BG does not change overnight.

So the low carb. diet seems to have been working OK for me.  However, yesterday I ate a bowl of yugort with blackberries after lunch.  It was probably 45 carbs. and I know some sugar and when I got home 4 hours later my BG was around 100.  So I went for a 1 hour bike ride and my BG went to 82.  I get up this morning and it is 81. 

One thing that I have noticed through all this testing is that no matter what my BG is at bedtime it seems to be the same in the morning.  I read that the longer you go without food the more you spike.  I did not eat last night so it has been 18 hours since I last ate.

Is this wrong?  Is my liver not dumping glucose like it is suppose to?  I don't know what to think. 

Also, no matter what I eat my BG never gets below 98 unless I exercise.   It seems like my body on it's own can't get BG any lower no matter how long I go without food.

Post Edited (ChrisR) : 6/21/2014 6:28:43 AM (GMT-6)

I thought that "Dawn Phenomena" meant that overnight levels went higher then bedtime levels.

I don't know.....I have not slept well in 13 years....All I know is that no matter what I eat the lowest my levels go is around 100 no matter how long I wait. If I exercise they drop considerably. Although I don't think this has anything to do with health. From what I read your muscles just burn glucose right out of your blood and it has nothing to do with insulin.

According to ADA, "Everyone experiences dawn phenomena". Even non-diabetics. I also found this.

Whether you have type 1 or type 2 diabetes you are likely to have the dawn phenomenon. However, dawn levels among people who don’t have diabetes rise only slightly, if at all, “because they secrete insulin to prevent it,” according Francesca Porcellati, MD, and her associates at Italy’s University of Perugia. Their study, “Thirty Years of Research on the Dawn Phenomenon: Lessons to Optimize Blood Glucose Control in Diabetes,” appears in the December 2013 issue of Diabetes Care, a professional journal of the American Diabetes Association. The full-text of this study is free online.



- See more at: http://www.healthcentral.com/diabetes/c/17/164945/phenomenon-diabetes-puzzle/#sthash.AtkwUaVT.dpuf

OH, so since my levels don't rise from night to morning then I am not diabetic let alone pre-diabetic......Ha! Ha!. Let my show you what happens when I eat a bagel......

Post Edited (ChrisR) : 6/21/2014 7:21:40 AM (GMT-6)

Know the feeling folks if I have been active that day going for my walk and weight training I will have to eat a fibre bar or breakfast bar before going to bed 15 to 18 carbs, sometimes I throw in one snack size kit kat or similar depending on what I have done that day and my sugar will be normal normal when I get up

Good morning Lanie. It's always nice to hear from you. Your so kind to share your advice. I have had to offer similar advice to newly dx. prostate cancer men. Although, there are no absolutes in life, I can often reassure the men diagnosed with the kind that I had that it will not kill them. It takes a while to talk them off the ledge, but eventually it gets to them. I so I really appreciate your similar attempts to help me.

So, once again I am confused or scared, a little of both.

Before breakfast I was at 81. I ate 3 eggs 2 pieces of bacon, 2 glasses of Soy Milk. 3 carbs each serving.

At 1 hour I hit 92. at 2 hours I am still at 91. Shouldn't the 2 hour mark be back down to 81'ish. Like I said my body can't seem to move my BG when it is lower then 100. Mabye a sign of not enough insulin.

I don't know.....If I go ride I bet it would drop back to the lower 80's.

thanks again to all for input....I really am greatful.

Dx @ 42 PSA 2.76 GS6
open RP 10/08
pT2 Organ Confined GS6
5.5 Year PSA <0.03 (Complete remission)

I guess you're just seeing how your body is reacting to what you eat. A non-diabetic or at least a person not having any problems with blood sugar would probably see his blood sugar go lower to the 80's around the two-hour mark. Still, your numbers are great and I hope they continue that way.

Chris, I'm really happy to help you in any way I can. Helping someone else is empowering just as I know you've found when you help others with PC. I've learned a lot in the eight years since I got my first blood sugar meter. When I came to HealingWell, there was only talk about medication and not too much about using diet or exercise to control blood sugar. I have to thank a Scot named Fergus, a type 1, who introduced me to Dr. Bernstein and his book. It was then that I learned how our blood sugar works - or doesn't work (!) - and how we can actually have some measure of control over it.

My own motivation is my health, of course, but I have two kids, now 33 and 30, and they are everything to me, and diabetes literally killed my mom and grandma. So, I know this journey really well and I've had lax periods of time in which I was lazy and other times in which I swung the other way. Now, I've come to sort of a compromise in which I do eat a piece of cake at a birthday dinner (or a piece of bread if it's a really authentic rustic bread) sometimes but my eating plan is always the same: low carb. This way of eating has given me better health (in addition to better blood sugar), better lab results, lower weight and lower blood sugar and resting heart rate.

So, I think you'll also realize you'll gain a lot of insight and knowledge about your own health and help your family, as well.

Some people may think that a low-carb diet is high-fat and all meat (like the early Atkins) which it is not. A great dinner would be a small salad (leafy lettuce, tomato slice, cucumber, shredded cheese, olives and oil and vinegar), a piece of roasted chicken, sauteed bell peppers and onions, mushrooms with wine. Lately for breakfast, I've been eating spinach and cauliflower or broccoli with a pat of butter or two pancakes made with wheat bran and flaxseed meal. And I've been drinking the Almond Breeze Coconut Almond milk (unsweetened) which seems to have no effect on my blood sugar.

We're going out to dinner tonight with friends and I know I'll be ordering chicken and mixed vegetables with a garden salad. I'll be taking half the chicken home because the restaurant serves two chicken breasts on the plate. (And that will be my breakfast tomorrow.) Afterwards, I'll eat a couple of strawberries and some nuts while we play cards (and the others will eat some cake and a lot more fruit).

Have a great day!

I hope you're writing all this down so you know what's working and what's not. It's interesting to see if you can duplicate the results. I did that a few years ago and made a list of the best dinners that gave me the best fasting the next day.

And remember that if you do change your routine like the biking for 1.5 hours, that you'll most likely have different readings as a result so be prepared for that, too.

My doctor orders lab tests for the A1c twice a year but in between times, I get the ReliOn A1c kit at WalMart to see my results. It may not account for much but it does give me an idea about my average.

ChrisR,

Thank you for starting this thread. It helped to remind me about apple cider vinegar and how it quickly lowered my fasting blood sugar level. I tried it in the past and it really worked, and after being reminded by this thread it is working for me again. Cannot remember why I stopped before, perhaps it is because like most meds and remedies: it works until it stops working.

Anyway google ACV and diabetes and you will find tons of information from a variety of websites confirming the efficacy of organic apple cider vinegar for lowering blood sugar.

That was 2 hours after eating a bunch of butter covered popcorn

Believe it or not it may have been the popcorn. Even though it is a carb some of us find it helpful. For others, not so good.

www.healingwell.com/community/default.aspx?f=20&m=2882142

I am sure it was the popcorn.  It's got a lot of carbs.  I agree with Lanie, it is basically corn on the cob.

Although, my overnight fasting BG seems to be doing better as many of you already know, I really believe it is your post-meal BG levels that are also really important.  I still feel my body is not reacting the way it should to a high carb. meal.    Either way I am somewhat encouraged that I seem to be able to control my BG with diet and exercise.  At least for now. 

I've been logging my BG and for the last month it is averaging 90....I'll take it for now.