2003-07-02

A flower in a sea of shit

Seven days and seven pounds later, I finally feel better! Woo! I even ate dinner last night. A real, full dinner. With onion mashed potatoes and everything. I suppose now that I'm eating again, that the seven pounds will come back on :( ah, well. It's worth it to eat without getting sick.

I went to an urgent care doctor, which Ken calls a "doc in a box" on Monday. I just wanted to find out why the sicky was holding on for so long, and if I should worry. (Because you know I was worrying anyway)He said it sounds like a stomach virus, and he doesn't think that I got it from eating a bad bagged salad. I try not to mention to doctors that I'm vegan unless it's specific to why I'm there, because I don't care for the eye roll or other irritating looks, But he asked me if I could have eaten any bad meat, eggs, or dairy. I said, "No, I don't eat any of those..." and he got a smile on his face and said, "How long have you been vegan?" I told him vegan for two years, and vegetarian for eleven years. You are never going to believe what he tells me next! He said that his wife is a vegetarian, and that he is weaning himself off of meat in order to eventually be a vegetarian!

A regular doctor said this! Whoo hoo!

Then as he's poking around on my abdomen and looking in my mouth with his little flashlight, he's talking about how common it is for him to hear from patients that think you have to eat meat to be healthy. He said, "It's amazing that people continue eat food that eventually will make them sick at some point, because they think it's the healthy thing to do." This was a younger, more fit looking doctor, too. Not the more common spare tire stomach doctor figure I'm used to seeing. It's the fat, out of shape doctors that like to grimace when I mention being a vegetarian.

I tell you, it was like finding a flower in a sea of shit, this doctor.

He did ask me if I get tested for B12 defeciency, and I told him that I regularly take a B complex and also eat enriched foods like soymilk. He told me that I had it covered. For once, I didn't feel defensive when hearing the words "B12 defeciency".

Only two more days of work this week, and no demos this weekend. Whew. I can't wait to sleep.