October and November Fitbit Stats

Whoa, I'm behind on this! 

Oct: 195,200 steps, 31 days tracked, 6,297 average
Nov: 136,927 steps, 29 days tracked, 4,722 average

October 2017 was a big improvement from October 2016 - I took an extra 40,000 steps!  Unfortunately, November 2017 was worse than November 2016 - I took 15,000 steps less. :( 

This month is also looking like a lot less than last year (although to be fair, for most of December 2016 I was in Florida where it was super warm, so I walked A LOT more than I would have if I'd been here).  It's going to be interesting to see how this year compares as a whole to last year in a couple of days!

Holiday Failure

Well, my planning for the holiday season totally failed.  I didn't end up very active over the last month.  I haven't eaten very well over the last month.  And now I'm needing more insulin than normal to deal with everything.  I'm not sure why, but my knee started hurting for a few days (eating too much?  Not active enough?  I'm not sure but it sucked - thankfully though it's doing ok now).  Right now I'm just desperately trying to survive the holiday season.

In good news though, I bought a new pair of boots, which I tried out today.  I walked to work and home and they were comfy.  So I'll be good to go over the next few months in that regard!

For the last few days I've been trying to eat healthier whenever I can, which has helped.  I also had a few days where I was back at work, which also helped make me feel like life was a little more normal.  On Wednesday, I went shopping as an excuse to go for a walk because it's been so cold here and I didn't feel like pulling all the heavy stuff out (this was also prior to buying the new boots).  So little by little, I'm feeling better about things, but right now I'm definitely just trying to cruise along and keep my glucose under control. 

This time of year is rough.  Maybe next year I'll do a bit better than I did this year.  But it is what it is right now, so I'll just keep on doing my best.

Weight Update

Just a quick weight update for today:

weight: 203.6 lbs
fat percentage: 43.1%
hydration: 39.1%
muscle: 28.0%
bone: 10.8%
cal: 2309

I was really surprised when I saw these numbers!  I'd been feeling like a failure all week because my plan totally failed (my period started, which totally derailed swimming (because my period is heavy, it's no fun dealing with tampons and pads in the locker room. Plus worrying about bleeding onto my bathing suit going to and from the pool) and fasting (I looked into fasting with your period a bit.  I decided it was safer to not fast during my period).  Then I ate way too much pizza over a couple of days).  So I'm happy to see that I did a lot better than I thought I did!

I'm going to have to sit down later and reevaluate my plan a bit.  But now that my period is over I can at least get back to adding in a few fasting and swimming days over the next month. :)  

Christmas Is Coming

It's December and that means Christmas is coming!  I love the holidays because they are a wonderful time to catch up with family and friends.  They're also filled with wonderful food, particularly treats that we only get at this time of year.  Since I am wanting to get myself down to a healthier weight, this is a difficult time of year to navigate.

This year though, I decided to try to plan out the month a bit.  I actually have most of my work schedule (over the last year I've been lucky to have two weeks of my schedule!) for December, and I already know when most of the parties are supposed to be happening. 

I printed out a blank calendar and plugged in what I knew was happening.  Then I started trying to plan in both activity and fasting days around everything.  The first few weeks are looking relatively planned out.  The latter half of the month still needs some work (and I don't have my full schedule yet - I'm hoping to get it later today), but at least I have a start on things.

Once I have activity planned, I'm going to have to start strategizing how I'm going to be making it through the dinners.  My first plan is to keep a food journal on most days (it'll be harder to keep track of what I'm eating during the potlucks and parties).  I'm also going to make sure I have healthier snacks in my house and on hand at work (I suspect the coffee room is going to be even more of a problem than usual through the entire month).  I'm also thinking I should avoid the coffee room at work as much as possible - I know I'm really bad for eating things when they're right in front of me.

Looking at my calendar, I seem to have one party/potluck a week up until the last week (Christmas Eve, Christmas, and Boxing Day usually all have their own big meals in my family).  So if I can eat healthily through the rest of the week and that ends up a cheat day, I think I should be okay.  I'm also going to try to make healthy dishes for the potlucks I'm going to (because healthy food is still good! Everything doesn't have to be gross and gooey!) 

So that's the plan so far.  Wish me luck!  I'll provide updates as I go along. :)

Weight Update for Nov 30

Just a quick weight update for today:

weight: 207.2 lbs
fat percentage: 44.2%
hydration: 38.3%
muscle: 27.5%
bone: 10.7%
cal: 2329

It's possible that the increase is due to my period, which should be starting in the next couple of days.  But I will admit, this is disheartening because I keep yo-yoing between about 205-208lbs.  I put my Fitbit weight goal up to 200lbs today as a result - I would be ecstatic to see my weight go down just that tiny bit.

Lesson Learned

So last week, I was on vacation from work.  As I already said, I had a fantastic week doing very little except reading.

But over the weekend and over the last few days, I've had a heck of a hard time controlling my glucose.  At first I thought it was because I wasn't eating very well/more than normal (I went to a Christmas party on Saturday night, then went to my parents' place Sunday night for a big Asian food feast).  Then I started blaming my period because it'll be starting soon....but that didn't seem right either because it never gives me this much trouble.  But when Monday rolled around and I had a heck of a time bringing my glucose level down, even with proper carb counting (I made sure of it all day), I knew something else had to be going on. 

It was around that time that I started to suspect my lack of exercise may be the culprit.  On a normal week, I typically walk to work a couple of times, plus I'm on my feet quite a bit while at work (maybe not tons, but a typical work day nabs me somewhere between 1000 to about 3000 steps without walking there and home).  I took a random week from October where I didn't go out of my way to be active (ie I didn't go swimming, didn't have any days with more than 10,000 steps) - I took about 44,000 steps.  Last week I took less than half of that (21,000).  At a glance, last week actually looks like my least active week all year.

I had to run a higher temporary basal yesterday all day, which managed to keep my glucose relatively okay.  I also added more insulin to carbohydrate boluses.  As a precaution, I was only running the temporary boluses for about 8 hours; I kept checking to see how things were going before running another one. 

As of last night though, things thankfully seemed to start going back to normal.  My glucose is back into range, and food isn't making it go unexpectedly and crazily high.  I'll have to make sure that I maintain my activity levels next time I'm on vacation so this doesn't happen again!

Weight Update for Nov 17 and 23 and Vacation :)

These are a bit old, but here are some weight updates from November 17th and 23rd:

Nov 17:
weight: 205.0 lbs
fat percentage: 43.8%
hydration: 38.6%
muscle: 27.7%
bone: 10.8%
cal: 2317

Nov 23:
weight: 205.8 lbs
fat percentage: 44.0%
hydration: 38.5%
muscle: 27.6%
bone: 10.8%
cal: 2322

November 17th was my last day working before a week of vacation.  November 23rd was near the end of my week of vacation. During my vacation, I visited a little bit, but otherwise spent most of my time reading; these stats aren't bad for a week of little activity. :)

My vacation was fabulous by the way.  Last time I had a week off from work, I was so busy that I actually felt worse by the time I got back to work the next week (I hate to think what that week would have been like had I been working, too!)  So this time I went out of my way to make as little plans as possible and it was wonderful. :)

Fasting Attempt Two and Weight Update for Nov 14

So yesterday I attempted my second fast. It failed as a complete no-food fast because I went low twice (once right before bed, and again in the afternoon). I treated the lows with as little food as possible, so the day still ended up a really low food day. Interestingly, having that little bit of food meant I wasn't super hungry once 4pm/5pm hit. 

Then I made a really stupid decision: after fasting all day, I decided to go swimming. I went in the evening, after eating dinner. I walked to the pool, and did glucose: I was lower than I wanted to be, but still at an okay level, so I decided to try swimming but to test my blood periodically (and I gave myself a cut-off: if I was 5.0mmol/L or lower, swimming was over). After 15 minutes I was 4.7, so I packed it up right then and there. I continued on the downward trend, so I ate a power bar before walking back home.

