Has It Really Only Been A Week of Winter Training?

As the title suggests, I can't believe that it's only been a week that I've been back in winter training. But what a week it's been! Tackling pesky blood sugars, a new training group/ coach and wildlife on the athletics track too... But it's been brilliant so far (but it is only week one).

First of all I think it's worth mentioning as people have been asking on Twitter, what caused my hospital stay a few weeks ago and all of the erratic blood sugars since. Well, when I got the opportunity to speak to my diabetes nurse after getting out of hospital, she mentioned that all of my issues of high blood sugars, ketones and dizziness sounded like an inner ear infection, and she was right. Assessed by GP who confirmed that all of my diabetes problems of the last few weeks have been as a result of an infection called labrynthitus- an infection of the inner ears. I'm not sure why it wasn't picked up in the hospital, but the relief of knowing what had caused it and that it wasn't something that I'd done was huge. But unfortunately the tablets I was given for the problem only helped with the dizziness and ear pain and not rectifying the blood sugars.

I hoped that going back to training after coming out of hospital and not being well enough to run three weeks ago, would now help bring my blood sugars down a bit. So on Monday I kept a close eye on my levels. But felt doubly nervous at returning to training after my hospital stay and joining a new training group. The training group were lovely, but the training session itself was hard. But I was determined to not let my diabetes stop me from doing what I love, and I managed to complete the session, smiling all the way home afterwards. There were adventures in training on Thursday night, when some wildlife made its way onto the outdoor athletics track in the form of a full size fox! Apparently a regular to training, the aforementioned Basil sat on the track the whole session and watched us run. It was a bit scary at first because I wasn't sure whether he would bite my ankles or run away. He did neither but was the perfect athletics spectator.

Sunday's session was the toughest of the week, but had the benefit of being completed in the great outdoors. Getting to training that day felt like a big achievement in itself because when I woke up, my blood sugars were 21.3 mmol, way too high. But I gave a correction dose, had my breakfast and thankfully got my blood sugars down to 8.8 mmol before starting training, as training with high blood sugars can be dangerous to exercise with. It would have been easy to stay in bed that morning, but getting up and doing the session, and the sense of achievement afterwards was well worth it. So it's one winter training week down and many many more to go!