Symilin (part 3): week 1

 Summary:
I've been taking Symilin for 7 days and have had a pretty good week with it. I have used it with every meal. So far, I have worked my way up to 30 mcg. Yesterday I could have stepped up my dosage to 45mcg, but we were planning a large celebratory meal and I didn't really want to risk not being able to eat everything due to a premature satiety. I have read online that some users are more sensitive to it than others, so not everyone ends up taking the full dose. I might be one of those. If I stop seeing the same benefits at the current dosage, I may take it up a notch.

Observations:

1. I have not noticed any stinging when injecting Symilin, (which some users reported). 
   
2. I feel full and satisfied after eating.  I'm likely to eat a bit less, and feel totally full. 
3. The "full" feeling is absolute. I couldn't even drink the 2nd half of my beer after dinner. Done. 
4. My blood sugar stays virtually the same from the beginning of the meal till about 1-2 hours afterwards. 
5. If my insulin dose wasn't quite right, it's the 2 hour mark that it starts to show. 
6. The changes in blood sugar are much slower. 
7. My meal bolus needs to be taken at the end of the meal or within an hour of starting.
8. The meal bolus needs to be about 60-70% of what I would normally take. 
9. The meal bolus needs to be stretched out 90-120 minutes.
10. It might cause a sleepy feeling after meals. I have other factors that contribute to feeling tired, but it could also involve Symilin. 

The main benefit I was looking for: 
I have been able to eat large, protein meals without seeing the glucagon rise that I normally experienced. It is still hard to get used to, because it always seemed like a price I had to pay for eating a larger whack of meat. I still see a small rise (30 points) later on from gluconeogenesis, but honestly, I like seeing a bit of feedback letting me know when the digestion happens. The times when it's been entirely flat it's kind of spooky because you aren't sure if you are about to go low...

So, that's where I am so far... I'm looking forward to teasing out a few more personal facts about how Symilin works in my system. I'll be summarizing the month of April in a few days.