Something over a year ago, I reverted to vegetarianism. I very quickly became even more ill than normal, abandoned it, and pretty quickly got back to my normal state of sustained mediocrity.
That time, I believed I focused too much on soya products and meat analogues. This time I reverted to the eighties, and the same wholefood veggie diet I ate quite happily for about 20 years, and I was fine – I thought.
There has, though, been a severe, if relatively slow, deterioration in my condition. This could be a natural consequence of what ails me, though none of that should make me physically weak, and I most certainly am, nor should it totally trash my tolerance for alcohol, which has also happened.
So is it my diet? As you might know, the body assembles proteins from the amino acids in food, which is why a balanced veggie or vegan diet is never, despite what the numpties like Giles Coren firmly believe, going to make you weak and feeble. In normal circumstances.
My circumstances aren’t normal, though, and since the mid eighties I’ve been seriously ill, worsening with each year that passed (I’ve been chronically ill since the age of 2), and developing COPD in the early/mid nineties. Now, of course, I have a brace of conditions that are potentially fatal.
Anyway, in the eighties I developed a theory that, when I was ill, vegetarianism made my body work too hard to obtain things like protein, whereas feeding it meat, with its perfect amino acid balance, might well have been easier on my system.
The problem is that the two main protein sources, grains (and grain products), and pulses (beans, peas, lentils etc), are each low in a couple of amino acids but, conveniently, grains are high in the amino acids pulses in which pulses are low, and vice versa – which is why I think assembling proteins from them makes the body work harder.
I did, on one occasion, put the idea to a dietician at the local hospital (who was very anti-veggie, until I showed her my kitchen workbook, when she conceded that I actually did know what I was doing), and she thought that the idea might well be valid, but as far as she knew, it had never been studied.**
So, then, is my current veggie venture proving too much for my seriously limited and impaired physical resources? It feels that way, certainly, but as I said above, there might be other reasons (to put it in technical terms, maybe I’m just screwed).
Still, finding out is easy enough, so I’ve just put a meat order in to Tesco.*** Not that I intend to revert to an entirely meat diet – my diet has been partly veggie for years, but I think a reasonable intake of easily-assimilable protein, in the form of meat and fish, might improve matters.
I won’t, however, stop making my veggie sausages, not least because they’re bloody good, but I will be making some more lamb and rosemary, as well as bog-standard pork which, oddly, I haven’t made yet. Maybe a chilli sausage too – beans, pork, tomatoes and chillies – sounds good to me.
I might, though, be clutching at straws – we’ll see – but what isn’t an option is sitting here and doing nothing. Maybe I can’t change anything, but I can sure as hell try!
**Anyone moved to tell me I’m wrong – and I’m willing to concede that I might be – has to provide proof, in the form of a link to an accessible research paper that has been favourably peer-reviewed (not lunatic fringe cobblers). Otherwise, it’s just your opinion and worth no more than mine. Less, in fact, since I can be an opinionated bugger! 
***Sausages (Jamie Oliver’s Cumberland – mercifully free of extraneous crap, unlike many mass-market bangers), a large piece of brisket, and a Wiltshire ham joint. The two joints, cooked, portioned and frozen, will keep me going for months (you don’t need to eat a lot of meat – a couple of ounces a day is ample). I’ve also got two packs of Birds Eye frozen pies, Mince & Onion, and Chicken, in the freezer.
Something over a year ago, I reverted to vegetarianism. I very quickly became even more ill than normal, abandoned it, and pretty quickly got back to my normal state of sustained mediocrity.
That time, I believed I focused too much on soya products and meat analogues. This time I reverted to the eighties, and the same wholefood veggie diet I ate quite happily for about 20 years, and I was fine – I thought.
There has, though, been a severe, if relatively slow, deterioration in my condition. This could be a natural consequence of what ails me, though none of that should make me physically weak, and I most certainly am, nor should it totally trash my tolerance for alcohol, which has also happened.
So is it my diet? As you might know, the body assembles proteins from the amino acids in food, which is why a balanced veggie or vegan diet is never, despite what the numpties like Giles Coren firmly believe, going to make you weak and feeble. In normal circumstances.
My circumstances aren’t normal, though, and since the mid eighties I’ve been seriously ill, worsening with each year that passed (I’ve been chronically ill since the age of 2), and developing COPD in the early/mid nineties. Now, of course, I have a brace of conditions that are potentially fatal.
Anyway, in the eighties I developed a theory that, when I was ill, vegetarianism made my body work too hard to obtain things like protein, whereas feeding it meat, with its perfect amino acid balance, might well have been easier on my system.
The problem is that the two main protein sources, grains (and grain products), and pulses (beans, peas, lentils etc), are each low in a couple of amino acids but, conveniently, grains are high in the amino acids pulses in which pulses are low, and vice versa – which is why I think assembling proteins from them makes the body work harder.
I did, on one occasion, put the idea to a dietician at the local hospital (who was very anti-veggie, until I showed her my kitchen workbook, when she conceded that I actually did know what I was doing), and she thought that the idea might well be valid, but as far as she knew, it had never been studied.**
So, then, is my current veggie venture proving too much for my seriously limited and impaired physical resources? It feels that way, certainly, but as I said above, there might be other reasons (to put it in technical terms, maybe I’m just screwed).
Still, finding out is easy enough, so I’ve just put a meat order in to Tesco.*** Not that I intend to revert to an entirely meat diet – my diet has been partly veggie for years, but I think a reasonable intake of easily-assimilable protein, in the form of meat and fish, might improve matters.
I won’t, however, stop making my veggie sausages, not least because they’re bloody good, but I will be making some more lamb and rosemary, as well as bog-standard pork which, oddly, I haven’t made yet. Maybe a chilli sausage too – beans, pork, tomatoes and chillies – sounds good to me.
I might, though, be clutching at straws – we’ll see – but what isn’t an option is sitting here and doing nothing. Maybe I can’t change anything, but I can sure as hell try!
**Anyone moved to tell me I’m wrong – and I’m willing to concede that I might be – has to provide proof, in the form of a link to an accessible research paper that has been favourably peer-reviewed (not lunatic fringe cobblers). Otherwise, it’s just your opinion and worth no more than mine. Less, in fact, since I can be an opinionated bugger!
***Sausages (Jamie Oliver’s Cumberland – mercifully free of extraneous crap, unlike many mass-market bangers), a large piece of brisket, and a Wiltshire ham joint. The two joints, cooked, portioned and frozen, will keep me going for months (you don’t need to eat a lot of meat – a couple of ounces a day is ample). I’ve also got two packs of Birds Eye frozen pies, Mince & Onion, and Chicken, in the freezer.