Newbie - Honeymoon Phase - Low BS - A bit worried

Redkitebait · Nov 19, 2016

Not sure if this is the right place, I'm more seeking advice and reassurance than anything else. I'm new to the forums, but here goes.

I'm recently diagnosed with Type 1 since the 3rd of November, and lately my blood sugar readings have been dropping lower and lower, with sometimes erratic readings.

I met my community diabetic specialist nurse the other day for the first time, and we reviewed my blood sugar readings. She said it could be the start of the honeymoon phase. She told me to lower my basal insulin (lantus) from 10 units to 8. I've been doing this new dosage for about 3 days now.

I'm just really concerned because I've had 2 hypos in the space of 3 days, one was before I met the nurse, I woke up with 3.4mmol/L. I had a another one on the second night of trying my new basal dose, I woke up at 4am with a reading of 3.7mmo/L. Obviously I want to avoid having too many hypos, so if my pancreas has come back to life it's going to give me a lot of trouble...

I'm having trouble finding good reading material online about the honeymoon period and how to "co-pilot" alongside my pancreas, in a way. Naturally I should reduce my insulin intake but I don't want to accidentally inject too little and end up with really high readings, because that's not great either.

Though my numbers are kind of erratic at the moment the past 2 days as I write this I have been under 10mmol/L which I'm happy about. I've been keeping my fast-acting insulin doses the same as I have been for my meals, and that seems to give me relatively good numbers in the day, if not more erratic than a few days ago.

I'm rambling now about my situation so I'll ask some questions now:
Should I contact my nurses more often about my numbers?
Am I actually even in the honeymoon phase? Is that something you can test? Or do you just have to rely on the numbers?
Is there anything I can do to manage my blood sugar numbers while I go through this phase?
I noticed my nurses when they figured out my basal dose they'd go up by several numbers at a time. If I decide to adjust if I stay low too often, should I stay safe and test one unit at a time? Or go down for example from 8 units straight to 6 and so on??
Any general info/tips&tricks to do in the honeymoon phase?

Any advice and/or reassurance would be handy, thank you.

col101 · Nov 19, 2016

Welcome to the forums great place to learn and get support. It sounds like you're doing really well being too grips with what's happening. I'll let others give more defined advice but would say from my own experience please don't ignore the hypos they don't sound very low but it's important to make adjustments or at least understand then. Secondly I'd say make use of your dsn and endocrinologist they're really important the early days. Lastly the book think like a pancreas is brilliant, easy to read and informative. Best wishes and good luck

Redkitebait · Nov 19, 2016

col101 said:
Welcome to the forums great place to learn and get support. It sounds like you're doing really well being too grips with what's happening. I'll let others give more defined advice but would say from my own experience please don't ignore the hypos they don't sound very low but it's important to make adjustments or at least understand then. Secondly I'd say make use of your dsn and endocrinologist they're really important the early days. Lastly the book think like a pancreas is brilliant, easy to read and informative. Best wishes and good luck

Thanks col101, I have been treating my hypos when I have them, my parents bought me flavoured glucose tablets which are quite nice. I'm told to phone the dsn's every week or so to just review my numbers and how I'm feeling, which I'm going to do on Monday because of this development. I also going to have my first hb1ac test done on Monday as a base to go on in the future so that should be interesting!

Juicyj · Nov 19, 2016

Hello @Redkitebait Welcome to the forum

The honeymoon phase can be a blessing and a curse, your insulin dose will be low to start with so it gives you a chance to bed in with administering your doses and get used to the regime, however no one knows how long it will last, if you can keep your blood glucose levels in range then there's every chance you can prolong the insulin activity the pancreas has. It does mean that your levels can be slightly erratic though so it will take some vigilance to watch what's going on. It kicks in because your taking insulin and therefore the 'stressed' pancreas starts working again, as your doses are being reduced this is evidence there is some insulin production going on. Obviously keep testing and try to record your results, it's not necessary to call your nurse every few days, do call if your having hypos to adjust your insulin levels, you will need reassurance early on that your doing this right, in time your confidence will grow and your nurse will encourage you to respond to changes in your BG levels. It may last 6 months, a year, have heard tit can last longer, I believe mine was about 7-8 months, a rise in BG levels and increase in my doses was proof it was over.

