There's a pattern I've been noticing lately. Most of the time, my numbers are fine; less than 100 before meals, usually between 105-115 after. My morning numbers still tend to be up a little, just over 100 about half the time. I'm okay with that. But there's this one thing that bugs me.

It looks like if I do too much exercise in the morning, it has a very negative effect on my blood sugar. All the times I've been way off recently have been like this:

* 100 before, Walked an hour after a light breakfast: 160 after
* Did certain physical activities the nature of which I won't go into before breakfast: 118 before, 105 after
* 95 before, had a normal breakfast, wore my leg weights for my 10 minute walk from the parking lot to the office: 140 after
* 97 before, Had a normal breakfast, walked to work (30 minutes): 133 after (Normally more like 110)

Now, obviously if I know what's causing it, I can try to avoid it, but there are a lot of times when this kind of early morning exercise is more or less unavoidable; I'd like to be able to walk to work some mornings (I'd do it every morning, but I don't actually live within walking distance. All of these events have occurred on mornings when I've spent the previous night at my girlfriend's place), and number 2 on that list is something I'm particularly disinterested in avoiding.

Anyone have any suggestions for how to mitigate this effect? Am I getting too many carbs on those mornings (and screwing up the timing of their effect on my blood sugar by doing exercise that speeds up/slows down my digestion), or too few (and spooking my liver into dumping extra sugar into my blood)? Would it help to take my metformin in the morning on those days, or is it too late for it to kick in in time by then?

Every time I think I'm starting to get the hang of this, something new throws me a curveball.

Sometimes you just can't predict what will happen. Keep in mind that since you have been diagnosed with a glucose impairment (sorry, can't remember exactly where you are med-wise) things won't work quite the way they are supposed to. Exercise can increase your blood sugar because your liver will dump glucose for the "activity". But it's not entirely predictable.

From the sound of it your numbers are still very good, so don't worry too much and enjoy! If you are hitting over 180 regularly then it might be time to re-evaluate. But in the meantime it sounds like your a1c is still doing fine. What is it, btw?

Good luck.

Cora

Med-wise, I'm on 500 mg of Metformin once a day (right before bed), with 750 of Tricor in the morning for my triglycerides (Which are down to 195 from 2200, so yay). My a1c was 7.7 last time I had it checked, but I'd only been diagnosed a month earlier, so I'm hoping most of that was from it being out-of-control before I was diagnosed.

I know there are a lot of things I can't control, which is why I get kind of compulsive about the things I can.

Something else I've noticed, which may be related, is that it seems like I have an easier time losing weight when my blood sugar is out of control. I'm not sure how they're related: if the trouble with my blood sugar was making it easier to lose weight, or if losing weight rapidly was doing funny things to my blood sugar, or if my body has just found a good place to balance and that's caused both.

It makes me sort of wonder whether it would be worth it in the long run to have more of these exercise-associated highs in the short-term, in order to bring my weight down to a healthier level.

Do not, absolutely DO NOT, lose weight by running your blood sugar high. It is an excellent way to damage your organs significantly. What happens when you lose weight that way is that you are literally starving yourself. The sugar in your blood is not getting into your cells. Your body feels it is starving, so breaks down fat (and muscle sometimes too) in order to supply the body with energy. This makes your blood sugar go higher, and the fat breakdown causes ketones to be released. That's why they call it ketoacidosis. The ketones are acidic and poison you. So it's a double whammy as far as damage is concerned to your body. Damage from the high sugar, and damage from the high ketones.

Believe me, you don't want to be a "healthy" weight and be on dialysis.

Basically, try to keep your lifestyle stable, eat well, exercise, and do the best you can. Don't intentionally not take care, the consequences aren't good.

Cora