This is a question for other teenagers (and their parents).
Some peaks I get, I seem to only get them at school, For instance, 4 mornings out of 5, during the school week, I get a peak starting at 9:30 or 10. But I normally don’t get morning peaks at home or on holidays. And the same breakfast at home, even at the same time, does not cause any peak. And I don’t eat anything at school in the morning.
What is weird is, I don’t stress at school in general, particularly in the morning. So it should not be stress.
Do other teenagers get these kinds of peaks at school only? If so, what do you do with them? For instance, yesterday morning I peaked to 300 and it took me more than 10 units to go down. 10 units is a lot of insulin for me.
I know everyone is going to say: why don’t you inject before they come. The problem is that it does not happen every morning, just almost every morning.
Maybe it’s air from the school I wonder if it’s a good enough reason to skip school?
I definitely think you should stay home for two additional weeks playing video games (rules out exercise) to ensure this doesn’t happen at home. Trust me I am a Dr.; just don’t tell your dad I said so. shhhh.
Stress can fly under the radar. And stress isn’t necessarily about “bad” things. You could be anxious about something but not so strongly that you’d ever say, “Wow. I’m so stressed about this.” There could be a zillion reasons. Were you worried about getting to school on time? Is there a teacher or a class or a classmate early in the day you don’t particularly like? Is there a class you get excited about? Is there a class where the teacher randomly picks on students to answer questions or go to the board? Will there be a test or an essay or a project in a few weeks and maybe you’re a little late getting ready for it? Will you see someone in a morning class or at lunch you really like (stress, but in a good way)? Is there some small thing that’s different about the mornings the peaks don’t happen, beyond these more obvious stress-causers?
I also immediately thought: cute girls or romantic interest or whatever?
I’m older and haven’t dated in a billion years, but the thought of it makes me stressed out! You don’t have to go on the record, but I agree with @Beacher and @Eric that there’s probably a latent stressor of either good or bad things that’s happening.
Sorry it happens, and it sounds like you’re on the path to resolving that by trying to figure it out. I wonder if homeschooled T1D kids have the same issue - that might add an interesting perspective.
@Kaelan
I would also take another look at a possible breakfast impact. I am sure you already have as you made specific mention of this, but if it was me, I would examine this as a possibility again and try various approaches to be sure it is properly ruled out. The timing is just too suspiciously close to breakfast for me to not want to investigate that further.
Including (yeah - I know not fun) but skipping breakfast once other approaches have been tried. Not that I am saying skipping breakfast is good or anything that should be a lifestyle but as an diagnostic approach to try and identify the cause of something unknown may be worth the aggravation.
Although stress can have obvious impacts, I find it more difficult to believe that stress would happen at the same time everyday. Unless it was tied to a particular class/subject or something like that. But even then, I would be expecting significant inconsistencies for stress issues. Growth hormone also - I would expect significant inconsistencies. The same time (almost) every day just makes stress or hormones a more difficult explanation to accept.
I think that physiological stress is sometimes different from “stress” the psychological concept. it just means your body is gearing up for something – and it may not even be perceived by you. And so it’s very possible that your body is ramping up its stress response to face the day around 9:30 or 10am during school, whereas when you’re relaxing at home there’s nothing to ramp up for and therefore your body doesn’t do anything.
We’ve noticed that our son’s insulin needs go way, way up when he’s on vacation. But I don’t think there’s any one activity we can pinpoint that’s responsible; he just lives life very differently on those days and is probably less stimulated and active in all these tiny ways.
Adrenaline can cause blood sugar to rise. Possibly just being excited, or being sociable, laughing, talking with friends, hurrying to class, etc. could cause adrenaline release. My son goes high when he plays with his friends, especially if it is a competitive game. Just a hunch but I understand how that must be frustrating. It always is when it’s unexplainable. Maybe wake up and try meditation before school?
Another option is to split the difference. If you can’t get something perfect then don’t try to get it perfect.
lol
Dose an extra 3 units at 8:30 AM during school days where it appears likely (based on historical pattern) that you will have a rise. When 9:30 / 10 AM rolls around if you see the rise kicking in then you have a head start on it. The insulin would not likely be enough to completely stop it but it would have put a dent which likely would prevent it from going so high which would potentially reduce insulin resistence which may decrease the amount of insulin required to bring it back down. Maybe only another 3 or 4 units would be required so less insulin in total and potentially a lower peak and quicker drop so if looking at the area under the cgm curve, less high BG/time higher out of range? Maybe?
