What foods make you go low? Home-style biscuits by Pillsbury seem to drop me every time I count correctly or count a little off for them. My ratio at night is 9:1 and quite frankly, I think sometimes I’m receiving too much insulin. I normally don’t eat until 6 or 6:40 at night, so maybe that could be the case?
Besides the fact, is there any foods that make you go high after counting correctly for them? I’d like to hear y’all’s thoughts and what you do about it next time you eat that same meal or food choice.
Hi @hanstan Hannah, the game you are playing is trying to match insulin absorption with carb absorption.
High fat foods absorb very slowly and so if the insulin is faster it’ll appear these foods make you low. Ice cream. Pizza. Fat bun cheese dogs with the good mustard. Etc.
Really fast carbs absorb faster than insulin making your blood sugar rapidly rise before the insulin can lower it. You see this as a high at 1-2 hours after eating. Glucose. Rice. Potato. Juices. Etc.
Some fats (for me cheddar cheese) makes it seem like it’s got more carbs than it should have. If I eat a lot of cheddar I count it like bread.
For fast carbs, bolus before (sometimes way before) eating and watch the total amount. For really slow carbs if you pump you can dual and square wave delivering your insulin over 3-4 hours to try to match the insulin with the carb absorption rate. If you don’t pump it’s tougher. The old beef pork NPH was good for pizza.
@joe I have been using the Omnipod for about 6 years now and it’s like certain foods are wearing out on me. I am not used to having lows, so now that I’m having them it makes me want to look more closely at why it’s happening. I haven’t eaten supper tonight because I’m waiting on it still (to go order) and I hope it’s not because I eat later. Bread usually rises me right after eating. I normally don’t count for my carbs until I start eating on it to make sure I’m going to be hungry enough to eat it all.
When do you take insulin for food and what kind of insulin do you use? I use Novolog and I think it works much faster than Humalog.
@hanstan I’ve used Novolog and Humalog they both are equal for me. I usually use Humalog because I figured Lilly saved my life at the beginning. I think I tried Apidra but not the bio similar yet.
Anyway I always bolus early for restaurant food and for really fast carbs. For Chinese take out I bolus, wait till I am dropping and then eat.
For ice cream and pizza. I take maybe 20% up front and the rest over 4 hours. It works out to about 1.5 units per hour for the 4.
Honestly it could be anything. It could be a nerve problem like Gastroparesis but that isn’t likely. I’ve always thought of diabetes as a moving target. Once in a while you have to redo basal rates, re figure ratios and whatever it is it is.
I had a week (at the beginning of summer) of perfect blood sugar control using less that 50% my normal insulin. How? Well it wasn’t my pump that’s for sure. Every once in a while I make a little of my own insulin and it starts with crushing lows and makes me feel like a beginner again. Or usually that I’ve lost my mind and bolused twice for lunch. Whatever. I enjoy it while it lasts and then things change again.
I would try to get the rate right for what you eat most of the time. Who cares if it works out to 1/2 or 3x the carbs it’s supposed to be.
Retesting basals are really important nothing in the pump works right with a bad basal rate. It’s tines like these I get out my CGM. It’s a pain in my rear (literally) but this is where they really come in handy.