• Guest - w'd love to know what you think about the forum! Take the 2025 Survey »

hypo problems

B

bedshaped2000

Well-Known Member
Messages
286
i work nights and i find i have trouble keeping my sugars up through the night . through the afternoon early evening i eat every 2 and a half hours with good results. but at night i find i can get away with murder. in the afternoon if i eat a pear im normally running 6.0 after 1 hour 5.6 after 2 hours. same pear at 2 in the morning would give me unchanged bg and then drop. should i be introducing more carb in the day. when i get in from work im showing between 4.3 to 4.9 and this would be 1 hour after having a latte and a apple.

so i normally have a biscuit before bed then awake in the morning about 11 with morning bgs between 4.7 to 5.4. is this because i work nights and normally at night the pancreas is working. im so frightened what would happen if i didnt have the biscuit. if i had the same latte and apple at three in the afternoon i would be showing a 7 easy. when im coming home early mornings i get the hypo signs of hunger and dull headache but my brain tells me ive just had about 15-20 carbs from the latte and 10g of carb in the apple so how can i be low whats hapening? i have about half of my carb intake for the day in the space of about 4 hours with no effects.
 
As a night worker myself you should be eating to keep the levels up during your working 'day' which, for us, is night.

The exercise levels you are using at night will be keeping the blood sugar levels down and in the morning this exercise continues to use energy after you have stopped working for a while hence the low levels when you wake. I was exactly the same. I always had my normal breakfast when I came home but invariably woke with something in the 3's, rotten feeling !

You are on diet and exercise, like me, so if you did go low while sleeping then you would 'liver dump' and your own body would bring your blood sugar levels up again.

When I was working nights then I always had a sandwich at 3 am, the only time in the week I ate bread !
 
thats the thing sue although im working is actuall driving so i get confused weather im high which i should be, low or tired. this morning i woke at 4.7 and after breakfast i shot to a 6.8 in 50 mins. i felt like id been on a rollercoaster. but the other day i woke on a 5.4 exactly same breakfast put me up 0.2 in a hour
 
bedshaped2000 said:
thats the thing sue although im working is actuall driving so i get confused weather im high which i should be, low or tired. this morning i woke at 4.7 and after breakfast i shot to a 6.8 in 50 mins. i felt like id been on a rollercoaster. but the other day i woke on a 5.4 exactly same breakfast put me up 0.2 in a hour
Click to expand...

As a driver you really should be testing before you start and at intervals through the night, only in that way will you know exactly what your levels are during the night. Try a few tests next time you are at work. Driving in itself is stressful and will affect your BG levels.

Waking at 4.7 mmol/l should be a fasting level if you have eaten nothing etc during the night. That's all good. When you say you 'shot up' to 6.8 mmol/l that would all be dependent on the type of food you ate, how long after waking before you ate.....many variables.

If you are only testing at around 1 hr after a meal that is only showing you a 'spike' in your Bg levels........you need to know what the readings are at the 2 hr point as by this time the reading should be getting back to the pre-breakfast level. If it isn't then you need to be looking at the carb content of your meal as you are only on diet and exercise.

The readings will fluctuate from day to day, hour by hour, minute by minute ........you will never get the same reading just because you ate the same meal. It doesn't work that way unfortunately. That's why we advocate frequent testing until you get the hang of what is happening in YOUR body.

Ken
 
second hour on that breakfast was back to a 5.8 but i cant get rid of morning spikes this is the worst meall for me to control
this is my daily routine religiously is this ok?

11.00 am wake up have 20g of mixed sunflower and pumpkin seeds, 20g of lizis granola
spoonfull of almond powder,handfull of mixed nuts strawbeerys milk and a coffee
12.00am go for a 1hour 15 min walk or the same time cycling

1.30pm 2 slices of flaxbread with a pear

3.30pm normally a small cadburys eclair and a cup of coffee

5.00pm normally mixed veg and a meat normally 50g of potato or swede never together

7.45pm 20g of mixed seeds total fat free greek yougurt rasberrys

9.45pm small 5g 85% cocoa chocolate bar from aldis


12.30am mixed salad and meat or chicken and a small packet of crisps (no more than 13g of carb per bag)

3.00 am apple and a latte

5.00 to 6.00 am custard cream

i have done this for the last year and lost just off 7 stone and 14 inches of my waist. my hba1c has gone from 8.7 to 5.3. just wondered if im under doing it all these meals and snacks have been 1 hour and 2 hour tested and im alaways under 7 in the first hour and under 6 in 2 hours. after chocolate for some reason i seem to drop rather than rise. is this enough carb or am i over doing it hence the low readings at night early morning. a long night i knowdont let me start about when i convert back to days at the weekend :lol:
 
Without going through everything with a fine tooth comb........

A 'spike' is just a reaction to what you are consuming. It is almost impossible to avoid them unless you virtually eat nil carbs........as the levels are getting back to normal after the two hours and it is obvious that things are working out good for you I cannot see anything to worry about as far as your levels go.

I have to say though that both Sue and I would blanch at the food intake, most of it seems way too carby for us. Sue is a low carber and her intake is around 50-60g carbs per day. Mine is between 75 - 80g at the moment but has been lower, I use low GI/GL methods to control my Diabetes, two main meals a day.....the odd snack....that's it. Sue is much the same. I would be happy to see levels you are quoting on my meter. I don't think I have ever managed to get rid of some spikes. Only if I stop eating certain things.

Still as it works for you and you seem to have great levels.........go for it. If there are fatty foods involved that will delay the absorption of the carbs and it might even need you to test later to see if it was actually on the way up at 2 hrs ! Testing is all.

You are doing fantastic.........stick with it but don't get concerned about the odd spike. You'll end up paranoid.....like me apparently ! :wink: (in joke....sorry )

Ken
 
i have done this for the last year and lost just off 7 stone and 14 inches of my waist. my hba1c has gone from 8.7 to 5.3. just wondered if im under doing it all these meals and snacks have been 1 hour and 2 hour tested and im alaways under 7 in the first hour and under 6 in 2 hours. after chocolate for some reason i seem to drop rather than rise. is this enough carb or am i over doing it hence the low readings at night early morning. a long night i knowdont let me start about when i convert back to days at the weekend :lol:
Click to expand...

At a rough estimate ( different brands have different values) you are eating probably around 150gm of carb per day.
That is much more than Ken or I can handle but you are doing brilliantly on this so don't worry! You are eating quite a lot of fat in the seeds which will slow down the absorption of the carbs you are eating but again, you are losing weight etc so carry on like you have been doing as long as your blood sugars are under control.
 
Back
Top