[twawaaay]

Can confirm. Just at this moment I have a Dexcom G7 attached to my arm and I don't even have diabetes. Just using it to learn a little bit about my blood glucose patterns.

But these devices are not really built for non-diabetics. There is a constant barrage of alerts as my blood sugar regularly dips into hypoglycemic levels. I feel fine but the device purposefuly does not have any way to disable the alarm.

[jablongo]

You can adjust the alerts a little bit. If you are actually going below 60 on a regular basis then you are hypoglycemic and the alerts are probably useful. It’s possible that your readings were slightly off though. Thanks for driving down prices for the rest of us! Keep on ordering em, big spender! I mean that.

[twawaaay]

My blood sugar goes below 60 but I am not hypoglycemic and no, the alerts are not useful. And yes, the measurements are correct -- I have more than one way to measure blood sugar level.

Hypoglycemic means your body is dependant on sugar, can't get sugar and has adverse reaction to it.

My body can't get sugar, true, but is not dependant on it (fat adapted) and I have no reaction to it.

As I have not eaten any carbs for about two months any notion of hypoglycemia due to not eating sugar is a bit meaningless.

I know people who get much, much lower blood sugar levels and feel fine. The levels they get would (below 40? below 30?) would be lethal to "normal" person, if sugar addiction can be called normal at all. But they all feel fine and are probably healthier than most.

I put CGM on my arm to learn how my blood sugar levels look when on my diet and then what happens when I switch carbs back on -- I expect my body to "freak out" a little bit and then stabilise within couple of days and that's what I would like to see in a bit clearer detail using my CGM.

As to driving the prices down... nah, I am not making a dent. These devices are too expensive to use regularly even for me (software devs salary). I will just put a couple of them to learn a bit about myself and then stop when I got what I needed.

[azmodeus]

Very interesting experiments as a data nerd would love to see a write up about how your diet effected your sugar. I know it's unlikely you will publish it but if you would I'd love to read it.

[twawaaay]

It is interesting but my data is useless. I lost over 70 pounds since July last year but I don't have any good record of blood sugar measurements. I did measurements whenever I liked either to confirm I am in ketosis or just to check my blood sugar / ketone levels in response to how I felt or to check how much various meals raised my sugar. But I did not keep any log.

There is couple things I learned. When you are on a strict ketogenic diet your blood sugar pretty much stays the same throughout the day. Even if I eat one huge meal for entire day, my sugar after the meal is pretty much the same as before the meal or within 10mg/dL. My exercise and circadian rhythm affect sugar more than meals.

Given this I wonder if it is possible at least for some people with diabetes to skip carbs completely and live carb-free but also insulin-free life.

Another thing I learned is that as I started my first keto month, your blood sugar starts dropping, then goes back up after about two weeks. Coincidentally, I also felt pretty poorly for those two weeks and my running performance dropped dramatically until my body adapted. The second time I started keto (after two months of break from it) I have seen nothing of the sort. Actually, I feel (but don't have good enough record to be sure) my blood sugar got a bit higher. But I have only been doing regular sugar measurements when I was in keto so I don't have data for sure.

[robobro]

As a type 1 I still need insulin even if I'm completely keto. It's not just carbs that affect blood glucose; as you pointed out, exercise and sleep can affect sugar among other things (stress, infections, meditation, using the toilet, drinking, various drugs...).

If my blood sugar goes up, to some degree, exercise and water can help - but they're not replacements for insulin. The suggestion that diabetics may not really need insulin is both ignorant and dangerous. You are not a doctor. People of hn, please go to your doctor for medical advice instead of hackernews comments.

[twawaaay]

I specifically, for this reason, not to mistake my (not even opinions but just thoughts) with this disclaimer:

> Given this I wonder if it is possible at least for some people with diabetes...

I am fully aware that diabetes is a dangerous, life threatening condition and that you can't do the same things that are totally fine for a healthy person.

And while I do not agree with some of the treatments for diabetes, it is just my own opinion and everybody is responsible for their own health and in doubt they should follow their health professional's advice.

Now... given the above disclaimer so that nobody confuses what I am about to write as an actual medial advice... I have just lost 1/3rd of my body weight and feeling absolutely fantastic by doing exactly the opposite to what health professionals are saying. I also observe a lot of people struggling to get any lasting effects by following the popular, official advice. I am angry and feeling powerless to the inertia of the health establishment and forces that do not really want people to get healthy but would rather avoid change that would disrupt their jobs, keep pushing medication that could be easily avoided for most of the people.

I have learned that so many "professionals" do not really understand what they are talking about. And it should not be a surprise, when you go to multiple "professionals" for advice and they give you opposite advice.

Just yesterday I had to visit an ophthalmologist to remove a foreign object from my eye (a piece of eyelash that got stuck for the past week). I had to spend at least 20 minutes to hear his ranting about how improper glasses I wear and how this is going to damage my vision. About a year ago I red (here on HN) that you can actually reduce your shortsightedness by slowly reducing the strength of your glasses which I have been doing successfully for the past year. I went from -3 diopters to -2 diopter glasses. I am currently seeing perfectly with -2.25 diopter glasses and I am using slightly lower strength for most of the day except for driving a car. Some of the stuff he said is that "This has been proven not to work by a study X", and "This is going to my shortsightedness to only deepen" (when exactly opposite has been happening) and that "If there are any result this is only my imagination" and "If I am seeing well at -2.25 it must be because my previous prescription of -3 diopters was wrong".

I am grateful that I am intelligent person that can read and make my own opinions but I am dismayed that people who can't do the same have to rely on those fucking idiots for their health.

[azmodeus]

Thanks for sharing your experiences with keto and measuring its effects.