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Jun. 8th, 2018 10:36 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
the_rckI spent some time yesterday, before my appointment, poking around online and looking at things related to slow digestion. Apparently, what I consider normal for digesting things, is decidedly not. If I have a decent meal with protein and fat and some sort of simple carbohydrates, I will feel full for a minimum of five hours and more likely seven hours. That is, when I have breakfast at 6 a.m., I generally won't feel hungry until some time between noon and 2 p.m. If I only eat protein/fat, I won't feel any energy from it for at least two hours; that's why I need simple carbohydrates, so that I won't fall over before my body starts processing everything else.
Vegetables take longer than protein or fat do. Raw vegetables take longer. The more cooked to mush something is, the easier time I have with it. Stir frying is evil because it just barely cooks things. My digestive system fights with those vegetables. They taste good, but...
Slowed digestion tends to be extremely erratic and to cause entirely unpredictable fluctuations in blood sugar because nutrient absorption and things passing to the small intestine don't happen steadily. The recommendations for dealing with it on a chronic level aren't actually very useful to me because at least half of it is a recommendation to puree all of one's food. I can't do that because my throat won't let that sort of thing down.
The other recommendation is lean really heavily on simple carbohydrates, avoiding insoluble fiber as much as possible.
I emailed my gastroenterologist to see if I can talk her into some testing. If I can't, I need to find a gastroenterologist outside of the UMHS system because the department is extremely unwilling to allow patients to get second opinions or to change doctors. I've changed once (he moved to a different city, and I can't drive), and they told me that they only permit one physician change per patient, for any reason, ever. (I'm pretty sure that I could force another transfer if my current gastroenterologist moved her practice, but it would require beating them over the head with the ADA and threatening public shame).
A lot of what I found about links slow digestion to diabetes with the assumption that it's caused by diabetes. I'm 51. I've had this sort of digestion for at least 35 years and quite likely longer. My A1c is high but still not technically in range for a diagnosis of diabetes. It has never been high enough for that. May was the first time it ever got as high as it was (6.0).
I went downtown to see my psychiatrist. I was very wobbly on the way there. My 6 a.m. breakfast didn't start helping at all until very near to 11 a.m. at which point I was already there. It was also in the high 70s outside, and my body reacted as if I was trying to run in 90+ weather.
After the appointment, I went to the downtown library to meet another Ingress player. He was starting up playing again after a couple of years of not, and before people get invited to the team Slack channels, someone has to meet them to verify that they're not bots or spies. The guy was, as I reported later, neither a bot nor nine ducks in an human suit. There was a little concern because I didn't report back right after the meeting due to not having any data left on my phone. I suppose I could have gone into the library to do it (the library wifi doesn't reach the parking lot because that's on the older side of the building which is mostly brick walls), but I wanted to get to Totoro for lunch and still get home before the cleaning lady arrived (both of which I managed).
And, seriously? I was meeting the guy at a specific plaque in library lane which is in public view from pretty much all angles. It's a heavy foot traffic area at noon on a weekday. (I thought the plaque was a better target than just 'the downtown library' which is four floors and not all that compact.)
I seriously considered not going to Totoro because I still felt full from breakfast, but the cleaning lady being here was going to mean me not being able to eat from 2 p.m. to at least 5 p.m. Also, I don't get to eat out very often.
When I say 'still feeling full' that doesn't mean that I didn't have room to eat, just that my body didn't feel at all in need of food. How my stomach feels doesn't have anything to do with whether or not I consider myself hungry. Hunger is signaled by muscle tremors, headaches, exhaustion, etc. Mostly, I just try to stick to eating at a certain time of day because it's easier to say that it's been six hours and that I probably ought to eat something than it is to judge those signals. Judging a meal complete is hard, too, because I won't know for hours whether or not I ate the right things. I don't eat to satiety/fullness because I have no idea what on earth that means. Given my evening schedule, I pretty much never know whether or not I'm eating enough to get through the hours until bedtime or not.
I had always been extremely puzzled by Scott's family's custom of waiting an hour or two after the meal for dessert. I never understood why they bothered. Two hours is nothing like long enough to get hungry again after a good meal, so why not just get it done with while we're all at the table to begin with rather than trying to gather the scattered family again? Waiting also makes the 'save your fork' part seem less sensible from a not sharing germs point of view.
I've made an endocrinology appointment (late July which is actually sooner than I expected). I don't know if I can keep taking the metformin that long. I'm bouncing up and down (but mostly down) like a hard rubber ball that's being hurled at something.
I have signed Cordelia up for driver's training. The price tag for it was painful, but if we want her licensed before college, there aren't many options. Requiring the class and making it something provided by third parties puts a huge barrier in place for families without much money (which eventually makes things like voting at 18 harder). When I was Cordelia's age, the schools did driver's training for free. My high school used cars donated by local dealerships.
Wanting Cordelia to get her license as soon after she turns 16 as is feasible is a fairly practical thing for us because her being able to drive would help me immensely. Getting and insuring a second car will be a huge expense that won't be entirely balanced out by Cordelia being able to help me, but combining that with other things (like her being able to get a job in the evenings and getting comfortable driving) makes it likely that we'll try.
Vegetables take longer than protein or fat do. Raw vegetables take longer. The more cooked to mush something is, the easier time I have with it. Stir frying is evil because it just barely cooks things. My digestive system fights with those vegetables. They taste good, but...
