Healing Type 1 Diabetes

Still Learning how to Work with my Dawn Phenomenom

I am still experiencing morning blood sugars in the low 200's.

At first I thought about titling this post as "Still Fighting with my Dawn Phenomenom" but decided to go with a more positive message instead.

I mean we have (the United States) had a war on cancer going on for a long time and now we have a war on obesity. I definitely don't like that negative connotation.

Some say the reason we get cancer is that it's our body's way to help us survive a little longer, otherwise we would have succumbed already and died. So maybe we should learn how to improve the person's health instead of fighting the cancer, or perhaps a little of both.

The second war has a blame factor where we are, in essence, fighting with people who are obese. Not good. The way our society is set up has made it hard to stay slim, especially for those with the thrifty gene. And there is more to it than willpower and calories in/calories out. Any type of prejudice is bad. Smile and be kind to everyone, including the overweight.

I thought back to one time when I was drinking only vegetable juice and my need for insulin disappeared except for in the early morning hours. I would be level all day and then wake up with a 300 blood sugar. So I really think a more pronounced Dawn Phenomenom is a healing sign for me.

I have been slowly increasing my basal rate everyday and will keep doing so until I wake up with a normal blood sugar. Right now my basal rate is .425 per hour most of the time but 1.25 between the hours of 2 am and 5 am.

Here's a picture of some scrambled eggs with mushrooms I had over the weekend.

Dawn Phenomenom

I had another blood sugar this morning in the low 200's. I've decided that perhaps it is due to the Dawn Phenomenom.

I never used to have much of a Dawn Phenomenom before, but now I am going to bed with a good blood sugar and then waking up to pee at 4 in the morning due to high blood sugars. I am wondering if maybe part of my healing process is to develop more of a Dawn Phenomenom, which of course my body does not react well to.

So I have increased my basal rate on my pump between 2 and 4 am. My normal basal rate is .425 per hour and I upped it to .8 for that time period. I will bump it up more if need be.

Here is a picture of one of my lunches over the weekend.

It WAS the gum!

I haven't blogged in a while because my daughter was home for her fall break from college. It was great seeing her and the good news is, I did stick to my primal diet.

I went to see my endo & DE (Diabetes Educator) yesterday. They were very impressed with my progress. 6 weeks ago I had an A1c of 9.5 and this time I had my best A1c ever of 7.9!

In case you don't know, an A1c is a blood test that shows your average blood sugars for the last 3 months - with the most recent month having a bigger weight in the average than the other 2 months. Non-diabetics have an A1c of 4.5 - 5.5. They usually shoot for diabetics to get their A1c under 7. Dr. Bernstein, however, the author of the book "Diabetes Solution" that I am reading - shoots for diabetics to have normal A1c readings.

My DE reviewed my log and was impressed with my improved blood sugars. She noticed I was no longer letting my pump decide how much insulin to give me for a meal. I always do a manual bolus for meals, but I do let the pump calculate how much insulin to give me to adjust for a higher blood sugar.

This is because the pump decides on a meal bolus based on the number of carbs in the meal. This doesn't work for me because I often have to give myself insulin for a zero carb meal/snack. I need 2 units for a handful of nuts and 1/2 unit for 2 eggs, for example. So, in the end, she agreed with me.

But she said I am the most sensitive to insulin and to food that she has ever met. That's the story of my life. lol

At one point my DE was noticing the 200's and upper 100's during the first few days of the log I provided to her. I told her my theory about sugarless gum causing that and how when I quit my blood sugars went down. I thought she would think I was crazy. But since by then she realized how sensitive I was, she agreed with me. Sugarless gum has sugar alcohols in it that do convert to .5 or 1 gram of carb. So she could see how that would affect me.

