"Activity" is not the same thing as "Exercise": Allison's Running Trial

:heart::+1::muscle::fist:

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Week 6 Run 2: 19:00; 1.73 miles - Ran 15:00 (1.55 miles) at 6.2 mph until last minute of 6.5 mph
ZB 30:00, 2:55 after breakfast, no carbs prior
Start: 130
End: 134

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Wow, you stayed near the same from start to end! Well done! :slight_smile:

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WOOO!

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Really is amazing how much more effectively we respond to insulin with regular cardio exercise… I fall on and off that wagon pretty regularly but my blood sugars are much better with much less insulin while I’m on it

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Alright. It’s time for Accountability Hour here. I did not do Friday’s run. For a good reason, though.

I’ll be starting my 7th week of running. I started out 4x/week. I decided a week or two ago to bump that back to 3x/week (M/W/F) to give me more flexibility with how to spend my family time.

What running has currently clarified for me is that I need to take better care of my basics. I need to sleep more and sleep better. I need to hydrate better (coffee lover here). I need to get my fear of prebolusing under control. For years…since starting on the pump…I’ve gotten this weird, irrational fear of prebolusing. I’ve gotten too disconnected from the grass roots of what’s going on with my blood sugar and that’s undermined all of the things that I actually do know about managing my bg. In transitioning to the pump, I’ve gotten overly preoccupied with all of the possible Boogeyman Factors that might spin off sideways and have ignored the basic, foundational rules of engagement…such as prebolusing.

So I have been eating the same lunch, testing different prebolusing timing, and not complicating the picture by watching the bg/Novolog action for the next five hours. It has already helped tremendously. Novolog’s action is really evenly distributed for me from 40 minutes in to about 5 hours in. This means I really should listen to myself and spread out my planned lunch carbs. For me, that means my sandwich and V8 as the first carb installment…and then when the medium spike turns back downward two or three hours later, have my yogurt. I really do think that Novolog works differently in my system than Humalog did. With Humalog, I’d get the bulk of the action in the first three hours. Novolog stays strong longer in my system.

So anyway. What was happening is that I was spiking from not prebolusing hardly at all for lunch. Then I’d be stuck stupid high. Then I’d incorrectly assume the Novolog wasn’t going to do anything else. Then I’d take a correction dose. Then the 3/4/5 hour action would kick in plus correction. And then I’d have missed my afternoon snack and was going low at dinner.

That’s the main problem I’ve had for far too long. I got off track by listening too much to what worked for other people. That’s always been the tricky thing for me…being open to new ideas for what might work better…but figuring out which “rules” in my body really are my rules to follow. I’m finding that the rules I’d decided on for myself on shots are still the foundational rules that I need to adhere to on the pump.

So I’ll get back to running this week. Wish me luck.

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Week 7 Run 1: 15:00, 1.54 miles, 5:00 walk cool down
Blood sugar is being “fun” today. I’m near the ovulation kick-off to two weeks of silly (obnoxious) variable insulin resistance.
No ZB. Kept Basal on for entire run. 3:00 after breakfast.
Starting bg: 177
Ending bg: 209
10 minutes after work-out: 183

My bg was beautifully flat overnight until a 30 point rise pre-wake up. I knew I was going to walk my dog after breakfast so I took 3 units instead of 4 units (via injection). (In this same scenario just two weeks ago and last week…I needed to take carbs before my run to keep me level even with the ZB 30:00 prior…so I’m blaming hormones for this until I see something that tells me otherwise.)

I tested 30 minutes prior to my work-out (183) and immediately prior (177), which is why I kept my basal on for the run. We’ll see if I regret that choice today.

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Are you spending all that time at the 10:00 pace now? That’s wonderful progress!

Did this drop continued? The post-run drop is sometimes a nice sign of hard work. :grinning:

Great run today!

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6.2 mph for first 14 min (minus treadmill spool up). 6.5 mph for last minute.

Surprisingly no. It was still stuck at 180 an hour later.

thanks for your honesty. you will be setting new goals for yourself every time you put yourself out there. one foot at a time and you could run around the globe :grin:

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sounds about right?? or a site gone bad?

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Yeah I can’t tell for sure. I had great numbers that previous night to the run on that same pod. I’m on a new pod now and am dealing with the same resistance which makes sense hormone-wise. I’m dialing up basal and boluses. Wish there was a decoder ring for it.

