Just wondering are all of you checking 1 hour after meals or 2? just wondering…seems like some like 1 hour after and some 2 hours after…
Two hours. Judging by my Dexcom, a one-hour test would be NOWHERE NEAR my target range anyway, even if my two-hour test is perfect.
Regularly at the two-hour mark, but sometimes at the one hour when my Dex tells me I’m going low.
Pre-pregnancy, my endo wanted me to check at 1.5 hours after eating. During pregnancy, I’m checking at 1 hour after eating.
It is best to work to prevent the spike after eating. I didn’t think that it was possible, but we adjusted my boluses, carb amounts, and types of carbs consumed to avoid a spike even 1 hour post-prandial.
I also was told to test at the one hour mark. I had previously been testing at two hours, and those numbers were usually fine. I did notice a big difference between the one and two hour readings, and my doctor also worked with me to make adjustments. The biggest thing for me to avoid the one hour spikes was to take my insulin a good 15-25 minutes before my meal, depending on what my blood sugar was before the meal. Good luck!
I think it’s interesting that it sounds like some of you are able to achieve anything consistent with your reaction to carbs. I also wait 15 to 20 minutes before I eat most of my meals, but even when I eat the exact same thing for breakfast all week, one day the spike will be insanely high and the next day it’ll be fairly nice and smooth.
It wasn’t like that before pregnancy. I was very well controlled before pregnancy and felt like my blood sugar was pretty predictable most of the time. I read about people having amazing blood sugar control during pregnancy and being so proud, and I’m like, Jesus, I could can do everything exactly right with foods that are normally totally predictable for me and there’s still no guarantee that my blood sugar will be in range two hours later, much less one hour later… even if it was perfect under the exact same circumstance yesterday, and might be perfect again tomorrow.
It’s really frustrating.
Kristin, did you reduce your carbs? I ate a fairly low-carb diet before pregnancy and have found I can’t do that now because I wasn’t gaining weight even when I had already increased my carbs and calories after the positive pregnancy test. Reducing my carbs would probably mean my OB would start complaining about lack of weight gain again.
It drives me crazy. I get pregnant and:
- My blood sugar is suddenly more difficult to control than ever.
- My blood sugar is more important to control than ever.
- I have to gain weight (even though I’m already overweight).
- The easiest way to gain weight is to eat foods that make your blood sugar go the most insane: carbs and fat.
I’ve developed a better plan for working in extra calories without screwing my blood sugar up, but I spent a week trying to gain a couple pounds because my OB was concerned that I’d reached the end of my first trimester with no gain at all and I was sick of the weekly trips just to weigh in, and let me say that trying to gain two or three pounds in one week is not friendly to blood sugar levels! I’m not doing that anymore.
I have gained some weight (around 5 pounds), but my doctors actually did not want me to gain weight in the first trimester! Overall they want me to gain no more than 20 pounds, but they said most of that gain should start after month 4.
I am eating 185g of carbs a day, but I am eating every 3 hours. I think that I am able to avoid the spikes because my boluses are higher than they should be and I would go low at hours 3-4, but that is when I am eating again anyway. This extra bolus insulin then partially covers the next snack. This works because I am eating at the same time every day (around 7am, 10am, 1pm, 4pm, 7pm, 10pm).
Also I never eat more than 10g of fast acting carbs (fruit, milk products) at a time. Most of my carbs are whole grains and low glycemic carbs. I do not eat anything that contains sugar or other forms of fast acting carbs (just the fruit and milk products).
Believe me, I never thought that stable blood sugars were possible and I DO sometimes get readings above 140 (but rarely above 200). But this system has helped me a lot. My endo was pretty strict about it.
Pregnancy hormones can make things quite unpredictable. You are not alone there! The last four nights, two nights I went high and two nights I had lows – so that is not really helpful for figuring out how to adjust my basal rates!!
The high bolus plus snack makes sense. It’s like what I do when I see my blood sugar going down too fast around the three hour mark, having a quick little snack before it actually goes low and I have to do something fast-acting.
I’m not as strict about not having fast acting carbs or sugar, but I am picky about when I have them. Breakfast and evening snacks seem to be the easiest times to eat those, and I might have something with refined grains mid-morning if my blood sugar is coming down too quickly, but I’m careful to avoid them at dinner as that’s been the most unpredictable meal with the biggest spikes.
I don’t miss that stuff much though, because I’ve always preferred whole grains and tended to avoid high sugar because I’ve been overweight since college… You know what I miss most since getting pregnant? Cold cut sandwiches!!! I’d really love to just have a cold turkey sandwich without all the extra work of heating up the meat to steaming (then letting it cool again for a few minutes in the fridge). sighhhh
We sometimes bake turkey breast ourselves and put in the fridge and cut off slices for sandwiches!
i do 1 hour from when i eat - not from when i take my bolus. if it’s a higher fat or protein meal, then i wait a little longer.
Two hours usually.