Blood Sugar Crash.. Near Panic Like Episode During Gluten Free?

[asickdaddy]

I have twice done the gluten free diet.

Both times I had a moments where I felt like my blood sugar dramatically dropped and I felt horrible.

My symptoms

I got extremely shakey

my heartrate increased

I felt like fainting

I felt weak

I felt breathless

Both times felt like panic attacks, but are different. I have had a panic attack, these felt less mental and more physical.

The one time it happened it was so severe I stopped by at my doctor. I had it hit me and I ate an apple and a candy bar and drank some juice and still felt the feeling. They checked my blood sugar and it was in normal range 86 I believe.

Each time this has happened food has helped, but its not instant. Its like once it starts it does not fully resolve until a good hour or two after I eat. It gets better with food, but still takes time for my body to settle down.

My doctor said I was healthy and that I should get better more quickly and chalked it up to stress. I do not think so anymore. Each time I go gluten free it happens and not just in early stages, but on gluten I do not have it happen.

Any thoughts?

[sreese68]

I posted to your other post. These symptoms describe my neurological reactions to gluten exactly except for the breathless part. The faintness and weakness were mild but would show up in waves. The worst shakiness came around 2 or 3 hours without eating, but it never completely went away. I always thought my slight hypoglycemia I've had for 20 years was normal for me. It went away gluten-free and came back FAR, FAR worse when eating gluten.

The physical panic part I've always interpreted as my body screaming "EAT NOW!" I would get VERY irritable and flustered and not able to think clearly until I could eat. I just learned to mask my symptoms by eating frequently throughout the day.

ETA: I just realized you said you get this when gluten-free. Maybe withdrawal? Maybe you react neurologically to a food you eat when eating gluten-free and don't eat when eating gluten?

[Leli]

I don't know how you'd check this, but I know that if you make serious changes in your diet your intestinal flora will possibly change in colony size and type. Many bacteria release toxins when they die, and if you excluded somthing from your diet and subsequently had a bacterial die-off (many at once instead of a constant but smaller number of bacteria dying), the toxins released could cause the symptoms you describe.

I have a friend who took her boys off wheat, and for the first week their behaviour was atrocious. After that they were fine - much improved compared to their wheaty behaviour.

This is a guess. Maybe a probiotic would make the picture clearer?

How long into the gluten-free diet have you gone, and had these episodes?

[GlutenFreeManna]

  On 6/15/2011 at 3:34 AM, asickdaddy said:

I had it hit me and I ate an apple and a candy bar and drank some juice and still felt the feeling. They checked my blood sugar and it was in normal range 86 I believe.

What type of candy bar did you eat? Also how long had it been since you had eaten last when you ate the apple, candy bar and juice? I get those symptoms for two possible reasons--I waited too long to eat OR I ate gluten, soy or dairy.

[ravenwoodglass]

  On 6/15/2011 at 7:07 AM, Leli said:

I have a friend who took her boys off wheat, and for the first week their behaviour was atrocious. After that they were fine - much improved compared to their wheaty behaviour.

This was most likely due to gluten withdrawl. Many of us have neuro effects and when we stop eating gluten we will go through a withdrawl period.

[kwylee]

My gluten reactions are almost all neurological, all the symptoms you cite were present for me on a regular basis, albeit, not as severe as the withdrawal phase. About a week after going totally gluten free (although I was still careless about dairy and soy at that time), I had a horrible episode in the middle of the night. I awoke to an intense feeling as if I was going to jump out of my skin. I was panicked, dizzy, nauseous, heart was pounding and I shook for about five long minutes. My husband was 30 seconds away from calling the paramedics before it began to subside. I got through that, and for the next week I was pretty dizzy and shaky, much more so than ever before removing gluten from my diet. After that though, I also removed dairy and soy. I think ingesting those the night before may have touched off the episode, unsure.

But once I got over that hump, that initial withdrawal though, things were 800% better.