How often do you check your sugars during the day?

I am a type I insulin dependent diabetic, so I am supposed to check it 5 to 6 times a day, but I don't!!

4/2/2007 12:39:34 AM

oh man, you're really showing them!

4/2/2007 12:42:16 AM

4/2/2007 12:42:40 AM

paging Mindstorm

4/2/2007 12:53:16 AM

my sugars... let me show you them.

4/2/2007 12:54:17 AM

im hypoglycemic, not exactly diabetic, but that low blood sugar is a bitch

4/2/2007 1:12:47 AM

enjoy your blindness and limb loss

4/2/2007 1:21:18 AM

hypoglycemia is a symptom not a disease.

its about the most overplayed self-diagnosis ever.

it just means you need to go eat something.

4/2/2007 1:29:51 AM

bttt

4/2/2007 5:43:08 PM

it would benefit you to at least check it twice a day.

esp since you're type I.

4/2/2007 5:49:36 PM

how come they haven't come out with blood sugar monitors yet that don't involve physcially drawing blood?

4/2/2007 5:57:54 PM

I check my sugar twice a day, sometimes three...I just don't always remember to check it more times than that.

4/2/2007 8:09:35 PM

HEIL BRIMLEY!

Checking it 5/6 times a day is optimal. So far today I've checked it 4 times. I'll probably check it again before I go to bed.

When I'm sick I may check from 6-10 times a day.

If it's something I'm terribly stupidly serious about I will check it once every thirty minutes (like when I first gave a beer a shot, I just wanted to make sure I could control it, just because).

If you slack from that sometimes it's understandable. As a student it's a bitch keeping everything in your life (including the aidsabeetus) in perfect alignment all the time. However, try not to slack TOO often. My A1C numbers keep sliding closer and closer to the 7.0% mark, so right now I'm working on actively controlling my diet (moreso than I was before anyway) and checking my numbers more often.

Then again, my insulin pump's got a broken part that basically makes it impossible for me to get an accurate dose of insulin right now, and I can't repair it until wednesday. And that's just a bitch.

Do what you can. <3

[/aidsabeetus gurul337us]

^^ They do exist, there are continuous blood glucose monitoring systems in testing right now that are inserted as a chip under your skin. The blood is monitored constantly and the numbers are reported to some external device (this is my limitation of understanding regarding these things). They're in testing phases right now, and my doctors are not recommending that I go for it yet. They still want more kinks to be fixed before they subject the majority of their patients to it (and these are the people over at duke children's hospital).

[/aidsabeetus rantabill3us]

[Edited on April 2, 2007 at 8:23 PM. Reason : DIABEETUS]

[Edited on April 2, 2007 at 8:38 PM. Reason : PS: Thanks for the callout chembob. <3 Glad somebody remembers my horrible self-stabbing threads.]

4/2/2007 8:18:10 PM

^^^ I agree. If we can check blood alcohol, why not blood sugar?

[Edited on April 2, 2007 at 8:18 PM. Reason : ^ extra]

4/2/2007 8:18:27 PM

Thanks for that info. I am a bad diabetic when it comes to checking my sugar.
my A1C was 6.4 last time. I need another check up. It is not hard for me to not go crazy on things that raise my sugar significantly, so I at times deal with lows. I don't want to do a pump bc I hear too many bad things about it. I administer shots everytime I eat something and I also take LANTUS at night . When I first became a diabetic I got really fat bc I was always having lows and eating to compensate the insulin level. I don't see my diabetes as life threatening, but it is definitely a bitch! I want to eat things that I know I cannot! Like pop for instance. I don't drink this that often bc I don't want to drink diet. When I have lows now, I have learned that I need to drink OJ and a PB sandwich.

Do you deal with a lot of lows?

4/2/2007 8:57:36 PM

O yes! I have a lot of lows. I just roll with it and treat them. It's either that or my blood sugar will end up higher than usual. Almost all of my lows are related to me being a fool and giving myself too much insulin, me exerting myself and lowering my blood sugar as a result, or me being sick.

My A1C was 6.6 last time. I have been having one hell of a bad semester both in diabetic health and general health, sometimes it just happens. As far as pumps being bad: Bullshit! They're awesome. Granted, they cost four thousand dollars, they're still awesome. If your health insurance covers it, go for it. You can eat a lot of stuff you ordinarily might not eat, simply because you're giving yourself the insulin for what you're eating (and you'll have it calibrated so that the regular daily insulin you need is automatic). It makes it easy for me to say, go and eat something from taco bell one day, then eat some pasta and chicken I make myself the next night. Lots of flexibility! It's also handy when you're completely incapacitated, throwing up, sick as hell, exhausted, and you just need to sleep (you can sleep for a while if you need to, no worries about waking up to give yourself another shot).