Slowed digestion tends to be extremely erratic and to cause entirely unpredictable fluctuations in blood sugar because nutrient absorption and things passing to the small intestine don't happen steadily. The recommendations for dealing with it on a chronic level aren't actually very useful to me because at least half of it is a recommendation to puree all of one's food. I can't do that because my throat won't let that sort of thing down.
The other recommendation is lean really heavily on simple carbohydrates, avoiding insoluble fiber as much as possible.
I emailed my gastroenterologist to see if I can talk her into some testing. If I can't, I need to find a gastroenterologist outside of the UMHS system because the department is extremely unwilling to allow patients to get second opinions or to change doctors. I've changed once (he moved to a different city, and I can't drive), and they told me that they only permit one physician change per patient, for any reason, ever. (I'm pretty sure that I could force another transfer if my current gastroenterologist moved her practice, but it would require beating them over the head with the ADA and threatening public shame).
A lot of what I found about links slow digestion to diabetes with the assumption that it's caused by diabetes. I'm 51. I've had this sort of digestion for at least 35 years and quite likely longer. My A1c is high but still not technically in range for a diagnosis of diabetes. It has never been high enough for that. May was the first time it ever got as high as it was (6.0).
I went downtown to see my psychiatrist. I was very wobbly on the way there. My 6 a.m. breakfast didn't start helping at all until very near to 11 a.m. at which point I was already there. It was also in the high 70s outside, and my body reacted as if I was trying to run in 90+ weather.
After the appointment, I went to the downtown library to meet another Ingress player. He was starting up playing again after a couple of years of not, and before people get invited to the team Slack channels, someone has to meet them to verify that they're not bots or spies. The guy was, as I reported later, neither a bot nor nine ducks in an human suit. There was a little concern because I didn't report back right after the meeting due to not having any data left on my phone. I suppose I could have gone into the library to do it (the library wifi doesn't reach the parking lot because that's on the older side of the building which is mostly brick walls), but I wanted to get to Totoro for lunch and still get home before the cleaning lady arrived (both of which I managed).
And, seriously? I was meeting the guy at a specific plaque in library lane which is in public view from pretty much all angles. It's a heavy foot traffic area at noon on a weekday. (I thought the plaque was a better target than just 'the downtown library' which is four floors and not all that compact.)
I seriously considered not going to Totoro because I still felt full from breakfast, but the cleaning lady being here was going to mean me not being able to eat from 2 p.m. to at least 5 p.m. Also, I don't get to eat out very often.
When I say 'still feeling full' that doesn't mean that I didn't have room to eat, just that my body didn't feel at all in need of food. How my stomach feels doesn't have anything to do with whether or not I consider myself hungry. Hunger is signaled by muscle tremors, headaches, exhaustion, etc. Mostly, I just try to stick to eating at a certain time of day because it's easier to say that it's been six hours and that I probably ought to eat something than it is to judge those signals. Judging a meal complete is hard, too, because I won't know for hours whether or not I ate the right things. I don't eat to satiety/fullness because I have no idea what on earth that means. Given my evening schedule, I pretty much never know whether or not I'm eating enough to get through the hours until bedtime or not.
I had always been extremely puzzled by Scott's family's custom of waiting an hour or two after the meal for dessert. I never understood why they bothered. Two hours is nothing like long enough to get hungry again after a good meal, so why not just get it done with while we're all at the table to begin with rather than trying to gather the scattered family again? Waiting also makes the 'save your fork' part seem less sensible from a not sharing germs point of view.
I've made an endocrinology appointment (late July which is actually sooner than I expected). I don't know if I can keep taking the metformin that long. I'm bouncing up and down (but mostly down) like a hard rubber ball that's being hurled at something.
I have signed Cordelia up for driver's training. The price tag for it was painful, but if we want her licensed before college, there aren't many options. Requiring the class and making it something provided by third parties puts a huge barrier in place for families without much money (which eventually makes things like voting at 18 harder). When I was Cordelia's age, the schools did driver's training for free. My high school used cars donated by local dealerships.
Wanting Cordelia to get her license as soon after she turns 16 as is feasible is a fairly practical thing for us because her being able to drive would help me immensely. Getting and insuring a second car will be a huge expense that won't be entirely balanced out by Cordelia being able to help me, but combining that with other things (like her being able to get a job in the evenings and getting comfortable driving) makes it likely that we'll try.
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Date: 2018-06-08 05:19 pm (UTC)We've got a friend who's got some sort of medical condition that I forgot (missing/deficient in one enzyme, perhaps?) that means he cannot feel hunger. It's easy for him to go a day and a half without realizing that he hasn't eaten, so when he starts feeling cranky and whatnot, his wife asks him how long it's been since he's eaten.
I tend to wait on desserts because after a good meal they're not appetizing to me. I don't want to wait until I'm actually hungry, because sugary stuff makes me feel bad if that's all I eat when I get hungry. But an hour or two means I've digested enough that a dessert seems appetizing, and I'm not yet hungry so I can actually eat a sugar bomb without feeling icky.
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Date: 2018-06-09 03:09 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2018-06-11 04:51 pm (UTC)I have no idea if that applies to anybody else, but it's what turned out to work for my body.
I hadn't realized that I was overweight, because my BMI was in the middle of the normal range, so all of this was a big surprise to me.
For whatever that's worth.