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Persistent high blood sugars

Chloelox

Chloelox

Well-Known Member
Hi,
So over Christmas I was struck down with cold/flu which lead me to having no taste or smell, breathlessness, headaches and fevers - multiple covid tests.. all negative.

i seem to have recovered for the most part aside from a lingering chesty cough 10 days later.. but my blood sugars still continue to be persistently high. Where I’ve doubled my novarapid and increased my basal by 50%, still getting bloods in the 20’s, Dsn has told me not to increase too much more as I may drop too quickly and seeing as there’s no ketones present to just eat low carb and wait to recover fully.

it’s driving me crazy because I just feel so defeated. I had managed to get my sugars the best they had been in 2 years and now it’s gone completely out the window. Anyone been through the same?
 
Chloelox said:
Hi,
So over Christmas I was struck down with cold/flu which lead me to having no taste or smell, breathlessness, headaches and fevers - multiple covid tests.. all negative.

i seem to have recovered for the most part aside from a lingering chesty cough 10 days later.. but my blood sugars still continue to be persistently high. Where I’ve doubled my novarapid and increased my basal by 50%, still getting bloods in the 20’s, Dsn has told me not to increase too much more as I may drop too quickly and seeing as there’s no ketones present to just eat low carb and wait to recover fully.

it’s driving me crazy because I just feel so defeated. I had managed to get my sugars the best they had been in 2 years and now it’s gone completely out the window. Anyone been through the same?
Click to expand...
Hi Yes I have this every time I am ill, it’s very frustrating. Usually is a very gradual return to normal and often takes me the best part of 3 weeks. You look a lot younger than me so hopefully it won’t be so long for you! You could ask to try one packet of Fiasp rather than Novorapid while you are recovering. It kicks in a lot quicker and might stop that spike to the 20’s. or wait a little bit longer before your meal after injecting Novorapid. Do be careful though as when your body decides it can calm down you will probably have a day of hypos. Or when I notice any slight improvement I am then adjusting gradually downwards again. Hope you get better soon.
 
Hertfordshiremum said:
Hi Yes I have this every time I am ill, it’s very frustrating. Usually is a very gradual return to normal and often takes me the best part of 3 weeks. You look a lot younger than me so hopefully it won’t be so long for you! You could ask to try one packet of Fiasp rather than Novorapid while you are recovering. It kicks in a lot quicker and might stop that spike to the 20’s. or wait a little bit longer before your meal after injecting Novorapid. Do be careful though as when your body decides it can calm down you will probably have a day of hypos. Or when I notice any slight improvement I am then adjusting gradually downwards again. Hope you get better soon.
Click to expand...

I’ve been prebolusing half hour before food rather than the usual 15-20. But the difference is minimal, overnight I’m spiking to 25 despite eating my evening meal 4 hours prior. Very disheartening, it’s a shame.
Yeah my dsn wants to avoid a sudden SnapBack where my sensitivity comes back, I haven’t even noticed any gradual improvement yet! Fingers crossed though
 
Chloelox said:
I’ve been prebolusing half hour before food rather than the usual 15-20. But the difference is minimal, overnight I’m spiking to 25 despite eating my evening meal 4 hours prior. Very disheartening, it’s a shame.
Yeah my dsn wants to avoid a sudden SnapBack where my sensitivity comes back, I haven’t even noticed any gradual improvement yet! Fingers crossed though
Click to expand...
Are you taking a correction dose of Novorapid before bed? My nurse tells me to do this, however start small as you are then not eating it has a much greater effect but would hopefully stop that 25 in the night?
 
Hertfordshiremum said:
Are you taking a correction dose of Novorapid before bed? My nurse tells me to do this, however start small as you are then not eating it has a much greater effect but would hopefully stop that 25 in the night?
Click to expand...
I have tried doing corrections before bed but end up waking needing to correct again 4 hours later
 
Chloelox said:
I have tried doing corrections before bed but end up waking needing to correct again 4 hours later
Click to expand...
I have nights like this where I have to correct every 4 hours to have a normal waking reading. I've never thought anything of it. I'm just following my numbers.
 
ert said:
I have nights like this where I have to correct every 4 hours to have a normal waking reading. I've never thought anything of it. I'm just following my numbers.
Click to expand...

I have nights like that too. :). I assume it's because I need more basal and as the extra bolus only lasts 4-5 hours it makes sense that I have to inject that frequently.

