7.0, or the enemy within

I went for a blood test just before Christmas. I have a variety of routine tests and check-ups from time to time to establish that I am still suffering from hypochondria. They usually follow a fairly straightforward process – first, I start exhibiting some symptoms. Then I find something suitably nasty that those symptoms could be in maybe one case out of a million. Then I become convinced that that’s exactly what I’ve got. Then I go to the doctor and after some routine tests and/or checkups the results come back, conclusively establishing that my hypochondria has flared up again.

Only this time it was different. Last month my doctor told me that my blood cholesterol reading was 7.0. I’ve always thought 7.0 was a respectable mark out of 10 – after all, if it was a Pitchfork review I’d give serious consideration to buying the record. Unfortunately, that doesn’t quite apply with cholesterol. It turns out that this is very bad indeed, and that I need to drastically change my diet – and start medication – to prevent the risk of a heart attack in the not too distant future.

The doctor gave me a nice friendly looking handout with details of what I can and can’t eat. So it turns out that fish, fruit and vegetables are good whereas pies, chocolate, cakes, biscuits, butter, cheese and full cream milk are all off limits. In fact I had a look at all the foods in the “avoid” column and, set to music, I could probably incorporate them all in a cover version of My Favourite Things.

It has taken a bit of getting used to. The topography of the supermarket, for instance, has changed completely. Before, I would go into a supermarket and rush through the irrelevant distraction of the section full of random green stuff en route to the pizzas. Or the cheese for that matter. Not to mention the ready meals. From there on in the voyage through the aisles got increasingly exciting culminating in the Holy Grail – three consecutive aisles filled with cakes, biscuits, crisps, nuts and of course chocolate. All the fun was loaded towards the end of the trip and the wares got gradually more and more exciting. Which is just how life should be, right? (Ignoring for a second the inconvenient fact that all the cleaning products are right at the end. Let’s not think about that.)

But what a difference a blood test makes. Now by the time we’re finished in the fruit and veg section the shopping excursion is virtually over. I spend more time choosing between varieties of apples than I do scurrying past the chocolate section while averting my eyes and suppressing a pathetic whimper. On Sunday I spent all of five minutes picking which granola to buy. Yes, I know. It’s not good. It all looks like it belongs in a bowl being gnawed at by some indeterminate rodent and that is what passes for fun around these parts. But it’s a slow process, and people I know who know these things tell me that eventually your palate changes and you get positively excited about granola. We’ll see.

It’s not all bad. Last night I had a delicious supper of swordfish steak, crushed potatoes and green beans with a delicious home made tomato sauce – something I would never have thought to have a month ago. I am getting used to wholemeal bread and sweeteners. And semi skimmed milk really isn’t a hardship when you get used to it. But I’m still trying to find those magic foodstuffs that you can eat as often as you like without making serious inroads into your life expectancy. Fish in general, it turns out, is one. Granola – should I ever develop a taste for it – is another. And I can have as many strawberries as I can comfortably eat. But passing on a bowl of peanuts and instead chomping on a pickled onion? Not sure I’m ready for that quite yet.