Do or Die-t

Our new nutritionist, MaryJean, prescribed a 1,500-calorie-a-day diet for Karen and me if we plan to lose weight in a steady, healthy manner. (In case you missed it, I need to dump around 30 pounds in preparation for the procedure that will insert a catheter next to my belly button for a form of kidney dialysis.)

I tried to explain to MaryJean that I can do 1,500 calories just by poking my head into the refrigerator, but she suggested a slightly stronger form of self-discipline may be required.

The major problem with trying to diet while working at home is that food is never more than a few steps out of reach. Like the old Richard Pryor routine about cocaine, sometimes when I'm very quiet I swear I can hear the food calling out to me from behind the cupboard doors.

"Yo, Jim! Jimbo! Got some mighty tasty chips in here. Bar-be-cue, too, just like you like!"

"Hey, what about us pre-cooked bacon strips? You know you want some of this, Jimmy Mack!"

"Don't forget about us sardines! We're packed tight, but we taste right!"

Great googly-moogly, do I love to eat. Sometimes I think I really just like to chew. Maybe if I could develop a cud, or Karen could bring home a chew toy from PetSmart, it might serve as a reasonable substitute.

Karen found a Web site called MyFoodDiary.com where you can input what you ate for breakfast, lunch, dinner and between-meal snacks and the site will calculate the amount of calories, fat, sodium, etc., that you consumed. We tried it for the first time today.

My breakfast was a piece of cake – well, not literally, but it was a simple computation for MyFoodDiary – a bowl of cereal with soy milk and a cup of decaf tea. I breezed through lunch as well, a simple garden salad with modest embellishments, and even the single serving of Skittles I had for an afternoon snack (thanks a lot to whoever brought over the Halloween candy!) wasn't too damaging.

But when Karen got home from work she appeared too pooped to poach, bake or broil, so we decided to GO OUT for dinner. Ooooooh. After some deliberation, we decided on Outback Steakhouse. We could order grilled chicken, rice, maybe a few shrimp on the side and a modest salad. We'll drink ice water, not pop. I mean, how bad could that be?

Yowza! Did we learn a first-night lesson! We blew the entire 1,500-calorie wad, and more, on that simple dinner alone. I feel like I should just relegate myself to bread and water, but I probably can't do the bread, either. This is all so new to both of us.

And will someone tell those sardines to shut up?

You'll Eat Nothing, And Like It

On our own initiative, Karen and I obtained a referral and made an appointment last week to see a nutritionist. I have not been ordered to begin a restrictive, "pro kidney" diet yet, but we figure I will at some point so I might as well get in the habit.

Besides, in order to have the permanent catheter needed for Peritoneal Dialysis inserted into my abdomen, I've been told by my nephrologist that I probably need to lose about 30 pounds of belly fat. (All my pants seem to agree.) Karen has lovingly decided to go on the diet with me, so I won't begrudge my lettuce while she's downing cheeseburgers.

We have tried to make better and wiser food choices to coddle my damaged kidneys, but Karen has found that the diet information she's researched on the Internet seems to be wildly contradictory from site to site. We decided to go to one professional source that we can actually look at and talk to, and abide by what the nutritionist says.

So we met with an effervescent wisp of a woman named Maryjean who asked me to come with a list of everything I'd eaten in the previous 24 hours, read it, then shook her head a lot. Obviously we'll need to eat less and exercise more if we intend to lose weight, but there's so much less to eat, too.

We received a list of foods that are naturally high in potassium, which is Kryptonite for kidneys, and generally should be avoided. That list includes:

Tomatoes
Tomato juice
Tomato paste
Spinach
Potatoes
Carrots (raw)
Baked beans
Squash
Potato Chips
Mushrooms (raw)
Artichokes
Lima beans
Broccoli
Melons (all kinds, including water!)
Peaches
Orange juice
Bananas
Raisins
Avocados
Brussel sprouts
Radishes
Peanut butter
Nuts
Scallops
Sardines
Cocoa
Hot chocolate
Dates

What's left, you ask? We asked, too. Maryjean smiled sweetly and talked about creative food alternatives, most of which sounded to me like eating wallpaper paste.

I don't think I'd mind so much having medical issues if I could at least eat what I wanted. The two best things I do in life are eat and sleep, and one of them is about to be severely compromised. I've said it before and I'll say it again: I foresee a steady diet of chicken – baked – and rice in my future.