Hello everyone, I posted a few weeks ago about my struggles to lose weight as a type 1 and got so many wonderful and helpful replies so I just wanted to update everyone on my progress and again ask for some more advice and suggestions.
The consensus was to lower my carbs to lose weight and YAY IT IS WORKING! Finally, after 6 years of trying to lose leftover pregnancy pounds, something is actually finally working. I've been going lower carb for about 3 weeks now and have lost 1 lbs. per week - not fast but steady and I am thrilled with it. Thrilled b/c I don't feel like this is a "diet"" - I am a really changing my way of eating and I do not feel deprived. I am still probably not true low carb - I am probably averaging 60-100 carbs per day but I am still losing 1lb. per week so I am sticking with it. I am only eating whole,real foods, got rid of all the packaged junk except I do allow myself a chocolate protein bar (8 net carbs) as a treat.
So with all this my blood sugars have stayed mostly good and I have def. reduced my insulin (on a pump) intake by about 10u per day. But my problem is after low-carbing all day, by after dinner, I have sometimes been going low before bed or wake up in the middle of the night with a low. By that point, I have eaten all my allotted carbs for the day - what do other low carbers eat before bed to keep you from going low over night? I guess maybe I should save a carb for this time? Just looking for some food suggestions for this.
Also wondering this - the carbs that seem to affect my weight gain/loss are grains only or packaged stuff like chips or crackers. I find that if I eat fruit, yogurt, milk or those kinda carbs it does not really affect my loss. Does anyone else find this is true for them? So I haven't been as strict about counting carbs from those foods as I have from counting carbs in bread or potatoes, grains, cereals,etc. But for these foods I have chosen the lower carb, higher fiber versions. Just wondered others experiences on this too.
I can't help with the low carb part but I use two different methods to deal with overnight lows. The first is that I drop my basal rate a bit if it happens for a few days in a row. Even cutting .05 per hour out for 6 hours is .3 unit which will be the difference between a 58 and an 80. The other method is to target a slightly higher blood sugar before bed. I usually target 95 but if I'm having a bit of trouble with lows I raise that to about 110 just to give myself some more room. Eating some almonds before bed also helps me stabilize blood sugar but I'm not sure that's a good technique if you're trying to lose weight.
I would keep the carbs in your diet and the carbs you use to treat/adjust blood sugar separate in your head. A glucose tab is medicine and it has about 16 calories. It's not food.
Strong work loosing the weight, that's awesome. I agree with Maurie, it sounds like a basal adjustment might need to be made. Your dinner bolus should be gone in 4 hrs so if you are going low after that it most likely is too much basal. That said, don't sweat a handful of carbs to prevent or fix a low, not all carbs are bad. Good Luck.
Hi christi, Your basal is too high. Reset it. In other words, drop the basal.
Count all carbs including fruit and figure your boluses accordingly.
It may be also that your insulin sensitivity is changing: "more mm/dL" drop per unit.
Pay close attention to every segment of your day to learn what your (maybe new) I:C ratio is.
And congratulations! BUT DROP THAT BASAL!
I also try to stay in the 100 per day range. I'm on MDI so pump adjustments don't apply. I usually have 1 or 2 spoon fulls of peanut butter (not Jiff. Peanuts only peanut butter) before bed. Another product I have found very useful, especially for active times, is Extend Bars. This is a really interesting and unique product line. The bars are my favorite. Most of my carbs are at snack times. I eat little or no carbs with most meals. That's just me and my preferred routine. Another food I have found that works well for me is sweet potato. I bake them until they are just barely tender, peel and slice into approx 1/2 inch slices. I can then take out what I want, dice it up and do whatever I want to with it. One or two slices give me a very slow and steady BG rise. They work great with eggs for breakfast.
Congratulations. I've been doing ~35g / day. I find my weight plateaus for a little while, then drops a couple lbs now and then. I bolus 50% for protein. Since I've been LC, I've noticed more nuance in my need for insulin. Some of your night time lows could be attributed to the Somogyi Effect. I would second still_young@heart's advice for dealing with them. It sounds like you are on the right track. Perhaps if you eat to keep your BG stable, any weight issues will sort themselves out. Best of luck.
