Bolus for a biscuit!

I’m in two minds about insulin pumps. I can get through my days reasonably well and my blood sugar levels are extremely good. But since I became tied to only eating if I inject, and only exercising if my levels are just right, then worrying afterwards if they’ll fall too low because the basal insulin I injected 12 hours ago is now too high – I’ve been becoming more and more seduced by the flexibility that a pump would bring. The downside for me at the moment is whether I really want to be permanently attached and dependent on a sophisticated electronic device. Injections seem to be so much simpler, but do limit your lifestyle considerably compared to a non-diabetic’s. Pumps can make such tiny and rapid adjustments that they much more closely mimic a fully-functioning pancreas. However, because of the expense involved, it’s unlikely to be a choice I’ll have to make any time soon…
One hundred and twenty five monthly injections,
One thousand, five hundred a year,
And virtual abstention from sugary confections –
Now which do you think you’d prefer?

If your other choice was, instead of a pen,
To wear a device day and night
That pumped constant insulin under your skin,
Can you say? Do you think that you might?

What if the tubing should get pulled loose
As you toss and turn in your bed?
Or coils itself into a hangman’s noose,
And then you should wake up dead?!

Imagine though, if you were offered some cake,
When at one time you wouldn’t dare risk it,
The tiny increments you’d be able to make –
And bolus for a biscuit!

So if your levels swing from low to high,
Or possibly go ballistic!
Then let electronic wizards show you why
The future’s optimistic!

The Three A.M. Club

Low blood sugar can occur at any time of day or night, but it can be the night-time ones that are the most troubling, as often the symptoms do not awaken a sleeping person so that the hypo can be treated. It can be especially worrying for parents of a diabetic child, as you might imagine. For this reason, it is often suggested that blood sugar levels should be tested during the night to ensure that levels are not dropping too low. Generally speaking, three in the morning is when levels are likely to be at their lowest, so this is the most appropriate time for testing – what fun! Imagine all those bleary-eyed adults and sleepy children being pinged with a finger-pricker just at the time when you’re all comfy and snug and dreaming your favourite dream – oh what fun to be a member of the Three a.m. club!



At dead of night when all are sleeping,
Shadows through the room come creeping,
Seeking blood from those who slumber,
Hoping for a perfect number.

What beasts are these, with hair so wild,
Who would disturb a sleeping child?
What brings them at this witching hour?
What misbegotten, ghostly power?

Some phantom from the nether lands
With sharpened lancets in their hands?
A ghoulish, half-lit apparition,
Intent on some demonic mission…

In other houses, adults sleep –
For them, their slumber is so deep
Alarms will wake them with a shock…
Synchronised at Three O’ Clock!

Three is not a time for resting!
Three’s the time for glucose testing!
Join us till we sleep again,
The club that meets at Three A.M….!

The Pump-O-Dyne Eight

There’s a lot of talk about insulin pumps these days. Over in the US, they are fairly common as they tend to be financed by private health insurance, but in the UK it can be quite a battle to get them funded on the National Health Service – you have to prove that you would benefit significantly from having one, rather than using the much cheaper method of MDI (Multiple Daily Injections – now sometimes called BB, or Basal-Bolus). Usually, that would mean that you were finding it very difficult to get control of your blood sugar levels, leaving you at greater risk of diabetic complications.

I have very good control, so the only way I would probably be considered for one would be if, say, a rock-bottom model were to emerge that cut costs significantly. If probably wouldn’t be as elegant as some of the more expensive models, and possibly a bit more unwieldy. Probably something along these lines…



Hello, will you sit down? I’ve something to say.
You remember about pumping? How we said we can’t pay?
Well, I’m happy to tell you that we have found a way,
For a new pumping company has entered the fray!

Now, please don’t be shocked, for I know it looks cheap,
But the cost of those others would just make you weep!
And we’d love to provide them if the costs weren’t so steep…
So, just close your eyes now – and promise you won’t peep!

Tada! There you have it! The Pump –O-Dyne Eight!
With its own little trolley (because of the weight),
And here is the thing that straps onto your back,
With the steam-powered motor in its own special pack…

Now here, let me hold that, and you climb aboard!
Let’s get you strapped in with this thick nylon cord…
Don’t spill that jug where the insulin’s stored!
Come on! Are you thrilled? Let's hear you applaud!

