As a child of the 50's I grew up and developed my personal eating preferences and habits beginning in a time when someone at home prepared home cooked meals, almost everything was made from fresh or canned or frozen ingredients, with little other processing, and eating out was a rare and special treat that only happened once in a while. But as America and I matured together, the food supply and American eating habits changed. Industrial dominance of agriculture, production and distribution dug its corporate claws into the nation, leading to an obesity epidemic and proliferation of lifestyle diseases.
But, as a kid, I was conditioned, by my depression influenced family, to eat what was put in front of me and clean my plate because we were a lot better off than the people who were starving. As a good, obedient kid, I did as I was told.
Well, old age ain't no place for sissies, especially if you've lived and eaten like a "good" American. This brings us around to the point which is that yesterday afternoon a nephrologist, to whom my internist referred me after a series of troubling blood studies, placed me on a low potassium diet, among other ways of addressing some kidney issues I'm having. I'm not having failure or chronic disease problems, thankfully, but I am trying to stay off of a trajectory that leads to those kinds of problems.
This new medical wrinkle has had me burning up the internet for much of the last 18 hours and I've started to learn a lot. At first, as I sat there digesting the news at the
specialist's office, it didn't seem like such a big deal. But I'm starting to realize that for a lot of people, a seemingly simple adjustment like this might really be a big deal.
Come out into the tall grass for more.
The sheer magnitude and variety of the foods I am now supposed to avoid, many of them ubiquitous and beloved, has just started sinking in. Here are the biggies: No tomatoes. No potatoes. No greens. No beans. No milk. No peanut butter.
A diet like this (caution, PDF), would be a disaster for a person relying on SNAP food benefits by placing many basic, economical staples out of reach. Because I have recently retired, I am fortunate enough to have time to research, shop, prepare and cook meals with my problems at the forefront. But I couldn't have done so very well, if at all, before I retired. I also have the money to buy what I need. But a special diet like this is big trouble for someone with a less generous time or money budget and it doesn't seem like there is any social safety net at all for this sort of problem.
I am much more fortunate than most with similar health issues. I suspect that there are a lot of such people. When I first called for an appointment the doctor wasn't taking new appointments before September, and she only moved me up because she read my lab reports. She is very busy. A lot of Italian, Mexican and basic American food is out the window on a low potassium diet. I see a lot more Asian food in my future, but even there it can get weird. I suppose substitutions are possible. I'm going to try making an apple salsa tomorrow.
And so it goes.