Yesterday I made a serious mistake with a temp basal

Friday evening I had a big paper due for school, so I worked very late, until about 1:30am.

Late that evening, around 12:30am I started creeping up. During the day, the first thing I do when I creep up is to up my temp basal to a high level, then cancel it later when I see it was a false alert, or when I creep down (I do that because, any time during the day, I am at risk for hormone spikes: the earlier I increase my basal the better to control these). So I dialed a +35% temp basal for 12 hours.

I submitted my paper around 1:30am, then decided to relax in bed for a few minutes before turning in by reading a book while listening to music on my phone. Because I was very tired, I fell asleep right away, with my +35% temp basal on.

Luckily my dad follows my CGM and noticed I got low a bit later.

So, after thinking about it, I decided on a change of process for temp basals. They are very important to me for dealing with hormone peaks. But, now, instead of automatically dialing them out 12 hours when I use them to prevent a possible peak (or for any other reason), I time them to end around bed time or shortly afterwards. In the evening, I dial them for a short time (1 or 1.5 hours) even if it forces me to start them again later. This way, I don’t run the risk to fall asleep with a high basal on for long.

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I use and love temp basals, i use for meals also in addition to boluses. But i run for 2hrs at a time.

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That is a good learning @Kaelan, thanks for sharing. I will say with our Tandem pump, and the ability for the pump to suspend temp basals or cancel extended boluses when Cody goes low, we have gotten a lot more aggressive with them. Hopefully your pump will have this functionality soon. It is really nice to set a temp basal and then have it automatically cancelled when my son’s bg goes low.

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That would have saved me this time. I wish I had that with my Omnipod. But I think it will be there before I go to college. Also I think I will be more able to wake up to my alarms by then. Right now I don’t.

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