The joys of putting in a cannula

Now, in the UK there are many diabetics, only a small fraction of those are type one such as I. Forgive me as I cannot remember the statistics (then again it wasn't a strength of mine at university!) but I do remember this one; out of all the type ones in the UK only a miniscule four percent use an insulin pump. I'm one of the lucky few. [For he who today sheds his blood with me will be my brother. We happy few, we band of brothers. Shakespeare, Henry V)] Excuse the novelty that is me quoting things and doing so in what is probably a none too accurate fashion!
This four percent will know what a pain in the arse it is to change a cannula on a regular basis. Mine generally last about three days before things start to go Pete Tong. After about threee days boluses begin to loose their effectiveness and after meals I generally begin to shoot up into double figures so then I need to change. That aside there is the choice of cannula. This is quite something as to different pumpers different cannulas mean different things - comfort, convenience of insertion and foot print upon the body. There are many more things that people take into consideration but those are the main ones for me.
Having tried a variety of Medtronic's cannulas (cannulae?) since I began pumping a little under eight months. Those would be Quick Sets, Mios and last but by no means least, the Silhouettes. Out of all of these I currently use the Silhouettes and I love them. I won't go into the reasons why at this point in time, a later post will come about this.
Back to the original point of the post, changing cannulas. Today was the day of a cannula change as the reservoir for my pump (1.8 ml, about 175 units of the lovelyt Novorapid) lasts roughly three days if I don't binge on carbs or need many corrections. I thought that today I would try a new site. It's not far from the ones that I usually use which are about an inch or two from my belly button which is found amidst hairs on my fledgling beer gut. I thought I would move it more near my hips as at the time my considerable love handles seemed adequate to house the lovely cannula.
I tried twice. I failed twice before retreating back to the more normal areas. Now in retrospect I should have gone in at a more shallow angle. The blurb that Medtronic dispenses with each box of cannulas (something I fail to read at every occaision) says that I should by rights go in at an angle of approximately twenty to thirty degress. I go in at about forty to forty five degrees. Perhaps that was too deep an angle for the flab that was available on the love handles. It seems so. The sites were bloody agony to touch, not something I am used to as I have a considerable amount of padding with which to work. I don't really know anything else other than those two factors that caused such pain. I suppose you learn something new everyday when you pump.
Here endeth the lesson.