CP free lunch

Hi, I'm currently doing my DAFNE course today and yesterday I had the same carb free lunch Ham and Cheese 2 egg Omlette with salad that consisted of lettuce, toms, cucumber, spring onion and beetroot. I've been testing my BG every hour since my lunch and its gradually increasing from 6.5 before my lunch at 2pm it has just reached 13.5! I've not even had any milk in tea or coffee so I'm unsure as to why this could be. I usually take 20 of BI at 12am I did this on Friday however the reason for doing the CP free lunch as I had a suspicion my BI was running out towards 6pm so yesterday evening I did 14u of BI at 12am and a further 6u at 12pm today in the hope it may fix the problem. I realise I can't make a judgment on one day's results but I'm concerned I miss calculated the CP content of my lunch.
Any thoughts welcome!
Thanks Rachel

Some people (including me) find that in a carb-free meal, protein can raise blood glucose levels. Your lunch contained several sources of protein - ham, egg and cheese, and it may be that this has raised your BGs as a result. I usually need to take a small amount of QA if I just have scrambled eggs without toast.

If you had the salad without the omelet, then the rise would probably be negligible. You'd get hungrier though :-)

Thanks for that Warwick I will bear that in mind, I did think that might be the case!
Rachel

Warwick said:
Some people (including me) find that in a carb-free meal, protein can raise blood glucose levels. Your lunch contained several sources of protein - ham, egg and cheese, and it may be that this has raised your BGs as a result. I usually need to take a small amount of QA if I just have scrambled eggs without toast.

If you had the salad without the omelet, then the rise would probably be negligible. You'd get hungrier though :-)

Hi,

This is very interesting topic because that was my main concern during attending DAFNE program just few weeks ago. All my breakfast and lunch meals had almost non carbs during the program, however my BG levels were increasing much higher than my targets. Through all my diabetes years (15 years) now, I learned that not just carbs put my sugar levels up but also protein and some vegetables like carrots and capsicums especially red ones. I shared that with my professional DAFNE educator where she advised me to monitor my BG levels associated with my meals including carbs, vegetables and proteins. It is important to share your records with your educator and your physician to adjust your QA and BI accordingly.

Cheers
Muna .

I've seen the same and was recently by a consultant that when having a Carb Free period to monitor BI behaviour that it was much more reliable to skip a meal altogether rather than skipping carbs but continuing to eat proteins etc. That advice certainly helped me to improve my understanding of my morning BI dose.

The advice on my course is to have some sort of carbs with each meal and dose accordingly, and may I remind that high fibre carbs are good for your bowels.

Hi
Maybe your BI isn't enough. Splitting it, but using same total amount, may no be correct approach.
I went to my DAFNE course 2 weeks ago and was convinced my BI was correct, as I'd had to fast for a minor procedure last year. At that time I was on a no carb (actually no solid food) 24 hours. I was able to drink bovril, tea or coffee with no milk and eat sugar free jelly as it contains next to nothing. I wouldn't suggest you do this for a whole day as I had to, but maybe trying it for half a day or part of a day might clarify your BI.
As it happenend I had to adjust mine down by a couple of units during DAFNE week.
Good luck!

Yeah I'd agree with people above, I'm trying to be low carb, salad for lunch, meat and veg for dinner, I find Tomatoes spike BG and peas, sweetcorn.

Before low carb I wouldn't count vegs or protein (they would be covered by QA for bread/potatoes etc...), but now that's all I eat I'm having to inject for it, not a lot admittedly. An old school carb free meal still needs a few units of QA, more if I have eggs.

Rachel454 said:
Hi, I'm currently doing my DAFNE course today and yesterday I had the same carb free lunch Ham and Cheese 2 egg Omlette with salad that consisted of lettuce, toms, cucumber, spring onion and beetroot. I've been testing my BG every hour since my lunch and its gradually increasing from 6.5 before my lunch at 2pm it has just reached 13.5! I've not even had any milk in tea or coffee so I'm unsure as to why this could be. I usually take 20 of BI at 12am I did this on Friday however the reason for doing the CP free lunch as I had a suspicion my BI was running out towards 6pm so yesterday evening I did 14u of BI at 12am and a further 6u at 12pm today in the hope it may fix the problem. I realise I can't make a judgment on one day's results but I'm concerned I miss calculated the CP content of my lunch.
Any thoughts welcome!
Thanks Rachel

A carb-free meal with protein will usually require a bolus taken with it. For myself, I usually need to dose the same as for carbs, so if I am having 40 grams of protein, then I would take the same amount of insulin. as if I was taking 40 gram of carbs.

I do take issue with the fact that we need carbs as part of our diet. That is not true. We need protein - essential amino acids - and we need fats - essential fatty acids - but there is no such thing as essential carbohydrates. There are many T1 diabetcs successful;y practising extremely low-carb diets. For the 'bible' on this, try reading Dr Bernstein's Diabetes Solution.