Pregnant and Hospital are being a nightmare!!

kt78

Well-Known Member
Messages
145
Hi all

Thought Id write this post to reassure all you lucky pregnant women about your hypos!

This is totally normal, in non-diabetic women their BGs drop too (All info taken from a proper book by a proper Dr - Pumping Insulin by John Walsh - not pulled off the internet!) :

Research shows that that a normal waking blood sugar for a woman who is pregnant but does not have diabetes is 3 - 3.6 after an overnight fast.

Low BGs / High Insulin sensitivity happens to non-diabetics in pregnancy - they are even looking at this as a way of curing us T1s in the future, so don't worry if you're at 3.3mmol and able to function okay!

http://www.diabetesdaily.com/voices...estore-insulin-production-in-type-1-diabetes/ :thumbup:
 

Danlie

Member
Messages
13
Hi Vans, Lemontree and kt78,

It's so nice to know that there are people out there that genuinely care and are happy to offer advice!!

I wish i could drink milk, but it makes me sick as soon as i have swallowed it! just can't stand the stuff, i like milkshake however, would that be any good do you think? Bananas i do enjoy but my potassium levels are always verging on too high, so have been advised to avoid things like bananas spinach etc that have high forms of potassium in them! :( i am willing to give milkshake a shot tho!?

the diabetes dietician keeps advising that i should be going into my meals at 3.6, but i honestly can't function at 3.6, i start to get the "shakes and disorientation" when its at 4.9 or below, so 3.6 i feel too out control to enter a meal at, i would feel like i was throwing my dinner down my throat to bring my levels up, i feel best when i am between 6 and 8.

i have tried changing my carb ratios, but as mentioned previously, i could honestly eat the same thing day in day out and it would be different every single time! I have had the hospital stumped on my diabetes for years, it fluctuates so much and I only have to do 1 unit different and it sends it swinging all over the place! i must have a very sensitive body to insulin?! :?

luckily i am ok with driving at the moment as i am still well aware if i am having a hypo, i have heard that women can lose the signals of a hypo during pregnancy tho!

It's nice to hear that you have a bump at 12 weeks vans, as i reckon i will have gained nearly 2 stone by 12 weeks too!!

I'm interested to know if any of you are finding out the sex of your baby - sorry that's not even diabetes related, just curious, as i don't know whether to or not, although still got plenty of weeks to decide!

its such a relief to know that there are others out there feeling the same way as i am, as when i speak to the diabetes team, i made to feel like i'm moaning in fact, i'm not very happy with the way they are being at all! :x

This is something that happens often and i don't understand, so earlier i mentioned that my bloods were 12.1, for breakfast i had porridge oats (at 8am) bloods were 8.2 at (9am) but then by 9.45am they were at 4.9 so had a cereal bar as a snack and now at 11.45am they are at 3.9 so then at 3.9 i had lucozade and biscuits (no injection) so before i go on my lunch break at 1pm, my bloods are now at 9.0. within 30 minutes (1.30pm) i am now at 2.5!!! why is this? so again i had to have lucozade as was so low in the middle of the high street and wanted to bring them up quite quickly, then i got back to the office and ate my sandwich (on malted brown bread turkey and ham) so good carbs with protein! sorry to keep going on but its things like this i just don't understand :crazy: xx
 

LemonTree

Well-Known Member
Messages
71
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High sugar levels :(
Wow Danlie! If you ever figure this out, I think you should write a book!

Ok so you started today off high which is never great but I do think you might be over doing your long acting insulin. Can you take it down by one unit? I really think you have not yet got your long and short acting insulins balanced - apparently this is not easy when you're pregnant. Hormones eh? :roll:

Now I'm not pregnant (yet) but I'm finding porridge gives me a huge spike an hour after eating but by lunch it's fine again - very frustrating. I'm starting to think porridge is not a good thing to have first thing but I'm loathed to give it up because it's really reduced my cholesterol. I don't understand why I can have the same amount of carb at lunch as for breakfast and I don't get spikes after lunch - weird!

I think you should try eating a really low carb meals - particularly when you have a pattern of having highs and then lows very quickly say in the morning. Any moving about you do between breakfast and lunch is probably helping to keep your sugars down then.

It is all trial and error and it is frustrating when no two days or even meals are different but try not to get too worried about highs. You're really not going that high.

