4

3/21/2008 5:12:07 PM

This thread reminds me why I am soooooooooooooo greatful that I have not taken 1 diabetic medicine since 12/3/07. Went from glucaphage, amaryl, byetta AND insulin to nothing... But I took extreme measures, that were mainly for other reasons.

Oh, speaking of, if my A1C and blood sugars are doing great now, how long would I go from classified as "diabetes in remission" to not having diabetes? I'm trying to figure it out for stuff like health insurance and things that I hope to one day get some (decent).

My last A1C, in February, was 5.6! The one before that was like 12.

3/21/2008 5:13:49 PM

^ I dunno, I don't get to use cheatcodes in my game.

I'm bumping this thread because I can, and because I just wanted to say damnit I need to force myself to eat some good staying carbohydrates before I fall asleep. Waking up under these circumstances is such a PITA (low blood sugars in sleep).

Kinda like waking up after a nightmare but the post-wakeup stress doesn't go away. The current plan is to eat everything in the kitchen to make it go away.

6/13/2008 3:08:49 AM

OMG!! I think I had one of those the other day!!!! I was dreaming that I was having a seizure and then when I woke up my sugar was 31, I had a tremendous headache and I was more tired than I was before.

Good staying carbs FTW!!!!!

6/13/2008 6:12:22 PM

Haha, my doctor got mad at me on Friday because my blood pressure was high from the lack of sleep, the salty food I ate the night before, and the caffeine I had that morning to keep myself awake.

Now, amusingly, I have a fun new "eat nothing delicious" diet which is going to reduce my blood pressure (no doubt) but is going to sharply increase the amount of bland that I have to eat every week.

Hypertension Nutrition Therapy. Good shit, haha. (Blood pressure was like 133/82.)

The insulin adjustments my doctor laid out worked pretty well, too. I have to reduce my insulin intake because I'm so active now. If you knew me, this would be somewhat unheard of. I used to be a professional bump on a log, 3x world champion.

6/15/2008 12:42:32 PM

hey...I have been having high sugars in the morning again-this is after I have eaten nothing since dinner the night before. What is wrong??? My sugar comes down after I bolus so I know it is not the site itself. I am getting so frustrated with this crap!

I HATE DIABETES!!!! GAH!!!

6/27/2008 10:47:47 AM

Oh snap! A serious question that I missed. Ya gotta PM me or something when these pop up.

I always miss this thread when it gets bumped, lol. Anyway, I have this problem too if I skip breakfast or, sometimes, if I don't eat enough for dinner or don't eat a snack after dinner (something small like crackers). I found my blood sugar goes up when I'm fasting, and I think that's because my body is trying to find SOME way to get the sugar it needs to function (breaking down fat, etc) and since I didn't eat anything and include a bolus with what I ate, there's no way for me to know how much sugar is going to end up flooding into my bloodstream. Usually I can go to sleep, wake up with a blood sugar of about 115, then go throughout the morning without food and, at lunch, my blood sugar will be anywhere from 160-220 depending on the day. Sometimes it'll do that even if I correct a high blood sugar from the night before (i.e. I'll have a 180 in the morning, then at lunch it'll be 185 or something). After I eat something for lunch, bolus for lunch, and bolus for the increased blood sugar it'll go back to normal.

I'd say consider adding something that agrees with your stomach that's not TOO big into your night time schedule an hour or two before you go to bed. I know that disagrees with most of the stuff you hear on the web, but most of the stuff you hear on the web is for people who don't have diabetes. If doing this causes nighttime/morning indigestion for you (adding in the nighttime snack, I mean, or increasing the size of it), try increasing the amount of food you eat at dinner. Just throw on an apple or something to get the volume of food up there.

As for why I bumped this thread: I'm so glad my insulin pump decides to work even when I"m lazy. I didn't want to change my infusion site when the insulin cartridge went low, so I just went to bed. It vibrated a few times to say "hey asshole, you're running on your reserve insulin, change your site" throughout the night, but I woke up and my blood sugar was 118! Normally when I let it run low like that the infusion site is nearly toast and my blood sugar is 205 or something.

