Had an incident this morning and want to know if this is what others here on Tudiabetes have experienced. I happen to lose two pounds in 48 hours. I had been fairly active physically over the weekend, bike hiking, rushing around. Drinking 32 oz of fluid didn’t make me go to the bathroom. Then I was very dizzy, nauseased after walking my dog. Checked my sugar: 96. Huh?! But I suspected it was a false high as I was feeling so rotten. I put 2 and 2 together, that being so dried out would lead to this.
Had nothing to lose, so drank a few ounces of low carb cranberry juice and within 20 minutes the dizziness was gone. I was still feeling crappy for couple hours after that, but that was probable cuz I had to go without more food (went for a medical test this am).
Does dehydration usually/often result in false meter readings?
If I’m even slightly dehydrated, I feel awful. Your meter was probably correct. Being dehydrated doesn’t result in false readings, but being dehydrated can result in higher, though accurate, readings.
Yes it can. And dehydration can occur when you are high, so the best thing to do is to drink and drink and drink … until it all comes out again, and water only.
Emmy, I bought that sports drink, G2, that is only 7g carbs in mini size, and using that more now to head off another dry out. Thanks for your advice!!!
Yes, it has happened to me twice! I was very much surprised… I had never heard about dehydration related to false BG’s before! The first time it happened, I didn’t take enough water during the day, i mean almost no water, and I was just slight dehydrated, not feeling nauseas, nothing like that, but my skin was actually very dry… and when I checked my sugar it was 240 on the meter but despite the result, i felt pretty good. As I was with a friend who has also diabetes, before taking insulin, i told him about that, and he said: “You might be dehydrate… Drink couple glasses of water and check it again”, That was what I did, and FOR MY SURPRISE, when I checked again, about 20 min later, it was actually 130.
So, yeah, at least in my experience, it can happen, and i am glad you brought this subject here!! I could have given myself the insulin and have a severe hypoglycemia…
