Thinking about a Baby

I am getting married in August — and everyone keeps saying that they can’t wait for my and my fiancé to have a baby. Of course, we would like to have one – I’m just not 100% sure I am ready right now. My blood sugars have been better, a1c is about 7 and I think we are financially ready.

When I was 21 I had a miscarriage. It was an unplanned pregnancy, my blood sugars were bad and my a1c was like 8.5. I had lot of severe lows and was stressed out with school, work and drama from my ex.

Now, 5 years later I feel like I may be ready to have a kid. I’m just scared to have another miscarriage. I think my fiancé and I would be devastated… and I think it would be all my fault for not keeping my blood sugars 100% on track. I also am not sure when to actually start trying. I’ve been continuously on birth control for at least 5 years now, and I know it might take a month or so for my body to get back to its normal ways. Obviously, I would like to get through the wedding and everything before trying, but now is the time to start thinking and getting in tighter control of my blood sugars.

So for those who have gotten pregnant with type 1 diabetes, how long did it take you? Were you on birth control before getting pregnant? What was your a1c level? Any advice would be wonderful!

While I have not been pregnant yet, I can totally relate. I’ve been married for 1.5 years and family/friends are anxiously waiting for a little one. I am sorry to hear about your earlier miscarriage. I don’t have any real advice to offer, but I’m interested in following any responses given here as well. Good luck on your wedding plans!

Well I’m glad I’m not alone — are you still just thinking or trying right now?

Unfortunately I’m still “thinking about it”. Constantly. We are actually ready to try but I’m struggling with getting my A1c under 7. Late last year I hit 6.8 and thought we would start trying after we got through the holidays. When I went back to the doctor in January, my A1c had jumped to 7.7 again and was the same in May. My doctor now said he at least would like to see me under 7.5 before stopping birth control. Sigh. I’m so disappointed in myself. I keep thinking after I go to the doctor that this is the beginning of a new 3-month slate and that I can go from there to bring my A1c down. However, I’m now 1 month into my most recent new slate and things don’t seem to be improving as much as I would like. I was so proud of that 6.8 at the time but as more time goes on I tend to think it was just a fluke.

@KSmerk12,

Don’t beat yourself up. That happened to me as well and it started making me feel as though I was going into a downward spiral. Stay focused, Stay POSITIVE. Tell yourself you can do this. Keep checking your blood sugars every couple of hours and bolus A LOT. Try to eat less carbs that will make your blood sugars raise. With determination you can do it. Ask for help from your doctors. Maybe try sending your numbers in every week and making adjustments as if you already were pregnant that may be able to help!

Don’t let family pressure you into having a baby. My husbands family would ask ALL OF THE TIME, and it used to drive me crazy till one day I cracked and got really angry.

@callanicole,

I am sorry to hear about your miscarriage. Unfortunately, miscarriages happen more often than you think. It didn’t necessarily have to do with your higher numbers.

When I became pregnant with my son, my a1c was 8.9. In the beginning it was a bit stressful trying to get my numbers back in range but at three months my a1c was 6.1. I stayed in the 6’s till probably 8 months and it went up a bit because of insulin resistance. The entire pregnancy went amazingly boring. Thankfully.

Just wanted you guys to read that because not every pregnancy is a preconception number below 7.0. :slight_smile:

I didn’t think I wanted kids and my husband and I were pretty good about using birth control, but apparently not good enough because we had an unexpected blessing. My A1c was about a 7. You can definitely be a healthy type 1 mom. Just be reasonably intelligent.

Definitely think it’s smart to enjoy your marriage for a while before starting a family. You need time to settle in with one another. I was listening to Ray Ramano’s comedy (Everybody Loves Raymond) recently and he said you shouldn’t become a parent until you’re ready to give up sleep and sex. Unfortunately that’s a little too true. =)

1 Like

I’m about 7-8 weeks now and my last A1C in May (so at that point about 3 weeks pregnant) was 7.5. My team’s goal now is to try and get my bloodsugar under tight control which has been a struggle and time consuming but totally possible.

I haven’t seen the baby doc yet that I’ve been referred to but the team isn’t worrying about what my bloodsugars were like before, they just want me to get on a tight track now. I’m sitting at 4-6mmol/L before meals and 5-7mmol/L after meals; they wanted me to be 3.5-5.5mmol/L before meals but because I feel lows at 4.5 they agreed that for now I could go with 4-6.

I got pregnant around a month after getting off birth control but I’m pretty damn fertile apparently. I’ve been pregnant twice (miscarriage and abortion) which both happened while taking the pill.

I’ve always been told that miscarriages just happen and are common in the early weeks; whether because it just “didn’t take” (which happened in my case) or trauma, etc. I don’t think T1’s have a higher chance of miscarriage. My team isn’t worried about my past pregnancies but it’s information they need to know as part of your medical history so you will need to tell them; if they are concerned they may take some additional steps but really you just need to pay attention to what your feeling/your body is doing during the first trimester as that’s when the risk is highest.

Good luck :slight_smile: