Pregnancy Early Stages: Weeks 5-6

My pregnancy symptoms started immediately and I felt lucky that comparatively they were mild. I was moody, tired, and having tummy aches. My most persistent symptom was fatigue. I felt like I could sleep 12 hours a day or more.(Sometimes it was 16, yay for teacher schedule and summer vacation)

The biggest thing these few weeks, and the months ahead,  would be micro-managing my type 1 diabetes.

I adjusted my insulin pump basal* settings the night I found out I was pregnant. I began using a "super bolus" where I would take insulin for my meal but also my next two hours of a basal rate. I then set my pump to a temporary basal of 0-10% for those two hours. I learned about this method from another diabetic and believe she found in the book "Pumping with Insulin" and she also stated that she saw it on Diabetes Sisters Website.

After some consistent low blood sugars I stopped using the super bolus* and changed my bolus rates instead. I will likely need to super bolus after week 20 or so of the pregnancy as insulin needs will start to increase drastically. I was a bit too aggressive with adjusting my rates initially because I was anxious about having good blood sugars.

(*A basal rate is the rate of insulin that I take throughout the day in order to maintain blood sugars even without eating. A bolus is when I take insulin for a meal.)

I began eating more carbohydrates as recommended by my Dietician, a CDE (Certified Diabetes Educator). I needed to eat 150-175 carbs per day, which was a lot for me. I tried to bulk up on healthy carbs; whole wheat bread, brown rice, quinoa, potatoes, fruit, coconut yogurt, whole grain tortillas, and almond butter cookies! I began eating more protein, mostly chicken and some fish. Tofu in moderation and dairy in moderation. In order to get enough calcium I started eating more greens, coconut yogurt, and taking a supplement. This became really hard on days I felt nauseous or when we were traveling. There was more than one day that I survived on saltines, diet ginger ale, a piece of fruit, and miraculously could handle a cheeseburger (so unhealthy, so delicious!). I was often in the mood for things like fruit and kid friendly foods that I don't normally eat including mac n' cheese, grilled cheese sandwiches with tomato soup, and PB&J.

I had made a diabetes log template on excel. It is based off of one my doctor uses and I formatted it to highlight the numbers a certain color based on my blood sugar range goals! I started carrying around a hardcopy of my logs to write in. This meant using a bigger purse. 

I walked when my blood sugar started spiking. At night I would set alarms to wake me up if my blood sugar was going up or if I wanted to make sure that it went down. Nothing like jumping jacks at 11pm when my blood sugar is 240 and I'm exhausted/cranky from hormones. It worked though and that 240 dropped to 130 in 15 minutes, I took 0.5 units of insulin to help it. (Please note I am EXTREMELY insulin and exercise sensitive, not everyone's body reacts the same way). Of course then woke up low in the middle of the night and had to have a snack. Diabetes+Pregnancy is testing my strength is all kinds of new, exciting, and of course very frustrating ways!