How much of a raise is considered a ‘spike’

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Emilymay

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I’ve been given a blood sugar monitor to check what foods are spiking my blood sugar but so far no carbs are… unless I’m grossly underestimating what a spike is….?

Potatoes - 130g (39.5 carbs per meal)
Before meal - 5.6
After meal - 6.1

Rice - 66g (86.8 carbs per meal)
Before meal - 5.4
After meal - 7.3

Bread - 14.6g (34g carbs per meal)
Before meal - 5.8
After meal - 7.4

Now, would any of these be considered a spike?
The only thing I have found that’s spiked my sugars (unsurprisingly) is galaxy caramel when the night after I ate a whole bar I woke up to a blood sugar of 11.0.

Why aren’t carbs spiking my blood sugar?
 
None of those are spikes @Emilymay Blood sugar naturally moves up and down through the day. A spike would be something more like from 5 up to 13 or whatever.
 
Inka said:
None of those are spikes @Emilymay Blood sugar naturally moves up and down through the day. A spike would be something more like from 5 up to 13 or whatever.
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I’m so confused as to why nothing is spiking my blood sugar. Is it normal for only sugar to spike blood sugar rather than carbs?
 
Emilymay said:
I’m so confused as to why nothing is spiking my blood sugar. Is it normal for only sugar to spike blood sugar rather than carbs?
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When are you testing for your after meal reading? It may be that you are missing the high reading.
The rule of thumb is testing 2 hours post meal and aiming at no more than 8mmol/l
The more complex carbs like rice etc will be metabolised more slowly than something sugary particularly if they are combined with fatty foods.
 
Leadinglights said:
When are you testing for your after meal reading? It may be that you are missing the high reading.
The rule of thumb is testing 2 hours post meal and aiming at no more than 8mmol/l
The more complex carbs like rice etc will be metabolised more slowly than something sugary particularly if they are combined with fatty foods.
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I’m testing 2 hours after the first bite with the readings above, that’s why it’s the ‘highest’
I’ve experimented with 1 hour after, 90 mins after, 3 hours after and even 4 hours after and 2 hours after is when I get the highest reading.
 
Emilymay said:
I’m testing 2 hours after the first bite with the readings above, that’s why it’s the ‘highest’
I’ve experimented with 1 hour after, 90 mins after, 3 hours after and even 4 hours after and 2 hours after is when I get the highest reading.
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It looks as if you are tolerating those carbs, many wouldn't. Keep an eye on it.
Are you taking any medication as that may be helping.
 
Leadinglights said:
It looks as if you are tolerating those carbs, many wouldn't. Keep an eye on it.
Are you taking any medication as that may be helping.
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I’m not. Diet controlled currently and hoping to get my H1ABC down enough to ‘reverse’ it without meds.
 
Inka said:
Then it looks like you’re doing well 🙂
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Thank you. I’m definitely having moments on wondering my pancreas and liver might be so ‘destroyed’ they’re not working as well hence why not spikes. I like to think it’s because I’m doing well.
 
Emilymay said:
Thank you. I’m definitely having moments on wondering my pancreas and liver might be so ‘destroyed’ they’re not working as well hence why not spikes. I like to think it’s because I’m doing well.
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If your pancreas was destroyed, you’d be like a Type 3c and be unable to control your blood sugar without medication. I’m Type 1 so only part of my pancreas (the insulin-producing cells) has been destroyed. Believe you me, if you had similar you’d be seeing much bigger spikes.

Whatever you’re doing is clearly working, so keep on doing it 🙂
 
Having curry and rice for dinner. I am going to test
30 mins after
60 mins after
90 mins after
2 hours after
3 hours after
4 hours after

To see if I am indeed missing the spike.
 
Here are two graphs of what the spikes might look like (screenshots from a Libre 2, edited to add some data). The blue lines represent the first bite and two hours later. I intentionally ate white rice (though not a huge pile of it) as a test as I'd read that was a particularly rapidly digested spikey food, and then I tested the same meal but with cauliflower rice another day. Testing at 2 hours is a good measure of how quickly your blood glucose is coming down after the peak of the spike, which is the important thing - a cheap, repeatable way to compare foods - but it doesn't capture everything.

Incidentally if you have a smartphone that isn't too old you can get a free trial of the Libre 2 and get 2 weeks of data like this, which I found very valuable for planning my diet.

Chicken stir fry cauliflower rice 1.pngChicken stir fry white rice 1.png
 
PerSpinasAdAstra said:
Here are two graphs of what the spikes might look like (screenshots from a Libre 2, edited to add some data). The blue lines represent the first bite and two hours later. I intentionally ate white rice (though not a huge pile of it) as a test as I'd read that was a particularly rapidly digested spikey food, and then I tested the same meal but with cauliflower rice another day. Testing at 2 hours is a good measure of how quickly your blood glucose is coming down after the peak of the spike, which is the important thing - a cheap, repeatable way to compare foods - but it doesn't capture everything.

Incidentally if you have a smartphone that isn't too old you can get a free trial of the Libre 2 and get 2 weeks of data like this, which I found very valuable for planning my diet.

