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Fast acting insulin that isnt fast

B

bleemster

Member
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12
I have been on insulin since 2007, mainly novorapid and then in 2011 i kicked up a fuss as novorapid wasnt working for me and changed to the illusive Apidra, and now a week before xmas in 2012 now have a animas vibe pump.

Anyway, after years of this my fast acting insulin takes ages to work.

I can have a level of 8... eat a bowl of frosties (70g) inject obscene amounts of fast acting, and 2 hours later my sugers be up in the high teens ie 17+

I know you will talk about BG insulin not being correct etc, but have tested this by fasting etc and working with closely with my diabetic nurse specialist.

I have also been into hospital and had three opperations on seperate times and every time the attending nurse has stated that when i have been hooked up to the sliding scale that my sugars take a crazy amount of time to come back down.

So this is my problem.. does anyone else face this problem? Ive been thinking about a gastric bypass and wonder if shortening my intestines to absorb less food/sugars could help. Im grasping at straws. someone somewhere must match my condition and might have found a resolution. Fast acting insulin should not take 4-6 HOURS to come back to normal level.
 
Hey

I found Apidra FAST. I had to change to Novo.

Frosties have a ludicrous amount of sugar in them and starchy carbs :mrgreen: ...I am insulin sensitive, and to be honest I would have to main line to bring them down after a bowl of Frosties and milk .

Have you looked at low carb or even reasonable carb?? Again, even if you carb count there are certain foods that are just a no-no IMO . I know we are taught DAFNE but to me that is just nonsense.. Type 1 or Type 2 we have cut the carbs and it's a no to sugar, high carb foods fullstop...many will disagree but if you are one of those Diabetic s with high BG after you eat, even using DAFNE ,or SWINGING blood sugars, or using huge amounts of insulin(which is never good) to cover carbs ingested, then low carb is the solution. Try it, it might work!

Your alternative would be the insulin sensitising med's, Metformin ect, to shove them down after your Frosties, again it may work, again excercise for high intensity for 30 mins after eating will work just the same...i mean really working up a sweat.

You have choices .All you may not like ,but if you want a good HbA1C without all the meds...it's takes work...or at least cut out the Frosties and other similar foods, and you WILL be able to cut down on the insulin. Take a look in the low carb section on here , and at the low carb recipe bit inparticular it may just help you out.

Good luck with it all. Surgery seems very extreme for something which could be easily controlled with diatary intervention, but each to their own. Obviously keeping Body Fat low will aid in all of this, you may already have a very low BF , so diatary intervention will hopefully help you...KILL THE FROSTIES :lol:
 
Thank you for your reply, I am on metformin, 1g in the morning and 1g before i goto bed (slow release)

I dont always eat frosties it was an average... my usual breakfasts are alpen, 2x toast, frosties, or nothing, all got carbs i know.
The way of the world is everything now a days has shed loads of carbs in it - and non carb foods seem to be rarely filling or very expensive. I could fill up on silly amounts of chicken, but that would kill my bank balance pretty quick.

Does anyone else crave carbs ? If i dont eat a carb, i crave a potato or rice etc. madness.

I will deffo look in to the low carb menus.
 
I am like you and do just like carbs, I have tried going lower carb with a little bit of success, it does help but I can't really go low carb. I also use apidra in a pump and tend to have high 2 hour readings that are then perfect at 3-4 hours and it drives me mad and gets me really disheartened even trying, and I have tried pre bolusing, dual wave blouses etc. I haven't tried meteor in at all as my TDD is not that high so I don't think I'm insulin resistant so don't know if it would help at all. I think I need to take a good look at it again in the new year, because I see people talking about getting high numbers and talking about being in the 9-11 range but I am nearly always in the high teens after a meal and i'm getting so frustrated with it
 
Alpen again ,high in carbs, so is toast :mrgreen: ...I have a big bowl of blueberries and strawberries and half a big pot of full fat cream for breakfast = 3 units of Novo rapid...if I had Frosties or Alpen I would have to have around 12 /15 units or more , it's been so long since I ate high carb , and it not something I would want to test out now :D The blueberries and strawberries are also full of essential Macro's I love. In it's purest form..Whats not to like! You are feeding your body what it needs.

Eat carbs, you crave carbs, well that is what I found...More insulin......more cravings..... more carbs.... more insulin... more carbs...it was once a terrible vicious circle for me. Protein, Fat and all carbs just from Veg and some fruit have stopped all this. I do need high fat (a lot) but I do Endurance Marathon so need the high calories , you may not need as much fat as I do , but fat will slow down the absorption of carbs whatever!!

Take a look in the low carb section, it may just be what you need to change your life, and keep in touch whichever route you decide to go down
 
bleemster said:
does anyone else face this problem?
Click to expand...


I would if I ate Frosties for breakfast.....they are just corn and sugar!

What I'd find eating a high glycemic breakfast such as this would be my postprandial bg's would spike badly and then crash a few hours later, by eating a low-medium gi breakfast I find the spikes are far less and and my bg stays within my own target range.

