Hi again all 😉

Officially given up the diet as far as calorie counting goes but we are still watching the carbs and fat etc, cooking as per the book and therefore eating the same stuff. I made the mistake earlier of having too many carbs too quickly for lunch and my mmol/l shot up 2 hours after a meal to 12.9. That was about 1PM. About 30 minutes ago (so 4 hours later) I started to feel hot,faint and have the shakes. I tested again and my mmol/l had dropped to 5.1!. I AM on my metformin also – is this going to be potentially dangerous for me?

Dr says take metformin with this diet,(although didn’t mention the low calorie intake) leaflet says no if 1000 or under. When I was told I was diabetic I have photo’d my levels being at 17.4 so I have come a long way since then , but I have never seen them at 5.1 when you consider my fasting (so from 7pm-8am) level is never more than 7!

My training has always taught me that 3.9 and under was Hypoglycemia – but could this have been possible? I will keep checking and I am about to eat the simple shephards pie for tea, But I wanted to see if anyone else with T2D knew what the hell was going on with me?

Thanks!

Pete

HI Pete
Try checking out Bill1954’s thread from last year – think it’s called this has to work for me. Might be helpful as he lost loads on this with type 2 diabetes and several diabetes related conditions.
Julia

5.1 definitely seems too high to be getting hypoglycaemia symptoms from it, Metformin isn’t supposed to be dangerous on the diet I don’t think, the one people are advised to cut down is Gliclazide (I think). Hopefully someone who knows more about it can help you.

Thanks for the replies. I feel better now after the simple shepards pie and a drink

Julia, I read the whole thing, took me most of yesterday but it was very good to read.

mixnmatch I can only assume I had a crash. I’ve never seen my levels so low. I am going to check my 2 hour levels again at 9:15 and see what they are. I was amazind i’ve never seen 5.1 in my life. My wife is not diabetic and her 2 hour later blood is 4.8!

Hi Pete, I started with readings of 190 (10.5) and after about 5 days on the diet it dropped to 7.5, I started to reduce my insulin from 38 units to 36, then 34 and so on. Within 2 weeks I was down to 6.1 and I was getting shaky in the afternoons but instead of doing what I had before, eating something high carb or super sweet, I followed the advice of someone on here and ate 2 prunes and 2 tablespoons of Greek yoghurt and the shakes stopped. After 6 weeks on the diet I was due a HbA1c and found it was down from 8.2 to 6.7.

The diet continued and my morning BG was around 5.5 but in the afternoon it could drop as low as 3.5. I countered this with the prune and yoghurt but was still reducing my insulin by 2 units every 10 or so days. Then I read that glicazides could cause serious lows so I cut one out (I was on 3 in the morning). Since then I don’t seem to get the shakes etc even though my BG can go as low as 4.0 and I don’t even feel afternoon hunger – however, in Summer I exercise strenuously in the afternoon (swimming) in Winter I do my exercise in the morning about 1 hr after breakfast. I am still on 2 glicazide but my insulin is now down to 22 units. I showed my doctor my daily log and asked him ‘considering I often go low in the afternoon which should I reduce, the glicazides or the insulin’. He told me to try to get off the insulin first but if I continue to have lows below 3.8 to cut one of the tablets in half so I am on one and a half.

I know my meds are different and maybe my circumstances but I see you have had a conversation with your doctor and have not had a satisfactory answer. I don’t think your BG is too low at 5.1 (your wife’s don’t compare as she is not diabetic) but I do think they are low for what you are used to and it is scaring you. I too was frightened but I have got used to it and am now very disappointed if I go over 5.0 in the morning and 4.5 in the afternoon. When you start getting lows too often, and I mean under that 3.9 mark, maybe you should at least reduce the Metformin but I am not your doctor and, like him, I am going to err on the side of caution and not tell you what to do. Most people on this diet have stopped taking Metformin once their levels are down. You can always go back if BG rises again.

Oh and you might want to have a small snack just before bed, just a glass of milk or piece of cold meat or cheese, just to ward off the dawn effect which can send your BG high in the morning. By the way my last HbA1c was down to 5.9.

Pete I think it’s called reactive hypoglycaemia, I’ve had that reaction too. It’s like a roller coaster, because you went so high, dropping down to normal was such a big change your body reacted as if it went below normal. It was the difference in levels rather than the final number that made you shaky etc. Imagine being in a lift and dropping suddenly from the twelfth floor to the fifth floor – your heart would be in your throat even though you hadn’t actually gone “low”. At least that is how I understand it. But I don’t actually know if it is dangerous like a true low blood sugar event.

Sunshine-girl, Natalie

Thank you both very much for your replies. I am going to have a small amount of cheese and some milk now before bed and see what my levels are like in the morning.

I am not really on the diet anymore, I am still cooking and eating from the book and keeping an eye on the carbs but I am not counting or anything. I am sort of in a routine now of 2 -3 eggs in the morning. Snack and then a meal all before 7PM and then tonight I’ll try the snack

My last blood result was 8.0 2 hours after eating some chicken, quinoa and cauliflower/brocoli – most of which I understand is okay as it grows above ground. So I have no idea what I am doing wrong. On the plus side, the weight is still coming off me