7/8/2008 7:32:14 PM

hey...I added you as a friend on facebook!

Thanks for the info! This is def a need to know thing. I will check my sugar at 6 in the morning and it be great and then I will check it around 9 after not eating and it will be close to 200.

I will try this extra snack thing and hope that is the key. I have been trying to eat breakfast ealier and I have been trying to change my site before 8am.

7/8/2008 7:43:42 PM

Yeah, I just realized you were on there, figured that I might as well add!

I change my infusion site whenever it runs out of insulin (I do not follow a schedule because I absolutely hate to waste medicine and supplies, so I just put about 3 days worth of insulin into my pump and change it when it runs out). It's a little crazy that way, sometimes, but I've not had it really interfere with my blood sugar much (I just stop eating if it runs out of insulin, haha).

Eating some fruit and some toast shortly after you wake up could fix that morning blood sugar rising. It took me forever to figure out what it was, too, til I started looking at my graphs and such and tried to figure out what was going wrong (well gee I ate breakfast that day and it actually went low, hm, and it went high when I didn't eat... HMM).

I also figured some of this out by bringing up directed questions to my doctors when I go in every 3 months. A lot of the time they'll just confirm my suspicions so I'll think to myself "oh, why didn't you all tell me that when you were doing the diabeetus edumacation the first day I was here? That could've made life a lot easier!".

7/8/2008 7:49:16 PM

Bullshit.

8/2/2008 8:48:26 PM

8/2/2008 10:35:45 PM

bttt

8/18/2008 10:24:22 AM

People with Type 1 Diabetes! Please see my thread:

http://www.thewolfweb.com/message_topic.aspx?topic=538041

8/18/2008 10:26:43 AM

people with asthma, warts, lots of moles, people that get fever blisters, etc =

8/18/2008 10:28:32 AM

that was a pretty dumb comment dnl... some of those things are hygene related and none of them can ever be as serious as unchecked diabeeetus...well asthma...but still.

[Edited on August 18, 2008 at 10:35 AM. Reason : .]

8/18/2008 10:34:48 AM

the thing they have in common is that i look down on people with those things, hence the "" face(because i shouldnt be like that but i am)

8/18/2008 10:35:43 AM

bwahahahaha

and i'm sure they look up to in your genetic perfection....

8/18/2008 10:37:28 AM

they should...good metabolism, no history of diseases/cancers, pretty much perfect immune system, etc etc etc, not to mention i smoke cigs all day and live vicariously on the internet, and yet i'm STILL healthy etc

8/18/2008 10:40:53 AM

i look down on people who smoke cancer sticks all day and live vicariously through the internet. it all evens out.

8/18/2008 10:41:57 AM

lol, thats what i said

8/18/2008 10:45:21 AM

Haha pwnd. If anybody needs an extra lancing device or batteries send me a PM. Brand new, I get 'em free and need to pass them on to someone that'll use them.

8/18/2008 10:45:30 AM

your face is pwnd

8/18/2008 10:45:54 AM

At least my face isn't an effective method of birth control.

8/18/2008 10:50:40 AM

8/18/2008 10:51:54 AM

do yall still need to know a good endocrinoligist in Ral?

8/18/2008 11:17:34 AM

Mindstorm might.

8/18/2008 11:18:43 AM

I'm doing alright, I just drive out to durham and go to Duke children's hospital still. I'm the biggest kid in there.

After I graduate in 1.5 years I'll need to start looking, though.

[Edited on August 18, 2008 at 2:11 PM. Reason : DNL just get out of this thread. You fail as a human being.]

8/18/2008 1:56:33 PM

I just had my first blood sugar over 500, ever. I also just had a crap ton of fun.

