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Blood Glucose levels are weird

Messages
49
Hey, guys! So I've had what was presumed to be hypoglycemia for years. In fact, I mistook the onset of my ME for a hypoglycemic episode. After all this time, I finally went to an endocrinologist and was prescribed a BG monitor to see if my BG was actually low when I was experiencing these symptoms.

In short, I start feeling low *really* early. Like in the 80's. By the time I get to, say, 60, I'm where most people are at like 40 symptom-wise. Even more interesting, this is what happened on Saturday:

around 5:30, I start to feel distinctly "low." I hadn't eaten in a while, so I go and test my BG and it's 97....normal..... I texted the type 1 diabetic girl in my class and she said to eat and test again and see what happens.

5:30, I eat an oreo chocolate bar (it's new, they just came out with it and it's freaking amazing but I digress). I wait 15 minutes, test, and it's 95. Lower....

6:30, I test again (1 hour post-candy) and it's only gone up to 108.

8:00, 2.5 hours post-candy, I eat dinner. Cabbage and rice, a hamburger sans bun or toppings or anything, and a Snapple peach tea with 39 mf-ing grams of sugar lol. I figure if this doesn't bring it up nothing will. Oh, I was at 94 at this time.

8:30, I've finished eating, I test and it's 171. Too high now. Supposedly it's not supposed to go above 140 after eating. It's also gone from 94 to 171 in half an hour.

Over the course of the night, it wouldn't come back down....


TL;DR: my blood sugar was normal but I felt low. It wouldn't come up even after eating candy. I ate dinner, it shot up, then wouldn't come down.


Does anyone else experience BG weirdness? BG won't go up after eating or won't go down?

Thanks,

Lauren
 
Messages
15,786
In short, I start feeling low *really* early. Like in the 80's. By the time I get to, say, 60, I'm where most people are at like 40 symptom-wise.
Are you actually hitting 60?

8:30, I've finished eating, I test and it's 171. Too high now. Supposedly it's not supposed to go above 140 after eating. It's also gone from 94 to 171 in half an hour.
Rice has a ton of carbs, so it's pretty normal to see a big increase from it. And the recommended time for testing after a meal would be between 1 and 2 hours (90 minutes is standard in the Netherlands). So it might not be unusual to see a high reading very shortly after eating rice.

Over the course of the night, it wouldn't come back down....
This could be more problematic. It's basically what my diabetes was doing without effective treatment. Normal during the day, then high at night.

My suggestion is to make a thorough log of food and blood sugar for 24 hours. Basically you measure blood sugar 8 times in the course of one day: when you get up in the morning, before lunch and dinner, 90 minutes after each meal, at bedtime, and in the middle of the night (2-3am). This isn't a regular daily testing schedule, but the more thorough version to get a detailed look at what's happening.

It helps to plan meals with a consistent and normal amount of carbs ... the Dutch guidelines work out to about 60 carbs per meal (subtract fiber). And it's also best to avoid snacks for testing purposes, because otherwise you'll end up with pre-meal values that are also postprandial :p This might require doing a lot of weighing and calculating, but it's worth it.
 

bertiedog

Senior Member
Messages
1,738
Location
South East England, UK
he Dutch guidelines work out to about 60 carbs per meal (subtract fiber)

If I ate that amount of carb at a meal I would be diabetic but because I have around 80 mg carb maximum A DAY or less I am not diabetic or even pre-diabetic.

I recommend reading Blood Sugar 101 for help with this, its got some good explanations as does Dr Bernstein who himself is an 83 year old diabetic but is fit and healthy because for many years he has only eaten low carb.

Pam
 

Basilico

Florida
Messages
948
My husband (who has CFS) had the glucose tolerance test a few years ago. You go there while fasting, they take a baseline glucose reading (his was mid 90s, so normal). Then he drank a gross glucose drink. They tested his glucose again 1 and 2 hours later.

If you have a properly functioning system, your glucose should ideally go up to 120 (I believe up to 140 is considered acceptable though not ideal). Within an hour it should be close to baseline and within 2 hours it should be exactly back to baseline.

I don't remember his exact numbers, but I think his 1 hour was 150 or 160 and at 2 hours he was at 130 - based on this, he was diagnosed with insulin insensitivity and glucose intolerance.

