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Limiting Hypo treatment

Aknitty

Active Member
Messages
35
Hello
When treating a hypo, does your body get crazy about eating jelly babies/drinking apple juice etc? I suppose it is a biological urge as it's obviously an emergency situation but am planning for pregnancy so find it difficult dealing with subsequent highs.how do people limit hypo treatment effectively? Or not? I am hypo now so probably not making much sense thanks
 
A better way to put it - what are your best hypo treatments that dont send your blood crazy sky high? Thanks and sorry for waffle
 
You brain panics a bit when it’s short of glucose, and that makes it irresistible when it comes to jelly babies, as they’re nice. I use dextrose tablets, treating it as a medical situation rather than an excuse for a treat. I don’t tend to overdo those because they’re pretty horrible! So I take a max of three, see how it goes, and maybe add a couple more of my levels don’t rise. I know from testing that one 3g tablet raises my sugars by 0.6mmol, so if my BG is 3.6 for example, two would get me to 4.8mmol.
 
Sitting next to the fridge, eating everything we can find in there, is something many of us know well.

My "need something fast!" hypo treatment (for when things are bad, not just a dip into the 3s) is jelly babies, but only a small bag. I now know that 6 full size jelly babies will get me out of pretty much anything, which removes the temptation to binge further - if I had a big bag I would be very likely to over do it. I might even get away with 4 - needs experimentation (the 6 comes from the little mini bags of 9 2/3 size ones, which are no longer made. I've got a stock of little ziplock bags to split the big bag into.)

I've never been a fan of dextrose tablets - I don't feel the need to have to eat something unpleasant just because I'm hypo
 
I must be the only person who actually like Dextrose tabs!! The orange are my favourite, followed closely by the blackcurrant.

One thing I do find quite useful are fux size bags of Skittles. Easy to keep in the bag or pocket (especially when I'm running) and 16g of sugar in them which is usually enough to get my out of the hypo.
 
I'm not sure if this is the best thing if you are pregnant but I treat hypos with half a can of red bull (about 16g carb). This tends to raise me by 2.0 really rapidly and the caffeine kick is good to stop me falling straight back to sleep if it's in the night
 
I do actually quite like the lemon ones. The tropical and blackcurrant ones are vile! I usually have the orange jobbies because they’re two pack for a quid in Home Bargains and lemon ones are 70p a single pack... the first one tastes nice, but the second and third are just too sweet - I eat low carb and my tastes have changed a lot, I really don’t like oversweet things now.

I’m allergic to gelatin, so most of the usual sweeties aren’t an option.
 
My DSN recommended not skittles, as they're sucrose rather than glucose. But if it works for you, sounds like a good answer.
 
OMG I must be worlds worst diabetic. When I read of you guys having like 3 jelly babies etc, I think eh???????

I am going low at moment sitting at 3.7 and on way down. I will try jelly beans and hope they work, but I usually take around 12 and generally that will not have a huge impact quickly. I find these can take 15/20 minutes to have any impact by which time my BG will continue to go down

My go to if I am low and in house is warm cup of coffee with at least 2 sugars and a couple of biscuits to see me through. Outside it will be part of a bottle of full sugar cola and that will do the trick
 

I've had cause to use them on the odd occasion.. It's worked for me too! Don't confuse the taste of sweetness with the fast acting carb content. Though I feel the chewiness & hard coating, may slow down the digestion a little with a Skittle...?

"Sucrose is a disaccharide consisting of one glucose and one fructose molecule, or 50% glucose and 50% fructose. ... Table sugar and the sucrose found in processed foods are commonly extracted from sugarcane or sugar beets. Sucrose tastes less sweet than fructose but sweeter than glucose."
 
Dextrotabs for me, 0.75 - 1.0 mmol raise per tab I find unless it's low from swimming then it's a tube of Glucogel, if after a meal and there's potential to drop off under 3 then a Kit Kat whilst I'm still in the 4's.

But then I've never been pregnant so not much help
 


Sometimes I have right problems with my hypos! Especially if its an early morning one.

I have a bag of jelly babies by my bed, and if my xDrip alarm is going off and I've double checked the reading is correct I'll have maybe 3 jelly babies. 45 minutes later and nothing has happened (sometimes the reading has even gone down) so I'l take 2-3 more, and still nothing. Another 45+ minutes later and I'll try another 2-3 and then BAM!! My glucose shoots up from 3 to 13 in no time at all and I struggle to get it under control for the rest of the day.

I know you're supposed to wait and give the sugar a chance to get working, but nearly 2 hours of being in a hypo state has to be enough time to wait surely?!? This frustrates me no end!
 

Hi,

Answer this when you come back up... But give it an hour. What is your approximate time between testing when you go low? 5, maybe 10 minutes?
 
Fun size Mars Bars can be quite good too with about 11g of carbs in them.

(Yes, I know that chocolate is not recommended as a hypo treatment, and the fat may delay the absorption, but they work great for me as a pre-hypo treatment when my Libre and xDrip are warning of an impending hypo when I'm around 5mmol and heading downwards)
 
Daibell said:
I think all flavours of Dextrose tablets are great!
Click to expand...

I can do them all as well, with the exception of the non-flavoured/plain ones. Yuck! In order of preference (from the ones I can get locally) orange, blackcurrant, lemon+lime

Haven't tried tropical or any of the other flavours as Tesco and Sainsbury's only have orange, blackcurrant, lemon lime and plain on the shelves around here.
 

I'm not going to disagree with you. They are a stable, reliable & steady slow riser for me. I personally don't always need a head banging rush.
 
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