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New to insulin

J

jackluxford

Active Member
Messages
27
Hi.
I'm new to the 'Type 1' board.
I've been struggling since the end of April (this year) on tablets but not got very far so after a one and a half hour visit last night to my doctor/nurse she has decided that I'm type 1 and it's insulin for me (can't start it yet though because the chemist can't get me a pen, how ridulous is that?).
Going to be twice a day, maybe rising to 4 times a day.
I must say that when going through the actual injection procedure last night I was completely gobsmacked that my test injection in my stomach was totally, totally pain free, never felt a thing, that makes the prospect of it all much easier to cope with.
Anyway.. onwards and upwards!
 
Welcome to the type 1 club :-)
can't believe they can't get you a pen, that's daft. My hospital, for all its faults, always has pens and meters in stock as you generally need stuff like that straight away. So my advice would be to make sure you always put your repeat prescriptions in with plenty of time to spare, once you've started on the insulin. Make sure you've got at least 2 cartridges left - one to account for the prescribing ****-up that will inevitably happen when it's urgent, and the other in case the first one breaks or gets accidentally frozen! I think prescriptions are more subject to sod's law than anything else is!

Hope you do well on your new insulin regime. It can take time to get settled though. I was on 2 injections a day for years with no luck. I have 5 injections on an average day now (2 background and some quick acting every time I eat). I think it's much more flexible as you can eat at different times or miss meals and you don't have to snack. Luckily we now have nice short needles so it usually doesn't hurt at all.
Anyway, hopefully this board will help you with any questions. There's a lot if very smart people on here who give really helpful advice, so if in doubt, just ask.
Good luck :-)
 
Glad you had a good first experience with injecting. You will probably find that 4 or 5 injections a day (1 or 2 long acting and 3 with meals) gives you far more flexibility with food times, types and physical activity. I was also given tablets for a few months, with no effects, before starting on insulin - not such an unusual scenario for those diagnosed as adults (1 was 30, 14 years agao)
 
Finally got a pen so I'm ready to go..
How do I stand with alcohol and insulin? I should have asked at my last visit but there was so much to take in I never really gave it much thought.
I'm on Novomix 30 at the moment.
 
The instructions for NovoRapid say to carefully monitor your blood sugar level if you drink, as it might go either up or down. Can't find the levemir instructions (Novomix is levemir and NovoRapid?), but I imagine it says the same.

Did the dr/nurse say why they'd decided on Novomix 30? When I was talking to the dr about which insulin to choose, he said that separate long lasting and quick acting insulins gave far more flexibility, like badmesdisin and copepod said.
 
HLW said:
Did the dr/nurse say why they'd decided on Novomix 30?
Click to expand...

My eating is not very healthy at the moment.. (not what I eat, but when I eat).
I might have a couple of bits of toast for breakfast - not every day - then nothing at all until evening meal time.. so basically I eat hardly anything until 5.30 - 6.00pm, then I scoff for England.
I now have to have breakfast without fail after my morning injection and then inject again before my evening meal. I will probably have to introduce lunch at some point I suppose.
A visit to the dietician is on the cards apparently, something I am quite looking forward to really as I have never really had to worry about healthy eating (I know about frying and that kind of thing).
After 50 years of doing and eating as and when I please it's going to take some getting used to.
 
was just interested really and hoping they'd given you an option, I've read people saying they didn't know they had a choice about what insulin to take. I've had very different attitudes from different drs personally.

Improving what you eat is hard but worth it, there are so many benefits as well as improved blood sugar control. Insulin can make you gain weight (I think it has for me - or stopping the metformin has, not sure which), so you need to watch that too. Good luck, I'm sure you will feel the benefits!
 
Really? I wasn't given a choice of insulin.. mind you, I wouldn't have had a clue which was good for me anyway.
My levels were all over the place.. fasting was averaging about 8, after evening meal was averaging about 12 with the odd 15-16, and one evening while having a few beers I hit 20. Gulp!
Hopefully, with the help of the insulin and a new eating regime these levels will be a thing of the past.

edited a typo.. Jack
 
Well tbh I don't know how good their advice was, and I don't know if they would have been OK if I didn't agree with what they recommended!

I found I felt a lot better after starting insulin, I hadn't realised before how much I had been affected by high blood sugar before! I'm a lot less tired, I can concentrate so much better, it's a massive improvement.
 
Hi Juckluxford

Your Novomix, is a combination of Quick Acting insulin and Medium length insulin, designed to be injected 2x a day, with this type of insulin regime it's important to eat carbs regularly throught out the day otherwise you risk suffering an hypo...

At this point of time you really need to take your main guide of your diabetic team, as they can look at your blood glucose results and better advise adjusments, you do need to keep a diary of blood glucose levels, and foods that you've ate (and if you can work out the amount of carbs per meal) this will enable them to help even more..

Tip for the Novomix regime, is keep your carb count for each meal or snack the same, i.e if you eat 30g for breakfast stick with this, if you mid morning snack is 20g stick with this and so on..

As to Alcohol, I would avoid this for the moment until you've got your sorted with injecting and controling your blood glucose levels... The problem with alcohol is some like beer, larger etc contain carbs which will at first put up your Blood Glucose, but while your liver is processing the Alcohol it can not store any Glucogen (glucose that it's delivers into the blood stream 24/7) this can also be dumped in a emergency into the blood stream to bring blood sugar levels back up, usually via a glucogen Jab..

It takes on adverage around 1 hour to process one unit of Alochol until the Alcohol is cleared you will be at a very high risk of suffering a hypo with could be a very dangerous one, as these can be extremely difficult to get out of...

Tip for drinking..

Never drink alone, always ensure a friend is aware that you are taking insulin, and know the signs between a hypo and being drunk..

Avoid drinking too much, when you first start to reintroduce alcohol, start off with a small amount and check BG regular..

Always check BG regularly when you've drinking or have been drinking, and enusre good supply of hypos treatment is available to you..
 
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