Insulin Sensitivity

Healthy Living Physical Activity
#1

After more than 15 years training at the afternoon, I am training in the morning (8am), usually 30 min of intense cardio + 1 hour of intense heavy weight lifting.
I use Lantus (AM + PM) + Humalog with every meal.

Right now it is almost imposible to handle my Hypos. Comes everytime, especially at mid night and at the end of the afternoon. I can go to bed at 200 and wake up with 56.

The Insulin Sensitivity is killing me. I am reducing my night Lantus at 5 units (Usually I use 10 units), and usually I am suffering lows only shooting myself 1 unit of Humalog.

If I take 1 day off from the Gym, this magical situation disappear and I have to return to my " normal doses of Insulin". But it is hard to handle 2 schemes of Doses. I am now very paranoic with this unconfortable situation.

I am thinking in reduce the intensity and the duration of my exercises.

Any advice

Thankss

#2

Did you ever consider whether this is an issue of post exercise hypos and not an insulin sensitivity problem? Are these lows are occuring only on training days? Changes in overall insulin sensitivity take several days to work off. Do you specifically have a meal following exercise that is designed to restore your glycogen stores?

Being a bit older than you, I train 2-3 days a week and have to raise and lower my basal to adjust for training. I was able to limit my post workout hypos by taking more care to follow up training with a meal and insulin regime focused on restoring depleted glycogen.

#3

I second bsc’s suggestion. Your situation pretty much describes mine exactly.

I had to do three things to smooth things out. First, I eat within an hour after each workout. Second, I gave myself one or two rest and recovery days between intense cardio days. Unless you’re training for some particular event that requires consecutive days of intense cardio, I don’t know that, as a diabetic, you are getting much more of a benefit by going consecutive days if your BG numbers are suffering. I still may do consecutive weight days, but they don’t affect my BGs as much, personally. Combining my cardio and weight program, I’m still only in the gym 5 to 6 days a week max. I think you may find that giving yourself a rest day helps steady your numbers and helps your overall program.

Third, and probably the biggest change, I went fro MDI to a pump. All the chanages helped, but the pump helped especially with overnight lows. Being able to dial in a specific basal dose, and having multiple basal doses programmed, makes a huge difference.

#4

What’s your strategy for restoring glycogen on a low-carb diet bsc?

#5

Thanks for your responses

Definitely I have to take 1 day off in the week in order to be able to handle better my BG and avoid the lows at bed time.

The lows at 3 am I think is due to a Delayed-Onset Hypoglycemia. If a took 1 or 2 days off, the problems at bed night disappear.

Right now I am using 1 - 2 units of Humalog for a large meal of CHOs. I eat a lottttt of Carbohydrates, but I do not have a specific strategy for restoring glycogen.

But its very hard handle the Diabetes with the exercise because I love to train like a Pro (in my dreams jejeje).

#6

My strategy for avoiding post exercise hypos is to eat a meal within two hours after workout. My hypos occur two hours after workout. If I eat a meal with some level of carbs, bolus about half the amount it averts the hypos.

It may be that Edgar can help his situation with late night snack, perhaps with some protein to help avert the overnight lows. Another possibility would be to perhaps move the lifting to the evening.

#7

I had the same issue. My doc suggested me to stop taking insulin before exercise. So all I had before exercise was 200ml milk with one scoop of (8gm) proteinx diabetic care and one apple. I ate my breakfast within one hour after workout. and my hypos went away. This happens because our muscles utilise glucose from blood without the need of insulin while we do high intensity exercises. HIIT works the best to increase insulin sensitivity. And please dont let your sugars go above 140mg/dl as it causes inflammation in veins leading to various complications. Especially with us people interested in body-building who take lot of protein since we need to protect our kidneys. If your are worried about the milk spiking the sugars abnormally, delay your basal intake during the night such that the gap between the basal and milk is not more than 6-7 hrs. This helps in controlling the sugar spike. Another thing is try to maintain your fasting sugars in between 80-90 strictly, it will help in maintaining your sugars through the rest of the day. I think this will help you a lot. Thank You.