Sunday, October 28, 2007

A perfect day

Is there such a thing in D-life? I don’t know, but looking at the readings at least it sometimes seems so :-) I had such a day Thursday this week. All of my reading were in target, from 4.2 (76) to 6.7 (121). Go me!

Actually this week has been rather good BG-wise. When I look at the pie charts in Kevin’s logsheet that I use for logging, I can see that so far 72% of my readings have been in range and only 5% above. The part of readings below target could be smaller, but at least when looking at those values, only a minor part of them are really low (I must admit, I don’t really regard readings of 3.5-3.9 (63-70) fasting or just before a meal as low, or at least I don’t treat them with anything but the meal that I’m about to have). When I left work Friday afternoon the statistics were even better with 81% of the readings in range and only 3% above, but weekends generally have a tendency to mess things up a bit.

I wish there could be more such days, preferrably weeks! :-)

Today I went for one of my “marathon” bike rides (little more than 43 km (just short of 70 miles), so actually it is longer than a traditional marathon ;-)). My experience tells me that I better do these rides in the morning to have least possible BG-issues. Today, however, the weather was a bit rainy all morning, and I must admit that I prefer to make these rides in dry weather, so I postponed it, hoping for better weather in the afternoon. Around noon it seemed like the rain had subsided, and I decided to go for the ride in the afternoon. I reduced my basal by 50% 1.5 hours before starting, and my BG was 10.3 (185) when I started my ride. The weather was quite windy, which usually is very effective in lowering my BG when I ride my bike. Riding my mountain bike also increases the resistance when riding on paved roads, which I – unfortunately – do most of the way, even though I go off-road every where I possibly can :-) Since I started out at a good level, and also felt quite good riding, I didn’t make a “pit-stop” for testing until half way through my trip. Little more than an hour of MTB-riding had dropped my almost 8 mmol/L down to 2.6 (47)! Although I usually have a little snack midways on my trips, the aim of these rides are NOT to be able to indulge in sugary snacks while riding. Today’s trip however, caused me to ingest a total of 64 g of carbs as the halfway through low, was rather resistant to treatment, and reared its ugly face again halfway through the last half of my trip :-(


This week Jimmi and I went for another visit with the dog that we were going to have. I say “were” because yesterday Jimmi got a txt-message from the owner, who apparently had gotten surprising news about the father of the pups. It seems that the father is actually a Smaller Münsterländer, and as these dogs grows to about 50-60 cm (shoulder height), our pup would likely get a lot bigger than anticipated. Also the owner, who we’ve had long, honest conversations with about our wishes for our coming dog, said that she actually didn’t really like the father dog and didn’t see it as a smart dog, so she could understand if we wanted to back out on this deal. After a lot of information search and talking back and forth, we did decide not to get Trille anyway, even though we were actually now really looking forward to getting her home :’-( However, the prospect of her getting that big (I know it could be a lot worse), doesn’t really fit our settings. If we lived in a bigger house with a bigger garden, then a bigger dog wouldn’t be a problem, but given the fact that we don’t live in that big a house, and our garden/terrace is only the size of our living room, to us doesn’t seem ideal for a dog this size, so now we need to look for a replacement. When you see the picture below, you’ll know that this is not going to be easy :-(

Jimmi with a sleeping Trille in his arms

Trille awake on my lap

Mayby she already knew that she wouldn't come home with us? She does look sad here. Bye Trille, we hope that you find another good home!

On the Scotland front I just heard from my supervisor over there that the German research fund’s money have finally arrived on the right account at the Scottish university, and that the registry office are pushing hard to get the registration through as soon as possible. I am looking forward to see if this will then cause the missing salary from the past three months to enter my account!

9 comments:

Scott K. Johnson said...

Fantastical blood sugars! Way to go!

Chrissie in Belgium said...

Yes, don't you feel just SO happy and proud and oh so good when you get a perfect day. AND you see it so clearly on Kevin's logsheets! I am so gladd they work for you! I AM JEALOUS THAT I CANNOT MANAGE TO SHOW MINE ON MY BLOG. Why am I the only one who can't make it work!!! So you think a Munsterlander is too big - they are not that big dogs. BTW Big dogs don't always need more exercise than small dogs, but I agree, Munsterlanders DO need alot of exercise. My brother had one. And I am so happy that your money is FINALLY coming through! Maybe the long distance kick helped?! So you will soon be off to Scotland. Ooooh you are so lucky!

Chrissie in Belgium said...

I forgot to ask you - have you had your C-peptide level checked? If you have, could you tell me what it is?

Heidi said...

Scott - Thank you very much :-)

Chrissie - I agree, the Munsterlanders are not that big, but they are big enough for us to feel that we don't have enough room for one. From the very beginning we have agreed that, at least for the time being, we do not want a big dog. We think that big dogs belong to bigger houses with bigger gardens where they can run around and play if their walk is postponed or shortened for some reason. If it wasn't for these limitations I feel sure that we would have accepted Trille regardless her paternal originator :-)

As for the C-peptide level, I haven't had it measured since the spring of 2001, so I have no idea what it might be today. At that time, however, it was 119 pmol/l (fasting), which is about half the normal, healthy value (200-300 pmol/l). Still, the fact that it was present - after more than 11 years of T1 - suggested to me that maybe my own islet cells could occasionally be playing tricks on me regarding BG-regulation. I don't know, it may also just be the reason why I've been able to keep my A1c below 6.5 for the past 13 years or so (actually at the time the C-peptide was measured my A1c was above 6.0 - can't remember if it was 6.2 or 6.6 - for the first time in years).

Chrissie in Belgium said...

Do I multipy pmol/l by 18 to get µg/l? I have <0.009µg/l. In other words, my amounts are so small they cannot be accurately deternined. I have been told from a reliable source that some long-time diabetics definitely have more c-peptides than others, and that this is not related to how long they have had diabetes. Furthermore, the more you have, the easier it is to control your diabetes and the less complications you may have! A professor of endocrinology told me this! Since then I have been kind of curious to find another long-time diabetic who has higher levels than me......

Heidi said...

To be able to compare these different values requires some additional knowledge. One cannot just convert a concentration in µg/l to pmol/l - or the other way around - without knowing the molecular mass of the matter in question. I do not know the molecular mass of C-peptide so I will have to look that up before I can answer you :-)

Chrissie in Belgium said...

Thanks Heidi - I have just been so curious about c-peptides!

Chrissie in Belgium said...

Thanks Heidi. If you ever read about how c-peptides vary in long time diabetics and how this may be correlated to complications and ability to manage diabetes I would be interested in knowing!

Kevin said...

Indeed, those are some seriously rockin' blood sugars! I'm quite jealous.

I'm sorry that Trille didn't work out for you, but it looks like Nemo is just as nice! Enjoy the new pup!