I’ve been a type 1 since 11 years old. I turn 30 this year. I’ve been on lantus 100% of that time and switch from novalog to humalog probably 6 years (or longer) ago. I have recently gotten myself on a good sleeping schedule (I have always been a night owl my whole life, sleeping all day and up all night) note: I have gotten myself on schedule a few other times for maybe a few weeks and then went back to how I was. This time it’s only been about a week so far. I have noticed a good change in my sugar levels they have been way better (I’ve been high my whole time being diagnosed) I’ve been training in MMA for about 12 years so my exercise hasn’t changed. I’ve had a couple scary lows trying to figure out how to adjust to the change. But just yesterday I had a bad low and I drank two small juices 33 carbs each. After about 15 minutes my sugar was still going down so I drank another. Eventually my sugar reached 177 and then slowly started goin back down again. To the point I drank another juice and then another. Last night I cut my lantus in half. I drank a little bit of juice before goin to sleep bc I was scared I was gonna bottom out in my sleep. I woke up with a big high over 300. I took 2 untis (I would normally take 7-8 for that sugar level) I fell back asleep. Side note: my sugar always goes up when I sleep for some reason. I wake up high all the time) 2.5 hours later I was 220. I decided to wait on more insulin bc of the sudden sensitivity. I checked just over 30 minutes later to find it had gone up to 236. Still scared to take insulin I was another 30 mins and it went up to 252. I took 1 unit. (Again I would normally take 4-5 units for this) just under two hours later I was 199. So basically I’m takin a fraction of what I would normally take. Does anyone know what can cause this? Any advice? Just as I get myself on a good sleeping schedule my sugar starts goin crazy and now I’m scared to sleep. My thoughts are to just deal with a high instead of bottoming out. I can’t get into an endo until June. And now I’m not sure how to correct for food
Sudden increased insulin sensitivity.
- Thread starter Jkcreech
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Hi @Jkcreech and welcome to the forums.
Any chance you've had Covid recently? (There are a few weird reports from folk post covid).
Having said that, I find I need more insulin both when I'm stressed and when my blood sugars are high, so could it just be that you are in a better place physically and that is reflected in reduced insulin resistance?
Do you have access to a cgm such as libre or dexcom? That would help you panic less about low blood sugars.
Personally I have had a few "lantus lows" where I've injected my lantus into a blood vessel and my bg plummets as a result, but if your short acting insulin is having more effect also then that seems unlikely.
1) your basal dose is wrong. Have you done any basal testing recently? Generally you need to get the right basal before you can make any attempts to work out insulin ratios for food.
2) your bg goes up in the morning because of dawn phenomena (liver pumps out sugar first thing in the morning).
I'm going to tag in @Jaylee who is also on lantus and I think has had some weird experiences with varying insulin needs.
Good luck.
Any chance you've had Covid recently? (There are a few weird reports from folk post covid).
Having said that, I find I need more insulin both when I'm stressed and when my blood sugars are high, so could it just be that you are in a better place physically and that is reflected in reduced insulin resistance?
Do you have access to a cgm such as libre or dexcom? That would help you panic less about low blood sugars.
Personally I have had a few "lantus lows" where I've injected my lantus into a blood vessel and my bg plummets as a result, but if your short acting insulin is having more effect also then that seems unlikely.
Not even a phone appointment?
Couple of reasons I can think of for this (and I'm sure there are many more).
1) your basal dose is wrong. Have you done any basal testing recently? Generally you need to get the right basal before you can make any attempts to work out insulin ratios for food.
2) your bg goes up in the morning because of dawn phenomena (liver pumps out sugar first thing in the morning).
I'm going to tag in @Jaylee who is also on lantus and I think has had some weird experiences with varying insulin needs.
Good luck.
