Emotional Diabetes

This week I was introduced to looping, the ability through technology to have my insulin pump take direction from my glucose sensor. And last night, I witnessed to how my new tech handles an old body phenomenon — an unfelt glucose spike.

The looping app (on my phone) was provided by my endocrinologist. Progress has been overseen by a tech assigned to my case. There were immediate issues regarding settings needing to be tweaked because I kept feeling repeated lows (hypoglycaemia). Overall, I think pump is now kicking in appropriately — that is, it’s giving me insulin when my sensor indicates I need it. It’s not perfect, but it’s a heck of a lot better than me trying to manage on my own.

When we eat carbohydrates, like anything sweet or starchy, the body turns the carbs into glucose. Healthy people enjoy having this essential form of energy easily transported from the blood into tissues. Unfortunately, for many diabetics, this doesn’t happen without additional insulin to push the glucose through.

I’ve long struggled with glucose spikes that have nothing to do with food. After a lot of research, I’ve realize these originate from hidden stress, a fight-or-flight survival response that occurs without my awareness. I suspect this unfelt response has been happening for much of my life, and my poor pancreas paid the price, leading my diagnosis as a Type 1 diabetic. I wonder how many other people suffer from staying in unhealthy emotional situations where their bodies were screaming at them to flee.

I had told my tech that I suffered from these hidden stress responses and she suggested that the looping app should be able to handle them. I didn’t have to wait long to witness technology in action. Last evening at 6 pm, after hours of not eating carbs, my glucose started to climb. I wasn’t paying attention, was watching TV, as the app began releasing insulin into my system. (I have 3 days of insulin contained in a pod stuck on my arm.)

These pumps inject insulin in two different ways. The basal, or base system, releases a small amount every few minutes to keep the glucose low. Then a bolus amount is added when I tell the pump I’m eating a particular amount of carbs. An appropriate amount of insulin is released to quell glucose spikes.

It was the basal component that went to work last evening as my background level of glucose started to climb. I can see that after I fell asleep, the pump released dozens of spurts of insulin into my body in an attempt to suppress the spike.

Despite this, my glucose rose above 10 mmols, the top end of my target range. It remained high until 2 a.m., while I slept. At that time the pump finally got the glucose down to about 7 mmols. This morning the stress response is still at work, pumping the glucose back up to 9 mmols. It’s now sliding back down again.

Contrast this experience to a couple weeks ago, prior to looping, when I went to bed with glucose of 6 mmols and awoke to it at 21.

I plan to fast today, a healthy but often misunderstood method of losing weight. I expect my blood glucose will settle down as the day continues. With the first stress response under my belt, I now can see that the technological advances will be able to cope with anything my body can throw their way. It’s a huge relief.

Thanks for reading.