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If you drink alcohol, do any of the following types of alcohol cause a noticeable drop in your blood glucose, even if you do not bolus? Select all that apply to you.
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The drop usually happens the following morning.
I put other and was going to say the exact same thing: the drop happens the next morning.
I also have noticed that my food choices sometimes are impaired when drinking i.e. I will help myself to some extra handfuls of my kids’ snack foods that I would not normally eat. So, while it is not the alcohol itself causing my blood glucose to go up, it’s the alcohol causing *me* to make choices I wouldn’t normally make that may cause a rise.
For me also.
I don’t drink alcohol without food. I don’t bolus for the alcohol, but notice I need much less insulin for absolutely everything the next day.
I have not drunk alcohol in years. I used to occasionally have a glass of red wine. When I did, I noticed a very slight drop in my blood glucose level.
95% of the time, I drink beer. So I will take a shot for the carbs in the beer but have never noticed a drop.
Wine and hard cider both lower my blood sugar, especially on an empty stomach.
Quite the opposite: I find that light beer helps me maintain my blood sugars, not unlike a Glucerna shake does. Yay for light beer! Vodka doesn’t impact my levels unless I mix it with tonic, which has some carbs, so I dose a little for it.
All seem to cause some drop in the long run, but if I don’t Bolus for it, wine or beer almost always causes my BG to skyrocket before it starts dropping to dangerous levels. Best option is to never drink without carbs of some sort along with the alcohol. Vodka or Whiskey almost always causes dangerous drop in BG for me if I don’t take some form of carbs along with it.
I put other because I drink only rarely (1 beer or 1 glass of wine and usually with lots of food) and so don’t know my exact patterns. I had the most severe low of my life (18 mg/dL, ambulance + ER) after drinking wine and champagne while traveling in Paris. That was likely a combo of multiple factors alcohol, physical activity, dehydration and NPH insulin. Enough to make me skittish!
I was recently diagnosed with LADA at age 57 so haven’t had many drinks in the past 8 months. But I have found that if I mix equal amounts of cranberry juice and vodka (then add club soda and lime), they balance each other out. I usually eat and bolus for that but don’t need to bolus for that drink. Same with equal amounts of rum and ginger ale. I haven’t tried much else and when I order this in a restaurant or bar, I’m very careful to tell the wait staff that the equal amounts is important (or my husband, trying to be helpful blurts out “She’s diabetic so they have to be equal!” Honestly, drinking alcohol isn’t THAT important to me but sometimes it’s nice to fit in and feel like things are like they used to be.
I drink alcohol occasionally but have not noticed any patterns.
I’m not one to drink alcoholic beverages without food and most of the time I run high because of underestimating carbs and it’s hard to say on the occasional low was it the alcohol or an overestimation of carbs. Life is full of variables we can’t quantify, embrace the ones that bring you joy.
#BeWell
I rarely drink because of my rheumatoid arthritis medicine. Doctor said I could occasionally. Even before the meds, the effort to figure out a bolus eclipsed the urge for a drink, so I usually abstained.
Liquor will make my sugars drop starting about 6 hours after drinking up to 24 hours after I stop. Beer makes my blood sugars rise soon after and will also cause drops the next day if I drink more than 2.
I think it would be very difficult to single out alcohol as a factor in lowering blood glucose. I sometimes have changes in my blood glucose that I can not explain. There are hundreds of factors that influence blood glucose. Just to name a few: activity, sleep, diet, stress, hormones, medications, illness, hydration, and many more.
I went to my sisters one day who lives a few house down and we unexpectedly ended up at a bar having a few gin and tonics. My blood sugar was going down and we ate more than I expected. My blood sugar stayed perfect after eating junk I would never eat. That is the day I discovered Gin is the new Insulin. LOL
HMM, I did not know that… I like Gin …
Everclear did, mostly because I was told it was Chrystal Light and didn’t eat along with it. Though if I don’t snack or have a meal with it, any ‘hard’ alcohol will drop it.
Had to laugh….you had no option for: I don’t drink alcoholic beverages.
Oops…guess I can’t READ! There it is!!
My problem isn’t the alcohol but the mixer. I’m always high with mixed drinks. And I don’t drink alcohol straight and no beer.
Here is what I have noticed. Straight up alcohol of any form will stop stop my liver from producing glycogen, which will send my blood sugar down especially if I bolus. But I use to my advantage sometimes… For example, when I get off the tennis court after a 3 set match, I usually drink a glass wine or a shot vodka to stop my liver from sending glucose stored out into the body. That way, my liver slows it’s role and my blood sugar is more steady later. Just one glass of wine or shot will do that. Alcohol is powerful (and tasty) stuff that needs to carefully consumed by diabetics on insulin.
Thanks for the info. I have always wondered what made the BG drop with alcohol, but never remembered to ask the doctor.
