Lows during pregnancy

[Emilyalice]

Hi guys, just wanted some help. I’m 11 weeks and 4 days pregnant, I’ve been having bloods which are fine during the day but In the evenings I am struggling with lows & keeping them up.
We have kept in mind I don’t need as much insulin, reduced my levimer in the evening & I am now on fiasp insulin.

how do you guys cope with lows that won’t go up, it took me so long to get above 3 the past 4 nights and it only seems to be the evening,help needed

 

[Inka]

Hi @Emilyalice Lows are very, very common in early pregnancy. I completely understand what you mean about struggling to get your blood sugar up. I remember eating carb after carb and still being in the 3s.

I have a pump, but what I did was lower my basal insulin by approximately 25% in early pregnancy. I also tested very frequently, so I could catch lows early and top up with food. I also changed my insulin to carb ratio for the meals (eg breakfast, lunch, etc) that were causing me problems. I sometimes had an evening snack (without insulin obviously) and always set an alarm for 2am to avoid nighttime hypos.

Do you take Levemir twice a day? If so, have you tried reducing your morning Levemir too?

Have you changed your insulin to carb ratio for your evening meal?

 

[Emilyalice]

Hi!
Thankyou so much for your reply

I take levimer in the evening before dinner and then I take my other half in the morning with my breakfast. I usually do 22 units of levimer in the evening & 5 units of Levemir in the morning. Maybe I should try lowering it slightly in the morning?

we haven’t changed my insulin to carb, but I’m waiting for a call back from my diabetes team I’m sure they will mention about reducing that to

Thankyou you’ve been a big help. I’m going to try an evening snack without insulin before bed. I’ve been noticing my nausea is so bad in the evenings so it’s a struggle to snack after dinner !

 

[Inka]

Ah, well hopefully a change to your insulin to carb ratio will help. It’s always best to change things gradually, but I’d think that getting your ratio right would help a lot 🙂

How long after your meal are you getting the lows?

For the nausea, it’s a case of finding carbs that you can tolerate. I had awful nausea and it was a pain, but I tried various things until I had a ‘safe’ selection of things to snack on that I could choose from. I found things like biscuits, flapjacks, etc, were ok, and quelled that horrible feeling.

It’s interesting your morning Levemir is so much lower than your evening dose. I’d assumed it would be higher. So, it might be that reducing your morning Levemir might not suit you. There’s no ‘right answer’ - just what your body needs 🙂

 

[trophywench]

@Emilyalice - congratulations!

Just don't worry and don't think that doing whatever doesn't fall in line with what you've always needed to do or understood were the 'correct' things to do when X or Y happens - because at the mo and for the next 6 months - you are fire fighting and therefore you have to do what you need to do when you need to do it - and that's that. Each semester of pregnancy will be different - from needing less insulin you might be on masses more of it at different points, you're juggling whilst walking a tightrope!

In view of that, it's better to relax as much as humanly possible so you don't fall off or drop any bean bags and just go with the flow. Good luck matey, it WILL all be worth it !!

 

[PhoebeC]

Congratulations!
I can’t add to what had already been said, other than it’s all good advice.
With pregnancy I found that it was a constant change all the time ha! And it is hard work but not impossible.
Try to relax and if you need to just eat and eat or change your meds then just do it.
Hormones and that growing life will put you on a rollercoaster but you’ve got this!