heliotrope42

The exact same thing happened to me. My celiac disease was activated in 2002, after a stressful event. After 6 months or so (before I had figured out that I had celiac disease) I started to get symptoms of hypoglycemia. I blamed it on my body not being able to properly absorb nutrients.

After I figured out that I was a celiac and went on a gluten-free diet my abdominal symptoms disappeared but the reactive hypoglycemia continued. I'm no expert, but I tend to agree with the person here who thinks you still may have reactive hypoglycemia.

My condition is pretty severe...I wake up at about 5 in the morning hot and sweaty with kind of a panicky, suffocating feeling. I keep an apple by my bed, and take a few bites which allows me to sleep for another hour.

I've found that it is necessary to be fairly strict in avoiding sugar and starchy foods. I eat very little, if any fruit. Definitely no orange juice, for instance. The bedstand apples are the exception, but I've found that if I eat half an apple in the middle of the day it throws me off.

No potatos, definitely no bananas, no beets. Be careful, even, with carrots...they are very sweet. Basically nothing sweet or starchy. Beans are acceptable in moderation. Brown rice and blue corn chips for some reason seem to be OK for me as a source of carbs.

I made some mistakes in trying to cope with the condition. First I tried drinking unsweetened soy milk as a go-to food for when my blood sugar got low. I also tried regular milk. What I've found is that soy milk and cow milk are actually very sugary foods that made my condition worse. I ended up drinking way too much and gaining a lot of weight in my midsection.

Intuitively, I would recommend experiment with cutting out dairy altogether. I love cheese, but it's energy doesn't seem to last for me and I wonder if I'd be better off without it.

It's also very important, I think, to eliminate caffeine.

So that leaves meat, not-sweet veggies like broccoli and kale, and moderate amounts of brown rice as my perfect food combination.

It is important to note that this diet takes some time to help. In the info I read it mentioned six months, but I noticed improvement after one or two months.

Wow, I'm so glad I came to this forum! I hope someone can be helped by my experience.

I've never heard of a cigar that does have gluten.

richard

Actually, all or most cigars DO contain gluten! I was just coming here to make a post about it to warn people. I think I will start a new topic for that post...I will give more details there.