Type 1 Panic Attackes

[itconor]

Ive posted this else were before but i had a night time hypo i couldnt explan a while a back that took me under 2.0mmol i felt myself starting to loose the abilty to understand what was going on around me and started to loose my vision it took a lot of sugar to bring me up from it. then a week ago i was on holiday in spain and had a similar experience and a rapid drop in blood glucose, which i imagine was due to the heat. but after these 2 incidents i am now suffering panic attacks daily.

my blood sugar has now been running high since i was on holiday and any time i feel like im starting to drop (ive been getting unsureal drops outside of my normal rapid acting action) i start to get a tight feeling in my chest along with rapid heart rate sweats and the inability to stay still and just sheer panic which has caused me to take sugar before ive even gone low in fear of my sugar not acting quick enough if i actually have a hypo which is never a feeling i have had before after 13 years, i have lost a lot of weight recently and i think this has changed my sensitiveness to my insulin, ive dropped my 2 doses of levmir down quite a bit because i assumed they were responsible for my rapid drop in blood sugar.

i have no idea what my ratio is for carb/insulin anymore i find myself purposely taking to little so i dont panic about going low, every time i try to take more insulin to try bring myself back to what i should be i spend the next 2 hours with a tight chest testing to often, the problem is i think the panic is also causing blood sugar increase making it even harder to guess how much insulin i need.

do many others experience this dread of a hypo how do you deal with it... its really starting ruin my life and control.

The other issue i have is my meter seems to give me wildly different readings. im using a accu-check mobile, i wash my hands test my blood sugar and it will tell me im 17.0 i test the same hand 5 mins later and it will tell me im 13.2 which then also sets of panic as i think i have dropped super fast.

 

[noblehead]

You sound as if your suffering from anxiety brought on by your hypo experiences, hence why your having panic attacks. I'm sure once you overcome or control this your bg control will settle down, I would discuss matters with your gp or diabetes consultant as they can offer you help to ease your problems.

 

[rochari]

itconor, I'm with noblehead about this. Talking it over with your doctor or consultant is the first step. Indeed, the most important step. In fact, talking it through with anyone may help too and by posting your message on here is perhaps the start of a better journey for you.

Ten years ago after 40 years on insulin something similar happened to me. Seriously bad hypos began and I began to get phobic about them. I had no idea of the cause. I did most of things you are now doing but, if I can be frank, they still didn’t get rid of the anxiety which was overwhelming. Even if I felt the tiniest bit ‘odd’ I’d rush to test my blood and usually I wasn’t low at all.

I used to sit and try to figure out why, after so many years on insulin, I had become terrified of injecting insulin. I’d had bad hypos before and dealt with them but those hadn’t left me feeling as I did now.

My consultant was fantastic and reassured me that I was not the first patient he had to help with this. One very important thing he pointed out was that crushing anxiety plays games with you and tends to find then attack your vulnerabilities. For example, those odd feelings which convince you that you are about to hypo and you are not.

He set a plan up, I saw him weekly and as far as I am concerned he was my God. Indeed he still is.

He started with the practical stuff. I’d to make sure I had a back-up plan and a way to contact someone immediately if I was going hypo (I’d been widowed a few years earlier and now lived alone). That was done (an emergency and cheap alarm system connected to a neighbour) and it really did help. For a short period he also had me eating first and injecting afterwards but keeping the same dosage, not reducing it. That worked too. There were other things he suggested and I cannot think of one that didn’t lessen the stress for me. But hey, these were things that worked for me and you need to talk to the consultant who can tailor a routine especially for you.

Don’t be embarrassed about asking for help. As you can now see, others have done it before you.

So, make that appointment!

Bill