Many years ago, I heard in a lecture (I’m not sure where; maybe at the Joslin Clinic, or in a college course that I took, 45 to 50 years ago) that it is VERY dangerous for a diabetic to drink alcohol when his/her blood glucose is low. The reason being that the liver and kidneys will work to expel the alcohol from the body, before it processes the food. So, if you have low blood glucose, your blood glucose cannot go up until the alcohol has been processed. I always made sure that my BG level was not low before drinking alcohol.
As a homebrewer, I take specific steps to make sure I create quick fermenting sugars which results in a beer with a lot less residual sugars. I still monitor my blood and use my CGM..small amounts of blousing to keep it in check.
Red, dry wines always do, within 10min, same with all clear alcohols (not in a cocktail). Whiskey and bourbons drop me less, but still drop. Spiked seltzers that do not contain sugar or sugar alcohols, drop me.
I always have to eat, or eat with the alcohol, or run a temp basal at about 85% of normal.
I no longer drink alcohol, but when I did, it did not lower my BG because I always drank just one and with food.
I have one drink out and only with food. Do not drink at home. So, normally I will go high because of all the extra carbs I consume. Lately, all I can drink is water: caffeine gives me headaches if I don’t drink it everyday and don’t like that; aspartame gives me headaches so I can’t have my sugar free decaf international Swiss mocha coffee; I’ve started getting cocktail headaches so I think I have to give up alcohol. Red wine gives me a headache. So, it’s water and a little milk. BORING!!!
I was taught a long time ago tha alcohol
Could cause a big drop and that you should always eat before or while drinking. Although I have never noticed a drop myself, that doesn’t mean it has never or will never happen because alcohol dulls your senses and removes any fear of it happening. I’m sure there were times it did, but I always was preventive.
I drank a bit while in university, but that was before BG meters so I don’t know how it affected my BG. I haven’t really drank alcohol for the last 35-40 years.
I have to bolus for beer but then it will lower bg many hours later. Wine is fine with dinner but sometimes I will go low later in the night
It’s all about the amount of alcohol that I drink! If I consume more than 3 servings of alcohol then I definitely run the risk of going low in the hours after because my liver is then dealing with that larger amount of alcohol — your liver stops releasing stored glucose while it’s processing the alcohol which increases your risk of lows.
Rarely drink alcohol. Not it’s even less than rarely cause of kidney issues.
My system is tough enough to keep stable and decided years ago not to complicate it with alcohol.
Just easier without!
I don’t drink alcohol
WOW!! this was a good subject!!! 70 years T1D and I had NO knowledg of any of these things.. I was given a bottle of good scotch that has honey in it, does it mean they will balance out the BG effect ???
I rarely have alcohol, but since I always have food with my drink, I really haven’t noticed a drop. Since my drinks of choice have carbs, my sugar probably goes up a little bit.
Compared to 25 years ago I’m a “nondrinker.” But I’ve been known to require an adult beverage while changing brakes or a water pump, and it’s a federal law while grilling.
If I drink more than 3-4 beers levels will drop but that’s a rarity, so I clicked “other.” Also drink MICHELOB ULTRA or COORS LIGHT, both with significantly less carbs (this redneck was a Budweiser guy) I don’t dose for. And as I get older and moving slower it’s a whole lot less appealing in the morning.
Now I only drink wine. White wine will raise the BG, but red will slightly bring it down. Problem is that when I drink wine I always eat something, often too much.
I wouldn’t say it’s a significant drop, but it will slowly drift down. I have to make sure my blood sugar is high enough when I start drinking, so that I don’t have to worry about lows. I never drink on an empty stomach.
Also, I’ll add that I stick to low carb drinks and do not bolus for alcohol.
I do not drink.
I do not drink alcohol. Too much addictive behavior in my family genes. It is not worth it.
I know that the two types of alcohol that I checked, wine and rum, both make my blood sugar drop, but I’m not sure about the other options. Wine will sometimes make me drop and sometimes raise my blood sugar, so this is misleading. It really depends on what type of wine.
As for the other types of alcohol listed, I usually have them in mixed drinks that I know are sweet, so I will bolus, but not due to the type of alcohol in the drink.
I just wanted to add, just before I became legal to drink, my endo at the time, a T1D himself, told me to drink only one type of alcohol each time I went to a bar. Then to check my blood sugar 2, 4, and 6 hours after to see how that type of alcohol affected my blood sugar. That way, I’d know that if a drink made me drop, that I needed to eat something when having that drink in the future and not bolus (or bolus less). This was before CGM, so it was all done with finger sticks. I also did not have a pump. Even with these advances, this advice still works. Don’t mix your drinks, until you know how the alcohol affects you!
Unless I drink an IPA or a sweet wine (i.e moscato) or mixed liquor drink with a mixer containing real sugar, I NEVER bolus. I rarely drink those things but they will cause a spike too quickly. If I did drink them I’d bolus for half the carbs. Light beer, seltzer, dry wine (like pino grios) or liquor with a diet drink I would never bolus for.
The harder the liquor the harder I fall. I really notice the drop with hard liquor even if mixed with sugar. I always eat when drinking and regardless I drop a few hours later.