Healing Type 1 Diabetes

Monday - Am I Eating Enough?

I continued to have problems with low blood sugars over the weekend, so I ate some raw food. I have rebumped my 24 hour insulin to 10 units and am now back on my juice fast. I plan to pay more attention to low blood sugars and respond quicker with slow lowerings of my 24 hour insulin.

I also found that even though I did not invest in all the supplements that the pH Miracle Plan recommends, I definitely need a fiber supplement. I did a home colonic over the weekend and bought an herbal fiber supplement - 5 capsules in the morning and 5 at night. We will see if that helps.

I want to respond to a comment I got awhile back where someone thought that I was not eating very many calories. Also, I got a recent email from a fellow Type 1 diabetic who believes the low calories with the juice feast is why my blood sugars are low.

I should point out that at times I am eating more than it appears on my blog. This is because when I list a smoothie or salad or raw soup, often it is actually a hu-u-uge smoothie, salad, or soup. Sometimes I fill 3 glasses with my smoothie, or eat from a huge serving bowl for my salad, or eat 2 or 3 bowls of raw soup. I definitely don't go hungry. I eat when I am hungry and eat until I am full and, unfortunately, a little past that at times just to finish up the smoothie, etc. I am not underweight. I will try to post a picture of myself soon so you can see for yourself.

As to low blood sugars and low calories, I want to tell you what my endocrinologist has taught me. She has taught me that my 24 hour insulin should not cover food at all. It should only cover my hormones, etc. and my fast acting insulin is for all food. So, to test my 24 hour insulin dosage she has me fast until 2 or 3 in the afternoon (if I wake up with a good bs) and see if my bs stays steady. If it does, that is a good dosage. Therefore, the amount of calories I eat should not cause low blood sugars. Too much insulin, at least for me, causes low blood sugars.

I have had some minor toe and foot cramping lately. Perhaps this alkaline diet is healing something in that area. Also, my eyes have gotten blurry for closeup work but still great for driving, etc. Something is healing there too I believe.

• 8:00 am - 110
• 10:20 am - 146
• 4:45 pm - 115

Tuesday - Signs that my blood sugars are off

The longer I eat raw foods, the more my body sends me signals when my blood sugar levels are even just slightly high or low. These symptoms don't happen everytime and I don't feel all of them at the same time. But whenever I feel one of these symptoms, it is a good sign that I should check my blood sugar.

High bs:

• get hyper and chatty
• find people annoying and irritating
• nausea
• legs & arms get heavy
• headache
• sugar cravings
• more emotional and prone to crying & screaming
• tired.

Low bs:

• sweaty, clammy, feel hot
• dizzy
• feel my energy level plummeting
• can't focus or make sense of things, get confused
• a buzzing in my head.

If I check my blood sugars often, I can usually bring my levels back down or up before symptoms happen. Also, the longer I am on the raw food diet, the more my bs levels are normal - at least it seems that way. My next A1c blood test in February will confirm whether or not that is true.

• 7:30 am - 139
• 10:30 am - 126 - 2 1/2 bananas & some stuffed tomatoes - 5 units
• 2:45 pm - 49 - I felt my energy dropping - 1 apple
• 4:30 pm - 204 - I guess that apple did it - 11 stuffed grape tomatoes - 3 1/2 units (1 1/2 for being high)
• 6:00 pm - small piece of flax cracker with raw walnut butter
• 8:20 pm - 84 - I ate a soup & entree from Rawvolution. Didn't know how much insulin to take so I guessed 3 units
• 10:30 pm - 50 - I felt myself getting confused. So, my guess was too high. I ate a Coco Joy bar without insulin. I'm sure my bs will be too high in the morning, but I am tired of crashing (twice in one day) so I am not going to take anymore humalog insulin. 10 units lantus

Sunday - Raw Food & Blood Sugars

I appreciate someone who has been posting comments lately on my blog. I wanted to address her concern about my high morning blood sugars. I have a great endocrinologist and she taught me that my 24 hour insulin (which is lantus) should not cover my food (my humalog is for that) but is for covering my hormones, etc during the day. In other words, if I fasted all day my blood sugars should remain steady. So, for instance, if I wake up with a good blood sugar I should be able to make it to 2 or 3 in the afternoon without eating and maintain a good blood sugar. Then she gave me a way to do the same thing to check my afternoon and evening levels. Sometimes I think I need 10 1/2 units of lantus instead of 10, but unfortunately my lantus pen does not do 1/2 units. 11 however, is too much, as I crash and am forced to eat - which is not what should happen.

