Being on a strict diet during the festive season.

My low salt diet is a tricky one during this festive season.  I went to a second birthday party on Saturday and the only thing I could eat there was fruit.  Of course there was plenty of food available - chips, sausages, bread, cakes, biscuits, salads with dressings - all too high in salt.  I now have to prepare my own food to take with me to parties or eat before I go.  It is tough seeing all that yummy looking food and knowing that I can't have a single bite.  However, I can't ask people to cater just for me and I'd much rather do without any of those foods than have a vertigo attack. 

But it is annoying having to prepare my own food for every occasion.

First Words.

I caught our cat in Maya's room, where she is not allowed to go, and yelled "Out Out" at her. Now whenever Maya sees the cat she chases her yelling "Oot Oot". Poor cat.

I've been teaching Maya the names of body parts. I taught her the word eye recently by pointing to my own eye. Now Maya will poke me in the eye saying "aye aye". :-|

I'm amazed at just how much Maya can understand now. Her vocabulary is still very small, but she can definitely understand what people are saying to her.  If I say "It's dinner time Maya" she will go to her high chair. I say "milk" and she heads to the fridge. I love this new understanding between us, although we do both still get frustrated when we don't always understand each other.

The stages of walking.

	Maya has been 'walking' for a long time now.  She cruises the furniture.
There was a short time when she walked holding on to a walker, but she kept getting frustrated whenever she bumped into something and then totally refused to use it any more.
	Instead she walks holding on to someone's hands and last week my mother in law managed to get Maya to walk holding on with only one hand.  (Thanks Trish :)

The lasting effects of Meniere's Disease.

Due to Meniere's Disease both my hearing and balance are permanently damaged in my affected ear.  I am lucky so far to only have this disease in one ear (there is a 50% chance I will one day develop it in my other ear).  My 'good' ear has taken over my hearing now and in most normal day to day activities I am able to participate in conversations and hear sounds around me, so you wouldn't notice that I am quite deaf in my left ear.  However, in some noisy environments I will struggle to hear someone talking to me if they are facing my 'bad' ear.  For instance walking down a busy street with someone on my left makes it almost impossible for me to hear what they are saying with traffic noise steadily on my right side.

This year with my many repeated attacks my hearing has worsened in my left ear.  The attacks have also made the balance damage on my left side a lot worse.  To be upright and walk my right side must have taken over.  (It's amazing how the brain can relearn and then compensate for damage.)  However, the balance damage leaves me feeling like I am moving sometimes, when in fact I am completely still (like getting off a boat and maintaining your sea legs).  It can be very unpleasant and often I am assessing whether I am actually moving or not by scanning my surroundings.

There was a period of a couple of weeks where I felt like I was moving almost non-stop (after going through some very awful balance tests, which I do not recommend at all - unnecessary and unneeded).  I was scared that I was going to remain in motion for the rest of my life.  Some Meniere's Disease suffers (usually those with MD in both ears) remain in constant motion.  Can you imagine that?  Feeling like you are constantly swaying nearly every minute of the day, whether you are moving or not.  A couple of weeks of it was enough for me.  And I felt motion sick with the constant movement.  I am so glad it resettled again and now I am back to occasionally feeling like I am in motion.  This happened to me when I was first diagnosed too and it did eventually cease altogether.  So I am hoping if the vertigo attacks continue to stay away maybe I will once again regain control of my balance.

Maya Cruises the Furniture.

Maya understands words.

Maya says 'Mum'.

Finally at 13 months Maya can say "Mum". :)

Maya stands up.

I choose to rejoice in my child's achievements.

When I announced recently that Maya had finally said 'Mum' for the very first time (something I have been waiting for since other babies seem to have mastered this word a very long time ago) a friend and fellow parent said "You will start to regret she can say Mum, when she gets old enough to whinge."

When I told someone that I cannot wait for Maya to start talking so that she can actually tell me what's wrong or what she wants, a friend and fellow parent said "You will regret when she starts talking because she will then talk back to you."

And a few people I've mentioned to that I am looking forward to Maya learning to walk have told me "Oh but then you'll have to run after her all day". I also got this same comment when Maya learnt to crawl for this first time.

