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What do you eat on basal testing days?

Nomi

Nomi

Well-Known Member
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151
Hi guys,

I need to do some basal testing to make sure everything is doing what it should and I'm terrible at not eating, I usually graze all day long.

Does anyone have any vaguely exciting no carb recipes hidden away?

Thanks in advance!

Nomi

X
 
1) don't basal test for a whole day, during an extended fast you might get a liver dump pushing blood sugar up and making the basal test unreliable. Instead do a night, morning, afternoon and evening test. So if your testing for the morning just skip breakfast and finish off with a late lunch or if your doing afternoon have an early breakfast so you've got 4hours food and bolus free then start the test and skip lunch and finish up with a late dinner.

2) don't eat when basal testing. It's all well and good saying carb free snacks but in reality anything vaugely edible but carb free is likely to have a decent amount of protein in, if youre not eating carbs your body will work to turn protein into glucose and that will raise your blood sugar, making a basal test unreliable.

Here's a guide on how to basal test - https://mysugr.com/basal-rate-testing/
 
A basal test has to be a fasting one @Nomi , as explained above just miss one meal at a time and run the test over several days if need be.
 
Nomi said:
Fair play. Interestingly is not what my DSN told me...

Thanks for the advice :)

Nomi
Click to expand...

By all means go with what your DSN has said, but most literature now states that a basal test has to be a fasting one, the author of the book Think Like a Pancreas covers the Do's & Don't of a basal test:

http://integrateddiabetes.com/basal-testing/

I know from my own experience any carb free food like cheese & hams tends to cause a bg rise......hence why I wouldn't eat them during a basal test.
 
ickihun said:
Out of interest what did dn advise?
Click to expand...

Well they said to split the day up in to sections like you said, I was just trying to take a shortcut and do it all in one go. I didn't realise the liver might kick in.

But they said I would be ok to eat food that isn't carbohydrate like eggs and meat and things during the test.

I want to do it properly so I will do a fasting test and try and distract myself from eating!
 
@Nomi I had an ongoing fight with my DSN about whether I should have insulin if the food I am eating contains no carbs. She says they 'wouldn't advise' bolusing for my egg-only breakfast, as they don't contain carbohydrate - even though they raise my blood glucose quite a bit! I chose to ignore her advice and act on my meter instead.

Curiously she changed her tune when I started on a pump and talked about basal testing, for which I was told to fast for parts of days as explained above.

I saw my chance to ask about the eggs again...... Turns out she can't advise people to bolus for carb-free foods, but she DOES advise people to avoid even carb-free food when basal testing as 'even things like eggs can raise blood glucose'!

I think I won that fight!
 
@Snapsy I can't believe how the 'correct' information changes so much depending on the person you are talking to.

I have noticed that large amounts of protein affects me but I can get away with the odd egg here and there *starts daydreaming about a fry up...*

I'm trying to get my basal set so I can really see how different foods affect me. At least that's the plan!! :)
 
It's crackers*, isn't it?!

Hope the basal testing goes well - it's worth the effort!


*low carb ones! ;)
 
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