Of course, with a pump you're not free of shots entirely. Sometimes your infusion site might be shot and you'll have to give yourself a shot to correct any problems. Sometimes you'll have two or three infusion sites in a row that just give you problems, and sometimes your control will be perfect. When I have the energy, I can keep my control perfect. Lately my control has been alright or good. Once the little plastic thingy broke on my pump saturday though, my sugars have been fudged up. So you are basically relying upon this thing constantly (I do keep a bunch of needles and extra bottles of fast and slow acting insulin available in case something ridiculous happens to my pump). Still, it's a great thing to have.

Don't be tempted to drink soda, too. Drink beer. I just give myself the insulin beforehand and it swings up like it would with any other junk food I eat. If you drink the beer slowly, it's less of a problem. As for diet sodas: I agree, they are not as good as regular ones. However, if you completely deprive yourself of regular soda for a while and just drink water, then you switch to diet drinks, it's not that bad. I got used to it.

AIDS

A

BEEEEEEEETUS

Oh, and what you do now isn't entirely consequential, but it won't end up killing you 5 years sooner either. Keep your long term goals in mind, keep your blood sugar under control when you've got the time to actually focus on it, and control it once you get out into the "real world" and you should be good. If you're already in the real world (I mean graduated and with a job and a fairly stable schedule), you should focus on getting better control.

BTW: Lantus is that hormonal supplement right? The one that helps you control your body's uptake of sugar that you've consumed and how fast it's absorbed into the blood.

4/2/2007 9:14:32 PM

Aidsabeetus FTL?

I thought we were going to have a little conversation here.

4/2/2007 11:57:32 PM

Dibeatus is where you jerk off two dudes at once right?

4/3/2007 12:06:30 AM

well...today I have checked my sugar like twice.
I am horrible at this thing and I have been a diabetic for almost my whole life!
How long have you had the diabeetus?
Do you know if there are anymore cool type I people on TWW?
I have been talking to people about their diabetes lately and there are an aweful lot of type II's out there. Most of them NEVER check their sugars.
I hate it when I tell people that I have diabetes and then they tell me that thier grandma has it.
What is the craziest remark you have gotten from someone when you told them you were a diabetic?
I wear a medi alert and at one point I thought about getting it tattooed on me, but then I was thinking that there might be a cure one day and it would stink to have diabetic on my body if I were no longer a diabetic.

More convo to come!

Quote :

"Dibeatus is where you jerk off two dudes at once right?"

you are one dirty SOB.

4/3/2007 5:07:58 PM

I've been a diabetic for four years, starting in june (diagnosed Type I Diabetic).

I know there are some more Type I's on TWW, but they don't talk about it that much (though if we BTTT this thread 5000 times they'll probably show up).

I also hate it when people say "omg my grandma has diabetes I know what you're talking about" because they usually think it just makes grandma tired (and have no idea about the other 90% of the complications and other boring yadda yadda yadda about the disease).

Crazy remarks? Well, the obvious questions are always kind of crazy to me. Like where people say can you drink sodas and ask if I ever had to have anything chopped off (although I do resent being asked that when all my digits are visible). Don't get a tattoo, what if you get aids from it? Then you've got aids and diabeetus.

4/3/2007 7:38:37 PM

I feel bad for you guys. It must be such a hassle to deal with something so serious and what other people take for granted

4/3/2007 8:22:35 PM

one of my former roommates has it. Although, he made things worse by going out and drinking a lot. I had to take him to the hospital a couple of times. I know that it is something that is hard to deal with at times and am thankful I don't have it...

[Edited on April 3, 2007 at 8:34 PM. Reason : .]

4/3/2007 8:29:43 PM

It's a bitch at the worst times, yes. It's only made me stronger though. You should've seen me before I had diabeetus, I was a real dick. Then I got it. Now I'm a lot nicer, more organized, and more afraid of being smitten by a higher power.

But yeah, this thread needs more needles.

4/3/2007 8:31:14 PM

Quote :

"So you can't eat sugar, right?"

most quoted phrase.

telling people about balancing my sugar seems complicated [or maybe it is people assume things and then don't listen when I tell them about balancing sugars.]
Luckily I married someone who really cares about me having diabetes and he has learned how to "help" me if I need help.
If there was a cure, would you get it?
I WOULD!!

