All Caught up, and a gout attack!

For most of 2009 and spring of 2010 I was pretty sure I was on the edge of having gout.  My mother had it, and Craig was told he has had at least one attack. When he was in pain I did a lot of research about it.  Then  I tried to be fairly careful about what we ate and avoided many of the foods that are said to be  bad.  I was taking care of myself and being a "good wife."

Last spring I asked my Doctor about it and he assured me that I "did not have gout."

So I started eating things that I had been avoiding like red meat and beans and lots of mushrooms and asparagus!  I also started enjoying red wine again, but then I had some painful joints and the Doctor prescribed  Mobic.  (At that time I again stopped all alcohol.)

Months go by.  I felt great.  The Mobic was working.

Until the World Series!  During the playoffs we had lots of "baseball food."  Hot dogs, Bratworst, beans.  Ice cream became an evening ritual after the games. I even had some forbidden beer!  On the last night of the series, we had a steak dinner with red wine, and a bottle of champagne to celebrate.

36 hours later, while grocery shopping, my ankle seemed to disintegrate into 1000 shards of broken glass.  I could barley walk and hung onto the cart to get myself into the van and home.  I called the doctor and described what had happen

and he said, "Sounds like a gout attack."

 No kidding.  I knew that, and now he finally gave me some medication for it.  He also suggested a vegetarian diet for at least a week to ten days.  I'm doing that, and I do know what foods to avoid in the future.  It's not hard, but when he told me in spring that I didn't have it I saw no reason to give up red meat and all the other things I liked.

So for now I'm not eating any meat and my ankle is ok again.  Tomorrow I want to resume walking.  Next week I'll try some chicken.

On another note, I finished all of the sculptures that had been ordered and shipped the last of them this morning.

The next two weeks will be devoted to a much needed house cleaning effort.  Thanksgiving is just around the corner and we will be having family visit.