And try not to give your Diabetes Care Team a hard time, the more I understand of diabetes (yes, after 14 years I'm actually properly taking note of it) the more I realise that you really do have to put in a lot of effort yourself and your care team can only really mull over your readings and offer advice.

You never know - maybe being pregnant has reignited something in your pancreas and it's started producing a bit of insulin!*

* No scientific evidence to back this up, it was just a random suggestion... :wink:
 

Danlie

Member
Messages
13
Hi Lemontree,

i need the 7 units of background at 10.30pm at night as if i do only 6, my bloods just go into figures of 18 and up! that's how much just one unit makes. i have been diabetic since i was 7 so thats 21 years that i have had it in september this year! it has never honestly been rights since the day i was diagnosed and a lot has changed since i was 7 and what ever seems to come out just doesn't seem to work with my body - we even looked into a pump with the hospital and it was proving to complicated!! :crazy:

I don't particularly like having porridge for breakfast, but that's what i have been advised by all of the diabetic team to eat. I find i get on much better when i have smoked salmon on wholemeal toast for my breakfast which i treat myself to at weekends, but for one i can't afford to eat smoked salmon every day and its not something i can really prepare by the time i get to work. i eat when i get into the office at 8am, i can't seem to eat before 8am without feeling sick (this has always been the case even not being pregnant).

i realised at about the age of 20 that i needed to take control of it and since then, i have monitored myself closely all of the time and like i say, even the hospital have been puzzled, i have been put on continuous blood monitoring and that showed that my bloods were dipping as low as 2 in the night and i wasn't waking so unless i set my alarm through the night for every 1-2 hours, i can't be sure. its very frustrating, but that's what has always caused my morning highs.

when i did low carbs before it caused me to have ketones, this is what i mean, i must be the most complicated diabetic on the planet - nothing works in my favour! but hey, i'm just going to have to get along with it, it could be worse i guess. what gets me is the hospital advised eating slices of toast with cheese spread on every 1.5 hours!! I'm sorry but that's not possible, i would be eating about half a loaf of bread a day and i just wouldn't be able to stomach that much food especially as eating breakfast, lunch and dinner!thank you for your help though x :D
 

kt78

Well-Known Member
Messages
145
Just read your post again - and had a thought - though I appreciate you won't want to muck around with around with doses too much - but stick with me a mo!...

I am now on a pump, but used to have horrible night-hypos, liver dumps etc. (The pump has saved me - I need less than half the amount of insulin between midnight and 4am as I do for the daytime so the same flat profile of lantus all the time was going to cause highs and lows).

The second best thing I did, apart from the pump, was to split my long acting insulin into 2 doses - I used to take 20u in the morning and 6 units at night and that really helped a lot. Worth asking your DSN about perhaps?
 

nixiepixie

Member
Messages
14
Danlie, i feel like i have found my diabetes twin!! I have had diabetes for coming up 24 years and i have NEVER got to grips with it. I must admit a lot of that is due to me being negligent and not wanting to admit that i was different from other people and can't get away with eating the way they do. However, i have had stages of really REALLY trying and yet no matter what i do my levels seem to shoot up and down like crazy!

The theory seems to be that your BG peaks 1 hour after eating, but then should begin to fall again, right? well i seem to be getting my 1 hour readings pretty spot on, but instead of my sugar then dropping before the next meal, it ALWAYS goes up. So like you, i am testing every couple of hours and i am just having to have a couple of extra units of novorapid here and there to counteract the raise in sugar. this particularly happens between lunch and dinner. if i do a test 1 hour after lunch i cannot possible then leave it several hours until dinner as god knows how high it will have gone by then. It makes me wonder whether my Glargine is working properly, as surely my sugar shouldn't keep going up if that is working in the background? I do my glargine before bed but i'm wondering if it would be better to do it in the morning?

