Wednesday, June 3, 2015

Diabetes and running

I'm going to share my blood sugar readings, nutrition before, during, and after my runs and try to make sense of the numbers.

Here are my results for the first week of training:

Tuesday I woke up at 4:30 a.m. and my morning reading was 127, I ate a Cliff Bar and waited around the house for 30 minutes and left the door for my run at 5:00 a.m. at which point I was 114. This is a little concerning because I ate, didn't take insulin, and my blood sugar dropped. I had a 15 gram Level Foods packet and headed out. I tested during my run and at 5:20 I was going back up and hit 127 again, at the end of the run I climbed up to 156. 

Tuesday doesn't make any sense, if I bolus for the 56g Carb I would bolus almost 8 units of insulin. When I got home I took a bolus for 4 units because after I usually spike and with a correction ratio of 1 - 25 I knew I was trending back up and I should take a little more to anticipate the increase. An hour later I was 243 and had to correct again for another 3 units. 

In review the food would have required me to dose 7.85 and I took 7. The hard part with this decision making process is that when I have active insulin, I tend to drop FAST, and want to avoid this. 

Wednesday I woke up at a similar time, this time I woke up at 65 with no feelings of being hypo. I ate a banana and a 15 g packet of Level again. Nearly 40 minutes after eating those items I left the house at 101. I also set a temp basal for 2 hours at 50% to see what different results I would have. I brought a mix with my water and that had 30 g Carb in it. 20 minutes into my run I had made it to 140 but another 15 minutes I was down to 120. Walking into the house I was 114 and felt GREAT. Another spike in my blood sugar though, an hour after my run I hit 257 and an hour later I was 45. 

What is my plan for Thursday going to be, what should I do? It will depend on my blood sugar at the time but I plan to have a banana again but hopefully an hour earlier than I leave. When I leave the house I'm going to bolus 2 units so the insulin is fresh and the run will help kick it into high gear. I am hopeful I'll make my 3 miles in 36 minutes and walk in the door within range. I plan to try and not consume anything because its a short run.

Wish me luck! 

I'll try and be back Saturday to share my 8 mile experience. 

Monday, June 1, 2015

Training, Twin Cities Marathon & Ragnar

I've come to the realization that I need to put in a solid training effort for Twin Cities Marathon this year. My first marathon I did almost all my training runs and while it was incredibly difficult and I had to take breaks, but the work got done. From October 2011 to June 2012 I improved my marathon time by about 45 minutes and this was because I put in all the effort. 

Of the seven marathon's I've done, I am not proud of Twin Cities 2014 or Fargo 2015. Both of these runs I finished but it was a lack of commitment to get it done. Sure I can use work or school, or even a personal life as an excuse but in all reality I didn't make the time to get it done. 

This year I am doing a Ragnar, Ragnar is a team event that I'm signed up through JDRF MinnDakota's. We have two teams and we start in Winona MN and head 201ish miles up to Minneapolis. I can give up on myself and finish slow on my own personal races but I can't let my team down. 

So many people have different training programs available, it is difficult to decide which plan to use. In the end Hal Higdon's plans have never failed me so I'm going to use him again. He runs 18 week training programs for people who are new to running as well as folks that are seasoned vets. For this event the goal is to finish, and not let my team down. Ragnar falls on Week 11 of training and 18 miles that day. Ragnar will require me to run 15.4 total in three legs. Leg 1 is 6.2 miles, Leg 2 4.4, and Leg 3 is 4.8 miles. 

Don't cross your figures in hopes of another blog post before the next 18 weeks is up, I'll consider logging my training and keeping people in the loop. 

