A Common Sign of a Diabetic Becoming Sick

For many diabetics, a common sign for them becoming sick is their blood sugar running high.  This can happen before they start feeling sick or when they are sick.

This past week I was at the beach and a lot of sand got in my pump site causing me to change it.  I tested my blood sugar and it registered 513, a very high reading.  So I injected myself with some insulin with my insulin pump.  However, mid way through the insulin being delivered into my body the pump vibrated and said “no delivery.”  This meant no more insulin could be delivered into my body by the pump so I had to change it again.  I did my blood sugar after I changed the pump site again and this time it registered at 585.  So I did another correction of insulin through the pump and also injected myself with insulin manually through a syringe. 

I waited an hour and did my blood sugar again and this time it didn’t even register on the meter. It just said “high," which meant it was over 600.  At this point I panicked along with the rest of my family because my blood sugar should have gone down, especially with the manual injection.  So we quickly got in the car to go to the emergency room.  On the car ride there I gave myself another manual injection of insulin.  In the car I also checked my blood sugar and saw that it went down to 597. 

We got to the emergency room but did not check in. Instead we waited in the waiting room because I noticed my blood sugar was going down.  I also went to the bathroom and checked my ketones, which luckily was only moderate.  Eventually within almost 2 hours after getting the emergency waiting room my blood sugar went down to my normal range and my insulin pump was working.

Then two days later I became sick with a sore throat, fever, cough, and pink eye.  This occurrence shows that diabetes can be very unpredictable at times, and you need to be prepared to handle it and not panic.  What saved me from getting ketones was drinking a lot of water.  Once I saw my blood sugar was in the 500’s I immediately drank a lot of water.