had an extremely frustrating day and night yesterday...post lunch sugar was 7.8 - perfect right?! but by 5pm i was up to 12.6 for no apparent reason. Did 2 units of novorapid to bring it down. Couple of hours later before dinner i was up to 13.3! So i did a big jab and had a sensible tea of wholemeal pitta bread with chicken, with some crisps and an apple. Bear in mind we were at a friend's house and everyone else there got a massive Chinese takeaway followed by chocolate!!! after dinner my sugar was 7.4, again i'm thinking, i've cracked this, brilliant! But then before bed i'm up to 9.4, did my glargine and woke up at 1am at 13.9!! why is my sugar going UP when i haven't eating anything and have taken insulin?! ended up lying awake for about 3 hours last night stressing and worrying and trying to work out what on earth went wrong. so today i feel like absolute poo :(

i'm really sorry to hear your diabetes team aren't being very supportive. I have only spoken to the midwife on the phone so far but she seemed very nice and reassuring. Maybe it will be different when i actually have an appointment with her and the doctor though! At the end of the day it's not ideal to get pregnant with a high Hba1c but we haven't done it deliberately and it's not going to do any good to keep harping on about it! what you need is help and support to bring your hba1c down as quickly and safely as possible!

Does anyone else find (pregnant or not) that you have some days where your sugar goes low no matter what you do, and then other days where you can do as much insulin as you like yet it doesn't stop your sugar going up?

oh and Danlie, yes i will be finding out the sex of the baby, my husband and I both said we couldn't not! i really really want to know what i'm expecting so i can start planning things, arguing about names etc! But i know several people who have had babies and not found out the sex (i thought pretty much everyone these days found out) what are your reasons for and against?

oh and i'm only a few weeks but i also feel like i'm putting weight on my stomach already, dreading trying to hide it for 12 week! :shock:

sorry for rabitting on but god it's so nice to talk to people who actually have a clue what i'm going on about and can sympathise!! :D

Nixie xxx
 

LemonTree

Well-Known Member
Messages
71
Dislikes
High sugar levels :(
Hi Nixie

I know it's a pain because you - like me - can't be bothered but after your evening meal have you tried going for a walk for about 30 minutes? Try that and see if it helps to stabilise your levels.

You may already be quite active anyway, I don't think you've said but it may or may not help. Anything is worth a try though?? :eh:
 

Danlie

Member
Messages
13
Hi Nixie,

My bloods seem to be doing the opposite, like you they are pretty good levels an hour after eating but then within another 30-45 minutes they will drop right down to about 2 or 3! so end up having to eat again and as much as i love food, im getting pretty fed up of having to eat nearly every hour to stop lows! but then if i cut back on my novorapid, the blood levels an hour after dinner are too high! it's very hard work! just wish my diabetes team cared more, i haven't had any phone calls or appointments with them UNLESS i contact them! the doctor asked if i had an appointment with the diabetes team and i said no, and the doctor was shocked!

last night i left my levemir (i changed from glargine about 8 months ago and i prefer levemir) i took my dose at 11pm instead of 10.30pm and i had good levels throughout the night they were 5.0 at 1.30am then 6.2 at 5am then 8.4 at 7am when i get up for work so was quite chuffed with that, i am happy to continue doing my insulin that late if it means that they continue in this pattern, but i bet any money i do the same tonight and i will get totally different results, not one day is ever slightly the same!

as you say, its nice to see that there are others out there who seem to have an understanding!

with regards to finding out the sex, both my partner and i have always said even when growing up that if we ever had children we would want the sex to be a surprise, but since falling pregnant, we now feel eager to know! Also the fact it is due on Christmas Day means that we would obviously like to buy him/her a few christmas presents as well as being born!! haha!! so it would be nice to be able to know whether buying for a girl or boy. also we were wandering around mothercare the other day and there wasn't that much with regards to "unisex" clothes like neutral colours, it was very clear if you were buying boys or girls clothes.

do you have an idea what you are having? i think i'm having a girl, my partner thinks boy, i haven't told many people as it such early days, but i have told one friend and she thinks girl and my partners mum also thinks girl. i'm not too bothered as long as its healthy! :D xx
 

Mrssimison

Member
Messages
6
Hi,

Is there any chance you could be considered for an insulin pump? I have never been pregnant but when I mentioned I was keen to start a family in the near future my consultant did everything to get me a pump as my Hb1ac was too high (8%) and working with the pens was not working for me- it is terrible that you were made to feel you were being judged, hopefully they are just concerned over you unborn child? not trying to make you feel bad, but we all know the risks of getting pregnant with bad control.

Not sure if this is recommended but have you thought about following low carb? it really does wonders for my control, and may help reduce the chances of weight gain you are worried about - i would check it out with ur dr/diet. cos not sure on impact of that diet for pregnancy though?

