Bug off.
As if diabetes wasn’t tough enough to manage on a regular day, when you have a cold the battle becomes a lot tougher. Being ill causes your body to be under stress as it fights off the bug, and stress hormones cause a rise in blood sugars. Not only are you going to be running high because of the hormones, but they also cause insulin resistance! So, even as you try to correct, it takes more and more insulin to bring levels down to normal when you are under the weather.
I am sure you can guess where this is going: I have a cold and my BGs have been pretty ugly for the past 24 hours. I woke up with a scratchy throat yesterday morning and have been watching my numbers climb ever since. My fasting BG this morning was 286 (ew) and it took – count ‘em – 15 units of insulin to bring them under 200. I usually take that much in bolus units in and entire day.
There’s not a whole lot you can do except try to get better as fast as possible so your sugars come down. Getting better would be easier if I was able to have ANYTHING in the cold/flu aisle at the drugstore. Cough syrup? Packed with sugar. Ricola cough drops? Made with REAL honey (great). Even most headache medicines have a warning on them that discourages use if you have diabetes. I’ll never forget the one and only time I ever took Nyquil. I must have been about 13 years old, and after one bedtime dose my mom and I were up for half the night chasing lows with food and highs with tons of insulin. Later in life I would learn that Nyquil is probably not safe for anyone to take unless they are planning on attending a rave in Indio, but that’s another story.
Having a cold is messing with my numbers, which is in turn messing with my diet, which is in turn messing with my workout schedule which is in turn driving me up the wall. I have been downing water and vitamin C tabs like they’re going out of style, and I plan to stagger through a workout anyways tonight since I am not running a fever. I’ve found that when I have a cold, sweating actually makes me feel better, as long as I don’t have a temperature and am under 300 – which could be debatable today.
Arrrg. Alright, done venting in a public forum now. If anyone has an “sick day” tips for diabetes management, let me know!
In more exciting news, I watch the Rock n’ Roll Marathon yesterday and was psyched to know there were a few people with diabetes out there, runnin’ on insulin. Maybe I’ll be out there next year!
Did you enjoy this post? Why not leave a comment below and continue the conversation, or subscribe to my feed and get articles like this delivered automatically to your feed reader.
Comments
I’ve also found that taking really hot showers and sort of “sweating it out” really helps too. I don’t have diabetes, but I don’t like taking meds unless I absolutely have to.
Oh yeah - that totally helps - and a good hot shower tends to kind of relieve the congestion too - thanks for commenting!
Feel better boo!