*Poke!*

This is a tiny thing, but strikes me as worth mentioning.

The other day, somebody on Twitter was having trouble finding her lancing device. I jokingly suggested that she follow the example of my friend Kelly Kunik, who tests by lancing herself without benefit of the lancing device. (Because she rolls awesomely like that, you know: a fan of direct action.) And, as I typed, I realized that I was on the verge of saying, "I could never do that."

That would have been bad. For two reasons.

First, that comment is one of the things insulin users hear most often and hate to hear the most.

Second, it would have been telling myself that I couldn't do something that I might, in fact, really need to do some day.

In a flash, as I realized these things, it became apparent to me that I had to test without a lancing device. Right then.

So, having found a lancet, I figured out how to hold it so that my forefinger and thumb would (theoretically) keep myself from driving too deeply, took a breath, thought about the horrible old guillotine-style lancing device I've seen a picture of, and *poked*.

It was okay. It hurt more than my test usually does, but way less than it sometimes does. I could do it again if I needed to. I could do it that way every time if I needed to. And I even got a good number on my meter.

I felt absurdly good about having done this. By doing a manual test, I'd both shown internal respect for my fellow PWDs and I'd bought myself an option for the future.

Not bad for one little poke.