gestational diabetes and low numbers

[jlw617]

So some of you may remember me from before asking questions about gestational diabetes, well im 99% sure I have it...its a long story so Ill spare you all the details but my midwife ended up prescribing me a blood glucose monitor-my numbers definitely can and do spike but whats been worse is Ive been having a very hard time keeping my numbers up! They are more often tan not in the fasting range-I phoned my midwife today and spoke with the nurse, she spoke with the midwife and told me that i need to be eating every hour and a half and drinking more fluids...i can see the fluids part because i know im not getting enough but Ive been eating every hour-hour and a half, especially the first part of the day and they continue to stay low...anyone have any experience with this, any advice or tips? I feel terrible when my numbers are low like this...

 

[jlw617]

Anyone at all? Btw yesterday my numbers officially dropped into the hypoglycemic range yesterday!

 

[AmeliePoulain]

How low is low?

And are they low after you eat or fasting?

You are still early on in pregnancy and in a non GD pregnancy it is common to get low blood sugar. Your tendency to spike probably is showing you will develop it (if that is what you suspect)

I could get very high numbers and then crash. It does make you feel rubbish though.

 

[jlw617]

How low is low?

And are they low after you eat or fasting?

You are still early on in pregnancy and in a non GD pregnancy it is common to get low blood sugar. Your tendency to spike probably is showing you will develop it (if that is what you suspect)

I could get very high numbers and then crash. It does make you feel rubbish though.

Yes, I'm getting fasting ranges (80s and low 90s) even after I eat and yes I also have a tendency to spike as well though, 2 days ago I had 2 starbursts, just 2!!! And I went up to 131.

 

[AmeliePoulain]

Silly things like 2 chocolate raisins would spike me too!

I wouldn't worry too much, at points in my most recent pregnancy I was getting fasting readings in the 60s and 70s and much like you I'd get post meal readings at 1 hour in the 80s and 90s some days.

It is normal in pregnancy for it to be low. As your GD gets harder to manage the numbers will likely creep up (sadly)

Keep eating enough so you aren't hungry but don't worry about eating on a schedule is my advice. Little and often is a good habit for further on though.

Out of interest do you have many risk factors for GD? I had none and I think that is why I was lucky and could control it with diet in each pregnancy.

 

[d_b]

How long do you wait after eating to check your sugar?

 

[jlw617]

D_b I wait an hour, but I've also been testing randomly when I feel bad because I've read you should test if you feel like your sugars might be low.

Amelie-thanks for the advice! Yes I do have risk factors, quite a few actually lol although I will say I didn't have it with my other pregnancies but then again that's where one of my new risk factors comes in, age, I'll be 33 when I have this baby, the last time I was pregnant I was 28 I'm also Hispanic, my dad has diabetes and I'm a little overweight although on that note, I still think it's weird that it's a factor when they say no matter how good you eat, GD is completely hormone related so I don't know how that would be a factor, I guess it just makes me mad because I have 2 brothers that are 450 lbs each! I'm barely overweight...oh well rant over haha!

So have you had to test for ketones in your urine? I've been a little worried about that with my numbers being so low.

 

[AmeliePoulain]

They tested me for ketones at every appointment and I rarely had any and when I did it was a trace.

I did eat extremely restrictively for a big chunk of the most recent pregnancy though. And I was running around after a 4 y/o and 2 y/o and working part time. I did sometimes physically not have time to eat!

In my 2nd pregnancy I only gained 10lbs in total (I weigh between 115-120lbs usually) and I was really paranoid about ketones so I bought testing strips from Amazon to keep an eye myself.

In my first pregnancy I was diagnosed late on and I lost a lot of weight when I switched on to the diet and I ended up in hospital with 4+ ketones - but that was down to the weight loss and drastic change in what I was eating.

It is good you are being so proactive so early - I think being on the diet from 12 weeks this most recent time helped my body adapt and the low carb, low sugar diet didn't seem so draining.