By SUE GOSS
Nutrition is a hot topic among many in the community, not the least being people with epilepsy and their friends. In this article Sue Goss takes a light hearted and informative look at some aspects of nutrition that you might find enlightening.
Let's start with the extremely ugly. The message is simple, "Listen to your body, and if it's not telling you anything, listen harder until it gets the courage to speak to you."
Your body will probably say, "Coffee/tea/junk food/ tomato sauce". Why?
Caffeine works in the body as a nervous system stimulant that affects the adrenal cortex. Once adrenalin has been released, it activates the liver to secrete glycogen, its stored blood sugar. The rise in blood sugar accounts for the lift that coffee and tea give the body. It is the drop later, when the blood sugar is acted upon and brought below normal by the subsequently released insulin, that is dangerous for people with seizures. Coffee is a proconvulsant especially at high doses. It constricts the cranial blood vessels - great if you've got a migraine, terrible if you have epilepsy. And the subsequent depression may be severe in some of us.
Make the break! Stop taking this proconvulsant which can only act against your medication and confuse your neurochemistry. But how? I found that a gradual reduction of coffee, tea and chocolate has been effective. I felt especially proud (and especially well) on days when I successfully went without coffee altogether. How is it that we know what it does to us (as with cigarette smokers), but we still keep taking it? Find a variety of herb teas or caffeine-free coffees, Milo or beef soup and steadily replace your caffeine drinks with these. It's a new world for those of us who can!.
Watch out for caffeine in medication (eg. Sudafed knocks me out for a day), diet drinks and anything else which comes in small packages. Above all ... become a label reader and stick to what is safe for you.
And now for something completely different ...
The extremely good (but always in moderation. You can die from carrot juice poisoning - it has been done!).
Vitamins
Since society's change from natural produce to convenience foods, those of us with epilepsy must become more conscious of nutrition if we are to remain effective members of society.
It is simply not enough to take a shelf full of supplements every day and continue with the rubbish that most people eat.
Some medications deplete vitamins, especially vitamins K, D and Folic Acid (a B-complex). I take a multi-B supplement daily, but I do the rest with real food.
Phenytoin can reduce the amount of calcium we are able to take in. We can drink lots of milk (soy if you are allergic to cow's milk like I am), eat cheese, and get lots of yoghurt, especially those containing acidophilus, which is amongst the most recent findings of essentials for people with epilepsy. In fact anything containing a lot of Vitamin D will help restore the calcium balance - so a sardine sandwich with real butter is ideal especially if taken regularly, sitting in the sun.
Vitamin K is another kettle of fish. Phenytoin and Phenobarb shoot it down, and we need it to clot the holes. Huge plates full of spinach, broccoli and cabbage are ideal, otherwise have an egg with your sardine sandwich and some soy milk to follow. Have two egg yolks. They will also supply essential magnesium, chromium, zinc, Vitamins A, B3, B5, B12, D, E and K. Wow!! All you anti-cholesterol addicts, pay attention. Look what you are missing out on!
If you have a sardine and egg sandwich sitting in the sun on a bed of lettuce (not you, the sandwich) using wholemeal bread, you will not only get a lot of useful fibre but also calcium, iron, magnesium, potassium (you can eat prunes instead for this), chromium, manganese, selenium and zinc (watch out for the egg). This lovely nutty bread, apart from being delicious (which after the spinach is a real bonus) will find you with Vitamins B1, B2, Niacin (if you add some grated cheese, you will get a double dose of this), B5, B6, Biotin and E (especially important for us). Perhaps it would be easier to have Vegemite (don't forget to read the label" it might contain some horrific additives as well), but it would not be nearly so much fun.
As you sip your newly-squeezed (no additives) orange juice (Vitamin C), you might contemplate taking a Brewer's Yeast pill. These are, apparently, full of just about everything. Chromium, copper selenium, Vitamins B1 (or you could have brown rice for tea), B2 (but you are already having fish and cheese), Niacin (or Vegemite), B6 (lots of prunes!), Folic acid (includes Vitamin B9) or you could have liver on your brown rice, Biotin (don't worry, you've got two egg yolks) ...