I decided to start training in Wing Chun at a local school (a form of Kung Fu, so to speak) and wasn't feeling all that hot today and thought I had some lows, so I guess I overcompensated. I had a low before I drove out here so I had some juice and fruit snacks (~50 carbs, would've zeroed me out with how low my sugar was), then I still felt shaky at the place so I dropped another juice (another 25 carbs) and felt a little better after that so I then spent about two hours and twenty minutes training and sweating (a lot). Then I pop in my car and the meter is like "Glucose over 500, check ketones". Whoops! So I'm slammin back the water now and staying up a little late to make sure this all levels out.

I didn't realize my glucose would go up so much by itself during all that, or that I wouldn't burn that much sugar. Does exercise make your glucose go up (for anybody else in the room)? I'm trying to determine if it was a residual effect from the glucagon needle I gave myself after lunch (I was all over the place today, kinda sick).

Whatever, aidsabeetus ftw!

8/19/2008 9:53:56 PM

that amazes me that you did not sling back some fat 15 min after drinking the juice. I think my highest ever was like 525. That was when I was pregnant. Sorry again Pecky.

I hope you can get it down Avery. I have been having constant 200's today bc I am not taking enough insulin for what I eat. I hate not having an actual carb count at my disposal all the time. FYI- a power bagel from Einstein bagel has 81 FREAKIN CARBS IN IT! Don't do it!!!

8/19/2008 10:03:58 PM

Yeah I'm effectively crashing my blood glucose right now. It was 389 40 minutes after I left the place and falling. The water was having a decent effect at rehydrating me and everything was being fairly predictable as far as where it's going to fall (I'll be low in about an hour to an hour thirty). I contacted my pediatric doctor (being the little kid that I am) and have asked him if a long period of exercise (2.5 hours) with limited water and no insulin pump hooked up will cause me to swing that darn high (about 200-250mg/dl higher than it should've been assuming that I didn't have food still absorbing into me and that I didn't do anything that would push it higher like eat a snack or something). I mean the total amount of insulin my pump would've given me at that time would've been 1.5 units, enough to move my blood sugar about 40mg/dl by itself. I've been a fairly sedentary diabetic and, when I have done my cardio and weightlifting exercises, I've mostly done thirty to forty minute sessions of real activity, with only a few times being over an hour. It's kind of new territory.

Also, I don't follow up juice snacks with crackers or something because it doesn't make me that hungry any more to have a low blood sugar. I feel like I'm full and then I don't eat anything. After this workout session I'm currently feeling pretty sick, but part of that is all the water in my stomach and the ketones i have (moderate, 40mg/dl). I also kinda bent my pinky too far the wrong way and slapped the holy bejesus out of a bag of rice when I should've been letting my hand mostly fall onto the bag of rice by itself to start with (i.e. my hand hurts, lmao).

It's cool, I've got advil here and I'm about to stream myself and get some water all over my skin. Should feel top notch again in about 2 hours, but I hope to be sleeping in one or less.

[Edited on August 19, 2008 at 10:25 PM. Reason : Oh and yeah. Bagels = aids. I avoid those shits like I avoid doing my homework.]

8/19/2008 10:25:00 PM

"Wow," at the blood sugar over 500. My husband is hypoglycemic and his blood sugar rarely creeps over 100. I have a hard time convincing him to watch his diet and test his blood sugar. Fortunately, he has only passed out on me once.

8/19/2008 10:33:14 PM

I mentioned the fat chaser bc I usually crash with another low if there is no fat to make the juice last in my body. Every one is different...I forgot that point.
I am glad your sugar is falling. and I am glad you are not pregnant.

8/19/2008 10:40:10 PM

Yeah I'm all over the place. I just got semi-used to a 40-60 hour a week sedentary job schedule, then I mixed it up by sleeping late this week and starting to learn Wing Chun, and now I'm going back to school and will have officially completely ruined any semblance of a schedule I had and will be putting up with crazy ass swings for about 2 weeks while I figure out how to "do it right". Haha...

OK, I need to get cleaned up now. I'm starting to stick to myself (nasty).