I am going to move your post into type 1 so it will have more visibility with other type 1's

Redkitebait · Nov 19, 2016

Juicyj said:
Hello @Redkitebait Welcome to the forum

The honeymoon phase can be a blessing and a curse, your insulin dose will be low to start with so it gives you a chance to bed in with administering your doses and get used to the regime, however no one knows how long it will last, if you can keep your blood glucose levels in range then there's every chance you can prolong the insulin activity the pancreas has. It does mean that your levels can be slightly erratic though so it will take some vigilance to watch what's going on. It kicks in because your taking insulin and therefore the 'stressed' pancreas starts working again, as your doses are being reduced this is evidence there is some insulin production going on. Obviously keep testing and try to record your results, it's not necessary to call your nurse every few days, do call if your having hypos to adjust your insulin levels, you will need reassurance early on that your doing this right, in time your confidence will grow and your nurse will encourage you to respond to changes in your BG levels. It may last 6 months, a year, have heard tit can last longer, I believe mine was about 7-8 months, a rise in BG levels and increase in my doses was proof it was over.

I am going to move your post into type 1 so it will have more visibility with other type 1's

Thank you for moving the thread ^_^

I understand I still have a lot to learn! I really want to get into being able to dose my insulin on my own but for now I don't feel so confident about making any drastic changes - but if I stay too low too often I will definitely think about reducing my basal insulin bit by bit until I have some nice numbers.

rockape37 · Nov 20, 2016

Redkitebait said:
Not sure if this is the right place, I'm more seeking advice and reassurance than anything else. I'm new to the forums, but here goes.

I'm recently diagnosed with Type 1 since the 3rd of November, and lately my blood sugar readings have been dropping lower and lower, with sometimes erratic readings.

I met my community diabetic specialist nurse the other day for the first time, and we reviewed my blood sugar readings. She said it could be the start of the honeymoon phase. She told me to lower my basal insulin (lantus) from 10 units to 8. I've been doing this new dosage for about 3 days now.

I'm just really concerned because I've had 2 hypos in the space of 3 days, one was before I met the nurse, I woke up with 3.4mmol/L. I had a another one on the second night of trying my new basal dose, I woke up at 4am with a reading of 3.7mmo/L. Obviously I want to avoid having too many hypos, so if my pancreas has come back to life it's going to give me a lot of trouble...

I'm having trouble finding good reading material online about the honeymoon period and how to "co-pilot" alongside my pancreas, in a way. Naturally I should reduce my insulin intake but I don't want to accidentally inject too little and end up with really high readings, because that's not great either.

Though my numbers are kind of erratic at the moment the past 2 days as I write this I have been under 10mmol/L which I'm happy about. I've been keeping my fast-acting insulin doses the same as I have been for my meals, and that seems to give me relatively good numbers in the day, if not more erratic than a few days ago.

I'm rambling now about my situation so I'll ask some questions now:
Should I contact my nurses more often about my numbers?
Am I actually even in the honeymoon phase? Is that something you can test? Or do you just have to rely on the numbers?
Is there anything I can do to manage my blood sugar numbers while I go through this phase?
I noticed my nurses when they figured out my basal dose they'd go up by several numbers at a time. If I decide to adjust if I stay low too often, should I stay safe and test one unit at a time? Or go down for example from 8 units straight to 6 and so on??
Any general info/tips&tricks to do in the honeymoon phase?

Any advice and/or reassurance would be handy, thank you.

If your waking with a very low BG i would recommend that you have something like a round of toast just before you go to bed.

It's still early days for you still so don't make any adjustments with your insulin without guidance from your diabetic team and do ring them with any concerns.

Keep good paper records of your BG's, Carbs to make things easier both for you and your diabetes team to analyse.

A really good book to have and i consider this to be a Diabetics Bible is "Think Like a Pancreas"

Like i said, its early days for you yet so try not to worry too much but do speak to your Diabetes team.

Regards

Martin

col101 · Nov 20, 2016

There's an online course called Bertie
http://www.bertieonline.org.uk
That's very good and maybe a good introduction and start to the process of carb counting and managing your own insulin on conjunction with your dsn and team.

Newbie - Honeymoon Phase - Low BS - A bit worried

Redkitebait

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col101

Well-Known Member

Redkitebait

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Juicyj

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Redkitebait

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rockape37

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col101

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Newbie - Honeymoon Phase - Low BS - A bit worried

Redkitebait

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col101

Well-Known Member

Redkitebait

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Juicyj

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Redkitebait

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rockape37

Well-Known Member

col101

Well-Known Member

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