frustrated and confused, how do you get ahead?
So this morning, I was amazed and delighted to test my fasting blood sugar at 124. I SO want to get down to 100. I went out to walk and throw the ball to my impatient German Shepherd before breakfast, and about 3000 steps later, came in. I tested my blood sugar before eating and it was 177. Without eating. I know exercise can spur the liver into releasing glycogen in the bloodstream for the muscles, (now, having looked it up) but I was so hoping to see my blood sugar go down. I try to walk 10-20K steps a day, throughout the day. How do I keep my blood sugar low when exercise (if it is) is making it high again? How can I get my A1C down like this? Does anyone understand this better than me?
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Sadly I can't exercise enough to have it affect much of anything. I would suggest testing for several days in a row to see of you have the same results. This is all the information I found but it doesn't seem that you were doing any of the exercises they mentioned.
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I know, right? I've been wondering about something similar myself. I asked my dietition and Dr. Google and they seem to agree. I am sure I am missing some nuance here, but… My understanding is the liver releases glucose to fuel the activity. As the musles' stores get depleted the muscles claim some of the glucose. Our glucose levels should go down after a while. (I am not sure how long that process takes).
Personally, I noticed if I take my glucose within 30 minutes of either long-duration or vigorous exercise I either see a high reading or too low. (I have a history of hypos during long duration activity and everytime I tried to go no/very low carb). I have a couple evenings where I am active for 2-3 hours, my glucose either spikes or is too low when I get home. But the morning after, my fasted glucose is usually at its best (compared to other days) even if I ended up eating an evening snack to correct a low. Depending on the intensity/duration, exercise can help improve insulin sensitivity for up to two days. So overall, it should help.
I also wonder whether it has to do with stress (for more vigorous workouts, not necessarily playing with your dog). I was told the body releases glucose in response to stress (in response to cortisol). A vigorous workout is stressful, though we (usually) get stronger from the recovery. If so, it might be a little like the dawn phenomenon (a source of frustration for me). When I first started checking glucose my morning fasted glucose would be higher than it was in the evening (other than those two active evenings or if I sleep in). That seems to be improving, though I am on a medication as well as making lots of diet and lifestyle changes.
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Happily, when I tested my blood sugar at 9pm before dinner, my blood sugar was 115. I haven't been into the 120s and now the 110s until this week and all because I've been really strict about carbs.
I will test it tomorrow when I wake and then after I walk the dog and see if it repeats. I am not walking so fast or exercising so hard that it should qualify as that kind of vigorous exercise. Maybe it's happening because it is first thing in the am and I don't have any food or carbs in me. I am very cardiovascularly fit, so honestly that kind of walk rarely even gives me any zone points (if you are familiar with fitbit). Though I do live on top of a mountain so there's a certain amount of hill climbing involved.
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my diabetes was 'uncontrolled' the doctor had me on three meds. I think it took a few weeks before I was consistently in the 80s. I took myself off one of the meds. So if you haven't changed your eating habits for a month yet, I would give it a little more time for the base to settle. I'm usually below 100 in the morning and before I go to bed at night. I'm happy that you are happier.
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same thing happened today. BS went up after the morning walk.
I am not on any meds. The PA let me try to control it with exercise and diet. And I've been on a diet since October. have lost 40+ pounds. And my BS has gone down substantially, but it is not normal yet. That's why I am trying so hard to get it to normal.
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Exercise brings mine up too. In the long run it is good and part of overall fitness, weight loss, etc. The immediate BG reading can look scary when you have been making progress overall.
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@2t9nty Tried to quote you but I got a "permission problem" pop up. The problem is that I walk all day long, every hour from 10 am to 10pm, so that means my BS is up all day long. I don't know what to do about it. It is frustrating me unbelievably.
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I haven't seen 124 (morning BS on the 10th) or 115 (evening BS on the 10th) since then. Tried to replicate the same diet as the days before that, and that day, in the days since, and no dice. Really frustrating. Yesterday, at a family dinner, I had a half cup of spaghetti and sauce on a bed of spinach and arugula, so of course after that my BS was through the roof. Today I am back on track with a breakfast of one egg, a slice of cheese and a slice of 1 carb gram keto bread, and cucumbers for a snack. For lunch I'll have a small steak and green beans. Dinner will be something low carb too. I hope to see those low BS readings again. I started supplements of cinnamon and berberine. And I have decided to halve my BP med because having lost 40+ pounds, my BP is lower than normal, and BP meds raise my BS. I know because when the pharmacy was out and I went off them involuntarily for a week, my BS dropped a lot. So maybe that will help. I'll of course monitor my BP to make sure it doesn't go above normal and up the dosage again if I need to. Partly this is because, once again, the pharmacy is out and delivering late, so I figure halving it is safer than going entirely without till it gets to me.
