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Weird glucose raise in the morning (I'm a libre sensor user)

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This thread is now closed. Please contact Anna DUK, Ieva DUK or everydayupsanddowns if you would like it re-opened.

MatildeSousa

New Member
Relationship to Diabetes
Type 1
Hi!

So i recently changed to a different long acting insuline (Toujeo) which for now is working wonders in keeping most of my values on a flatline at night! Before i used to eat 2 jelly babies sometimes at night to prevent me from having hypos at night which happened a bit to often.

Today I went to bed at 23:00 and my values were 130 = 5.8 with a turned down arrow on my libre so I took 2 jelly babies( almost 10 g of carbs) to prevent my values to go to low during the night. At 00:28 I measured again and it showed 102 = 5.6 with an arrow slightly turned down so my values would likely be dropping a bit more I thought and took 2 more jelly babies.

My sensor showed an almost flat line until 3 am and around 3:30 am it started gradually going up which made me wake up with 212 = 11.9 in the morning which is weird to me. Can anyone explain what might be happening?

Bellow is a chart that explains how rapidly your blood sugars are going according to the machine (Ignore the first insuline adapting chart)

1584699039892.png
 
This is most likely to be what’s called the 'Dawn Effect'. The body starts gearing up for the day ahead round about 4am, when the liver starts trickling out a bit more glucose. It’s notoriously difficult to combat. I just live with the fact that my Libre trace overnight looks like a washing line, with a slack bit in the middle. I find mine disappears if I’ve had a glass of red wine the evening before, but that’s not something I can do regularly, (and if I did, my body would probably adapt eventually) and sometimes a protein/fat snack before bed rather than a carby one helps, ie, a lump of cheese.(or eaten as well as your carbs, if you’ve got a downwards arrow and need glucose)
 
Hope you find a solution to the Dawn Phenomenon @MatildeSousa

It can be tough, and some people certainly experience it more than others.

One option that may be worth considering if it is a problem for you is an insulin pump, which can be set to provide more insulin a short while before the rise generally happens.
 
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This thread is now closed. Please contact Anna DUK, Ieva DUK or everydayupsanddowns if you would like it re-opened.
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