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Week 7 Run 2: 15:00, 1.54 mi, 3 minute cool down
ZB: 35:00 prior; 2:50 after breakfast
Bg 10:00 prior to run: 113 slow decline, ate 6g carbs
Ending Bg: 129

*I injected 4 units for my standard breakfast this morning rather than 3 units like on Monday. That did a nice job given the current hormone resistance. Throughout my four weeks, my breakfast bolus/injection ranges from 2.5 units up to 4 units for the same breakfast everyday. Hormones, baby. I would not be comfortable running 2:50 after breakfast with 4 units taken in the first half of the month. Second half? Different story. The more I learn…

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Week 8 Run 1: 9:40, 1 mile, 5 minute walk
ZB 30:00 prior, 3:00 after breakfast
Bg 30:00 prior: 150
Bg at start: 150
Bg at end: 160

So, I’m going to stick with brutal honesty and oversharing bc (1) they are my natural impulses that I’m too lazy to restrain and (2) I find that they help me find neat people much quicker than being polite.

My Dexcom transmitter was due for replacement this upcoming Friday…but it’s been losing signal like a mo fo for the last week. In light of my data loss last night before bed, I played it safe and went to bed 130ish for bg. I regained signal overnight, but it didn’t really help me overall. I’m taking Singulair right now for allergy season and it gives me wicked nightmares. I had the WORST nightmare last night and woke up Completely Soaked. I checked my bg thinking it might be a low but nope, it was a nightmare. My blood sugar was hovering just below my high threshold most of the night…not sure if that was from the nightmare or any of the other five million things it could be from. Anyway, I lost signal again this morning so I ripped out the Dexcom sensor, fired up a new transmitter, and got my warm up period started. I didn’t have trend data before the run…just fingersticks. That’s why I went ahead with ZB even with a bg of 150 at 30 minutes prior to a run. I figured it would give my breakfast bolus some room and I could run and cool down sans Dexcom without worrying too much about it. (I know I can fingerstick until the cows come home, but I hate testing during a workout. It’s super demotivating for me. We’ll unpack that later.)

So anyway. No Dexcom. I was really dizzy this morning anytime I changed from sitting to standing or stretching. Even just laying down during stretching made the room spin a bit. I assume that’s from dehydration? Maybe? So I worked on hydration today. After the run. :slight_smile:

Got on the treadmill. Ignored the screen. Kept track of how many songs I’d listened to. At three songs in, the tops of my shoulders sweat. That’s still weird to me.

Then I felt like I had something under the ball of my foot that was stuck under my sock or something. And then I wondered if I would end up with diabetic foot problems because I started exercising and if that would stop @Eric from his mad ways (TEASING - I LOVE YOUR CRAZINESS EVEN THOUGH I KNOW RUNNING IS SERIOUS AND I’M NOT SUPPOSED TO JOKE ABOUT IT). And then I made it to a mile and all things considered (dizzy and foot weirdness…never did find any rock or anything in my shoe), I was good with stopping at a mile today.

The good things are that I look forward to running now. I still hate it but not as much as I used to. I am WAYYYYY less dependent on Dexcom and don’t rely on it in incorrect ways like I used to…so running in the “dark” was not even a thing to me today. I never would have done that at the start of this. Being in the “dark” post-run was also no big deal to me. So those are all good things that make a Huge quality of life change for me that are super easily applied to most every other area of my life. Thanks, @Eric!

So there’s the brutal play-by-play. If you want sexy running, go to @Nickyghaleb’s thread. (Love you, Nicky!!) My exercise thread is more…

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Yes.

All are welcome. Most will be terribly disappointed.

Love you, too. :hugs:

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Week 9? Can’t remember; Run 1 aka “A Learning Experience”

Running three hours after dinner is WAY different than running three hours after breakfast.

ZB 30:00 prior, 3:00 after dinner injection
Starting bg 150
Ran .75 miles at 6.2 mph, felt nauseous, tested…bg 130, 8g carb
Walked for 5 minutes and kept feeling bad
Bg 111

That’s it for me tonight!

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Was it from the dinner or your BG?

I’m guessing from the drop bc the nausea stopped after the descent was arrested. I ended up taking three tabs and a 24g juice box in total. Seeing it go from 130 to 111 five minutes apart via fingerstick was interesting.

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What was the difference between after dinner versus after breakfast? A bigger bolus which meant you had more IOB? Or was there something else happening?

More IOB.