Sunday, April 19, 2015

Global Hero Application

My name is Douglas Michael Scalia and I was diagnosed with Type 1 Diabetes on May 24, 1999.  The winter prior to my diagnosis I started losing weight, I was always thirsty, and using restroom constantly.  At the time I didn’t have medical insurance so I didn’t do anything about my condition.  Eventually I finally had insurance so I went to the doctor, I recall telling the doctor the reason for my visit was because I thought I had diabetes. After performing a blood test the doctor returned and he said “I have good news, and bad news. The good news is we know what’s wrong, the bad news is you were right.”
The doctor was able to schedule me an appointment at The International Diabetes Center where I would learn to manage diabetes and gain control over my life with diabetes. Some of the things I learned were how to count carbs and dose for the food I would eat. The original treatment plan was a combination of two kinds of insulin. NPH and Regular, the NPH was a long lasting insulin otherwise known as a basal, and the Regular was a fast acting or known as a bolus. For the longest time I really didn’t have a full understanding of what I was doing, I was just going through the motions and listening to the doctors, forced to eat when I wasn’t hungry since I decided what I was going to eat at 7:00 a.m. instead of when I wanted to eat.
A time came when I was presented a new solution, Lantus and Humalog. I really enjoyed this program because I could eat when I was hungry or skip meals if I wasn’t hungry. This gave me a lot of additional freedom to live my life the way I wanted to. This new treatment option made living with diabetes a lot easier.
When I was diagnosed with diabetes I had made it down to 150 pounds, months after diagnosis I made my way back up to a healthy 175 but suddenly I found myself at 190, then 205, and before I knew it I was 255.  I read that a good way to lose weight would be to sign up for a 5k and raise money for a charity but I skipped that idea and somehow went right for the marathon and didn’t raise money for any charity.  I still have the email from the moment I registered for The Twin Cities Marathon in 2011. Registration opened at midnight but I logged in and the site let me in, at 11:52 p.m. and the response read “Congratulations! You are officially registered for the 30th Annual Medtronic Twin Cities Marathon on October 2nd 2011”
My first marathon was difficult but I finished. I remember chewing about 50 glucose tablets along the course, a lot of walking, but I finished. Probably the best part was around mile 25.5 when my brother came up and asked me “are you ready to do this because you’re going to have to lay it on the pavement to wrap things up, let’s go” as he ran with me to the chute. Sitting on the ground as my other brother showed me my unofficial time 6:00:05, had I finished or did I fail? I was told you get 6 hours to be considered a finisher. Eventually race officials assured me if I had a medal, finishers shirt, and my name was online as a finisher, then I was a finisher.
March of the following year I talked to my doctor about going on the insulin pump. Earlier in my story I mentioned words like bolus or basal but it wasn’t until I was on the pump that I knew what either of those words meant. Some other new terms I would learn while on the pump are Dual Wave Bolus, Square Bolus, and Temp Basal and Calibrate, and Active Insulin. Prior to being on the pump I really had no idea what all those terms were and how things such as active insulin could dramatically impact a run.
Running with an insulin pump and continuous glucose meter has dramatically increased my success rate of preventing a low while running and having the energy to continue. It takes a lot of practice, documentation, and trying to go out the next time to repeat what you did the previous time.
My second marathon was a huge success but a disaster at the same time. I finished the run at 5:12:16, I had to walk for almost 3-4 miles because of a low blood glucose reading. I did not carry my glucometer with me and I solely trusted my continuous glucose monitor. The meter read above 400 and I over corrected and met my fate around mile 16. I had brought plenty of glucose with me but because my correction was so great I about lost it. At this time I turned my temp basal to 5% and ate all that I could. I family was spectating and they had OJ on a table, I was lucky and that was enough to put me back to where I needed to be and I ran it out.
My third marathon is where I had my first run in with a Medtronic Global Hero. This chance meeting in line to use the restroom at the 31st Twin Cities Marathon is where I learned how to calibrate my continuous glucose meter. In the past I had calibrated it every single time I tested. The Global Hero was from Isrial had taught me to wait until I saw a flat line on my pump, this was the best time to calibrate. If it was shaped like a mountain it was a bad time to calibrate. Ever since that moment I’ve had a ton of success with calibration and improved awareness.

I don’t recall the exact moment when I decided I wanted to be a Global Hero but I do recall the moment when I decided I wanted to help change lives. If I can do this, anyone can do this. I’m not the fastest runner and to be honest I’ve always been a back of the crowd kind of finisher but I finish. I use running to tell the story of life with diabetes. My endo once told me I should make a shirt that says “I’m diabetic, what’s your excuse?”

Monday, January 5, 2015

18 Weeks until 26.2

Around this time last year I was tasked with training for Fargo Marathon. I had all the best intentions of training and running but then life got in the way. I was thankful you could defer your entry to the following year since I've never signed up for a race and intentionally missed it. I did miss Minnetonka Half Marathon but because I thought it started at 8:00 but it started at 7:00, I showed up and no one was there because they all were running. I got sick and missed much of the early training, then discovered class was on Saturdays so I decided to attend class instead of running the marathon.

A friend of mine told me I needed to run year round instead of just training for marathons and that way I would stay in shape. I tried my best to keep busy in-between but wasn't 100% on task. I've worked out probably half of the days between October and today.

