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Emily's Story

When I presented a Sugar Surfing™ Workshop in Houston on February 3rd 2018, a young mother approached me. In her arms she held her lovely 3 month old daughter. Her name is Emily Vocke. She related a story to me which literally brought me to tears. I asked if she would share her journey and allow me to share it with you. It speaks to the power of Dynamic Diabetes Management to benefit new moms and their unborn children.

I remember it like it was yesterday. My heart was filled with two things- the first was this incredible desire to be a mother and the second was fear. Fear that I would never be able to get my A1C below 6.5%, much less to the 6.0% target my PA said should really be my goal. I had never gotten my A1C below 7% despite all of my efforts. My PA is a type 1 himself, and he assured me that it was possible and gave me some tips that I scribbled down through my feelings of helplessness. I had tears streaming down my face on my drive back to Houston after that visit. I couldn’t fathom a world in which my A1C was 6%. But more importantly, I couldn’t fathom a world in which I wasn’t a mother. It seemed impossible and I felt defeated. It felt like diabetes was finally going to win.

The next day I was going through my notes from the visit and saw that I wrote down the name of a book I had never heard of that my PA suggested. Little did I know that this book would change my life. I had been searching for answers about how to better utilize my Dexcom CGM, and I found those answers in Dr. Ponder’s writing. Knowing that he is a type 1 himself gave me a higher sense of confidence in what he writes in his book, Sugar Surfing. I finally had something to validate how I felt about the static approach that I was so used to taking for 17 years. I had toyed with adjusting my insulin based off what the arrow on my CGM was doing, but always felt like I was straying from the settings on my pump. I felt like I was going to get in trouble with my doctor for overriding my pump so often. Sugar Surfing offered a way that made sense to take this more dynamic approach that I had