It's definitely warmed up here in Minneapolis, to which most of us here say...finally. Over the half the year here, it's dreadfully cold. So while some complain about the 95+ degree days we've had for the last four days, I am actually enjoying it.
Yesterday, it reached 99 degrees. For some reason, I felt like it was a good idea to go for a 3.2 mile speed walk session. I strapped on my Spibelt, threw in it my CGM and a roll of glucose tabs, grabbed my iPhone and earbuds, and hit the pavement. I ate a healthy snack one hour before the workout (1 small banana with all natural peanut butter, 1/4 cup of pumpkin seeds and 2 turkey sausage links). Right before leaving the house, I drank a toddler-sized Juicy Juice, just to be extra prepared. When I left the house, my bg was 133.
The speed walking felt good. I don't mind the sweat pouring down my limbs. It felt like progress. Every 10 minutes or so I checked my CGM. The lowest my bg got was 79, which was awesome! When I came home, I did 75 crunches and pushups and then ate a full, healthy meal (stuffed peppers, stuffed with quinoa, organic hamburger, garlic, onions, and tomato sauce. I've been cutting out dairy lately so I didn't put any cheese on them. Instead, I seasoned with oregano, Mrs. Dash Southwest Chipotle, pepper and nutritional yeast flakes.)
All went better than I anticipated. I thought to myself, maybe I am one of the diabetics who aren't affected much by exercise or heat.
Wrong.
My CGM started alarming me of lows starting at 11pm and continued throughout the night. I wasn't dangerously low, but low enough to have to get up each time to eat glucose tabs or drink juice. The last of the alarms went off around 4:30am. In between the alarms, I dreamt of being awake and checking my blood sugar. I'd wake up and realize I was dreaming. The dog had enough of my getting up all night and around 5am, she started whining that she needed to go to the bathroom. I opened my heavy eyelids and thought to myself "are you kidding me?" So, I got up, took her out to go to the bathroom and this time, I just stayed up. I knew that trying to go back to sleep when I had to get up soon would only make things worse.
I have been in a sleepy fog all day. I had to drive down to Rochester, MN (about an hour from my house), had to be there by 7:30 am. I was so tired driving back that I almost fell asleep a couple of times. I feel like I went on a binger last night. (I actually don't drink, but I do remember my college years ;)
I'm realizing that exercising with diabetes is a little challenging because it can affect you long after you're done. It's unfair! I want to exercise and be healthy, but having residual lows makes me scared to do it. It also sucks that in the end, I end up eating all the calories (to treat the lows) that I was trying to burn off in the first place. I was going to go for another speed walk today, but the high today is 100 degrees and humid. So I thought I'd take a pass today. I think it's supposed to be cooler the rest of the week, so I'll try again then.
On a happier note, I'm pretty psyched about Crystal Light's new drink flavors (sugar free AND gluten free). I usually try to steer cleer of artificial sweeteners, but for these flavors, I'll make an exception! I tried the margarita flavor yesterday and it's FAB. Gotta appreciate the MOCKtinis!
Your post spoke to me because I used to work out at least 5 days a week, but started getting really frustrated over post-workout lows. I kept having to stop every 15-20 min to check my blood sugar, and it started to really annoy me that I had to cut my workouts short. Also, I don't want to take in extra calories so I always do glucose tablets. But, it also can be annoying having to chomp those things down, so juice or a sports drink seems preferable. I think overall though it helps stabilize numbers long-term. I also find that after a workout, I need less insulin so I switch my carb:insulin amount. I sometimes even decrease basal for about an hour or 2 afterwards.
ReplyDeleteI give you a lot of kudos! It seemed as though you learned a lot about your diabetes tendencies from working out so often. I hope that the more I work out, the more I will learn and that the bg will become more predictable. One can hope, anyways :)
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