8/19/2008 10:40:53 PM

ahahaha I forgot about that picture.

8/19/2008 10:41:24 PM

Woohoo, everything's back in order today. No more sickness, at least not more than usual.

The doctor thought it was just a fluke and I'm inclined to agree.

I still need to bring more water with me the next time I go and exercise. 2.5 hours is too long to go with just a few sips of water.

8/20/2008 6:17:46 PM

OMG!! Sugar is 49!!!!

8/21/2008 11:24:45 AM

Suckage!

I gave myself a glucagon shot for that sort of low the other day. Wasn't feeling good after it. Now I know how bad those shots actually are and that I should never use them, unless I'm really screwed. My doc cleared that up.

8/21/2008 11:26:47 AM

I have never used one of those. I don't want to use it.

8/21/2008 11:31:26 AM

Don't. My diabetes instructor was like "why not use one instead of sugar sometimes when you're really low? They work fast, etc etc" so that has stuck in my head as time has passed and I've used them a few times. I was way lightheaded so I used it, and I was sick for about 8 hours after taking it. Only recommended if you've got a decent risk of dying if you don't use it.

[Edited on August 21, 2008 at 12:24 PM. Reason : It's also like trying to stick a skewer into your arm. The needles are big.]

8/21/2008 12:24:31 PM

do you know how accurate those watch glucometers are? I always thought that was a cool idea. They make me think of Panic Room.
My fingers def have calluses on them.

[Edited on August 21, 2008 at 12:29 PM. Reason : ...]

8/21/2008 12:29:05 PM

You mean the sort of constant updating type that pull moisture through your skin to measure glucose levels, something like that? I heard those suck and aren't accurate at all, and my doctor(s) told me not to waste the money.

If I get something like that it will probably be a surgical implant, or I'll wait for them to make something like a mini insulin pump system that just sort of pokes through your skin and is glued to you at all times. Then the thing can just communicate wirelessly with a little receiver and you'll have semi-continual glucose monitoring (it could do it every 15 minutes just like an insulin pump).

8/21/2008 12:31:53 PM

what I am hoping for is for this sensor to be in with the infusion site. I don't like how you have to poke yourself in two different areas with the current sensor and infusion site with the Mini Med.

8/21/2008 12:38:13 PM

Your mini-med has a built in continuous glucose monitor?

8/21/2008 1:15:04 PM

its the thing on the left. The only problem is you have to have two sites but the cool thing is it constantly sends readings to the meter and adjusting your sugar according to your settings.

http://www.minimed.com/products/insulinpumps/components/cgm.html



[Edited on August 21, 2008 at 1:52 PM. Reason : link]

8/21/2008 1:49:50 PM

NICE! Wow... I'm still doing the old fashioned finger prick.

I don't think I can switch to a system like that until it's integrated into the removable cap that is attached to you by the insulin tubing. With the activities I am now taking I don't want ANYTHING like that sticking off of my stomach when people start coming at me. I'm more interested in a separate monitor system I think and using the glucose meter I have attached to my pump to test for now as I am not sure that I fully trust any of that technology yet.

Also, I figured out that my 2.5 hour long workouts (not joking) for wing chun kung fu classes raise my blood sugar about 150 mg/dl over those two hours. I went in at 204 (left it alone cause I THOUGHT I was gonna burn that sugar off) and left at 358 or so. I do keep my pump unhooked the entire time I do it. I'm gonna call the pharmacy tomorrow and see if i still have some of those insulin pen cartridges and insulin pen needles on file (and active) and I'll start giving myself about 4 units of insulin (enough to offset my blood sugar by 100 mg/dl over 3 hours) at the start of class. Maybe... I have a lot of trial and error to do before I go head-first into that because, as you know, you can crash super fast by exercising a moderate amount once you put just a bit of insulin onboard.

It's just another layer of complexity for our disease I guess. I don't feel that sick once my blood sugar swings that high after all that activity unless I don't get any water, so I think I'll start slow with the advice of my doctor.