October 6th - quit chewing gum today, so tomorrow's blood sugars are better

• 5:00 pm     206 bs     1.3 units
• 7:45 pm                         1.0 unit - Ate 1 oz. cheese & 10 small olives
• 8:17 pm     227 bs         .7 unit - Ate 3 eggs & 2 bacon & took 1.2 units more
• 11:09 pm   217 bs         .6 unit - My legs were jumpy so I took another unit

October 7th

• 6:47 am     112 bs        .1 unit - disconnected for a few minutes
• 7:47 am     130 bs       .2 unit
• 8:30 am                                        - Ate eggs & bacon & took 1 unit
• 11:58 am    152 bs       .6 unit - Ate large salad & took 5 units
• 3:53 pm     220 bs     1.5 units
• 4:00 pm                                        - Drove to pick up my daughter from college (4 hours driving in total) & ate a lettuce, turkey, & cheese roll during the drive
• 10:14 pm   148 bs       .8 unit - Ate 1.5 oz. peanuts & took 2 units
• 1:34 am      179 bs       .9 unit

October 8th

• 9:42 am     113 bs       .1 unit - Ate 3 eggs & 2 bacon & took 1.2 units
• 1:30 pm                                       - Disconnected pump for shower
• 2:00 pm    199 bs     1.2 units
• 3:00 pm                                      - Ate 5 carb greek yogurt with almonds & cacao nibs & took 2 units
• 7:55 pm     123 bs      .2 unit - Ate Quizno's salad with chicken & took 5 units
• 12:30 am     73 bs                     - Ate cheese, nuts, & olives

October 9th

• 10:17 am     79 bs                      - Ate 3 eggs & 1 bacon & took 1 unit
• 2:23 pm     133 bs     .4 unit   - Ate cheese & olives & took 1 unit
• 4:00 pm    110 bs                      - Drove 1 1/2 hours to take daughter & friends to haunted event & ate string cheese & nuts during the drive
• 9:04 pm    114 bs     .1 unit    - Drove 1 1/2 hours back from haunted event

October 10th

• 7:33 am     144 bs       .5 unit  - showered without pump
• 9:30 am     124 bs                      - Ate 1 egg & took .2 unit
• 2:00 pm     156 bs                      - Ate cauliflower & cheese dish & large salad & took 4.5 units
• 8:08 pm     132 bs       .4 unit  - Ate cheese & olives & took 1 unit
• 9:00 pm                                        - Ate 3 eggs & 2 bacon & took 1.2 unit
• 12:00 am     62 bs                      - Ate 5 carb yogurt with almonds & cacao nibs

October 11th

• 6:27 am     213 bs     1.4 units - disconnected while got ready for work
• 7:20 am     243 bs     1.0 unit 
• 9:45 am     144 bs       .5 unit  - Ate 1 egg & took .2 unit
• 11:44 am   106 bs                      - Ate steamed broccoli & large salad & took 3.5 units
•  4:45 pm                                        - Ate cheese & 5 small olives
• 5:00 pm                                         - Drove 2 hours to take my daugher back to college & ate nuts during the drive
• 7:51 pm     106 bs                       - Drove 2 hours back home & ate some more nuts
• 10:30pm                                       - Was so tired that I forgot to check my blood sugar & bolus for the nuts

October 12th

• 6:24 am     225 bs     1.5 units - Disconnected for an hour
• 7:30 am     217 bs        .8 unit

The main thing I learned during my appointment was that I should bolus before I disconnect to shower and get ready for work. Since my basal rate is .45 unit per hour I will now bolus .5 unit in the morning before I disconnect (if I expect to be disconnected for an hour).

Tweaked my Bolus Settings

My blood sugar was 90 this morning! Woo-hoo!

I haven't had a single crash since I gave up starchy carbs & reduced my basal rate from 20 to 10.  I've gotten tired of the slight highs that my pump seems to think are okay. I'll use my bolus wizard for 160 bs and it'll deliver .1 units of insulin. Two hours later my bs is still 160.

So I decided to check out my bolus settings yesterday that my diabetes educator helped me to set up. We had my BG Target set at 100-140, because I did use to crash a lot. I have now changed it to 70-100. My pump warned me that target range is valid but outside the usual range of 90-140. My first endo told me good bs's are between 70-120, so that's why I picked 70 for the bottom of my range.

 I think this change is working great for me. I woke up with a 90 bs and now when I have a 160 bs, it will help me get it down to 100 instead of doing nothing - or me needing to do a manual bolus.

The other setting I changed was the Active Ins Time. It was set at 4 hours and because of this setting my pump would not deliver any insulin sometimes even if I had a bs of 211. Instead it would tell me that I had plenty of active insulin available. Then 2 hours later I would still have a 200 bs. So I changed that setting to 2 hours.

I know I can override what the pump will deliver with a manual bolus and I have done that, especially lately. But if I can get the pump to work more accurately on its own, why not?

If anybody has any similar experiences, I would love to hear them.