What Caused Your RH?

Starke said:

I would love to hear what you think caused your reactive hypoglycemia... (for those who don’t have the obvious clinically recognized causes of gastric bypass or pregnancy induced RH).


Both my husband I have have suffered from it for various years now: him from 2011 and I since about 2014. Neither of us have had stomach or intestinal surgery or pregnancy.


We both had to take many courses of antibiotics, both were vegetarian or vegan for many years, both had high levels of emotional stress or shock and both have extreme cases of RH: we can’t tolerate any veggies, any fruits, any simple carbs. I had cysts on my ovaries but had them and an ovary removed which theoretically should have rectified the metabolic rollercoaster. Neither one of us suffers from diabetes nor is overweight. Both have been to various endocrinologists and many doctors.


Maybe hearing how many of us all on the forum got to where we are, we can find the road to curing it rather than just controlling it.


I know I feel I live in a nutritional desert, where nutritive food is all around me, but my body can’t accept any of it. I live off of eggs, cheese, chicken, pork, whole thick cut raw oats (in small quantities), and a few nuts. He is the same but cannot tolerate eggs or cheese as well as I do.


We have both tried just about every alternative or wholistic remedy we can think of. Have taken chromium picolonate, ozone therapy for years, acupuncture, glutathione, sea water, supplements, colon hydrotherapy, vibrational remedies, medical biomagnetism etc.


Thank you in advance for sharing your stories. Wishing you all perfect health.

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Hi,
I believe that my RH was caused by a bacterial infection in the gut called heliocobacter pylori. Or it could have been the antibiotics which were used to treat it.
My endocrinologist suggested at first that I developed RH naturally, but after a lot of research, and I mean a lot and looking at many papers on RH, I had the conversation with my specialist, and he said that it could have been, but there was no way of knowing.
I am in ketosis, and I have a lactose intolerance, I can't eat cooked greens, or similar, for example, I like carrots and spinach raw, but can't eat cooked spinach or carrots.
I love salad and I get my protein from meat, and sometimes I just have a portion of say chicken.
I used intermittent fasting, and only eat in the late afternoon and finish at 7pm so I know that I'm not going to bed with a hypo.
What are your Hba1c and your fasting levels?

Potatoes are the worst and highest spike.
Porridge is really bad for me and I have a grain and wheat intolerance.

Keep safe.

Mine started in childhood. Definitely not related to antibiotic use, and years before puberty.
However, mine seems to be heavily connected to my endocrine system, with PCOS and a prolactinoma affecting hormones all over the place. And I recently learned that I have at least one adrenal tumour too (benign) but they have never considered that to be a problem, so no treatment for that.
Food intolerances, particularly gluten play a large part too.

I suspect that you will find every RHer will have a different scenario that affects their body's handling of glucose.

I have had it since my early teens, but it was not until my T2D diagnosis in my 40s and closely monitoring blood glucose, that the dots connected. A couple of hours after a heavy breakfast or strong oolong tea, I will be all jittery and breaks into a cold sweat.

This would be a typical scenario... a sharp 10 mmol spike and crash...


So the regular sharp glucose spike and overcompensation of insulin to drive down the glucose when repeated enough... leads to all kinds of chronic health issues...

The solution worth considering... a diet that maintains stable glucose/insulin levels.

kokhongw said:

I have had it since my early teens, but it was not until my T2D diagnosis in my 40s and closely monitoring blood glucose, that the dots connected. A couple of hours after a heavy breakfast or strong oolong tea, I will be all jittery and breaks into a cold sweat.

This would be a typical scenario... a sharp 10 mmol spike and crash...
View attachment 47182

So the regular sharp glucose spike and overcompensation of insulin to drive down the glucose when repeated enough... leads to all kinds of chronic health issues...

The solution worth considering... a diet that maintains stable glucose/insulin levels.
View attachment 47183

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Hi! I was reading this thread and saw your comment. What kindof chronic issues can spikes and drops cause?

