High sugar level readings when fasting - any experience?

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Pet70

Pet70

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Relationship to Diabetes
Type 2
Hi All 🙂,

My last few HbA1cs have slowly risen up by 1 notch, but still good. The last one was 44 (6.2%). As I am not on any medication, and haven't been for the last 3 years, I was a little shocked when my doc said I would have to go back on Metformin if that rises again, especially with a fasting of 7mmol on the morning of the test.

My fasting BG is always high, in the low to mid 6s or higher. I know about the Dawn Phenomenon and expect these higher readings. I don't look overweight, but my BMI says I am obese (odd to see that). I am 5' 11'' and weigh about 12st. I thought intermittent fasting therefore would be a good idea, so I tried it. To my amazement my BG readings seemed to go through the roof. I tested at the time that I would normally do a PP test after breakfast. Those readings are normally 5.8-6.5 after eating a bowl of porridge and fruit/nuts/yoghurt. With no breakfast my readings were between 7.7 and 8.6. Now when I was actually expecting the new readings to be lower, this was a complete shock and so I stopped doing it!

I'm confused. Where these much higher readings telling me to STOP fasting, or is it normal? Do they eventually drop? I have read a little about how the liver will release sugar into the system when fasting, as it thinks that seeing as no food is coming in it needs to release some of the stored sugar in it to help the person move about and carry on with their day.

One interesting thing that happened on the days that I fasted was my PP BG reading after lunch was lower than normal at about 5.2 (instead of 6.2). I imagine this was due to the fasting.

Do any of you guys have any experience with this? I would like to try the fasting again but seeing numbers in the high 8s scares me a bit, because in general I have good control of my diabetes.

If eating is a signal to the liver to stop releasing stored sugar, maybe a handful of nuts or an egg could stop that happening and then carry on with fasting. Sounds oxymoronic but does that make sense? Anyway, any advice would be great if you have had any at all.

Stay well people 😎
 
I haven't a clue but it's highly interesting. I thought fasting was all good!
 
I'm certain I've read elsewhere that for some people eating quickly resolves a DP effect.

Also, could it simply be that your body is used to pumping out blood glucose off a morning because you usually eat. Keep experimenting and let us know!
 
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If you’re 5’11 and 12 stone, that doesn’t work out as obese. It puts you in the 23.something range which isn’t even overweight let alone obese.
 
Hi

Yes, some people find that a low carb snack will switch the liver off from diligently pumping out glucose, so that is worth a try but as with all things diabetes, what works for one person may not work for another. Also getting out for some exercise like a walk may help. More exertive exercise can push levels higher but a brisk walk usually works well for me.

The reason that your PP lunch reading going lower than usual will most likely be as a consequence of the fasting. From what I understand, the pancreas has a facility to store insulin rather than just produce it on demand. This stored insulin is called first phase and is released in response to food hitting the stomach. Presumably because you didn't need any at breakfast time your pancreas had a bit more stashed away by lunchtime to hit your blood stream quickly and deal with the carbs in your meal. The food acts as a trigger to switch off the glucose release by the liver and get the pancreas to release insulin. There are 2 schools of thought.... that eating little and often is best or intermittent fasting. You have to find which works best for you.
 
Inka said:
If you’re 5’11 and 12 stone, that doesn’t work out as obese. It puts you in the 23.something range which isn’t even overweight let alone obese.
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That's what I thought, but this machine was insisting I am obese! Perhaps it was in 'scare patient' mode. It kind of worked though...
 
rebrascora said:
Hi

Yes, some people find that a low carb snack will switch the liver off from diligently pumping out glucose, so that is worth a try but as with all things diabetes, what works for one person may not work for another. Also getting out for some exercise like a walk may help. More exertive exercise can push levels higher but a brisk walk usually works well for me.

The reason that your PP lunch reading going lower than usual will most likely be as a consequence of the fasting. From what I understand, the pancreas has a facility to store insulin rather than just produce it on demand. This stored insulin is called first phase and is released in response to food hitting the stomach. Presumably because you didn't need any at breakfast time your pancreas had a bit more stashed away by lunchtime to hit your blood stream quickly and deal with the carbs in your meal. The food acts as a trigger to switch off the glucose release by the liver and get the pancreas to release insulin. There are 2 schools of thought.... that eating little and often is best or intermittent fasting. You have to find which works best for you.
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Thanks for the info. It's good to hear that it might be possible to control flows of insulin and glucose by eating and fasting at the right times. Sounds like a right faff, but I am willing to give it a go. Yeah, you're right about all things diabetic being temperamental. I just need a bag of testing strips and chart it all for a month. I'll let you know how it goes 🙂
 
EllsBells said:
I'm certain I've read elsewhere that for some people eating quickly resolves a DP effect.

Also, could it simply be that your body is used to pumping out blood glucose off a morning because you usually eat. Keep experimenting and let us know!
Click to expand...
So many questions come up, hey? I'll let you know what I find out 🙂
 
Pet70 said:
That's what I thought, but this machine was insisting I am obese! Perhaps it was in 'scare patient' mode. It kind of worked though...
Click to expand...
To be honest, it sounds like the machine needs ditched into the nearest sea. 🙂
There's absolutely nothing wrong with your weight for that height so you can definitely relax there. The NHS have an online tool which will give you a value within a few seconds.
 
Pet70 said:
That's what I thought, but this machine was insisting I am obese! Perhaps it was in 'scare patient' mode. It kind of worked though...
Click to expand...

What machine? One of those smart scales that measure fat? I use the NHS BMI calculator.
 
If you are interested in splashing some cash at the problem you could try a Freestyle Libre sensor from Abbott Laboratories for a couple of weeks. If you are going through a lot of test strips it might even be more economical and you get a huge amount of data from it as it samples every few minutes and stores the data and displays it as a graph as well as being able to scan it with your phone assuming you have a compatible one every few minutes to see what is happening. It also gives you a direction of travel arrow so that you know if your l;evels are rising and how sharply or falling or just ticking along quite nicely. It is important to do some learning so that you can interpret the results better. Be aware that it is highly addictive though and when your sensor comes to an end after 14 days you will likely want another one!!
 
Abbott may even still be doing a free trial....
 
OH is 5ft 8 and was fit as a butcher's dog since he walked miles and miles and miles every working day - reading meters. Gorgeous bum, cheeks of which fitted nicely into each of my hands. Could count his ribs, hip bones and shoulder blades visibly evident, when upper half bared. 12 st 7lbs - overweight. Collar size 16.5, chest 42, waist 32.

Pardon?????

Bollards! - BMI takes no account whatsoever of a person's skeletal width, nor how much muscle they have.
 
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