Times that I HATE my pump, What was causing the problem? Options

[GA Hiker]

I’ve been running high, for me, the last few days and really struggling to fix the situation. On Saturday, I inserted a Sure-T in my butt, a site area that has given me problems with absorption before. But after many months off, I’ve been trying again. Thinking the site was the problem, Monday morning, I inserted a Silhouette in my abdomen, best set-site combination for me. I was overly high after lunch, then fine all day and evening. But by bedtime I had gone up, corrected, continued high during the night, corrected again, and woke Tuesday morning at 125 instead of my usual 60s – 80s. Then I soared up to 195 after breakfast, but it was hiking day…

My usual hiking procedure is to under-bolus for breakfast, reduce basal below 50% for 2 hours before hiking and to zero while hiking – and still I often drop into the 40s. But yesterday, taking a full bolus for breakfast and not reducing the basal at all, I hiked 6 miles and never dropped below 135. Something was definitely wrong!

When I got home, I opened a new vial of Novolog (old one only 17 days old), and changed the reservoir and tubing (both 5 days old). Had only some sliced turkey, lettuce and tomato for lunch – no carbs. Corrected 2-3 times during the afternoon and still hovered at 150.

Finally, gave a correction from the new vial by injection. Yea!! Dropped right down! So my day-old Sil in the ab, my best location of all time, was bad??? I inserted a new Sil, also in my abdomen. Success!!! I actually went low last night (2 glucose tabs), woke at 72, went low again after breakfast.

So what was it? Were both the Sure-T and 1st Sil sites bad? Was the insulin also weak? Or all of the above?

It’s times like these that I HATE my pump!

Barbara

[tedm]

My guess is that both sites were bad. You said that you've had problems in the past with your butt so I'm just going to assume that this was more of the same. I'd say that you just happened to get unlucky with you Sil too. Maybe it was in just the wrong spot or the Insulin gods were just angry :-).

The fact that correcting through the pump with the new insulin (after your light lunch) didn't help but the injection did seems to show this.

With MDI, if you happen to inject into a bad site, you screw up one injection. With a pump, a bad site means that you're fighting for days.

I still wouldn't go back.

[Tiffany]

For me, incidences similar to yours Barbara are often not caused by the pump at all! In fact, hormones are typically the first culprit in my case! There are just so many variables that sometimes it's impossible to pinpoint the exact cause; PMS, Post-MS, During-MS (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wink.gif) , high-fat meals, intense cardio exercise on an empty stomach, heck even massage therapy guarantees me some pretty stubborn post-highs lol! It's more times like these I really don't much like my Diabetes lol.

I hope everything has at least evened out for you now and that you're back on track! (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

[GA Hiker]

Thanks Ted and Tiffany. I agree with everything you said. (In my case though, I'm way past all the MS's.) I've been totally back on track with BGs ever since I inserted the second Sil. However, I've just come back from a non-diabetes ER visit. Near the end of yesterday's hike, I had some mean insect I did not see give me a painful bite on the back of my upper arm. By this afternoon, it had created a 2"x1.5" flat raised hot red oval area that itched like crazy. I got up several times during the night to ice it, and continued that today. I didn't realize how big it was getting until my husband looked at it and said I'd better get a medical person to look at it. I went online and freaked out looking at what some spider bites can become. Don't know if it was a spider, just that it was big and black. The ER couldn't say if it was a spiker bite or what, just that the treatment would be the same whatever it is -- ice, Benedryl and hydrocortisone cream. It's helping already. If it is a BAD spider, it will get ugly, take 3 months or so, and might need unappealing surgical procedures. I'm sure hoping that's not the case. I would have suspected that this bite could have caused high BGs, but most of the time since the bite I've been going low. Go figure!

[redladytiger]

I am new to Insulin Pump Forums, but i will pray for you that it is just a bad bug bite, and not a spider bite, they can def. get nasty. Hope you feel better soon.
redladytiger

Thanks Ted and Tiffany. I agree with everything you said. (In my case though, I'm way past all the MS's.) I've been totally back on track with BGs ever since I inserted the second Sil. However, I've just come back from a non-diabetes ER visit. Near the end of yesterday's hike, I had some mean insect I did not see give me a painful bite on the back of my upper arm. By this afternoon, it had created a 2"x1.5" flat raised hot red oval area that itched like crazy. I got up several times during the night to ice it, and continued that today. I didn't realize how big it was getting until my husband looked at it and said I'd better get a medical person to look at it. I went online and freaked out looking at what some spider bites can become. Don't know if it was a spider, just that it was big and black. The ER couldn't say if it was a spiker bite or what, just that the treatment would be the same whatever it is -- ice, Benedryl and hydrocortisone cream. It's helping already. If it is a BAD spider, it will get ugly, take 3 months or so, and might need unappealing surgical procedures. I'm sure hoping that's not the case. I would have suspected that this bite could have caused high BGs, but most of the time since the bite I've been going low. Go figure!

[GA Hiker]

I am new to Insulin Pump Forums, but i will pray for you that it is just a bad bug bite, and not a spider bite, they can def. get nasty. Hope you feel better soon.
redladytiger

Thank you for your good wishes. I went to my dermatologist today and he doesn't think this is going to be terrible. It's still hard red hot and itchy, and BIG but he gave me a soak for 2-3x per day and a strong cortisone ointment for 2x per day and said it should be resolved in a week or so. He wanted to also give me cortisone pills to take but I refused -- I don't need to deal with high BGs.