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Confused

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Victoria Arthurson

New Member
Hello,

I have just joined the forum and have not yet been diagnosed, but am likely to be on Friday by my GP. If I may bore you with a brief history I was investigated for hypoglycemia but my levels were not seem to be low enough and so was referred to a nutrionist. She set me up with a blood glucose monitor thing and said she my diet was good however after four weeks of testing it appeared that my level was all over the place from 4.2 to 14.3 and at least once over the parameters she set most days, though on a few they were all normal. As I kept a food diary there were no correlations to eating found. At 4.2 I was weak, dizzy, unco-ordinated and had trouble thinking straight and starving. My endocrinologist thinks it could be steroid induced diabetes and asked my GP to do a blood test hence the visit on Friday for results.

Does anyone have any advice on how I can help myself? The diet things I have looked at all seem to tell me to change to a healthy diet which I am already on but not much information on things I should perhaps avoid. I am overweight, but, that is partly due to the steroids I have to take. Is steroid induced diabetes different in some way? From what I have read at my age and length of time I have been on steroids it would be unlikely enough to go away.

I am sorry this seems to have turned into an epic, but I am floundering here.
 
Victoria Arthurson said:
Hello,

I have just joined the forum and have not yet been diagnosed, but am likely to be on Friday by my GP. If I may bore you with a brief history I was investigated for hypoglycemia but my levels were not seem to be low enough and so was referred to a nutrionist. She set me up with a blood glucose monitor thing and said she my diet was good however after four weeks of testing it appeared that my level was all over the place from 4.2 to 14.3 and at least once over the parameters she set most days, though on a few they were all normal. As I kept a food diary there were no correlations to eating found. At 4.2 I was weak, dizzy, unco-ordinated and had trouble thinking straight and starving. My endocrinologist thinks it could be steroid induced diabetes and asked my GP to do a blood test hence the visit on Friday for results.

Does anyone have any advice on how I can help myself? The diet things I have looked at all seem to tell me to change to a healthy diet which I am already on but not much information on things I should perhaps avoid. I am overweight, but, that is partly due to the steroids I have to take. Is steroid induced diabetes different in some way? From what I have read at my age and length of time I have been on steroids it would be unlikely enough to go away.

I am sorry this seems to have turned into an epic, but I am floundering here.
Click to expand...
Hi Victoria, welcome to the forum 🙂 Sorry to hear about the difficulties you have been experiencing, but it's good that you have been given the tools to monitor things, even if it is proving confusing currently!

I don't know a great deal about steroid-induced diabetes, but am aware that steroids can make blood sugar control more difficult. Hopefully, some of our other members can give you more informaion on this. Regarding diet, this always causes confusion! It's most unhelpful to be told to eat a 'healthy' diet, because many of the things considered 'healthy' may not be in practice for many people. As an example, fruit juice is considered healthy, but it contains a lot of sugar and will therefore raise blood sugar levels quickly and by a large amount. The chief thing you need to be concerned about is carbohydrates of all types -bread, potatoes, pasta, rice, bread and of course sugary products. These need to be eaten in accordance with your own particular tolerances. You can use your food diary and monitor to help you with this 🙂 Record the amount of carbohydrates in everything you eat and drink (in grams - weigh foods if necessary). This will give you a good indication of your normal carb intake and give you an opportunity to see where you might reduce or replace things. Use you monitor in conjunction with your meals, following a programme of testing as described in Test,Review, Adjust by Alan S. I'd also recommend reading Maggie Davey's letter, as this is very helpful in describing good food choices and a good general approach to achieving and maintaining good blood sugar control 🙂
 
I'm afraid I don't know anything about steroid induced diabetes, so have no experience of that.

For times where you feel weak/dizzy as a result of low blood glucose the advice is to eat 15g of rapid acting carbohydrate/glucose and wait for 15 minutes, then repeat if still feeling wobbly. The extreme hunger you feel is part of your body's warning system so it is difficult not to overdo the eating, but 15/15 rule should help restore your levels without causing a significant bounce into high blood glucose. 15g of carbs is not much, a few glucose tablets or 3 jelly babies would be plenty.
 
One other thing I wondered about was the possibility of 'reactive hypoglycaemia' where the body is late to respond to rising blood glucose, but then overreacts to the high BG with too much insulin that subsequently drops you towards low blood glucose.

It might be worth asking your Dr whether that might be affecting you.

There is some information here in case you recognise anything: http://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-...rt-answers/reactive-hypoglycemia/faq-20057778
 
I have no knowledge of type 1 or steroids except the fact I have been taking them for almost 40 years for Asthma, & now I have type 2 & certainly not overweight. I have gone many years on & off, in the past not taking the steroid, just using the reliever when required, but the last few years I have used the steroid more or less every day.
I might just have to contact the doctor to find out if the steroid inhaler has brought on my diabetes.
Hopefully you adjusting the time before meals will help you.
 
Hello to Victoria.
 
Derek Stubbs said:
I have no knowledge of type 1 or steroids except the fact I have been taking them for almost 40 years for Asthma, & now I have type 2 & certainly not overweight. I have gone many years on & off, in the past not taking the steroid, just using the reliever when required, but the last few years I have used the steroid more or less every day.
I might just have to contact the doctor to find out if the steroid inhaler has brought on my diabetes.
Hopefully you adjusting the time before meals will help you.
Click to expand...
You've just made an interesting point @Derek Stubbs. When my breathing became very difficult I was frequently prescribed a course of Pred.steroid tabs as well as my inhaler for my asthma for a number of years prior to being dx. But then I stopped using them because my breathing became even worse. Amazingly my breathing is fine now without the aid of steroid inhalers and at my last asthmatic review my Copd reading was 98%. (And at my post-op my C/° reading was 100%) I did gain weight when on steroid meds even tho my GP said I wouldn't!
I hasten to add that if any members are thinking of stopping the use of their inhalers, then I would suggest you speak with your GP first....
.... oh and Hi Victoria and a warm welcome to our friendly & supportive forum. x
WL
 
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