Dr. Rice, you were my only hope.

So my no-longer hero, Dr. Rogers Rice, is no longer working on a cure for diabetes. Before, I looked up to her as a health pioneer, kindof like Marie Curie. Now I look down on her as a quitter, like Hillary Clinton or Britney Spears.

(AN ASIDE: Our Puerterican neighbor told Murray that someone in Cuba has developed a cure for AIDS and will sell enough vaccine for ONE PERSON to Americans for $50 billion. I think that the American taxpayers can spare another $50 billion to save one person from AIDS, don't you?)

Back to diabetes. It turns out I might have them--the gestational kind. At least Dr. Rogers's previous efforts at curing diabetes have taught me to refer to them as LIVAbetes. That gives me hope.

When my mom asked me today if I can name the people in my family who have diabetes, I immediately named my grandpa, whose diabetes have been the family joke for quite a while now. He was told by a doctor that he had a pre-diabetic condition, or something, and so he needed to change his eating habits. My grandpa likes a good meal, and likes a good dessert to follow the meal. After the diagnosis, he'd help himself to a quarter of a blueberry pie (instead of half a blueberry pie) and let everyone know that he was cutting back on sweets "on account of me diabetees." Of course, when he was in a senior's center for a while, he told them about his diabetes so that he could get special treatment. Unfortunately, that special treatment was them rationing his sweets in a proper manner, and suddenly Grandpa was miraculously cured of the diabetes! But when he stayed with my parents for a while, and was fixing himself a large breakfast on Fast Sunday, my mom asked him why he wasn't fasting and he said that he couldn't fast, "on account of me diabetees." My mom said that she thought he no longer had diabetes, and he told her that he never could be too careful; they might come back!


So this is a picture of me drinking my orange soda before the test. My mother-in-law was very interested to know what I thought of the drink, and she kindof made me think that I was to expect something awful and nasty. What I got was a fairly potent bottle of orange soda. Kindof like drinking carbonated melted orange popsicles, and since when was that a bad thing? I offered a small taste to Murray, but he declined, saying that he'd rather not drink a pregnant women's drink, for fear of spontaneously sprouting ovaries.

Notice the look of confidence in my eyes. My pregnancy has been a breeze so far. So I was expecting to pass this test as easily as I have passed all the others. Let's review my pregnancy, shall we?

Number of times I've thrown up: 1 (before the pregnancy test was even positive; this may not have been pregnancy related)

Number of pounds gained: 10ish. And I'm at month 6. I figure I'm doing pretty well.

Size of belly: Manageable. I can still fit into my normal jeans if I want to. I'm not that large, due mainly to my long torso with lots of room for baby and my soccer-ball-sized uterus.

Swelling of extremities: Manageable.

Hip and joint pain: Manageable. Sometimes uncomfortable, but nothing that slows me down too much.

See? It's been a good pregnancy so far. And I've felt pretty much not-that-pregnant for the whole thing. So now to find out that my pregnancy might not be perfect?? It's a little bit weird.

I get to go back tomorrow and do a longer version of the test, and drink a more potent orange soda elixer (yipee!!). So I'll know more about it then. And if it turns out I have gestational diabetes, I think it just basically means that I have excellent incentive to make very positive lifestyle changes.

What I know for sure is that I can't count on that quitter Dr. Rice to cure me diabetees.