May 25, 2004
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Bad Salad?
Basil and Spring Mix May Carry Disease
I am trying to lose weight, but not so fast nor at so high a price. I was miserable while I was ill.
My diabetes has become intense and makes weight maintenance very difficult. I eat a very simple diet, low in carbohydrates and high in protein, with almost no fruit or vegetables. Most fruits and vegetables cause me intense intestinal distress because of diabetic gastric neuropathy, which means that the nerves to my intestines have died off and my intestines don't behave like those of normal people. In particular, the cabbage family and apples are hazardous to my health.
Diet plans like Atkins assume that you are healthy enough for a fairly normal diet. They give you guidelines based on that assumption. Those diets don't work for me. Until recently, diets for diabetics were high carbohydrate, low protein and low fat, which is the worst possible combination for controlling your weight. Low fat leads to excessive appetite, while high carbohydrates cause the body to store fat even with a low calorie count. Since published diets don't work, I have to wing it, doing my own thing.
A few weeks ago, I fixed myself a spring salad, using fresh basil and the small greens known as spring mix, sometimes called mesculin. That was a mistake. It turns out that both basil and mesculin have recently been suspected of causing outbreaks of cyclosporiasis in Texas, Illinois and Virginia.
About a week after making my lovely little salad, I came down with what seemed to be the flu. A few days later, quite by accident, I ran across the news report of the Texas and Illinois cyclosporiasis outbreaks. I did a little research. The symptoms agree with those I suffered, the timing was right ... .
Whatever caused my problem, I lost five pounds in just a few days. The weight has stayed away, even now that I have apparently recovered from whatever problem I had and am eating normally, despite my blood sugars being higher than normal.
High blood sugar is the weight control curse of the diabetic. When the blood levels are up, taking extra insulin causes the body to store the sugar from the blood as fat. The more insulin I have to take, the more fat my body stores. The worse my diabetes gets, the more insulin I have to take. It simply gets harder to lose weight, no matter what I do.
I've had more salad recently, simply because I like salad. I have been able to eat small enough quantities that it hasn't bothered me yet. I'm afraid to eat more.
When I can keep my blood sugar under control, I can manage to lose about a pound a month. Hopefully I'll reach some threshold where the blood sugar control will become easier because my weight is down, but the process is slow and frustrating.
And I would rather do without little parasites in my salads.
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