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Hello All,

This is a bit long, but the possibility of confusion between the
symptoms of CD and hypoglycaemia rang bells with a lot of
people. There's also confusion about hypoglycaemia itself, so
perhaps this will help - very simply, if you are hypoglycaemic, there
is a tendency for your blood sugar to drop below an optimum level,
causing certain - often highly unpleasant - physical and mental
symptoms, e.g. an sort of 'emptiness' in the stomach unlike true
hunger but giving the sufferer nevertheless a feeling of an urgent
need to eat, a sense of inner unstable-ness and trembling,
sweating, faintness, brain-fog, sudden debilitating loss of energy,
impairment of vision, palpitations, etc. Some or all of these
symptoms may be present, plus others depending in the individual.

At the same time, there is often an instinctive urge to grab
something sweet to eat. Which is perverse in a way, because
anything with sugar in it ultimately has the opposite effect, and
beware - many doctors are not aware of this! The trouble is that
although the ingestion of sugar gives a sudden, much-needed
boost to the system, the hypoglycaemic's sugar-regulating
mechanism is out of kelter, and its reaction is to over-produce
insulin in order to counteract the sudden surge of sugar. Which in
turn then produces another low, so making matters worse in the
long run, not better. The best thing when you sense at attack - or
'crash' as it's commonly known - coming on is some sort of protein
like nuts, sunflower seeds, hard cheese, raw vegetable etc., which
I'd advise any hypoglycaemic to carry with him\her wherever  - just
in case.

The real no-no's for the hypoglycaemic are sugar - regarded as a
virtual poison by the serious hypo community - alcohol (sorry!),
caffeine, and starches. (All or some of which - apart from sugar
which should be permanently outlawed - can be re-introduced once
you've stabilized).

Most of those who replied, and who suffered from those symptoms
felt there could well be something in the hypoglycaemia theory;
some thought it more likely to be dairy products; one felt that
perhaps those people were not managing to eliminate all gluten
from their diets. But 90% of those who replied agreed there was
'something else', but what it was nobody *knew*.

One asked, 'How would you find out if it's hypoglycaemia?' It's a
good question because the medical profession has hardly covered
itself with glory on this one either. 'Do you have to keep checking
your blood-sugar levels?' My own answer is that if you cut out all
the things which are likely to exacerbate hypo, and the symptoms
disappear, then you can be fairly certain that that's what you had! I
think your best guide is yourself. And if your symptoms disappear
when you change your diet, does it matter what name you give to
the condition you've just got rid of?? I'd urge anybody whose
symptoms persist for what seems an  unreasonable period after
going GF to go on a hypoglycaemia diet. Even if there's no
improvement, you will at least have eliminated that avenue. (One
respondent made a plea for the use of digestive enzymes in the
treatment of hypoglycaemia).

This is a selection from the replies -

1. You hit the nail right on the head. I am on GF diet four years.
When I started, the symptoms not disappearing quickly as I hoped.
Than I learned about Candida Albicans and stop consuming any
sugar. I went through the hell, but after 5 weeks I experienced
"candida die off" Since that the symptoms slowly, but steady
disappeared. I don't consume any more processed sugar and in my
age 67, I feel as good as I could.

2. I always suspected that refined sugars might make symoptoms
worse, though I thought it may be because they were feeding
harmful flora of bacteria or candida.

3. I have both Hypoglycemia and Celiac. I had cut out all the
sugars and gluten and still had fuzzy days. Then someone told me
that coffein creates a similar reaction as sugar - the insulin output
seems to go up as well as the adrenaline output with coffin.  I
stopped coffein and I am doing better now.

4. I have been gluten free for exactly one year and my symptoms
are still there. I still battle fatigue, weakness and exhaustion

5. .....the excess sugar can aggravate the imbalance of intestinal
flora as well as the hypoglycemia. I'm sure your observation will
prove useful to many.

6. I.....will start on cutting down on sugar.  I am sure it would
make me feel better.

7. You may be on the right track to explore other reasons why
some people don't get well for a long time.  I can't help but wonder,
though, if they are getting gluten regularly in some insidious way
such as medicines or vitamins or ?.

8. I've been feeling extremely tired for a long time although there's
no obvious reason for this: I stick to my diet, eat healthy, get
enough exercise, am generally a happy person. It's just that I'm
often so exhausted it makes me wander if I'll ever feel dynamic
again.

9. I actually have eliminated most processed sugars without
complete success, but that doesn't mean your suggestion won't
work for many.

10. I too have recovered quite well since being on a gluten free diet,
but do feel tired, listless, etc, etc from time to time. of course this
could be due to any number of things, but i would like to investigate
the hypoglycaemia theory

11. I really think you may be very right.i have had blood work done
and all was well including diabetes.  i do feel very tired in the day,

12. The majority of my specifically GI symptoms went away after a
month or so on the diet, but the other problems, fatigue, brain fog,
and nausea continued.  I went back to the GI who did a blood test
and (for other reasons) did a second biopsy, and both showed no
signs of gluten.

13. I have the very same symptoms you speak of.  I have been
caught many times while out of the house without any food.  I shall
not do this anymore.

14. Hypoglycemia as been with me since l983. (This person then
goes on to talk about depression, severe in this case, associated
with hypo - another symptom that seems common to both
conditions).

15. There is a stage of Type 2 diabetes that involves hypoglycemia.
There is also a separate condition of permanent, recurring
hypoglycemia that is solved by diet.

16. I suffer from it myself sometimes as well as my 13 year old.
She is on a GF diet also but always seems to be so hungry -


It's pretty clear that the symptoms which may be hypoglycaemia
are experienced by a lot of GF people. Sugar is a pretty constant
factor, and it's unquestionable that in Western society - the US in
particular - there is an unhealthy consumption of sugar, most of it
processed so that any goodness in it has been removed. My own
view, for what it's worth, is that as sugar in any form as an item in
itself is quite unnecessary - the body extracting all the sugar it
needs from a diet of fresh, natural food - it's best avoided,
particularly by people such as ourselves whose digestive systems
are already weakened by CD.

Finally, for anybody's who's seriously interested in this, I suggest
they go to this excellent Dutch site -

http://lightning.prohosting.com/~hypoglyc/

- it has links to many  other hypoglycaemia sites, the best of
which, I believe, is the HAI  - Hypoglycemia Association Inc. - site
in the US -

http://www.fred.net/slowup/hai.html

On both of these sites there's vast amount of info, diets, etc. Both
are non-commercial, and maintained by people who either suffer
from hypoglycamia or who have done so in the past. Treat with
caution sites funded by drug companies, or their philanthropic-
sounding spin-offs - with the best will in the world, there has to be a
second agenda.

I hope this has all been of some use.


Jeff in London, UK