24 hours after passing out?

Status
Not open for further replies.
randomange

randomange

Well-Known Member
Relationship to Diabetes
Type 1
Hi everyone

I've had a bit of an eventful evening. I took a really bad hypo in Sainsbury's, which resulted in me passing out and having a seizure and then spending the rest of the evening in A & E. :( Not really sure what happened, I felt fine, then realised I was low. Tested my blood sugar and got a reading of 2.9, so I popped a few glucose tablets and waited for them to kick in. I realised very quickly that things were getting worse instead of improving, so I had some more glucose tablets (by this point I'd had 12 in total!), and then realised that my vision was really starting to go and I should get help, and the next thing I know I'm waking up to a paramedic treating me. I don't know if it was a combination of the heat, a bit of exercise, and an earlier correction I had given to bring down a high, because I was 11 an hour before, but in 22 years of being diabetic this is only the second time I've passed out, and the first time I've had a seizure.

So my question (finally 😛). I've never had to really deal with the consequences of a hypo this bad before. I know the paramedics didn't give me glucagon, because by the time they got there and tested me my blood glucose was 5.6. I'm also not convinced that I had a liver dump, because the highest my blood glucose went all night was 9.1. However, I know you have to be careful after something like this because the chance of another hypo is greater, so I've been aiming to keep my blood glucose a bit on the high side for the next 24 hours, and I'm not correcting anything under ten. I've had a couple of snacks with no insulin, and I underbolused for lunch, which so far seems to be working ok. Is there anything else anyone would advise I do/keep an eye on? 🙂
 
Sounds pretty bad. Can't advise I'm afraid, but I hope you feel better. It is abit cooler today, so hopefully that will help.
 
Sorry to hear this Ange :( I've had a couple of hypos in the past couple of years where I found it almost impossible to keep my levels up and I could feel that I was really losing control. It was very scary, but thankfully I didn't go through what you have just suffered. In my case, I was just sat watching telly, so there were no extra demands like being out in hot weather, so that might be what helped me and made things worse for you.

As I have little experience of the situation I can't think of anything you have missed, so I hope that you are feeling much better soon and that it doesn't happen again. Take care.
 
Very quick response, but I would always follow up glucose tablets / sweets / sugary drink etc with some starchy food - I find muesli bars are the easiest things to carry, as they're wrapped, have long use by dates (but have eaten them over 1 yr past with no ill effects) and resilient to heat & squashing. Did A&E give you any food?
 
Sorry to hear you had such an ordeal hun x I cant advise im sorry but im sure people will give you tonnes of good advice


take care.
 
Poor you. Sounds horrid. Hope you are feeling better.

Just thinking about a trip to the supermarket is enough to make me go hypo... It became a bit of a family joke when the kids were younger.

I'd be very wary of correcting while the weather stays warm (if it seems to be driving your bgs down). I had bgs of 10.x recently, walked to Asda (approx 8 minutes) bought 4 pints of milk, walked back. Tested again: 4.2!

Don't know if you are the same, but pretty much any activity when my levels are half decent needs a tiny amount of carb to prevent a dip.
 
Last edited:
Oh no! Hope you're feeling better now.🙂
 
Really feel for you that sounds like one hell of a scarey experience - hope you are feeling better now. Never passed out before and have only come very close once. X
 
Poor you Ange- I hope you are feeling better.

Sounds like you are doing the most sensible thing, thank god you had that amount of dextrose on you and ate it otherwise it sounds as if that event could have been much worse.

Im sorry that had to happen to you, keep you spirits up. Lots of love xx
 
Blimey Ange!! Poor you! Glad youre ok now.

Seems like this heat is really playing havoc with the big D! I was at the Goodwood festival with work today, walking around in the blazing sun, and barely got above 5 all day and had 2 hypos, although nothing like yours!

Lots of TLC I think for you over the next few days xx
 
everydayupsanddowns said:
Just thinking about a trip to the supermarket is enough to make me go hypo... It became a bit of a family joke when the kids were younger.

I'd be very wary of correcting while the weather stays warm (if it seems to be driving your bgs down). I had bgs of 10.x recently, walked to Asda (approx 8 minutes) bought 4 pints of milk, walked back. Tested again: 4.2!
Click to expand...

Sorry to go off thread a bit but why does this happen? I think there was a thread about this a while ago or at least got onto this topic somewhere. Its really odd as i too go well low when in a Supermarket. Its really fascinating to be honest and one of lifes little mysteries it appears.
Its getting to be a joke in our household too....

Bernie xx
 
getcarter76 said:
Sorry to go off thread a bit but why does this happen? I think there was a thread about this a while ago or at least got onto this topic somewhere. Its really odd as i too go well low when in a Supermarket. Its really fascinating to be honest and one of lifes little mysteries it appears.
Its getting to be a joke in our household too....

Bernie xx
Click to expand...

Thinking back, I had my first bad hypo in a supermarket, and on a hot day too! Although it's not far from my home I quickly realised that I needed to stop and get my dextrose tablets out (hadn't realised at that time that jelly babies were just as good!), rather than wait till I got home.

Hmm...might be a poem in this! 🙂
 
well i have keeled over twice in a supermarket and had to be picked up and sat on a chair so ill add my bit in as well :D
 
I have alot of hypos at work at the moment. Good job I work in a hospital and only a stone's throw from the diabetes centre. I'm just trying to sort out my basal needs at the moment. The damn heat is killing me. It never gets below 25 in my lab. Spent an hour hypo this morning, I tell you that was interesting. Four hypos today. Two at work, one on the way home and one a few minutes ago.

Tom
 
Thanks for the replies everyone 🙂 Shopping is clearly hazardous to our health! 😛

Feeling a bit more like myself today, although my muscles are still protesting! I'm still not 100% sure what caused it, but I think it might have been a combination of heat, exercise, and maybe some weird stuff going on with insulin absorption. While I've had a couple of mild hypos due to the heat, it's always been something I can easily treat, and I've never had problems correcting when it's hot. The weird thing is that I'd been running on the high side all day (I'd hit 15 after lunch), and I'd been cautiously correcting down all day, before I plummeted. I work in a very well air conditioned building, so I'm wondering if maybe the insulin was pooling somewhere and the heat etc made a whole bunch of it kick in at once?

I think it's a case of chalking it up to experience, doing what I can to make sure it doesn't happen again, and moving on. 🙂

Copepod - I don't usually follow up fast acting glucose with anything else, mainly because I tend to find that sends my BG way up. However, any time I have used something slow acting to follow up, I need to get my BG up *first*, or else I find that if I need more fast acting, the cereal bar will slow down the absorption of the glucose. In this case, I just couldn't get my BG to that point. Definitely worth keeping in mind though. 🙂
 
I was wondering if it might be an absorbtion problem Ange - maybe you got a bit of an insulin 'rush' which is why it proved so hard to treat, and why you had been high earlier.

Glad to hear you are feeling a little better today 🙂
 
You poor things, it must the the time of year for this as i passed out in work two weeks ago. Having really low blood today, it think its the heat. I have only had a fit twice in 25 years of diabetes and my muscles ached for days. I think you are doing the right thing by letting your blood run higher for the next few days. Hope you feel better soon. x
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top