for the last month. It has been a little cold and I was also waiting for him to earn it by doing well in school. He has been doing much better at school but we have been pushing him to do the best he can. Yesterday he finally earned a ride on the motorcycle. We ate dinner and then went for ice cream. William got a Ninja Turtle ice cream with really scary looking red eyes. By the time we were done William's tongue was black and so was most of his mouth. He did a better job not dripping the ice cream all over his clothes. 

Ninja Turtle Ice Cream

    It was just a few years ago where it was really hard for me to get William on the motorcycle. Now he loves it. It seems like just yesterday where I took him for his first ride. When we got out on the road he started yelling "whahoooo" and "faster daddy. make it into a race car". It was a short ride so we got back home again pretty quickly. When I pulled into the driveway I asked William if he wanted to get off. He told me no and said that he wanted to go again. Since that day it has never bee hard to get William to go for a ride. I have a special harness to hold him on the motorcycle. When he was little he would fall asleep while riding. The first time I took him for a longer ride he almost fell off. It really caught me off guard. William was sitting in front of me and I went to go around a corner. All of a sudden he fell right into my arm as I was holding on to the handle bars. William has type 1 diabetes so I wasn't sure what was going on. I wasn't sure if his blood sugar fell low or what was going on. It wasn't until I got him home and got him off of the motorcycle that I knew he had fallen asleep. That was when we got the harness to make sure he couldn't fall off while riding. William's grandmother once told us how she fell asleep while riding on the back of grandpa's bike so I guess it isn't unusual for someone to fall asleep.

    School is almost done for the year. Things went much better this year. William did not get kicked out of school one time. That is a big improvement. I am proud to see him doing better in school. I am also glad to see him making friends in school and being more successful. We found a daycare for summer. I am hoping that things go well there and William has fun. We are planning to take a few trips to Michigan's Adventures to spend time with William's older sister. I am sure there are all kinds of things that we can do for fun. I can't wait for summer vacation to start.

Another school year down,

Your Loving Dad