My hubby has been told by his doctors to watch his potassium intake. He has kidney issues. We are both losing weight (or trying to ) at this time. How do I as his wife deal with this? I do 95% of the cooking and shopping. In a nutshell what he can eat is some veggies, some fruit, some meat/fish and nothing whole grain. This whole low potassium thing goes against everything that I have retrained myself to think about. Meaning, beans and whole grains are good. Now beans and whole grains are bad. I feel like my head is spinning.

My dad has kidney issues. He had a transplant a couple years ago, but unfortunately was misdiagnosed BEFORE his transplant, and now the disease is back and attacking his new kidney. I don't know how bad your dh's potassium is. Dad is at the point, he can basically have 0 (not possible but he has to get it as close to 0 as possible).

It's a HUGE struggle when dealing with potassium. Especially when trying to cook what we've learned is healthy also. What my mom does with the white and whole grains is buy 2 kinds of bread. They usually buy small loaves if they can find it, white of some sort for him, whole grain for her. When dad could have a little potassium, and craved potatoes (or it was T-giving, etc), mom would peel and soak her potatoes all day. This helped draw the potassium out. Not all of course, but definitely some. Beans are something they've just eliminated from their diet. Healthy or not. They do a lot of lean cuts of meat, any veggies that he can have, etc.

I know between what your husband CANT have and what you've learned you SHOULDNT have, it leaves very little. But it is possible. Look online for new and different recipes. If you are making enchiladas (I found one with a green sauce instead of tomato based, and you'd just have to go easy on the cheese (which we would do anyway)) you can roll his up with flour tortilla and yours with wheat. Little things like that.

I'll be happy to help you in any way I can. <hugs> to you both!

It really illustrates that there are no healthy foods separate from the individual. Healthy is always relative to a person's unique situation.

There may not be any food that is universally healthy to everyone. That can even apply to some foods we consider generally unhealthy (if you're literally starving, a Big Mac would be healthier than a carrot, at least in the short term where calories would be top priority over micronutrients).

Hang in there. In a quick search of amazon.com I found only one specific low-potassium cookbook (there may be others that a doctor or dietitian could recommend). I wrote down a few that are likely to cover low-potassium diets (I searched on kidney disease, because many patients with kidney issues have to avoid potassium). I can't know for sure by just the titles, but you could order them through your library, and see if any of them meet your needs.



The No-Salt, Lowest-Sodium Cookbook

Eating Well with Kidney Failure by Helena Jackson

Cooking for David: A Culinary Dialysis Cookbook Sara Colman


Silver Spoons: Hemodialysis Cookbook

Kidney Health Gourmet Diet Guide and Kidney Friendly Recipes for People Not on Dialysis [Spiral-bound]
Nina Kolbe RD CSR LD

Handbook of Nutrition and the Kidney (Lippincott Williams & Wilkins Handbook Series) by William E. Mitch and T. Alp Ikizler

Eating Well for Kidney Health: Expert Guidance and Delicious Recipes (Class Health) by Helena Jackson, Gavin James, and Claire Green (Nov 1, 2008)

If theres one thing I remember from nutrition classes its that Tomatoes are a BIG source of potassium and should be avoided by those on dialysis. Sorry, thats all I remember from school, so much for that degree and all my debt.