T1.. Exercise drives me High

Here's a link that might be of interest to you:
(Was posted elsewhere by catherinecherub)

http://www.diabeteshealth.com/read/2010 ... diabetes-/

Ken

All depends on blood glucose levels before starting exercise session and how much long and short acting insulin you have in your body.
www.runsweet.com has good advice for anyone on insulin for all sports, not just running.

Hi there

I just noticed your post, and myself posted something very similar in ask a question a few days ago. I'm going very high after exercise despite, trying eating/not eating, injecting etc. I was offered some great advice if you have a look.

What exercise were you doing if you don't mind me asking? I was doing DVD :wink:

Karen

Hi,

I find that my blood sugars go up after exercise, but only when I exercise in the afternoon. They have gone up as high as 16! When I exercise in the morning they stay low.

I split my background insulin into a 7am and 7pm dose, so when I go to exercise in the afternoon after work, my background is running low. When you exercise, if there's not enough insulin in your body, your muscles can't take in energy. As a result your liver dumps sugar in to the blood to try and give you the energy you need, leading to high blood sugars.

I am DAFNE trained and my doc advised me to deal with this problem by having a snack worth more than 10g carbohydrate before the gym, which you have to inject quick acting insulin for. This would keep my body topped up with insulin whilst doing teh exercise. Based on DAFNE you would have to choose a snack and insulin dose which would bring your blood sugar to around 10 when beginning the exercise.

I never have time to do this though, so trying to stick to exercise first in the morning now.

Holly

Hi Happyholly
Great you've sussed out what works for you. You've been diagnosed 4 years and I'm assuming you're on analogue insulins. These are NOT insulin and for many people are unpredictable and don't act as "real" insulin should; perhaps at fault is the release mechanisms of the long-acting type, Lantus is particularly suspect;and the rapid action of Humalog, Novorapid & Apidra, more likely to cause unexpected and sudden hypos, and not like natural "human" insulin at all.
I find it infuriating that type-1s are diagnosed, put on these medications, told it's insulin, and therefore expect it to act as insulin should. Medical professionals give standard advice, suchas Daphne courses on the presumption that these analogue insulins are working the same for every person. That is not the case. Just like any medication, people will react differently. Medical professionals also seem blind to the associated side-effects of analogue insulins, one of these side-effects is the failure of them to work in a predictable way, no matter how much the patient persists, leading to huge frustration, and often resulting in a diagnosis of insulin resistance :?
Liver dumping ???? Not sure I believe in this phenomenon and await to be proved wrong, but it's certainly something I have never experienced and never heard of in 21 years of being a type-1 until very recently :?: . That's with 15 of those years being on synthetic "human" insulin, and 4 years on Lantus. I suspect it's a term made-up the medics to explain away the failure of anlaogue insulins. You either have insulin working or you don't, and if it's not working, change it.
People need to wake up and smell the sugar-free coffee
Jus

janabelle said:

Liver dumping ???? Not sure I believe in this phenomenon and await to be proved wrong, but it's certainly something I have never experienced and never heard of in 21 years of being a type-1 until very recently :?: . That's with 15 of those years being on synthetic "human" insulin, and 4 years on Lantus. I suspect it's a term made-up the medics to explain away the failure of anlaogue insulins. You either have insulin working or you don't, and if it's not working, change it.
People need to wake up and smell the sugar-free coffee
Jus

Click to expand...

Hi Jus.
Liver Dump.......is a well known metabolic process. Everybody will at some point get one....even a non-Diabetic. Well documented in many areas. Not sure why you don't believe in it. It is a similar process to the Dawn Phenomenon which will elevate Bg levels if they start to drop too low.

I recall having a discussion some while ago here with the late Kegstore. He got them at times when his Bg was low, and he was a Type 1 as you know. If you have never knowingly experienced a liver dump then your Bg levels have probably never been low enough for it to come into play. All good.

Here is a link to an explanation of the process which might help:

http://ezinearticles.com/?Understanding ... id=2422851

Part of the article:

Liver dump, dawn phenomenon and dawn effect are all common terms that describe the same condition. It is an abnormally high early-morning fasting increase in blood glucose. It usually occurs between 4:00 AM and 8:00 AM. It occurs in everyone's body, but it has more impact on diabetics than normal bodies. It is more common in people with type I diabetes than in people with type II diabetes. Understanding the phenomenon can go a long way towards helping diabetics manage it.

Click to expand...

Ken

Thanks Ken,
As a long-term type-1 I am well aware of the effect of the liver producing glucose in reaction to illness, stress, etc, resulting in higher BGs during illness and stressful periods, and in some cases after exercise. Howevever the term "liver dump" is a recent and overused, possibly innacurate term for unexplained high BGs in type-1s.
There are many other reasons for unexplained high BG levels, being on an inuslin medication that isn't doing it's job is just as likely an explanation.

Unfortunately my BG levels have gone low enough to put me in a coma after taking Actrapid with my evening meal about 13 years ago. I didn't wake, but luckily my husband found me unconscious in the early hours and called an ambulance, hence the reason I am here to tell the tale.
Jus

I can't convince you it's been around for a long time then........there are references to this from 1981 onwards and I also came across an article which refers to the Somogyi effect from 1930. Discussing the effects.

As you say there are many reasons for high Bg levels whether in Type 1's or even T2's. Liver Dump is one of them another the Somogyi effect which again Kegstore and I discussed way back. Whatever the causes may be it does exist and has been known about for some time.

As you say, medication that isn't working can also be a cause. I don't dispute that. What I am saying is that the term 'liver dump' does exist and what happens in that process also exists. Not disputing what the cause may be. Lantus may or may not be involved here, however the term 'liver dump' was around before Lantus was in production. It's just a metabolic process. A natural phenomenon.

Ken