Gestational Diabetes help

[lithorcla123]

I have just been told I am on the cusp of having gestational diabetes so I am having to monitor it over the next few days. What are other people's experience of this? Did many of you have to have insulin injections? Or did you take metformin?

[Seb9]

I had gestational diabetes and managed for a few months just on diet and exercise to keep my sugars down, with only a few blips.

Towards the end of my pregnancy it was getting harder to eat any carbs so I started taking metformin when I had any meals with carbs in. I tried not to take too many as some people have side effects from it, but I found them fine and didn't have any luckily.

I found that I could tolerate things like brown rice, quinoa, brown pasta and rice cakes better than I could bread, potatoes and breakfast cereals, so it's a lot down to what works for you,some trial and error.

I ate so healthily for those few months I wish I'd kept it up 🙈 sadly as soon as baby was born the diabetes went and I lived on chocolate hobnobs those first few sleepless months 😂

If you're borderline you might be able to control it using diet and exercise too though at least till your further along, your midwife should refer you to the diabetes clinic and they should be able to give you more advice on it. Good luck xx

[Lilian13]

I have gestational diabetes since day one of my this pregnancy, probably had to do with been overweight and having a high Hba1c. So I was able to manage with diet and exercise until the start of my third trimester and now I am on metformin once a day. No side effects just have been able to keep my sugar in check. So I think it depends on your diabetic midwife or doctor. They always give the best advices. I got an appointment on Thursday to review my diary of my sugar monitoring.

[fridayfever]

I've had gd for 6 weeks and can't control my fasting numbers so I am currently taking metformin and insulin for this.

There is some really good support and information on a couple of Facebook pages which I have found invaluable and made me realise none of this was my fault.

Good luck x

[lithorcla123]

Thank you everyone. I am 30 weeks and only just got the monitor to check over the next few days as I was on the 39 mark for the Hba1c so they want to see if I have it . So far so good. I had one reading that was slightly above the normal mark for fasting (by 0.3) and I had one spike after I ate something naughty ( I wanted to see how my levels would change). I have an appointment on Tuesday so they can look at the levels and discuss with me my options. I really am terrified of needles so I am hoping that if they do want to medicate then it will just be metformin. I had a huge meltdown just about the pinprick monitor never mind having to do daily needles!

[Charliesaid]

Hi, I had GD whilst pregnant with my youngest child,(he`s now 17), and I had to inject myself with insulin twice a day. The diabetic nurse went through evrything with me and even told me that if I was uable to inect myself, she would arrange for a district nurse to call to do it for me.

Injecting yourself isn`t as bad as it sounds. It`s only a little needle as it only goes into the fatty layer under the skin and not into the muscle. I had a pen to administer the insulin and so I didn`t have to draw the insulin up myself. Just turn the dial to the number of units needed and pop!

I know I`m not exactly seeling this to you, but it probably isn`t as bad as you think it is.

Take care xx