An Unwelcome Visitor:  Chapter 10
                                                 
                                        A change in taste and palette!!

         One of the many changes that have occurred over the past thirteen years are to my taste buds and indeed to my palette as a whole (perhaps that should be cake hole?)! About the time of my diagnosis, I suddenly developed a major allergy towards bananas, was this something that could be put down to M.S, I have no idea but for as long as I could remember, I used to love them and anything that was banana flavoured, ice cream, milkshakes anything at all, I loved it. The reaction, that seemed to happen totally out of the blue, caused me to be violently sick, gave me incredible stomach pains, believe me, it was nasty! Out of ignorance to the Unwelcome Visitor who was about to make an appearance, I tried to persevere with them  for a while but always had the same result, so I just stopped eating them and that particular problem stopped, or so I thought! A few months later and yours truly went to hell in a hand cart and I was diagnosed with M.S and as I have blogged about since, I was out of action for almost a year!  During that time, especially in the early days, my Doctor would prescribe to me these multi-vitamin milkshakes, loaded full of all of the nutrients and vitamins, that hopefully would help my body regain some of the weight  that I had lost and generally help to build me up again. They came in a variety of flavours and had the consistency of plaster but if they were supposed to do me good, I was game and so I had a good go with all of them, except one, banana flavour!  This gave me the same reaction as normal bananas, it went in and it duly came back up  again, so we decided to leave that one out and just stick to all of the other flavours.  For a start you needed 'industrial strength suction power' because they were so thick and the straws were so bloody thin, they must have been crammed full of all of the goodness that the laboratory could cram into that little box but I'm sorry, they all tasted the same to me!  I know they were supposed to help with my recovery but I ended up hating them with a passion and I remember pleading with my wife not to get them anymore!! Even to this day, I am not keen on milkshakes of any kind, I admit, I do have a problem with them, I think they scare me!
                                   Other things that I once enjoyed that have since been consigned to the bin are Lucozade(glucose drinks of any kind)!  For nearly six  months of 2000, I was permanently  sick, so I drank the stuff to get rid of the horrible taste that was  always present, bottles, cans, whatever. When I began to improve health-wise and  the vomiting stopped, I grew to hate the taste of Lucozade and even to this day, I can't touch it, now work that one out! Then I went on to 'sparkling' mineral water, the same thing I suppose, I drank so much of it, I just grew to hate it and nowadays, I just drink the water that comes out of the tap and it is free! With the hostile reaction to some food and drink came a bit of a change in general to my palette and once again, I cannot confirm or deny if the changes were due to M.S!  One change was that I became a lover of most beans and pulses, this was all new to me because I was a sod for pushing them around my plate, almost child-like I suppose but now things were starting to change.  I started to like them and even ask for them when my wife went shopping, broad beans, butter beans, chick peas, haricot beans, you name it, in a tin in a sauce, mixed, I did not worry, I just knew that I had started to like them!  I remember reading somewhere that beans and pulses were good for the central nervous system, probably had a dream about it but whatever, so I just thought, bring them on, if they grew in the ground or came out of a tin, bung them on my plate.  I must emphasize that I had not gone veggie and I was still very much a carnivore, that's what God gave us teeth for, right?
                                 I am a big 'soup' eater, or should that be drinker? I have always liked most flavours and because it was easy to prepare, I had it very often. On one of my many day's when I was unable to keep anything down, all I fancied  was a mug of soup, chicken on this occasion. It gave me a similar reaction that bananas had caused, total wipe-out, horrible to say the least and since that day, chicken soup has been off the menu, now that's a strange one because in all the movies, mama's chicken soup cures everything!! One of the other things that I knew were good for me was 'oily fish', omega 3 and all that!  Tuna I liked, in a sandwich or in a salad, that's cool, I can do that not a problem and I started to eat more and more, in brine, in springwater, olive oil, sunflower oil, whatever, if Castrol had bred their own tuna I would have had it, tuna in GTX, hmmm!  However, must have been tuna overload and I soon got sick of the sight and smell of the stuff and it was then that someone told me that their was more than one 'oily' fish in the sea, so I tried sardines, herring and mackerel, even kippers I tried all sorts but at the end of the day if I eat some fish that has bones in it, I would gag and I would be put off straight away!  I suppose I'm just a cod and chips kid of guy, tastes good but does not necessarily do you good! I drive my wife crazy because she loves fish in general and is forever trying to get me to eat it ,bless her.
