Our 7 year old son will be going on prednisone during Christmas break to help slow the progression of his MD. He will be monitoried closely by his Neurologist for wt gain, glucose levels, and blood pressure. We need to have him on a low sugar, low cal, and low sodium diet. The whole family will be doing this together. I need to know if there are any websites or books any of you can suggest for snack and meal ideas. I just started paying attention to labels and could not believe the levels of sodium in so many different things that we eat. This is going to be harder than I thought.
I don't know if this would help or not but maybe try a diabetic cookbook. Lots of diabetics have to follow similar diets. My mom has done this for my stepdad and said their are a lot of good recipes out there. Hope this helps and good luck.
J.
Hey K.,
This sounds challenging for you all but I am impressed you will be braving it. The best and easiest way for you to eat is to throw away the boxes and cans. Anything processed is going to be off your list.
We do meat and 2 veggies almost every night. This allows you to shake things up. Lemon and parsley are very flavorful and don't contain any sugar, cals, or sodium. You can marinate almost any meat in that or toss rice or quinoa in olive oil with lemon and parsley. Or lime and cilantro with black beans (rinse them if you're using cans to wash away the packaged sodium). Use herbs and citrus to flavor things and you will get great tasting stuff that won't make you all feel like you're suffering. Popular combos - Orange juice and tarragon, basil and tomato (use fresh), rosemary and garlic, lemon or lime with mint, green onions wake everything up.
Also sweet potatoes and winter squash taste sweet and help satisfy a sweet tooth. Plus fruit is an excellent dessert. You can also make smoothies for breakfast and we eat oatmeal without sugar in our house. Occasionally we'll use Stevia to sweeten it. A little goes a long way!
The other thing you have to do is read read read every label. And eat at home, foods you prepare yourself, as much as you can. Whole Foods has a wealth of things for you. But watch out - just because it's organic, or just because they sell it at Whole Foods does not mean it's healthy. You still need to read labels.
When in doubt make everything yourself. You can do this!
Good luck,
E.
My 18 month old daughter has been on prednisone for the last year. There is a great book written by a pediatric nephrologist called Coping with Prednisone. It gave me a good baseline for expectations and things I can do. It doesn't have recipies, but it has been a very helpful resource for me during the last year. Good luck and wishing your son good health.
Working mom with 2 daughters, ages 3 and 18 months.
when my friend got diagnosed with kidney disease she had to watch her sodium. Maybe if you researched meals for kidney patients you would have better luck? I know diabetics also have to watch their sodium, sugar and calories so that may be another method of research for you.
Ask your Dr about what hospital he is affiliated(SP) with and ask to speak with the nutritionist/dietician. Hospitals have to deal with many special diets all the time and some of their dieticians will meet with pts and community members to help with those diets. They may have some recipe ideas or other resources you could use. Good Luck
I think we could all benefit from such a "diet"!
Essentially it sounds like you'll have to immerse yourself and your family in good, whole foods...mostly shopping from the outside aisles of the grocery store with little of those processed convenience foods located all along the inner aisles. Things we usually buy, like salad dressing for example, can be easily made at home with simple ingredients that you have complete control over. Balsamic vinegar,olive oil and a teaspoon of mustard and some garlic if you so desire. So tasty and so simple, an no "extra" ingredients.
Another idea, for example, is if your son likes juice (very high in sugar) try doing half juice and half sparkling water. Get some fizz and half the sugar! Dairy products, yogurt, cottage cheese, milk. Probably already staples in your fridge. I know what you mean about labels though. I find it quite frightening what passes as food actually. Anything manufactured/processed, from cereal, crackers, cans of soup, flavored rice packages etc etc...all are pretty much loaded with sugar, sodium and preservatives to enhance their "convenience". It can be a pain to make everything from scratch and take a bit more time but it really is the only way you can be sure of what your family is eating.
Do you have a veggie or rice steamer? It make things easier to have a separate small appliance to be cooking away without you while you focus on other things.
Check out Cooking Light magazine..they have amounts of fat,salt,sugar listed for each of their recipies.
www.epicurious.com is a great website to fine recipes for any ingredient you can think of.
Good luck and congrats for making everyone in your household healthier!!
check out his books
very healthy, excellent for kids!! and mantaining blood glucose. The fat burning diet. I would get some of his protein powder for a quick and easy breakfast. No sugar , stevia instead.
I highly recommend the Better Homes and Gardens Diabetic Cookbook. I was on a low carb/low sugar diet during both pregnancies and my husband gave me this cookbook. I have always been on a low sodium diet too (by choice) and have really enjoyed these recipes.
I also recommend looking at All Recipes [http://allrecipes.com/Default.aspx] for other recipes. I have found that it is easier to find recipes by ingredient, and have been experimenting with new dishes as a result. There are also a lot of cooking sites and blogs out there. If you pick an ingredient base and do a google search (i.e. beet side dish) you can find tons of stuff. I seem to recall some sites that address the low-salt diets specifically.
When you need to be on a diet like this, then it is generally best to make all foods from scratch if you can, as then you can control the ingredients going in. For restaurants, you can often rely on salads to fit the diet, although I highly recommend you make up a dressing to bring along that fits the diet too - most dressings are loaded with sugar and often salt too.
Good luck!
Your best bet is learning how to cook meals without using prepared ingredients and staying away from the center aisles. I call this perimeter shopping. Just the perimeter of the grocery store where you can get fresh vegetables, fresh dairy and meats. The one additional aisle I venture down is for whole grains and legumes and spices.
As you mentioned, labels tell an ugly truth of not just the sodium but the sugar content as well. What's worse is once you learn all of the other names that sugar and salt (MSG) can hide under, some items can have the first 4 out of 5 ingredients as sugar.
The hardest part I think is finding healthy meals to cook that are VERY quick!!! Giada DiLaurentis has some great meals "Every Day Italian" is a great cookbook as is her others that has quick meals, most of which are 8 ingredients or less and take 10-30 min. to prepare, which is key for us busy moms!
Good luck!
My mom is on a similar diet. Zucchini bread and zucchini bakes are good cuz the kid can't see the "weird green zucchini" in it, and you can carve breads and bakes into cute shapes to give to kids.
I'm on a low sodium diet and it was daunting at first. The main cookbook I use is "The No-Salt, Lowest Sodium Cookbook" by Donald A. Gazzaniga.
I also buy some foods on the internet at www.Healthyheartmarket.com Trader Joes and Whole Foods carry some low sodium items as well. My latest find is the Spice House in Evanston, because without salt you will be using the arsenal in your spice drawer.
Eating out is the most daunting of tasks. You can forget any type of pizza, Mexican and most Chinese food.
Send me a message if you want more info. Salt does hide in some amazing places!
Good luck!
