Kidney Disease and Diet

Ya'll let me know when you're tired of hearing about this.  For almost a year, I swore I wasn't going to yap about my kidneys and I didn't.  I don't want to overdo it, so just let me know.

One would think that with kidney disease, it would be easy.  Stay away from soda and other things known to be hard on your kidneys.  That's simply not true.  I've had to give up things...addictions, in the name of kidney disease.

As your kidneys fail, certain foods and drinks make them work harder to process things and high potassium foods do just that...

With a potassium controlled diet, you have to avoid the following high potassium foods:

Instant Breakfast
raw broccoli
pumpernickel, rye bread
bran, wheat germ   
granola, Grapenuts cereal
Dried fruits (apricots, dates, figs, prunes, raisins)
bananas
kiwi fruit
melon
nectarines
oranges, orange juice
prune juice
tangelos
brussel sprouts
mushrooms
parsnips
*potatoes, white or sweet, unless soaked
spinach and all other greens
squash, winter (acorn, butternut, hubbard)
tomato juice, vegetable juice cocktail
avocado
dried beans (pork and beans, butterbeans, navy, great northern, garbanzo, kidney *how ironic, lol*, lima, soybeans)
dried peas (cowpeas, black-eyed, split, lentils)
nuts
barbecue sauce, chili sauce
salt substitutes, lite salt
chocolate
coconut
brown sugar
molasses, sorghum
licorice
chewing tobacco  *gag*

Limit the following foods to the amounts listed, per day:

Milk - 1/2 cup
allowed fruits - 3-4 servings, 1/2 cup each
allowed vegetables - 3 servings, 1/2 cup each (limit tomatoes to 2 thin slices) *again gag*
coffee, tea - 3 cups
peanut butter - 2 tablespoons

As a general rule, canned fruits and vegetables, drained are lower in potassium than fresh.

*Eat no more than one serving of potatoes each day.  All potatoes, white or sweet, are to be presoaked before cooking.  Directions for presoaking potatoes are as follows:

1.  Peel potatoes and slice thin or dice into small cubes.
2.  Place cut up potatoes in bowl and cover with cold water.
3.  Soak the potatoes in water in the refrigerator overnight (at least 12 hours).
4.  Change the water by completely draining potatoes, then filling the bowl with fresh water.
5.  Rinse potatoes and cook in a large amount of fresh water until done.
6.  Do not use potato water for gravy, soup, etc.  Pour it down the drain.

That's too much damn playing.

By the way, surprisingly I may partake of clear sodas and rootbeer.  Seems dark sodas are made with phosphoric acid, which is very hard on your kidneys, so my monthly  PMS Pepsi and Snicker/Milky Way are things of the past.