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Hypo @ night

M

mariposa84

Well-Known Member
Messages
127
Type of diabetes
Type 1
Hi,

Had a really bad hypo overnight earlier in the week. Was in range before bed but woke up at 2.15am at 2.3. Felt dreadful and lucozade took a while to work but eventually blood sugar rose back up to 6.6.

About 45 min after drinking the lucozade I started feeling really nauseous and had stomach cramps that prevented me from getting back to sleep. I tried some peppermint tea to see if that might help but it didn't.

I've never felt that sick or had cramps after a hypo and just wondered if anyone else had before?
 
Did you check you weren't accidentally using the new reduced sugar lucozade? Apparently it looks exactly the same but has half the amount of sugar.

Was the sickness only happening once you were euglycaemic? I've had nausea during a hypo, as a hypo symptom, don't think after. But it could just be the stress and what you had to ingest to bring you back up.

Or it could be the nausea was totally unrelated to the hypo and you would have had it anyway, even without the hypo. What had you had for tea? Anyone else feeling it or maybe they just slept through?
 

Your muscles need glucose to work properly, so in a hypo, and the aftermath, there's a fair chance they'll stop their usual tightening and relaxing business and cramp up.

The nausea is probably down to the fact that when you go hypo, you kick out a lot of adrenaline to put you in fight or flight mode, and adrenaline wires you up a bit: have a look at people who've just been in a car accident/fire/terrorist incident - a lot of them throw up.
 

Hello there! I find if I have a nighttime low then something like Ribena or Vimto is easier on the stomach when going back to bed. I try to avoid the carbonated, fizzy drinks as that nearly always makes me feel bloated and sick pretty soon after returning to bed - Of course it's then tough to get back to sleep until the feeling subsides. I don't know if your Lucozade was one of the fizzy varieties or not but possibly might be a reason.
 
@mariposa84 . Have had this more than once but many years ago.
If I ever went hypo during the night and had to treat I would inevitably end up feeling nauseous to the extent is was very difficult to eat to raise BS. On occasions I would actually be sick which just made the whole situation worse. I found extremely sugary items made things worse at the time. Toast, porridge and the like although difficult to eat whilst feeling sick tended to work best.
What insulin are you using?
When hypos made me physically sick I was on mixtard30/70 pork insulin.
Hope you're feeling better now.
 
Thanks @catapillar and @Scott-C.

Definitely wasn't the new low sugar version of lucozade...I've stockpiled a few bottles of the old stuff!!! No-one else had any problems after eating tea the night before.

I wonder if like you say it may have been the stress of the hypo ... I was pretty panicked at waking up so low and my libre showed a red line from midnight.

It's never happened before though. Sometimes I feel sick when hypo but not after.

When I ate breakfast I felt slightly better but was not fun having to do a full day's work after 4hrs sleep...!
 


I think you're right with this too....I had fizzy lucozade as it was all I had close by my bed and it was one of those hypos where I had to force myself to sit up and treat it.

Carton of Ribena it is then ☺ (never been able to stand taste of Vimto).

Thanks
 

Hope that works for you. Ribena has always been very effective for me when treating a hypo. I should get a sponsorship deal! Take care
 

I am feeling better thanks. I'm on Novorapid. Weirdly enough, I ate toast for breakfast (instead of my current favourite of Greek yoghurt and fruit) after the peppermint tea had failed and it did make me feel a bit better.

I'm usually very good at following the lucozade with something like a biscuit to make sure I don't go back down again but didn't this time as was really tired and desperately wanted to go back to sleep. Think I've learnt my lesson.

Thanks for the advice
 
mariposa84 said:
I've stockpiled a few bottles of the old stuff!!!
Click to expand...

This lucozade thing is turning into a massive business opportunity! Imagine a near future Mad Max style world: T1s turn up at a sleazy little pub in Soho, few whispers over the bar, "hear you've got some of the old stuff, ya selling?" "Sure, dude, gonna cost ya."
 

Hahaha!!! Once the "old stuff" runs out there's got to be someone somewhere who's got the time and inclination to make a diabetic moonshine equivalent!!
 
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