The point I am trying to make here is that it is not necessary to have a shelf full of vitamin pills. Half an hour in the library will give you all the information you need to know about vitamins and minerals so that you can have delicious and nutritious meals for people with epilepsy and their unhealthy families, without being a gourmet cook. But don't eat the books!
If you are really wealthy, you can do it in style. Oysters are packed full of iron and phosphorus as are almonds and dried apricots. Manganese is listed as essential for nerve function, so have avocado with your oysters, sprinkled with nuts, with extra oysters for zinc.
Whenever you are making stuffing, throw in a handful of wheatgerm and you will automatically receive a handsome dose of Vitamins B1, B5, Folic Acid, Biotin, Vitamin E and K. Of course, you could simply eat lots of potatoes, which are great for potassium, Vitamin B1 and the essential Vitamin K. Just look at any Irishman. Say no more ...
You can have quite a lot of fun as I have done, matching up a full list of essential vitamins, minerals and enzymes to all the food you like - or didn't think you should have.
Here starts another big argument. Do I get healthy or do I get fat? A lot of the really useful food like red meat, eggs, potatoes and butter are eliminated by health-freaks which is why Andy thinks they all look so sick (as well as thin). They are not getting nearly enough of the essential vitamins and so they have to take supplementary pills. Very expensive. They may as well eat avocado and oysters with a wholemeal bun and butter.
Many other contentions will enter the bones here also. Everybody knows perfectly well that margarine is full of as many poisonous substances as cigarettes because of the processes through which it must go, but nobody dares say so because too much money is at stake. You will have to decide for yourself on an effective combination which works just for you.
Some more of the rather bad-to-poisonous
If you read a full list of additives you would never buy a packet of biscuits again. There are dozens of substances which are put in packets and tins and bottles of goo which are known by the medical profession to cause asthma, hyperactivity and other allergies, but they are still allowed to put them there.
Don't buy anything yellow, unless it is an egg. Don't give rainbow ice-cream to the visitors, or put tomato paste in your sauce. Make your own gravy. Watch out for jams and fruit juices. One of the worst is soft drinks - how can you stop anyone drinking Coke (full of caffeine) or even Solo (look at the label and give it to the dog).
Lists of food additives are available from the Epilepsy Foundation and in the Reader's Digest Guide to Alternative Therapy, as well as many other places. If you can eliminate at least some of this rubbish from your diet, you will start living again for certain.
And back to the really good
Sugar: Why do I like to sneak the odd barley sugar at odd times? Maybe it is because my body tells me that I am getting too near the hypoglycaemic level.
People with epilepsy are usually advised to eat six or seven smaller meals each day. If you are liable to seizures in the early morning, try a hot muffin with (home made) jam and butter late at night. Don't push yourself too far between meals. I am much more likely to experience small seizures just before afternoon tea than just after it. High fibre (are you sick of hearing about it?) actually works as a control on fluctuations in blood sugar.
Preventing glucose highs and lows is essential. Serum glucose levels are usually extremely low just before a seizure, especially in children, and much can be regulated by ensuring a continual but not too high intake of sugar, while having plenty of steamed potatoes.
This is no joke! If the digestive system has to work longer and more slowly to digest the food, then the blood sugar will be released more slowly over a longer period. Cholesterol levels will be much lower also. People with diabetes can control the danger of seizures from high blood sugar levels with diet and so can we. Check with your neurologist about all this first.
I was devastated when I read that honey as a sweetener should be avoided - this is what made my constant coffees taste bearable. But when I started with soy milk I didn't need honey - and then I didn't need coffee either. Wonderful stuff.
A really good thing
I love Mars Bars, but there is too much 'stuff' in them for my general health. What to do?
Take your savings to the market and get a supply of mixed nuts, pineapple pieces, banana chips, extra almonds and dried apricots. Add a dash of shredded coconut, a few handfuls of pepitas and some sunflower seeds. Mix it all up and put it in little bags to be thrown into your pocket if you think you may not be coming home at an unreliable time. Take two for a really good time. Make sure that the rest are kept airtight. If you are keen, look through your list of vitamins, minerals and enzymes to find out how much good you are about to do for yourself. Then eat them and do it.
BE ENERGISED AND ALERT. EAT YOUR WAY TO A BETTER LIFE.
A checklist of good and bad
Have a good breakfast and have a healthy day.
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© Epilepsy Foundation of Victoria July 1997 |