Hypoglycemia

[Oatsandbeans]

After the holidays I have gotten very strict with my diet again. Potatoes, rice, corn,and pasta with some leafy green vegetables and fruit. This week I cut out all nuts and fats. For the last two mornings I have woken up with severe low blood sugar symptoms. It has taken me the better part each day to feel normal again. What is going on? Do I need to add in more protein or fat? I absolutely hate feeling this way. But want to be healthy and lose a few pounds. I have not had any refined sugar, caffeine, or alcohol. Just starches with vegetable. Sometimes I can get the symptoms if I fast or do not eat enough food in the day. But I feel like in the last few days I have worked hard to eat enough to ward off any symptoms, I certainly ate as much as I could hold.

[colonyofcells]

I am only guessing but maybe try cutting out the fruits and replace with more unrefined starch. For potato, I always eat the skin. For corn, I avoid sweet corn and prefer corn tortilla in soups. For rice, can maybe try other types like red rice, black rice, wild rice.

[Oatsandbeans]

I have always had this problem but it has gotten worse with full compliance. I thought when I cut out all the fat I would feel better not worse.

[colonyofcells]

Dr mcdougall diet does allow 1 cup cooked beans, peas and lentils per day. Beans, peas and lentils tend to help slow down digestion.

[Oatsandbeans]

I do eat beans, but not every day. I can try to add them in on a regular basis. I have always been told that I should never eat a carb alone and to always make sure that they were accompanied by a fat or protein. I can give that a try.

Colonyofcells have you had any hypoglycemia symtoms?

Thanks

[Spiral]

After the holidays I have gotten very strict with my diet again. Potatoes, rice, corn,and pasta with some leafy green vegetables and fruit. This week I cut out all nuts and fats. For the last two mornings I have woken up with severe low blood sugar symptoms. It has taken me the better part each day to feel normal again. What is going on? Do I need to add in more protein or fat? I absolutely hate feeling this way. But want to be healthy and lose a few pounds. I have not had any refined sugar, caffeine, or alcohol. Just starches with vegetable. Sometimes I can get the symptoms if I fast or do not eat enough food in the day. But I feel like in the last few days I have worked hard to eat enough to ward off any symptoms, I certainly ate as much as I could hold.

Are you a type 2 diabetic? If so, do you take any medication for your type 2 diabetes? The hypoglycemia might be a signal that the diet is working to make your insulin work more effectively and that you need to cut back a bit on your medication. But seems like you need to talk to your doctor or email Dr. McDougall to be certain.

[colonyofcells]

I do not have hypoglycemia. I have heard stories of people with hypoglycemia getting better on the dr mcdougall diet on one of the weekly youtube webinars. I would guess that eating unrefined starches will help. Instead of pasta, can try farro wheat which is like brown rice but more chewy. I usually soak my farro wheat overnight to make them cook faster in the morning.

[Oatsandbeans]

No, I am not on any medications and I am not a diabetic.

Thanks, I really appreciate the feedback.

[colonyofcells]

Instead of sweet corn, can try white hominy corn. Hominy corn is nixtamalized corn.

[Oatsandbeans]

So basically do the MWL version and add beans?

[katgirl55]

I started an Engine 2 7-day Challenge last week and I was suffering for a few days with hypoglycemia symptoms. It eventually went away though. But, I have to eat every 2-3 hours to make sure I do not go low again. Sometimes I only have an apple for an afternoon snack, and by the time I drive in traffic and get home I'm getting cranky and feeling sick. Once I eat I'm fine again.

So, I suggest eating every 2-3 hours to regulate blood sugars. Trial and error on what will work during those smaller meal times.

[roundcoconut]

I wonder, though, if you can ever develop the ability to USE stored body fat (as a healthy human is generally able to do) if you keep your body in a constant mode of digestion.

You couldn't pay me any amount of money to keep my body in a constant mode of digestion -- it seems like your body is always working, whether it's pushing food through the stomach, or breaking it down further in the small or large intestines -- and how can you ever have a moment of relaxation in your entire life if you are always making your body work so hard???

In addition to having a body working away in a constant state of digestion, there is the additional matter of how hard the cardiovascular system has to work if the body is carrying around stores of excess body fat. So, it just seems like life becomes harder than it has to be, if we overburden the organs of digestion as well as the organs of circulation.

When I, in my own life, experience feelings where my last meal is almost fully digested, and it will be time for a meal soon -- I remain pretty happy and functional. I don't find that I have to run to the nearest bowl of lentils or hunt down a pear really fast. It just feels natural.

So when people are experiencing something very, very different from that, I wonder whether it's more like a physical and/or emotional withdrawal process (like when a smoker cuts back on his cigarettes) that's rearing its head. It strikes me that a person who is eating healthier or eating less, sometimes feels such a level of distress to have their familiar patterns and their comfortable coping mechanisms not readily at hand, that a certain amount of stress hormones enter the system, and disrupt their feelngs of well-being.

Well, that is just an idea. If you don't like it, then you may of course feel free to disregard that! But that is how I see things.

[katgirl55]

It is definitely a physiological issue and not a mental one for me. I would be mentally okay with an empty growling stomach and waiting several hours between meals if my body cooperated. In fact I would prefer this because digestion can make you feel sluggish. The feeling one gets when sugar drops is extremely uncomfortable and causes mental fog/irritability. Not having my drug of choice (junk food) makes me cranky and depressed sometimes, but that's a gradual onset, comes and goes independent of meals, etc.

I have PCOS, which causes hyperinsulinemia. The endocrine system works so that when one hormone is imbalanced it can affect the others. Imbalance of estrogen also affects insulin, testosterone, etc. I developed symptoms in my late 20s, and the blood sugar problem developed in my early 30s. In my 20s I could skip meals and be fine. Immediately changing my diet last week caused a revolt, but now my body is adjusting to it. More time and weight loss will result in more improvements.

[Dougalling]

Hi

Would regular exercise help?

I was not able to donate blood last year because my blood pressure would drop too low. It was almost too low to be allowed to donate at all.

I know I am not eating enough. Will totally work on that this year.

[Helpinghands]

Those who have posted on this thread with hypoglycemia how low does your blood sugar do before you start seeing physical and emotional symptoms? Have any of you measured that level with a meter?