Hi @Kpop7,
I will let @kokhongw explain, cos he has given links to support low carb and stability of blood sugar levels.
My experience which I have told many times, is over ten years of decreasing health problems and weight gain, my blood panel results were all over the place and because of hyperinsulinaemia and elevated blood sugar levels, this lead to the all day hyper/hypo scenario. I was ill because of the excess insulin and if I hadn't been diagnosed, my endocrinologist said I would have almost certainly died, if not extremely ill. Stable blood levels and a very low carb diet, has improved my health so much.
With RH, to not go hyper/hypo is so different from not having control.
Getting told at my age, that I'm in perfect health and all my scans were clear is testament to my diet and not having hypos and carbs.

Keep safe

Starke said:

Dear Lamont,
Your posts and replies are informative, light-shedding and very much appreciated. Thank you.

I am curious how/why you can eat raw carrots and spinach but not cooked?

Is it that cooked has too much sugar for you?

I love that you can eat salad! How do you manage it? I heard lettuce can trigger hypoglycemia.

I can’t do carrots spinach greens or salad raw or cooked. Nor can I do just a portion of protein without the fat, it seems. Merely a chicken breast will usually drop me.

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Even as a child, food was not to be wasted. And putting cooked vegetables in my mouth was totally abhorrent, it was horrible, taste was like rotting vegetables. But salad was always fresh and tasty. I do have other foods that I just can't eat, such as chilli and spicy dishes. So it's not the sugar.
I have never heard that about lettuce, it has never done that to me. Nor had anyone else who has been soon the forum.

I do hope, you will get to the bottom of your food problems, and find a way to get through it all.

Best wishes.

Hi @Starke,

I am privileged to talk to someone who has gone through what you are experiencing.
We use the term 'Reactive' because myself and @Brunneria at the behest of the hierarchy of this wonderful site, to have a sub forum for Hypoglycaemia. Something that I couldn't find in the majority of medical websites. And the advice given, was the same that I was given back at the turn of the century. And that was high carbs and low fat. What is called in the U.K., ' the eat well plate', but for myself, that advice was making me ill.
We needed a platform for advice that actually stopped the hypos, rather than eat every three hours. I found by experience and experimenting that any carbs above around 5-10%, depending on how much protein and full fats was with it.

Since diagnosis about 8 years ago, and a fasting test, my health improved dramatically, weight loss, and my blood panel tests improved. The changes in dietary intake made me healthier. And other than a couple of times when I was getting hypos, my health has improved a lot, so much that a recent stay in hospital, (for something else) I had scans, which the specialist declared that at my age, I was as healthy as I could be, my blood panel results were all within normal levels range.
My fasting bloods and Hba1c levels are always normal.

That is why food is important, but having looked at how the response of the amount of hormones that is present even before eating. What I discovered myself, was my initial insulin response was weak, and this lead to high glucose levels, other hormones acted to adjust this imbalance. The gut brain trigger (I have read this many times in papers) and because I have quickly become hyperglycaemic, a secondary insulin 'overshoot' is produced. This swamps the glucose and drives blood levels down into hypoglycaemia. I have taken the drug Sitagliptin, since 2015, it helps with initial insulin response. I took part in a trial for a medical treatment for this drug for RH.
I will speculate, that other hormones, do contribute to symptoms and the effects of the hyper/hypo rollercoaster ride that happened to me every day.
I have also looked at how the bacterial make up of the gut, it does make a huge difference in your health, and getting a healthy balance, is just as important, how your gut bacteria helps with the digestion process.
I believe environment has a bearing on how the condition evolves, also, the reason I eat fresh food is because I found that manufactured foods contain even in small amounts, contains added bad fats and sugars.
I have also discovered that there are many individual differences of how hypoglycaemia can be caused and symptoms are completely different for every one.
As is the severity of hypos.
Those who have experienced hypoglycaemia, know that prevention is so much better than just going through the motions of eating complex carbs, there is a fundamental opinion in medicine, we require carbs for good brain function, then why is it the exact opposite applies to me?

I am a layman in medical knowledge, but I know my body and I am fortunate enough to have a specialist endocrinologist that recognised my symptoms.

I do hope you find, the exact cause of your problem.

Keep safe