I knew there was a reason I felt like I needed to throw an extra vial of test strips in my purse this morning.

After coming back from lunch, I sat down at my desk to do a little bit of paperwork. Only there was a slight problem. I started seeing spots. Big spots. Big, black spots. So, from prior experience, I knew I must be dropping low, so I pulled out my meter, only to be scared batty by what I saw.

A big 25mg/dl flashed across the screen. I had to double take. I haven’t seen a number this low in almost 20 years.

The last time I saw a number like this, I was about 6 or 7 years old. My sister and I were playing around the house, running from one end to the other up and down the hall, running around, jumping on the bed, doing normal kid stuff. My sister noticed I wasn’t acting right and told me to stop because I was acting funny and we needed to check my sugar. I didn’t want to. I was having fun. I felt great and didn’t think I was low. She was insistent that I needed to check, and I was insistent I was fine. I don’t remember what finally made me gave in, but something did. And it was a good thing. My sugar was a measly 16mg/dl by the brick meter.

I have always remembered that day. It was so scary. After I had my low, I text my sister and asked her if she remembered my lowest being any lower. She said no, but that she thinks that was also the night I had passed out.

That shook me to my core. I can’t remember most of that night. From what I’ve been told, I went to bed with a nice 100-110mg/dl, and 15 minutes later, I was having a seizure. Mom and dad did what they could and eventually rushed me to the hospital. They said I woke up at one point, but was blind. I couldn’t see anything, and then I went back out again. The second time I woke up, I remember. I didn’t know where I was or why I was there. They had to explain to me that I had dropped too low and had passed out. They released us and I think I remember staying home from school a couple of days after that to recover and get my bgs back in line.

Granted, things have changed since then. We have better meters, I have a CGM (which I did NOT hear going off for some reason – usually lows amplify my hearing), and I’m on a pump rather than MDI, so I can change things on the fly. Yes, I know this doesn’t insure that nothing will happen, but I do feel somewhat more comfortable knowing I have a little bit more of a safety net than I did back in the early 90’s.

Now? My bg is 129. For pregnant diabetics, yes, this is a little on the high side, but I do have a correction bolus for the slight (okay, more than slight) overeating I did to treat the 25 earlier, so I’ll be keeping an eye on my bgs every 30min-1hour to make sure everything levels out ok.