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Rising blood sugars for seemingly no reason

lucynical

lucynical

Member
Messages
14
Location
London
Type of diabetes
Type 1
Treatment type
Insulin
Hey, hoping someone might be able to offer some advice.

For the last week or so, my blood sugars have been a bit all over the place, but mostly rising for no reason (that I can figure out). For example, this morning when I woke up I was at 4.4 but by the time I got to the office I was up to 10.9. I hadn't eaten anything, only had a pint of water. And therefore no insulin either. I'm on Novorapid and Lantus - which i take in split doses at 10:30am and 10:30pm.

Similar things have been happening for a few days, it's making me feel knackered and dehydrated (yes, i'm guzzling water like an undiagnosed person!).

Any ideas on what can cause these jumps?

Thanks
Lucy
 
Hey @lucy - Do you normally have something to eat first thing ? The two things that affect me are not eating in the morning, I find if I don't eat or take novorapid that my BG levels will rise, it's a liver dump of glucose, so I make sure I eat within 20 minutes of rising.

Otherwise try some basal testing to see if your background needs adjusting ? Let us know how you get on ;)
 
Definitely sounds like the Dawn Phenomenon, the bodies own glucose contribution after a period of fasting....

as mentioned, making sure the basal is right is the first step, then you will need to start thinking about getting some food in the stomach, digesting, so as your liver can be told its not longer needed....
 
lucynical said:
Any ideas on what can cause these jumps?
Click to expand...

The cold? The dark?
Do you usually eat breakfast & you aren't?
Stress?
Illness? Are you coming down with something?
Hormones? Are you coming on?
Less exercise?
Less alcohol?
More carbs the day before?

So, there are a few possibilities for you to pick from, I'm sure there are dozens more I've not mentioned!

Of more use, hopefully, might be ideas for solutions:
- do you eat breakfast usually? Could you consider eating with a conservative correction bolus on waking?
- could you do a correction on waking or during the morning (careful with corrections & better doing the with food if possible)
- check that your basal dose remains correct for you with basal testing - https://mysugr.com/basal-rate-testing/
 
Thank you all!

I don't normally eat before I get to work, and have always been that way to be honest. But perhaps I need to try eating on getting up. At weekends I sometimes go until 1 or 2pm without eating and have level BS, so I guess there must be something in the sudden activity of commuting that causes the liver dump to kick in. I've experienced "dawn phenomenon" over night before, as in high on waking, but not usually after being awake an hour or two like this. I'll try the basal testing out.

I've also had a horrid headache for the last few days, whether high or low blood sugar - not something I usually have an issue with.

The only other rogue thing I can think of is that I've just switched BS monitors. So now I've got a fear that its not calibrated correctly or something and is giving me false info. So will test that too comparing to my old one.

All in all a pain in the ****! But thanks for all the advice, will consider all of the above.
 
Juicyj said:
Hey @lucy - Do you normally have something to eat first thing ? The two things that affect me are not eating in the morning, I find if I don't eat or take novorapid that my BG levels will rise, it's a liver dump of glucose, so I make sure I eat within 20 minutes of rising.
Click to expand...

Much the same as @Juicyj, if I don't bolus and eat soon after waking my bg levels will gradually rise, eventually into double figures by mid-morning.
 
Have you changed your insulin pens in case one of them has become ineffective? Worth a try. Otherwise, possibly an approaching cold? There are a lot of them around and mine started with a dry mouth for days.

I hope you get it sorted.
 
My DP and WP are always much worse during the week when I have to get up and about for work. If I lounge in bed at the weekend they're much less pronounced.

For the rise when I get up I set my alarm for 20 mins before getting out of bed and give myself my breakfast insulin plus an extra 2iu to cover the rise before it can begin. This seems to tackle the worst of it.

If you're high all day it might be that you need to do some basal testing and increase your background insulin.
 
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