A day in the life of a type one diabetic

A day in the life

Each day it can be a struggle. Life can be hard at the best of times, chuck diabetes in the mix and it can fast become a nightmare

I am writing this blog post, to try and show what thought processes go in the mind of a type one diabetic. I want to show newly diagnosed people how I deal with my diabetes on a day to day basis, it looks like a lot to take in, but it all becomes second nature. To me this is exactly the same as breathing in and breathing out, just something we do.

Diabetics make this look easy

That is one of the problems with the image of diabetes in the public eye. We are experts in this and as such we do make it look easy. This is why the media, many employers, co-workers, friends and family think diabetes is not really a serious condition. If we were all bad at diabetes control then it would become apparent very quickly to the outside world just how serious this is.

Whats going in in our head
Whats going in in our head

That’s the problem with having an invisible illness, from the outside everybody thinks that this is easy. It appears as if we just carry on as normal, lead exactly the same lives as them, go to work, go to the gym, play football, all these things we can do, just takes a bit of working out.

My typical day

Wednesday 13th July 2016

  • 6am – Alarm goes off. Before getting out of bed I check my BS and see it’s 7.3 🙂 Take my usual 9 units of Levemir and 3 units of Novorapid. The 3 units I take everyday as I suffer from waking phenomenon. If I do not bolus this amount my BS will just keep on rising until I take action
  • 6.30am – All washed and dressed now, having my morning coffee BS 8.1 and going up, its going to be one of them days 🙁
  • 8.15am – At my desk now and will be eating breakfast at 9am, need to bolus in advance. BS are now 7.9 and stable. Breakfast ratio is 1U to 10g carbs, 30g carbs for breakfast is 3 units, plus a 1 unit correction to get me back to target of 6 mmol/l by lunch.
  • 11am – About to have a meeting, check BS 6.9  😀 with that 2 hours after breakfast
  • 12.30pm – BS 5.4 will be having lunch in around 20 mins so pre bolus is needed to avoid a spike. Lunch is 68g carbs at a ratio of 1U:15g carbs I need 4.5U
  • 1.45pm – Feeling funny, check BS 3.3 hypo  😯  😯  Take 15g of  carbs to treat this one. I use A1c as my latest hypo treatment of choice, great little product. Check their site  ➡ hereI know why this hypo happened though, went for an unexpected fast paced walk after lunch, sure fire way to make me more insulin sensitive.
  • 2.15pm – Bs now at 5.9 after hypo treatment :mrgreen:
  • 3.30pm – Cake is offered around the office, happy days. BS is level at 5.5. No time for a pre bolus here though so take 3 units for 45g carbs  and get eating  😆
  • 4.30pm – Check BS before driving 10.9  😥 , that shows why I pre bolus and don’t eat cake very often. At least I am above 5 to drive!!
  • 6pm – Just at gym, check BS back in range at 6.1 🙂 Now with exercise at this level I will go hypo for sure, mixed up 20g carbs in my water to drink during workout, hopefully this will work
  • 7.55pm – Dinner is at 8pm no need to pre bolus as dinner has high fat content which slows my carbs down, pre bolus will lead to hypo in this situation. BS 8.1 Guess exercise didn’t send me that low today, or the 20g carbs was too much. Anyway dinner will be 80g carbs tonight so ratio of 1u;16g carbs means 5u and a 1 unit correct again
  • 10.15pm – Feeling tired and groggy, BS 9.7, that would explain it 😡 Wont correct this as have insulin on board, and I exercised earlier and dinner had high fat content
  • 11.25pm – Bedtime at last BS 8.1 😕 Guess im ok with that for bed, tad high but wont correct – 15u Levemir for my nighttime shot
  • 03.00 am Wake up in a sweat, feeling shaky. My old friend the hypo popped in to say hi again BS 3.1. Swig of orange juice and a chocolate digestive sees me right again. Guessing its delayed hypo from exercise earlier

Well there you are

Well there it is, just one day in my life. Seems a lot doesn’t it, guess it is a lot really but its all 2nd nature now. Its just part of my life.

If you are newly diagnosed then I hope this shows that we can manage this illness and you can lead a normal life, just takes practice

For now

 

Take care and blend your pairs

Type1Bri

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