“In some respects what I am about to talk about is not a day I want to remember, however TDFC founder Chris Bright made me think about the experience in a different way.
I am currently playing my first season of futsal for Bedford Futsal Club who are in the Women’s Super Series South. Our season got off to a great start with a strong win & I even bagged myself a hat-trick, however our second game of the season stepped up a level…
The day itself brought a lot of new challenges that we all as a team had to try and combat. For instance, playing a very strong opposition, having crowds back and being streamed live on TV with BT Sports.. yes BT Sports!
On Saturday 9th October I was lucky enough to be the first female type 1 diabetic to play competitive futsal live on BT Sports (as far as I am aware… definitely reach out if you know differently!!!).
The Lead Up to the Game
The day before was sensor change day, something I’ve never had problems with.
I applied my sensor as normal, however, once set up was complete I received an error notification reading ‘replace sensor, sensor not working’ – luckily, I did have another sensor with me as I get two a month. So I thought no stress I will just replace the faulty one and as I’ve never had this issue before it must be a one off. After applying the second sensor and after checking my levels once or twice I got the same error message – what are the chances both sensors didn’t work??
The panic started to kick in – I am not going to be able to control my bloods as I would want to for the big game tomorrow without my sensor. Fortunately, I was able to go and purchase an additional sensor from a local pharmacy which thankfully worked. I was however very conscious of the accuracy given my experience that day, therefore I was sense checking my sugars with a finger prick for the rest of the evening to gain confidence.
On The Day..
I hadn’t had a great night with the blood sugars, I often go to sleep with bloods in range to find them spike in the night, which is what happened the night before the game. I woke up around 2/3am by chance and had a correction dose as my blood glucose levels were rising above 15mmol’s. As you can see from the below graph this started to kick in but as my bloods dropped back into range it spiked again. I then woke up just before 6am and saw my bloods were too high yet again so I decided to do another correction dose, hoping to wake in a couple of hours with much better glucose level.
When my alarm went off around 7:30am my bloods were dipping into the low territory, which I treated with my usual carton of orange juice. I then had a decision to make as it was essential I got my levels under control for the day.
We had a 2:30pm kick off which in itself adds complications and decisions to be made around when I would need to fuel up for the game with potentially 2 meal times to squeeze in whilst also ensuring my bloods were under control from the get-go. As I had just treated my low sugars, I was conscious of them spiking if I had breakfast straight away – so I decided to hold out and just pack breakfast for the journey.
To help relax before the game and give the legs a good stretch beforehand we decided to travel up early and catch some of the earlier games. We wanted to familiarise ourselves with the settings, try to squash the external pressures and settle the nerves.
I had read a very interesting blog only days before from a type 1 who ran the London Marathon (who I now know to be Scott Burrell (what a legend and don’t miss his podcast about it by clicking here) who had experienced the negative side of adrenaline and added pressures of big events on blood sugars, leading him to not be able to bring his levels down to perform at his best.
This was playing a lot on my mind in the lead up to and on game day.
As I had held out on having breakfast my bloods started to drop during the journey up to Birmingham, so I decided to treat this again with the trusty orange juice carton and one Weetabix.
My bloods started to rise again ahead of the warm-up, so I did another couple of units as I know my bloods tend to rise once I start playing. This seemed to eventually start to work, however, the adrenaline mixed with the usual during exercise spike still managed to creep in across the second half of the game.
I didn’t feel the impact of this movement as I was very focused on the game but on reflection I probably could have benefited from another unit or so whilst I was off the court.
Overall, considering the occasion, I was fairly happy with my blood sugars, however, I wish the lead up to game day and previous night’s levels were a bit more in control as I know the middle of the night highs, and the corresponding lows, have an impact on my body throughout the following day.
After a tough game and unfortunate result, the day ended with a huge spike in sugars from the evening meal that I consumed post game to drown the sorrows.
There are definitely some learning points I can take from the day to help me move forward if we are lucky enough to be on live tv again in the new year.
When I take a step back, I am extremely proud to have had the opportunity to play live on BT Sports and will continue to work hard to have that opportunity again.
