Every few years, my symptoms of low blood sugars morph a bit.
When I was first diagnosed, numb lips and quick tears were my reflex symptom. The emotional uptick would hit first, and I knew things were going south quickly once my mouth and tongue would go numb. This caused a lot of slurred speech during hypoglycemic events, an immediate tell for my parents.
A decade or so later, the numb mouth switched over to excessive sweating and very shaky hands. The tears were still a thing, though.
About twelve years ago, I lost a lot of my hypo symptoms, which left things a little ambiguous until I was already super-low, like in the 30s or 40s, at which time every possible symptom (shaking hands, sweating, crying, fumbling speech, headache) would come slamming into me. I had a lot of panic attacks at this time because my nerves were shot and fear of hypos was real.
Adding a reliable CGM to my diabetes repertoire helped mitigate that mess quite a bit. It also reinstated some confidence in being able to avoid lows, and also catch them more in the 70s and 60s range instead of free falling.
And recently – like within the last month or two – my low symptoms have shifted again. The sweating and crying seems like it’s retired for a bit and has been replaced by a feeling I can only describe as prickly, both physically and emotionally. My skin feels prickly, almost like pins and needles only not specific to a certain area. More all over my arms and shoulders and face, and with that feeling comes this wave of tension and irritability, laced with slow-moving panic that fills the space around every thought.
I felt this new range of symptoms acutely last night as I was writing. Sitting on the couch around 10 pm, I had my laptop open and I was writing when my Dexcom low alarm went off. A few Swedish fish later, I thought I had caught it in time but then the skin prickly feeling came back, along with the panic and the strange waves of discomfort. I felt almost paralyzed on the couch, but my muscles relaxed and responded to commands after minute or so, and even more so after seeing the upward arrow once the sugar did its job.
“How does a low blood sugar feel?” is a question parents of kids with diabetes ask me a lot. And every few years, my answer changes. The learning curve of diabetes is not limited to topics; it’s not like you figure out one aspect of management and then move neatly on to the next. The minutiae changes every decade or so, giving me something else to try to learn and understand and make sense of.
Keri,
I like you have lost the ability to feel lows, so I also am in low with my CGM! And like you I had the numb face, the crying, the temper tantrums as a youngster. And then it all went away. Very scary time for my family and myself. But CGMs have given all of a sense of safety now.
And it’s so weird how like you, I have started noticing some symptoms coming back. I have had a couple in the past few weeks with numb tongue and sweat, holy cow the sweat, the mental jumble of a brain starving for food, and the hopeless feeling of not being able to breathe. And while it is kinda nice to feel it happening instead of being blindsided, I really don’t like how they crash into me.
So until the next change, I will deal and work as usual to keep it above the line! Best wishes on the same.
Kerri, been doing this for 58 years, and sounded like you were talking about me. Before CGM, it was a real fear, and never had anxiety but in the last 10 years have developed it. Our minds and hearts go thru so much. Worry, Wonder, What ifs..it is real. My pediatrician told me in 1961 to not worry ‘you will live to a good 36.’ Well at 9 that sounded good to me. No knowledge of diabetes then, and was not taught a thing, but to take one shot, and eat a 1500 cal diabetic diet. Knowledge is power, and so thankful for the internet, and many helpful websites. I am wayyyyy past the 36, and still kickin’ dang diabetes in the butt when I can. I flub every now and then. I have tried to tell my doctors my skin hurts. It is sad to be aware of your skin, but recon it is a part of the disease.
(((Hugs))), wishing us all to create power with knowledge. Love Life : )
My endo(St Elizabeth’s, Brighton, Ma) for the past 3-4 years, is the best I ‘ ve had in over 39 years. After initially looking at my meter readings, and asking about my “ diabetic history”(past episodes), she labeled me as very insulin sensitive. Made adjustments to dosages based upon diet, and was emphatic that I MEASURE my carbs. She also advised that the more frequently a td1’r encounters lows, the less likely we are able to sense lows, timely.
Because of that advise, I’ve become much more aggressive at both monitoring my bs, and measuring my carbs. Probably should not admit this, but for the first~36 years I winged it. I now hit it hard during the time while I’m awake and able to timely respond, I make sure to not take risks at night these days(no day is the same, it’s uncommon, but I’ve awoken with my bs more than 100mg/dL in the morning many times more than once, not so much in the last few years).
I would advise any td1’r , new or old, to heed former Green Bay Packer football coach, Vince Lombard who said, “Perfection is not attainable, but if we choose perfection, we can catch excellence”.
I’ve been doing this for almost 50 years now. My symptoms of low blood sugar vary quite a lot. It’s as if I have a file drawer full of symptoms and I pull out different ones for different episodes. The thing that is most scary is hypoglycemia unawareness. For almost 20 years, I lost almost all of my symptoms. Sometimes I would have a few symptoms, but they didn’t appear until I was already too low to recognize them, or do anything about them. Thank goodness for my CGM. It has helped me reduce the frequency of significant lows so that I have symptoms more of the time. Not always, so I check my readings all the time. But I feel much more confident than I used to!
I could not agree more. The longer you live with and deal with diabetes the more adjustments you have to learn to make. Glad to hear as always that it is not just me who feels this way and has experienced a change or shift in how the body tells me (or doesn’t tell me) to take charge. I am very thankful for the CGM for helping me to catch the lows before they become too severe.
I’m not diabetic, you’re describing what a thermonuclear hot flash (menopause) feels like to me. Skin prickly. Feeling prickly. Easy to slide into a dark place emotionally. Want to argue.
My lows tend to change based on the cause, exercise, too much insulin, not eating, etc. And yes the symptoms change over time. However, if I ever hear a mouth harp playing that is a good sign I am in for a rough low blood sugar.