Morning Has Broken…My Blood Sugar

You’d think when you wake up in the morning, wouldn’t have above normal blood sugar readings when, the night before, they were normal. Unfortunately, it can and does happen, especially in people with Diabetes.

It’s happened to me–the fasting numbers were higher than I went to bed with. You’d think I was sleepwalking down stairs, going into my pantry, and eating a slice or two of bread. Which actually sounds pretty good right now, but I know what it will do to my blood sugar.

Welcome to the Dawn Effect, caused by the liver dumping glucose into the blood overnight. The hormones that are believed to cause the liver to do this (including cortisol, glucagon, epinephrine) are also believed to give rise to insulin resistance. The end result: your body is unable to process the excess glucose in your blood stream, which of course means elevated blood sugar.

I do not experience this every morning. A diabetes site in the UK suggests this spike occurs 8 to 10 hours after going to sleep, which explains why on the mornings where I did observe this, I slept later than usual.

One of the possible solutions to this problem includes a late-night low-carb snack. Mixed nuts seem to be my go-to snack. We’ll have to do some more science and see.


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