Wednesday, November 26, 2008

glucose screening test alternatives

for all of you planning on becoming pregnant, i just wanted to mention that you should ask your midwife or doctor if you can substitute the sugary day-glo orange drink with jelly beans. i ate 28 jelly belly beans within 5 minutes, 45 minutes before my blood test, and felt just fine afterward.

two reasons for the jelly bean alternative:
1. some women apparently have bad reactions to the orange drink (nausea, sugar crash, etc). this might be because they drank it on an empty stomach. i recommend protein-rich food beforehand like eggs rather than carbs or sugars.
2. although eating that many jelly beans in 5 minutes requires a lot of will power (my jaw started to hurt after 3 minutes of chewing), this is so much more fun than drinking something that looks like it could glow in the dark.

Update:
apparently my score suggests hypoglycemia. that means i have low blood sugar. i just checked some of the symptoms, because i love doing that:
  • hunger (yep)
  • shakiness
  • nervousness (yep)
  • sweating
  • dizziness or light-headedness (yep)
  • sleepiness (yep)
  • confusion
  • difficulty speaking
  • anxiety (yep)
  • weakness (yep)
  • crying out or having nightmares (yep)
  • finding pajamas or sheets damp from perspiration
  • feeling tired, irritable, or confused after waking up (yep)
the best thing about lists of symptoms is that they're often so general that a hypochondriac like me can have a field day with them.

moral of the story: eat smaller quantities more frequently.

4 comments:

Catherine said...

Ew, bright orange, sounds like something worse than Fanta. I had my glucose screening test the other week, and in NZ we have a crystal clear drink that tastes a bit like flat not-so-sugary lemonade. They must have improved on it since the last pregnancy as it tasted more palatable than I remember it being. I still felt a bit windblown after half an hour or so (from the sugar), so nestled in a nearby bookstore's armchair with magazines until my bloodtest time came round.

Why on earth would they need to colour yours? So unecessary!

erica said...

hah, i agree, the orange color is really disgusting! i would never drink anything that hue anyway. your drink sounds much better. i tasted mine, and it's very sickly sweet.

V said...

Hmm the whole thing is odd to me. The idea is how well your body processes sugar, right? When in life does one ever have that much sugar in one go? Considering it's a struggle to get it all down (in whatever form), maybe the whole test is extreme!

If I ever get pregnant, I'm afraid I'd have to put up a fight if asked to drink the orange stuff!

anabela / fieldguided said...

I'm not even pregnant and your description of that concoction makes me feel a little nauseated. Jelly beans are much better. Also, more fun to look at!