Too much of a good thing

It's been raining in San Diego off and on, so it interrupted my usual Sunday morning walk with Sara around Discovery Lake.  So we decided to go and walk around one of the indoor malls.  She brought her son in the stroller.  He is such a cutie pie and lights up when he sees me.  I heart him, Sara!  Although it took us a little longer than usual walking around the stores and with playtime for him, we were still able to log in 2.4 miles.  I use the MapMyWalk app on my phone to keep track when I do walking outside of the gym.  Then, after we said goodbye, I headed over to Costco to get fruits, veggies and nutrition bars.  I ran some other errands and then headed home, where I eventually had lunch, albeit a later one.  My legs were hurting more than they normally do so I decided that I would head over the gym for another workout.  I did have moments before I left my house where I thought I was being crazy exercising again because the walking I did earlier was just fine, but I was restless.  I didn't sleep well last night because of my leg pain and I was still feeling it today, so, for better or worse, I decided I needed more exercise.

I got a really good workout in and was totally dripping in sweat.  When I get on that treadmill, I swear I get lost in the music playing in my ears.  I work up to a really great walking pace, which makes me feel really alive.  After I got home from the gym, I went in to take a shower and then started doing a load of laundry.  I sat down and added up my exercise.  Between the walking at the mall and all the exercise I had at the gym, I logged in at 1,032 calories burned.  That does not include the walking I did at Costco or my other errands, so who knows how much more I did (I told Sara that I want to get a Fit Bit and I think it's time for me to do it).  I knew I needed to eat some dinner, but wanted to call my dad back.  I missed his call earlier in the day and didn't want to forget to call him.  As we were talking, I started getting sweaty.  Weird since I had just taken a shower and the heater was on.  Then I started to feel jittery and what I was saying to him on the phone wasn't making much sense.  I knew what that meant.  I decided to end my phone call with him sooner than I planned on and ran into the kitchen to find my meter.

My blood sugar was 53.

Dang it, dang it, dang it! I grabbed a banana and ate the whole thing.  I would have eaten some of my emergency glucose tablets, but I ran out of them the last time my blood sugar was too low and the pharmacy wasn't open in Costco when I went earlier to get more.  I have a bottle of them at work sitting on my desk, but not at home so I had to find another choice.  Eating an entire banana is about 2 servings of a carbohydrate, so I knew that would help.  After I started feeling a bit better, I sat down and thought to myself, "Okay, Kathy, think back on the day ... what went wrong?"  I then realized I didn't eat my morning snack before exercising with Sara, my lunch came really late, I didn't have a snack before the second workout at the gym and, up to that point, I hadn't had dinner yet.  Well, duh, it makes sense now.  Not only did I mess up with my food today in terms of when I ate and how much I ate (or, more accurately, didn't eat), but I also got a lot of exercise in, burning a lot of calories, so I needed to replenish those as well.

As great as the last few days have been in having normal blood sugar levels, this was a stark reminder that I have to continuously be vigilant.  It's the same idea as the struggle I have been having with wanting to snack at night - some days can be really great and others can be a real problem so I have to always be practicing those things that help me be successful every single day.  Sara gave me a great reminder of that when she asked me today how often I'm journaling outside of the regular blogging that I do.  It's been a long while.  I'm so glad she asked me that because I hadn't even thought about the fact that I haven't been doing that.  She made a great suggestion to do it every day when I get home from work or school, which will help me separate my day from my evening when I have the hardest time with wanting to graze or snack.  Being vigilant has to be a priority for me so that I can stay in the healthiest place possible, whether that is having normal blood sugars or healthy food at every meal.  And, hello Kathy, you don't need to exercise that much!  One time in a day is just fine.  You're not competing on The Biggest Loser ... this is real life.