February 15, 2001
Diagnosis and Symptoms, Hypoglycemia
Question from Lehigh Acres, Florida, USA:
For almost a month now, my three year old daughter has been waking up in the middle of the night with screaming and crying and kicking. She keeps calling for me and looks right through me when I am holding her. She says her ear and head hurt throughout this terror. She hits her head and legs almost like something is hurting her. Then, after about a half an hour, she snaps out of it like nothing, has only little recognition of the spell and says she is fine and that nothing hurts.
We recently found out that she has a cardiac arrhythmia and have cut out soda. For a week, she was fine and didn’t wake up at all during the night. Just a little while ago, I gave her some candy and she started to go nuts and throw a terrible tantrum, and last night she had another spell. I guess she had some birthday cake at night before she went to bed.
We thought this was night terrors, but after reading of a mom whose child woke up the same way, we wonder, could my daughter have hypoglycemia? Can I buy a kit at the store to test her? What do I do if her levels are high?
Answer:
I am assuming that your child does not have diabetes. If so, then it is unlikely that these are due to hypoglycemia (low blood glucose). It is extremely unusual for this to be caused by high blood sugar. The story sounds more like night terrors. It is important to comfort your child and give reassurances. Check if there isn’t anything else she is eating or drinking that might be causing it.
JS
