This morning, I accidentally took novolog instead of lantus. I wasn’t even planning on eating this morning (not really hungry), and now suddenly, I’m eating more than I usually eat in an entire day. It’s hard to find enough carbs lying around the house to make up all that insulin, even though we did have sugared soda left over from Memorial day. The only good factor is that my I:C ratio is 1:10 in the morning, not 1:15 like it is the rest of the day.
I caught it as soon as I woke up enough to look at the vial I was drawing from (which was right after I had injected). I guess it could have been worse.
Now I’m going to be obsessively testing until I figure out if I got the carb load right . . .
Sorry this happened to you, every diabetic worries about it. I see this post was 2 hours ago now, but I’m assuming you took some fast-acting carbs such as glucose tabs first and are now following up with longer acting carbs. Try and stay away from fat as it slows digestion. It sounds like you are doing everything right, testing regularly. The good news is your novolog only lasts so long, but the bad news is you will probably end up high. Bottom line, I’m glad you’re ok. Do repost to let us all know how you made it through.
It happens to the best of us getting the insulins mixed up. I’m pumping now but b/f I started pumping I done the samething. No need to feel like an idiot. I hope your better now. Please keep us posted on how your doing.
Hi Teowyn, I’m sorry you’re having a problem, please call sanofi-aventis at 800-633-1610 to report any problems you may have experienced while take LANTUS. Regards, Mandy.
Teowyn, you’re not alone. I don’t know how many times I’ve picked up the wrong insulin, only to catch myself just before injecting. I know it’s easy to get caught up in our daily routines and take a misstep. The misstep I make regularly is to figure the insulin dosage I need, prime the needle, and then inject before I dial up the dosage (I MDI and use insulin pens.). Fortunately, you knew just what to do to correct your mistake. Hope the rest of your day goes better.
I’ve tried to tell my husband that what I call “real” coke works really fast but he don’t think so. So much for nondiabetics! LOL! I won’t even try and count the times I’ve done it b/f I started pumping. LOL!
The last time I did this wa my lantus night time shot of 50 units - grabbed the wrong pen and shot 50 units of novolog. I called the ENDO office and th e ENDO on call called me back and said I had a free night except that at the time I was no carbs so there was very little carbs in the house. I did get thru it and stayed up about 4 hours longer than usually.
Hi Teowyn. There’s always some way to make a mistake! I help myself from confusing my Levemir and Apidra by using a Levemir pen and a vial for the Apidra. Also I keep the pen on the kitchen shelf and refrigerate the Apidra, so I have to go through entirely different motions to get to one of them. I’ve also learned to keep Coke on hand, Regular for lows and Diet for highs–otherwise, I never drink soda. Hope the rest of your day is a lot better!
It happens. I thought I had taken Apidra instead of Levemir late one night. Did I or didn’t I? Panic mode not sure which I had injected. Got my BG up to over 300 in case it was Apidra. Turns out I did take Levemir since my BG continued to climb ever upwards from the all glucose gel, jelly beans & juice. Spent the rest of the night trying to get it back down. Don’t we have fun!?
You DO realize that this isn’t a complaint about Lantus, don’t you? Also, I’m not sure what kind of help I will get if I call that number when the representatives can’t even write 2 grammatically correct sentences.
Well don’t feel so bad because a lot of us have done the same thing.
Hahaha Gerri, I did exactly the same thing with my Humalog and Protaphane except that I really did take my short acting. Worst part of it was the “did I, didn’t I” routine. In the end I waited a bit and then figured that it would be better to eat* and if the sugars climbed to correct via a shot.
*Disclaimer - There may or may not have been some scoffing down of cheesecake at the time
Well, I still feel totally stuffed, but my day went fine–at 10:30 I was at 96. I took a nap (I need to practice better sleeping habits) and just before lunch I was at 56. So I ate again, and have held mid 80s afternoon on. I think the most disturbing thing about the day was my mother, who called from work at about noon and asked if I was still alive. Dad asked me at least twice (as I was eating everything in sight–poptarts have an unbelievable amount of carb, but I couldn’t eat more than one) whether I should be injecting more insulin when I had this problem.
And we had a nice discussion about emergency contingency plans–if I do this again, and pass out or don’t realize that I did, what should they do.
I do hope I don’t do this again for a very long time.