What made this whole escapade even stupider was that a few minutes into swimming, I was HUNGRY!!! I don't think combining swimming with fasting is a good idea, so I'll make sure I don't do it again.

So after yesterday's escapades, here are today's numbers: 

weight: 205.0 lbs
fat percentage: 43.6%
hydration: 38.7%
muscle: 27.7%
bone: 10.8%
cal: 2317

Not bad. :)

Weight Update Oct 29

I was just curious what things would look like the day after that fast yesterday.

weight: 206.6 lbs
fat percentage: 44.4%
hydration: 38.2%
muscle: 27.4%
bone: 10.7%
cal: 2325

Looks pretty comparable to yesterday.

End of my 24-Hour Intermittent Fast

So I made it through my attempt at an intermittent fast.  The tail end was pretty tough - at about 4pm I started to get really hungry.  5pm was even worse.  But my hunger stayed at the same level from there.

To make things really bad at the end though, I went low. So when 7:30 rolled around, I was hungry and I was having trouble concentrating!  So I treated the low and ate a supper that was high in lean proteins as recommended.

Thanks to all the testing I did, I actually ended up with a bit of an impromptu basal test. The evening from dinner to about 10pm has been a notoriously difficult time for me to test, so this gave me some idea of what's going on then.

So I'm supposed to go back to normal eating after tonight.  So I'll have to see if I notice anything different over the next few days in regards to my insulin requirements or anything else.

Weight Updates for Oct 13, 17, 25, and 28

Whoops, I forgot to put four weight stats up here (including today's):

Oct 13:
weight: 209.0 lbs
fat percentage: 47.1%
hydration: 36.3%
muscle: 26.0%
bone: 10.7%
cal: 2339

Oct 17:
weight: 207.6 lbs
fat percentage: 47.8%
hydration: 35.8%
muscle: 25.7%
bone: 10.7%
cal: 2332

Oct 25:
weight: 207.6 lbs
fat percentage: 45.7%
hydration: 37.3%
muscle: 26.7%
bone: 10.7%
cal: 2332

Oct 28:
weight: 206.6 lbs
fat percentage: 44.2%
hydration: 38.3%
muscle: 27.5%
bone: 10.7%
cal: 2325

Attempting a 24-Hour Intermittent Fast

Lately I feel like I've been eating absolutely like crap.  Most of this is happening at work (there's always crap in the coffee room) or while out with friends.  I've been busy working on a big work project, so eating out has become an easy way to catch up with friends.

So last night, I went looking for possible strategies to help me deal with the coffee room thing (eating out with friends I'll have to deal with by saying no more often, and making other, non-food hang-out plans with people).  While doing so, I came across information on a 24-Hour Intermittent Fast.  After reading about the health benefits (this wasn't the first article I found about it, it was just the easiest one I could link to that I read), I went looking to see whether it was safe for people with diabetes to attempt such a thing.  The short answer was: yes, but monitor your blood sugar the whole time.  I even found a couple of fasting schedules for people with diabetes to try in this how to get started guide on Diabetes Daily.

Since my last food-intake last night just happened to finish up at 7:30pm, I decided to give it a go.  I go to bed later than their schedule, so I just didn't eat anything last night.  I'm not going to be very active today and will be monitoring my glucose quite a bit (which isn't really anything out of the ordinary for me to be honest).  And if I go low at any point before 7:30pm tonight, I'm going to call it off and treat the low.  But even if that happens, as of right now I've already fasted for about 18 hours, so I think I should be seeing some health benefits, right?  Especially since some people argue that all you need is a 12 hour fast (which is about what most people get while sleeping - although this book by Dr. John M. Berardi with Dr. Krista Scott-Dixon and Nate Green says people who are more sedentary may need 20-24 hours of fasting to get the full benefit in Chapter 1 (which is all I have read of their book so far)).  But, long story short, I'm giving this a try today and shall let you know what happens with it later. :)

Also, if you were wondering, apparently we are hard-wired to eat food that is put in front of us.  Some people argue that we can build up willpower to not eat junk food sitting on a table in front of us.  But that's not super helpful for me, especially when I'm tired (which happens to be every day I have to be at work earlier than like noon because as I already said, I go to bed later). So I think I'm going to have to brainstorm some of my own strategies to deal with the junk food, which may involve avoiding the break room. :(

Weight Update for Oct 8

Just a quick weight update for today:

weight: 205.0 lbs
fat percentage: 46.3%
hydration: 36.9%
muscle: 26.5%
bone: 10.8%
cal: 2317

My period is over, and I've been eating healthier overall this week, so my weight is back on track. :)

Weight Update for Sept 20, 26 and Oct 1 + Fitbit Stats

Ok, these stats aren't great.  I'm going to preface this by saying that the last few weeks have been stressful and busy to the point that I feel like I haven't really been taking care of myself (my glucose has been running high, I haven't been eating very well, and I haven't been very active).  So with that in mind, here's Sept 20th:

weight: 207.2 lbs
fat percentage: 46.5%
hydration: 36.7%
muscle: 26.3%
bone: 10.7%
cal: 2329

Sept 26:

weight: 208.0 lbs
fat percentage: 47.2%
hydration: 36.3%
muscle: 26.0%
bone: 10.7%
cal: 2334

and Oct 1:

weight: 209.4 lbs
fat percentage: 46.5%
hydration: 36.7%
muscle: 26.3%
bone: 10.7%
cal: 2342

These last ones I don't feel *quite* as bad about because I am expecting my period to start in the next few days.  But they're still moving in the wrong direction.  Which is true of my Fitbit stats for the month, too:

Sept - 152,291 steps, 28 days tracked, 5,439 average

This is both down from 2016, and less than August.  During September, I seemed to only break 5000 steps three times a week (instead of my goal of five times a week).  So I'll have to be working on that as well for October. 

I've been a bit healthier this last week in that my glucose has gotten back to normal.  So now I need to step things up in other regards of my health.  After today (because I have some slices of leftover pizza I need to eat), I'm going to try to eat out less and step up my activity (which also means going back to swimming - I swam once last month, which is actually an improvement over July and August!)

Oh, but on the plus side, I haven't felt exhausted like I was earlier in September.  So hopefully that is over!!!

Weight Update for September 12 + Fitbit Stats

Ok, so I thought my period was going to start waaaay earlier than it did.  Because of that, I've only just weighed myself again since August:

weight: 205.6 lbs
fat percentage: 44.9%
hydration: 37.8%
muscle: 27.1%
bone: 10.8%
cal: 2320

These numbers surprised me, because I was feeling gross and fat the night before.  I feel like I haven't been eating very well lately (I'm not really sure how true that is though), so I'm thinking I'm going to start keeping a food log for the next little bit.

Oh, Fitbit stats for July and August (because I'm apparently really behind on those):

July - 160,371 steps, 29 days tracked, 5,530 average
Aug - 195,489 steps, 30 days tracked, 6,516 average

These are both down from last year.

Finally, I am proud of myself: I managed to drag myself to the gym today and go for a swim!  I haven't gone swimming since the beginning of June.  In July I was busy with a friend's wedding, then I got sick for a couple of weeks.  Then in August, I never managed to drag myself back.  Of course, the longer I avoided going, the harder it was to go back.  Hopefully I can get back into some sort of habit now that I finally did!

I'm still feeling way too tired every day though.  I'm going to see if swimming/being more active helps with that.  If it doesn't, I'll make a doctor's appointment to see what's happening.