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I get the same permission problem when I try to quote.
The challenge is keeping an eye on the trends. You will get one reading, and it will look terrible, but it is the average you are going for. Having said that, there is the hiker's adage: "Take care of the ounces and the pounds take care of themselves." You want to manage the bg checks and keep them low, but keep an eye on the big picture. It is complicated.
I tried cinnamon and berberine at one point and did not think they helped my numbers any. Everyone is different though, so you might find they help you.
The exercise is part of the big picture. It is contributing to general health, metabolism and weight loss.0 -
@2t9nty It's been a week since I lost. Still staying at 155.6, which is pretty weird because the scale is not rising or fallling with normal weight fluctuations. Yesterday I gained more in exercise calories than I ate in food, and still the scale isn't moving. Eating about 1200 calories a day or less (yesterday was 943) and walking 15K to 20K steps a day. so 700 to 1000 exercise calories a day. Not that I believe those exercise calories are accurate and if I go over 1200, which is rare, (and I weigh everything) I never go more than 1300. Still the scale is stuck. Oh well. BS was 130 this am, which is not the best I've recorded but it is an improvement over the past 4 months. And I will try the berberine till the bottle runs out and if I don't see an improvement i won't buy it again, it was $10 for a 15 day supply. So too expensive for me unless I see results
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@patriciafoley1 - That sounds frustrating especially since you've been working so hard. If you take your blood glucose 30 minutes-an hour after walking your dog, is it still high? When I asked about post-exercise highs, I was advised to take it a little later to give the body a chance to go back to normal. I definitely see some post-activity highs when I check, but usually not for mild-intensity activity. Everyone is different, though, and I have a history of hypos during long duration, low intensity acitivity. The last time it hit me, I was just sightseeing, slowly walking around a few museums.
I am interested in hearing whether you see any improvement with Berberine. I looked into it at one point, but it seemed to have similar side effects to Metformin for some people. I've heard such mixed things, but it seems to work well for some people but not others, and there are studies indicating that it can help.
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@samgettingfit25 I walk 1-2K steps every hour from 10 am to 10pm so my BG doesn't really have a chance to get down. I have to not walk and not eat for several hours to see that kind of drop. It's been hard for me to balance trying to get exercise for myself, walk my dog, etc, with seeing a BG not influenced by exercise. I don't know which is worse, doing the walking, which raises my BG or not doing the walking, which would hinder my exercise and diet.
I will post here after I've been on the Berberine for a week. I bought a bottle of Berberine + from Walmart. 30 capsules, you are supposed to take 2 a day. It was about 10$ if I remember right, for a 15 day supply. So far, I am not seeing any change. I also started taking cinnamon capsules, as they are supposed to help regulate BG. I have a 200 day supply of those, so I'll keep taking them till they are gone.
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The scales can be difficult with irritating long times when you seem to be in a holding pattern. I would not be too discouraged here.
I am no expert on this, but there may be stores of glycogen in your liver that will eventually be exhausted. I would suspect the walking would be (very) good in the long run.
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@2t9nty I can only conclude that too and am hopeful if I can lose enough weight, that those stores will be exhausted.
it's frustrating because I feel i am getting close, but getting to 100 eludes me day after day.
For example last night at 11 (some five hours after dinner, I tested my BS and it was 110!!!! I was so happy and hopeful that I could get it down to 100. I walked 1000 steps more, because people do say that exercise is supposed to lower BS. And then at midnight I tested it again. It was 120. No food, but the BS went up.
In the morning, before breakfast, I tested it again and it was 130. So in all that time without eating, my BS did not go down, it went up.
I just wish I could figure out what I need to do to reverse this, since I am not eating any refined carbs. I have an occasional half cup of brown rice, maybe once every couple of weeks when I make a certain recipie. Otherwise it is just meat and green veggies. And one slice of 1 carb keto bread a day. (And frankly ,that seems to spike my BS. I wonder how accurate these products are in their claims of calories and nutrient grams).
