For many people living with type 1 or type 2 diabetes, it's commonplace and unfortunate to wade through misperceptions and misinformation about diabetes. Or, what we like to call, diabetes myths. You know the ones we're talking about: cinnamon cures diabetes, people with diabetes can't eat sugar, etc.

One of the biggest diabetes myths, not typically mentioned? "Blood glucose numbers are the only things that matter."

Reality

It is extremely important to check your blood sugars often and throughout the day. But just tracking your glucose levels is like submitting the answers to a quiz without knowing the questions! While it's true that blood glucose patterns are extremely relevant, and it’s critical to watch out for glucose readings that are too low (hypoglycemia) and too high (hyperglycemia), the reality is that blood glucose levels are the result of three main factors (along with many other, smaller factors) spread throughout each day: food, activity, and medication. And without understanding these three variables in context, our blood glucose readings and diabetes management plan are not all that actionable.  It would be like driving a car forward while looking only in the rearview mirror. What's up ahead? Am I re-acitve or pro-active?

Living in Multiple Moments in Diabetes

Understanding how these interconnected moments in life - across food, activity, and medication - each impact blood glucose are the keys to looking ahead and understanding what is going to happen. If my BG levels are high 75% of the time during a time of day (after lunch), that's interesting information, but not necessarily actionable information. Why? Too little insulin? Too many carbs? No morning jog? Without the context of the three input variables, the output variable (glucose) seems out of context. Focusing on interrelated moments creates a shift to a more mindful approach and a broader consideration on how glucose, food, activity, and insulin work together. This enables someone to make better pro-active choices and stay in range more frequently.

Learning Together

Over the past few months, we’ve had great feedback from the One Drop community on the day-to-day rhythms of navigating a day in the life with diabetes, including how we often interact with food, insulin, activity, and glucose readings in large data-sets. With the latest One Drop iOS app, you can log and track food, activity, medication, and blood glucose at once and “Save All” to your iPhone or iPad. Tracking your moments all in one place is not only faster, but also helps you stay aware and in touch with all the things that matter. A lot of this is common sense, but life is lived in multiple moments and now there is a platform to shatter the diabetes myths and make sense of it all.