I started IF on December 23 2019 and “dirty” keto two weeks later. My doctor told me either drop 60 pounds or end up on meds for high cholesterol which I’d like to avoid. I have metabolic syndrome and am borderline T2 diabetic but my sugars run low not high. I have lost 13 pounds in 5 weeks which is great but I don’t feel better. A few days ago I started experiencing blood sugar levels in the 80s and even 70s toward the end of my fasting periods. And my symptoms of hypoglycemia have worsened - urinating at least twice a night, tingling hands, feet, lips, and cheeks, mild vision impairment, and some lightheadedness. Breaking my fast only alleviates the symptoms somewhat but not completely. I can’t go back to my doctor for another blood test right now because my lousy insurance only allows blood work once every 3 months and I just had it a month ago. I find it strange that I was fine on this WOE for 4 weeks and am suddenly having issues. I’m doing mostly 2 meal a day 18:6 IF and mostly eating red meat, chicken, eggs, hard dairy, nuts, and leafy greens, with a square of 93% dark chocolate just before my fasting window starts. I drink a 24 ounce bottle of electrolyte added water every day. I take magnesium supplements because I have magnesium absorption issues and I also take an ace inhibitor and a beta blocker for poorly controlled high blood pressure. Any ideas what could be causing these issues? Too low carb? Electrolyte imbalance? Is this IF with keto simply not a good idea for someone with metabolic syndrome and hypoglycemia?
5 Weeks in with IF and Dirty Keto, Hypoglycemia Issues
What do your sugars run at normally? How often do you test?
Hmm…do you know what your blood pressure is now? Blood pressure can change quite rapidly on a low carb diet.
70s and 80s isn’t bad…unless you’re experiencing issues. (I’ve hit low 60s – on an official blood draw – and felt fine. Others go even lower and feel fine.)
I’d look at your blood pressure and medication first and consider halving or cutting back on medication. Then, salt or other electrolytes. (After 6 years low carb, I rarely take magnesium, and even when I get cramps, it’s unclear to me whether Mg helps, though I will take it then.) Then, if necessary, 3 meals a day.
These may actually be symptoms of low sodium. Try increasing your salt intake and see if that helps. You might wait to start fasting until you are fat-adapted and you find yourself skipping meals without thinking about it.
Your blood pressure medication could also be a problem here. Your doctor needs to be cutting your dose as your insulin level drops and stops interfering with the nitric oxide that regulates your blood pressure. The symptoms of metabolic disorder can, many of them, resolve themselves quite quickly, once our sugar and carbohydrate consumption drops, so you need to be working with your physician as you embark on this way of eating.
I usually run anywhere from 60s when I’m fasting to 80s when I’m not fasting. A couple of times I’ve been in the 40s! It takes a very high carb load to get me up to 100. I normally only test when I feel symptoms which until recently hasn’t been very often. I can pass a 3 hour glucose test with flying colors.
Unfortunately due to a recent divorce after years as a stay at home mom, I have no job, no income, and no insurance. So I can’t afford a doctor right at the moment nor will my old doctors even see me anymore since I can’t pay up front. I’m in the process of trying to get on disability because I am losing my vision (non diabetic hereditary macular degeneration) but until that goes through I can’t get on Medicaid. But because I can’t drive with poor vision, I can’t work, I live way out in the middle of nowhere and the only jobs here are for dairy farm workers. But my last blood work, about a month before my insurance expired, my sugar was 80 but my LDL and triglycerides were really high.
My blood pressure is usually in the 140s over 90s and my heart rate is almost always over 100 even at rest (I have mild dilated cardiomyopathy and tachycardia). I’m on the lowest possible daily dose of Altace and Coreg.
The test was with insulin? Or only glucose?
140/90 is a bit high. Have you experienced any decrease since starting low carb?
What happens if you eat a higher protein meal? Does your blood sugar go down?
What about a high fat meal, with relatively little protein?
My last test was fasting but it was just a metabolic panel it wasn’t the glucose tolerance test. I haven’t had one of them in a while now and now I can’t because I have no insurance. My blood pressure is not dropping, it’s been high for years now (ever since I had pre-eclampsia with my last pregnancy). I’ve only been having issues for the past few days so I really haven’t had time to play with my meals. But I’ve been doing 2 meals a day, with my first usually being sausage and eggs or grilled chicken and a salad, and my second being red meat and green veggies. I snack on cheese, nuts, olives, and I drink a glass of unsweetened almond milk every day. So I am getting a lot of protein. When I eat high fat I tend to get severe diarrhea so I don’t do it very often.
I was thinking more along the lines of higher protein could cause lower blood sugar. If you have a glucagon problem, that is. Glucagon is basically the “mirror image” to insulin, and it’s what should cause your blood sugar to go up and not drop too low. But if there’s something broken there, protein, which causes an insulin response, might cause low blood sugar. As blood sugar comes down due to the rise in insulin, glucagon should counteract that. But yours might not be doing that.
So, to help with low blood sugar, you could up the fat content. Could you add butter, ghee, etc.? Think about what fat causes you issues and see if there’s any fat that doesn’t, and test a day or two with higher fat, if you can.
If your blood pressure hasn’t changed, then maybe Paul is correct and it might be a salt issue.
Would salted sunflower seeds be a good way to raise sodium levels? We don’t use table salt in our house at all as my whole family on both sides has hereditary hypertension and has for at least the last 3 generations.
If you haven’t been supplementing salt or adding salt to your food after losing a gallon of water weight over the last few weeks, your electrolytes are probably pretty far out of balance.
I’m still getting used to the idea that salt is OK. What with my poorly controlled high blood pressure I’ve always been told to stay away from salt. I do eat a lot of dill pickles though.
Do you have a blood pressure monitor at home? It’d be useful to track it every day so you know what to do with your BP meds.
It would help you to see how your BP reactes to the salt as well. My blood pressure was not good before keto, but when I had it tested a few weeks ago, it was right smack in the middle of the healthy range. Ironically I probably doubled if not tripled my salt untake over that time. Losing weight helped I’m sure.