Weight Update for August 5, 12, 14, and 24

I have been so busy over the last month.  I don't know where the time has gone!  I had a week of vacation that ended and I was more exhausted than when I started.  :/

So here are the numbers from the last month:

August 5

weight: 206.0 lbs
fat percentage: 44.9%
hydration: 37.8%
muscle: 27.1%
bone: 10.8%
cal: 2323

August 12
weight: 207.0 lbs
fat percentage: 45.9%
hydration: 37.1%
muscle: 26.6%
bone: 10.7%
cal: 2328

August 14
weight: 204.8 lbs
fat percentage: 43.8%
hydration: 38.6%
muscle: 27.7%
bone: 10.8%
cal: 2315

August 24
weight: 207.8 lbs
fat percentage: 45.5%
hydration: 37.4%
muscle: 26.8%
bone: 10.7%
cal: 2333

I cannot explain these numbers.  I was apparently 2lbs lighter from August 12th to August 14th (it's possible that I weight different amounts at different times of the day - I believe on August 14th I got up later because I was able to sleep in).  Right now it's slightly before my period is scheduled to begin, so that may account for the higher weight yesterday.  But I may have also been eating a bit crappier lately?  (Although I've eaten a lot of stuff from home like broccoli salad, fish, and chili?)  So yeah, I don't know. 

At this point I probably won't be getting back to swimming at the pool until September.  I'm exhausted, and my period is going to start any day now, so might as well wait and get a clean start.  And I'd like September to be a clean start - with the summer relatively over, I want to focus more on eating healthier again, too.

Weight Update for July 25

I almost completely forgot to post this:

weight: 205.4 lbs
fat percentage: 44.2%
hydration: 38.3%
muscle: 27.5%
bone: 10.8%
cal: 2319

I'm super excited about these numbers because this was a few days right before my period! Hopefully I take care of myself well enough during my period so I don't have to deal with any weight gain. :)

Weight Update for July 18

I have been sick for the last week or so. 

But here are today's numbers:

weight: 203.8 lbs
fat percentage: 43.8%
hydration: 38.6%
muscle: 27.7%
bone: 10.8%
cal: 2310

That's pretty exciting!  Hopefully I won't gain the weight back once I'm feeling a bit better.  But honestly, I feel like I haven't been eating as much; hopefully that will continue!

This is a bit late, but here are my Fitbit stats for June:

159,632 steps, 28 days tracked, 5,701 steps average per day

This is comparable (but a bit worse) to last June.  I know I wasn't walking as much because I was doing a fair bit of basal testing.  I didn't quite get everything I wanted to done, but the testing went relatively well.  I haven't done much this month due to a friend's wedding and me being so sick.  So hopefully next month I'll get back to it!

Speaking of things I need to get back to: swimming.  Last month I went swimming ONCE.  Not good.  And so far this month I haven't gone at all.  Once I'm feeling better though, I will get back to it!

Weight Update for July 5

Just another quick weight update for today:

weight: 205.0 lbs
fat percentage: 44.2%
hydration: 38.3%
muscle: 27.5%
bone: 10.8%
cal: 2317

I was a bit worried about what I would get because I haven't been swimming or otherwise working out for the last few weeks. But apparently I survived both my period and the long weekend!  :)

This week is super busy because a friend of mine is getting married (I'm in the wedding party).  I'm hoping to get back to swimming (and basal testing - I need to double check the evening) next week. :)

Weight Update for June 22

Just a quick weight update for today:

weight: 207.4 lbs
fat percentage: 44.6%
hydration: 38.0%
muscle: 27.2%
bone: 10.7%
cal: 2331

I survived my birthday without substantially changing weight, so that's pretty great.  :)

Soooo Many Basal Tests

I don't think I mentioned it here, but a week and a half ago I had a really scary low blood sugar.  So I've been attempting to fix that problem area pretty much since then (hence the attempted overnight basal test on June 2).  In the process, almost everything has been going wrong to the point where I now need to check ALL my basals and carb ratios (and since all this is wrong, I might as well check the correction factors while I'm at it).  The sensor I'm running (which ends this afternoon) has helped, but I've also done glucose a ton of times over the last (I've averaged about 11 tests per day over the last week).  This whole thing has been super frustrating and will probably continue to be frustrating for another few days until I can get some of the basals sorted a bit better.  I have an idea of some of the carb ratios that are particularly off, but need to make sure the basals are working before dealing with them.

I borrowed Pumping Insulin by Ruth Roberts from the library, and that has been a huge help while I'm looking at fixing things.  I think I'm going to pick the book up for myself because it has been a really handy reference (specifically when I'm looking at carb ratios and stuff like that - knowing how long before your glucose should return to normal and how big of an increase is acceptable is great).

Oh, I also weighed myself today for fun. 

weight: 207.4 lbs
fat percentage: 44.7%
hydration: 38.0%
muscle: 27.2%
bone: 10.7%
cal: 2331

I'm having to cut out my activity due to the basal tests (and lows), so I'm not surprised to see that slight gain in weight. But it also occurred to me that I may not be losing weight because I've been going low too much lately (and treating the lows, causing a yo-yo in my glucose levels).  So maybe once I get through this hurdle and get back to being more active I'll start to see the scale move a bit.  I'm still wanting to get my weight to a healthy level after all.

Weight Update for June 2

For fun I decided to weigh myself today, just to see if there was any change.

weight: 206.8 lbs
fat percentage: 45.2%
hydration: 37.6%
muscle: 27.0%
bone: 10.7%
cal: 2327

Huh.  Neat.  I have no idea why such a big change since yesterday (I'm literally 2lbs lighter, and magically 0.7% more muscular), especially since I barely did anything.  But whatever.

In other news, I attempted to do an overnight basal test yesterday, but had to stop it because my carb ratio at 5:30pm was off.  I changed it last night and am attempting another basal test tonight.  Unfortunately I accidentally ate part of my meal during one carb ratio, and the second part of my meal during a different carb ratio (I currently have a new one at 6pm), so I have no idea what will happen with that.  If it fails again, I'll have to make sure I'm in either one or the other for tomorrow night.

I also was cleaning out some notes and discovered that I had set a new carb ratio while I was trialing the 630G.  I'm putting that into my VEO now, too.

I also started a sensor today.  I am trying it in an alternate site, rather than in my abdomen like I normally do.  The alternate site is approved by Medtronic, so it should be good.  So far it has been pretty good; we'll see what happens with it over the next few days!

Weight Update for June 1

Alright, so since my last update, I had my period and went on a trip.  Here are my numbers now that I am back home (and period-free):

weight: 208.8 lbs
fat percentage: 46.6%
hydration: 36.7%
muscle: 26.3%
bone: 10.7%
cal: 2338

I was hoping that my weight would stay about the same because I was walking lots on my trip, but I also ate more/worse than normal.  Not horribly badly (thanks to being able to have a relatively normal breakfast like I am used to), but still, it was different enough that my stomach wasn't 100% happy over the course of the trip.

Oh, it's the beginning of the month.  Time for the Fitbit stats as well.  In May I took 244,245 steps in total.  Oh, and for the first month ever, I actually tracked EVERY SINGLE DAY!!!!! :D  Not only that, but I met my goal of walking 5000+ steps five days a week (I walked less than 5000 steps on only 5 days out of 31).  That led to a 7879 steps taken on average per day.  That's a huge increase from last May (over 77,000 more steps, and an increase of almost 2000 steps on average per day!)

Finally, I have made gains on getting my money's worth on my gym membership.  I went to the gym 8 times over the month.  If I go an extra 5 more times (plus the 6 I need to go per month to break even), I will be roughly on par with how much I have spent.

630G End of the Trial Period

So on Monday, I put my VEO back on.  I wanted to put it back on so badly on Friday, but the sensor wasn't quite over and the reservoir ended a little too early.  So I sucked it up and wore the 630G for three more days.  I've been so much happier with the VEO back on, with one caveat: the 630G is way handier when you're adjusting basal rates.  It's a huge pain that the VEO doesn't remember what you had programmed in as later basal times when you have to change an earlier one.  But other than that, I'm so much happier

Over the course of the last two and a bit weeks, I discovered that there are quite a few things I actually hate about the 630G. 