Good luck :)
 

nixiepixie

Member
Messages
14
I was planning to talk to the doctor about a pump at my next review, with a view to getting my diabetes under control before trying to get pregnant....whoops! i am a bit wary of the whole thing but hearing people rave about how much they have helped is really making me consider it. anything that will get some stability at this stage to be honest!! i'm so worried all the time about the potential harm i could be doing to the baby, even though i'm trying my best to keep things under control.

This morning i was 5.2 before breakfast, had some low sugar muesli and my normal insulin and yet an hour later i was 13.9!!! what is going on?! :crazy: i'm so confused and just feeling anxious and horrible all the time, which cannot be good either. *sigh*

Now looking at low GI foods and also trying to limit the amount of carbs i eat. at this rate i won't be able to eat anything!!

Danlie, i would really like a girl, just because everyone i know seems to have boys! but to be honest, i don't mind either way, just want it to be healthy (and not too large haha!)

the midwife called me 2 days after i saw the doc, she said she's sent me details of an appointment for the 29th May (would have been next week but they have a doctor shortage-fab!) also she's sent me details for booking an early scan. but they send all that out second class so i'm still waiting! got to love cost cutting measure hey! i really wish i didn't have to wait til the 29th to speak to a specialist about all this. I have to ring the midwife again on Wed and tell her all my levels for the past week. They do seem pretty attentive, i'm shocked yours haven't been!
 

Danlie

Member
Messages
13
I did go to a meeting about pumps and blimey they were the most confusing things EVER! they still have a long way to come on in my eyes, so much inputting all of the time and entering all your carbs etc - im not sure if other peoples pumps vary from the ones that i was shown, but it didn't fill me with confidence also i don't like the thought of something being permanently inside my body for 3 days, i had to have a continuous blood monitoring thing done for 4 days once which was exactly the same concept, you were injected with this this needle which then came away leaving a little plastic tube inside you, but my body kept trying to reject it and push it out so i don't know how the pump would work.

your bloods are doing the opposite to me Nixie, i had my porridge so my bloods were 8.4 beforehand, then an hour later they were 7.2 which was perfect, but then another hour on they are at 4.1! 4.1 is obviously good BUT i still need to last until 2pm when its my lunch break at work, so again im finding myself eating when i don't want to! i have now had a bacon sandwich on brown bread (the office got bacon sandwiches today which came in handy! :) ) i have also had a chocolate bar and i am still only at 4.5 an hour later!! I did take some insulin with the sandwich and chocolate bar, but still would expect it to be higher than 4.5. maybe i should have not done any insulin? :crazy:

is this your 7/8 week scan that you are going for on 29th? its amazing to see the little heart beating! although the bubba was the size of a baked bean, it was amazing to see its little heart beating already! i can't wait for 20th June for my 12 weeks scan and i can actually take a picture home of bubba!! :D i have been told that i won't have contact with a midwife until my 16th week of pregnancy!! :roll:
 

nixiepixie

Member
Messages
14
i basically feel like my sugar is constantly trying to go up! Happened again after lunch, all i ate was a wholemeal pitta with chicken and some raw veg with houmous, did what i thought was plenty of insulin (based on the carbs listed on the packets!) yet went from 6.7 pre-lunch, to 12.6 after lunch! so have now had to do an extra injection again *sigh* i'm also wary of overcorrecting and causing a hypo, which is what i've done in the past and ended up in this stupid see-saw of going high-low-high-low.

it really does seem like my long acting insulin isn't working properly :? glargine is supposed to last the whole day yet every time i turn around my blood sugar has gone up?! i am trying so hard to eat the right things! had really bad nausea today and couldn't even have a ginger biscuit to help ease it because my stupid sugar is too high.

i know you are annoyed with having to eat all the time but i think i would prefer that at the mo!

i think the 29th is just an appointment to see her and the doctor, whenever i eventually receive this letter from her i have to book my scan, she said 8 or 9 weeks. according to the Dr's estimate i'm already at 7 weeks though! i've done a test which only said 2-3 weeks though- just a bit of a difference!! i didn't realise you can already hear the heart at 7 weeks- WOW! hope the next month goes quickly so you can get your picture and start telling people! :D
 

nixiepixie

Member
Messages
14
oh yeah about the pump, i have never ever been spoken to about a pump despite being told constantly that my hba1c is too high. i feel like my diabetic care has really fallen off since i turned 18. i now get looked after by a diabetic nurse at my doctor's surgery and i know they mean well but i really find it hard to take condescending advice and criticism from someone who has been on a course about diabetes for a couple of days when i've been living with it for 20+ years!

