I have been a Type 1 diabetic for a little over a year. I have a cgm and the omnipod. I workout everyday at a high intensity for 45 minutes to an hour and lift 2-3 times a week. I have not changed anything with diet and exercise and suddenly I am gaining 1 pound a week! Is this something that has happened to others? Am I doing something wrong? I am lifting a little heavier, but I have never been able to put muscle on that fast, but I know insulin is a storing hormone, so maybe that is it. Help!
hello megan, i am pretty new to this too,and the only thing that comes to mind is to ask if youre having lots of lows, and if you are, then are you treating them with glucose, or with delicious good stuff?
i am not on a pump but one of my friends is and she put on a fantastic amount of weight because she tends to just eats what she wants and dials up for it.
it would be great tho if the weight were all muscle.
there are probably other (more plausible?) explanations old timers and pumpers will have, so im sure theyll be on it.
I found I was doing a slow gain on insulin, but nothing like a pound a week. Have you started any new medicine that has weight gain as a side effect? Ditto on the treating lows question. Are you taking more insulin lately would be the other question.
I found that I stopped gaining and started (slowly) losing when I lowered carbs (and insulin)
Most importantly perhaps, have you had your thyroid checked? Hypothyroidism is very common in Type 1's.
Having the same problem. Gained 25 pounds in six months since I started on insulin. Part of the gain is water weight....body was dehydrated before. While I exercise 4-5 days a week and have gained muscle, I have also gained my fair share of fat, from snacking and using the insulin to adjust. I am 37 and getting acne....my wife jokes that I am on steriods.
Supposedly, going on a pump is supposed to help with lowering the amount of insulin....but from your comments above that may not be the case. I start on a pump next month. In meantime, I am cutting my calorie intake to 2000 carbs and see if I can shed some weight.
The pump in and of itself doesn't cause weight gain. But some people see the pump as permission to eat "whatever they want and bolus for it". It's so easy to just press buttons! Bad idea! It will cause (as you've seen) weight gain and, over time, a Type 1 can develop insulin resistance as well as insulin deficiency. Makes life harder.
I haven't started any new meds and I just had my thyroid checked last week..in normal range. My endo said I shouldn't lift heavy because I will gain muscle fast, so I guess I will take my weights down and increase my cardio even more. I am not sure I totally agree, but I guess I will try it. I eat about 150 carbs a day to fuel my workouts, but I may have to lower them.
I blame carbs more than insulin. I think that with weight training, it's important to time carbs to fuel workouts. If you like lifting and are getting good results (i.e. stronger!) I wouldn't cut back on working out. I'd look at timing the carbs specifically to fuel your workouts. Maybe cut back in other areas and work to replace some carbs with something like veggies (which are carbs, but not as much, and tons of vitamins) or protein. I used to eat cereal, granola bar snack w/ yogurt, sandwich, chips, apple, then whatever (tons) for dinner and weighed 275 lbs. I've worked out a lot but have made the most weight gains cutting out carbs. These days I mostly eat eggs or egg beaters w/ veggies (broccoli/ spinach, maybe cheese) for breakfast, 1/2 sandwich, veggies and plain Greek yogurt for lunch and then dinner.
I am more cognizant about what I eat but when I'm working out, I work to arrange my BG so it will be where I want it to be. If it's not, I still figure out a way to work out and keep at it. If 150G of carbs is gaining 1 lb/ week, try 130 and see if it works for you.
"Normal" can mean different things to different people. If your level was over 3.0 mIU, ask for a second opinion — some specialists are still using a level of over 4.5 as being "abnormal" but the standard reference range is 0.3 to 3.0 now, and there are some who argue that even that is wrong and it should be 0.3 to 2.0. Folks with T1D seem to be especially prone to hypothyroidism so do keep tabs on your levels.
That said, I think muscle gain is the most likely culprit.
Lower your calories and you will loose weight, get on a bike and spin off the pounds. I agree weight lifting will pack on body mass.
It is really hard to really give helpful advice without knowing a little more about your particular situation. There are certain things that are a recipe for weight gain. One is a when your basal/bolus regime is not tuned properly. I really doubt weightlifting is the cause of excessive fat gain. As a woman, it is improbable that you would gain a pound a week of muscle for any length of time. If you did this for 6 months you would win the worldwide bodybuilding title. Sure, it is not uncommon for the untrained to gain weight fairly quickly when weightlifting, but it tails off really fast. And weightlifting tends to promote muscle gain over fat gain. So don't give up on the weightlifting.
My suggestion is to focus on your insulin and food regime. Seek to maximize the amount of time you spend during the day with a really normal blood sugar (at least 70-130 mg/dl, preferably 70-100 mg/dl). If you can walk around all afternoon with a blood sugar of 80 mg/dl and only the minimal basal insulin needed, you will be a fat burning machine. And to do that, you may need to do basal testing. This is described in the book "Pumping Insulin" by Walsh and a description is on his web site.
And finally, exercise has actually been found to increase hunger. Always remember, weigth loss happens 90% in the kitchen. Always turn down you basal for exercise rather than feeding glucose tabs and always be alert to increased hunger after exercise.
I would see how many lows you are treating as well as what you are using to treat them. I found that on MDI I had more lows and therefore gained some weight. I recently started on the pump and have started to drop some of the unwanted weight as I find I am not chasing my insulin with food as much.