Hi
@LornaFarrell, It sounds like a discussion about managing exercise with your DSN is due.
Otherwise your life remains restricted. You deserve to be happy !!
I can tell you of my experiences, but they are not professional advice or opinion.
Some years after being diagnosed at age 13, I was informed that with diabetics on insulin 3 possible things happen in the process of exercising:
Blood sugar goes up during after for some minutes to hour + afterward, or blood sugar stays fairly level, or the blood sugar goes down, sometimes to hypo levels. For me, the adrenaline released during exercise tends to put my blood sugar up and may takes over an hour to settle back down.
Of course the above may not only depend on the individual but the time of day that exercise was undertaken, the insulin used and working at the time, the time of the last meal and content of that meal and what changes, if any, were made to food intake and /or insulin dose in order to cope with the exercise.
Similarly I was offered
three ways to deal with exercise:
a) reduce the dosage of insulin acting during and for 6 hours after exercise.
b) eat food before and during the exercise plus have a larger meal carbs-wise to cover the 4 to 6 + hour low blood sugar or
c) or do a combination of both.
There is one proviso about BSL at the time I wish to start exercising: if my BSL is above 14 mmol/l, I avoid exercise.
I may take a correction dose of short-acting insulin to reduce the BSL and may do do some modified, less long and less strenuous exercise later. The reason is that with a blood sugar at 14 mmol/ and above the body thinks it is starving and the liver will release glucose it exercising occurs. Also trying to exercise at that level is painful for me. Something to do with the BSL level I think.
Rather than gobbling down food before exercise and feel heavy in the stomach (or have fluid sloshing away in my tummy) I find that reducing my insulin works better. When I was on short-acting insulin before each meal and long-acting insulin I would reduce the short-acting insulin which was acting during and after the exercise plus, because I was on Levemir insulin which has a 12 to 16 hour action I would reduce the dose of the Levemir which would overlap with the time of 6 to 10hours approx. after the exercise. This was particularly important if the exercise was in the late afternoon or evening as I wished to avoid a hypo particularly at night time. How much did a drop the insulin dose? 20% was the usual but 30 % if longer/more vigorous.
Of course I also carry glucose jelly beans or glucose tablets in case I am delayed getting home, exercise takes longer than expected etc.
Please remember that many sweets contain sucrose for sweetening and use of them for hypos over the years is not kind to one's teeth, dental health and thus finances.
Why does my BSL drop some 4 to 6 + hours after exercise/? What I learned was that muscles have their own glucose storage system, apart from the liver's glucose storage one. As we need our muscles to react swiftly in case of danger it makes sense to have their fuel supply stored within them. With exercise the muscle's storage supply is partly depleted, more or less depending on intensity and duration of the exercise. At the 4 to 6 + hour mark, the muscles claim replenishment of their stores.. Where form? The circulating blood stream. If I have eaten between exercise and this 'claim' time, any carbs absorbed and rendered into glucose will help but depending on the size of the 'claim', there may still be a drop in my BSL. Moreso if I have not eaten.
Hence the need to drop the dose of insulin. Sometimes I over- or underestimate the amount of insulin reduction. Live and learn is the motto.
Now that I am using an insulin pump things are easier again. I lower the basal rate of the pump by 20 to 30% at start of exercise for 4 hours or so. That generally keeps hypers and hypos away. The pump uses short-acting insulin and so the last hour of the dose reduction will have an effect through to some 7 to 8 hours after the end of exercise. (duration of Novorapid = 6 to 7 hours).
So .... I would suggest you discuss what to do about managing exercise with your DSN and develop a flexible plan.
Then enjoy the challenge of exercising, playing with your child and releasing 'the inner child' within yourself again.