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Diagnosed with Hypoglycemia after bypass surgery: What helps?

Posted by happyheidi63 @happyheidi63, Oct 22, 2023

I had Roux en Y bypass surgery March of 2021. I went from 265 down to 160 (with in 6 months). Over the past year I have been putting weight back on and now I am at 205. I have been diagnosed with Hypoglycemic and my problem is I do not know I am low until I hit 40 or below and this has ending me up in the ER. So when I start to feel sweaty, shaky, dizzy I test my sugar and if it is in the 50's I grab something "sweet" but if in my 40's or below I take a couple of my glucose tablets and prayer it come up. I have never had diabetes and to this day do not. I see Endo. and Gastro. and General Surg. and they don't understand why I have lows. Insurance will not allow me to have a CGM as I am not a diabetic. I do take Acarbose Tablets 25 mg which has helped some. I do not drink, smoke or do drugs. The weight gain is crazy. My new thing is after eating I get very hot and break out in a sweat. Anyone else have these issues?

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rileylori74 | @rileylori74 | Sep 13 9:16am
In reply to @happyheidi63 "Hi everyone, sorry I have not updated everyone. Here is a recap and update and hopefully..." + (show)
@happyheidi63

Hi everyone, sorry I have not updated everyone. Here is a recap and update and hopefully I can answer everyone.
I have my CGM (insurance finally covered) I do see my general surg. team that did my surg. and I see endo. and a dietician and my PCP. I have increased my protein (Pure protein bars are great).
If I do anything "extra" out of my normal routine I get lows, then I have to eat to get my numbers up so I then lose any calories I burned off. I take Acarbose if I know I am going to eat a "bad" food to help off set it (like if I am out to eat or at a function.
I was told by my endo. provider that if it c that they would need to reverse the surg. which I really do not want to do only because of problems and scar tissue build up.
So I continue to watch what I eat and wear my CGM and carry protein bars, glucose shot (the 2 oz bottle you can get at pharmacies) and snacks with me and try keep my protein level up.
Hopefully I answered everyone and thanks for the ideas and tips and hope things work out for everyone. If I missed something please let me know and I will try to stay on top of this.
Have a great weekend

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Hi. My Endo from Mayo told me that yes they can reverse the surgery, but the hypoglycemia and problems eventually come back. He said that there really isn't a "surgical" fix that is not temporary, so I would definitely not get the surgery reversed. Good Luck to you.

REPLY
projfan | @projfan | 6 days ago

I've had post-bariatric hypoglycemia since my surgery about a decade ago -- at that time, there was a lot of disbelief that it was real.

I apologize if someone offered this and I missed it, but...OTC CGM technology is unreliable for hypoglycemia (the money is in hyperglycemia), so if you really want to track what's going on for a month or two (I suspect it's triggering overnight migraines, but I won't know that without digging in to the fine-grained pattern that a glucose test won't tell me) in detail, you need a prescription product. You can use Freestyle Libre with only the sensors and a phone app, which keeps the cost as low as it's going to get.

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