Blood Sugar & Stress

What happens to my blood sugar levels when I’m stressed?

During stressful situations, epinephrine (adrenalin), glucagon, growth hormone and cortisol play a role in blood sugar levels. Stressful situations include infections, serious illness or significant emotion stress.

When you have a low blood sugar, hormones respond to raise blood sugar. The response to a low blood sugar includes releasing glucocounteregulatory, or stress hormones.

When stressed, the body prepares itself by ensuring that enough sugar or energy is readily available. Insulin levels fall, glucagon and epinephrine (adrenaline) levels rise and more glucose is released from the liver. At the same time, growth hormone and cortisol levels rise, which cause body tissues (muscle and fat) to be less sensitive to insulin. As a result, more glucose is available in the blood stream.

When you have diabetes, stress may make your blood sugar go up and become more difficult to control – and you may need to take higher doses of your diabetes medications.

During times of stress individuals with diabetes, may have more difficulty controlling their blood sugars.