These past few days, I did something stupid. By doing that, I scared my family half to death. Now I feel guilty, I even go out of my way to take care of my mom myself, like she's been doing it always, but especially in the last few days, when she was so scared and she couldn't even eat because of that.
So in short, this is what happened: as some of my friends know, I am a heart patient. I had two surgeries, one of them was open heart. Being a heart patient, I must follow a certain lifestyle and a low sodium diet. Sodium was the culprit for my state these days, or I should say I was to blame, not the sodium itself.
So: If I eat salt, liquid builds up inside my abdomen. around my organs & especially my liver. The liver can also become enlarged; this means I get what doctors call ascites, a symptom liver patients get. It's not pleasant, at all!!
I got overzealous and eliminated all sodium in my diet: no salt food, no salt bread. I want to make myself clear: no salt AT ALL!! Now a good doctor will tell you the human body needs sodium to function. We simply CANNOT eliminate all salt in our diet, we will upset a very delicate and important balance in our bodies. The medical term is electrolyte balance. Upsetting this balance can lead to various situations. One of them is hyponatremia, meaning a too low level of sodium in the human body. Symptoms of hyponatremia include nausea and vomiting, headache, confusion, lethargy, fatigue, appetite loss, restlessness and irritability, muscle weakness, spasms, or cramps, seizures, and decreased consciousness or coma.
I had various of the symptoms. Except for seizures and the following ones, thank God! I had a deviant behaviour, I'm even ashamed to confess some of it. This got my mom really scared, along with my sister. I ended up in the ER, obviously. They took me to a psychiatrist, that stupid doc didn't even look at me. He said I was under the influence of drugs, that I was high. Idiot! Another one scratched the soles of my feet with a needle. Needless and ouchy. Infectious diseases specialist, duh! Then I was taken to the ICU, there they finally learned I had hyponatremia. They had me under iv with saline solution and sedated. When I was a little better, I was sent inside the Arges County Hospital, Here an internist took my case. I would really like to thank her: She is Violeta Marinescu MD. She is the one who brought me back from madness Ha-ha! So thank you, Doc!
So the lesson for me, and my word of caution for all people following a low sodium diet out there, is this: DO NOT eliminate all sodium from your diet!! Don't be stupid like me, you can endanger your sanity, your health, and eventually your life!!!
