I failed my basal test early last night. Why? Because about 2.5 hours after I ate, I dropped into the 60s, which leads me to believe that my dinner bolus ratio is still too high.

Or is it?

I have a horrible habit of overriding my pump. I feel that if my blood sugar isn’t under 200 2-3 hours after a meal, I must have seriously miscalculated my previous meal’s insulin intake. So I rage bolus (feverishly administering mathematically-inaccurate amounts of insulin just to make blood sugar readings do something) until I get down to a normal level. Never mind that there may be 2, or 3, or 5 units still working through my system that haven’t done anything yet.Don’t care. I just don’t want to be 289 anymore please, thanks.

Herein lies the problem. Rage bolusing blindly often just stacks insulin against you, resulting in an epic tumble down to no-man’s land and leaves you crawling to your fridge for another glass of orange juice. My doctors and CDE have told me, repeatedly, to stop this practice because it just sets me up for all the lows that I’m diligently trying to avoid. However, when you test every hour for four hours straight with an average of 170, you start to think something isn’t doing it’s job. (Yes – pump air bubbles – I’m blaming you… because who else can I blame?) I have been “conservatively” over correcting in places, rather than just administering an entire correction at will. A unit here… a unit there. If it’s still not enough, another a half hour later.

By the time dinner rolls around, I’m hanging out between 120-140 mg/dl with about 4 units of insulin on board. What possibly could go wrong?????

Oh hey… maybe I should try NOT micromanaging my sugars for an afternoon to see what my dinner blood sugar will actually be around 5:00 pm. Hmm.

Today was an exception. I was treated to a luncheon/learn session by a local PR association, which was catered by one of my favorite restaurants. (And was held in a nightclub I used to frequent when I was 24… weird…) I had a salad of mixed greens and <*goat cheese!!!*>, a half turkey sandwich… and an epically huge brownie. I started the meal at 112 and felt myself falling. Lunch popped me up to nearly 300 and kept me there. all. afternoon. I still haven’t really come down to stay down yet. (But that may have been the veggie pizza I had for dinner…)

BUT – before I headed to dance class at 7:15, just barely an hour after I ate that pizza, I was 116. Maybe all of that insulin I was correcting with finally kicked in. (Only to have the fat in the pizza negate all my progress.)

I should take my own advice. Maybe I’ll have an accurate test here soon. But that involves not having a social life or a need for sleep for three evenings.