newtboy said:

Holy sheep shit man! So sorry to hear it.
Was the stomach expansion the only symptom? Are the gallstones related or just an extra fuck you from the universe?
Lots of questions....but for later.

Good luck on the drain and function tests. Do what your Dr tells you, don't fuck around with liver problems.

Glad to hear your wife is almost well....but so sorry your roles of patient/caregiver are reversing.

Good crunchy granola vibes from hippie land. Get well, and keep us updated.

dannym3141 said:

I have to strongly disagree with the suggestion that animals are killed and tortured for my "taste preferences" and "pleasure".

It gives me no pleasure that an animal has to die for me to eat. My pleasure in the consumption of that animal is a fleeting, automatic chemical reaction triggered in my body. In an evolutionary sense, i only receive this pleasure because it prolongs the survival of my species to feel it.

Most of these arguments reek of over simplification and ignorance to the reality of the society westerners live in.

In ideal conditions, i would eat meat from animals that i tended, who died of natural causes (mostly old age i assume) which i would personally butcher. In reality, it is not possible and even if it were possible for one person, it would not be possible for every person - we have limited space, limited resources, limits placed by law, limits on our time. As well as the cost of the land, I would have to hope enough animals died naturally to sell enough humane meat to pay taxes on the land and maintain my farming equipment, buy grain for the animals and so on. Or maybe i could grow my own grain and use primitive DIY tools, but then i'd probably need help for all the farming i'd have to do every day and now i'd need enough animals to die to feed three, so more land, more grain... Oops, it looks like this is getting complicated doesn't it. Shall we keep going until we reach a society of 70 odd million people, or should we consider that the problem is far more complicated than comments here would care to acknowledge?

Furthermore gluten is often the primary protein source for vegans, but i have a disease that requires me to avoid that protein in entirety. The smug, holier-than-thou field radiating from certain commenters here will i'm sure extend far enough to condescendingly say "ah, but you can be a vegan and avoid gluten, you poor, uneducated, smiling murderer!" Yes, and you could live your life without ever being touched by the sun's rays, or sail a small sailboat without ever getting wet, not even a droplet. And how can we know what effect gluten-free-veganism may have on public health when it is extended to a population of 7 billion? What a dangerous experiment to salivate over - reckless and potentially harmful in a way that a butcher could never hope to be.

It would be wonderful if the world was ideal. I wouldn't have this disease, and all people of the world could enjoy their own 10 acre farm and eat only those animals whose time had come. Unfortunately when i am abroad, away from home, the only source of protein that i can entirely trust might perhaps be a roast chicken. And i will eat it, the only true pleasure from which i take is that i will not spend the next three days doubled up in bed.

There are people worse off than me, but i don't know enough about their situation to use it as a point in this discussion. To people like me, the language used by some people here makes me think of someone dancing around at a diabetics convention shouting "I can't believe you losers have to use insulin! I hope you all realise that drug addicts use needles!"

I reject any notion that these people have a moral advantage over me. Have any of them ever heard of walking a mile in another man's shoes, or does their narrow mind only reach as far as "ME"?

By the way, plants are also alive. Or is this about sentient life? Shall we move on to abortion then, if non-sentient life is ok to end? Shall we have the philosophical discussion about degrees of sentience and types of sentience and whether we can even know if a plant has its own brand of sentience? If yes, let's try to at least do it without you being smug and in return without me being sarcastic.

Worrying about how people treat vegans? How about how the language used to describe people who have no choice in the matter, lest that choice be never leave your own house and eat only this very small list of things which you may or may not find too disgusting to stomach? Am i to live in misery and squander my life so that a chicken could have an extra 2 years to run in circles? This issue is not fucking black and white despite the attempts to paint it so.

Mikus_Aurelius said:

Well that was out of left field.

But it's ok. We secretly hate you for what you eat too.

krelokk said:

My gf had terrible headaches, constant nausea, and terrible drowsiness whenever she was hungry for her entire life... until I met her. I suggested she might be hypoglycaemic and should carry around a sugary treat or drink wherever she goes. She started doing that and quickly her hunger sickness symptoms could be basically controlled. But they were still there. One thing I always found strange about her eating habits was her insistence on having lots of bread. She never felt satisfied or full without bread.

After a year of doing that my mom suggested she might be gluten intolerant. My gf had never heard of the concept, had zero friends on any kind of gluten free fad diets. She decided to give it a shot, no gluten for 4 weeks. Boom all symptoms gone. More tests led her to trying out gluten after a week, and what do you know it was back. She waited two weeks, back again. Eventually she figured out a system in which she could have a gluten meal/snack/treat every four weeks without symptoms appear.
Also, she started to feel satisfied and full without an urge to eat bread, almost like the bread caused a weird drug like addicting withdrawal cycle which seemed to be why she always craved it. The gluten seems to build up in her system, or at least the allergic reaction and her body goes through a withdrawal after she has had too much, or too much too frequently, and doesn't get more in her system soon enough.

I eat gluten just fine. Together we eat vegetables, meat, fruit, and occasional pieces of the best gluten free bread (most of its sucks). I tend not to eat tasty gluten stuff around her unless it is a treat day for her Gluten products also make people fat, so it really isn't a problem to not eat them. No one on the planet requires gluten to live a healthy lifestyle. Bread, white bread in particular just gets converted into sugars and fat inside the body. It is empty calories.