Here is a great example of what Black Friday looks like in the US.

No seriously… most stores and malls opened at midnight last night. But I thought it would be a good time to sleep instead. Or at least I tried. Since I was up around that time, I thought, well, why am I not shopping right now? Oh well, right, I want sleep.

Our Thanksgiving plans were altered slightly. Well, maybe more than slightly. The hubs woke up with an epic cold and we were slated to sit in a car for 2+ hours to visit my family. Since I have an ailing grandfather, we both figured it’d be a horrible idea to spread the cold to everyone in my family. Plus – the hubs just felt miserable. And I’d have to do all the driving. No thank you.

We had two options. Some of my good friends host an “orphan Thanksgiving” every year for those in the swing community that can’t afford to travel or don’t want to travel to their respective families. And then my brother-in-law and his wife were also hosting a mini Thanksgiving at their apartment. After some phone calls, it turns out I’m heading to two Thanksgiving dinners. One at 3 and one at sometime after 5 pm.

So here comes the ultimate game of pacing yourself so you don’t overeat and overdose on insulin. Since I was hungry at 3 and could stand to eat, I did. But chose my weapons wisely. And bless my friends for having a diabetic friendly meal prepped. I brought all my Splenda/Low Carb desserts to enjoy and carb count. They offered sweet potatoes that were boiled; not mashed, marshmallowed, and brown sugared, thank goodness. Plain steamed green beans with onions, rather than in a high carb/fat casserole. Dinner rolls with carb info. Just a couple things on the appetizer table. The biggest offender on my pump was a slice of jalapeño cheesy cornbread that everyone fought over. Yum!

Oh. And wine. Lots and lots of wine. I had to drive, so I mostly just watched everyone down glasses while I nursed my one and half. With some water.

On to the next party…

I started that part of the evening at 210 mg/dl. Which is crazy. That never happens. My average Thanksgiving blood sugar is 250 or higher. So for being 2 hours after I ate and that’s as high as I recorded, I was pretty stoked. (Though, I have no idea what my pre-dinner sugar was because… well… oops.)

I didn’t partake in second dinner, with the exception of dessert at the end. The hubs hadn’t eaten yet, so this was his meal after napping for most of the day. This dinner was quite different. Sweet potatoes with brown sugar and marshmallows. Green beans and bacon. Mashed potatoes. Mostly the stuff from my hubs and his brother’s childhood. And while delish… way hard to carb count. So I refrained, stating that I already had dinner, but would take some leftovers home. And then enjoyed a slice of homemade pumpkin pie.

Which I grossly overestimated.

I read somewhere that a good size piece of pumpkin pie is 37 grams of carbs. This was a good size piece, but maybe not a store bought size piece. I also over corrected to bring down my sugars floating at around 160 at this point and had been for the last couple hours.

By midnight, I’m 54 mg/dl. In an effort to not mess with my morning sugars too much, I only have juice and try to go to bed. 15 minutes pass and I still can’t shake the low feeling. Check again and I’m 46. Another round of OJ and some crackers and PB because obviously something isn’t sticking. I’m browsing Facebook to keep my mind occupied while my sugars hopefully come up. 15 minutes pass again and I’m at 96. Thank goodness. Bolus to cover the midnight snack. Briefly consider changing to go shop with the crazies. Decide against it and head to sleep.

Wake up at 9:00 am with a 101 blood sugar. How the hell did that happen? No idea. Let’s go shopping!