Anyone else with Reactive Hyperglycemia?

I've had it for a long time now.  It can be triggered with too much fat or sugar and it is the single thing that keeps me accountable and keeps me from gaining too much weight!  I guess it's a blessing in disguise!  LOL!

I am trying really hard to see it that way too............but it's difficult when social situations come up, I feel stuck or screwed or...........lol  But hey, I've lost 200 lbs and folks tell me I look great:-)  I think if I felt great then I wouldn't be having such a difficult time dealing with this aspect of this surgery.  Fibromyalgia doesn't care if your fat, skinny or in between unfortunately......I'm having a great deal of trouble even just sitting.  Which since I do a desk job now instead of nursing.........well let's just say that meetings seem endless.........but that tailbone issue I'm hearing is common with us.  I plan to call my doctor today and set up an appointment to go in and chat about this RHG thing and the tailbone pain.  Maybe he can help......

 

Thanks to all for your insight/input.........it's been very supportive:-)

 

Carol J

Hi  I am struggling with reactive hyper and hypo glycemia. Would love to know what any have been doing to help with this problem. I am 10 years post op RNY

 

Teri

Hi T:-)  I am now 9 years post op, I think I wrote this original post back in 07' maybe.  But I have continued to pretty much control my blood sugars as long as I stick to a diet of fresh, real food and always have enough protein with my natural carb.  I still do my soy coffee protein shakes for breakfast and I have 1/2 a serving of fruit with it.  My protein shake only gives me 6 grams of carb so I still feel like I need a few more but I need the fiber too.  Juice has no fiber in it and with all the vitamins, etc we have to take constipation is a big concern.  I usually eating something protein/carb every 3-4 hours, but they are still small meals and so far I have managed to maintain my weight loss.  I think the mistake some folks are making is they try to go back to eating some kind of bread or some other high glucose food like white potatoes, white rice, something with flour....I can't tolerate any of that now.  And I limit my fruit portions to two a day.  Love my apples, love my 1/2 grapefruit in the mornings but sometimes I forego that and have a small packed in juice peach cup mid morning....and I eat a nice salad with protein in it for lunch.  No lunch meat ever though, carbs are always hidden in lunchmeat.  I love poached fish for dinner, I get a big salmon fillet and cut it into servings and freeze it.  Pull it frozen from the freezer, put some olive oil and salt/pepper on it and I use a steaming dish to cut it perfectly in the microwave.  Squeeze alittle lemon on it and add some steamed frozen veggie and I've got a quick healthy meal.  If I'm hungry before bed I like to eat a handful of nuts.  I am not very active, can't exercise due to other health problems so I don't need alot of calories, I think when anyone considers a new way of eating they should take that into consideration......anyways.....just happened to get an email on this post ....I hope you can get some answers here.

Hi! I am an RN and I am also almost 2 years post op. i've lost about 225 pounds. I started having reactive hypoglycemia really bad about 2 months ago. It's like we've all heard, your body is so used to having to produce SO much insulin that it does not take into account your now 1/2 your size. The insulin is too much and drops the blood sugar dangerously low. The trick is, from experience, to eat every two hours or so and eat at least a protein and if you eat a complex carb, eat protein with it. If even just peanut butter and crackers. I ate a bowl of potato soup, maybe 1/2 cup, and within one hour my blood sugar was down to 30 and I was beginning to have shakes, confusion, jitters, etc. It's very dangerous. Then you find yourself wolfing down high sugar, high calorie foods to try and get it back up. It can be a vicious circle. When i started eating protein every two to three hours, i actually dropped 9 pounds that week, so it can be a blessing in disguise.

Thanks for your reply:-) I have been eating snacks now and instead of fruit, they are jerky or pork rinds....high in protein.  Or peanuts, I buy them in that 1 oz pk from Sam's club and carry those too.  I am working on it.............

 

Carol J

 

I have it too. It started about 2 yrs post-op, when I was at goal weight. I find it acts up when I'm over exhauseted and not eating right. Also happened more the lower my weight was. I'm about 30 lbs over goal now and 5 yrs post RNY. Always have a quick snack close by in case it drops while your driving or in bed and can't get to the kitchen.

I have really worked to add more protein to any carb that I'm eating, which is always natural carbs now...........no more eating processed crap for me.  The light bulb finally went off in my head!  lol  If I want to maintain my goal weight then I know that I have to eat some protein/carb every 3 hours. Since I've really adhered to this way of eating, I've lost 4 more lbs so apparently even though I had decided that 150 was my goal weight, my body thinks I need to weigh less so I'm going to keep with this and see where my actual weight settles down at.  Thanks for your reply:-)

 

Carol J

About a year ago I thought mine to was reactive hypoglycimia and since it didn't happen to often I was able to deal with it. What I have and a some other RNY pateints is not reactive but yet a condition called hyperincilimic hypoglycimia or nesoblastosis caused from gastric bypass. This mean that you have an over production of islet cells on your pancreas that overproduce insilin and it can become life threatining. I am hoping that your problems are only reactive hypoglycimia but after reading most of your blogs it sounded all to familier. Now a year later I become hypoglycimic anywhere from 6 to 12 times a day to dangerous levels, I black out, I have gone into comas and had a seizure. My life has changed dramaticaly as I can no longer be home alone with my three children, can't work, can't drive and have a hard time functioning in day to day life. I am part of a research at stanford hospital and unfortunently they have found no solution to this horrible condition. I am on 16 injections a day of octreotide to stop the production of insilin (it's 16 injections cause I have to take two at a time 8 times a day). I am on a pottent medication called diaazoxide that has many side effects. I have done everyting with my diet to try and help the symptoms but nothing works. I can find some foods that will give me a little more time betweeen lows but nothing realy works. I have found that two table spoons of corn starch mixed in a drink at night helps so I stay at a normal blood level while I am sleeping most of the time but I can't get it to work during the day. My endroconologist thinks I need to have a pancreotomy but I am so scared as the complications at mortality rate are all to real. I dont want to scare anyone but this is serious and if you are experiensing low blood sugars now it could get worse. I am four years post op and most people tend to get bad about 3 to 4 years post op. I have seen people who are going through this in the begining say that they are glad cause it keeps them eating the right foods but this is not the answer to keeping you on track. I hope that all of you do not have to go through this and if anyone is already please feel free to email me. Kim

Man, that is rough:-(  I have been doing alot of reading online and I know that you are right, the symptoms can become much worse, even life threatening:-(  I just hope/pray that I never get any worse than I am now, not much else to do at this point.  I hope that your situation improves for you, how scary this must be for you and your family:-(  Will keep you in my prayers that it will stabilize for you.......... Carol J