Blood Glucose Monitoring for Dummies

[NinMD]

I am planning on getting a keto mojo next week, specifically to see how certain foods and sweeteners affect my BG. I am not diabetic and have zero experience with this. Does anyone have any tips to make this as easy as possible? When do I measure? How soon after eating, etc.? Any tips welcome.

[atomicspacebunny]

I like to use multiple glucose meters to experiment with, I am not diabetic but I always wonder how accurate they really are? Would use them to tell me when to eat and see how long I could maintain a certain level of blood glucose without feeling hypoglycemic/symptomatic.

There are apps also where you can record your numbers and it will make spread sheet charts with hikes and peaks with a running median.

Can’t wait until some diabolical genius figures out how to create a device that measure cortisol, insulin and glucagon levels along with glucose and ketones?

Blood Glucose Monitoring Protocols

How to take more accurate blood glucose meter readings: 1.) “…Notes for Context & Additional Observations Average readings of two or three blood glucose readings were taken for each blood glucose data point. From discussions with blood meter manufacturers I’ve learned that blood glucose meters have a high variance in their readings, so when you want accurate results you need to take several readings depending on the variance of the readings (two readings if the first two readings are < 0.5 mmo…

[Jody2]

I’m T2D and I always test my morning number (immediately upon waking up) and then most days I’ll take one more, the timing varies, depends on what I’m curious about. On fasting days, I’ll take it before bed, on feasting days I’ll take it 2 hours after a meal to see how foods affect me.

I alternate between my index and middle finger. I have two monitors and cross check them occasionally. I always wash my hands first and I use the little alcohol wipes. Confession: I do not however change the lancet very often because I’m lazy in that regard, I got tired of maintaining the lancet disposal things…you have to drop them off at doctors when full.

When I was gestational, it required testing like 4 times I day, I hated it. It’s not as bad now testing 1 to 2/x day. Even my doctor is okay with 1x/day.

Hope that helps!

[Alecmcq]

specifically to see how certain foods and sweeteners affect my BG

Welcome to the world of n=1!

I did a series of BG experiments a while back that were documented on threads here. Take a look and let me know if you have any questions. I came to the conclusion that erythritol did not raise my insulin (don’t forget that is what we really want to find out), so I went long on erythritol (pics at the bottom!!!)

I was rather fixated on eating raspberries back then. Interestingly, I don’t do them any more. The craving has gone.

Live experiment

Ok, I am right now experimenting on my reaction to this sweetener (pictures below if you are interested). Natvia is a mix of stevia and erythritol (it seems mostly erythritol). I have been eating quite a bit of this, and I want to find out what my BG reaction is going to be to ingesting 50g of this stuff. 10 mins ago, I tested my BG level, and it was 5.0. I then weighed 50g of this Natvia, mixed it with water, and drank. Yuk, way too sweet, took some effort to get it down! I will be testing my…

Live experiment, part 2

Here we go again. This time I am testing the same sweetener below (mostly erythritol), and testing what impact it has on my BG, and hence testing for an insulogenic effect. A few minutes ago, I tested my BG level, and it was at my usual base level of 5.0 (pic below). Last time I ingested 50g of this sweetener (pic below) and got an insulogenic effect (drop of BG from 5.2 to 4.5). But Brian @Bellyman pointed out that 50g of sweetener was not real life. He was right. So, this time, I have ingeste…

Live experiment part 3

Ok, here we go again. This time I am testing xylitol. More about that later… But for now, I tested my baseline BG level, and got my normal base reading of 5.0. By the way, I am being surprised at the stability of that base level. At the moment, I always seem to be getting a 5.0 when I am far away from a meal. Anyway, this time I then ingested 6g of xylitol. 6g only because that is the amount of erythritol I took last time, so it should be comparable. [image][image] I’ll be back at T+30 to te…

Live experiment part 4: pure erythritol

Ok, here we go again. This time I am testing my BG and therefore insulin response to pure erythritol. 5 mins ago, I tested my BG level, and you can see the result. A rather pleasing 4.7 (lower than in previous tests). I then ingested 6g of pure erythritol, pics below so you can see what it is. An interesting observation today is that this 6g of erythritol did not seem anywhere near as sweet when I was ingesting it as the 6g of the stevia/erythritol mix, or the xylitol. So maybe I might need mo…

Live experiment part 5.1

Ok, here we go again. This time I am going to test my normal dessert of raspberries and cream with sweetener. As this is a group of food (raspberries, cream, sweetener), I will end up doing 3 of these: Raspberries, cream, sweetener Just raspberries and cream Cream and sweetener (just for fun)… as I may have cream with sweetener on other things, might be interesting to see what it does. So, 5 mins ago, I took my base, and I will now go and eat my raspberries and cream and sweetener… [image]

Live experiment part 5.2: raspberries and cream (no sweetener)

Ok, here we go again. This is part 2 of the raspberries and cream experiment. This time, there’s no sweetener. So, 5 mins ago, I took my starting BG (5.7, bugger!), and now eating my raspberries and cream with no sweetener. Doesn’t taste anywhere near as good without the sweetener!! An old sugar addict talking! [image][image]

Live experiment part 5.3: eating nothing, what happens?

Ok, here we go again. This time I am establishing what happens when I eat nothing. I have had the same lead up to all the other tests I have done, except I have done a 5 day fast last week. Ended it yesterday evening, and have had 2 meals since then. Am hoping/expecting it won’t confound the results, but it may. 5 mins ago I took my first reading (below), and the plan this week is to simply eat nothing, and see what happens to compare vs the other tests. Not that interesting, but someone might…

[Regina]

The keto mojo website has some great videos and discussions on the timing of testing.

[Paul28023]

I did a series of BG experiments a while back that were documented on threads here.

Thanks for sharing Alec… I will need to bookmark this so I can take the time to read them…

It’s amazing how Non Diabetics take this BS stuff soo serious. Makes me think the keto thing really is tied into my T2D.

[KBG]

I second the keto mojo site for testing info. And just FYI, I ended up also getting their Bluetooth connector. It downloads my readings to the KetoMojo app on my phone. It’s handy to have it stored in one easy to review place and I don’t have to find some other way of logging or saving it.

[Alecmcq]

It’s amazing how Non Diabetics take this BS stuff soo serious

I am not diabetic, but I am sure I was IR and pre-diabetic. If I had continued with my old diet I would very likely have got T2D at some point.

Self measurement of health markers is really interesting to me. I love that we can now very easily measure our own blood pressure. And being a runner, I have been measuring my heart rate for ever. I now have a heart rate variability monitor which is the next level down, and I also have a blood oxygen monitor to see what’s happening to my blood as I run.

Understanding blood glucose and its important relationship with insulin led to me wanting to experiment a bit and be able to find out what was going on with BG.

To tell the truth I was a bit daunted going into a chemist and buying a blood glucose monitor. I was asked whether I was diabetic, because they were reserved for diabetics. I said no, but explained what I was doing and they then let me buy.

And now understanding how high insulin leads to many many chronic diseases I really want to measure insulin. Hoping that will happen soon.

[NinMD]

Thanks so much for all of the great information. I have lots to review now to help me. This is going to be fun.