• I know I mentioned that I have to turn the screen on to see the time.  Well, a week later, I've found that I REALLY hate that the screen turns off! I looked into the settings to see if I could have it always on - the longest you can leave it on is apparently 3 minutes. What a pain.  Of course, having the screen always on would cause its own problems while you're running a sensor, since the graph and glucose level would be visible for anyone else to see - and it's not their business. 
• The battery life is terrible because the screen is full colour (and probably also partially due to the amount you need to turn the screen on/the extra button presses).  One battery lasted just shy of two weeks (I turned the pump on at around 11:30pm, May 5th.  The battery gave me a "there's 30 minutes left of battery power" low battery warning just before 7:30pm on May 19th).  So it's great that it uses AA batteries instead of AAA's, but you'll burn through way more of them so it won't actually save you any money.
• YOU CAN'T TURN THE SOUND OFF!!!!!!!  The pump has the "Audio Options" near the top of the menu.  The first option in there is to turn the pump sound off.  But when you click on it, NOTHING HAPPENS!!!!!  (Believe me, I tried it multiple times).  Also, if you try to turn the sound down, you can, but it will not go to 0.  After the annoying beeping during the aqua jog class, I wanted to be able to silence it for times like that in the future.  But nope. WHY IS THIS EVEN A MENU OPTION IF IT DOESN'T WORK????  WHY CAN'T YOU TURN IT TO SILENT???  (*I realize you can't turn the sound off on their other pumps either, but seeing the option made me really upset that it was a fake option)

Oh, I don't necessarily hate this, but it's very annoying that there doesn't appear to be anything telling you that you're on a different basal pattern. So I spent the weekend using the new workday basal pattern I created without realizing it until Sunday (and was a bit higher than I should have been as a result).  

In addition to this list, there were many things I very much disliked after using it for one week. All in all, I have been very disappointed in this pump.  I was super excited for it when I first found out I could get it (and also after playing with it at an information session).  But after actually using it, I would hate having it attached to me 24/7 for the next few years.  I'm glad Medtronic let me have this trial period with it though - I would have been super upset if I had waited to get a new pump and didn't have the VEO to go back to.  I've been a fan of their pumps for years - this one is the first one I haven't liked.  I hope they'll fix these issues during the next few years, or else when I eventually need to replace my VEO, I may have to go looking elsewhere for a pump.

630G Sensor Trial Part 2

Alright, so I've had a successful six day sensor run on the 630G.  I was thinking that the sensor experience may totally make or break this pump.  Either it was going to be absolutely fantastic (and I would have to seriously reconsider whether my original misgivings/complaints were things I could live with), or I was going to continue to be disappointed with the whole 630G experience...

I know that I am a bit biased because the first sensor didn't work properly (which may have been why the 630G insisted on that calibration exactly 6 hours later the first time - I don't know for sure if it needed a calibration exactly 6 hours later the second time, but I also was super careful to do a calibration as close to 6 hours later as possible to avoid having to do extra blood tests).

Here's a fun (read: annoying) fact: when you are calibrating a sensor, it says "Calibrating" across the sensor graph on the main screen...and also the other sensor graphs unless you actually start looking over them. 

Here's the main 630G pump screen.

And here's when I specifically selected the sensor graph.

I know that it goes away on the sensor graph if you select right or left in an attempt to read the sensor graph.  I also know that the whole "calibrating" thing goes away once it's done calibrating in about fifteen minutes.  But I honestly don't understand why it's there at all (I know it's calibrating - I TOLD THE PUMP TO CALIBRATE!!!) and ESPECIALLY why it has to take up room on the sensor graphs off the main screen (I ALREADY SAW YOU WERE CALIBRATING ON THE MAIN SCREEN, PUMP!!!) Again, I realize it goes away after about fifteen minutes, but this was such a weird and annoying addition.

Through the entire life of the sensor, I found that my sensor glucose was consistently about 0.5-1.5 mmol/L off all of my blood sugar readings.  This has never been the case with the VEO, especially after the first day or two of running a sensor (it always gets super accurate from about that point for me).  So this was pretty disappointing because I had heard that this transmitter was supposed to be more accurate.  And I actually found myself not caring what the sensor was telling me because it wasn't overly accurate anyway - it was at the point that I was counting down the days to it being over because I hated dealing with.

Oh, and when I finally got to pull the sensor out, it looked perfectly fine.  So I don't know what it's problem was for the entire six days.

As you may have guessed, I ended up turning pretty much all of the fancy alerts off.  I had already turned the low suspend off thanks to the failed sensor.  But it was also annoying on the other end, being told I was going high/was high when I knew I wasn't (and confirmed it with a blood test). 

Needless to say, I would not be trusting these sensors/this transmitter with a closed loop system.  I don't trust my VEO with it, but it's a heck of a lot more accurate than the 630G was for me. 

Weight Update for May 21

And my weight continues to yo-yo. :(

weight: 207.8 lbs
fat percentage: 45.2%
hydration: 37.6%
muscle: 27.0%
bone: 10.7%
cal: 2333

At least my fat percentage came down slightly.  And my muscle increased slightly.  I have no explanation for why the weight has increased so much though (unless it's because my period is coming....)

Weight Update for May 16

I didn't remember what day I last weighed myself, so I decided to do so this morning.  Here are my numbers:

weight: 205.4 lbs
fat percentage: 45.5%
hydration: 37.6%
muscle: 26.8%
bone: 10.8%
cal: 2319

I'm very happy to see my weight going in the direction I want.  But some of the fact that the muscle and fat has increased is kind of weird.  I actually tried a water aerobic class last night, so there's no reason for the increase.

The class I tried was called "Aqua Jog."  You attach yourself to one of the lane ropes using a bungee cord and a floating belt thing. This holds you in place so you don't have to concentrate on staying afloat; you're free to concentrate on the actual exercises instead.

An example water belt.

I've never tried a water aerobics class before; I had a lot of fun.  The class is split into three segments: first it works your lower body, then your arms, and finally your core.  I really felt like you got out of it what you put into it...so if you really worked at it, you would feel the burn. This was the type of class that I wouldn't go to every week, but would definitely go back to here and there.

Hilariously (kind of), the 630G was obnoxious through the whole class.  I'm running a sensor, and it lost the signal part way through (I took the pump off because I don't have a good way to attach it to my bathing suit right now - plus I had no idea what the class would be like and didn't want to risk it getting in the way).  It started beeping loudly; I had to detach myself from the rope to silence it.  But I didn't realize the pump was still looking for the signal; it started loudly beeping again like ten or fifteen minutes later (and I had to detach myself again).  While this was super annoying, thank goodness I brought the pump with me to the poolside; otherwise it would have been freaking out inside the locker room without me around to silence it.  I didn't think of it at the time, but I should have turned the audio off; maybe then the pump would not have been so disruptive (but I don't actually know - maybe the alerts for this wouldn't be silenced?  I'll have to try and see later).

630G Sensor Trial Part 1 (Failure)

Last night, I started trialing a sensor with the new 630G pump.  And I ended up having a night from hell.  I started off low.  After correcting the low, the sensor kept insisting I stayed low.  This went on all night long (does this sound familiar? This exact scenario happened back in November, too).  As part of the trial, I had the low suspend turned on.  Part way through the night I had to turn it off because I wasn't able to sleep worrying about my insulin being turned off on me.  Then I also had to turn the alarms off so I could sleep. 

Oh, I didn't realize the 630G would insist on a calibration 6 hours after the first one.  I did a calibration an hour earlier than that, thinking that would be fine.  Apparently it wasn't.  An hour later the pump woke me up insisting on a new calibration.

So then I woke up around 11am this morning and did a calibration (the pump was still insisting I was super low when I definitely wasn't). The pump refused to accept the calibration.  Around this time I turned the sensor off and reconnected it, then did the second calibration (with a new glucose reading).  That one failed, too.  But this time the pump also told me to change out the sensor.  So I phoned Medtronic right away to troubleshoot.  We ended up pulling the sensor; it had a slight bend to it.  Apparently the calibrations also fail when the number is something the pump isn't expecting (so quite a bit higher or lower than the pump/sensor/transmitter all think it should be). 