Seriously what's up with the negative replies? And I can't believe that some of these comments are from parents.

First of all, every stage is going to have positives and negatives. Every stage! I know that but I would like to focus on the positives.

Yeah sure when Maya was a newborn she lay still and I didn't have to run after her, she slept longer hours and she didn't talk back to me. But I don't miss the newborn stage AT ALL. I don't miss the utter lack of sleep, being woken several times at night, all the crying that newborns do and constantly trying to guess what was wrong. I was happy when Maya started sleeping more at night and when she was able to sit and then crawl. She was then able to occupy herself more and was much happier.

I also love that Maya can express herself a bit more through pointing and grunting. I don't always understand what she wants but sometimes I do get it right. Which is why I do actually want my little girl to talk one day so she can tell me when her tummy is sore or say "Mum I want some milk", rather than me guessing all the time. Sure I probably won't enjoy hearing "Mum you're a poopy head" but I reckon it's better than the tears or screams of frustration as she desperately tries to communicate her wants and needs. And how about the heart-warming words of "I love you Mum". I reckon they'll be pretty special words to hear.

I also want to see her walking. At the moment Maya loves walking and it's all she wants to do all day. However, she cannot walk on her own. She needs someone to hold her hands. And who's the person who spends most of their time with Maya. Yes me. So I spend a lot of time bent over helping her to walk, which leads to a sore back. I can't wait for her to walk on her own so that I can save my back.

Secondly, I am a parent who actually wants to see her child succeed and develop. Yes sure, as I already said, each stage brings negative things but she needs to go through each stage in order to progress and develop. She needs to learn to talk. She needs to learn to walk. And I choose to rejoice in her achievements and deal with the new challenges they bring.

My new diet.

To help combat Meniere's Disease I am now on a strict no caffeine, no alcohol and low salt diet. The no caffeine includes no chocolate but I just cannot stick to that one. As for the low salt I am sure it probably doesn't sound that bad does it? Just gotta avoid chips and don't add salt to your food. I wish. No I now have to read every label of everything very carefully to make sure it meets the low salt standard of 120mg or less per 100g. So what does that rule out:

• Bread and bread products like rolls, buns, muffins, crumpets, piklets, apple scrolls, etc (Bread is actually very high in salt. Lucky for me there are a couple of companies that do make a low salt bread alternative, however only one of them is edible and for a while they stopped making it altogether because not enough people wanted low salt bread. That still rules out being able to have rolls, buns, apple scrolls, etc);


• Breakfast cereals (Most breakfast cereals are high in salt. There are a couple of low salt alternatives.);


• Cheese!! (Cheese is extremely high in salt. Yes, all cheese.);


• Asian cooking sauces like soya sauce, oyster sauce, etc;
  


• Cakes (Self raising flour is very high in salt - so anything with self raising flour is out);


• Convenient cooking sauces like pasta sauce (Everything now has to be made from scratch); and


• What I miss most of all... take away & restaurant food! (I have thought of ONE take away possible - fish and chips because it is cooked from scratch and you can ask for no salt to be added. However, I cannot think of a single other possibility. I really miss having take away food as an option. It means no time out from cooking. If anyone can think of any other take away or restaurant options I'd love to hear them.)

Plus of course many other manufactured foods are high in salt while fresh foods like fruit and vegetables are low in salt. So my diet is much healthier than it even has been - eating plenty of fresh fruit and veges and making food from scratch with fresh, natural ingredients. Plus best of all.. it doesn't rule out one of my favourite foods - ice cream!

The truth is most people's diets are way too high in salt. High salt can lead to high blood pressure, heart disease and other health related problems. Sticking to a low salt diet seems to prevent the vertigo from Meniere's Disease from occurring for the majority of suffers. Doctors believe the reason is that Meniere's Disease is caused by fluid retention in the inner ear and high salt in a diet leads to fluid retention.

I don't really care why sticking to my diet stops the vertigo. If it works it's worth sticking with in my opinion. It's just a tricky diet to get used to. Salt is in nearly everything we eat. Even low salt alternatives are generally too high in salt. The low salt diet isn't catered to by manufacturers. So until they do I guess I'll be cooking from scratch - but health wise that's not a bad thing.