You do what you have to do. Am I right, POTSies?

This has been an exceptionally bad week. So much so that I think I’ve spent most of it in bed. I say I think because I’m having a difficult time remembering right now.

I’d like to be lying down in bed, but David is so exhausted from working both his regular job and security for the Pro Football Hall of Fame events over the past several days that he’s snoring voraciously. Enough to make my pounding headache worse. But he’ll only keep it up for another hour or so before he’ll quiet down. That’s the usual pattern.

I can tell that right now I am in desperate need of salt, despite having already ingested at least 3,000 mg in the past eight hours. And since I spent 21 hours in bed yesterday (after being up for about 30 hours), I’m way behind and my body is letting me know.

I’m having a major coat hanger phenomenon going on right now, which is where your head and neck hurt tremendously due to lack of oxygen to the head. That’s how Dr. Wilson explained it. And the Florinef has been giving me daily obnoxious headaches. I hate head pain, but I’m at least thankful that these headaches respond to ibuprofen, whereas my headaches a year ago from the brain tumor would hardly respond to the big guns. So if I need to deal with these headaches every day as a side effect of a medication that makes me feel a little bit better, I’ll take it.

So what does a POTSie do when she needs salt (and calories, honestly) at 4 am? Make a frozen (gluten free) pizza! 670 mg sodium if I eat the whole thing (and only 360 calories, which to me is very reasonable for an 8″ pizza.)

I suppose I could have gone with grilled cheese and (gluten free) tomato soup, which packs just about a whopping 1,000 grams of sodium altogether based on the kind I make. But I can’t stand up long enough right now to grill the sandwich. Details.

Ahhh, pizza. Probably one of the things I miss most with having celiac disease is good pizza. It’s one of the first foods I sought out when I started my gluten free diet almost five years ago. We’ve found some decent substitutes, but it’s still not the same as some good old pizza and buffalo chicken wings with bleu cheese dressing from back home.

Pizza devoured. Mission accomplished. And I’m feeling a tiny bit better already. Too bad it won’t last.

What do you do when you’re in need of salt, or another key nutrient? If you have celiac disease or are on another restricted diet, what food do you miss the most?

?ribbonrx

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