Sunday, June 3, 2012

High intensity muscle work, a new tricky project...

I've been doing some sporadic strength training, but the frequency has been spotty because the effect on BG has been hard to predict and balance. The first time I did a 30 min. workout before dinner (a couple months ago) I ended up with my BG at 300 after dinner. Geesh, talk about counter-intuitive results...

Yesterday, I took a unit of insulin before working out and then had dinner, and saw it rise to 170 mg/dl before I took a walk and another correction and it began to descend.

I also threw in another variable which was that I had a glass of milk with dinner, which is usually "off my list". I understand that the carbs and other parts of the milk might be useful post-workout to help with recovery and muscle building. It's likely that I didn't bolus enough for the milk and the meal together. I was shy on the bolus because of the insulin sensitivity that often comes after exercise. I normally think of a glass of milk as 12 grams of carb, which is about what I usually eat for my whole meal. I only bolused for 15 grams.

In the end, I spent the 7pm-midnight window out of range, and a correction at about 9:30pm brought things back to normal overnight. I looks like I needed about 1.5 more units somewhere in the mix. The caveat... I'm not sure I would want to bolus much more in this situation because my wake-up BG was 50-60 mg/dl. I think the exercise impacted my overnight basal. There are surely a few moving parts here.

I may try working out earlier in the day so that I can isolate the impact and get it straightened out before it gets tangled in meal and bedtime factors. It's a bit tricky because the AM isn't probably the best time to do strength training because of the dawn phenomenon, but the pre-dinner window is also less than perfect. Well, just until I get it sorted out... and I will.

4 comments:

  1. I think trying to do it earlier is a good idea. When you are on your summer break that should be easier. The whole night-time thing is really tricky!

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    1. Yeah, I think summer will be the time to work out the kinks. As of today, it's time to tinker.

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  2. Too many variables! At least it sounds a lot better than the previous time.
    I like doing aerobic exercise in the pre-breakfast AM because it's the only time I can really avoid lows despite going running. At that time of day it just leaves my blood sugar pretty level... well, at least sometimes it does. Sometimes it rises or falls anyways.

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    1. Yes, it seems like the AM is the time that a walk might not work as well for a correction, at least that's what the "experts" say. However, if I have an insulin correction on board, I'm getting a rapid correction in the AM as much as any other time of the day. But, if it's just normal basal insulin in my system, I'm not seeing much change in the AM. So, it's pretty easy to throw a walk in there before breakfast or whatever happens in the AM.

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