So, my high morning blood sugars are caused by other factors and I know what they are but, unfortunately, I am not doing things perfectly and these factors still occur. Things like:

• eating too late the night before
• stress of my morning routine
• not enough sleep the night before.

Stress does make my blood sugar go up, unfortunately. Judging how much insulin to take to cover raw food is sometimes difficult to gauge since fruits & veggies vary so much in size and sweetness. So, if I eat a fruit smoothie, for example, late at night and don't finish eating it at least 3 hours before I go to bed, then if I gave myself 5 units (and I'd rather underestimate than overestimate and my endocrinologist agrees that crashing is worse) and I really needed 6 or 7 units my bs will rise during the night while I am sleeping.

I am excited that other Type 1 diabetics are following my blog. That is cool. But, remember we are all different and this diet might work even better for you than it does for me. All my doctors, endocrinologists, nutritionists, and other practitioners think I am a tough case and I just seem sensitive to everything. I mean I have to take insulin if I take Omega 3 supplements, so I don't take them, and everyone is always stumped by this. Before I went on the raw food diet, my endocrinologist shook her head and said I don't know what else to suggest for you. But now she is much happier with how I am doing. My theory with raw food is that even if my blood sugar goes high because it is hard to estimate the insulin to take, that the nutrients in the raw food help to heal damage from the sugar - to some extent. Hence my better A1c numbers. But keep posting any and all comments, I appreciate it. Or email me if you want. Thanks!

I went to a raw food workshop from 10 - 2 yesterday. It was hosted by Christie Kellogg of www.rawinanutshell.com. We tasted a lot of great raw food, including raw zucchini lasagna and blueberry pie. I checked my blood sugar under the table a couple of times during the workshop, but it would have been hard to estimate how much insulin to take or to sneak off and inject it. I definitely didn't want my blood sugar to crash during the workshop, so I was kind of chasing my blood sugars the rest of the day.

Yesterday:

• 9:15 am - 159
• 11:30 am - 135 - eating at raw food workshop
• 1:15 pm - 164 - still eating at workshop
• 2:45 pm - 273 - Raw food workshop ran late, so this was my first chance to check my blood sugar and take insulin. - 2 units - I probably needed more as my blood sugar was probably still rising from the workshop, but I didn't want to crash (my blood sugars, not my car - although it could end up being both) while driving home.
• 7:15 pm - 332 - salad of dandelion greens, green leaf lettuce, thyme, tomatoe, mushrooms, and cucumber with a raw black tahini/water dressing - 2 units for salad + 2 1/2 units for being over (I normally would have taken 3 units, but my pen ran out and I didn't think it was worth it to refill it for 1/2 unit)
• midnight - 191 - 1 unit + 10 units lantus - I didn't finish eating 3 hours ago, so I was afraid that I might not need another unit.

Today:

• 10:45 am - 56 - yeah, I probably didn't need that unit at midnight last night. - 1 granny smith apple - no insulin
• 1:40 pm - 149 - ate a small flax cracker with raw nut butter before driving
• 3:40 pm - 143 - 2 raw bars & some raw olives - 4 units
• 6:30 pm - 246 - made a tropical smoothie of young coconut meat & water, 10 chunks of pineapple, 5 slices of mango, 2 bananas, & 10 frozen strawberries. - 5 units + 2 units for high bs - hard to estimate the insulin, I will probably need more.
• 11:10 pm - 285 - 2 units + 10 units lantus

Sunday - Food & Blood Sugars

Today I ate another raw bar, a banana, an apple, a raw flax cracker with raw pecan butter, and a green salad with lots of veggies in it. I sneezed a lot today, had to blow my nose a lot, and felt drainage down my throat. This is good. I know my body is dumping toxins that it wants to get rid of in the mucus that is coming out. Yeah!

I made a huge salad today and some green smoothies to last me through the week.

• 11:05 am - 252
• 12:30 pm - 120
• 5:10 pm - 99
• 8:50 pm - 110
• 11:30 pm - 82

Saturday - Food & Blood Sugars

I didn't write down everything I ate today nor the units I took. I did eat 2 apples, a handful of raw peanuts, 1 raw bar, a salad, and a fruit smoothie with the meat & water from a young coconut. I'm starting to get the sniffles today. Perhaps the start of a healing crisis/detox?

• 7:40 am - 143
• 10:10 am - 234
• 2:00 pm - 117
• 5:50 pm - 92
• 7:45 pm - 121
• 1:00 am - 289