Have you ever seen the video that went viral on Fb during which 4 wonderful ladies with sort 1 diabetes discuss what hypoglycemia (low blood sugar) looks like?
I really like this video, and it impressed me to consider what a low blood sugar looks like for me and to place it into phrases on this publish. I believe that is significantly helpful for family and friends who might not know or perceive what it’s like.
Please watch the video and think about sharing this text along with your family members in the event you suppose it helps clarify how you’re feeling when your blood sugar is low.
What does low blood sugar really feel like?
Making an attempt to clarify a sense is all the time onerous, and making an attempt to clarify one thing as distinctive as the sensation of low blood sugar is even tougher.
The bodily elements of a low are simpler to explain, so let’s begin with these.
I nearly all the time really feel the indicators of a low blood sugar earlier than it turns into essential. I’ll really feel it when my blood sugar is round 60 mg/dL (3.3 mmol/L).
(Hypoglycemia is usually formally outlined as a glucose stage at or beneath 70 mg/dL. Nevertheless, signs seem at completely different ranges in several folks.)
Delicate low blood sugar signs
I’ll begin shaking somewhat, my cognitive perform goes out the window, I get weak, and I usually begin sweating. These are among the many most typical gentle low blood sugar signs, which may embrace:
- Weak spot
- Sweating
- Starvation
- Tiredness
- Dizziness
- Lightheadedness
- Temper swings (comparable to nervousness or worry)
A half-cup of juice or some glucose tablets will normally get me again to regular fairly shortly, and I’ll transfer on with my day. (Observe the directions in your glucose tablets to find out what number of to take, and be taught extra about treating hypoglycemia in Methods to Deal with Lows as Shortly as Potential.)
Reasonable to extreme low blood sugar signs
However once I don’t catch my signs earlier than they get extreme and my sugars dip decrease, that’s an entire different story. Signs of reasonable or extreme hypoglycemia can embrace:
- Nausea
- Abdomen ache
- Nightmares
- Abnormally quick or sluggish heartbeat
- Confusion
- Blurry imaginative and prescient
- Vomiting
- Impaired cognitive perform (psychological skills)
- Fainting
- Seizures
- Coma and even loss of life
I hardly ever expertise extra important episodes of hypoglycemia in the course of the day as a result of I can catch it earlier than it will get to this stage, however it should typically occur in my sleep.
Nighttime hypoglycemia
I’ll get up in the course of the evening and comprehend it’s dangerous if I’ve had a “stress dream” (for instance, issues will transfer excessively quick within the dream or I’ll be caught in a loop of some type) or a nightmare, and I’m sweating profusely and shaking.
After which there’s the sensation — it’s an urge, an nearly primal must eat. I’ll stand within the kitchen, drenched and shaking, with all of my instincts screaming “feed me!”
It is sensible. At this level, my mind isn’t getting sufficient glucose to perform because it ought to, so the instincts take over to ensure that me to not die.
It’s, to place it mildly, extraordinarily uncomfortable. And in the event you don’t have a plan in place, a method for what to do throughout lows, you’ll shortly have emptied the fridge and cupboards and eaten something you may get your palms on.
The traditional alerts that inform you to cease consuming are merely placed on standby when your blood sugar is low.
I’ve written a complete publish about how I deal with lows at evening, and I all the time attempt to comply with that technique. And no, this method doesn’t all the time work (and what works for one particular person might not essentially work for an additional).
For those who aren’t experiencing signs of low blood sugar, be taught extra in Hypoglycemia Unawareness.
Methods to keep away from low blood sugar
For some folks, lows might be very scary, however I’ve by no means handed out from a low or had a seizure, so lows don’t scare me as such. However I’ll nonetheless do all the pieces I can to keep away from them.
In reality, I hardly ever have lows, and I believe there are a number of causes for that. Most significantly, I put on a steady glucose monitor (CGM). Since my CGM warns me earlier than I am going low, I might be proactive and stop it from occurring within the first place.
The CGM alarm for lows might be particularly useful in the course of the evening, since they wake me up once I’m sleeping and would possibly in any other case not pay attention to the creating low.
I additionally manually examine my blood sugar ranges often and have spent a whole lot of time determining my insulin wants for various instances of day, forms of train, and sorts of meals.
This didn’t occur in a single day, however I’m blissful to say that for me, low blood sugars at the moment are rare and barely extreme.
Remaining ideas
All of us expertise lows in a different way, however I believe anyone who has ever skilled what low blood sugar looks like will agree that it’s past uncomfortable.
So, subsequent time one in all your family members asks, “How do you’re feeling when your sugar is low?” think about displaying them this text and video.
It’s inconceivable to completely perceive you probably have by no means had a low your self, however this could no less than give them some understanding of what you’re going by way of.
Urged subsequent publish: What Ranges of Blood Sugar Are Harmful?