I think an issue here is that the DN doesn't want @Chloelox to increase her basal too much for fear of hypos when her system regains sensitivity. While I can see the logic of this it does make it difficult because if your basal is too low you find yourself playing perpetual catch up on the bolus doses. I also find I'm more insulin resistant if my bg goes high.

Chloelox, I think you may just have to wait this one out. Lots of virtual hugs.
 
Chloelox said:
Hi,
So over Christmas I was struck down with cold/flu which lead me to having no taste or smell, breathlessness, headaches and fevers - multiple covid tests.. all negative.

i seem to have recovered for the most part aside from a lingering chesty cough 10 days later.. but my blood sugars still continue to be persistently high. Where I’ve doubled my novarapid and increased my basal by 50%, still getting bloods in the 20’s, Dsn has told me not to increase too much more as I may drop too quickly and seeing as there’s no ketones present to just eat low carb and wait to recover fully.

it’s driving me crazy because I just feel so defeated. I had managed to get my sugars the best they had been in 2 years and now it’s gone completely out the window. Anyone been through the same?
Click to expand...
I had an illness almost identical to this recently.

The fact you’re having to give your Bolus extra time to start working is a classic sign of Basal being too low.

I do understand your DN’s worry about going too high with your Basal. One thing you can do, even though it’s not ideal either, is increasing your Bolus ratios. Bolus really isn’t supposed to do the Basal’s job, but it would at least take some of the “edge off”. You may find you’ll still need corrections on top, as it’s likely going up between meals as well as because of meals. However the advantage with this method is it’s easy to switch back to normal doses quickly once your usual needs reassert themselves.

You might also consider temporarily reducing your correction factor, as if your Basal’s insufficient it will take more Insulin to bring you back to normal.

If you can even get back to the 10s from 20s you’ll probably begin to feel a lot better to.
 
EllieM said:
I have nights like that too. :). I assume it's because I need more basal and as the extra bolus only lasts 4-5 hours it makes sense that I have to inject that frequently.

I think an issue here is that the DN doesn't want @Chloelox to increase her basal too much for fear of hypos when her system regains sensitivity. While I can see the logic of this it does make it difficult because if your basal is too low you find yourself playing perpetual catch up on the bolus doses. I also find I'm more insulin resistant if my bg goes high.

Chloelox, I think you may just have to wait this one out. Lots of virtual hugs.
Click to expand...
DAFNE sick day rules support if your BG is above target range use QA correction, even if you are not eating (you may find you need larger QA doses to reduce BG ). They don't recommend leaving your blood sugars high.

https://dafne.nhs.uk/wp-content/uploads/2020/03/HG-01-002-v3-Sick-day-rules-Standard-1.pdf
 
Yes, I have the same problem where some days the Bolus has little effect and I have to do one or two corrections despite using what I though was a high dose. My BMI and body fat are low so insulin resistance doesn't appear to be the problem. It's as if the body is just not reacting to the insulin on some but not all days
 
StewM said:
I had an illness almost identical to this recently.

The fact you’re having to give your Bolus extra time to start working is a classic sign of Basal being too low.

I do understand your DN’s worry about going too high with your Basal. One thing you can do, even though it’s not ideal either, is increasing your Bolus ratios. Bolus really isn’t supposed to do the Basal’s job, but it would at least take some of the “edge off”. You may find you’ll still need corrections on top, as it’s likely going up between meals as well as because of meals. However the advantage with this method is it’s easy to switch back to normal doses quickly once your usual needs reassert themselves.

You might also consider temporarily reducing your correction factor, as if your Basal’s insufficient it will take more Insulin to bring you back to normal.

If you can even get back to the 10s from 20s you’ll probably begin to feel a lot better to.
Click to expand...


It’s only come on with the illness and with me now taking double the novarapid and 50% more bolus my DN is concerned my sensitivity could come back and I could end up with dangerous lows. Once I shift the illness my sensitivity should return, but without knowing for sure if it was covid or not she can’t give me much more help than that :/
 
Chloelox said:
Well, my sensitivity seems to have just come back with a bang this evening so it’s not been fun.
Click to expand...

Oh, the joys of repeated hypos. :arghh: Still, on the plus side, hopefully this means you can reduce your basal and things will be back to normal soon.
 
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Glad to hear you finally came out the other side, Chloelox. I'm still fighting to stay on course at the moment. It happens to most of us at some time.
 
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