No Salt and Other Non-joys

For some time now, food has not been much of a joy. I have enjoyed, for all of my life, eating and I like to think of myself as a bit of a "foodie". I have enjoyed cooking, international dishes, new tastes and spices, and old standards, be that a casserole or pickled pigs feet. However, with the chemo it appears that my taste-buds have gone on vacation and my esophagus has decided that it doesn't want anything "chunky" to reach my stomach. Most unpleasant.

Then there are the issues with my kidney. The protein spillage and the build up of amyloids in the kidney had been causing edema in my ankles and lower legs. For that they have had me on Lisinopril and a diuretic, the latter making me pee a lot in an effort to keep the liquids from settling in my legs. Of course the doctor wanted me to do one other thing to help my kidneys: eliminate salt.

He arranged for me to have an appointment with a nutritionist to discuss this with me. It took a couple of weeks before I could get in to see her, and with the food issues I wasn't too keen to eliminate salt from a diet that is already lacking in flavor. Peggy and I were introduced to a pleasant enough young woman, perhaps in her mid-twenties, definitely younger than our children. With all of that "book learning" she was quite confident about her expertise. She went on and on about foods that I shouldn't be eating. The more she went on the more sarcastic I became, not quite rude, but not very open to her suggestions. I think a more experienced person might have been able to better read their patient and dropped the nutrition talk and started taking with the person. As it was I dropped further and further into myself and had little to say as we left the office. Before we went outside I went to the bathroom and just broke down and cried.

Through all of this MM, I have been quite able to talk about the cancer, about death and dying. Why was this such a big deal? Why did I have a bit of an emotional breakdown over "salt" of all things? Was it simply because of the food issues I am already dealing with? Or could it be that I really haven't dealt with the emotions of death and knowing that it is a reality, one closer at hand than I would like to think it is?

This certainly isn't the best period of my life. My first cancer had some hard times, but once I got through those times, we were back to the "good life". I know that with Multiple Myeloma things are not going to be going into any sort of long term remission; that's a given. But when I look to the future it is hard to believe that I will get back much of that "good life" again. The diarrhea, the fatigue due to the low blood pressure I have, the food issues, the pain in my legs and edema take a lot from you. Should all of this pass in the future, this post will look pretty silly and "whiney", but that is how I feel today