People in the DIY artificial pancreas community are talking about sensory changes in the way they experience their diabetes.
Some, like Thacher Hussain @Thachert1d, find that DIY looping causes them to regain their hypoglycaemia awareness.
“Feeling shaky at 84… means #Loop is keeping me in range enough that my body’s own hypo-awareness is readjusting to my goal range of 80-180 and (according to #DexcomClarity) only 6% under 80 in the last 30 days… #holyshit this is amazing”
Others like Tim Gunn @TwistaTim found that once they were looping they had less tolerance of blood glucose levels higher than normal range.
Before looping I used to be much more tolerant to a high BG, but with Looping, my body must have got used to me having such good control, when I have a High BG now…. I feel like crap.
For me, a sustained period of building trust using OpenAPS and Nightscout technology allowed me to finally let go of the thing that had haunted me for decades. Normal blood sugar levels feeling like ‘living on the edge of a hypo.’
Just looking at the ambulatory glucose profile (AGP) gives a clue as to how this normal (euglycaemic) glucose homeostasis re-establishes itself.
I am planning to write more about the psychological and behavioural aspects of this over the coming weeks. In the meantime, if you have experiences to share, I’d love to hear from you. Please leave a comment.
My Artificial Pancreas 