Have you dealt with hypoglycemia directly?

I have PCOS which causes insulin resistance and in turn can cause hypoglycemia episodes. I will tell you my experience with it has been like this...if I go several days eating very heavily on white flour based carbs..like bread or pasta, my insulin resistance goes crazy and that's when the hypoglycemia kicks in.

I will go from not hungry to absolutely starving in a short amount of time and I start sweating and shaking. I get light headed and cold and I've actually had a couple episodes where I vomited. I'm not diabetic. My doctor couldn't explain it.

As soon as I start to balance my meals and eat whole grains and fruits and vegetables my body goes back to normal. I haven't had a bad attack in a long, long time.

Insulin sensitivity is insulin resistance.

Sensitivity is the opposite of resistance.

Sensitive - "quick to detect or respond to slight changes, signals, or influences."
Resistance- "the ability not to be affected by something, esp. adversely."

I am insulin resistant which makes me extremely insulin sensitive. Hence why I have to watch my carb and sugar intake because the smallest amount of carbs can shoot my levels through the roof.

Do you have low insulin sensitivity or high insulin sensitivity?

I can eat large quantities of carbs, sugar and alcohol which usually cause blood sugars to spike, and mine barely goes above normal fasting levels. So, my insulin levels easily compensate for my carbs, and if I do not eat enough carbs is when I seem to have problems. Eating lots of simple carbs can cause low blood sugar like symptoms, but my blood sugar isn't necessarily low at that time. Other times my blood sugar is low but I do not have any symptoms. My A1C I believe was around a 4.5, which corresponds to overall having a relatively low blood sugar (low 80s).

Well, I have GREATLY REDUCED the number of hypoglycemic "attacks," since I started eating better a couple of years ago.

Previous symptoms: light-headed, dizzy, irritable, ravenous

What I learned to do (and what I've always known to do, BUT I have been attempting Low Fat, High Carb diets for over a decade...no bueno!!!):

Always eat protein at every meal. Limit simple carbs, such as: bread, pasta, desserts. I love these, but they don't fuel me for very long. I construct my meals as follows: protein + veggie (non-starchy, usually green) + fruit (or simple carb, if I want it), protein + soup, protein + salad. The protein will carry you through to the next meal. The veggies are just good for micronutrients and as bulk to fill you up sooner. IF you find yourself getting light-headed, eat some nuts or nut butter (PB2 is low cal and works very well), Greek yogurt (I like plain, 22-24 grams of protein, with my own additions or Chobani flavored-12 grams of protein), cheese (the fat satiates you, as well as protein), or jerky.

This is not to say that you should go through Atkins Induction, when I say limit carbs. No need to make cauliflower tortillas, pancakes, etc. You CAN have bread. You CAN have sugar. You CAN have dessert. You just need to fuel your body, first, with protein, then eat some veggies, then enjoy simple carbs, in small quantities.

I consulted with a doctor in my early 20's about this, and he was adamant about the concept that "hypoglycemia does NOT exist." He diagnosed my condition as a "pre-diabetic state." This is probably more true than I knew then, because my dad was diagnosed a couple of years ago with diabetes and diabetes runs in my family.

So, yeah. More protein, and simple carbs in moderation. Easy peasy.

I fainted 2 times from hypoglycemia, luckily at my home, one time almost fell on street though.

I sometimes dont remember I didnt eat for a long time when I am interested in something, I beat my head in kitchen ground once and I was alone, but thankfully I woke up completly lost and I got I fainted after 15 min.

Now is better after I got some weight. I dont think is good for me to be under BMI 23 (for me under 57-58 kg), I always had hypo problems and very low blood pressure if I am thinner (not under normal BMI, but just thinner in general). If you see me with BMI 23, I look like a horse face very very sulky on cheeks (my husband said he prefers when I am chubbier also), so dunno if is connected.

Now I am more chubby but had no hypoglicemia problems (except a field trip on some high mountain and without eating for whole day, I got dizzy and had to sit down with dizzy/vertigo/faint spell again). Also I make sure I eat small munchies frequently.

I was reading some person before me saying about hypoglycemia not existing, maybe in the common sense it doesnt, but I have no family diabetes history, only very low blood pressure from my mom side, we feel very cold and also my mom has Balance disorder (vertigo, problems with the inner ear).

so maybe what some people like me have is a mix of low blood pressure/bad circulation/vertigo and they confuse with what is commonly known hypoglycemia.

Insulin sensitivity is insulin resistance.

Sensitivity is the opposite of resistance.

Sensitive - "quick to detect or respond to slight changes, signals, or influences."
Resistance- "the ability not to be affected by something, esp. adversely."

I am insulin resistant which makes me extremely insulin sensitive. Hence why I have to watch my carb and sugar intake because the smallest amount of carbs can shoot my levels through the roof.

Do you have low insulin sensitivity or high insulin sensitivity?

