MS & hypoglycemia?

[gomer]

I had a few falls, late Feb-early Mar. I started getting hypoglycemia, not related to my insulin injections. Everything went wacky. Any other diabetics, (or non-Ds) here experience this?

I have to take insulin to keep the BG & spikes down plus feed hypos! A wild ride & more.

[msgijo]

Hi Gomer.

I am a MSer with type 2 diabetics (pills only). My husband is an insulin dependant diabetic with neuro problems due to brain hemorrhage (anyserisms and an AVM). So I will attempt to give you what we have seen/experienced between the two of us.

I was on a medicine (Glimepiride) that was the closest thing possible to pill form insulin (I know that there is no such thing). It kept my A1C down for several years with no side effects so was great .
Then I started having lows. A few extreme lows. There were no changes going on at this time. My doctor had me stop taking that one med and things went back to normal for about a year. When my A1C started creeping up he placed me on Januvia and now things are all back to normal.
I still don't have any idea why that med started causing such problems, just that I am glad that we discovered that was what was happening.

My Husband has had problems with his BG since I first met him (13 years ago). Of course he eats nothing good for him and gorges on high carb snacks. His endo placed him on several different types of insulin, and has finally settled him on one type he takes during the day (after meals and if his BG is high) and another one he takes at night (a long acting one that is supposed to last for 24 hours). His BG still spikes up to like 400 - 600 and then drops down to 20 - 30. I believe that a big part of his problem is his diet, and another part of the problem is that he can't keep track of the correct amount of insulin to take or when to take it.

BUT beyond these 'easy fixes' I do see that his BG does what it wants to do - for no apparent reason. I have wondered if he is not a true "Type 1" diabetic (he was dx'ed around age 30) and went straight to insulin. In other words I wonder if he still secrets SOME amount of insulin, enough to throw off his best guess of how much insulin to take. These are JUST MY IDEAS. But it would help explain why the same foods and same amount of insulin never has the same results.

According to medical research many factors affect BG - food (of course) and physical activity, as well as stress. Personally I see that the weather can affect my BG also - I blame the MS for that one.
Diabetes is at least as tricky to manage as MS, and having to deal with both of them is darn near impossible.
Looking at ALL possible triggers (for both MS and BG) may be the only way to figure this out.

About all that I can really offer is these few nuggets I have seen/experienced and the knowledge that you are not alone in this.

Hope you get to the bottom of this soon .

[gomer]

Hi Msgijo........(from arealgijoE [male])

My D got so bad, I was called a "brittle diabetic", fighting both highs & lows. My insulin doses dropped in 1/2, making it harder to dose.

I think I figured it out, as primary adrenal insufficiency??

Not Dx yet. will see an endo later this month. He was against Addison's testing, so is my PCP. Eventually I will get PROPER testing.

[msgijo]

arealgijoE - Thank you for your service!

I have not heard the term "brittle diabetic" but it sure does sound like my husband. I will venture into this with his doctor.

He has not had hospital visits for this - he has fought it so long that we normally just take care of it (sugar followed by 'real food' when too low and insulin when too high). There was a period when the EMTs would recognize him on the street from the frequent visits they made to our home when I couldn't bring his sugar up.
He has used the pump and it seemed to work better than anything but his endro refuses to treat people using the insulin pump. I have not been able to check how much the endo receives from pharmacy companies, but he certainly seems to push high priced meds an awful lot.

I hope that you do not have adrenal insufficiency - it sounds terrible . It appears to be even worse than diabetes.

Please keep us informed on what is going on with your path to dx and treatments offered. Hope that better days are ahead of you .