Stupidly, i thought that the pump monitored your BG and gave the insulin automatically. knowing that i would still have to calculate everything and give the correct dose...kinda seems like a waste of time as that's what i'm already doing. BUT sooooo many people keep saying what a huge difference it has made to them, so i don't know :crazy:
 

Danlie

Member
Messages
13
Thats exactly how i felt when i had a meeting with regards to the pump, i thought it measured ur bloods and decided the correct amount but it doesnt you still have to do the inputting! The only difference i could see was the fact you could set times for it to give u background insulin throughout the night, but you woukd still have to wake and check ur bloods etc, everyone raves about it but like u say im already doing workings out etc with the pens!

Honstly ive had two bottles of lucozade during today already, it took 4 hours to get them to come above 3.3!! The highest they went to was 5.5 and then dropped again and i had a sandwich and cereal bar as well as the intermitent doses of lucozade! Im now up to 8.9 slightly high but i camt eat anymore!!! :(

Yea i couldnt believe it when i saw the heart beating!! Both me and my partner had a tear in our eyes! Hope ur first scan goes well! Keep me posted! :) x
 

kt78

Well-Known Member
Messages
145
Hey Nixie Pixie and Danlie.

Congrats on your scan - how lovely!

I think the reason Nixies BG is going up is because she is earlier in her pregancy than you Danlie:

"Insulin requirements rise steadily throughout pregnancy and will usually double by the last month. The rising need for insulin is ca used by several factors... However there are two periods during pregnancy when a reduction in insulin may be needed. The first period occurs between weeks 7-12 of gestation. In one clinic's experience, after an initial rise in insulin doses of 18% between weeks 3 and 7, a significant drop in insulin requirement averaging 9% was seen in weeks 7 through 12. The second exception to the general rise in insulin need as pregnancy progresses occurs in the last 4 weeks. At this time the foetus starts to draw more glucose from the mother's blood for its own use..."

Oh, and just to add my opinion on the pump - it's great! It's easier than using glargine / lantus etc as you can just kind of turn the volume up and down as needed - if that make sense!

Glad you are both well and supporting each other - Great to see :clap:
 

nixiepixie

Member
Messages
14
Hi KT

Thanks for yor message. i'm soo glad to have found people on here going through the same things that I am!

What you said about insulin requirements would really make sense. I think i am still in the really early days, which would maybe explain why i'm needing more insulin than usual at the moment. So maybe in a few weeks i'll be like Danlie and having hypos every 5 minutes! at the moment i feel jealous of Danlie for being able to eat lots, but i know in reality having a hypo is horrible and i won't enjoy it if it happens to me! Danlie, could you try and have some more carby meals? i know you said if you decrease your insulin you will go high, so maybe keep the insulin the same but try and eat more at meals to prevent the lows afterwards? it's such a hard balancing act!

i'm still thinking the pump might be a good idea for me. i just worry about the period of adjustment where everything goes a bit haywire, do i really need that added stress at the mo? would i be better sticking with what i'm doing and just trying to continue improving my control? i do feel a bit better about things overall, i'm still getting some unexplained spikes in blood sugar, but at least i know that my sugar isn't staying high for long periods of times, as i'm testing sooooo often! i have increased my evening Lantus as i just feel like i've not got enough insulin in the background throughout the day, hence why my sugar keeps going up. Unfortunately increasing my Lantus at night tends to result in quite a lot of early morning hypos!

I have a scan booked for next Wednesday :D very exciting and also scary! after that i have an appointment with the consultant. Based on the doctor's estimate i will be nearly 9 weeks by then but really i think i'm only going to be about 5!
 

Samjamsmum2

Newbie
Messages
1
Hi danlie

Hope all is going well. The problem with being pregnant and having diabetes is that you are treated like the pregnancy is a health condition. I didn't like my treatment either as they make you feel like you shouldn't get pregnant. I also agree that that other poster was very rude and should think before they speak!

Anyway, enjoy your wonderful time and think of the beautiful outcome x
 

nixiepixie

Member
Messages
14
I have now been advised by my midwife (based on what the consultant told her) not to correct my high blood sugar readings?! :crazy: that just seems insane to me, i can't just leave my sugar high and not do anything about it!