4/3/2007 9:11:28 PM

Hell yes I would. I would throw this damn insulin pump under a bus and celebrate for a year.

4/3/2007 9:14:56 PM

do you say diabeetees or diabeetus?

4/3/2007 9:16:32 PM

Depends on what I feel like saying. It's aidsabetes, fuckabetes, aidsabeetus, diabetes, diabeetus, whatever. Sometimes I fake a wilford brimley accent with it to, the man is my icon (for diabetes).

4/3/2007 9:18:11 PM

what raises your sugar really high?

4/3/2007 10:11:42 PM

lots of sugar?

4/3/2007 10:12:06 PM

Beer

4/3/2007 10:12:10 PM

beer actually suppresses the natural sugar that the liver makes, not unless you are drinking alot of beer-o, then there would not be a hike. The problem with being drunk is that you have this feeling like you are having a sugar low, but not really. Then you start eating a lot of stuff that you shouldn't be eating and that is what makes the sugar go higher.

Pizza is what hikes mine up.

4/3/2007 10:24:36 PM

Great, now my coworkers are in here. Damn stalkers. :E

Anyway, yeah, sugars a lot? The trays at cookout. Their "quality control" is so off I can never get the carb counts right for their trays unless I go with, like, chicken nuggets and chicken strips.

Beer only makes my sugars go up if I drink it super fast and without a meal. It seems to go better with a meal, and if I drink it more casually (not chugging it like I do when I'm bored).

Of course anything with simple sugars in it will hit me fast. Soda, Candy, Elixir...

[Edited on April 3, 2007 at 10:24 PM. Reason : asdfdsa]

4/3/2007 10:24:39 PM

have you noticed since becoming a diabetic that you cannot eat a lot of "sweet" things?
I am totally turned off to ice cream, cheese cake, and a lot of cake/cookie/pie type things.

I have a huge weakness for sweet tea, fruit roll-ups, fruit, cherry coke and baklava.

4/3/2007 10:28:47 PM

we're keeping this conversation going

4/3/2007 10:42:13 PM

I have a weakness for cookout milkshakes. I don't touch regular sodas any more unless I'm going to die. Most sweet stuff isn't that good to me any more.

Krispy Kreme is another weakness toooooooooo...

4/3/2007 10:48:00 PM

Dammit, aren't there some lurking diabetics out there?

I don't know anyone besides my doctors that have the aidsabeetus.

Coworkers don't count, either.

4/4/2007 3:50:19 PM

hyperglycemia is a symptom of the disease, not hypoglycemia. duh...

4/4/2007 5:04:01 PM

left my insulin at home today
been feeling like shit since lunch

4/4/2007 5:50:22 PM

why in the hell did you leave insulin at home???!!1 I hope you don't go into a coma!

4/4/2007 5:52:20 PM

Quote :

"hyperglycemia is a symptom of the disease, not hypoglycemia. duh..."

You are very wrong.

BOTH are a symptom of the disease, more often than not Type 2 diabetics deal with hyperglycemia. Type 1's deal with both since they're on shots (and if you give yourself too much or too little insulin you can swing either way).

4/4/2007 5:54:00 PM

that is true and that is why people don't think type I diabetics can have any sugar what so ever!

[Edited on April 4, 2007 at 5:59 PM. Reason : man! ]

4/4/2007 5:58:39 PM

I just need to get 5 eggs and I will be happy!

4/4/2007 6:04:06 PM

I mean, I forgot it
it's not like I did it on purpose

oh and pizza KILLS my sugar

4/4/2007 6:16:49 PM

how long have you been a diabetic?
I love pizza and I hate that it demolishes mine as well.

4/4/2007 6:17:37 PM

diagnosed april '02
so like 5 years

last a1c was 6.7

4/4/2007 6:21:21 PM

the things you find out about people on TWW

4/4/2007 6:22:07 PM

blahblah

4/4/2007 6:57:56 PM

Quote :

"Brick Tamland: I love… carpet. [pause] Brick Tamland: I love… desk. Ron Burgundy: Brick, are you just looking at things in the office and saying that you love them? Brick Tamland: I love lamp. Ron Burgundy: Do you really love the lamp, or are you just saying it because you saw it? Brick Tamland: I love lamp. I love lamp."

4/4/2007 7:05:37 PM

58

4/4/2007 7:49:12 PM

set em up

4/4/2007 7:50:03 PM