My breakfast cereal of choice is Porridge using Jumbo Oats (do not use the instant variety) and added to this I use half water/milk, blueberries, pumpkin seeds and yogurt (total carbs 40g). The fat in the pumpkin seeds and yogurt helps slow down the absorption of the meal so there's less likely to be a large spike in bg's, of course this is my own experience and as we are all different some people may not experience the same, 10 - 15 minutes before eating I inject my 5 units of novorapid to give the insulin a head start before the food hits my system.

Reducing or low-carbing does work and can be used alongside eating a low/medium gi diet, I'd recommend that you read books by Rick Gallop who is easy to understand and offers some excellent advice on foods to choose, for a good book on diabetes then I'd suggest you read Think Like a Pancreas by Gary Scheiner.

Being overweight increases insulin resistence so losing weight will help enormously as will exercising more, there's an online carb counting course which is similar to DAFNE which you may find useful, you do need to register first but it's worth it as many a member on here have found it extremely helpful in their diabetes management, here is the site and good luck:

http://www.bdec-e-learning.com/
 
Thank you I'll get on amazon now.

It's crazy because all these nurses etc say you can eat what ever you want as long as you inject the right amount for it. But this isn't the case. It seems like I can't eat anything "normal" I love beans on toast and my frosties pizza chips :-( I know it's not healthy but I've cut way down. I'm 6ft 1 and am 15st 4lbs so not "massively" over weight. I carry a few extra pounds.

What boxed cereals could I eat?
I'm not a fan of many small fruits like ---berries I do like apples oranges peaches all stuff that has high sugars typically . :-/
I do like strawberries but so does everyone in the house and I domt get a look in. And there is no way I could buy them daily.
 
You are right Bleemster, it is what a lot of us find out about DAFNE, might look good on paper and it is good to have a guide , but you really need to test a lot to see how you react to foods.
I mean they tell you that your Basal will cover you for a pure protein meal of say bacon and egg, not to Bolus for it, but I need 4 units for said meal...More than I do for my fruit breakfast, again trial and testing! Protein will break down to around 60% Glucose, so if you do not produce insulin you will need to Bolus for it...they say you must include carbs with each meal, I do fine without them :D

Well, you know that the foods you love and what you deem as "normal" are doing you no good at all, so you can either carry on upping the meds and eating them or change, the NHS don't seem to care either way. But you will further along the line as complications set in, hopefully you can sort things out before this happens.

IMO, there is no more over processed food than boxed cereals, (Grain, over processed Eekk!)
A Dietician said to me years ago that Nutrition wise you may as well eat the box for the good it does you. You can buy Mixed berries in a bag frozen from Farmfoods for 99p, it's pretty decent. Tesco do the sliced frozen strawberries and blueberries for £2, and whole frozen strawberries for the same. I mix them in with the Farmfoods ones to keep costs down. You could have them with Greek Yoghurt, or cream, warm or cold. Does not work out too expensive, if you aren't spending it on a load of processed food aswell.

Almond flour pancakes are another good one for breakfast, there are a couple of Recipes in the low carb section. Also Bacon and Egg if you have the time. i do melted cheese in baby Gem lettuce with chopped peppers for lunch...Teas can be cheap if you batch cook the cheaper cuts of meat and have them with lots of veg, frozen and fresh to keeps costs down again...The combinations of food choices are endless. Just eat whole foods cooked from scratch so you know what goes in them...Lot's of veg. You will lose weight, which will help with insulin sensitivity.

As I said look in the low carb section on here, research low carb on line ,there are loads of ideas out there..Good luck with it all.
 
I do love my veg always have even as a child - spouts nom nom nom lol.

I'm obviously tryin to keep fats down to lose some weight. So your suggesting I have low fat Greek yog. With these fruits mixed up? And also you said "warm" really? Can honestly say I've never had warm yog.

Is there enough nutrients in there for a good diet. Previously I eat to fill up and not be hungry and not for nutrition but new year new start etc
 
Bleemster

Most of the time I try not to eat too much carb in one go for any of my meals even though I have a pump like yourself so in theory I could literally eat anything I wanted to but would have to manipulate some of my pump settings in order to do so and even doing that, would be a hit and miss as to whether I would get things correct or not..... but saying that, have you tried the 'super bolus' at all to deal with the high spike? If not google it and then you'll be able to read up on what is all about. I have just recently changed back to Apidra from using Novorapid but it does look as though Apidra will only have a real knock down effect after the first hour after eating. The only way I could get my bg levels to be lower in the first hour after gobbling is to either inject 15mins before eating or mess about with the bolus a bit more or alter the basal rates to suit or use the 'super bolus'.


I dont like Frosties but do eat some jumbo porridge oats with a small amount of cold or hot water to soften them and then add a couple of teaspoons of full cream yogurt and a tsp of crushed almonds. Tastes fairly nice and doesnt need cooking and isnt too much in carb. The best brekkie though for not causing any swing in bg levels is 2 rashers of back bacon with a fried egg. This also looks after the appetite and you dont feel hungry mid morning. In fact, you dont feel hungry at lunchtime either come to think of it...
 
cold fruit with cold cream/ yoghurt, warm fruit with cold Greek yoghurt, you take it whichever way you like it ; ). It's all good.
 
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