So now I'm starting a new sensor. Hopefully this one will work better.  As a precaution, I used the sensor inserter-thingy that I got with the VEO rather than the one with the 630G.  They're very similar (and the one with the 630G is honestly easier to use, requiring less steps), but I'm worried that when I used it (and was confused because I didn't realize it needed less steps), something went wrong on insertion.  This insertion seemed to hurt a bit less than yesterday's, so hopefully this is a good sign for the week!

Weight Update for May 9 and May 13

Here's May 9th:

weight: 206.0 lbs
fat percentage: 44.1%
hydration: 38.4%
muscle: 27.5%
bone: 10.7%
cal: 2323

And here's May 13th:

weight: 207.2 lbs
fat percentage: 44.3%
hydration: 38.2%
muscle: 27.4%
bone: 10.7%
cal: 2329

That definitely went in the wrong direction.  But that's not super surprising - I went low last night and had to eat a lot to get back to normal.  I'll be detailing that though when I talk about running sensors with the 630G.

630G Trial Period

So here it is: my 630G:

It's currently warming up as I attempt a sensor with it.

As I said back when I got my VEO, I am able to upgrade to the newer pump if I want to.  I have a 90 day trial period, after which I will have to send either the VEO or the 630G back.  Medtronic told me to take my time on making the decision, because once I decide and send a pump back, that's it (I won't be able to change my mind).

So I've been running the 630G pump for about a week now.  I was super excited to try it.  Back a few months ago I went to an information session and got to play with it; it seemed really, really awesome!  But first impressions while playing with it for a few minutes are not the same as wearing it for a week.

So first, what I like about it so far:

• Access to the basals (including patterns and temporary basals) is super convenient on the main screen!
• It's water-proof!
• Basals are easier to edit because the pump remembers subsequent lines!
• You can have up to 8 basal patterns (I think the VEO has a max of 3)!
• It runs on AA batteries, not AAA's!

What I do not like about it:

• When the screen goes to sleep, upon waking it you have to unlock it.  This is super annoying, adding extra unnecessary button presses. And the worst part: YOU CAN'T TURN THIS FEATURE OFF!!!! (I do understand why the feature exists - to make it harder for children on the pump to give themselves extra insulin. But I have been on a pump for years and have never accidentally bumped the pump and given myself extra insulin. The extra button presses are annoying!!!)
• The menu layout is actually really terrible.  On the VEO (and all the old Medtronic 500 series pumps that I've used), the most important features are first (like bolus settings, suspend, sensors, and basals). On the 630G, the insulin settings are fifth in the list, sensors are sixth. (I know you can access insulin settings from the bolus and basal options on the main screen as well, but I'm looking at it just from the main menu). I don't see why audio options, history, AND resevoir/tubing are all above sensors and insulin settings.  Suspend is thankfully still near the top.
• I have to turn the screen on to see the time. With the older pumps, the time is always visible on the screen (you just hit a button to turn the light on if it's dark).
• I can't find the history of when I did my last reservoir and set change without manually going through the daily history. (I guess you can turn a reminder on to do the set change, but the reminder I set for two days went off after just one for some reason, so I turned it off).
• Changing the reservoir takes even longer than it did with the VEO (that was the one thing that really annoyed me with the VEO - I get it, they want to make sure new pump users are comfortable/have proper guidance. But for myself, I find the extra steps and button presses SUPER ANNOYING).
• The screen doesn't rotate.  This doesn't bother me most of the time, but there have been a few times where I've been annoyed that I couldn't see what I was doing and had to grab the pump.

Things I am disappointed about it:

• I was super excited to hear that the glucometer functions as a remote for the pump, letting you bolus from it. Unfortunately my expectations were a little too high - I thought I'd have access to the bolus wizard from the glucometer.  No, I do not.  It literally functions like my old remote (but a bit improved), letting me manual bolus only.  Well, and use preset boluses, but I don't know why I would bother to program in a preset bolus. 
• The basal rates are like the VEO - you get awesome fine-tuning options if you need less than 1 unit an hour.  As soon as you hit 1 unit+, you have less fine-tuning abilities.

To be completely honest, when I discovered that I couldn't turn the screen lock function off, I was ready right then and there to send the 630G back. But I want to make sure I give the pump a fair trial period (maybe I'll get over it....?). And for that to happen, I also need to run a sensor.  I've heard that the sensors are more accurate with the 630G, so I'm starting one tonight and will report back once it is over.

Fitbit Weight Goal Rethink

Somewhere along the way, I set my Fitbit's weight goal as 165lbs.  I have been struggling to get anywhere near that goal.  And in some ways with good reason - it's SOOO FAR AWAY (we're talking about 40lbs to lose right now).  This was made even more depressing when I entered all my weights into the Fitbit app yesterday, where I have basically yo-yo'd between 5lbs for the last year.

So I had an epiphany yesterday - why don't I set the goal to something a bit more manageable?  Instead of trying to lose the whole 40lbs, why not set a smaller goal instead?  After a bit of thought (and at Fitbit's suggestion), I decided to try to lose 10lbs right now (and get my body fat % down 5% to 40%).  Hopefully this will be better motivation!!!

Standard Deviation

Thanks to chatting with a friend today, I just discovered standard deviation and what exactly it means for blood sugar control.  How all this came about was when a friend of mine who also has Type 1 and I were talking about basal rates and sensors, he said to look at my standard deviation.

If you're unfamiliar with standard deviation in regards to blood sugar, here's Lloyd's handy explanation that he posted on Diabetes Daily:

Standard Deviation, often abbreviated SD, is a measure of glucose variability.

From "Pumping Insulin", by John Walsh and Ruth Roberts, page 19:

"Emphasis is rightly placed on high blood sugar levels as a cause for damage, but evidence also points to up and down or unstable readings as an additional culprit."

Standard deviation is obtained from insulin pumps, and some glucose meters (including cgm) and the programs that the meters and pumps upload their data to.

What are we measuring here? We are measuring how tightly packed your readings are around your average, or to state the opposite, how widely scattered they are.

If you yo-yo all day from high to low and back, that will show up as a high standard deviation. If you are very stable, without many highs or lows, that will show up as a very low SD.

The lower the number the better.

What is a good number? Walsh says get it under 65 mg/dl (3.6 mmol), or under half your average glucose for a type 1.

As a type 2, I have found that it is easy for me to do much better than that. I started pumping at a SD of about 25 mg/dl (1.4 mmol). Now, 7 months later with no highs and very few lows, my SD is 15 mg/dl (.83 mmol).

Say your average is made up from a 250 (13.9) and a 50 (2.8) averaging 150 (8.3). The 150 (8.3) average is not bad, but the 50 (2.8) is too low and the 250 (13.9) is too high. So if you only look at the average, you might think you are doing well, when in fact you are not doing so well.

Looking at a standard deviation will tell you if your average is made up of good numbers (great!) or high numbers and low numbers averaging themselves out (not good).

-Lloyd

So in the context of my conversation, basically my friend was saying that if I set my target for 6mmol/L throughout the night, but my standard deviation is +/- 3.0mmol/L, then my glucose will vary and there is a good chance I will have lows. If this hypothetical scenario is true, then if I set my target to 7mmol/L, then I shouldn't be going lower than 4 throughout the night.

I'll have to keep this in mind when setting glucose targets!

Huge Update

Ok, I've got a whole bunch of things to write about, so here's a huge update.

First, weight.  Here are my numbers from April 20th:

weight: 206.8 lbs
fat percentage: 45.0%
hydration: 37.8%
muscle: 27.1%
bone: 10.7%
cal: 2327

And May 1st:

weight: 208.0 lbs
fat percentage: 44.9%
hydration: 37.8%
muscle: 27.1%
bone: 10.7%
cal: 2334

Some things that happened over the last few months.  First there was an ice storm that closed the city down (so exercise was a bit harder to do during that time).  It was also my dad's birthday, so I was eating a bit worse than normal (ie eating cake).  Also I had a bit of a life change regarding one of my jobs (a major reduction in hours), so while the sudden free time has been nice, I've noticed myself boredom snacking.  Since I'm aware of it happening, I need to take steps to stop it from happening (or at least to only have healthy snacks around the house, which is a good idea anyway).