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Everyone is different in their response. One of the issues with diabetes treatment/medication is that doctors, nutritionists, etc. have this one-size-fits-all approach. In reality, I think we all have general guidelines and need to figure out how we are responding. This is why frequent bg checks are key.
A few quirks for me - green beans give me a crazy spike for no good reason. Others can eat them with impunity. Also sometimes my fasting reading when I get up in the morning is my highest reading of the day. It is not supposed to work that way. All I can think is dreams or maybe body clock or something dumps glycogen.
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@2t9nty I worry about the green beans helping to keep my BS up. I buy the Walmart or Great Value frozen "fine" or "narrow" green beans, figuring they are more fiber than bigger fatter beans. but yeah, I eat them most every day.
It is a known thing that your body dumps glycogen from liver to bloodstream in the AM, to help you get up and deal with the day. Often the BS in the AM is higher than later in the day for that reason. That's why sometimes my BS is 110 or 120 at midnight but 130 or higher in the AM. Then after I walk it goes up another 20 points.
I wish I knew what to do about that. I don't know that I can do any more. I have thought to cut out breakfast (and I did this am) because I am not losing weight at 1200 calories any more. So if I cut out breakfast, that's 200 calories saved, so I can get to 1000 calories a day.
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Sometimes you just have a plateau with the weight loss. Goodness knows I did.
I don't stress any more about the fasting bg when I wake up. It is just a "thing." At one point people were giving me advice about it on the forums - ounce of cheese before bedtime and that sort of thing. Nothing helped and I decided to roll with it.
A problem is that when you have a blood draw first thing, it looks to the doctor like you ate a donut the night before, but after you explain a couple of times…
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@2t9nty Last night I purchased Apple cider vinegar with the mother capsules to add to the regime. I can't face drinking vinegar, but I can take the capsules. It's supposed to help with blood sugar. I think it's the last thing recommended that I haven't done, so I'll give it a whirl when they arrive in the mail.
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At one point (like from 2016 to 2018), I made my own "sports drink" that had some amount of ACV, epsom salts (for the magnesium) and lite salt for the sodium and potassium in a half strength Crystal Light base. I forget the exact amounts, but I made a gallon every morning and drank that during the day.
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so finally, after two weeks of 1200 calories or less a day, and 15-20K steps a day, I broke my "plateau" and lost 2/10 of a pound. 155.4. BS this am 128. Not as low as it has been, but I guess its progress.
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congratulations!
I started seeing a nutritionist a month or so ago and have been surprised at her advice. First off, she told me to eat MORE carbs. I was doing low carb, ie. a Greek yogurt for breakfast and she had me add a regular piece of wheat toast to that. I also was struggling with craving sweets in the evenings so she had me use my afternoon snack to have any sweet treat I was craving. Having it before dinner was key. I have been surprised at the advice but I have to give her credit, it is helping. My fasting blood sugars were high and have come down. Mine are still above 100 but are much better than they were.1 -
@pamelaory Thanks for the info. I will consider it. I have noticed that if I eat something carby it doesn't always result later in a BS high, sometimes my BS drops, and I wonder if the sugar is triggering an insulin response more than low glycemic index foods. But I haven't tried that, I wanted to get my BS normal, and then see if adding limited amounts of higher glycemic foods results in a change to my fasting BS, or if I finally have enough insulin response to tolerate them. I don't see a nutritionist, not sure if there's any around me, as I live in a very rural area. I've been asking GROK3 on X some questions, and I have to say, it's been helpful.
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My understanding is just about any kind of stress can temporarily increase glucose due to the stress hormones signaling to the liver to release glucose so it's available for fight or flight. It can go up from lack of sleep, illness, infection, stress, exercise, hormone fluctuations, etc.
My fasted is variable, this week it ranged from 90 - 130. (I suspect the 90 was a fluke). Sometimes, I think I see the pattern, but today was the 130 and I am not sure why. I have sore muscles since I started a new strength training program and my scale weight is also a couple pounds higher this morning than yesterday morning. I asked Perplexity AI and it gave me a link to a study indicating muscle inflammation can increase glucose but that's the first I've heard of it but I suppose it is a mild form of stress. I am not too worried about either the higher glucose or weight unless it continues.
