It's a Roller Coaster, Baby!

And not necessarily a good one, either. Boo.

That, my friends, is a representation of what my blood sugars did between 8:00-ish pm last night and 10:00-ish this morning. “Up down up down.” Or maybe down-up-down-up is more accurate. The funny thing is, when I woke up at 5:00 am this morning, I was totally drenched in sweat. It’s that whole adrenaline-kicking-in-because-my-blood-sugar-is-low thing that results in all that crazy sweat.

This is what happened: I was half asleep tossing and turning and realized, while still in bed, that sweat was literally dripping off me. Something clicked and I was like, “hmm…excessive sweat…probably low…probably should wake up and do a blood test.” Sure enough, 46 mg/dL. And the funny thing about that is that I swear I was not nearly that sweaty at 8:00 pm last night when I had a 45 mg/dL in the middle of my acro/tumbling class. One would think that with all the jumping, flipping, and tumbling that was happening, I would have looked like I’d just gone for a swim, but no. Instead I wake up at 5am looking like I’ve just run a marathon or something. Wouldn’t it be amazing though, if a person could dream their exercise and reap the benefits of that dream exercise as if it was real awake exercise? Aside from waking up in a puddle of sweat, it would be pretty cool.

Annnnd…this is that awkward moment that I realize I just wrote an entire blog post about my sweat…followed immediately by that awkward moment when you just realized you read an entire post about my sweat. Awkward!

P.S. Comments and stuff are welcome! Got a similar story? Or a not-similar story? Want to talk about cloud shapes? Don’t be shy!

You Might be Low if...

· You wake up on the floor and don’t remember how you got there. People may be hovering over you with concern.

· You get really angry for no reason.

· You start crying for no reason.

· You get angry and start crying…for no reason.

· You wake up (in your bed) with something like an anxiety attack, thinking:

• “What if I don’t get my circus application in on time?”
• “What if I am late to the Bike and Build orientation?”
• “Oh no, I totally forgot to prep the fruit salad, breakfast is going to be a disaster!”
• “I’m going nowhere in life and will wind up living under a bridge and dying in a gutter by the time I’m 40.”

· You wake up, in bed, tossing off all the blankets and sheets because you’re overheating but the room is only about 40 degrees F because it’s the middle of winter, and your sweat has soaked through the sheets so you’re going to have to replace them after you get your glass of juice. And maybe toast with jam, too.

· Nothing seems to be going right. I mean nothing. Then you cry.

• “Why can’t I do these kick-over to seats on the German Wheel?”
• “There’s no way I can do these math problems. The 3’s multiplication table is impossible.”
• “Why do I keep dropping everything?”

· Someone does something nice for you, and you get angry.

· Someone asks if you’d like some help doing a somewhat difficult yet not impossible task, and you get angry.

· You’re talking gibberish. Or rather, the story you’re telling makes no sense at all to anyone but you.

· You lose all sense of coordination. That is, if you had any to begin with.

· Mood swings? Haha, mood rollercoaster!

· You think to yourself, “I should go grab my blood test machine and do a blood test because I’m feeling a little off.” Then you realize that you’re already holding your meter, and that you’ve actually been holding it for a while, but you don’t know how long. And you have no recollection, whatsoever, of getting up, walking over to the table, grabbing said machine off the table, and returning to the chair. Then when you finally get around to doing a blood test, the machine reads “34 mg/dL.” Score.

*Some of those things may or may not have occurred in the course of my diabetic life.

Down on Me

It’s things like this that make me question the feasibility of my newly designed path. What I’m talking about is what went down in my German Wheel class tonight: my blood sugar. Before class it was really nice at 110 mg/dl. I took my pump off because sometimes it gets in the way. We did the warm-up which was some jogging, jumping, lunging, and stretching. Then the fabric kids (they’re around my age, some older some younger, but I like to call people kids) went to hang out on fabrics and us wheel kids got the wheels out to play. There was a new student with us tonight, so I felt a little cramped, but I was going to make myself be comfortable with it. I did some warm-up rocks and stuff and just felt off; too hot and sweaty and a little uncoordinated. So, I grabbed a chewy bar then hopped back on the wheel. Still didn’t feel right. Ok. I should see where I’m at…so I did another blood test. This time, it was 29 mg/dl. Seriously?!?! That’s very low. Seriously. I’m glad I didn’t try anything that required more skill and control. A non-diabetic typically stays around 60 – 90 mg/dl, and 60 is even a bit low, but not too bad. Usually the target range for diabetics is somewhere around 70 – 140 mg/dl. This differs from person to person; some break it down to 70 – 100 mg/dl before meals and 100 – 140 mg/dl after meals, whereas others might have slightly different target ranges based several reasons including age or how their control has been over the last 3 – 4 months. Moral of the story, I was low. This made me so frustrated because before class I thought to myself, I wonder if I should have a snack? I’m going to take my pump off anyway, and usually my blood sugar goes up a bit by the end of class, so, I’ll forgo the snack because I think it’ll be fine. I should have remembered that I snacked around 5 pm and gave myself insulin with it. That insulin was still hanging out in my system and got a little extra kick from the warm-ups we did. The result: crash, boom, splat, there goes my blood sugar. So I ate. Waited about 15 minutes. The wheel coach asked if I was ready yet…I just didn’t feel right yet, so I did another blood test. Whoopee…49 mg/dl. Grrrr, still not high enough; more snack and more waiting. I already felt like I was wasting time. I got really frustrated. I cried some. It happens when my blood sugar is low. I accept that, doesn’t mean I have to like it. Finally I felt kind of ok enough to do some stuff. But I was still awkward and not really on point like I’ve been in previous classes. Maybe in part because I was on a bigger wheel than I’m not used to; the new student had the wheel that I usually use. But really, I think I just let this “episode” get to me. I let it rattle around in my head and take up valuable space that happy-focus-wheel-focus-time needed. Then I let the insidious thoughts creep in, What are you even doing here, Abby? You’re just kidding yourself thinking that you can do this. You can’t even do a kick-over to seats without a spot yet. You can’t do pull-up to seats without a spot yet. You can’t do that weird pike thing without a spot yet. Stupid thoughts, where are you even coming from? Huh? The land of Low-Blood-Sugar-Shakes and Emotional City, that’s where. I know I’m low when I start panicking about the future. It’s true. I realized that during one particular finals week at UMass and I was standing in my dorm room just looking around and suddenly I was in the middle of some I’m-going-to-end-up-homeless-in-a-box-on-the-side-of-the-road-freezing-to-death panic attack. So, I knew this was just my blood sugar talking. But it actually tends to magnify fears or insecurities that I already have. So yes, I do wonder if what I am doing will be worth it; will I find success? Who really ever knows? All that matters is if I’m enjoying it. And yes, excluding the stinkin’ lows! Luckily, I ended on a high note. And I do not mean my blood sugar! I’ve been trying this trick that we call the “straddle spiral.” Most of the time the wheel just ends up slamming on the ground with a very loud SLAP! But tonight, after several tries, I finally got it. There is hope, after all.

Straddle spiral (the very first one, for about 2 seconds), then many more spiral moves.

Pull up to seats (at about 34 seconds) and kick-over to seats (at about 59 seconds)