And on the chance that you do NOT get the rise (you guesstimated maybe 1 out of 5 days you do NOT get the rise) then around 9:30 / 10 AM you would begin to go low. Obviously you would have to decide if the (potentially) 1 out of 5 days going low would be “worth it”. But with only 3 units pushing you down, it shouldn’t take that many carbs to pop back up. Particularly if you were prepared for it so it didn’t catch you by surprise.
Anyway - just an option for a different approach if the underlying cause is still not able to be nailed down.
I totally agree. It could be stress, it could be breakfast related as @Thomas says, or it could be some other factor we haven’t considered. I cannot think of any reason why stress would be related, as period one is the least stressful period of the day. I have virtually no pressure, as it functions as a study hall.There aren’t any “hotties” either, as some of you pointed out.
I usually eat 7-13 carbs in the morning. My morning ICR is about twice my normal ICR: I use 1:7 in the morning, and 1:10 or 1:12 the rest of the day. But most of the time, when I don’t have school, I don’t have a peak after breakfast, only at school (although today, I had a small peak when I went to ethics class this morning at Sunday school, which is a fun class, not a stressful one).
This is a real coincidence, I just did this the last two days of the week. I tried an extended bolus after breakfast, not very big: 2.5 units over 1 hour. It has done well to lower my morning peak a lot, and I got rid of it much more easily. Now IO have to see what happens on a day when I don’t get a peak at school, but still have an extended bolus.
This is entirely possible, though I am not sure on what my body would be preparing for. Classes have little consistency in level of work or stress, so I don’t know exactly what my body would be preparing itself for. Maybe it happens at a level that I can’t understand.
Sometimes you have to treat the symptoms and not worry about the cause.
It never feels like that is proper but sometimes it is the realistic choice. And then later, sometimes the cause may become clear. But the fact is we simply will never know WHY all of the time. Sometimes we can.
Yes. I often have no carb breakfasts. Most of my breakfasts are 6 or 12 carbs, and my ICR for breakfast I use 1:7 rather than 1:13 or 1:15. But I still get the peaks when I have no carbs at all, it’s frustrating.
I don’t have morning peaks on weekends though, most days.
How much later are you sleeping in on the weekend? And are your school mornings rushed and hurried? For me if I get stressed out like I’m running late (for example) it can start my blood sugar shooting upward… if I’m just lounging around on my own time it doesn’t do that
They were. But 2 weeks ago, i asked my mom to wake me up a lot earlier, so that I would have more peaceful mornings. I like the mornings a lot better now, even though a have to wake up earlier, but I still get my morning peaks, once I get to school.
Maybe it has to do with lack of sleep. Although when we went to Canada over Christmas break, I had to get up super early to get to the plane, and I did not have a peak, even though I had not been sleeping enough for days because I had many tests at school. I just don’t know, it’s hard to figure out.
[Yes. I often have no carb breakfasts. Most of my breakfasts are 6 or 12 carbs]
It has been my experience that the more I try to go low carb, the more it backfires on me and causes my blood sugar to rise. My husband and I think the liver puts out sugar to make up for the sugar you are not eating, especially if insulin is on board. I eat Ezekiel sprouted grain bread with almond butter and jelly. My post breakfast blood sugars are better on this than when I ate a small serving of plain yogurt with berries and nuts.
Over summer, my patterns of morning peaks totally stopped during the vacations.
But I started school in September, and now I have harsh daily peaks in the morning again.
I have ruled out breakfast issues. I am trying to test on the amount of sleep, which may be the problem. It could also be early morning wake-up (daily cycle), but I did not get peaks over summer when I woke up early for early departures.
One good thing is that I have now found a way to bring them down quickly, except that now they often come down so fast that I use a huge amount of carbs to stop from going low. I will figure it out though.
Activity level difference? I eat the same breakfast seven days a week, but I have to dose it totally differently on work days vs weekends. I imagine it’s from the sedentary commuting and sitting at work…and generally having to be “on” while at work.
But you’re so on top of things I’m probably being Captain Obvious here. Good luck!!!
I wonder if it’s a good enough reason to skip school?
