blood sugar Archives - The Life of a Diabetic

How Do You Log Your BG?

June 22, 2010June 22, 2010 Chris Stocker 1 Comment

Last week I was asked what my average blood sugar was and I could not give a good answer. I thought, hmm I can look in my pump, but wait, I don’t always input my sugars into there. So then, maybe I can look at my meter, but oh yea, I use about 4 different meters so those averages would not be accurate. Finally, I thought I can look in my logbook, but unfortunately it hasn’t been touched in about 3 years. I’ve made plenty attempts to use an excel sheet but then I started just writing numbers all over the place and never in the right place. I decided to start using a logbook again.

Right now I am just using the Bayer one that came with the Didget meter. I am going to take it old school for about a month and write down every sugar, the time, and how many carbs with how many units of insulin that I am taking. I had put a question out on Twitter to see how many of you still used a pen and pencil logbook and some of the answers I received were expected, “What is pen and paper?”. Even though I am an internet marketing guy, pen and paper to me still use what works best. Eventually I will probably switch over to using the iPhone to record all of my sugars, but I’m not to that point yet.

Logging my blood sugars is something that I haven’t been very good at doing since I was diagnosed. I recorded every single blood sugar for about a year, but then I became too comfortable with my diabetes and didn’t do it as well. I thought, what’s the point of recording them, if I can keep good numbers it doesn’t make a difference. Or I can just upload the results to the computer, but then I started using multiple meters and couldn’t get a good, accurate average.

I am also going back to testing 10 times a day and knowing what is going on with my blood sugars at all times. I have about 6-7 CGM sensors left that expired a few months ago, but I am going to give them a shot anyway and see how accurate they are. To end this post, I am going to ask for your help and just answer a few questions in the comments:

What logbook do you use?
What app on iPhone do you use?
What computer software do you use to log blood sugars?
Do you log food info along with blood sugars?

I appreciate your help with this.

Cherise Guest Post – Job interviews and Diabetes 

June 9, 2010June 9, 2010 Chris Stocker 6 Comments

Day 3 of guest post week is a post from Cherise. Please be sure to follow her on Twitter because she is very active and gives great advice and comments.

I would like to thank Chris for inviting me to do a guest post for him. I am honored.

There once was a girl named Cherise, she lived in California but soon to relocate to Indianapolis. She knew she had to find a job but where and what to look for. Cherise searched high and low. She applied for many jobs but no one would respond. She almost gave up! One day she received an email from Sue. Sue asked if she would like to come in for a job interview on Thursday. Cherise was excited. Could this be it? She texted her husband and off she was to Kansas City, MO to hitch a ride with her mother to the great city of Indianapolis. Cherise knew she had to eat something to keep her blood sugars from rising but she didn’t have a clue what to eat. Cherise said, “I can’t eat too many carbs because I will get sleepy but if I don’t eat enough carbs I will go low.” Off to the waffle house she went.

She ate bacon, eggs and hash browns. She looked at her iphone and it was time to go.  This is how the interviews went.

Interview number one:  Hi! My name is Cherise. I have diabetes. If you hear anything alarming or buzzing don’t be alarmed. It could be my insulin pump or my continuous glucose monitor. It’s a little hot in here can I take my jacket off? The interview lasted an hour! It was fun and I enjoyed talking to all three of the ladies in the room.

Interview number two:  Hi! My name is Cherise. I have diabetes. If you hear anything alarming or buzzing don’t be alarmed. It could be my insulin pump or my continuous glucose monitor.

Sue: “What if your blood sugar goes low? What do you do?”

Cherise: ␣I have glucose tablets I carry with my all the time. I eat a few of them; they bring my blood sugar up. After, I eat the glucose tablets I try to eat something that has protein in it to keep my bg’s leveled.”

Sue: “Ok, would you like a glass of water?”

Me: “Yes.␣”

The interview lasted about an hour and a half. It went great. I met with 2 people. I was asked about going back to school and why I wanted to become a CDE.

Interview number 3:  This interview was sprung on me at the last minute. I was a little exhausted. Seriously, I started interviewing at 8am….. now 1pm.  I repeated the same opening speech. I was excited! I have never had 3 interviews at once and all in the same place. My bg’s did not drop and I was offered a 2 positions out of the 3 I interviewed for. I know some people don’t like to disclose that they have diabetes when interviewing for a job but I try to be honest up front. I try to be open and honest with everyone. I have to go to the endocrinologist every 3 months. I could go low one day. IMO, the more people who know about me having diabetes the better it is for me in the long run.

In case you’re wondering, I went with job number 2.

Do you inform your potential employer that you have diabetes?

