It's Pretty Dark...

...at 5am. 

The sky is a rich, deep, dark blue.  The moon, which was full last Friday, hangs suspended.  There are no cars.  No noise except the birds and the sound of my shoes hitting the pavement. 

The heat and humidity are not yet ridiculous.  They are, in fact, quite tolerable. 

Why the hell didn't I do this weeks ago?

I have been running at 5pm - as soon as I got home from work.  It has hardly dipped below 30 degrees (+ humidity) in weeks now and runs have not been pretty.  I got them done but they were tough.

This morning, the thermostat read 23 degrees.  Seventy percent humidity.  After what we've been running in, that was almost chilly.  In fact, when I turned into the wind on the way home, I found myself covered in goosebumps. 

It was lovely and 10k went by almost too quickly.  I wouldn't have minded doing a few more. 

The biggest challenge this morning was what to do about eating and blood sugar management.  Normally, I would have woken up an hour and a half before a run to change my basal rate and have breakfast.  Today, that would have meant a 4am wake up call.  Even I am not that crazy.

I decided to gamble a bit.  I set the alarm for five, planning to be on the road by five-thirty.  There would be no basal reduction this morning.  I figured that it's all about having the right amount of insulin in my body.  So, if I'm not going to reduce my basal, I'm going to drastically reduce my bolus to make up the difference. 

I would never attempt this on a 20k run but my instincts told me that it would be ok for 10k.  I trust my instincts.  They have saved me countless times already. 

So I got up and checked my blood sugar - it was 12.2.  I had a low in the middle of the night and overcompensated a bit.  I was high but not awful.  My pump and I chatted.  He told me that I should take 1.6 units to bring the 12.2 back down to a 5-6.  Then I consulted my instinct.  It told me to only take 0.6 units.  So I did.  It also told me to have a gel but no dates (I had planned on having two).  So I had a gel...and I headed out the door.

I started off slowly, feeling the gel sloshing around in my empty stomach.  There were a few minutes around kilometre two when I wondered if things might take a turn.  I kept running and everything settled down.  I found my groove and got a little faster with every kilometer.

I watched the moon disappear.  I saw the sun rise.  I learned that cardinals are very very active at 5:30am. Robins - not to much.  I saw the world wake up.

I got back home around 6:40am and checked my blood sugar.

6.8

Perfect!

My instinct deserves 100% of the credit on this one.

Now the next trick will be to find a way to stay awake at work today.