I have to take a total of 5 shots daily to keep my blood sugar in a normal range. It is getting tiresome having to do all the monitoring so I can get the right doses.
I shoot 4 times a day and it gets tired of me doing it but remember that you need insulin to stay alive if you have type 1 diabetes. I keep reminding me of that often.
Have you considered getting a pump?
Also, instead of intensive insulin therapy you could try to just shoot up twice a day and eat low carb meals. Talk to your doctor about ways to take a break occasionally so you don't have to do so many shots.
it's definetely hard!!!;( i take 5 shots a day too. and of course the night (lantus) hurts more!!!! i hope i can get a pump soon, but they're so expensive. Plus, it is kind of scary to have a needle in you 24/7..:(
There is not a needle in you 24/7 its a small flexable tube. Im in the same boat you are and I hope to go on the pump very soon but I have to pay cash for it so It will be awhile :/
yeah, me too!!!!! not for cash..but it'll be a while!
if you guys have any info about the pump and what it's like...i would love to know!!!!! please share!
diagnosed~ March 23, 2011.
Well my mom just came through with the money and ill be getting one next week ill let you know what happens and how i liek it. Is that cool?
yep!! just message me on here or something! and that's awesome...you're lucky!
I know it is difficult breaking out shots so often every day. I take between 4-8 shots per day. I take Lantus 2X/day and novolog whenever I eat or am high so some days there's a lot of poking going on. I was on the pump for 3 years until about a year ago...I have a pretty active lifestyle and the cord was always wrapping around me, making it difficult to swim, and falling out, etc. The pump is a great tool and I hope to go back on it someday but for now the shots are a great break from all those "pump bites" on my butt, since I couldn't put them anywhere else. Keep in mind if you DO chose the pump, put it somewhere away from any clothes line (those rubs really can hurt too) and be sure to move as far away from the last site every few days or else you will get scar tissue. I am pretty thin so I didn't have many sites and scar tissue prevented my insulin from even being absorbed from the pump. Stay strong, it's never going to be easy. -MontanaVal-25 years old, diagnosed age 8
The issue with shots are not just if you are taking them, but where you take them. Any very active muscle group, like your thighs, will become scarred if you just rotate thru them. Atrophy can cause your legs to look really bad and weird, it did mine and took several years to return to normal, but I still do not use them for injections. This may become an issue for pump users with those sites being subjected to constant flow of insulin to them 24/7. I know I had some spots starting that before I returned to injections. Something to consider tho. dx age 12 almost 56 now.
Jeff-
My guess is that the insulin that hurt your legs was the old beef and beef/pork stuff we used back in the 70's. I remember it would cause skin to sink in on the legs.
It's not an issue with modern insulins, but we still have to rotate sites so the skin doesn't get overused and will stil absorb insulin well.
One funny issue about the old insulins is that I'm not able to be a blood donor now because of using beef/pork insulin decades ago. The American Red Cross says it may have caused me to have mad cow disease! Seems silly, but I guess it's better to be safe. My husband has teased me mercilessly about having mad cow disease and says it explains a lot about my decision making. =)
-Jenna
Jenna,
I thought we could not donate blood because of the elevated blood sugars, they have never let me do that. Of course mad cow disease would explain alot about myself. lol Yes my legs were totaled for about 10 years before they started to look normal again, and I could not use them at all. After using my stomach and finding that layer of fat to use, those problems went away. I still only use my stomach and not my arms, legs, or butt. I had found out the major muscle groups were too close to the surface and caused damage to the muscles. But maybe that is not an issue anymore.
Thanks Jenna,
Jeff
If you can add me as a friend I can give you some information. I had been part of another group and gave up , for reasons I will tell you later on. I have been taking shots for 32, almost 33 years, and have pretty good control, though not perfect.
Yeah Doc mentioned in a causal conversation last week. When was practicing with her new Ultra- sound on my me. Maybe it was time to graduate to a pump, so next visit is in May. I need do my research before hand. Any suggestions for az Newbie going from 5 to 6 injections daily to a pump?.
Personally for me having a pump means more monitoring than MDI. When i was on the pump for a 3month trial I was constantly having to test amd deal with lows, then spikes and then lows and spikes.
I ended up back to MDI (minus the 3months I’ve been on 5+ shots a day for 20+ years) and with the assistance of the Dexcom CGM (which just came on the market in Canada in November) have gotten my A1C down to the same level in 3months as when I was on the pump (which only went down because I was having a min of 3 lows a week, sometimes up multiple lows in one day).