Diabetes is the natural enemy of the frock. Yes, it is!  There are countless discussions on Facebook and other diabetes forums that could all pretty much be headed ‘where the fruitcake do I put my pump?’ I know of pockets sewn into dresses, invisible hooks added to wedding gowns and incredibly-difficult-need-instructions-to-use contraptions whose only purpose is to keep the pump hidden, yet accessible.

This is the dilemma I was faced with the other night as I frocked up for the gala dinner celebrating Diabetes Australia – Vic’s 60th anniversary. Alas, where to put the pump. Due to a very low cut back, the dress had in-built supports as a bra couldn’t be worn. (I could now go into a discussion about how I’ll need therapy for the Hollywood tape I was required to wear, but let’s stay on topic.)

I toyed with the idea of leaving my pump home and using pens for the night, but the thought of calculating basal insulin, then blousing made my head explode a little bit. I thought about not worrying about dealing with basal insulin and doing tiny corrections every hour or so, but I knew that I’d remember for the first hour and then completely forget about it for the rest of the night – or, at least, until I realised I was spending a lot of time running to the loo and chasing down waiters to fill my water glass.

So, I started thinking about a holster for the pump. I used to have one made of stretchy material that was held in place with a Velcro catch. There was a little pouch for the pump and the whole thing was meant to sit snugly on the thigh. And it did…until it started to slide down the leg and I was left doing some sort of weird two-step, trying not to trip over the pump tubing while attempting to reconnect the whole thing. Please, just picture the elegance, if you will.

Despite my husband kinda liking the idea of me wearing a holster, the thigh thing was a failure.

A woman I work with – who for the purposes of this will be known as Brilliant Sue (because she is brilliant and her name is Sue) suggested Tubigrip which is a stretchy, tubular bandage.

It worked a treat. The pump stayed exactly where I wanted it (inner thigh, so no tell-tale ‘pump bump’ showing through the dress, and was easy to access when I needed to bolus or check my CGM.

Unfortunately, the flesh coloured stretchy fabric didn’t look too hot, but given that the only two people who saw it were me and Aaron, it did the trick.

So while to everyone else there, I looked like this…..

gala

…..all I could think about was how diabetes manages to take the glamour of dressing up down a notch, thanks to this:

Pump thigh

But despite the delightful flesh-coloured bandage, I had a great time. And if truth be told, the most traumatic part of the night was the Hollywood tape. Now that is the stuff nightmares are made of!