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Sudden hypo seizure

E

Emila

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17
My 21 yr old son had a sudden seizure in the middle of Sainsbury's today. It was all a bit scary. He usually has good hypo awareness and did realise he needed to have a sugary drink but didn't think it was urgent. We were at the checkout and paid for the sandwich and drink and he was just opening the bottle of Apple juice when he suddenly went rigid and had a seizure that lasted about a minute. Luckily my husband was just behind him and caught him before he fell to the floor. It was all very scary, he wasn't able to eat or drink anything and he blacked out . Eventually after 6 or 7 minutes he came round and was able to drink some Apple juice and eventually eat a sandwich. An ambulance had been called but as he had recovered it wasn't needed by the time it arrived. We took him outside for a sit down and he was complaining of muscle aches, he thought he had a pulled muscle in his thigh. Six hours later his muscles in his legs and thighs and in his groin are all aching. Does anyone know of this is normal and will he feel better after a good night's rest?
 

I wouldn't say 'normal' but please take a look at these pages.

https://www.brainandlife.org/articl... in blood sugar,seizures to occur more easily.

https://medlineplus.gov/ency/article/000386.htm
 
Thanks urbanRacer I'll have a look at those. I'm hoping it was a 'one off' occurrence as I can't pin point any particular reason for the suddenness of what happened. The spasms were quite violent to begin with and his muscles did look like they went quite rigid. I just have to hope that he will learn to go with his feelings/instincts and treat even the slightest feeling of a hypo immediately. Maybe the horrible feeling of these muscle aches will encourage him to act straight away in the future.
 
I've had one in a similar situation to your son. I misjudged my carbs, had a glucose tablet which wasn't enough and keeled over in the car park (I was out with a group of friends). The hospital said I had had a hypo induced seizure and banned me from driving while they thought about it. In the end my endocrinologist told me to keep my levels between 6 and 12 for a while so as to improve my hypo awareness and let me drive, on the grounds that I did still have awareness and the fit was caused by a hypo.

I now self fund a dexcom so that I have an alarm that warns me whenever I go to 4.4 (you can set the level for other amounts). I believe the libre 2 also has alarms now and they are having a free trial at the moment? So is the dexcom? The libre 2 is cheaper and has the advantage that he might be able to persuade the NHS to pay for it. Worth a thought.

Good luck to your son. As far as I am concerned, hypos are the bane of a T1's life.
 
Thanks hopeful34 and elliem for your replies. He is presently using a libre sensor but we will now try to ask his clinic consultant to upgrade him to the libre2 or maybe try and get him a cgm with a new pump. He's a third year medical student so it would be a good long term investment for the NHS .
 
Hi @Emila ,

If it's any consolation to your son.
I got full hypo awairness even after nearly 45 years of insulin dependancy.
I nearly got caught out as a 10 year old cycling up the road from home with no hypo fix legs spasoming just managed to do a "ministry of silly walks" leaning on & eventually dumping my bike in the road to get up the path....
It was hard work controlling my legs. I felt like a puppet?

Sainsbury's, I do that shop with my wife. & oddly if I go low, the place can be a bit of a sensory "overload" on the cognitive..
Maybe it because I'm surrounded by food? Could be the lighting.. Early hypo sign for me is flickering lights or shimmering lower field of vision.
One Christmas my wife found me staring at a Storm trooper figurine on a shelf at the end of a Star Wars merch rack.

"Do you want Santa to bring you one?" asked my wife.
Nah, I was just trying to work out the carb content of his head.. Then it triggered. I felt low.

I always carry stuff on my person too? Especially after the incident on the bike.

Best wishes to you & your son.
 

Hi Emila, does your son manage his diabetes well enough usually?, we can ALL get caught out with a bad hypo no matter how hard we try. Sometimes if we are busy doing something (shopping, working or talking to someone) we might miss an early sign of a hypo, sometimes they can come on so fast that again by the time we are treating them it's a bit too late. I know you are not blaming your son but if someone said to me 'Act straight away in the future or this is what you get', I wouldn't be happy (unless I was a serial hypo ignorer). Also, hypo symptoms can be different (my Mum used to have loads and she never went rigid or had a seizure), so I wonder whether it's a good idea to get him checked out at the Drs?, it's easy to put these things down to diabetes (and it probably IS in this case) but I would always get rigidness & a seizure double checked. Did anyone manage to take a glucose reading at the time? Hope he feels ok. x
 
Thanks @Jaylee
I suppose it's bound to happen sometime, the one time you forget to take sugar with you. It was just frightening for me and I keep thinking I should have taken more notice and done something but try telling a 21year old what to do especially opening a drink before paying for it . I haven't spoken to him yet this morning so I don't know if his muscles are any better.
 

I feel if he was opening the packaging & trying to treat himself.? He still had the instinct to treat. "Auto pilot."
He wasn't in denial, which can make it difficult for those around him to deal with. Sounds positive to me in all of this..
He may have just pushed the envelope a little further than he could tolerate.

I remember being 21. We feel pretty "indestructible."
 
Hi @KK123 Yes he's always had good hypo awareness, I think it just came on so fast, he had managed to get a gulp of his drink but then he just started to spasm. I keep thinking what could have happened toake it drop so fast. His BS had been running high for about 3 weeks at university and he was finding it difficult to get them down. He ended up swinging low high low high for a while. He's been home for 2 weeks over Easter and we managed to get them levelled out by increasing his basal rate following a call to his clinic. He had changed back to a lower basal whilst we were travelling back to uni. Maybe it's just a mixture of things but mainly not acting fast enough when he felt that he was going low. He has a libre sensor with an app on his phone but (in my opinion ) should scan a lot more. He does rely on his feelings and does know when he's high it low. He has admitted not having any sugar on him and I'm hoping he will remember to check before going out in future. Easier said than done, I know. He's apprehensive about speaking to clinic about it as he thinks having this on his record will affect his driving licence the next time it's due for renewal. He doesn't have a car at uni yet. Does anyone know??
 
Sorry to hear about this. You have to declare if you've had a hypo requiring assistance when you get the renewal forms (I get mine every 3 years). I don't think a one off will affect it, but haven't any experience.

I always have glucose tablets in a pocket/bag as they're such a small packet and don't get affected by temp it is easy to have them as back up.

His GP should be able to update his prescription to Libre 2, they cost the NHS the same as Libre 1 but have alarms you can set to go off at a level of your choosing. Eg if I'm exercising then I'll set the 'low' alarm to go off at a higher level than usual. It shouldn't have to go through his clinic, I just rang my GP and they switched it for me. If his blood has been yo-yoing a bit recently then his hypo symptoms might not come on like they were before. I find my symptoms appear when I'm at a different level to normal. So if I've been running high for a few days then I'll get hypo symptoms when I'm back in normal range, and if I've been yo-yoing then I lose symptoms of high/low at the levels I've been yo-yoing to after a few days (eg if I've been going from 3.5-10, I wouldn't get symptoms til under 3.5 or over 10 typically). Hopefully his muscles aren't too painful today?
 
Thank you. It's very difficult isn't it. I have spoken to him again today. His muscles are still the same but probably just a result of the spasms. He is adamant he knows what he is doing and just didn't treat himself quickly enough. I've made sure he has now filled up his coat pockets and rucksack with glucose tablets and hopefully after this episode he will act instantly in the future. I am just the "nagging mother" who is now getting on his nerves so I think I need to back off a bit. I can log into his libre account so I can still help him with his blood sugars if they go awry again. We will deal with the driving licence when it comes up for renewal.
Thanks for everyone's help and suggestions xx
 
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