This result was quite shocking to both us and his doctors, because he's a very lean guy who has been athletic for most of his life (sports, bodybuilding, etc...) and eats a very healthy diet.

We've since realized that he only seems to have these weird uncontrolled glucose issues sporadically, usually when he's in a flare-up or hasn't slept well the night before or is generally feeling crappy.

It would be good for you to continue monitoring your numbers along with what (and how much) you are eating. That will provide a lot of helpful information later on. It would be helpful to you to understand if this is an all-the-time problem or if it comes and goes.

The suggestion given to us by his endocrinologist (who was the best doctor either of us have ever seen - she even tried to take a stab at helping us with CFS) was to:

-eat more frequent smaller meals and snacks
-try to keep the carbs at each meal or snack no more than 30g
***If you do eat a high carb/sugary meal, do some exercise afterward (it doesn't need to be anything strenuous - a 20-30 minute walk can be enough, if you are capable of doing that)

-additionally, on our own we found some things that drastically reduce how much his BG goes up after a carb heavy meal. Aside from the common suggestions of increasing fiber (which does actually make a difference), we found that both Apple Cider Vinegar and resistant starch (unmodified potato starch) prevent his glucose from spiking too high (they slow down the absorption of carbs in the GI system)

I actually recently started a thread here about weird BG issues that are not strictly metabolic but a function of CFS/ME and it seems like quite a few others also have this.

*Make sure you keep this in check. If you let your BG go too high for too long, you will eventually create irreversible damage. If you address it early on, it may not be a lasting problem, or it at least may not progress further.
 
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Messages
15,786
If I ate that amount of carb at a meal I would be diabetic ....
No, you wouldn't be, which is sort of the point. Diabetics react abnormally to "normal" amounts of carbs. I agree that the guidelines are a lot higher than they need to be, but if they caused diabetes, everyone would have it. And for TESTING, to determine if a response is abnormal or not, it's helpful to eat a "normal" amount of carbs to see what happens.
 

bertiedog

Senior Member
Messages
1,738
Location
South East England, UK
No, you wouldn't be, which is sort of the point.

Actually I would be because I have to take Prednisolone 6 mg daily and it makes me quite insulin resistant, I have to monitor my blood sugar on a daily basis because of this and if I eat any appreciable amount of carbs my blood sugar goes into diabetic levels.

Pam
 
Messages
15,786
Actually I would be because I have to take Prednisolone 6 mg daily and it makes me quite insulin resistant, I have to monitor my blood sugar on a daily basis because of this and if I eat any appreciable amount of carbs my blood sugar goes into diabetic levels.
So that's completely irrelevant to the original poster, who 1) presumably isn't on steroids, and 2) is trying to establish what is happening with her blood sugar.
 

bertiedog

Senior Member
Messages
1,738
Location
South East England, UK
Its always good to know helpful principles regarding the control of blood sugar, i.e. less carbs means the need for less insulin and therefore more stable blood sugars regardless of whether being a diabetic or not.

Pam
 

Wonko

Senior Member
Messages
1,467
Location
The other side.
AT least for some people, me included, carb cutting is NOT the way to control blood glucose levels. I used to be on a low carb paleo diet but had BG levels that behaved pretty much the way the OP's did, only a bit more so, getting worse the more I cut carbs, so gotta get more strict, and on, and on, and on, through longer and longer fasts etc. As this made no sense to me, or the 2 doctors, dietician and a consultant I spoke to, I did some google research and found that it's not uncommon for people's BG to behave in this manner when carbs are restricted.

So, as an experiment, I have vastly increased the amount of carbs I eat, 2 slices of toast (with eggs) for breakfast, potatoes (even occasionally white potatoes) with dinner etc.

Result - my BG levels are normal, for a diabetic, between 5.5 and 9.4 UK measure mmol?), and low overnight, only increasing if I don't eat for over 12 hours, in which case they go nuts (20+) even though I haven't eaten anything.

So...eat....food...not junk...but eat....and eat breakfast, even if you don't like it, or don't want to - if you don't your body may panic, release cortisol and your BG levels could go all over the place.

But - I'm not a doctor, nor a medic, just a type 2 who's googled something (I do a pretty good rock tho, so may be more medically qualified than EC)