
CGMs for Pregnant Women with Type 1 Diabetes are Officially Awesome
I went on my first continuous glucose monitor back in 2007, when the Dexcom system was known as the “STS” and the duration for a sensor was only three days. It also wasn’t waterproof, so I had to stick these giant saran wrap-looking shower patches over the transmitter when I bathed. And it wasn’t “dose your insulin” accurate but more “yeah, you have some bouncy blood sugars” kind of accurate.
But despite being cumbersome, it was the first glimpse I’d ever had into a streaming video version of my blood sugars – leaps and bounds better than the snapshots I was receiving from my finger sticks. I was instantly hooked on the data. It made me feel safe. And it made me feel like I had a chance at controlling this beast of a disease.
When I became pregnant with my daughter in 2009, I was already on the Dexcom Seven Plus and it was AWESOME compared to that first iteration of Dexcom. I used the data to help warn me of those epic first trimester hypos and also relied on the information to help me change my basal rates as the pregnancy-induced insulin resistance kicked in. My A1C stayed under 6.6% for my entire first pregnancy, and my daughter was born healthy, happy, and with a ton of hair. (Happy and healthy related to my hard work … the hair was just a fluke.)
Fast-forward six years to 2015, when I became pregnant with my son. This time, I was using the Dexcom G4 (the G5 was available but my endo-at-the-time preferred the data output from the G4 model) and the numbers on my Dexcom receiver were in line with my finger sticks. I was able to keep my numbers tight
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