- People are so fixated on being "Nice" that Beth thinks they've lost sight of the real goal: being Good.
- When a suspect ends an hour-long standoff by shooting himself, is that a good resolution? Sean tells you who the suspect was so you can decide for yourself.
- Barron is on assignment and will return soon.
- In the Main Topic, Erin tells us about her trip to Maryland Shall Issue.
- Tiffany is on assignment and will return next week.
- It's good for your tea and it's good for hypoglycemia - Erin tells you about honey in your EDC.
- When someone tries to open an indoor gun range in Northern New Jersey, the anti-gun nuts lose their minds. Join Weer'd as he listens to their proposed "Reasonable" restrictions.
- And our plug of the week is for War Stories Podcast.
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Blue Collar Prepping Transcript:
Hypoglycemia and Honey
I had an interesting experience when at MAG40: one of the students, who is diabetic, started experiencing hypoglycemia, and I had that prepper moment of “OH I HAVE JUST THE THING FOR THIS!” glee.
For those who don’t know, if you have diabetes you are prone to two types of blood sugar problems: too much and too little.
Too much blood sugar is known as hyperglycemia. As a diabetic friend of mine puts it, “Hyperglycemia is when your sugar hits 400 or so, and you get a little crazy, then you pass out, and unless you get insulin, you die.” Most preppers don’t have access to insulin - you need a prescription for it - and because it’s light sensitive and requires refrigeration, you can’t carry it around in your first aid kit. There are some shelf-stable things which help, like glipizide, but it’s also prescription. So unless you’re diabetic yourself, or a licensed EMT, if someone else experiences hyperglycemia the only thing you can do is call 911 and hope an ambulance gets there in time.
However, the other side of this tightrope is hypoglycemia, which is “your blood sugar drops through the floor, you get crazy, then pass out and die” according to that same friend. But unlike hyperglycemia, hypoglycemia is very easy to fix: just give that person some sugar. Now, the fastest way to do that is with a glucose IV, but again, unless you’re a licensed professional with medical gear, you won’t be carrying that around. But there are other ways to get that sugar into their system quickly.
The key word here is “quickly”. Many sugary snacks are made with sucrose, also known as table sugar. Sucrose is actually a compound of two other sugars, glucose and fructose, and before those sugars can get into the body they must be separated via a digestive enzyme within the small intestine. Now there are many bad things to be said about high-fructose corn syrup, but one good thing about it is that is doesn’t need that enzyme to get into the body. So if you have a soda nearby, that’s a good way to get sugar into a hypoglycemic person, but soda cans a large and not really a convenient part of a first aid kit.
Which brings me to what I had in my first aid kit at MAG40: a sealed tube of honey. Honey is amazing for different reasons: one of those reasons is that it doesn’t go bad, ever. Another reason is that is contains both glucose and fructose, but they aren’t linked, meaning that they absorb into the body faster than sucrose. So when I noticed my friend wasn’t well, and people were looking for sugar to give her, I ran to the blowout kit in my range bag, got the stick of honey, cut the end off with a knife, and squeezed the honey into her mouth.
I’m not going to say that it saved her, because there were plenty of other people there helping, but I know for a fact it didn’t didn’t hurt her. More importantly -- which is why I’m sharing this with you folks, because I’m not telling this story as an “Oh, aren’t I awesome” moment -- it showed me that it wasn’t dumb to have a container of honey in my medical supplies. 9.3 percent of Americans have diabetes, so odds are good that you know someone who has the disease and might need help with a hypoglycemic episode. Be prepared for that!
You can buy 100 sticks of clover honey for only $16.95 from Amazon. They’re 6.5 inches and contain 5 grams of honey each, so they fit easily inside a purse, backpack, or first aid kit. They’re shelf-stable and won’t go bad in high heat or humidity, so make them a part of your everyday carry. Even if you never need to help a diabetic, you can always use them to sweeten to your coffee or tea.
- Stakich Honey Stix (100) - http://amzn.to/2m4P4Qy
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