Diabetes is tricky. ("Duh," you say.) The math itself is complicated enough to make this gal who has a bachelor's degree in physics and a minor in mathematics bang her head against the wall. It's non-linear and seemingly has no formula solution. Nothing is more frustrating!
Such is the case when I forgot to program Arnold for my extended bolus for pizza this weekend. I must have had my ratios wrong or something, because the first hour after I ate I was chugging juice to keep from going low. So I decided to forgo the extended square bolus following the initial bolus because I kept going low. And when I tested before bed at 103 mg/dL, I thought I was set. I was only missing 1.0 units from my original bolus, no big deal.
Uh uh.
I woke up at 4 AM with Constance blaring at me, dry mouth, and a slight headache. She said I was 335 mg/dL and a test confirmed I was 300 mg/dL. My correction bolus was a little over 3 units of insulin!
How in the world does 1 unit missed equal 3 units for correction?! It boggles my mind! Is it like going into orbit away from the force of gravity? The further away you are from the central force, the less effect it has. Thus, sending you into a momentum of climbing higher and higher into the stratosphere. That's my engineering/physics mind trying to figure this out.
Has anyone else noticed this? Diabetes can get so out of control in a hurry. Just goes to show how important that initial bolus (before eating) is to keeping a nice streamline on my numbers. The fact that we can maintain numbers the way we do with a body that wants to live in the stratosphere goes to show how awesome we diabetics are!
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About Me
- Holly
- My name is Holly and I live in north Alabama with my hubby, two cats, and a dog.
Yep yep yep!!! I can go to bed at a nice 105 WITH insulin still on board if I've had a pre-bed snack that I've already bolused for like an hour before. So I'm like alright I'm good. Then wake up in the middle of the night with like 386!!! WTH!!!
ReplyDeleteYou are not alone. Franco & I get it.
Oh yeah, there's some sort of exponential relationship between units missed and correction units needed. And it's always worse when there's pizza involved.
ReplyDeleteOH MY GOSH!! This is exactly how I get every single high blood sugar! I always need like at least five more units to insulin to correct for a high blood sugar if I didn't bolus at the beginning of a meal. I like knowing I'm not the only one (I don't like knowing that it happens to us all!) This is the hugest problem for me getting my A1C down. Any solutions you or anyone has, blog it for everyone (me) to see!
ReplyDeleteSometimes it's just so hard to predict! I checked before bed and was at 68 do I ate a banana with peanut butter. I woke up for work the next day and tested at 268. What happened during the night??
ReplyDelete