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Looking for Advice - 9 year old with sore heads and feeling sick

K

KezHaz

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Hi

I'm taking my 9 year old son back to the Doctors tomorrow and requesting blood tests. For two years now he has been getting headaches and feeling sick - anything from once a month to twice a week. I've been able to discount anything to do with the eyes or neurological and more recently with a lot of hindsight have been able to see a relationship between the symptoms and going longer than four hours without a proper meal. I have told the Doctor before about this but he wasn't overly concerned. My son has had two episodes this week and tonight had to go to bed to go to sleep to alleviate the symptoms. My question is would feeling sick with a sore head and pale be typical symptom of someone who is either hyperglycaemic or hypoglycaemic ? Sometimes if I can catch it early he can feel better with food other times if it's just a headache a painkiller might shift it but on occasion he needs to go to sleep and when he wakes up he feels better. The rest of the time he is great and no other symptoms. Though he has always been small and slight like his dad and on the 25th percentile and still is. Any thoughts ? Thanks Kerri
 
Hello I think it is a difficult situation. I hope you find another doctor who is more helpful. I can't cannot comment if it's hyperglycemia or hypoglycemia unless you test your son's blood sugars. If you find a way to test his blood maybe that will build a case forward for the doctor to examine your son. I feel your post isn't clear, does he feel sick or has he actually vomited everywhere? Type 1 diabetes has a number of symptoms which all relates to hyperglycemia - high blood sugars for a long period of time, which includes excessive urination, unintended weight loss, extreme tiredness, vomiting is the last extreme symptom of DKA that needs urgent medical attention. Diabetics don't experience hypoglycemia unless they are on blood glucose lowering medication such as insulin. There's something called reactive hypoglycemia, which you can read up on it on this forum, unfortunately I'm not too familiar with it. I hope your son gets better.
 
Hi MeiChanski thanks for replying it's very much appreciated. I am asking really whether his symptoms would be typical of any diabetic symptoms. From what you suggest above the symptoms would be very evident and constant ? To answer your question he wouldn't very often be sick and most often it's brought on by being in the car and lack of food at the same time. The majority of the time it's just nauseausness. For instance now he is fast asleep sleeping peacefully but before he went to bed he was feeling sick and had a sore head.
Thanks Kerri
 
I can only speak for type 1 diabetes. If your son has type 1, it'll happen very very quickly and it'll only be high blood sugars due to the lack of insulin. You'll notice the weight loss, lack of appetite, extreme fatigue, frequent toilet trips etc. I think I spent a lot of time on the toilet and sleeping before my diagnosis. As time went on, it got worse where I was vomiting several times and ketones showed in my urine, so I was off to A&E. So if you can test your son's blood sugars and his urine - pharmacies can help, you may be able to build a case with a log of his blood sugars. Since you're going to the doctors tomorrow, I hope you find an answer and a helpful doctor. However I wouldn't just pinpoint it to just diabetes, it could be something else that is going on.
 
Hi @KezHaz ,

Welcome to the forum.

Is there a correlation of BG test results & the symptoms?

Is there any stress or anxiety in your son's life? (Could be anything? School, family dynamics, friends, competition to succeed?) The feeling of nausea & headache has been known to manifest with some people under duress...?
 
Interesting article here about migraines caused by low blood sugar

https://www.migrainetrust.org/about-migraine/trigger-factors/hypoglycaemia/

But honestly, if you start using Dr Google you can convince yourself of almost any illness/diagnosis.

Your description sounds unlike T1 diabetes to me, since symptoms caused by lack of food is more likely to be low blood sugar than high blood sugar related. Plus T1 usually comes on very rapidly in children. But honestly, if it's T1 then a blood test would quickly diagnose it.

Headaches can unfortunately be caused by all sorts of things. Other than eyesight checks you should also make sure you've discussed the symptoms with your dentist, as tooth grinding can be a common cause.

Good luck with your doctor and getting your son diagnosed properly.
 
Sounds exactly like migraines to me.
 
I went through quite a few tests from an early age myself, saw a few neurologists, and kept being told it wasn't migraines. It was migraines, and they are extremely crippling. I was pale, puking my guts out, splitting headaches, and it wasn't until an acquaintance of my grandfather's gave me a triptan to try when I was 16, (back then they were still injections, now I just take pills), and my migraine vanished like snow for the sun, that it turned out it really, really was a migraine. By then I'd had them for over 10 years. Triggers for me were certain foods (citrus fruit, chocolate, coke, chinese), smells (cleaning agents, perfume/deodorant), sunlight (never left home without my shades, and I had many back-ups), and my cycle, which I'm assuming your lad won't have a problem with. But yeah, that sort of thing... It takes a while to figure out triggers, but it does help once you know what to avoid.

You might want to read Heal Your Headache by Dr. Buchholz, that could provide some answers.

Good luck!
Jo
 
PS: On the ketogenic diet my migraines have become less frequent. Kind of makes sense, as it is also used in children with epilepsy, and migraines are a cousin to those. I dunno.... Just hoping your kid won't have to go through what I did.
 
It sounds like migraine to me too. Horrible, disabling things. I had them chronically for most of my adult life (they were more occasional when younger). Like @JoKalsbeek the ketogenic diet has been very helpful - haven’t had one for over 2 years. Hope you find out what’s wrong.
 
Hi I concur with you @EllieM, it doesn't sound like type 1 diabetes symptoms.
How is your boy getting on at school, could there be problems with his peer group, some type of bullying, being excluded, grades not good, so possible emotional trauma, have you spoken with the school ?
Whatever s happening to your son it's not nice and I hope you get some answers soon with a proper diagnosis.
Take care
 
I hope your son. get sorted soon, and I also suspect it may be migraines!

I was rarely actually physically sick with mine. Triggers were female hormones, certain foods, bright light and flashing/strobing, certain sounds, a few foods and stress. My SIL was also a sufferer and hers were actually weather related, which I have also experienced a few times in windy. stormy weather. I was told to eat regularly to help avoid them and at one point many years ago actually had a few migraine related hypos due to lack of food where I also went extremely cold and shaky and was desperate to eat sugar. I wasn't aware of this at the time, but since I've had T2 I've discovered what was going on (ref @EllieM's link to Migraine Trust article).

I'm another (ex!) sufferer who finds eating a low carb/ketogenic diet has stopped my migraines dead in their track.

Robbity
 
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