8/21/2008 11:01:25 PM

Exercising is still a mystery to me. I swear it depends how my body decides to react. I have lows and sometimes highs. I know for sure if I go in with it a little high, say 150, then I will def come out with it being above 200. But if it is, say 120, I could deal with some crazy lows or some semi highs.

[Edited on August 21, 2008 at 11:09 PM. Reason : sometimes I really hate being a diabetic]

8/21/2008 11:07:48 PM

I suppose what I'd really like is a semi-permanent sub-dermal glucose monitor with a wireless transmitter so when I was doing stuff that was serious I could hang the monitor up somewhere that I could hear it beep (low or high). That would make me pretty happy, I could just step aside for 2 minutes and give myself a quick insulin pen fix or drink a juice box and get back to what I was doing. I am not sure I want a machine making all my life-essential decisions for me yet. Machines make mistakes because they're designed by humans, and the last thing I want is a faulty line of code to cause a misread blood sugar that ends up killing me in my sleep when my pump decides to give me 12 units of insulin to correct that odd blood sugar of 400 I had.

8/21/2008 11:39:29 PM

Durr, i totally should've bumped this instead of posting in that other thread. Gotta preserve my old school shenanigans while I still have them.

So tonight I trained super duper duper hard at wing chun. I think I was sweating way more than usual (I wore sweat pants instead of shorts, stupid) and I didn't get enough water breaks, and my blood sugar spiked like it usually does. At the end I was loopy as hell so I sat down and waited for my heart rate to drop down a bit and for some of the dizzy lightheadedness to go away. It got a lot better so I got up and got a decent amount of water and hopped in my car to go home. 20 minutes into my ride home I had to pull over (if you were on gorman st around 9:25pm, I apologize for that dramatic curb-drift maneuver as I was throwing up while doing it) as suddenly my stomach decided to reject its contents. Twice.

So yeah I get home and check my ketones, they're way over 160mg/dl (i.e. turned the strip the darkest purple it would go and I was so dehydrated i could barely pee on the darn strip). I threw up again, five times in rapid sucession this time. That time I figured was due to chugging the water instead of sipping it very slowly, so I started sitting on the floor again, got a juice box, got my now half-full cup of water and started slowly sipping while sort of meditating (just using breathing techniques and focusing on reducing that nausea).

Got my heart rate down doing that stuff and managed to remain coherent enough to call the hospital, but my hands were (and currently still are) numb and my ears were both ringing so loud I had trouble hearing the person on the other end of the phone (got better as the phone call went on). I mentioned that my hands were trying to close themselves to the doctor and she said that could be a sign of a vitamin deficiency (namely, calcium) so tomorrow I am going into the hospital for a quick blood draw to determine what's wrong. I imagine there's something wrong with my diet. I'm pretty sure something is wrong there though as I can't figure what else would cause such a problem.

Anyway, right now I am laying here, my laptop on the bed, my arms kinda lazily typing on this thing, resting my head on the bed. I can't even sit up straight I'm so tired right now. About to email my doctor to see if we can create a "wing chun plan" for insulin so I can give myself humalog flex-pen shots as the night goes on to offset the blood sugar increase as the night goes on (my sugars were normal when I started and they jumped to 378 by the end!). I'll also be buying one of those gay little nalgene bottles from Target tomorrow so I can carry around enough water so I am not rushed in the water fountain line at Wing Chun again (part of why I'm not getting enough water).

To top the night off, I've got to be at work in 8 hours!! >:E I might make it... I dunno, diabetes is more important and this wing chun stuff is important to me. I'm gonna find some way to make this fucking schedule work, and it is not going to kill me.

8/26/2008 11:32:35 PM

Quote :

"Wow... I'm still doing the old fashioned finger prick."

My great-grandmother did that to me when I was little, after I had some ice cream, and then told me I was going to die because my blood sugar level was so high

8/27/2008 1:57:37 AM

set em up

8/27/2008 2:11:51 AM