Hypoglycemia For Dummies

Introduction 1 About This Book 1 Conventions Used in This Book 2 What You’re Not to Read 2 Icons Used in This Book 3 Foolish Assumptions 3 How This Book Is Organized 3 Part I: Addressing Your Ups and Downs: Could This Be Hypoglycemia? 4 Part II: Diagnosing and Treating Your Hypoglycemia 4 Part III: Emulating Lifestyles of the Well and Healthy 4 Part IV: Spinning a Network of Support for Yourself (and Others) 4 Part V: The Part of Tens 4 Where to Go from Here 5 Part I: Addressing Your Ups and Downs: Could This Be Hypoglycemia? 7 Chapter 1: Riding the Blood Sugar Roller Coaster Isn’t Any Fun 9 Defining Hypoglycemia 9 Organic 10 Relative 10 Reactive 11 Like a Greased Pig: Easy to Define, Tough to Pin Down 11 Identifying key symptoms 13 Arriving at a diagnosis 13 Knowing Who’s Prone 15 Prevailing problem: The pudge! 15 Like a couple of hooligans: Linking hypoglycemia and diabetes 16 Heading Toward Better Health 16 Chapter 2: Digesting Hypoglycemia: Your Body’s Role 19 Absorbing Some Physical Food 19 Breaking down proteins 20 Pancreas plays its part 21 Insulin gone awry 23 Tracing Cause and Effect 24 Multiple causes 24 Exhausting your adrenals 25 Ravaging your health: The couch and the potato 26 Sugar, sugar, everywhere — except where you need it 27 Addressing Addictions: The Link to Low Blood Sugar 28 Chapter 3: Symptoms without a Cause 31 Jumping on Stage: No, You’re Not Faking It 31 Eying the Physical Symptoms 32 Identifying the Emotional Symptoms 33 Unmasking Hypoglycemia’s Hidden Faces 35 Reactions to food 36 Overlapping syndromes 39 Haggling with hypothyroidism 41 Joining the hypo bandwagon: Hypoadrenalism 42 Hypoglycemia and Diabetes — Flip Sides of the Same Coin? 43 Looking at the syndrome flowchart 43 Identifying the types of diabetes 44 Nailing Down Hypoglycemia: Symptoms throughout the Ages 46 Hypoglycemia and newborns 46 Hypoglycemia and children 47 Hypoglycemia and pregnant women 47 Hypoglycemia and menopausal women 48 Hypoglycemia and older people 48 Part II: Diagnosing and Treating Your Hypoglycemia 49 Chapter 4: Matching Up with the Right Doc 51 Why Seeing a Doc on a Regular Basis Is Important 51 Paging Dr. Perfection 52 Knowing what to look for in a doc 53 Finding the right doc 54 Dealing with doubters 56 Choosing a Specialist 56 Internists and family doctors 57 Endocrinologists 57 Preparing Shows You’re Caring (About Yourself) 58 What to take to your appointment 58 Following up after the appointment 61 Putting Some Ohhhhmm into It: Alternative Medicine 62 Defining your alternatives 62 Considering your alternatives 63 Working in tandem 65 Chapter 5: Getting the Lowdown on Low Blood Sugar. 69 Poking and Prodding Yourself 69 Filling in the circles: A questionnaire 70 Eating by trial 72 Getting the 411 on Hypoglycemia Testing 73 The pros and cons of these tests 74 What to expect from the tests 75 How your doc interprets the results 78 Graphing your own results 80 Chapter 6: Gorging on Good Health 85 Of Food Pyramids and Healthy Eating 86 Re-designing the familiar pyramid 86 Building a hypoglycemic pyramid 87 Keeping your diet in balance 89 Shunning problematic foods 90 The World’s Your Oyster and Your Pear — Foods to Eat 91 Life’s a bowl of cherries: Fruits 92 Vegging out isn’t a bad thing 94 The squeaky hypoglycemic gets the grease: Fats 96 Powering up with proteins 98 Doing dairy 99 Breaking the proverbial camel’s back: Breads and grains 99 Eating the Right Way 101 Starting off on the right foot 101 Eating six meals — or more — a day 103 The most important meal 103 Sizing up your servings 104 Getting back on the wagon if you’ve fallen off 105 Adding helpful food substitutes 106 Hypoglycemia in Vegetarians: What Can You Eat? 107 Chewing on a Food Journal 108 Knowing what to record 108 A food journal isn’t just for food 109 Tracking your progress 110 Chapter 7: Hanging with Herb and His Buddies Vitamin and Supplement. 111 Getting Acquainted with Herb 111 Saying Hello to Supplements and Vitamins 112 Vitamins and minerals 112 Supplements 113 Taking the Hypoglycemia Mix 114 Matching Supplements to Ails: Which Makes You Feel Better? 