• Guest - w'd love to know what you think about the forum! Take the 2025 Survey »

Exercise and hypos

P

phil.short

Member
Messages
7
I'm constantly told that exercise helps enormously with Diabetes, but I don't seem able to get started!

For the last 5 years or so I have been a bit of a couch potato (or rather a desk potato, tied to a computer monitor at work), but prior to that I was a gym freak. In my 30's I was a avid natural bodybuilder, and I'm not afraid of hard work and not averse to putting in gym time.

My problem is that now even just walking the dogs for 20/30 minutes will bring my BG down to borderline hypo level. Any strenuous work in the garden for 30 mins WILL drop my BG to less than 4 and make me ill for the rest of the day.

How can I contemplate proper exercise when my BG drops that rapidly?
 
Eat a small snack of carbs before or during exercise should do the trick, try 10g of carbs first and test, if this doesn't work increase to 20g.

Nigel
 
Are you at a consultant led clinic? I now have a pump, becasue I was getting frequent hypos...and with teh pump, half an hour before hitting the gym, I turn my basal arte down to 50% its normal rate. thatis teh beauty of teh pump, you can change the rates to suit your day, whereas once you jave injected that lantus/levimir...you have injected it!

Worth an ask...especially, if like me, one of the reasons you need to go to the gym is to lose a few pounds, then you really don't want to be having an extra snack.

Just a thought?
 
Hey, I found that if I had 15g of carb before I start it usually does the trick, or if you don't want to snack then you could reduce your units.
 
Carbs is key!

I do a lot of cardio at the gym...had a terrible hypo only once and it was because I took insulin with my meal prior. With the amount of cardio I do I need about 30g carbs beforehand and my levemir does the rest of the work I guess. My levels are almost always perfect afterwords.

My key to working out is a meal of carbs prior (no novorapid) and protein afterwords to help those muscles.

good luck in your trials!
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Menu
Log in
Register
Cookies are required to use this site. You must accept them to continue using the site. Learn More.…