Be Blessed

Cherise

What a Busy Weekend with Good Blood Sugars

January 26, 2010January 26, 2010 Chris Stocker 1 Comment

After a really long weekend that was eventful and exciting, I had to go to South Beach last night because I was attending a conference there today and didn’t feel like driving down at 5 a.m. This past weekend was awesome, and there wasn’t that many high blood sugars either, it was pretty good. Friday night was just a normal night out on the town, until the end. We ended up at IHOP at 3:30 in the morning, so I wasn’t sure how well that was going to affect my blood sugar. Saturday was a whole lot of nothing, I relaxed a lot, and didn’t really get anything done. I hate days like that, but I guess you need days like that from time to time. Sunday was an amazing day. It was the day of the 25th anniversary of the chili cook off. The best part of that event was seeing Zac Brown Band live. That band is just incredible, enough said.

Yesterday was a long day, which is why I didn’t post anything, or go on Twitter at all. I worked on-site at Volvo from 9-4, then went right down to South Beach, made a few phone calls, answered some e-mails, went to dinner, did a little site seeing and then went to bed to wake up to go to the conference early in the morning. The conference was good. I must admit, I snuck out a little early and went walking around the beach and the shopping district with Amanda for a little and then headed home. I’ll be posting some Chili Cook-Off pictures, videos and also some from South Beach soon.

Time to catch up on more e-mails and make a few more calls.

5 Reasons Why Watching Sports Affects Your Blood Sugar

September 5, 2009September 5, 2009 Chris Stocker 4 Comments

I wasn’t able to get a post up yesterday because I was having computer issues. I have a WP app on my IPhone, but there’s no way that I can type that much on that phone. So it’s Saturday afternoon and I am at the Spanish River Library in Boca Raton with a nice venti bold from Starbucks, with my beautiful girlfriend and getting some work done. Why am I at the library on a Saturday afternoon when I am no longer in college? Because football officially begins tonight which means I will have just about zero time left from now until January to do anything at all. Tonight my Virginia Tech Hokies kick off against the Alabama Crimson Tide. It also means that my diabetes gets tougher.

For those that have been following me for a while probably know that my Hokies and Philadephia Eagles screw with my blood sugars big time. This year I have a CGM and vow to wear it for every single game so I can monitor how my sugars are going up and down. At my last Endo visit I was told that I need to track my blood pressure a little more frequently as well since it was 140/80 when I came in and also when I left the visit. During Eagles games I can feel my heart pounding rapidly on big plays and also at the end of the game. When they are winning easily it doesn’t really affect me. More on the Eagles in a further post when their game is coming up. Right now, it is all about the Hokies.

I am already becoming a little nervous because our star running back is injured and not going to be playing. Not to mention that we are playing the #5 team in the country. Grant it, we are #7 in the country, I hate having to play these top teams during the first game of the year every single year. Let’s get into the diabetes part of it though. And the reasons for why my sugar goes up. I have narrowed it down to 5 different reasons why they are all over the place.

# 1 – Passion and Nerves

I am a very passionate and die hard sports fan. I have been fans of the teams I am fans of pretty much my whole entire life. I grew up an Eagles fan, became a Hokies fan when I was about 7 or 8, so I feel attached to these teams. I have also had no luck with my sporting teams winning championships, except the Phillies last year, that I want them to win every single game. When they lose I become upset and pissed and feel like I am part of the actual team. Obviously I don’t want to feel pissy but when it is fourth down or there is 2 minutes left in the game and we are down by 6 my blood pressure is shooting through the roof. My goal this year is to take deep breathes and relax and tell myself that my life is not affected by this game.

# 2 Food Choices

During sports games I am not always able to watch the game at my own home just because of regional TV decisions. So, at times I must go down to the local sports bar. While I am there, I may as well make a meal out of it and eat also. This leads to a game long appetizer of homemade buffalo fried chips from Bru’s Room in Delray Beach, FL. Second part of the meal is usually a Memphis pulled pork sandwich or some sort of non-healthy meal with some mashed potatoes. You may have guessed why I named a specific food, because I am extremely superstitious and don’t like to go away from something that I ate when my teams have won while I ate that. I know, I know, I’m crazy!

# 3- Beer

Beer and football, just makes sense. Do I really need to go into why the beer intake messes with my blood sugar? I don’t think that I do, your educator can take care of that.

# 4 Guessing, not Testing

If I go to the sports bar then there is about a 5% chance that I take my meter with me. During that 5%, there is about a 1% chance that I will test my sugar. I also am kind of guessing how many carbs are in the food. Usually what I do is just take a 25 unit max bolus and then eat to cover my insulin. If I “feel” that I am getting low then I will just eat more of the chips or maybe even order a dessert or something else. Not a great decision for a diabetic.

# 5 Stress

This one comes during the game which I started to get into during reason #1. The stress gets even worse after a loss. I will be stressed out and down in the dumps for a few hours or even the next day until I finally get over it and realize that next week we get another chance to win. The later into the season the worse the stress gets.

I now know the reasons why sports affect my blood sugars, now it’s time to do something about it and fix these 5 things. Well I am going to the sports bar tonight even though the game is nationally televised, but I am going to eat healthy. No beer, no pulled pork. I will have an un-sweetened iced tea, a cobb salad and maybe a cup of French Onion soup. Maybe, just maybe I may cheat and get some jalapeno poppers because Amanda also likes them.