The no meat athlete

I don't eat a lot of meat. In fact, I tend not to buy it unless I'm throwing a party. Don't get me wrong, I love meat. One of my favorite dishes to make is puerco pibil, which is a Mexican dish that's hot and the pork just melts in your mouth. It's wonderful!

But I tend not to eat meat regularly. I always wondered if that would be a problem, and if it's the cause of my fatigue. Maybe I don't get enough iron. But I've found some great resources for running without eating meat. The No Meat Athlete has some great ideas on nutrition for runners.

Most people suggest eating beans and kale or other vitamin rich veggies and legumes. It sounds like a great idea, but it's hard to eat well here. Dad tends to get burritos on Thursdays, and chicken salads one day a week. Other than that, we pick at some things in the cabinet. We had clam chowder from a can tonight. I'm hoping that I can find some good recipes and start cooking again. It's easy to cook for two, and I'm sure he would appreciate it. I was thinking of making pumpkin bread again tonight. It just makes the house smell so good!

Watch for scurvy

Alcoholism is also bad for the nutritional system. Alcoholics often take in most of their calories from alcohol, and ignore the fact that you should have a healthy, balanced diet. I know that when I was on Weight Watchers I would eat less and drink more in order to lose weight. I always counted those calories, and I wouldn't be hungry when drinking a lot. You run the risk of all sorts of disorders from not getting enough vitamins.

What I didn't think about, though is that, "One of the main alcohol nutrition facts that perhaps most people don't realize is that the vitamin and nutrition deficiencies experienced by most alcoholics is not mainly due to poor eating habits, but from the malfunctioning of the body's organs and systems."

Your organs get pretty messed up with alcohol. Your liver and gallbladder aren't able to process a lot of stuff, and neither is your colon. Sometimes when you get the diarrhea associated with lots of drinking, or you vomit a lot, you aren't getting even the water that you are drinking, or the nutrients. Your colon does a lot to process nutrients. If it's not able to work, you're deficient.

Amazing what the body can do, and amazing how we fuck it up with substances.