Monday, March 19, 2012

Imperfect Insulin-Resistant Eating After a Stomach Flu

Everything you're supposed to eat when you have stomach trouble is full of carbohydrates.  Think about it.  Everything except for broth.  First, there's Gatorade at 21 grams of carbs for 12 oz.  Now, when you've been sick to your stomach and can begin to keep water down, you need liquid more than anything.  On a normal day, you're supposed to drink 8 eight ounce glasses of water every day.  That's - I can't do the math - 5 1/3 servings or 112 grams of carbohydrates, almost twice my daily intake.  So I didn't drink that much.  You might try telling me to relax about my carbs on a day such as this, but I'm pretty sure that yesterday, being the insulin-resistant that I am, when I began to drink Gatorade, I actually felt worse because of the carbs instead of better. 

On day two, I also began to drink tea and squishy jello.  Then, later last night, I had chicken soup that Mike made for me.  I promise I won't analyze the carbohydrates of all of the foods I ate yesterday.  There was broth.  Broth is good.  The rice in the broth was not so good.  There was jello.  Lots of pure sugar.  Okay, you might think that I needed a bit more sugar than usual since I was completely cleaned out and dried up.  I'm not so sure about that.  Between the rice, the jello, and the Gatorade, I think I may have ingested almost 170 grams of carbohydrates yesterday. On a good day, I'm at 60 grams and I usually hit about 85 when I'm a slacker, which is a lot of days.  Last night, my stomach gnawed on what I gave it and only gave a shudder or two, but I was up almost all night, sleepless.  That's a heavy-handed sign that I've been imbibing too much regarding carbs.  And I'm thirsty, very thirsty. 

I know I'm not well yet because, though I'm hungry, food doesn't taste quite right.  Still, at day three, I feel up to adding more solid foods.  Common wisdom says to stick to the BRAT diet, which is bananas, rice, applesauce, and toast.  All carbs, all the time.  So this morning, after after a ravenous 3 a.m. fridge raid for more soup and a bit of plain yogurt, I decided to add according to common wisdom.  Toast.  I ate it slowly.  I don't usually get toast.  By 10:30 am, I was up to my daily limit for carbs.  It's going to be a long, hard day.  My night might be worse.  Last night I felt downright loopy.  Do you think anyone noticed?

So, now, I've decided to skip ahead to greens.  Oh, I don't get how I'm supposed to reintroduce greens after all that TMI bootcamp, but here goes.  Still, I figured a little combining might not hurt.  So.  Right now I'm eating Organic Girl's Super Greens with baby chard, tat soi, arugula, and spinach.  Oh, I am so hooked on Organic Girl's greens.  I can eat them right out of the container when I'm on the run, which is most days.  Right now though, I'm eating them with ShaSha Cocoa Snaps, a crispy little cookie that doesn't have too many carbs.  The flavor is a bit like that chocolate flavored superfood stuff I add to my smoothies, SuperFood by Amazing Grass.  Interesting.

I can feel my stomach ruminating it.  I'll be glad when it doesn't have something to say every time I take a bite.

Whew, I am still loopy.

Thanks for listening, jb

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