Next: swimming. I may have actually discovered a better insulin strategy for swimming today.  Normally I do 45% of the basal, and about 45% of the bolus at lunch or dinner before going.  Today I started out a bit higher than normal (I was about 12 mmol/L), so I decided to do my regular bolus for food at lunch (but I didn't do the correction).  Then I backed off my basal to I believe 50% like an hour and a half before I went swimming.  This worked beautifully! I wasn't super high to start out, my glucose didn't go super low while swimming (it actually only went down by about 1 mmol/L over the 40 minutes I was in the pool).  When I was able to do glucose, I did a correction like I normally do to get a bit more insulin working after being disconnected; a couple of hours later, I'm still in about the same glucose range as when I started (which is awesome - my glucose didn't shoot up!)

I bought my membership at the pool back in January.  Today I sat down to figure out the math of whether or not I've been getting my money's worth out of that membership.  The short answer is no, I have not.  In February it more than paid for itself.  But every other month I've fallen short (with March being super bad because I only went once).  To get my money's worth, I have to go swimming 6 times a month.  To get caught up with the money I have thus far wasted in January, March, and April, I will need to fit in an extra 7 times over the remaining year.

I also have to remember that my membership isn't just for the pool - I can use the whole gym facility.  Like last night, when I didn't feel like going swimming because it was miserable and cold out, there was no reason why I couldn't have grabbed some indoor shoes and my iPod and just walked around the track!  I'll have to keep that in mind going forward.  And I really should hit up a yoga class at least once (I just don't like the times they're all at - maybe the summer will have some afternoon classes?)

Finally, my Fitbit stats for April.  I took 180,912 steps over 28.5 days, which averages out to 6348 steps a day. That's 64,027 steps more than last year, bringing my average step count up by over 2000 steps from last year.  Not bad!  :)

I also had three weeks over the last month where I hit my goal of walking 5000+ steps on five days of the week! That makes April the best month so far in regards to that goal (February was my next best month).  Go me!

Weight Update for April 5 and April 15

I've been putting off posting here for a few weeks.  Here are my numbers from April 5:

weight: 204.6 lbs
fat percentage: 43.9%
hydration: 38.5%
muscle: 27.6%
bone: 10.8%
cal: 2314

This was super exciting - the numbers stayed about the same from March 26th!

Here are my numbers from April 15:

weight: 206.8 lbs
fat percentage: 45.8%
hydration: 37.2%
muscle: 26.7%
bone: 10.7%
cal: 2327

This was a bit disappointing, but at least it isn't a huge jump.  I expect things to go up a bit more unfortunately because I have most likely eaten more (this is the Easter Weekend).

I was a bit sad with how my weekend turned out - I was really hoping to have a weekend mainly to myself because I really feel like I needed it.  That didn't really happen, but at least I got a few things I have been putting off for awhile done. And I had an unplanned good meal with friends. :)

I've also gone swimming twice in the last five days, which was great!  :)

March 2017 Fitbit Stats!

I've got the March Fitbit stats!  It looks like I tracked 30 days worth of steps.  I took 154,255 steps in total over the month of March, which averaged out to 5142 steps.  Like last month, this has been a huge jump from my March 2016 stats. :)

I'm really excited by these numbers, because like I said last time I had an unexpected issue with anxiety.  I stopped walking to work for about a week and haven't gone swimming since that happened.  I've since started walking again and I'm going to attempt swimming tonight; wish me luck! :)

Weight Update for March 26

weight: 204.6 lbs
fat percentage: 43.4%
hydration: 38.9%
muscle: 27.9%
bone: 10.8%
cal: 2314

Wow.  Ok, I was not expecting these numbers. I've had an unexpected issue with anxiety, which has led to me not being as active as normal (not that that is a good thing, but I haven't been walking to work or going swimming).  In particular I'm really not sure why my muscle percentage went up so much compared to normal.  But for the weight, I guess I haven't been eating tons because there's been a knot in my stomach which has left me feeling not very hungry. I keep eating more because I know my body needs the fuel.  I have eaten some bad for me things (like a bit too much pepperoni  pizza last night), but other than that I have been striving to eat healthily.

Going into this week, I'm going to try doing a little bit of yoga every day (or at least most days).  To get me off to the right start, I tried out Element: 5 Day Yoga today, which is with Ashley Turner (a yoga instructor I have never tried before).  I like that her DVD has five short segments, much like the 10 Minute Solutions DVDs (but these segments are 15 minutes each).  I'm not entirely sure what I thought of this DVD though because I found it a little hard to follow in a few cases.  I put two of the five segments together, ending up with about a 30 minute practice (there were a few minutes added on to start and end, so it was longer, but there were times where I couldn't figure out what exactly was going on, so that shortened things up a bit).

I wanted to add a bit of yoga into my days last week, but that didn't end up happening (I don't really know why not); I'm going to make more of an effort to fit it (or Pilates) in this week.  I haven't decided how many days I want to be fitting it in - I'm thinking about four or five (assuming I get back to swimming one or two days this week).  We shall see how it goes!!!

As a side note, this is post 300!!!!  It's hard to believe that not only has this blog been around for 10 years,  but that I've also managed to make 300 posts in that time (considering there's been a number of years where I haven't posted much!)

Weight Update for March 15

Life is slowly getting back to normal (thankfully).  Here are my numbers from yesterday:

weight: 207.0 lbs
fat percentage: 44.9%
hydration: 37.8%
muscle: 27.1%
bone: 10.7%
cal: 2328

These are interesting.  I got back to swimming (once) this week.  And my muscle percentage went slightly down from last week.  My weight is staying the same, so that's something.  Overall, these are very similar numbers to earlier in March.

I also tallied my Fitbit stats for February a few days ago: 145,173 steps, 24 days tracked, 6,049 steps on average per day! That's a huge jump from February 2016!

Weight update for February 22 and March 8 2017

It's been a really busy couple of weeks.  I've actually been exhausted over the last few days as a result; I feel like life is slowly getting back to normal now.  So here's my weight from February 22nd:

weight: 209.6 lbs
fat percentage: 45.1%
hydration: 37.7%
muscle: 27.0%
bone: 10.7%
cal: 2343

These numbers were from when I was gearing up for what's probably the busiest week of the year at my one job.  They were also pre-period.

Here's the numbers from today:

weight: 207.0 lbs
fat percentage: 44.6%
hydration: 38.0%
muscle: 27.2%
bone: 10.7%
cal: 2328

I'm not sure how these numbers will stack up over the long term.  I found that I wasn't really eating tons all last week as I was busy.  I tried to pack healthy snacks (like cucumbers) but kept on forgetting I had them with me.  I also only made it out swimming once during last week, so it's interesting that my muscle percentage is up a bit.  But I did get out for a walk here and there, so I'm sure that helped with things, too.  Like I said, I guess we'll see how things compare as life gets back to normal.

Weight Update for February 16 2017

Just a quick update for this week:

weight: 208.8 lbs
fat percentage: 45.7%
hydration: 37.3%
muscle: 26.8%
bone: 10.7%
cal: 2338

Not a whole lot to add here.  My weight came back down a little bit since last week, but it keeps yo-yoing so I'm not holding my breath on anything.  The most surprising thing is that even though I've been relatively active this last week (two times skiing and two times swimming) my muscle has once again gone down slightly (according to my scale anyway).  Very frustrating.  :(

Happy Birthday, Type1Chick!

Holy crap, this blog is 10 years old today!

I started out trying to get myself in bikini shape for the summer of 2007, no easy task when you have Type 1 Diabetes.  Unfortunately I didn't actually succeed that year, or the year after.  I didn't always stick with the blog, slowly posting less and less until my all time low of 3 posts in 2013.  But since then I started picking up steam, trying to post ever week starting in the fall of 2015 (and largely succeeding).  Even though it doesn't compare to my high of 77 posts in 2007, 2016 actually ended up my second-best year of posting here!