Tomorrow I start training again for Fargo. Originally my goal was 4:30 but I'm going to have to reassess my goal and shoot for 5:15. I may be able to go faster but I'm really concerned with my ability to train, work, and do homework. Tuesdays nights are class nights, Saturday mornings are class. January goal will be to run Tuesday, Wednesday, & Thursday before work. This will be a challenge because I'm in to work at 7.

I plan to go to bed by 10:00 and wake up by 4:30, unsure 6.5 hours of sleep will be enough I may have to again reanalyze my plan but for now that is the goal. Saturdays in January I will either run the track at St. Kates after class or on the treadmill there. Hopefully February we'll get some nicer weather and I can run the river and back to Kates to study.

I need to continue to load my pump information and try to use MySugr more. I also need to better mentally prepare myself by thinking about my workouts and knowing what is going on before it happens. I would love to add weights but I honestly don't know what I'm doing and I'm not willing to pay for services. Even if I paid for a trainer I wouldn't ever have time to run and do weights. 

For now that's it. Have a good night! 

Friday, January 2, 2015

Diabets and working out

Check out my afternoon:

12:05 Pre Lunch 117

3:11 Post Lunch 171 - I didn't correct here because one wasn't called for

5:32 170 - Pretty dang consistent from lunch, I didn't correct because I was planning a trip to the gym and active insulin is a big no no for me while working out. 

7:42 173 - Perfect starting # and thinking my basal rate must be pretty good but who knows?

10 Minute warm up then stretch and ager that I'm 168

Get going and I'm about 10 minutes in and I ate a BeeStinger because I figured I would be wiped out by the time I was done. BeeStingers are 29g Carb. 

30 minutes in I'm 122 - I go for another 10 minutes and think I should call it quits because I went from 168 to 122 in 20ish minutes and I didn't want to be a goner.

30 minutes later I test at home and I'm 185 and another 10 minutes later I'm 205.

WTF? What did I do wrong? No temp basal, did I just not need the BeeStinger? Is diabetes just F'd up? 

Tomorrow is a new day, I guess I'll just try again.



Wednesday, December 31, 2014

Year in review

Towards the end of 2013 I got it in my head to start and MBA Program. After meeting with the program administrator at the time I discovered if I did go to St. Kate's I would be the first male graduate of the MBA Program. Looking back on the first year its less of a big deal to me that I could be the first man to get the MBA there and more excited I made it half way.

I was supposed to have Fargo Marathon be my 6th marathon but then I was sick in February and March but also decided to not run because class was on Saturdays and I didn't want to miss class in fear of falling behind. Twin Cities Marathon was my 6th marathon. I almost didn't run it because I had been lazy all summer and a few friends said it was better to train for a last ditch effort vs. not even starting. I was able to finish the marathon on 7 weeks of training. As I ran the marathon I came across another couple that said its better to be a part of the DNF club vs. DNS. That is Did Not Finish vs. Did Not Start.

Seven year anniversary with my wife on the 29th of December!

January 4th will make 15 years at my current employer with 3 years at the current location. Longest time I've worked at one place in the same job, the longest I've worked in one place was 4 years but two different positions. Cray cray.

2015 should be an exciting year, this is what's planned:

Year 2 of the MBA, graduate in December but class done in January 16'

2 Marathons, Fargo and Twin Cities(if I hear back from Global Hero's I'll make it 4 marathons on the year because I want Twin Cities to be 5th TCM and 10th overall)

Make it a great year folks!

Douglas Scalia

Tuesday, December 16, 2014

Can't get the words out

Do you sometimes find a low blood sugar brings a bunch of random thoughts and its hard to get all the words out? You find yourself babbling inside your mind about all the things you are thinking and trying to find a way to say or do things but your'e worried about it coming out wrong? You're sitting there wondering if the thoughts are real or fake, are you imagining things or are they actually happening? Does this happen to you?

I wonder how things got to where they are now. How did my blood sugar just hit 66? I tested at what would have been a normal time of night and I was 175 and I took a 2.4 correction bolus, why am I 66? What if I wasn't up at 1:00 a.m. watching a TV show and I were actually in bed sleeping? How low would my sugar have gone? I am not wearing a sensor. I didn't feel low I just tested because I was about to shut my body off for sleep. 

What if I went to bed with out testing and didn't wake up? Why am I lucky and haven't experienced hypoglycemia? Some say its not a matter of if but when and that's bullshit! Should I not have corrected and just kept my 175 and fallen asleep?

#NeedACure