I think we all have our own approaches in how to deal with our children. What may be right for one person may not be right for another.
In this case I feel free to disagree with you. We have never lied to our children, including by omission, in any respect, be it death, religion, reproduction, anything really. In this case, I feel that the full truth, and all the facts, are a better way to deal with it. This is true, I think, for our children. It may not be true for others.
What methods did they use when you were refusing treatment? Either treatments they delivered or ones you did?
This is certainly true for our boy, too.
I loved the story you told and “liked” your post. As for your opinion here above, I respect it but I disagree with it, at least as far as my family is concerned. We all have thought in depth about what our families need, and we all come with our own conclusions.
I never refused treatment. I mean, if I refused treatment I knew I would die. It was obvious I had to take insulin. I remember the feeling I had before diagnosis. I was close to death. It just wasn’t an option to not take insulin. They didn’t need to convince me.
And for lows, again the feeling was horrible. They didn’t need to do anything to convince me.
I hope Liam feels your same way about diabetes treatment when he’s a bit older then.
I think the hardest thing to do as a parent, is realize that everyone needs something, and to change your approach when your child needs it changed. I can’t imagine taking @Eric’s approach with my kids, but when I was a kid, if anyone told me anything I would actively do anything but what I was told to do. Suffice it to say, I breathed a sigh of relief when neither of my kids were like me…
Do you mean way back when I was first diagnosed?
I just called it R and N (it was Regular and NPH)
And…it was made from cows and pigs.
So for those of you whose children self manage and you are pretty much hands off… Are you monitoring all the time even though you aren’t managing? I would just think that if your child dies under anyone’s roof that the parents would be liable…I don’t think the law would accept that your child decided they wanted you to be hands off?
I’m just trying to think in what world I would be totally hands off (at a bare minimum knowing BG levels at all times), and I can’t think of any time as long as he’s a minor.
Explain more please.
I used NPH and R when I was younger too. Was it always made form cows and pigs? I remember another T1 used an insulin called ‘pork’ which was obviously from a pig. I didn’t think mine was though.
We did not use these insulins dynamically in the way you describe. Makes me curious how my management would have differed if we were more flexible like you were.
I am not sure if you include us in the lot. My son self manages during the day.
Both my wife and I follow his dexcom. We have a lot of interactions. My wife or I will often bring his BG to his attention and ask what he intends to do. When there is a persistent issue (a high typically), we discuss it together for a minute or two often. Every few days, we review the data together. When we change his ratios, we change them together (or he tells us he thinks he needs to make a change).
At school, he is pretty much on his own. But if it seems to be really bad I might text him. I do it less and less because it tends to exasperate him. He almost always has addressed the issue before I have. He rarely calls me, maybe once every couple of months or less. That is typically when he has a deep problem, typically a deep persistent low, and wants feedback. Once he was worried he might pass out and wanted to make sure I was in the loop, very smart on his part.
But you are tracking his sugars and have a way of contacting him if you see a problem that doesn’t seem to be getting corrected. Say he’s low for 30 minutes… You atleast track so you can contact him or his school if necessary. To me that’s reasonable and sufficient for a self managing child. I just could not see ever being totally hands off…I.e not even knowing bgs through the day and night.
A bit of clarification. My parents didn’t just let me fend for myself. They helped me if I was low. They reminded me when it was getting close to dinner time and that I should take my shot. Things like that.
But it’s a lot like the difference between parenting now and then.
I’d go outside for the whole day, be back for dinner or lunch. They didn’t ask who I was going to be with, what parents would be watching us, what we were doing, all that stuff. It wasn’t the same as it is now. We were more autonomous. There is a generational difference.
Well, it was actually my parent’s approach, not mine. 
This will be our approach eventually… But we will always be the “eye on the sky” watching… Even if he isn’t aware of it.
I think helping kids learn to care for and about themselves is incredibly important. My parents sucked at it - they didn’t have good self-care, and I didn’t learn until well into adulthood the importance of that. I often think that’s a huge job as a parent that seems overlooked (as I watch my child rearing friends).
If you’re able to maintain respectful communications with your older kids, speak with them as the person in the drivers seat of their own diabetes, like @Chris and @Michel have written about, and help them to care for themselves in the best, non-judgmental way possible, seems like the right track.
Sometimes I assume a little tough love is called for (even with adults with T1D!), but it’s tempered with an underlying respect.
That was funny!
I think you were diagnosed after the rDNA insulin came out, so maybe you missed the cow and pig stuff.
In fact I would be lying if I said I won’t be tracking his sugars even when he’s all grown up and moved out. A loving parent never stops caring.
A few days ago my mom called and was talking to my wife. She asked to talk to me and my wife said to give me a few minutes because I was low but getting better.
And my mom told my wife, “He shouldn’t have highs or lows.”
So a) parents will always be aware and concerned, and b) my mom still sets the bar pretty high for me.
I often think I would like to do the same. But a young adult T1D friend of my son’s told him that he got really tired of his mother following his Dexcom and stopped sharing with her… There is an age where it stops, I think, although not because of the parents!
As for me, I hope my son keeps on sharing his Dexcom with me during college! I will refrain as much as I can from calling him, but I’d like to be able to call the paramedics if he has a bad low at night and can’t be woken up.
I think it just depends so much on the nature of the individual kid that there’s no way to compare apples and apples here… I have no doubt if I was diagnosed as a young child I’d have demanded my own independence and proved I was capable of it by the time I was 12 or so… I also have no doubt that if my 18 year old brother had type 1 that he would be completely incapable of managing it on his own whatsoever still and his parents would be doing all the work around the clock…
That said I do think that parents of kids who aren’t enthusiastic about taking responsibility for themselves in this regard really have an additional struggle on their hands because they need to be guiding them to that realization as well as taking care of them in the meantime. This skill, this responsibility, is not an optional one for these kids to learn…