Health Anxiety

[Jodi_S]

I am brand new to the community and have been suffering health anxiety for the past couple of months. I was diagnosed prediabetic in June and went on a complete lifestyle change to reverse it. I cut out sugar and simple carbs to help lose weight. I lost too much weight too fast and bottomed out my potassium which put me in the hospital. They took me off the diuretic I was on because that attributed to the potassium loss. Potassium has been great but I do still fear it bottoming out. My blood pressure has been steady for the most part and I would like to avoid meds with lifestyle change. My doc thinks I can do it but it spikes on me when I have anxiety. Anxiety has been AWFUL because of all my overthinking and worryingly by about my potassium, bp, and blood sugar levels. My sugars have been great until yesterday when I went for blood work and it came back a little high. I have read that anxiety can make that worse too. So, I am my own worst enemy right now because my anxiety is so bad and it’s making everything I’m worried about worse.

[Lauxa]

I’m so sorry about the potassium I had another friend that had that problem with weight loss and it was unexpected and scary.

[Jeff1943]

You are right, Jodi_5, anxiety can indeed put up your blood sugar reading, it is something not taken into account by most doctors. I worked this out for myself, if you're anxious your body goes into fight or flight mode and because your body thinks you need extra energy to fight the dinosaurs it pumps out extra glucose. I was actually diagnosed with diabetes because I went for a blood sugar test whilst very anxious (a leak in the bathroom and even the plumber didn't know where it was coming from!) however more important than a one-off blood test is the hba1c blood test which gives an average reading for the past 2 months. On that I am still in the prediabetes zone not the diabetes zone.

With respect I think you have over reacted to the news of being in the prediabetes zone. Reducing carbs and sugar is helpful but not cutting it out completely. Losing weight is also helpful if one has over indulged in the past.

To get an accurate blood pressure reading get a reliable bp monitor like an Omron, sit down for 5 minutes, not after eating and don't talk whilst you take your bp 3 times at 2 minute intervals. Add up the 3 results and divide by 3, that's your accurate bp and probably a lot lower than the rushed way it's done at your doctor's surgery. In the U.K. anything under 140/90 is considered O.K. whilst in the U.S. high bp starts at 120/70 which is the result of pharmaceutical companies successfully lobbying the American Medical Association to boost their profits.

I think you are worrying far too much as a result of the prediabetes thing. Only 1 in 4 of people with prediabetes progress to diabetes which can be controlled by diet or later on tablets or much, much later on insulin. But reducing weight if necessary and cutting down on carbs and sugar should ensure you don't cross into the diabetes zone.

So I think you should relax about the diabetes thing, make the necessary life style changes to avoid progression to diabetes (but not to excess where you end up in hospital) and replace worry with a little bit of caution.