Eating protein ALWAYS raises my blood sugars in the night...

The simple solution is to make sure you do not eat to much protein on it's own. ie, have a balanced diet. High fat meals have the same effect as protein does, hence moderation is the key. Even though I have a pump I just can not be a*sed to set temp basals or get up at 4 AM to test and bolus for the expected high blood sugar. Some people can get around the problem by having a higher basal and also injecting after a high fat and or protein meal.

Serial45 said:

Hi Guys,

So I've done a bit of research into the fact that protein can be converted into sugar if eating lower levels of Carbs.

But no matter what I eat, If I eat a ample amount of protein (150g+) then I will often wake up with blood sugars 15+.

I had 250g of chicken last night at 8pm. Went to sleep at 12:30am, my blood sugars where 3.4. I ate one sweet.
I woke up in the morning and my blood sugars were 19!.

I get around this sometime by injecting insulin before bed and it normally balances out.

What experience have you guys had with this and what are the best ways to work with it?

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All foods are ultimately broken down into sugars; just at different rates. You might be missing a hypo during the night. If so then your liver will release sugars to compensate and hence your v.high readings.
Plus certain foods will slow absorption of glucose; fat is a major player in that respect. Protein sort of.

Experiment with things. One night have no protein but some carbs and maybe even a small biscuit. Test during night and then first thing. Then alter your intake a few days later etc. All down to trial and error.

Protein does this to my bg levels as does high-fat meals, if your wanting to stick with eating protein in the evening then you might want to reduce your portion size and see if this helps.

Yep, you're right, excess protein does get converted into glucose. The two solutions are to reduce your portion size, or to take insulin for it. About half of the protein you eat gets converted into glucose, but it happens slower than carb->glucose conversion. Around two hours after eating, the protein will be converted. So two hours after eating is the best time to bolus for it.

If your interested, this info is given in Gary Scheiner's Think Like a Pancreas book. Very much worth buying if you take insulin.

Hi serial45!

I get exactly what you have described.

I try to avoid large protein meals late in the evening, but when I do eat late, I inject a couple of units rapid acting before bed to deal with the effect.

Last night I had a steak salad at about 8pm. I jabbed a couple of units with the meal and another 1.5 units at 11pm. Woke this morning at 5.2mmol.

Many times, people have suggested I'm going low at night and rebounding high. My consultant even insisted I reduce my night time Levemir - with disastrous fasting results. The truth is protein needs insulin and a couple of units before bed fixes that.

My theory is - and I have no evidence for this so please take it as an opinion - that people on higher carb diets use more background insulin due to the higher background BG levels and that the protein sugar release is largely dealt with by that - lost in the noise so to speak. Just an opinion, but I do know that if I have a few days higher carb, my overall background BG level increases and I have to raise my basal dose - not just my bolus - to compensate.

Smidge