Background Insulin

[xxgeorgiexx]

Hi All

I'll keep this brief (as I can!).

Type 1.5 (LADA), diagnosed 2nd July 2018, initially diagnosed as type 2 last October but got nowhere with diet and Metformin, so in June started feeling really off, losing weight, drinking like a fish and wee'ing for Scotland, so tests were done, and it came back that i was type 1.5, which as you can all appreciate, was a bit of a kick in the teeth, but hey ho, not alot i can do about it apart from manage it to the best of my ability. Prescribed Humalog as my quick acting insulin (1 unit=20 carbs) and no background insulin until 2 weeks ago. Am managing as best i can, last Hba1c was 83, and get results of latest one on Monday 19th November when i attend the Dafne course at my local hospital, so fingers, toes, eyes and legs crossed that it comes down to a decent level.

Hardest part of all this (and sorry this will be a rant) is the complete and utter randomness of all this, i read alot on the forum of people who's levels seem to barely move from one meal to the next whereas mines can go from +/- 3 from meal to meal, but i can also have practically no movement, i guess is down to my pancreas working only sometimes and there is no rhyme or reason as to when it does work, so makes calculating carbs and what to take for it that wee bit harder (rant over .....).

where i would like a bit of advice from anyone is my background insulin (Lantus), my fasting morning counts have never been great from the start (averaging anything from 9.0 - 12.0) but was able to correct this quite easily with a correction with my breakfast Humalog and my rest of the day counts were pretty decent (average 5.0 - 7.0), so i was told 2 weeks ago to start taking Lantus, but to start gently at 1 and work my way up, so am now on 4 units at the moment, but my morning counts are still in the 9.0 - 12.0 group and there doesnt seem to be any change at all to it. Has anyone experienced anything similar to this? and does 4 a night seem a really low amount?

Thanks all

 

[Deleted Account]

We are all very different on the amount of basal insulin we take - there is not really such as thing as a low (or high dose).

The purpose of basal insulin like Lantus is to keep our BG stable.
You say you are in the 9.0 to 12.0 range in the morning - the correctness of the Lantus dose depends on what your levels were when you went to bed. If they were in the same range, the Lantus is probably ok. But if you go to bed with a BG of around 5, your Lantus dose may be too low.

There are two reasons why I am not being absolute with my answers:

1. I am not a doctor
2. Your BG may be rising just before you get up due to Dawn Phenomenon. There are lots and lots and lots of threads about this. Basically, your liver releases glucose at the start of the day to give us energy to get up and go. People with healthy pancreases will release insulin to convert the glucose to the required energy and they will see little or no BG rise. Some people with diabetes see the BG rise more than others.

If you can afford something like a Libre, this will show you what is happening during the night and whether you have a constant rise or whether it is more of a spike just before you get up.
Failing that, you could set an alarm a couple of times in the night and prick your finger to get some intermediary points.

 

[xxgeorgiexx]

Hi

My bedtime counts tend to be approx 7 so i have a definite rise during the night. Have done random tests during the night and they have been +/-1 to my eventual morning count (tested 2.30am, 4.00am, and various other ungodly times), so looks like my rise comes very early on. I have my Dafne course in over a week and was told i may get the Libre at the end of the week

Definitely think i am not taking enough Lantus (at 10pm every night), so will up it tonight to 5 and see how things go for the next couple of days.

I sooooo love the complete randomness of all this