That's interesting about carbs @pamelaory. I reduced carbs from what I was likely eating before I started paying attention, but I haven't cut them or attempted keto. (I tried it a few times before I was even prediabetic and I would get terrible low blood sugar symptoms when active for more than an hour on very low carbs even when I felt satiated). I currently aim for 30 grams +/- of carbs per meal, but I am not super strict. I just try to minimize/mostly avoid simple carbs. I am more focused on protein and fiber. My daytime glucose varies but not as much as the fasted levels. That and it's usually lower than fasted (I only take it in the morning, 1-2 hours after eating, about 20-30 minutes after exercise, before bedtime).
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Grok also told me that eating too much of a percentage of protein can also result in a high BS, as the body turns protein into carbs. I aim for 50 net carbs a day. I never or rarely go over the recommended grams of protein a day (which varies as exercise calories are added which I don't generally eat many of), but i suppose percentage wise, I could be eating too much protein on some days. It recommended healthy fats to be increased, like nuts. Not a huge nut fan, though I often have an ounce of peanuts as a snack some days. I mostly get my fat calories from eggs, cheese and whatever is in the protein that I eat. My cholesterol has never been high, so I have never worried too much about fats. So I'm pondering the healthy fat recommendation and maybe cutting back on protein a bit.
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"so finally, after two weeks of 1200 calories or less a day, and 15-20K steps a day, I broke my "plateau" and lost 2/10 of a pound. 155.4. BS this am 128. Not as low as it has been, but I guess its progress."
Sometimes you take progress as progress even if it is slower than you want.
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I am glad you are seeing progress! I was told it can zig and zag it isn't linear for a lot of folks. There are just so many things that affect blood sugar and weight. It sounds like you are doing a lot of positive things.
I use AI tools sometimes for health/diet stuff and for work, but be careful. I've seen AI give untrue information. Like the other day I asked for ideas on how to use cartoned egg white, the AI gave me what I asked plus some unsolicited tips including to take any fat soluble supplements with it since the "natural fat content in the egg whites" would help me absorb it better. Except… egg whites have next to no fat. That's just one example. I hope you find other sources in addition to Grok before cutting protein or calories further. Sometimes, there can be inaccuracies in the training data that the AI picks up.
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"Grok also told me that eating too much of a percentage of protein can also result in a high BS, as the body turns protein into carbs. I aim for 50 net carbs a day. I never or rarely go over the recommended grams of protein a day (which varies as exercise calories are added which I don't generally eat many of), but i suppose percentage wise, I could be eating too much protein on some days. It recommended healthy fats to be increased, like nuts. Not a huge nut fan, though I often have an ounce of peanuts as a snack some days. I mostly get my fat calories from eggs, cheese and whatever is in the protein that I eat. My cholesterol has never been high, so I have never worried too much about fats. So I'm pondering the healthy fat recommendation and maybe cutting back on protein a bit."
I have been told about the protein raising BG too, but it has never been the case with me. I tend to stay in the 100 to 120 g range a day, but I have had over 200 g in a day and have failed to see any impact on the meter. I know this is a commonly held understanding, but I think the conversion process is complex, involves the liver and is not triggered unless your BG gets too low - which is not a problem for me.
I may be wrong about the process, but I am certain about the readings on my meter. I say see if it has any impact on yours. It may or may not.0 -
So today I dropped to 153.2. Which after three weeks of not dropping in accordance with the diet and exercise i've been doing (1200 calories eaten, 2400 calories burned) is nice to finally see. It's interesting that this plateau was broken right after i added the apple cider vinegar capsules to my regime. There's buzz that they can help in weight loss, but I didn't really believe that. I started taking them because they are supposed to help with blood sugar. My BS has not dropped (actually it has gone up a bit) but I've finally had a small Whoosh in weight loss. It is a puzzle. I'm hoping I don't bounce back up tomorrow.
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it is a puzzle for sure.
In theory, I should be losing according to the charts. In reality, I have been maintaining instead since 2018.
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It is frustrating. I can see why people resort to taking those weight loss drugs. I don't plan to, esp since it is said that as soon as you go off them, you gain the weight back. And the side effects can be brutal. I'd rather try to do it naturally, but boy, it is frustrating when you do everything right, significant calorie deficits, exercise, etc., and the scale doesn't budge for weeks. I went up a bit today, but I had a salty dinner yesterday and it takes me days to drop the water gained from the salt.
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