                       It must be said that I do however have a varied diet, I can't be good all of the time, lets face it, you have to spit this devil called M.S in the eye now and again but on the whole I do eat well, my wife see's to that and she does not want me to be a fat man with M.S now does she and when you are not as active as you once were,  it is so easy to pile on the pounds if you are not careful!
                                 These past few years I have also developed a liking of red wine, in fact I love it but before diagnosis I never touched the stuff, in fact I hated it, I was ( and still am) a Guinness man! Like everybody, I had heard that a regular glass of red wine was very good for you, good for the brain so they say and my old man would swear by it!  One Christmas I was given a bottle of red as a gift, at first I reluctantly tried a glass, then another and ended up polishing off the whole bottle, I think I was maybe feeling sorry for myself at the time!  From that day, I grew to love the stuff, don't know about it being good for the brain but it's good for me as a person, a glass of red, some good company, a good film or C.D and I am very happy, occasionally pissed but happy!
                                 Another of my weakness's is black coffee, the stronger and blacker the better, none of that decaf stuff either, got to be the real deal, full blown rocket fuel! Although it must be said that I have cut down a lot lately and because of this, I am now having a much better nights sleep!  I was drinking so much of the stuff, I was no longer getting that caffeine buzz anymore, or at least I never noticed, had I just become immune to it, who know's! Then during one of my weekly visits to the Therapy Centre, I was talking to Carrie one of the Holistic Therapists (try saying that after a couple of glasses of red!!) and she said that after one of my Bowen Therapy sessions, perhaps I should lay off the coffee for the rest of the day. I did this and much to my surprise, I had no major 'withdrawal'of any kind, so I decided to cut down on my intake there and then! Since then, my sleeping has become so much better, I'm not like a coiled spring quite so often and when I do have a cup of Joe now, I limit myself to two or three mugs a day  and  I really enjoy it more, so good result there then!
                                 The changes that happen to you and your body through diagnosis, do unwittingly do you some good I suppose! Another change that has happened recently to me is to drink more tea of various types.  Perhaps I should say, try,  different types and I still prefer a good old fashioned cup of Rosy-Lee and two or three (usually more) chocolate digestives thrown in for good measure!  Now because of me cutting back on my coffee intake, I had started to drink more and more cups of tea and after much research,  asking family and friends, I did look into the possibility of 'fruit teas'! Now according to the boxes, there are lots of flavours to choose from but to me, they all look, smell and indeed taste the same. I did have a go but just could not get on with them, so I tried chamomile, mint, peppermint and green tea, you name it and I tried it but I always found that they needed flavouring with lemon, this was because I always found them bitter or simply just too bland and I never put sugar in my tea anyway!  Then someone at work suggested I should try Redbush tea(or Roibush tea), which I did and at first was not too keen, it is very much an acquired taste but eventually I did get used to it and really began to enjoy it, it contains no caffeine or tannin  so it is good for you on all fronts. So I say to anyone who asks, give it a go, persevere with it and who knows, you may start to really like it, I know I did!
                      Like so many things you have to adapt to with M.S, your food and drink tastes can be greatly affected and unfortunately this is never of your choosing, far from it, as we all know,  M.S calls the shots, so you have to sit up and take notice! If certain things make you feel bad, no point in persevering for too long, move on to something else, it's frustrating of course but that's what M.S does but these changes can and do open up a lot of new opportunities for your taste buds, so in another way, you have got one over on M.S, and that is such a good feeling, don't you think !