Friday evening, I was still dealing with the RA flare I wrote about in my previous post.

I had come downstairs with my dinner to sit with my husband and started to feel weak and as if my heart were racing. When I checked my pulse, it was around 147.

I told my husband I needed to go upstairs and take some medication and get in bed.

By the time I made it to our bedroom, the situation was worse.

So I took a high dose of metoprolol and laid down for several hours. When I got up, I still was feeling pretty gnarly – though thankfully my heart rate was in the 120s and 130s. Still, Sara and I loaded up and set out for the ER. . . again.

After many hours, the good news is that the only thing cardiac they found – other than my mitral valve prolapse – was a low potassium level. I’ll be seeing my cardiologist sooner than I wanted to work on the rest.

The bad news is that I now have full-blown diabetes.

I was told last year that I was pre-diabetic which wasn’t unexpected with all the steroids – but still stunk. Additionally, my Dad and literally all of his immediate family members have diabetes. Soooooo. .  .

I was started on metformin and am doing all the things I’ve been telling all the patients to do for all of these years.

And the pill collection grows. This is just AM and PM, not including all the meds I take during the day:

While I know this is totally manageable and I will be okay, right now I’m pretty damn upset about it, both because it is yet ANOTHER diagnosis and also because I’ve seen way too much diabetes over the years. I’m just sick.

Still, I have had plans with the girls for today for quite some time, so, even though I still am feeling like Hale, I am going to get myself ready and go. Sara’s best friend is coming as well, and, if I feel too bad (a distinct possibility right now), I can always turn on the ac and some music in the car while they enjoy themselves. I’m not ditching them now.

And the next few days will be spent figuring out how I plan to change my diet and getting myself to swim and logging my blood sugars and getting a handle on this – and then I will be okay.

Be well, everybody.

Grace and blessings.