I also didn't exactly stick with living a healthy life.  Over the years my weight yo-yoed down then back up.  As life got busier with work, staying active and eating healthy got a bit harder.  But now work is steady and I'm trying my best to lead a healthier life.  I no longer care if I look good in a bikini; I just want to do my best to lead a healthy, active life free from complications.

So here's to 10 years, and almost 300 posts (I'm sooo close - I wish this could have been post #300!)  And here's to a future dedicated to being the healthiest I can be!  :)

Weight Update

weight: 209.4 lbs
fat percentage: 44.8%
hydration: 37.9%
muscle: 27.2%
bone: 10.7%
cal: 2342

These numbers were a bit discouraging when I weighed myself this morning.  But now, as I sit here having to eat because I'm once again low tonight, I realized they totally make sense.  Hopefully I can deal with these lows that I seem to be having repeatedly.  :/

And yes, that seems to explain the glucose issue I've been having.  I'm going low for some unknown reason in the evening.  I caught a few of the spots where this is definitely happening last night (I did a stupid amount of glucose tests because the sensor I've got on was still calibrating; it seems to be a lot more accurate today).  I think I found another one tonight, so hopefully that's all of them!

Pump Download (Data up to Feb 6 2017)

This is not actually the most recent download I've done.  I've done one with data up to Dec 29th, January 5th, January 17th, then this last one.  So I guess I can give the summaries for all of them, rather than just this most recent one...

December 29th Quick View Summary: 

My glucose was in range (between 4.0 mmol/L and 8.0 mmol/L) 35% of the time.  That's down from the 55% during the previous download.  High blood sugars were also back up (55% compared to 39% last time).  Lows also went up a bit (they're at 11%).  The average glucose level  9.0 mmol/L. The high was 18.7 mmol/L, and the low was 2.8.  My bolus was 52% of the insulin I took, basal 48%.   There were 95 glucose readings taken during this two week period. 
*Note these were my glucose readings during a 2.5 week trip. Also there were no sensors during this two week stretch.

January 5th Quick View Summary:

My glucose was in range (between 4.0 mmol/L and 8.0 mmol/L) 35% of the time.  High blood sugars were even worse at 60% of the time.  Lows went down to 5% of the time.  The average glucose level  9.1 mmol/L. The high was 27.0 mmol/L, and the low was 2.8.  My bolus was 50% of the insulin I took, basal 50%. There were 107 glucose readings during this two week period.
*The day of the 27 I was high for no reason.  Changed tubing and site and corrected by syringe to bring it down.

January 17th Quick View Summary:

 My glucose was in range (between 4.0 mmol/L and 8.0 mmol/L) 51% of the time.  High blood sugars were 46% of the time.  Lows went down to 3% of the time.  The average glucose level  9.0 mmol/L. The high was 18.8 mmol/L, and the low was 2.7.  My bolus was 50% of the insulin I took, basal 50%. There were 116 glucose readings during this two week period.

February 6th Quick View Summary

 My glucose was in range (between 4.0 mmol/L and 8.0 mmol/L) 34% of the time.  High blood sugars were 55% of the time.  Lows were 11% of the time.  The average glucose level  8.9 mmol/L. The high was 19.8 mmol/L, and the low was 3.0.  My bolus was 51% of the insulin I took, basal 49%. There were 103 glucose readings during this two week period.
*There were no sensors during this two week stretch

My depressing take away from looking at these back to back is that overall I seem to do better when running sensors. :(

Also I do glucose a heck of a lot (if you were to do glucose 4 times a day, over a two-week period you would have 56 readings. I do close to double that in most cases).  It's no wonder my fingers have been getting sore lately!

Glucose Issue

I went cross country skiing for the first time this year last night!!!!

...and my glucose failed me horribly.  :(

This hasn't happened in years, but I was already low by the time I got to the beginning of the Northern Lights at Kamview.  So I ate a whole bunch of Skittles and a Power Bar and waited around for my mom and brother to ski the Northern Lights.  By the time they were done, my glucose was high enough for me to ski back.  I checked part way back and my glucose seemed to be holding.  Then back at the chalet I was low again.  :/

And of course when all was said and done my glucose went sky high and stayed there for hours despite doing a lot of insulin!  :/

I thought this was 100% my fault.  I ate a starch heavy dinner but didn't carbohydrate count at all so I assumed I did too much insulin.

But then tonight I wanted to go swimming.  I did my normal swimming strategy.  I was much more aware of how many carbohydrates I ate (and so knew I was doing the right amount of insulin).  But an hour later I wasn't very high, and a little after that I was going lower. :/

At 9pm, my absolute last chance to go swimming (pool closes at 10), my glucose was FINALLY going higher.  So I jumped in my car (sad because I normally walk), did glucose (still ok) and jumped in the pool to swim for 20 minutes.  I checked my glucose half way through the swim and was still fine; that's the only reason I stayed for the extra ten minutes (and did some front and back crawl!)  At the end of the swim, my glucose was fine.  I did a little bit of insulin to correct, but it's been going high ever since (even with more corrections).  -_-

So tomorrow night I'm going to stay home and do a basal test in an attempt to see what the heck is going on (without adding exercise to the mix anyway).  I also started a sensor tonight (it's my last one from the box that came with my VEO).  So hopefully I'll be able to figure this out soon!!!!

Weight Update for January 30 2017

weight: 207.2 lbs
fat percentage: 44.1%
hydration: 38.4%
muscle: 27.5%
bone: 10.7%
cal: 2329

I thought these numbers were exciting because this is after I was sick and (after I was feeling better) my period!  I didn't go swimming at all last week, so that was exciting to see the muscle go up slightly!

Oh, and since we're into February now, I've also got the Fitbit stats for January: 152,657 steps, 28 days tracked, 5452 average steps per day.  Compared to last January, I've taken 20,682 more steps, which brought my average steps per day up by 739 steps!!!  Go me!  :)

The one thing I noticed though: I generally make the 5000 steps per day goal on four days during a week, not the five that was my goal.  I definitely make that goal on days I work; I'll have to make more of an effort to make the goal on the days when I don't have to go anywhere.

Weight Update for January 16 2017

Alright, here are those numbers:

weight: 208.8 lbs
fat percentage: 45.3%
hydration: 37.6%
muscle: 27.0%
bone: 10.7%
cal: 2338

I was a bit worried about what the numbers would look like because of Friday.  I wasn't feeling great, but I managed to drag myself to the pool and swim, which was great.  But later that evening I asked a friend to go out for dinner.  That wouldn't have been bad on its own, but I found myself to be SO RAVENOUS that I ate a ridiculous amount of food (we're talking half a flat bread, fries, a small pina colada, and a portobello mushroom burger).  The lesson from that day is that I should not go out to eat after doing a good swimming workout.  If I'm at home, at least then I can pig out on healthier things like carrots!

On the plus side, I handled my glucose just fine through the night (even though the sensor I'm still wearing says otherwise - I know it's wrong because I kept checking it).  This sensor ends today, so I'll be doing a download after midnight.  Once again I've been making changes as I go along; I think I'm finally dealing with the problems I've been having during the evening, which is great!

I failed last week to make my walking goal of 5000 steps 5 days a week.  Last week I only broke 5000 on 4 days (and Friday was a very near thing - I didn't actually know if I had made it or not until finally looking now).  I will have to try better this week!

Weight Update for January 10 2017

I weighed myself on January 5th and apparently weighed 215.2lbs!!??!!  I was not impressed, especially since I knew I had a couple of big family meals over the weekend.  But it looks like I made it through those okay:

weight: 209.4 lbs
fat percentage: 45.6%
hydration: 37.4%
muscle: 26.8%
bone: 10.7%
cal: 2342

I'm back to where I pretty much started, so that's good because I do not want to be gaining any more weight!

