2019 is here and you know what that means – resolutions!
I’ve thought long and hard about what I should focus on this year, and tighter management of my diabetes is always at the very top. Managing diabetes is a handful of a resolution that isn’t always as easy as it sounds. Within the management of diabetes lies a plethora of other achievable goals to focus on. Lowering A1C and focusing on blood sugars, managing numbers with a lower carb diet, or even just learning a little more about this funky disease. I am deciding to focus on record keeping. By keeping a closer eye on my blood sugars, activities, and carbohydrates by record keeping, I hope to reveal ways that I can adjust my doses to improve my numbers and continue to lower my A1C.
I created a lil logsheet for myself over the next two weeks. Feel free to download it here.
Here are my overall goals:
- Pinpoint opportunities to update dosing, ratios, and lifestyle in order to positively impact blood sugar levels.
- Learn more about how my body reacts to things. Learn about patterns in my numbers and how my lifestyle impacts my blood sugars.
- To check in with Ariana (me, not Grande, unfortunately), stay accountable, and start the new year looking at my diabetes in a positive way.
Here’s the plan:
Over the next 14 days, I am going to record the following items:
- Blood Sugar
- Morning, Mid-Day/Lunch, Pre-Dinner, Before Bedtime
- Noting if they are in my target range or not
- Any random low or high readings
- Morning, Mid-Day/Lunch, Pre-Dinner, Before Bedtime
- Insulin
- Recording how much insulin was taken each time
- And if I adjusted based on an activity etc.
- Carbohydrates
- Recording the number of carbohydrates consumed at that time
- Outside factors
- Workouts (and what kind) or any activity involving exercise (shopping, extended walking, etc.)
- Eating out at a restaurant
- Any forms of stress (arguments with loved ones, stress at work, illness, etc.)
- Alcohol
After two weeks, I am going to take a closer look at my blood sugars and see where I can make adjustments.
Factors to consider:
- Are my patterns different on certain days of the week? What are the similarities between those days?
- Does working out or physical activity have an immediate or delayed effect?
- Do certain types of food always increase blood sugar? Or decrease?
- Am I always high after experiencing a low? Do I tend to drop again? Or do I level out nicely?
- Am I often low after overcorrecting for a high? Or do I still require insulin to bring me back down to a normal range?
- Are emotional situations impacting my blood sugar control?
Hopefully, after reviewing my data I can start making some positive changes toward tighter blood sugar control which would ultimately lead to a lower A1C.
Some quick information about my cute lil diabetes routine right now:
- I currently am on MDI (multiple daily injections).
- I use 200 units/mL Humalog Kwik Pens for my short-acting insulin.
- My carb ratio is 1 unit every 6 grams of carbohydrates I eat.
- My correction ratio is 1 unit every 40 grams over 100mg/dL.
- I use Tresiba for my nighttime long-acting insulin, which I take before bed each night.
- I currently take 10 units each night.
- I measure my glucose on my Dexcom G6, and may also test on a meter throughout this week, for accuracy purposes.
- Medicine is fun!
January Challenge: Join me!
If you want to join me in my fun record keeping two-week exercise, do it! I am going to use this worksheet to log my numbers, carbs, insulin, etc. Print it out, follow along, and let’s stay on top of our health in 2019. I will probably circle back to this exercise multiple times this year, whenever my numbers just aren’t actin’ right.
Be sure to let me know if you are joining the January Challenge with me. Tag me on Instagram or Facebook if you decide to try it out. Let me know what you end up figuring out. Happy recording!
– Ariana
Quick sidenote: The book Think Like A Pancreas by Gary Scheiner, MS, CDE, originally inspired me to perform this exercise. I highly recommend everyone own this book. It’s a great refresher if you’ve had Type 1 Diabetes for years and would like to brush up on some knowledge, and a great source of information on things you may not know about the management of the disease. The factors I will consider once I complete this exercise came directly from the book.
