4.19.2007

Figure it out 'til we get it right...

Spring has returned to Minnesota! Or so it seems... ;)

So my diabetes is doing good but for some odd fasting results mid-mornings. Let me tell you I am not a morning person, not even close. Luckily I don't ever have to be to work before 9am but I still have a varied start time due to the position I have in the call center. There I can start anywhere from 9am or as late as 1pm and be scheduled for 9 hours with an hour lunch (love that lunch, it keeps me sane!). Even having my shifts start at 9 or later though, I still don't find time for breakfast. The late start is mainly to ensure I get enough sleep (I tend to go to bed late).

This is a good and a bad thing, but for the time being I am saying its good and using it to try and ensure my morning basal rates are set correctly. Well, the rates seem to be great for when I am in bed and asleep. I guess that is just fine for the dawn effect, but the time after I get up but before noon concerns me. I seem to run a little low after the higher basal rate drops back down to my normal rate. My tests in the hours from 9 - noon are running as low as 53 and all the way up to 69. I know, such a range! It isn't from bolusing too much, because I am not eating until noon or later it seems, and my pump is at the normal rate starting at 7:00am.

That I think is the error. The dawn effect increased basal should probably stop before 7am, so I pushed it back to 5:30am and gave a little more than the normal from 5:30 - 7, just in case. We'll see how that turns out.

"How did my increased basal end up returning to normal so late?" I asked myself, and I think it was when MiniMed replaced my pump last month and I reset my settings myself. I am sure I set it incorrectly then, and since these lows aren't waking me up I didn't notice until I started testing the minute I woke up instead of when I finally sat down to eat or drink something.

"Oh, thats right," that little voice inside my head chimes in, "I changed it to last until 7 am because I wasn't getting up to exercise and before, when I was getting up, I had it end at 5." Niiice Amber...

Guess thats a sign I should start exercising again...or stop meddling with my basal rates.

Ha, fat chance!

2 comments:

Scott K. Johnson said...

I sometimes have trouble with seeming to have my BG rise after waking up.

It's like my body is pissed about having to get out of bed, and starts spewing out adrenaline and other "getupandgo" hormones. Those hormones make my BG rise!

It's tough to deal with because the time I wake up is varied. On the weekends I don't even roll over until the crack of noon...

Anonymous said...

have you got any cats???

ahhh i'm having loads of trouble with my sugars at the moment.