What happens when you fail the one hour blood test
My one hour blood test was on Friday; I got a call from the nurse the following Monday because I had “failed.” I do wish they would find a different term for this but regardless- apparently the limit for normal sugar is 135, mine was 195- YIKES! Now I get to go back this coming Friday for a repeat blood test but this will be the three hour test.
Ok so let’s talk about- what is the three hour blood test? This was a fasting test, which meant nothing to eat after midnight; I was able to drink water but no coffee and no food so the blood test could get a true reading without having food interfere with the results. My appointment was EARLY so I was at the doctor and checked in by 7:30. The nurse had told me on the phone that given how my body had reacted to the one hour test, she wouldn’t be surprised if I passed out or got sick during the test (talk about reassuring) so I had packed a snack and brought a big thing of water, my first mistake here! Thankfully, my mom volunteered to come with me so I wouldn’t have to just sit there for 3 hours and possibly pass out by myself. For this visit, we didn’t see a doctor or even a nurse; after getting checked in we were directed straight back to the lab. We started off with blood work, she explained the process for this visit then drew a vial of blood from my arm; this will be the baseline fasting blood level. Then they again gave me the super thick syrupy liquid to drink and a timer; I got to choose my flavor and had 5 minutes to drink the whole thing. I chose orange, and it wasn’t too bad, it certainly wasn’t good but drinkable since I had to. After I finished the drink, she took my mom and me to a room where we would spend the next 3 hours. I wasn’t allowed to eat or drink anything, not even water, for the duration of this test. The technician instructed me to tell her if I felt like I was going to throw up because if I threw up during the test it would void the results and we would have to start over. After 1 hour I went back to the lab for her to draw another lab sample and reset the timer for another hour. This continued until we had a total of 4 blood samples drawn- the one at the beginning then 1 every hour for the next 3 hours. All-in-all it wasn’t too terrible. I did not get sick; I did not pass out! As soon as we were done mom and I found the nearest restaurant where we proceeded to basically order one of everything on the menu! I was of course super nervous that I was going to start feeling shaky and awful the same way I did after the 1 hour test but thankfully I never did this time. Shockingly, these results came back perfect! Everything was exactly where it should have been!! I was able to talk to the PA about this- what would cause my 1st test to be so out of whack and this one to be perfect? So let’s back up a bit to my 1st test, the 1 hour test-
My one hour test had been on a super busy day. That morning we had graduation at my school, where I have to sit up on the stage to help hand out diplomas and awards- which meant I had gotten to work early that morning, I was nervous (sweaty more), and hadn’t been drinking as much water as normal. When graduation ended and we got everything cleaned up, I had to rush to the doctor’s office and ate my lunch (garden salad with grilled chicken and ranch) on the way. I’m guessing you’ve identified the NUMEROUS mistakes I made prior to my 1 hour test! Being dehydrated and rushing around impacts your blood sugar, who knew?! So basically we are thinking the hectic-ness of that morning caused my blood sugar to go a little crazy for the one hour test. Just to be safe, I have to repeat the 3 hour test once I hit 28 weeks so stay tune but fingers crossed it’s not an underlying sugar issue or the beginning of gestational diabetes, just some a series of unfortunate events proceeding my 1 hour test.