Oh no. Here comes the dietician.
So many doctors. So little time. It’s the dreaded diet doctor, who has come to lecture me on what to eat and what not to eat.
The A to Z Challenge – N is for Nutrition
From the moment I was diagnosed with kidney disease, I began to see doctor after doctor. One specialist I would see would be the one with all the expertise on nutrition.
I had low calcium. I had low iron, anaemia. I needed to take supplements. I was put on dialysis. I was under weight and malnourished. My body wasn’t getting any of the proper nutrients it needed. The kidney disease was preventing anything healthy from happening in my body.
From then on I saw the dietician, who told me what foods to stay away from. Then, once I’d had my kidney transplant, I saw one again, who told me I was to basically eat the opposite of all I was to stay away from while on dialysis.
It was confusing. It was confusing, going from fighting to keep any weight on to being on high doses of medications which put on weight.
Food has been a major factor for me, something I had to think about, since I was eleven years old. I fought like hell to be healthy, but I never dreamed that nutrition would be such a difficulty for me.
Now, I am on such low doses of those transplant medications, but the damage has been done. My body has been through a lot.
I try to find balance. I love salad and I love chocolate. I could live on fruit and vegetables, but I love my pizza. I love to drink water and still I drink Coke.
This nutrition thing is hard and I don’t see it getting any easier, the older I get.
***This is my first year of joining the A to Z Challenge and so I’ve decided to post randomly, as a way for new visitors to my blog to get to know me a little better. I look forward to discovering some interesting new blogs too.
Hope it gets easier because this sounds really bad.
Finding Eliza
I tend to overdramatize, but it was hard growing up, wanting to be a normal kid, and having this to deal with on top of it all. Thanks for reading.
My daughter, who is now 42, has been an insulin dependent Type 1 diabetic since she was 12. Like you, she has to constantly be aware of what she is eating, and it is emotionally tiring. She has recently undertaken a healthier style of eating and is very pleased with the results both in weight loss and in her emotional well being, but it’s not easy, and I know it’s not for you either. I am like you, I love good healthy things to eat, but I also love all the bad stuff. I need someone to just serve as my food monitor each day and give me what I should eat. I am bad at decision making, especially if I am hungry! 🙂
That’s the one good thing about being in hospital, though when I used to be a patient my parents would sneak other things in for me to eat and my mom would eat the dinner provided. Ha.
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