I give up!

[kari1980]

HI,
My name is Karen and I am new to the boards ,but not new to IC. I was diagnosed in 1994 and I have to say, I give up! I just can't seem to get this diet right. Every day I am in pain, it seems no matter what I eat....and I LIKE to eat, so it's so hard to follow the diet. I just can't remember everything that I'm not suppose to eat, and ever time I think I have it, I read something else that I was wrong about. Does anyone else feel this way or is it just me? Also, if you cant' have mayo or mustard what do you put on sandwiches? And, does that mean I can never have chicken salad or tuna salad again? Gosh, everything I love to eat is bad for me and it's so hard, that I find myself in Pain all the time! Any advice would be helpful.
Thanks,
Karen

[siriuspsyclist]

hi, boy do i feel for you! I have such a hard time with these things too. But the pain just will not let me cheat! Once I get out of pain I tend to "forget" and then I am able to eat little bits of these things with NO PAIN until I overdo it and then

WHAMMOO - agony for a long time...battling back to health, hating myself for being so weak. I mean all this for MAYO! OK, I put cream cheese on my sandwiches. and butter/ and cucumbers and lettuce.

I keep a copy of the list in my car and bag and look at it trying to figure out what to eat all the time. It helps to have the info WITH me to REMIND me that YES, fvinegar that is in a little white pouch that came with my fries COUNTS!!

But on the good side, there is still so much I can eat. Like for example, tonight I'm making my friends a roast chicken with mashed potatoes and sauteed onions and purple cabbage and some cornbread on the side. That's all good! And I'll make some GRAVY too! Oh, how I have learned to LOVE gravy since I had to leave the MAYO behind.

I used to be a vegetarian, but the NO SOY thing really beat me down and after A horrible infection that had me trankked and antibioticed to death in the hospital for five days with almost a 15lb weight loss my loving partner declared me a meat eater and started cooking duck and lamb at home. We stick with organic when we can and I avoid pork and beef (I worry about the food chain and the sanitation in the states)

But boy, do I miss balsamic vinegar and HOT food. I haven't tried my favourite japanese food yet because no soy sauce will make me cry but I wonder if the hot wasabi (radish) powder will be too much, too. Oh, now I'm ****** off again.
good luck. have a yummy pizza with olive oil and parmesan cheese and yummy spices. sometimes I use pesto for sauce.
kt

[talksick]

Hi Karen,
You say Every day I am in pain, it seems no matter what I eat. But I kinda get the sense from your post that you might not be following the diet strictly enough cause you said: I just can't remember everything that I'm not suppose to eat, and every time I think I have it, I read something else that I was wrong about. So, I wouldn't conclude that diet has no effect on your symptoms yet. I was like this in the beginning of starting the diet.

First, I didn't want it to be true that diet would hurt me that much. So, I had to come to terms with that. Second, I didn't have the diet memorized well so I would be like uh is this in the maybe or usual column? (Then I'd eat something I shouldn't have). Last, even when I first started following the diet "strictly" I really wasn't cause I would make mistakes like....oh mashed potatoes I can have potatoes....(but duh not potatoes out of a box with like 6 bad preservatives on them). So, I would make mistakes like that that really killed my bladder.

Finally though I got the diet down and once I did my bladder really started feeling better. Now if I eat something bad I feel it right away and I know how important the diet is. So, I would suggest you really try to follow the diet strictly for a few weeks. Eat things only from the usual colomn....plain meat....plain baked potato....veggies are the staples and don't eat out. Even if it seems plain at a restaurant....trust me 99.9% it isn't....it will be preserved with something or marinated in something. So unless you can get all the ingredients and check them don't eat out. And be very careful about additives (no msg, no citric acid, no benzoates, nitrates, nitrites, etc.) you'd be suprised what is in food! So, I would try that for a while. Only if you've been on a really strict diet for awhile and it doesn't work would I give up on the idea of using the ic diet. For the majority of people it does make a difference. Once your bladder starts feeling better you can slowly reintroduce some things from the usually ok colomn one at a time and expand your food list.
Good Luck,
Kim :)

[meme]

Hey Karen.
The diet is really hard to stick to. Maybe you just haven't found your trigger foods yet. Sometimes what's usually okay for the rest of us might be making you flare. There's a lot of things on the diet that are no-nos that I can tolerate. Mayo and mustard don't bother me at all, I can even tolerate ketchup if I don't use a lot of it. For me the key is moderation. If I mess up one day then I make sure that the rest of the week I stick to a pretty strict IC diet and I usually do okay. Learned my lesson about that last month, had salsa one day and it didn't bother me, so the next day I had it again, BAD idea! Sent me into a flare. Think I would've been okay though if I hadn't had it that second day. I beat myself up a lot when I give into the cravings, but sticking strictly to the diet is so hard, and I LOVE food. There's always something in my mouth. My Husband makes fun of me because I can walk straight from bed and start eating. Grosses him out, lol! Good luck with the diet. Once I found my main triggers I started to feel so much better.

[kari1980]

Thanks for the responses. I know I need to try much harder, it just seems so hard to remember everything and figure it all out. I really need to read the ingredients better and get a better understanding on what's good and what's not, so any tips or advice I really appreciate, thanks.
Karen

[ICNDonna]

One thing you could do is print out the lists from the Patient Handbook and put a copy on your refrigerator and another in your purse. Once you find your trigger foods the diet gets easier --- and it's so worth it. I don't even have to look at the lists any more.

Sending encouraging hugs,
Donna

[mela414]

The IC diet is a way of life. After a while, you will know which foods not to even look at!
You have to change the way you prepare a lot of your food but you can still eat tasty things.
I eat mostly organic, nothing out of a can for me....no preservatives, no vinegars, mustard, mayo, nothing with citric acid........
Eventually, reading labels will become second nature. Your body will love you for it as you will be eating healthier. This diet keep me very lean too!
Hang in there..........you'll get it.

[Always L8]

I agree, it is so hard to not be able to put anything on sandwiches. I LOVE Mayo. I have picked up every mayo, barbque sauce, mustard, and dressing to read the label. The one thing I found that is okay for me is Hidden valley ranch dressing. I put that on everything. It has less than 2 percent of all the bad stuff for ICers. It works very well for me. Maybe you can give that a try.

[siriuspsyclist]

That ranch dressing sounds OK, but for me even the 2% can send me over the edge. Have you tried making the fresh mayo they have on the IC recipes section. It really satisfies the urge.

hope you're feelin' good today!