It was a strange day at work. I overslept a little this morning and was within a few minutes of being late to work. I felt a little “off” but that is nothing unusual. I was hungry by lunch time, so I went to the cafeteria and bought “real” food. Like chicken and rice, carrots, spinach. I ate maybe 1/3 of it, but it was still a lot. In the afternoon I started getting dizzy when I would get up too fast… also not unusual for me. But it didn’t go away. Eventually, I was dizzy just sitting in a chair at the nurse’s station. I got anxious and sweaty, and coworkers started asking if I was okay. My favorite coworker was there today. She took one look at me and said “your blood sugar is low.” And held out the container of grapes that she was snacking on. I thought for a second, and realized she was exactly right. Struggling with an eating disorder, I know that feeling well. It didn’t even click, though, since I had just had a good lunch a few hours before. It made no sense for me to be hypoglycemic. I reluctantly nibbled some of her grapes.
I love that feeling. It is awful, and not pleasant at all. You get dizzy and shaky, your head pounds and heart pounds, you breathe faster, your brain goes into panic mode and you start sweating. Eventually getting tingly and numb and crying from the anxiety. It is awful, but for whatever reason, I enjoy it.
My friend gave me the rest of her grapes and kept checking up on me the rest of the evening. I had gotten pretty bad before I got some sugar in me, so, pretty much all the other nurses knew I was not feeling right.
I have thought about hypoglycemia before, like in a suicidal sense. Not all that recently, but I definitely realized one day how easy it would be to go that way. Draw up some insulin from the med room and inject it into myself. A little shaky and sweaty and anxious, then, lights out. It’s awful, I know. I feel awkward even admitting that it has crossed my mind. Thankfully, ever since my daughter has been alive, I have never thought about suicide like that, because no matter what happens, I’m not leaving her. If anything ever happened to her, though… I don’t think I’d recover. But I’m not going to think about that!
I have been doing well with eating lately. But after that crash today, it makes me want to crash again. It is strange, too…. I have tried to research it a little bit: why did I get hypoglycemic when I had just eaten? That has definitely never happened to me before. I wonder if the back and forth eating patterns I have are damaging my pancreas or something. Meh.
Anyways. Just felt the need to write about my day. Strangely, I’m still dizzy, even though I just had dinner 10 minutes ago. Maybe something else is going on. I guess we’ll see.
Oh life.
thedepressednurse 