Yesterday I also went swimming for the first time since early December (before going on vacation).  I mean first time in a more working out sort of way - I went swimming a few times while on vacation but it was more of the fun floating around in the ocean sort of thing rather than challenging myself.  I was going to buy a year membership last night too, but I apparently went a bit too late; they only process new memberships prior to 8pm (I got there at about 8:30).  So I'm going to stop in and get my membership later today.

Swimming itself felt really good.  I was proud of myself too - I even walked to the pool!  It's been brutally cold for the last week or so, and I've actually walked to work every day as well.  I bought an awesome new longer jacket which has been keeping me toasty warm even in the bitter cold!

Oh, and thanks to walking to work and doing a couple of walks around the neighbourhood on the days I didn't work, I walked over 5000 steps five days last week!  :)

Had Another Sensor Fail

My sensor didn't work. :(

This sensor started out ok (I thought). Sure, it wasn't super accurate from the beginning. But I wasn't too worried about that because they all seem to need 12-24 hours to really sink up. But the longer I was wearing this sensor, the crazier it seemed to be. Like at work today, it kept telling me I was low when a blood glucose reading revealed I was totally fine. I tried troubleshooting the sensor using some tricks Medtronic told me when the last sensor failed, but nothing seemed to work.

I'd finally had enough when I got home and the sensor was telling me I was high when I was low. I called Medtronic to troubleshoot with them again. Eventually they told me to yank the sensor; it was all bent out of shape. 

Needless to say, I will not be making any changes based off of this sensor's data because I don't trust it at all!!!

Insulin Sensitivity

I wasn't expecting to write another post today, but I also wasn't expecting my glucose to rise for no apparent reason either.  My sensor alerted me to the rise (which wasn't actually as high as the sensor claimed) and I corrected it.  I checked the graph of my sensor about an hour and a half later and was told my glucose had not come down (but had actually gone up slightly).  Huh.

At this point, I was rather concerned.  My diabetes educators have always been wanting me to deal with basal rates first before messing with other things (with the exception of carb ratios here and there) so I was left wondering how soon a correction should happen.  According to diabetesnet.com, "A properly set correction bolus allows you to bring down high blood sugars to within 30 mg/dl (1.7 mmol) of your target blood sugar after 5 hours" with a fast acting insulin.  So that leads me to believe that my correction is off.

I need to be careful here because I'm not feeling 100% (and illness means you need more insulin).  But I'm going to try raising the correction factor by 0.1 from 9pm in the hopes that it will help!  I can always put it back to where it was if I start going low as a result.

That random high blood sugar bothers me a bit though.  I may need to increase my basal insulin to cover for that if it happens again.

Happy New Year!!!

Happy New Year!!!  I can't believe 2016 is over.  I feel like the year went super fast!!!

I've been away on vacation for the last few weeks (hence the lack of updates).  I started feeling a bit crappy on the way home; I'm hoping a few days of doing very little will make me feel a lot better (so to that end I didn't go out last night).  I've also been drinking way too much while on vacation; now is a good time to sit around drinking tea instead!  :)

Having been away for the last few weeks, I decided to weigh myself today to see how bad I've been doing (I say bad because I put a pair of pants on and they felt tight).  So here are my numbers for today:

weight: 211.4 lbs
fat percentage: 46.6%
hydration: 36.7%
muscle: 26.3%
bone: 10.7%
cal: 2353

So not terrible, but this is the highest my weight has been since I got this scale.  Now that I'm back home, it's definitely time to be healthier.

Although I have to say, at the beginning of my trip I did a lot of walking!  I actually took over 20,000 steps one day!  In fact, looking back over the 17 days I was away, I took over 10,000 steps on seven of those days!  I didn't track my steps on 5 of those days (I either forgot my Fitbit or was spending the day swimming and didn't want to worry about losing it).

So I just realized I have had my Fitbit for over a year now and have tracked the majority of the year.  Check out these stats:

Jan 2016 - 131,975 steps, 28 days tracked, 4713 steps in average
Feb 2016 - 111,783 steps, 23 days tracked, 4860 average
Mar 2016 - 119,954 steps. 28 days tracked, 4284 average

Apr 2016 - 116,885 steps, 27 days tracked, 4329 average
May 2016 - 165,550 steps, 28 days tracked, 5913 average
June 2016 - 171,997 steps, 29 days tracked, 5931 average
July 2016 - 232,834 steps, 29 days tracked, 8029 average
Aug 2016 - 225,527 steps, 29 days tracked, 7777 average
Sept 2016 - 184,492 steps, 28 days tracked, 6589 average
Oct 2016 - 154,932 steps, 29 days tracked, 5343 average
Nov 2016 - 152,230 steps, 28 days tracked, 5437 average
Dec 2016 - 188,960 steps, 24 days tracked, 7837 average

2016 as a Year - 1,957,119 steps, 330 days tracked, 5931 average

December is probably a bit skewed, but that's okay.  I wasn't trying to hit a certain number of steps per day so these stats are an excellent baseline for me to use for the future!  :)

So at the beginning of 2016, I had three main goals for the year:

1. Eat healthier
2. Be more active
3. Take better care of my diabetes

I can quite honestly say I failed miserably at the first two.  I didn't use the G.I Diet at all (and really I'm not at all interested in doing so).  On the activity front, I did try to walk to work whenever I could, but wasn't really going out of my way to be more active than that (with the exception of November, when I had my Month of Swimming).  So this year once again ended up a good baseline for my activity levels.

The only goal I would say I've had some success with is the third one, taking better care of my diabetes.  That's thanks to me doing a crap load of testing (over the last two months, it looks like I average SIX tests per day!!!) and getting that box of sensors to try to help me smooth out my basal.

So with all of this in mind, here are my goals for 2017:

1. Walk 5000+ steps on five days of every week
2. Swim twice a week every week
3. Control my food portions.

Why these ones?

1. Walk 5000+ steps on five days of every week

I don't know if 10,000 steps per day is a reasonable goal for me right now.  But I do know there are many days where I don't even crack 5,000, especially in the winter months.  I'm hoping that by paying a bit more attention to my Fitbit, I can motivate myself to go a little further this year.  But there are days where I forget my Fitbit or am not feeling well, so I don't want to be beating myself up for those days.  With this goal, I realistically need to walk 5000+ steps 20 days out of every 28, which I should be able to accomplish.  Accomplishing this goal will also mean my averages should go up a bit per month and for the year!

A problem area seems to be the winter months, but that's okay, I've already planned for this: I bought myself a longer, heavier jacket for winter walking!  I should be able to walk to work even when it's really cold out now! 

2. Swim twice a week every week

Let's be honest: I love swimming.  I also loved going every week to the pool this November, even without company.  So I am going to buy myself a year's membership at the same gym I've been going to.  I've thought about doing this for the last few years, but keep getting dissuaded with the thought of the membership not being worth it during the summer months.  But the pool is walking distance; how nice would that be to walk there in the summer months?  I've already braved a few colder days in November, so I should be able to walk almost all the time (it'll depend on my work schedule though). 

3. Control my food portions

I remember a dietitian telling me that portion control trumps low GI.  So this year I am going to make a big effort to control my portions.  I've been using my dietary scale a lot more over the last few months, so I'll keep using it as much as I can (I actually missed having it while on vacation; I'm going to invest in a travel scale before I go on any other big trips!) Going hand in hand with this, I am also going to make an effort to not eat things because they are sitting there in front of me.  I know this is a huge problem area for me - I'll have to come up with a strategy to start combating it.  Finally, I need to stop being guilted into taking food.  This isn't normally a problem, but I ran into it a few times over the last few weeks while on vacation.  I am going to make a concerted effort to only eat things I genuinely want when I am genuinely hungry.

So those are my goals for 2017.  I didn't make any specifically for my diabetes because I feel like I'm doing okay on that front right now (basically I want to keep doing what I'm doing).  Plus the portion control will definitely help me on that front, too.

I have to say, I'm quite excited for 2017.  2016 was a sort of baseline year for me as I gathered facts.  This year I hope to act on those facts, making my life healthier as a result!