For those taking Lantus

I have been taking Lantus for about 2 years now and I find that I react better to it when I take it at bedtime than in the morning when I wake up.  I keep switching back and forth because I'm not 100% sure, but ultimately I have landed on taking it at night before bed.  Does anybody else have this problem with Lantus where it works differently depending on when you take it?  Am I crazy to think that it would work differently by taking it at night?  My MD and APN say that some people do indeed benefit from taking Lantus at night even though it's recommended to take in the morning. 

I was told only to take it at night and it worked better.

I have recently started taking half dose in am and half dose pm.  It has only been two days but so far my blood sugars have been great.

When I took Lantus once a day, I took it in the morning b/c I tend to have early morning lows and it would be running out by then. But, like you AAcker, I also split my dose which was an instant improvement in my a1c's. It allowed me to get my sugars down in the 6's to try to get pregnant. It's worth an extra injection!

i started with a single dose every morning, and tried taking it at night for a bit. it didnt work, so i'm on a split dose between am and pm. works better now for sure. (20u AM, 12u PM)

I'm on a pump now, but when I was on Lantus for four years, I always took it at night.

I'm only taking it at night (20u) but then when I wake up in the morning i'm between 50-80!!! I'm thinking about talking to my endo and seeing about splitting it 10u in the am and 10u at night and seeing if that works a little better.

Everyone's body responds differently to the insulin. When I took Lantus I took it at night. I had a problem figuring out my dose, we switched it almost every week!!!

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I'm only taking it at night (20u) but then when I wake up in the morning i'm between 50-80!!! I'm thinking about talking to my endo and seeing about splitting it 10u in the am and 10u at night and seeing if that works a little better.

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Are you taking a fast acting insulin as well?  I just started needing to take Novolog with my Lantus.  My Lantus dosage is similar to yours and while taking it in the morning, it's actually more difficult for me to hit my target BG in the mornings when I wake up.

Yeah I take Novolog before every meal and then Lantus at night!

[quote user="Aggie_Girl_10"]

Yeah I take Novolog before every meal and then Lantus at night!

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Maybe I really should at least try taking my Lantus at night.  My blood sugar seems to almost always rise a little through the night when I take it in the mornings.  I really want my morning BG reading to be between 80-100.

Yeah it's hard to get used to it. I know at first when I was diagnosed I hadn't been to an endo and my regular physician had me taking 40 units of Lantus at night!!!! Which dropped my BG to 21 one morning!!!! I barely made it out of bed that morning! I think it's a guessing game though. I'm going to email my endo and see if I can do 10u in the morning and 10u at night and see if that helps any, I'm not liking waking up semi low. It sometimes has me worried cause what if I over sleep or something?

[quote user="Aggie_Girl_10"]

Yeah it's hard to get used to it. I know at first when I was diagnosed I hadn't been to an endo and my regular physician had me taking 40 units of Lantus at night!!!! Which dropped my BG to 21 one morning!!!! I barely made it out of bed that morning! I think it's a guessing game though. I'm going to email my endo and see if I can do 10u in the morning and 10u at night and see if that helps any, I'm not liking waking up semi low. It sometimes has me worried cause what if I over sleep or something?

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Holy S**T... haha If my physician gave me advice that caused my blood sugar to drop to 21 I might smack him in the face upon our next appointment.  Geez, I thought I was taking a lot of Lantus at 22u(which I'm currently taking 18) but 40? Geez...

Yeah Matt, but he was just my general physician cause I hadn't seen an endo yet at the time. I think my endo wanted to freak when she found out how much I had been giving. I'm still trying to see if I can do half and half and see if that makes a difference in my other numbers. I'm still having crazy off the wall numbers. I guess I should email her right now while I'm thinking about it. LOL!!!

I take 20u of Lantus in the morning and then Novolog throughout the day with meals. I find often though, that my blood sugar runs low right before bed & in the middle of the night - I often wake up in a cold sweat because of it! I like the idea of "splitting" the Lantus doses. Perhaps a smaller AM dose and a small PM dose would work better!

Aggie Girl - Wow I can't believe your regular Physisician had you taking 40 units of Lantus! That is an insane amount!

Nikki trust me!!! I thought that was pretty insane too. But I figured even a general physician has to know something about what they are talking about right? But I guess with him that's not the case. He is definately not the one to talk about D problems cause he knows NOTHING!!!! He even only wanting me test 2 times a day once at 7 am and once at 4 pm. Yeah being newly diagnosed I still knew something wasn't right with that picture. I was so glad when I finally got into see an endo too bad it was AFTER i had a seizure from going so low! :(

I only take it in the evening so I'm not sure what it would do to my blood sugars if I took it in the morning.

I also take it in the evenings..used to take it at night but that wasn't working for me (mostly because I would forget to do it on time sometimes if I was out or at work).  When I took it at night combined with not always taking it on time I would be high in the morning.  Now with taking it in the evening my numbers have been much better.

OH my goodness!!!! Well at least you have an Endo now, which in my opinion will be way better then a GP. When I had a GP after my health insuance had changed, once I told him I was a type 1 diabetic he was like "I'm just going to refer you to your normal Endo since you have been with him for so long"... whew! I guess I got lucky in that sense! You sound like you're on the right track now! Hopefully you will have no more low extemes :-)

Hi Casey,

 I have been using Lantus for about 13 months now. Mind I was 52 when Dx'ed. I have always had my Lantus in the morning(30 units) and seem to have good(?) control. I also do Novolog before I eat (2 units=15 carbs). When Dx'ed my bs was 672 and a1c of 13.2, at my last Dr. visit my a1c was 6.8 and the 30 day avg. on my meter is 104. I still get lows almost everyday, but this is from always fudging and uping my Novolog when in doubt. I am still very hypo-aware as soon as I get below 80 I feel it, yhe lowest I have been is 55.

We are all the same and different!!