[Click! Health] "Sleepy Since Spring"... Could It Be a Blood Sugar Spike?

As spring arrives, more people are experiencing post-meal fatigue and drowsiness. While these symptoms are often due to common springtime conditions such as chun-gon-jeung (spring fatigue) or sik-gon-jeung (post-meal drowsiness), they can also be caused by blood sugar spikes, which involve rapid fluctuations in blood glucose levels. Therefore, it is important to accurately identify the cause.

　

According to the health management platform Pilize on the 6th, chun-gon-jeung, sik-gon-jeung, and blood sugar spikes all have different causes and mechanisms of occurrence. First, chun-gon-jeung, which mainly occurs in April and May, is a symptom that appears during the adjustment of the biological rhythm due to seasonal changes. As spring arrives, the days get longer, and the secretion time of melatonin, a sleep hormone released at night, shifts earlier. During this adaptation process, sleep deprivation causes drowsiness during the day. Since it is a symptom related to seasonal changes, it naturally disappears over time.

Sik-gon-jeung and blood sugar spikes occur after meals, but their specific causes differ. Sik-gon-jeung is a temporary phenomenon caused by activation of the parasympathetic nervous system during digestion, regardless of the type of food consumed. On the other hand, blood sugar spikes refer to a rapid rise and fluctuation in blood glucose levels after eating. During this process, insulin secretion is stimulated, but subsequently, blood sugar levels can drop sharply, causing reactive hypoglycemia, which may lead to severe fatigue.

Blood sugar spikes are known to frequently occur after consuming foods high in carbohydrates. According to Pilize’s user data analysis, the probability of blood sugar spikes by food type was 62.1% for gimbap, 59.9% for sweet potatoes, 59.3% for tteokbokki, and 50.8% for white rice.

Repeated blood sugar spikes can cause problems with insulin secretion and insulin resistance, making blood sugar control difficult. This is especially risky for people in the prediabetic stage or those with diabetes, as it can lead to serious complications. When blood sugar spike symptoms are suspected, it is important to thoroughly monitor and manage the foods consumed and the overall diet. If managing blood sugar is challenging, one can also seek help from blood sugar management services that utilize continuous glucose monitoring (CGM) devices.

Kim Ah-young, a nutritionist at Pilize, advised, “Finding an appropriate meal size that does not burden the digestive system helps reduce sik-gon-jeung. To prevent reactive hypoglycemia caused by blood sugar spikes, it is important to lower the carbohydrate ratio in the diet and control blood sugar from rising rapidly by taking a 15 to 20-minute walk after meals.”