A few weeks ago I decided to give Apidra a try for Princess. We have had huge success with Lovebug using it and I thought maybe it would be easier to have them on the same insulin I know that sounds like a bit of an oxymoron because they are on different pumps so I am not confused. I am not a big fan of accidentally filling the wrong pump with the wrong insulin. Just don't need that headache. I have to make enough changes to basal and bolus amounts as it is! I really don't need to make MORE work for myself.
The first week, I was seriously ready to pull my hair out. Princess kept going low an hour after she would eat and she hadn't done that with Novolog. I raised I:C ratios, and kept raising them. To no avail, that was not working. So I lowered them back down and started using the Square Bolus and evening her bolus out over an 1.5 hours. That didn't seem to work at first. It just prolonged the low. But I kept with it for a few days and it started to work! A little victory, at last.
Then we started seeing higher numbers over all. I raised her basal rates and we are still raising them. Maybe I should say tweaking them. I think they are as high as they need to be, (i could be wrong though) I just really need to figure out how to balance the day out with what she needs.
Take for example, over night (for us that is 8pm to 8am right now) She typically goes to bed in range and then spikes up about 200 points with in and hour after she falls asleep. (dusk phenomenon) We still can't get that spike to go away. I did, for a while, but then she was waking up too low in the morning. So needless to say we are still working on that one. Plus we have this weird pattern that has been happening after breakfast.
I have been giving her a normal bolus and she will spike and come back down in range within 1.5 hours and then a half hour later is going straight back up again!! (double arrows up on Mini) And has been high at lunch. (around 200) I raised basal for the morning but it doesn't seem to be helping. Might need another basal tweak there too. All those tweaks just never end!
Now three, (almost 4) weeks in I am happy with Apidra for Princess and very hopeful we will be sticking with it!
The first week, I was seriously ready to pull my hair out. Princess kept going low an hour after she would eat and she hadn't done that with Novolog. I raised I:C ratios, and kept raising them. To no avail, that was not working. So I lowered them back down and started using the Square Bolus and evening her bolus out over an 1.5 hours. That didn't seem to work at first. It just prolonged the low. But I kept with it for a few days and it started to work! A little victory, at last.
Then we started seeing higher numbers over all. I raised her basal rates and we are still raising them. Maybe I should say tweaking them. I think they are as high as they need to be, (i could be wrong though) I just really need to figure out how to balance the day out with what she needs.
Take for example, over night (for us that is 8pm to 8am right now) She typically goes to bed in range and then spikes up about 200 points with in and hour after she falls asleep. (dusk phenomenon) We still can't get that spike to go away. I did, for a while, but then she was waking up too low in the morning. So needless to say we are still working on that one. Plus we have this weird pattern that has been happening after breakfast.
I have been giving her a normal bolus and she will spike and come back down in range within 1.5 hours and then a half hour later is going straight back up again!! (double arrows up on Mini) And has been high at lunch. (around 200) I raised basal for the morning but it doesn't seem to be helping. Might need another basal tweak there too. All those tweaks just never end!
Now three, (almost 4) weeks in I am happy with Apidra for Princess and very hopeful we will be sticking with it!
4 comments:
Hey there Heather - I just switched Grace over to Apidra to try it in her Pod. We have been on Novolog all these years. We are only two days into it, but I've noticed her correction factor needs to be increased on Apidra and I did tweak an overnight basal. It sounds like you are doing great with it so far.
I am glad you said that. It took about 3-4 weeks for Brianna's numbers to settle back down after changing from Novolog to Apidra. I think it takes the body a few weeks, days, to get use to the new insulin. Hope it starts workings really well for her. I know we LOVE it :)
Kelly Harp
It definitely takes some adjusting but once you're in the groove I think you'll love it :)
We didn't need a whole lot of adjusting, but we were on Humalog before.
We are having the opposite problem at night... Justin goes to bed "bumped up" to upper 100's and I am still doing a basal decrease a couple hours later... what a pain all this "twweking" can be.
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