Hungry? Hypoglycemic? Hope this helps.

In the past week and a half, I undertook the 5dpt.  I am almost 3 years out and had put on almost 10 pounds since September.  I had been experiencing constant hunger, cravings, and obsessive thoughts about food, that were really wearing me down.  I had also stopped going to the gym on a daily basis because of the demands of my job.  Most alarmingly, for the past several months (even before the weight gain began) I had been experiencing increasingly frequent and severe bouts of hypoglycemia.  It begins with feeling cranky and anxious and can continue on to include shakiness, dizziness, heaviness and difficulty controlling my extremities, confusion and trouble verbalizing my thoughts, to the point where I feel like I'm going to black out.  It has even happened while driving. I started seeing that others on the boards have had similar experiences.  So I did some research and found that hypoglycemia is a growing problem in the post op community as more and more of us get further out.  The symptoms include all those listed above including hunger!  The causes are unclear, but studies suggest that the problem is part of the dumping syndrome.  It might be that although we have lost all this weight, our pancreas spits out insulin in response to carbs as if we were still fat.  That causes us to go into hypoglycemia like a diabetic who gets an insulin overdose.  There have been cases in which patients have had to have partial or total removal of the pancreas.  Needless to say, I was a little alarmed as I poured through the research.  

However, I began the 5dpt in the hopes that I would be able to get back on track.  I found out two important things about me.  First I found that I can still eat a lot!  My stoma must be rather large because stuff just seems to slide right through.  So in a way, the 5dpt should have been a big disappointment for me.  But it wasn't, because the other thing that I discovered was that cutting out carbs drastically reduced my appetite, obsessive food thoughts, and cravings.  Though I can eat a lot more, I am finding it much easier to stop at a reasonable portion.  Additionally, I have had only minimal symptoms of hypoglycemia since about the second day of the 5dpt.  I was so pleased with the results that I have continued to cut out pretty much all starch based carbs because I have found that my body responds really drastically to them.  This includes whole grains folks!  They contain starch and have a high glycemic load even though their glycemic index may seem low.  I have been eating low fruits with low glycemic loads, vegetables, and all types of protein and feel 100% better.  I have gone from having a couple of hypoglycemic episodes per day to not having had one in several days now.  Let me stress too that I was not eating terribly before.  I generally eat a mediterranean diet, but I was eating bread, grains, and pastas, as well as desserts and sweets now and then.  I find that I cannot tolerate more than a condiment size amount of these items or I am hungry and weak within 1/2 hour to 2 hours later.

As a postscript, I find that I also have to be very careful about artificial sweeteners.  If I overdo these, it brings back some of the symptoms and hunger.  However, though you would think I would feel deprived, I don't.  I have a lot more energy and I am rid of the constant thoughts about food which were causing me to become very depressed.

I have lost 5 pounds, which is very good considering that I am a lightweight, and I have lots of energy and am enjoying exercising again.

I've been so thrilled with the results, that I thought I would share.  I hope this helps some of you that  have been experiencing the same problems.   I'd love to hear from any of you who try this to see if it helps you as well!

 Beatrice

hi Beatrice, glad to see the pouch test made you go back to eating less and the weight loss was a bonus! :)  I too suffer from RHG (as quite a few of us do) and do think its our bodies use to producing larger amounts of insulin and with rapid weight loss, our bodies are still kicking out too much insulin causing hypoglycemia.   I started taking 500 mg of chromium picolinate after being told by an endocronoligist that it helps hypoglycemics and have gone from faithfully eating every 3 hours to avoid a crash in blood sugar (even having to wake up at night) to not having to time my meals!  I still have to watch my carbs (eat complex instead of simple, protein with every meal, etc) but taking chromium picolinate faithfully has certainly helped! congrats again on your 5dpt results!

Thanks so much for the tip!  I'm going to buy some chromium picolinate and give that a try as well.  

Hi, I was just reading and I noticed that chromium picolinate was brought up.  Will this disolve in our pouch?  Because I remember hearing that it has been know to pass through a normal persons bowels. I heard this yrs. ago. Buckeye gal

 

 Hi Tena,

Not sure about this.  I know that I have read in the past the Chromium Picolinate helps to keep blood sugar levels steady.  But I don't know if it's any different in wls patients.  I doubt much will happen to it in the pouch.  It will probably pass very quickly into the gut.  I'm going to do some research and see if I can find out anything on this.  Or if anyone else already has, maybe they can let us know!

 

I am glad you have found something that works for you. One thing I want to mention that if this AT ALL happens while you are driving, you should wear a medical id somewhere.  This summer we were in a car at a stop sign at the bottom of a hill.  We were rear ended at full force, no breaking, by a man who had slipped into a diabetic coma.  He had apparently got as far as getting his emergency test/food kit out and on the passanger side seat and opened.  It happened too fast for him to take anything in.  We knew something was wrong when the man didn't get out of his vehicle or respond at all to us even though his eyes were open.  He was wearing a bracelet and the EMT's immediately tested him and got him iv glucose.  He obviously anticipated being able to take something to prevent this, but didn't get that far.   Just a suggestion.

Thank you!  Thank goodness that it has never gotten to that level while I'm driving, but a couple of times I did get very lightheaded while driving.  I will talk to my doc about it.   I'm hoping I will continue to get results from my dietary changes.  So far so good.  Thanks again!

Interesting that you would post this today, as I had a hypoglycemic episode today. The clinic at work tested my blood, and my blood sugar was 55 - almost low enough for an IV.

Some of the sites I read on non-diabetic hypoglycemia indicated that any kind of Gastro-Intestinal surgery can bring it on - not just WLS. Also, as I'm a DS'er, I don't think it's related to dumping syndrome. (which is good news for RNY'ers)

I have been sick the last couple of weeks though, and I realized after the fact that I haven't been eating the volume of food that I normally do. Last night I had a light early dinner, then I had a light breakfast, no-mid-morning snack, a mocha-breve Venti, and no lunch.

As I was reading the sites on what triggers an episode, it indicated that lack of protein/food and excess of caffiene can trigger it. Basically, I simply didn't eat enough, and instead of trying to stimulate my body with caffiene, I should have just eaten something. I just thought I was too busy, and didn't have time. *smile* My body obviously thought otherwise.

Interesting what somewhat said about chromium piccolinate - what does that do to blood sugar levels?

--BT

The same thing happens to me with carbs! Like you said even some whole grains. I know I do best when following a south beach/atkins approach. Its weird because pre op I was on 3 shots of insulin a day.......now im having the opposite problem!!!

Hi Kathy!

Pretty amazing.  We get rid of insulin resistance and then all hell breaks loose!  South Beach is pretty good, but I've gotten so carb sensitive that i really have to pay attention to glycemic load not just glycemic index. This seems to help.  There are lists online and i have a couple of books that list glycemic loads of different foods and portions sizes.  These might help you too.

 

Good luck!