What can I do to feel better?
Is there a cure for hypoglycemia?
If you have alimentary hypoglycemia, caused by stomach surgery, there would be no cure unless the surgery was reversible. If you have had stomach surgery in which the size of your stomach has been reduced, your diet has already changed drastically, and it will be very important to make sure that the small amounts of food you are able to consume are as nutritious as possible. In this case, supplementing with Glucomannan may help normalize your blood sugar, but more study is required. [All about vitamins, minerals and herbal supplements in the next article.]
In most cases, the cause of the hypoglycemia is never found. For those unexplained cases, some doctors believe that there is no cure and that the best you can hope for is to reduce your symptoms. Other doctors, often those who have made a study of hypoglycemia, believe that the proper diet, used consistently, can actually improve your metabolism and "cure" your hypoglycemia. It might be argued that you are not cured if you must continue the treatment for the rest of your life, but consider this: would you say your Ferrari was a lemon just because it only runs properly on the best possible fuel?
What can I do to feel better?
The most important change to your lifestyle will be your diet. Since hypoglycemia is an indication that your body doesn’t deal well with sugar, the first thing to do is eliminate sugar from your diet. Sounds strange, doesn’t it? If I have low blood sugar, shouldn’t I eat more sugar to feel better?
The body runs on sugars, and it gets them by breaking down all of the carbohydrates you eat. When you eat simple carbohydrates, (sugar, white breads, fruit juice), your body has to do very little to gain access to the sugar, and you will have a sudden "sugar boost". In hypoglycemia, your body has a tough time keeping the blood sugar level stable, so when the sugar is "used up", there is nothing left and you may experience a sugar crash and many of the symptoms we talked about in Chapter 2.
By choosing to eat complex carbohydrates instead (whole grains and protein, for example), you will find that your body breaks down the food much more slowly, and the sugars are released into your blood stream more slowly, too. This will help you to keep your blood sugar stable for longer periods, reducing, or even eliminating your symptoms.