It seems that when I go low (say 50s-60s) and then get back up to the normal range, I still feel the low for a bit and am out of sync for a few hours? Is this typical? What are your after effects if any?
I feel tired and out of breath for some time after (like half and hour), and then I usually start getting a headache that often develops into a full blown migraine attack. If I don't get a headache then my brain just works really slowly for an hour or two.
its different with every hypo, i have to say. last week i had a 59 and it happened really fast. i was REALLY irritable about madonna being on my mp3 player and actually threw it on the ground in the park! i realized i was low because of the ridiculous reaction to the erotica álbum. thought about how i was going to have me a MASSIVE fry up for breakfast, got home and stuffed a bunch of pineapple in my face and then had to go to bed for a couple of hours. felt terrible. had trouble recalling spanish AND english all day. this is not a reaction i usually have to a low. i think i get these bad reactions when its a nosedive low, but im not really sure.
most times i treat and im ok, maybe a bit fuzzy here and there.
If I catch it quickly and get it to come back up, I don't usually feel too bad. But a bad low can really take it out of me. This weekend I was between 40-60 for about 45 minutes and I felt tired and groggy all day, went to bed early and slept for almost 12 hours that night.
If I'm really low, like in the low 2s or high 1s (30s mg/dl), I sometimes get a migraine-like headache (I don't get migraines otherwise) after coming back into range that lasts for hours and doesn't go away until I take Advil or something similar. That's probably the worst after-effect of a low I get.
Except for the rebounds, of course. For some reason, some lows don't come up right away. I'm not sure if it's related to IOB or what. And often I don't feel low, but once I test and treat I start to feel it. At lunch today I was 2.4 (43 mg/dl) and barely felt low at all, and treated, and when I tested 15 minutes later I was still 2.5 (45 mg/dl) and felt terrible, and so treated again. Then I ate lunch, and was worried I'd go low again because that previous low had literally come out of nowhere, so I skimped on the bolus a bit. So now I'm sitting at 19.4 (349 mg/dl) and definitely feeling it. I probably not only under-bolused but also over-treated.
Most lows in the 50-60s, if I catch them quickly, I can shake off with little lingering effect. If a bad low hits me, <40 and I'm unaware of it, like during sleep, and it goes on for more than 20 minutes or so, I definitely get a "hangover" of sorts. I feel cognitively slow and more tired, especially if I'm dealing with a rebound high that usually follows. I remember when I was first diagnosed. I was more sensitive to the lows and I would feel the symptoms at higher levels, like in the upper 60s. And rebound highs would just make me want to crawl into bed and sleep.
for me a low to 50 is recoverable in maybe 25 minutes without too much emotional effect but if I have 3, or sometimes just 2, lows like that in a single day, it wears me down mentally and psychologically and puts a bad spin on the day.
It doesn't seem to affect me later or perhaps I'm "addicted" to various other activities so I don't have time to dwell on lows. I might be sort of inclined to be dismissive about them to keep them from getting in the way of things and figure out ways to work around them. If I'm doing something, whatever hypo leftovers are lurking around go away.
So the Spanish and English abandoned you, but I gotta know: How about the Piglatin?
Like acid, I don't have lingering after-effects. Once I'm back over 65-70, I'm good. Keep in mind, though, that it usually takes 30-60 minutes to get back up there, simply because I'm chasing insulin with carbs, and the insulin has quite a head-start.
I'm very lucky to be quite hypo-aware. I start to notice the slightest edge of jitteryness and "caffeine-like" hyperactivity between 65-70, so I almost always catch them before they get bad. I've had a few in the 50's in the last 4 months, and one in the 40s.
That one that got down to 43 was bad. Still, after I was back over 70 again I was fine.
I've had the pleasure of experiencing pretty strong false-hypo over a period of about 3 days as I got back under control after a long period of being wildly out of control (averaging 300s). My "team" wanted me to take it gradual, bringing the BG down slowly over a few weeks. I just couldn't handle those high readings over and over again, so I decided to just suck it up and slam the BG back down to normal. Too a lot of insulin, but I got it back under 100 in two days.
Then I spent 3 days of hell feeling like I was in the 20's and going to die. It was like an alcoholic detoxing, except I was a sugaraholic.
All the symptoms of hypos happen because of glucose starvation to the brain. When it is bathed in corn syrup for months and months, it gets used to it, and when withdrawn, even though there is no actual danger, it reacts as if it's being starved.
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A non-diabetic and someone like a T2 just on some simple medications like metformin can have a low and their body will naturally counterregulate. It will release hormones like cortisol and adrenaline and your liver will dump glucose to restore a normal blood sugar. This happens quickly and while you might have some shakiness you will feel normal within a short period of time. But for those of us on insulin or sulfonylureas, the higher insulin levels can suppress the natural counterregulation. Counterregulation will usually still happen, but may only be triggered by a harsh low and then results in a huge hormone response way out of proportion. Your liver may release a huge amount of glucose (it keeps up to 150 g of glycogen in storage for this purpose), resulting in a rebound high. Some people find that after a harsh low, they then have a high and spend the day treating the resulting high. And those extremely high levels of the hormones I mentioned may also affect your feelings for hours as well as messing up your body for quite some time. Some people may find that they become insulin resistant after a harsh low, perhaps it is due to the surge in the stress hormone cortisol. I am fortunate and have few lows and never serious.
Eryvay, icenay!
No, I definitely experience symptoms of hypos, but once I treat them and am back in range I feel fine. The only residual effects I've had is when I had a severe or prolonged low, but even then the effects were just emotional, in the form of "omg, that was scary!"
It's so easy to over-treat when the low does not start coming up after the "15 minute wait". I have also treated, then on recheck my BG is even lower than before. So Frustrating! I have given up on using juice on a serious low (20-40 range) and suck down a mini Pepsi instead. For me, it works much faster and I don't seem to get the "hangover effect" as I do when pushing juice and a mix of fast/slow acting carbs. I've had this hideous disease for 53 years, so am not able to always detect a low before it really gets serious. Part of it has to do with being involved in something else and not paying attention to my body, or not wanting to stop and check/treat!
Do you always treat your lows in the same way? Maybe try something different and see if the after effects are better.
I have no ill effects from a 50 or 60 and do not really consider BG in that range to be a hypo...But a 25 mg/dL that my wife or someone has to assist me in order to overcome certainly has some residual effects, I usually suffer low energy for the rest of the day.
I think there is a fairly wide range between what some feel and consider a low BG, I may not even treat a 60 mg/dL but my brother freaks out if his BG gets under 100 mg/dL. My A1c runs in the 5's in comparison to my brothers who has never had a A1c under 7.0......