Type 1 - finger prick testing before meals only

[mum2westiesGill]

Anyone who is like me type 1 and does finger pricking from meal to meal - what do you do if wanted a small snack of around 6g to 13g like a biscuit or maybe some crisps in-between a meal? Would you have the snack and wait until your next meal to do your test?

 

[khskel]

I would test.

 

[Inka]

Test definitely because that will help you judge a) if you can eat it; and b) how much insulin you need (if any).

 

[Piglet]

I would enjoy the biscuit especially if it is a chocolate one and if my BG is slightly higher at my next test I still would not worry.....I know and understand why it might be slightly higher than normal. Life is too short to worry about having a single biscuit.

My BG are never the same twice after the same meal so I go from test to test in real time and just deal with it whatever.

 

[mum2westiesGill]

I would enjoy the biscuit especially if it is a chocolate one and if my BG is slightly higher at my next test I still would not worry.....I know and understand why it might be slightly higher than normal. Life is too short to worry about having a single biscuit.

My BG are never the same twice after the same meal so I go from test to test in real time and just deal with it whatever.

This sounds good because you're not risking any insulin stacking (it's both food insulin and correction insulin which can cause insulin stacking) and if BG is higher which it would be at the next before meal test then you know why it's higher and you deal with it at this point and would no doubt need food insulin and correction insulin all in one single dose.

My BG are never the same after exactly the same meal.


Here by testing in-between meals if you needed insulin for the snack you would be causing insulin stacking

Test definitely because that will help you judge a) if you can eat it; and b) how much insulin you need (if any).

I would test.

 

[Inka]

@mum2westiesGill You should do what you feel works best for you as an individual 🙂
As you know, I often snack and it’s not a problem because I remember my boluses. I got to that point by experience. My consultant only considers it to be stacking if it’s for corrections. If that is something you’re not at ease with, then do what you feel is right for you.

 

[Sally71]

Insulin stacking only means that you have one bolus still working when you take another one. If one of those boluses is only for carbs then it shouldn’t cause a problem because the insulin will work on the carbs and then be about finished when they are used up. It’s only if you correct more than once that you are in line for problems because you could accidentally correct twice for the same high BG and then you’ll end up going hypo.

My daughter just eats when she feels like it, lets her pump do all the calculations and just whacks a bolus in if she needs one without any thought for how long ago she did the last one. She often just grazes and will have several boluses within a 4 hour period without any problems. But you are not us, if you really aren’t comfortable doing boluses in between meals then you’ll have to just content yourself with a snack no larger than 10-15g carbs. If you eat more than that then you have to do insulin, it will cause you more harm going high than having two insulin boluses working at once.