119 Anxiety 120 Asthma 121 Chronic fatigue syndrome 122 Constipation 122 Depression/mood swings 123 Digestive problems 125 Fatigue and energy drain 127 Fibromyalgia 128 Headaches 128 Insomnia 129 Low sex drive 130 Memory problems/poor concentration 131 Midafternoon slump 132 Nausea 133 Poor circulation 133 Stress 134 Water retention 135 Table of Contents ix Taking a Whiff: Aromatherapy 135 Rocking Bach’s Flower Remedies 136 Part III: Emulating Lifestyles of the Well and Healthy 137 Chapter 8: Easing Symptoms and Energizing with Exercise 139 Why Exercise Is Important When Battling Hypoglycemia 139 Easing Your Way into Exercise 141 Modifying your behavior 141 Finding the time to exercise 142 Timing Your Carbs 142 Improving Insulin and Feeling the Burn: Aerobics 143 Strut your stuff and work that walk 144 What’s the difference, you ask? Running and jogging 146 Shaking your groove thang: Dancing 147 Regulating Blood Sugar with Yoga and T’ai Chi 148 Going yoga 148 Taking T’ai Chi 149 Kicking Weakness with Weights 150 Building endurance with bodyweight workouts 150 Easing into free weights with body weights 152 Incorporating free weights into your exercise regimen 152 Clearing Brain Fog with Qigong 153 Chapter 9: All Stressed Out and Nowhere to Go. 155 How Stress Impacts Your Hypoglycemia 155 Determining Your Stress Level 156 Knotting Off: Relaxing Your Tight Muscles 157 Taking a Deep Breath to Relax 159 Breathing helps regulate your blood sugar 159 Trying some deep-breathing exercises to relax 160 Surfing the Alpha Wave with Meditation 161 Balancing your blood and body 162 Energizing with EFT 164 Kicking food cravings in the gut 168 Making the Ultimate Smoothie: Hypno-Soothing 171 Chapter 10: Defanging the Depression Demons 173 Revealing Another Epidemic 174 Knowing What (Gray) Matters 175 Getting Comfy on the Couch 176 Mastering new thinking skills 177 Thinking healthy 178 Easing through the transition 179 Beating the Low Blood Sugar Blues 180 Stop being so SAD 180 Taking a swing at your mood 181 Discussing dietary plans 182 Feeling Out Antidepressants 184 Identifying the different drugs 184 Considering antidepressants? Know both sides of the story 186 Working with a psychiatrist 187 Chapter 11: Making It through Your Day at Work 189 No Rings around Either: Blue and White Collar Workers 190 Hard hat area 191 Tie required 191 Addressing Your Boss and Co-Workers 192 Knowing when (and how) to tell your boss and co-workers 192 Knowing when not to tell 193 Flying with the legal eagles 194 Finding practical solutions 195 Framing your condition positively 196 Putting Up a Cot in the Cubicle? Managing Long Work Hours 197 Gettin’ in the groove with work 197 Breaking up your work day 198 Preparing for those long hours when you’re away from the office 199 Diffusing Work-Related Stress 200 Evaluating your life: Does this job impede your health? 201 Passing up the caffeine 202 Creating a cozy cubicle 203 Part IV: Spinning a Network of Support for Yourself (and Others) 205 Chapter 12: Jockeying for Support 207 Grasping the Link between Support and Hypoglycemia 207 Getting Yourself Out There 208 Getting to Know Me 209 Joining the In-Crowd 212 Netting some help 213 Doing the 12-step 215 Buddying Up 218 Matching up with a buddy 218 Starting off on the right foot with your buddy 219 Chapter 13: Dealing with Friends and Family: Eat and Let Eat. 221 How Hypoglycemia Can Affect Your Relationships 221 Explaining to Your Significant Other 222 Starting with open dialog 222 Helping your significant other cope 223 Talking to Your Children about Hypoglycemia 224 Keep it simple 224 Be prepared for questions 225 Reiterate that they didn’t make you sick 225 Involving the Whole Family 226 Can we talk? 226 Helping your loved ones help you 227 When can we eat? 228 Dealing with the Doubting Thomases 230 Staying clear of negativity 230 Avoiding conflict 231 Maintaining your boundaries 232 Sabotaging the saboteurs 233 Chapter 14: Suffering Along with Your Sweetie? 235 Introducing Mr. (or Ms.) Hyde 236 Understanding Hyde’s condition 236 Identifying Hyde’s symptoms 237 Talking It Over 237 Starting with the four Rs 238 Giving these words the green light 239 Stopping negative talk 240 Offering Your Offspring Support 241 Jumping In with Both Feet (and 2.5 Kids, a Dog, and a Cat) 242 You Be Betty Crocker and I’ll Be Julia Child 243 Part V: The Part of Tens 245 Chapter 15: Ten Myths about Hypoglycemia 247 Hypoglycemia Doesn’t Exist 247 Hypoglycemics Lack Willpower 248 Eating Sugar Is a Quick Fix 248 One Diet Fits All 249 Eliminating the “Bad” Foods Is All You Have to Do 249 You Can’t Be a Vegetarian if You’re Hypoglycemic 250 Having a “Cheat Day” Is Okay 250 Sugar Can Be Part of a Healthful Diet 251 Hypoglycemics Should Eat Low-Fat Diets 251 Blood Glucose Levels Remain the Same throughout the Day 252 Chapter 16: Ten Hints for Helping Hypoglycemics 253 Acting Practically at Home 253 Testing for Sugar 254 Controlling Blood Sugar 254 Dining Out: The Do’s and Don’ts 255 Food Facts for Tasty Health 257 Noshing on Nourishment 258 Eating Brainy Foods 259 Banishing Brain Fog 259 Remembering How to Deal with Short-Term Memory Loss 261 Changing Successfully 262 Index 263