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Permalink Reply by Pavlos on January 20, 2010 at 6:13pm

My strangest vision symptom is what I call "Animation Vision." When I dip below 60 the world begins to look like it's a cartoon drawn over reality. Sort of like those commercials by . . . I want to say it was an insurance company or maybe an investment company where they took the actual actors and applied a layer of animation over them. It's very bizarre.
I don't usually get such spasms, but I have had some instances of low where twitching was involved. It mainly happened on one of my eyelids and went away a few minutes after my meter showed I'd climbed back up.

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Permalink Reply by Michael Gonzales on January 20, 2010 at 6:42pm

Dave,

I to have had these exact same symtoms when it comes to my vision....especially in the morning times. At first it really worried me, and I kept it to myself (not wanting to worry family), but I did speak with my Endo and she was just telling me that keeping my BG target was very important (not too low or too high).

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Permalink Reply by Michael Gonzales on January 20, 2010 at 6:58pm

Dave,

My initial low symtoms were the same as yours...but the most recent symtom of low bg is the blind spotness. Usually happens in the morning while brushing my teeth in the morning.

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Permalink Reply by John Manning on January 20, 2010 at 8:02pm

Thanks for the info all of you. That's exactly what it was like, try to stop my leg and arm would flail. Then stop my arm and my back or leg would jerk. Good to know. Symptoms seem to change with the age.

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Permalink Reply by Theodore Quick on January 20, 2010 at 8:36pm

Yes, I've had a fairly large variety of symptoms during my 53 years as a Type 1. For a fair number of years I seemed to get a different thing affected about every 6 months. Involuntary muscle movements make as much sens as anything else mentioned, since a shortage of glucose leaves undernourished nerve cells. This usually affects the brain or vision first, but not absolutely.
Try this symptoms of a hypo. In 1986 I found that my eyes would cross when I got low enough, making me an instant cross-eyed guy. Got real interesting 1 time when I was driving my wife and son around town, got the eyes crossed and didn't have a place to pull off the road OR anything to eat to bring me back up, so I kept driving toward a convenience store. That was the first place to get something to eat. At least that was my thinking at the time..... Had to drive around a swerve in the road where they had twisted it to the side to fit under a highway bridge, which my eyes crossed.

At least I figured out to close 1 eye and drive using the other one, so I got there OK. I don't have them much anymore, what with my insulin pump and all the testing I do.

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Permalink Reply by Christian on January 20, 2010 at 11:17pm

Yes, sometimes when my blood sugar is going low I can get involuntary muscle spasms. Mine are fairly mild though, its as if I'm flexing my muscle, then relaxing, then flexing...

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Permalink Reply by Brian (bsc) on January 21, 2010 at 5:54am

I suppose everyone is different, but you should actually look on this little quirk of yours as a really good thing. Many diabetics become hypo unaware and this is obviously of great concern. It has been discovered that in many cases, people become hypo unaware as their typical "stress" like responses no longer are activated, but not surprisingly people still have a broad range of other responses to low blood sugars. A technique developed at UVA looked at using these other indicators as a way of restoring hypo awareness with marked success. You can read about it here http://care.diabetesjournals.org/content/24/4/637.full. You can actually get training on the technique called Blood Glucose Awareness Training (BGAT). And the good news, those funky spasms in your legs and arms may well be your ongoing your ticket to hypo awareness.

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Permalink Reply by Senna arshad on January 21, 2010 at 6:36am

hey i have this symptom often when my BS are low. Usually on my legs and fingers, they just kind of jerk and almost vibrate when my blood sugar is low. My BS drops very quickly and comes back up quickly aswell and this symptom has only recently started happening. I have had type 1 diabetes for five years now.
§ennä

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Permalink Reply by Xanthasun on January 21, 2010 at 6:44am

It's not an age thing.. had spasms before and more so when I was in high school. I remember trying to butter toast one time and being unable to do it cause my hand kept jerking out of control. Once I corrected the low, the spasms stopped. I haven't had that happen for awhile though...I haven been pretty hypo unaware for awhile though...even when I had spasm...it's like my mind was already not functioning and I didn't think I was low...it was more like why can't I do this correctly....luckily someone else intervened at that point though.

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Permalink Reply by Kathyann on January 21, 2010 at 6:51am

My hands shake really bad and my heart starts pounding. Newest symptom is tunnel vision.

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Permalink Reply by Scott on January 21, 2010 at 6:56am

I get those, John. By the time they start happening, I'm usually so low that it doesn't register right away that I need carbs

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