Feb 19 2009
No Meat For The Meat Eater
James loves meat. He is a real meat and potatoes kind of man. I have for years indulged him with meals that he likes. I know that he should not eat them but it is what he wants and it makes him happy.
Through the years he has been told by doctors to change his diet but it never lasts. His blood pressure is high and he is on medication for it but the new diets lasts at the most a week. I always jump on board with him and make it a change for the whole family. It still does not last long because he does not want to give anything up.
Yesterday he went to the doctor because his foot was swollen and hurt a lot. He did not remember hurting it but that is nothing new since he is so busy all of the time. The doctor told him that he did not believe it was hurt. He said that it looked like James has Gout.
I will not go into all of the information about Gout. The big problem is that this means that the meat eater can no longer eat meat. Not unless he wants to be in a lot of pain. Gout will come and go the rest of his life depending on what he eats. Once it comes about it takes anywhere from a few days to a couple weeks to work it’s way out of the system.
He woke up this morning after another night of pain and decided that maybe he should become a vegetarian. I then spent the next couple hours looking up what he can and can not eat. Then I switched to finding recipes.
He should not eat any meats not even poultry or seafood. It looks like eggs are okay so far. I was surprised that he is also not supposed to have any whole grain. This really limits the vegetarian recipes that he can have.
He is now at the grocery store with the list of vegetarian staple foods that I made him. As always I will be trying to help him out by adjusting all of our meals so I eat the same things. He has already called me 5 times from the store asking about what he is allowed. I really wonder how long this new diet will last. Hopefully now that pain is involved he will stick to it better.
My Dad suffers from gout too. He found an e-book online that really helped him a lot (don’t know the name of it though, sorry). Basically he now eats dried cherries and dried blueberries a lot and that seems to help quite a bit!
Good luck with the the dietary changes too!
I have read a lot about how much cherries help. James bought a few bottles of cherry juice but he said the little bottles were $5 each. I will have to look for dried cherries. That would be much more convenient. I heard the cherry pills do not help so dried cherries would be great.
I have lived by the mantra that if it moves, thinks about moving or looks like it could move then it should be eaten. Period. I feel bad for poor James since he cannot enjoy the food he so dearly loves. If that ever happens to me I hope someone will have me put to sleep.