I can eat large quantities of carbs, sugar and alcohol which usually cause blood sugars to spike, and mine barely goes above normal fasting levels. So, my insulin levels easily compensate for my carbs, and if I do not eat enough carbs is when I seem to have problems. Eating lots of simple carbs can cause low blood sugar like symptoms, but my blood sugar isn't necessarily low at that time. Other times my blood sugar is low but I do not have any symptoms. My A1C I believe was around a 4.5, which corresponds to overall having a relatively low blood sugar (low 80s).

Low 80s isn't low blood sugar. Low blood sugar is 70 and below. Have you had the function of your pancreas tested? You're not a type 1 diabetic, right?

80 is not low, but it has tested in the 40s and 50s. Overall it is normal towards the lower side of normal. My blood sugar does not go high at all. Like ever. I have no symptoms of diabetes and have never tested positive.

Insulin sensitivity is insulin resistance.

Sensitivity is the opposite of resistance.

Sensitive - "quick to detect or respond to slight changes, signals, or influences."
Resistance- "the ability not to be affected by something, esp. adversely."

I am insulin resistant which makes me extremely insulin sensitive. Hence why I have to watch my carb and sugar intake because the smallest amount of carbs can shoot my levels through the roof.

Do you have low insulin sensitivity or high insulin sensitivity?

I can eat large quantities of carbs, sugar and alcohol which usually cause blood sugars to spike, and mine barely goes above normal fasting levels. So, my insulin levels easily compensate for my carbs, and if I do not eat enough carbs is when I seem to have problems. Eating lots of simple carbs can cause low blood sugar like symptoms, but my blood sugar isn't necessarily low at that time. Other times my blood sugar is low but I do not have any symptoms. My A1C I believe was around a 4.5, which corresponds to overall having a relatively low blood sugar (low 80s).

Low 80s isn't low blood sugar. Low blood sugar is 70 and below. Have you had the function of your pancreas tested? You're not a type 1 diabetic, right?

80 is not low, but it has tested in the 40s and 50s. Overall it is normal towards the lower side of normal. My blood sugar does not go high at all. Like ever. I have no symptoms of diabetes and have never tested positive.

Have you ever had your insulin tested? I wonder if you need insulin injections. That would help raise your blood sugar! I'm thinking maybe your pancreas isn't producing much insulin… this would be the reason for your hypos.

Upping my protein has helped me tremendously. I am in the same boat as those who have written how eating just pancakes, or waffles, or cereal will have me crashing within the hour. Protein with every meal helps balance me out.

I thought I had this... I had a few occasions where I would all of a sudden start feeling sick and shaky and go hot and cold. I wouldn't notice that it was related to eating straight away, until about 15 minutes into the sick feeling and then would have to eat a biscuit or something and within five minutes I would feel better.

I went for countless tests including 7 blood tests and an ECG as they thought it may be linked to my heart. They found nothing..

I spoke to my manager who happens to be very into nutrition and health etc.. She told me to go on a low GI diet.. Or just to ensure that when I eat high carbs... I must eat protein with them!.. All my attacks had been about 2 hours after breakfast... usually a large bowl of high sugar/carb cereal.

Now If I have fruit, I have a few almonds with it. If I eat cereal or oatmeal, I put flaxseed on it.

Have you tried this?

I had one about 2 years ago, though not under standard conditions.

At my university, I often volenteer to be a test person at the medical department or the hospital - Not drug trials or anything like that, but quite often they need people as 'standard data' to compare with ill people, or they need to see how one lifestyle differs from another etc. It's very interesting!

Anyways, I was in a study where they needed to measure healthy individuals response to hormones - so they had to give me a bit of insulin, hoping to drop my blood sugar levels to 2.2 (first symptoms of hypoglycemia is at about 2.8-3.0), to then see how well it would stabilize (as non-diabetics do) Based on my fasting blood sugar, and factors such as my weight (which was at it's all time high) they calculated how much insulin they needed to give me for that - they included the assumption that morbidly obese people tend to be a bit more insulin resistant, due to their diabetic risk.

Well, turns out, I'm not resistant. At all. Which is a good sign for me, very small risk of diabetes! But at the time, it meant my blood sugar dropped to 0.8 - levels where diabetics (aka, people who cannot stabilize their blood sugar) risk going into coma!

Luckily I stabilized in record time, I was at 1.5 at the next measurement, again a pointer that I'm not in much diabetis-risk because my hormones are so potent and finely tuned!

I wasn't very scared at the time, because a) I was barely concious, (they took blood samples every 5min, and they had to wake me up each time!) and when I was, I felt incredibly drunk, so not much mind to worry. and b) I was in the biggest hospital in the country, surounded by a team of doctors, who were experts in this, and had all their focus on me. Really, no danger.

But thinking about it, if I had felt nearly anywhere like that, just at home or something, I would think I was for sure dying. I couldn't really speak (extremely slurred), my thoughts were so slow, I couldn't feel my hands etc.

For years friends have been known to bung me a chocolate bar or piece of fruit at times because "I needed to eat" - I didn't necessarily feel it myself, but I would get irritable and argumentative. Then I started to experience shakes a couple of hours after eating lots of pasta or white bread. The crunch came when I fainted twice at work, a couple of hours after breaking fast with a sugary bun.

