Wednesday, June 23, 2010

Pumpin at the Pool

This is our first summer with Grace on the pump. I kind of thought it was going to be pretty easy to regulate her blood sugar - simply lower her basal rate and we're good to go.

I'm finding it much harder than anticipated. She uses the Animas Ping which is supposed to be waterproof, but from a couple accounts I hear that's not always the case. Plus, swimming always plummets her numbers, so disconnect while swimming is the rule.

But even disconnected, I have trouble keeping her over 70. Today I was literally chasing her around the pool with Gatorade during swim team practice! Yesterday every snack she ate during the day I didn't need bolus. What happens is she comes out of the water wanting a snack. I check her number and she's, say, 100. 15-20 carb snack with no bolus, don't even bother reconnecting, and she's back in the water pretty soon.

However, late yesterday she came out of the water, I didn't check her blood sugar, she stayed out for a while, I forgot to reconnect her, and she ended up at 318! I felt so rotten, because I could've prevented it if I'd remembered.

Do any of you have a good pool-day routine that I can follow? It seems I can't keep Grace from pinging from low to high to low again. I know much of the answer lies in testing more frequently, but I'm already testing 10 times a day! Any pumping and swimming advice?

4 comments:

  1. Hey - our 1st summer pumping and swimming too! Learning curve is steep on this one. I'll tell you what I do, maybe it will help. I created a temp basal of -20% of her basal rate for 2 hours (or longer if she is swimming). But that's cause I don't have to disconnect, so would that work for you on the Ping? I don't know. I think that decreasing her basal rates BEFORE she swims might be the trick, like 3-4 hours before she swims. Maybe cut that rate down, so that she goes into swimming on a higher number which would result in less 'pinging' from high to low. Then still give snacks without a bolus and she won't have dropped that much cause she started higher.

    I know other mommas will chime in here with some good advice. I'll bet Meri has the answer - she has the answer to everything in her swelly, hurty brain. And I know if she is reading this right now, she is laughing. But I will bet she knows.

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  2. I wish I had some good advice for you but unfortunately I have none...I have just enrolled Miss E in swim lessons this summer, this will be her first time swimming and I don't know what to expect yet.

    I wish you all the best and hope that you get some great advice from all of our fellow D-moms/dads...I know that they have a wealth of knowledge!

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  3. Yup Penny, you totally made me laugh! But too bad I have no real good advice. I'm usually chasing kids around with juice too. On swimming days I do decrease basals after the pool. But with my boys, the lows usually come hours after...during the night. Everyone is affected differently by activity...so there isn't a mold. Keep tinkering and you'll come up with a plan. Trial and error stinks, but it's all we have sometimes.

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  4. Swimming makes me sick.

    Sorry to be so blunt.

    We haven't had any issues with Addy's pump in the water -- except the she seemed to have alot of lows while swimming with it on.

    This is our 3rd (AZ) summer with a pump and it's getting a little better.

    I wrote this post awhile back, trying to explain how we're managing swim. Sorry if it sounds all complicated. But. This freaking disease is complicated.

    http://rosefamilyaz.blogspot.com/2010/06/average-swimmer.html

    Hope it helps!

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