View attachment 30273View attachment 30274
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Is that considered bad that you’re spiking but your blood sugar is coming back down after 2 hours? I got told it’s only bad to spike if your blood sugar remains high. If it spikes and comes back to a ‘normal’ reading 2 hours after, that carb/meal is fine.

I’ve applied for the free trail of the Libre 2 sensor, should be coming within the next 10 days which I know will give me a better ready. I’m just confused if that spike is considered bad?
 
Emilymay said:
Is that considered bad that you’re spiking but your blood sugar is coming back down after 2 hours? I got told it’s only bad to spike if your blood sugar remains high. If it spikes and comes back to a ‘normal’ reading 2 hours after, that carb/meal is fine.

I’ve applied for the free trail of the Libre 2 sensor, should be coming within the next 10 days which I know will give me a better ready. I’m just confused if that spike is considered bad?
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The answer is unfortunately nobody knows. Nobody has figured out how to test the long-term effects of short, high spikes. I did read of an experiment done on rats, where the researchers basically injected them with glucose repeatedly to produce 'spikes', and the research showed that the rats were more likely to develop cardiovascular health problems, but that's rats not people.

What I'm fairly sure of is that many of the complications of diabetes are not associated with short, high spikes. Even in healthy people eating a lot of carbs in one sitting will cause spikes, and nobody has ever found that eating lots of bananas regularly or eating lots of pizza can make you go blind or lead to problems with your feet. Cardiovascular problems though - the risk of heart attack and strokes - are a possibility as there are so many factors that raise these risks that nobody would notice that people who eat four bananas for breakfast every day were more likely to have a heart attack in later life.

I'm choosing to play it safe, just in case. I've found that if I go for a walk about 30 to 45 minutes after eating it 'blunts' the height of the spike and brings blood glucose levels down quicker. I typically don't eat anything likely to cause a big spike unless I know I have the opportunity to go for a walk afterwards. That's as much as I can reasonably do, so it'll have to be good enough.
 
PerSpinasAdAstra said:
The answer is unfortunately nobody knows. Nobody has figured out how to test the long-term effects of short, high spikes. I did read of an experiment done on rats, where the researchers basically injected them with glucose repeatedly to produce 'spikes', and the research showed that the rats were more likely to develop cardiovascular health problems, but that's rats not people.

What I'm fairly sure of is that many of the complications of diabetes are not associated with short, high spikes. Even in healthy people eating a lot of carbs in one sitting will cause spikes, and nobody has ever found that eating lots of bananas regularly or eating lots of pizza can make you go blind or lead to problems with your feet. Cardiovascular problems though - the risk of heart attack and strokes - are a possibility as there are so many factors that raise these risks that nobody would notice that people who eat four bananas for breakfast every day were more likely to have a heart attack in later life.

I'm choosing to play it safe, just in case. I've found that if I go for a walk about 30 to 45 minutes after eating it 'blunts' the height of the spike and brings blood glucose levels down quicker. I typically don't eat anything likely to cause a big spike unless I know I have the opportunity to go for a walk afterwards. That's as much as I can reasonably do, so it'll have to be good enough.
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Ok so results are as follows after a 64g carbs dinner: -
Before dinner - 5.6
30 mins after - 8.3
60 mins after - 9.6
90 mins after - 8.7
2 hours after - 7.5

Looks like I spike 1 hour after eating (well today anyway) my question now is if my blood sugar is returning to 7.5 2 hours after than surely that’s ok? Or should I not be wanting a spike as high as 9? According to my diabetic nurse and various sources under 8.5 2 hours after a meal is what I should be aiming for. So 7.5 after 2 hours is fine??
 
Emilymay said:
Ok so results are as follows after a 64g carbs dinner: -
Before dinner - 5.6
30 mins after - 8.3
60 mins after - 9.6
90 mins after - 8.7
2 hours after - 7.5

Looks like I spike 1 hour after eating (well today anyway) my question now is if my blood sugar is returning to 7.5 2 hours after than surely that’s ok? Or should I not be wanting a spike as high as 9? According to my diabetic nurse and various sources under 8.5 2 hours after a meal is what I should be aiming for. So 7.5 after 2 hours is fine??
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Absolutely fine especially after what is quite a high carb meal.
Everybody can tolerate different amounts of carbs per meal and many would be sky high even after 2 hours with that many carbs all at once. So that is a good result as less than 8mmol/l.
That is almost what I have in a day. Try to be around 70g.
 
Leadinglights said:
Absolutely fine especially after what is quite a high carb meal.
Everybody can tolerate different amounts of carbs per meal and many would be sky high even after 2 hours with that many carbs all at once. So that is a good result as less than 8mmol/l.
That is almost what I have in a day. Try to be around 70g.
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I try not to go over 90-100g a day myself. I allow myself 10-15g carbs at lunch and then eat my carb meal in the evening.
I think I’m going to try tomorrow with a lower carb dinner and see how I get on at these intervals with my blood sugar and the spiking.
I think I will keep doing this for a week with different foods at these intervals and then cut the testing. I’m getting unhealthily obsessed and stressed with the numbers.
 
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