I apologise for the title, writing titles for OPs is not one of my strong suits. My inclination is to post this in GQ, but every time I post there it gets moved over here, so I will start here. If the post needs to be moved will someone please flag a mod?
I am a Type II Diabetic. My sugars are under pretty tight control now, I brought my A1C down from 14 to 6.1 in less than a year. I test twice a day, first thing in the morning and two hours after dinner, and adjust my insulin accordingly. I haven’t had to adjust my insulin for a while, it seems I have finally figured out what I can and cannot eat. Yay me.
I got up two days ago, peed, washed my hands and brushed my teeth. Sat back on the bed and tested, 85, yay! I hit the button on the coffee maker and was talking with my daughter when I started feeling - weird. As the minutes went by I became shaky and all I wanted to do was to lie down, my daughter noticed and grabbed the meter and between the two of us we got the strip out of the container* and into the meter, and then after I got my finger bleeding it was a bit of a circus act to get my finger and the strip to meet long enough to get a sufficient amount of blood to test - 59. There was literally less than 10 minutes between the first test and the second. I had not yet taken my morning meds, and this isn’t the only time my sugar has taken an unexpected plunge.
I do have a doctor, and I will see him soon and will bring this up with him, I just am interested to see what The Dopers have to say. I appreciate your time and thoughts, thank you.
*What genius designed the container for those damned strips anyway? I have dumped the entire container onto my lap more than once.
That being said, 85 is where I start to notice a low. After 12 hours, your body is pulling a Wiley Coyote off the cliff, holding the sign that says "empty ".
Be happy you are not on U500 insulin, which has a weird response curve. Waking up at o’dark 30 in the 50’s is more fun than you want.
Non-insulin dependant Type-II.
Every now and again, my pancreas wakes up and says “Wait, I’ve got a job to do, right? Here! Have a bolus of insulin!”
Immediate sugar crash.
But yeah, “good morning crash” is moderately common. Have something to eat the instant after you test. Even before the coffee (Coffee can, IME, accelerate a crash).
Yes, this. There are other things that can affect the picture, including unusual exercise (out of your usual routine) in the previous 24 hours, or alcohol consumption in the previous 12 hours or so; also having eaten earlier or later than usual the previous evening, or having changed the timing on your medication the previous evening. That being said, every diabetic is going to get a weird number that they just can’t explain now and then. Don’t worry about it unless it becomes a pattern. This kind of thing does happen.
And congratulations on getting your A1c down and getting things stabilized! It takes some work and obviously you’ve been doing it and paying attention to your health. That’s the important thing. (disclaimer: I am an RN and a CDE)
I think you should call your doctor’s office and tell them what happen and see if they want you to come in today . That was good your daughter was home to help you.
My mother in law had diabetes and she end up having to go ER b/c she didn’t let her doctor know when her blood sugar dropped .
This was my thought on it. Sometimes the littlest bit of exercise can make your pancreas react. Do you climb stairs in your morning routine or anything? Even if it’s not stairs, your body can be reacting to the difference between lying still and moving.
Curious - why did you take your BSL right away instead of having some juice or a glucose pill? Do you not know what low sugar feels like?
This is true. A brisk 30 minute walk can have a MAJOR impact on my sugar levels. as many as 30 points (yes, I’ve tested it).
In my case, because my Endo said to.
The idea is to get a semi-fasting sugar reading, which is a useful number for telling just how well your sugalr levels are controlled. Likewise, testing before eating, or (in my case) three hours after eating tells how well you’re regulated - and whether additional steps need to be taken.
Well I mean they said they woke up and took their fasting level which was 85. So they had their fasting reading for the day. Then they did some moving around and it dropped and they felt the low blood sugar shakes. In the OP they describe their next step was to struggle to take their BSL again. I am curious as to why their immediate reaction was to test, and not to do something to rectify the low BSL.
I know the feeling of an impending crash, and it sucks. I act immediately before testing in that situation. THEN I’ll test - in a bona fide crash, my numbers will still be notably low even after I’ve acted. The risk is to over react, and send the numbers too high. It’s one of the situations where experience helps, but you don’t want the necessary experience to get the skills.
ZipperJJ has a good point. Rapidly falling blood glucose levels will lead to confusion followed by unconsciousness. Once that happens there is no easy safe way to reverse it without calling 911. Better to be safe, get some sugar into you, and then check. The worst that can happen is you were wrong and now your glucose level has gone up 20 or 30 points. Much better than the alternative.
Thank you for all of your responses. My doc does want a fasting test in the morning. I had done my “moving around” prior to testing, which was just going from my bed to the bathroom and back, maybe 20’. I have had similar experiences later in the day; for example once I had taken my evening oral meds at the normal time (5:00) and then ate a decent supper consisting of a broiled hamburger patty, some lightly buttered broccoli and a green salad. I take my pills with milk so add an 8 oz. glass of 2%. After the meal I was watching a movie with my daughter (who is my caregiver) when I began to feel weird and the shakes started and when I tested my sugars were low, I forget how low, but in the 60/50 range. This happens maybe every 6 weeks or so, it isn’t frequent, but it’s weird when it does.
The reason I check when I feel weird rather than get some fast acting carb in me first is because it isn’t always low blood sugar, and I don’t want to cause it to spike unnecessarily. It has been such an effort to get and keep my numbers under control that I am a little obsessive about what I ingest. I very rarely drink alcohol, I have two cups of coffee in the morning and after that I drink water. My biggest vice right now is both fresh fruit and fruit juice. I have learned to keep both a honey bear and a glass of juice next to the bed when I retire.
I was diagnosed in 1997, handed a prescription for metformin and glucotrol and sent on my way. It has only been since moving back home that the doctor has been insanely proactive (I mean that in the best way possible) and I have gotten my A1C to a good place, and for the most part my sugars are good.
(I have more than diabetes going on, I do take metformin twice a day, pioglitazone in the morning, and I inject 150 units of Lantus and 1.2 mg of Victoza at bedtime for the diabetes)
I too (Type 2, on orals and now Truelicity), during only-so-so periods of control definitely have thought I was getting hypo, usually just when I’m hungry, but the numbers after a stick said no. Endo told me that you’re normal “feel OK” is so high, that a real normal feels like a crash.
