The Glucose Tolerance Test

Well... yesterday I completed the glucose tolerance test. For those of you lucky enough to have never had this test, this is how it goes. First, you have to fast for at least 8 hours. My doctor's office told me this included water, but that was incorrect, so I was hungry and dehydrated yesterday morning. Second, they take an initial blood sample to see what your baseline blood sugar level is. Then you get to drink this really nasty, pure sugar beverage. One hour (exactly) later, they take your blood a second time. Then another hour later they take the third sample followed by a fourth sample three hours after you started the whole mess. This is the second time I've had the test done - I had it done once in high school to test for low blood sugar.

So, needless to say, by noon yesterday I had a terrible headache from almost 16 hours without food (since we had dinner at 5 on Thursday and I forgot to snack before bed in anticipation of the test) and about 12 hours without water. Steve had most of the day off, so he took me out for lunch after the ordeal, but putting food into a totally empty stomach just created extra acid reflux. Oh well...

I talked to my sister Melissa last night and gave her the low down on the test so that when she gets to the one hour test in a few weeks she will not eat anything sugary before and end up having to do the long test. Sitting in a hospital laboratory waiting room is not my idea of fun. Neither is being used to show the 3 nurses in training how to do the glucose tolerance test. We specifically decided to use the local hospital, rather than the University of Michigan's hospital to avoid having a bunch of students, interns, and trainees around. It just goes to show you that you can't always get what you want. Unfortunately Sparky won't be old enough to understand this lesson for quite a while.