Finally, I have 1 nice thing to say about Kaiser. Well actually I have 2. First, they treat their employees really well: pension, generous 401k match, excellent vacation time, you name it.
It’s great to work for Kaiser, but sucks to be a patient. Thank God for my blog and for social media. If you have a grievance, it’s no use screaming your head off to someone on the phone who isn’t paying attention to begin with. Tell the world the issue and someone who’s tasked with trolling the interweb for the company’s name will contact you and try to play peacemaker. Can’t say that’s solved any of my issues, but at least complaints have been filed and are “being discussed.” Yeah, whatever that means. Keep counting your money, Kaiser, and distribute the wealth among your employees while patients suffer from your gross incompetence!
The main nice thing I wanted to say about Kaiser is that I finally got some quality health care! Granted, I had to be proactive and make the appointment myself, nevertheless the Registered Dietitian I saw was so helpful, giving me one full hour of good counsel. She confirmed my nutritional death sentence, but advised me to take it one step at a time as it looks like I am already overwhelmed. “How about for 2 weeks, you pick one thing out of the list you’re going to give up. Then something else after 2 weeks and we’ll just take it slow.”
She continued, “A glass of wine isn’t going to derail your plan. But make it count. If you’re going to have wine or sugar, make sure it’s something you’re going to savor. Make it your favorite glass of wine or your favorite dessert. Then stop because you should be satisfied.”
So here is the nutritional death sentence.
I need a BMI of 19-20 which means I have to get to 91-95 pounds.
No dairy.
No soy.
No sugar.
No caffeine.
No alcohol.
No aspartame which can be found in gum.
No wheat.
No gluten.
—–
The limited things I can eat:
Fresh fruit and vegetables
Oatmeal
Quinoa
Sweet potatoes or yams
Avocado
Nuts
Nutbutter
Flaxseed
Rice cake
Eggs
Cinnamon
Organic Tomato Bisque soup from the SF Soup Co. (but limit soup to 1 cup a day or no more than 2500 mg of sodium a day)
I keep telling myself this isn’t forever. I can do this! The dietitian also has the same disorder I have, PCOS, so she had expert advice and resources for me to research. This is crazy time-consuming. I spend about an hour of every day researching vitamins, herbs, supplements, food products, books, resources, healers, and going to acupuncture. I need another vacation!
All I can say is– coconut oil/coconut milk! Super healthy, great for getting your calories up if you’re trying to gain weight. Make a smoothie with some coconut milk (the full-fat stuff from the can), some blueberries, some protein powder maybe….or almond butter instead!…add some ice, blend it up. YUM.
Ahh, thanks for the reminder Brody. I wrote coconut milk/oil in my planner for my next big grocery shopping experience. Sounds yummy too.
I have zero advice to offer on this front, but I hope you at least get a good end result from that crazy diet. Good luck!
PS – Thank GOD you can eat cinnamon. What would you do without that? Seriously though, what a random list ‘okay’ food items.
Thank you Cara for cheering me on! This diet is laughable. No way I’ll be able to gain weight without chocolate and ice-cream!