Thank you for the response! Oddly enough I actually just got over covid
thank you for responding! Oddly enough I just had covid in December. For the third time within 2 years! I just get lazy and feel sick. No respiratory problems luckily. I didn’t think about an over the phone appointment I’ll try that. And honestly I’ve tried to manage on my own and just seeing a pcp for a lot of years now. I just really started trying to take better care of myself and realized I can’t do it on my own. And the endo was booked out until June. And I’m currently workin on getting approved for the dexcom. My current doctor is being really unprofessional for some reason and not responding to dexcom for clinical notes and to sign the prescription so I found another doctor and have an appointment towards the end of February.
Jkcreech,
You have not provided much specific info in your details. The event you refer to which made you go low sounds like one occassion. Was this occassion the same as the other ones you mention but provide no details on?
In my experience as a type 1 for 25 years and someone who does a lot of exercise, balance is key.
It sound like you may have double dosed more than there being an issue with your insulin, (as 4 juices at 33gm each is a very large amount of sugar) do you ever double dose. . . .?
Yes exercise can reduce insulin requirements or alternatively increase carbohydrate requirements, but normally the events are consistent with previous events. I don't think such a big reaction to a hypo is going to do you any good.
Go back to your setup previously and for a number of days keep a very watchfull eye on your CGM results / BG monitor numbers. Make sure you eating is consistent with what you know used to work with your insulin levels and try to keep it this way. Then track if and when you have either lows or highs and if consistent you can then look to make a decision on either increasing/decreasing insulin or carbohydrates in those periods on a consistent basis to balance out the BG changes.
Hope this makes sense and best of luck.
You have not provided much specific info in your details. The event you refer to which made you go low sounds like one occassion. Was this occassion the same as the other ones you mention but provide no details on?
In my experience as a type 1 for 25 years and someone who does a lot of exercise, balance is key.
It sound like you may have double dosed more than there being an issue with your insulin, (as 4 juices at 33gm each is a very large amount of sugar) do you ever double dose. . . .?
Yes exercise can reduce insulin requirements or alternatively increase carbohydrate requirements, but normally the events are consistent with previous events. I don't think such a big reaction to a hypo is going to do you any good.
Go back to your setup previously and for a number of days keep a very watchfull eye on your CGM results / BG monitor numbers. Make sure you eating is consistent with what you know used to work with your insulin levels and try to keep it this way. Then track if and when you have either lows or highs and if consistent you can then look to make a decision on either increasing/decreasing insulin or carbohydrates in those periods on a consistent basis to balance out the BG changes.
Hope this makes sense and best of luck.
It was 2 days in a row I was battling lows. I had taken insulin for a high about 2 hours before going to teach an MMA class. It was BJJ night and I was mostly demonstrating so I wasn’t really even doing an exercise. I noticed I was low and drank a juice after it kept goin down I had to drink two more. It went up to 177 but then started going back down to the point I drank two more juices. I took my normal dose to correct my high before the class. I didn’t take anymore insulin the whole night it wasn’t until sometime when I was asleep that my sugar got high again. The next day I took insulin to correct a high and went low again so I started only taking 1 unit to see what would happen. Since I had been on a better sleeping schedule for a week and my sugars were better I had lowered my lantus bc I started to get too low. I had drank 5 juices that night for a total of 165 carb’s, probably within 3 hours and my bs wasn’t high until the next morning. Even if I double dosed it would have still been high with that amount of carbs. I really can’t explain it. Today I’ve been higher bc it freaked me out so I’ve been taking less insulin. I’m slowly trying to figure out how much to take.
I'm in hospital now and in my case I think that my doses of insulin were simply too high (edit: I'm not saying this is your problem, just simply stating why I think my doses are too high). The "problem" is that they give me more food in hospital than I'd normally eat and were basing my doses on that (hospital diet) so I've asked them to give me smaller meals. I've been switched to a sliding scale. I'd rather just count carbs because I've been keeping a food diary since 2019 anyway but I'm too new, to diabetes, probably. They're also adjusting my lantus again. I don't really get highs, my problem is lows, so can't comment there but the information about covid is interesting
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