Camp Lo-Be-Gon 2010

What an incredible experience for my kiddos! They *all* had immeasurable fun this week, and despite being EXHAUSTED, they were all sad to see it come to an end.  Camp Lo-Be-Gon is a 4-day day camp for children with diabetes (both types) and their siblings. It is sponsored primarily by OU Pediatrics, and staffed by nurses, nurse practitioners, diabetes educators, and parent-volunteers.  Every group (of animals, lol) was led by a parent-volunteer and it was nearly a one-to-one ratio of campers to counselors and counselors-in-training.  (They actually had to turn away volunteers ... how awesome is that?!)  Campers are aged 5 to 12, CITs are 12-15, Counselors are 16+.  It happens at Camp Loughridge, which is a beautiful facility filled with way cool activities.  Every day included "Diabetes Ed" which taught campers about their disease, how to manage it, and how to stay healthy. When weather permitted (which was an issue a couple of days), they got to swim in a huge pool with diving boards. They had a "test" the first day to determine whether or not they needed life-jackets, and LilBird was not upset in the least that she had to wear one. (Though, having the pool in the backyard now has GREATLY improved her water skills.) They canoed. They rode a zip line. They created art. They sang and acted silly. They climbed and walked. They swung in a camper-propelled swing. They ate ice cream every day. They got awesome goodie-backpacks (L.L. Bean!). They sweated a LOT. They played games.  They laughed! They made lots of new friends. Despite the high numbers of people with diabetes, the majority of the population does not have diabetes; at camp, though, my non-diabetic girls were clearly a minority. LilBird was normal, which is such an important part of this experience.

We did have a few issues, but they were far outweighed by goodness of camp. The first day, she went low after swimming, which I discovered when she came home was because nobody had made sure she ate all the food she'd been bolused for ... she forgot about her Gogurt (which was 1/3 of her carbs that meal). She ate everything the rest of the time.  The third day, LilBird had to have a set change at camp. I was horrified by a) not being notified, b) manual insertion of the set rather than using a serter, and c) the nurse did it in the lobby rather than in private. For her, though, the worst part of that was removing the old set without adhesive remover. OUCH. But, she managed, and her sugars came down (which was the reason they changed it, even though *I* think it was because they didn't use the dual-bolus feature for pizza lunch, which I had requested of the nurse that morning and she forgot to do). One day, LilBird lost her sunscreen, another day, she lost her shorts and panties ... both were retrieved the following day. One day, she cried after she reached the top of the incline log she climbed and had to be rescued because she was too afraid to climb back down. In the end, though, these things were not even close to what I'd call "problems".

Turtles

Foxes

Squirrels

Some of the memorable things I've heard as I pieced together their week were ...

• "One of LilBird's leaders asked me if she was this quiet all the time."
• "Yeah, I was hooked on a rope, but the rope was hooked onto the guy, and if he just wasn't paying attention, I could've just fallen down!"
• "YEAH! I got to wear a life jacket! For some reason, though, I couldn't ever get to the bottom of that pool." 
• "No, I didn't get a medal (like LilBird did) because I was NOT going to stick myself with a needle."
• "Mom, say the name of my camp." ... "Camp Lo-Be-Gon." ... "ROCKS!!"
• (When asked why she didn't tell the nurse she'd prefer to do the set change in the office.) "Because I'm shy like that."
• "I thought if I put my Gogurt back in my lunch bag, it would freeze more."

Good times. Times they would have never had if diabetes wasn't part of our life. There really is always a silver lining. :)