I'm allergic to doctors, so I did the very unsensible thing of just not eating sugary foods first thing in a morning and limiting the amount of white bread and pasta. Since I've started losing weight, I'm eating a lot more protein, especially in a morning and I'm much less prone to crashing or getting irritable. I don't need to eat too often, but I do keep snacks handy, just in case.

If/when I finally see a doctor (not 'til all this weight is off though!) I will probably mention it to him/her.

So, will this likely be a lifelong issue that needs to be managed?


Also, I would love to carry a glucometer for curiosity's sake, however my extreme needle phobia barley allows me to type the word glucometer.

Hi - just wanted to chime in. I got this far in the thread and said, "Oh, I totally get that." Just thinking of that needle makes my palms go sweaty and ice cold!

I'm right up there with pretty serious blood sugar problems. I never really knew what caused my headaches, dizziness, and fainting until I went on South Beach a few years ago. On the first day I passed out and cracked my head on a table. Suddenly cutting all carbs caused a severe crash. That's when I learned about hypoglycemia! I did stick with a modified South Beach (basically allowing brown rice & fruit), but it was extremely rough going at first. I'd crash during workouts (often passing out) and went into full-blown insulin shock after one of them - very scary. I stuck with it for a couple of months, but it never got much better. Severely low-carb wasn't the answer for me.

I've since done a lot of research on hypoglycemia and basically did food trials to figure out what would work for me. I've learned that my body works best when I limit the amount of carbs I eat in one sitting and make sure sandwich those carbs between fat and protein. Long ago my breakfast was toast (white bread) w/ jelly & orange juice. Not surprising I frequently passed out every day. These days breakfast looks more like this: ONE slice of whole wheat bread with peanut butter and two scrambled eggs with spinach & cheese. I still get to eat whatever carbs I want, just in limited portions and never carbs by themselves.

What's working well for me now is to strategically place the carbs in my diet. Basically I think about what carbs I want to eat each day and then build protein/fat meals & snacks around the carbs. I'm not deprived at all - I just have to think carefully about what I'm going to eat and watch the portions of carbs. I generally stick to whole grains, but I also still indulge in ice cream and cookies. Just not the entire package of cookies. :laugh: . If I DO have a carb-loaded meal or snack it ALWAYS precedes a cardio workout. Things like oatmeal, whole wheat bagels, or fruit & yogurt smoothies - I can have them, but generally only to fuel an intense workout. So I plan ahead with my meals & exercise so that I can still eat what I want.

A lot of managing things came from basically studying myself: test blood sugar (yeah, it hurts - not gonna lie!), eat something, test again at intervals to see what happens. In the beginning I was testing all the time - mainly to learn which combinations of food worked best for me, which caused problems, and how long I could go between eating.

And yeah, unfortunately it's a lifelong thing. I had hoped that over time my pancreas would quit freaking the f*** out when I eat some chocolate, but that hasn't happened. Fudge is still pretty lethal for me!

But I'm not perfect, the body isn't a machine, and low blood sugar still does happen. For me, that's what fruit is for. Oranges & bananas will provide a boost, and I usually follow it up with a carb/fat/protein combo (peanut butter on whole wheat toast is a go-to for me, followed by a protein heavy meal a little while later). My best defense is to recognize when I'm getting the shakes and people are giving me the, "Whoa, crabby much?" looks - and eat something before it gets any worse.

My advice - buy a glucose meter. Amazon has them fairly cheap and if you buy a giant box of strips the cost isn't too bad. Keep a journal of everything you eat & do your own food trials w/testing. I do NOT recommend any sudden changes. South Beach was the WRONG way to go for me - I just didn't know any better at the time.

The glucose meter sucks - no doubt about it. My hands are icy just writing about it. But it's a great tool to really learn how to eat in a way that is best for your body.

Best of luck!

I think I need to see my general practitioner as well as my gyno--I feel like my hormones are all out of whack. I want to make sure my cholesterol and blood sugar levels are healthy, too. I don't know what hypoglycemia feels like. I've had a couple of episodes of lightheaded feelings at the gym--I didn't eat a snack with some quick carbs in it that afternoon, I had stuck to a protein like cottage cheese. Is that a normal reaction, or is it a sign of hypoglycemia? I've tried to cut back on my carbs and find a balance of 30%Carbs/40%Protein/30%Good Fat. It's hard to eat a lot of protein--I'm a pescatarian but only eat about 3 servings of seafood each week.

I used to get hypoglycemia really bad in high school, from only eating a bag of chips and juice/milk I guess. I guess it's from the simple carbs, but if it hadn't been the end of the day I would have passed out easily. I only got dizzy, fuzzy vision and felt really off a couple of times.

Now I get it from either not eating while doing some kind of moving or from drinking diet pop without eating first. I figure since my fasting is 71mg/dL, that I probably dip a lot lower and don't notice until it's in the 40-50mg/dL range.