Things that go low in the night…

In the early days after my diagnosis I would frequently wake up with a thumping headache – and that, without the benefit of an over-indulgence in alcohol! It took me a little while to realise that what was happening was that my blood sugar levels were falling very low during the night, but recovering by the morning. At that time I was on 20 units of Lantus as my slow-acting insulin and, although it is not supposed to have a ‘peak’ in its action profile, it seemed that for me it was peaking around 2-3 hours after taking the injection.

The first step was to determine if I truly was dropping low during the night. For me, the symptoms are very different from a daytime hypo. During the day I would get hot and cold sweats, thumping heartbeat, shaky limbs and hands, and blurry vision. At night, as far as I’m aware, I just sleep through it – but then wake with that headache. Some people experience a ‘bounce’, so that the levels are much higher in the morning than expected. I don’t – I’ve always woken up ‘in range’. So, the only way I could find out what was happening was to do the dreaded 3 a.m. tests. Sure enough, I found that I was often dropping low at this time. Gradually, over a period of weeks, I adjusted my Lantus dose, observing and recording the effects. It seemed that, every time I reduced it, it needed reducing further – I began to think I had hit on a bizarre ‘cure’!

Now, I’m happy to say, my overnight levels seem to be completely stable after reducing my Lantus by 55%. But that’s for now, with diabetes, you never truly know what might happen tomorrow…

Things that go low in the night…

Things that go bump in the night will often alarm us and give us a fright,
But since diagnosis, there’s one thing I’ve found –
It’s not the creaks and the rattles that make my heart pound,
But something quite different, if control is too tight,
And that’s when my levels go low in the night…

Things that go low in the night: the temperature’s one, due to lack of the Sun…
And because there’s no Sun, then you’ll find there’s less light,
For despite it’s best efforts the Moon’s not as bright
But it’s none of these ‘lows’ that would give me a fright,
It’s a dip in my sugars, or the thought that they might!

So I’ve worked on my basal, and I’ve tuned it so fine
That my overnight levels stay just over the line,
But there’s always that chance, it’s a diabetic’s plight
That out of the blue, I’ll go low in the night…

Glycoraptors and sugar sloths

I had an awful hypo the other day. Mostly, when my blood sugar is falling it’s a slow, gradual sensation, and my symptoms of dizziness, shaking, and heart a-thumping increase over a period of minutes. When this happens I can usually just treat with a couple of jelly babies and a biscuit, and I’m fine. On this occasion however, it all started happening within seconds – I was guzzling down jelly babies to no effect and felt as though I was sliding down out of control. I decided I shouldn’t be on my own, so went next door to my neighbour’s and she made me some sweet tea which finally seemed to do the trick.

It was scary, and without any real explanation – and thankfully a rare occurrence! But it did get me thinking about possible causes…





If you’ve got diabetes then there’s one thing you should know,
That one of two things happens if you feel yourself go low:
Number one is gradual, like surfing on molasses,
It creeps down slow in tiny steps, inexorably as time passes.

The other plummets like a stone – not dropped, but thrown with force,
And speeding ever deeper down, you cannot change its course…
Or so it seems, when remedies that once worked seem to fail,
With planning and with luck, you will, and live to tell the tale.

‘How can this be?’, I hear you say, ‘How can there be two sorts?’
This question too had troubled me, in my dreams and waking thoughts,
Until I met a wise old man who knew about them both,
‘It’s because of Glycoraptors, and the lazy Sugar Sloths.’

‘Now, rarely does a Glycoraptor get inside your blood,
But given all the sugar there, he’d live there if he could!
He’s not like other dinosaurs, those massive frightening beasts –
He’s tiny, and there’s nothing more he likes than sugar feasts.’

‘So, if you spot a toadstool whilst you’re walking through the wood,
Be careful not to pick your nose, for it is understood
They jump from toadstools up your snout and burrow their way in,
And make you shake and shiver as they crawl beneath your skin!’

‘And once inside your bloodstream, with voracious appetites,
They’ll gobble up the glucose till there’s nothing left in sight!
You’ve got to fill their bellies up, and then their hunger fades –
But quickly, and the best thing is some lemon lucozade!’

‘And Sugar Sloths?’, I then enquired, ‘Why, you should always keep
Some Jelly Babies in your bag – it sends them straight to sleep!’
So now you know, if you go low, the reason for the fall –
If it’s fast, it’s Glycoraptors, if it’s slow, a sloth that’s small!’