Oy...

So I took a week off from checking my blood sugar (somehow knowing I would have to be diligent about it soon enough...) since it had been fine. Imagine my surprise when I tested 1 hr after breakfast (measured from the beginning of the meal) on Monday and found that my blood sugar was hovering close to the "uh-oh" line.

I panicked. Things evened out the rest of the day (all numbers were completely normal), so my worry abated...a little.

Tuesday, ALL my post-meal numbers were high-ish (official cut-off is 7.8 and I was near 7.6 on the metric scale - I think the units are mmol/l but I'm no scientist) no matter what I ate (unless, obviously, it was pure protein).

Wednesday, my fasting number continued to be completely normal and I ate 1/2 cup of cottage cheese and 1/5 of a cantaloupe for breakfast. Numbers were fine (5.9 1 hr post-meal), but I forgot to pack a snack for myself and was seriously hungry by the time we got home for lunch. I ate 1 c. lentils, brown rice, and yogourt. Numbers went back up.

Crap. Lentils?!?!? I freaking ate lentils! Where is the "legumes+rice are supposed to equal the perfect protein"???? Was I doomed to cottage cheese, steak, and chicken for the rest of this pregnancy? Ugh. I had made peace with no sweets, but I would like the occasional piece of whole wheat bread, for crying out loud!

I called my midwife just to check on the accepted standards for gestational diabetes control in our community (I had been going off info published by the province, but anyone who has looked into GD will know that standards of care and acceptable numbers vary widely). I had retested at 1 hr 15 min after the lentils and, surprise, my numbers were way down to within normal range. My chief question for the midwife was whether I should be counting the hour from the beginning or the end of the meal (my logic being that my numbers would be fine if I could only have those extra 15 minutes without endangering the baby or my health!).

My midwife was awesome. She said I should definitely time from the *end* of my meals and that I should wait 2 hours before testing after a meal and that as long as the number was under 7.5, I was golden. She said it's totally normal for my blood sugar to go up since I'm about to enter the 3rd trimester - nearly every pregnant woman experiences some rise in blood sugar. I *knew* this, but it was reassuring to hear it from her. It's not necessarily indicative of GD, but it does bear watching since the Hippo was in the NICU unable to maintain his blood sugar for 48 hours after he was born - an experience I definitely don't want to repeat with this baby.

You can't imagine how relieved I was. My two hour numbers are always below 7.0, even after gorging on ice cream and cake (I've only done it once, I promise...).

So, now I'm down to testing 2x a day - fasting and we agreed on two hours after lunch. I hope all stays well. I'm still going to avoid sweets, but the odd bit of therapeutic dark chocolate may not come amiss...