How do you know if you have ascites?

Hi again Susan,

Edema is usually fluid retention in legs.

Ascites is fluid rettion in belly.

When the heart pumps rich blood out to the body, sometimes the fluid that is absorbed by the cells from the blood cannot return the fluid from the cells to the blood to return to the heart to be reoxygenated.

This lingering fluid causes the swelling in both cases.

A quick wt gain generally means my partner, Mike, is retaining fluid. We had a sliding scale before his transplant (he doesn't get the swelling much since the transplant). If he was over x lbs one dose of lasix, if it crept up over y lbs, add more, and so on. If he was dropping wt, we reduced the lasix as well.

So, yes, it is likely the quick gain is fluid.

Mike only had fluid in his legs and feet, not in his belly. He was lucky. But others report feeling "stuffed" and less able to get around, bend, etc. some complain of having difficulty breathing if the fluid is pushing up on lungs.

Speaking of lungs, some get fluid around the lungs also.

They can drain the fluid in the belly and around the lungs. I don't think they can drain the legs, that has to be nature's course.

When is your next dr. apt? They'll check you out. Best to be sure what is what.

Is your sodium low or high, do they test that too?

AND, you know what to do about the junk food.

I have this same problem...my drug of choice is food...ice cream, cookies...

Junk food is like any other addiction....you think about the cookies in the cupboard, they call to you while you watch TV, they beg you to need dish soap so you can make a quick legit trip to the market and toss in a bag of chocolate chip cookies while you are there! Evidently, junk cant be in the house. If you buy it, you will eat it. ME TOO.

You know what to do.

I hope we can both do what's best for us.

Cheers,

Carol

Carol and Connie,

Thank you. Your replies have helped a great deal.

Since I can't drink alcohol (I never did drink much, even in college), and I can't do drugs, (never did any drugs, not even weed) and I am not even supposed to have coffee, and I never smoked, I am down to very few vices left.

Now salt is gone, and I love salt. The only vices left are baked products and biting my cuticles. And when I bite my cuticles, sometimes they bleed, and of course I don't have enough platelets, so I bleed like a stuck pig.

With salt gone from my life, baked products are gone too. It is sad.

I have a great hepatologist, but he is hard to get a hold of. My plan for now is to stay on a very healthy, very low salt diet for as long as I can stand it, and see how much weight I lose and how the swelling in my ankles/legs looks.

I am not sure if the belly issue is just fat or ascites, or a little of both. But for now, I am going to stick to the diet and see how it goes.

I am exercising every day, which is a first for me. I am very proud of the level of exercise that I am doing. I never in my life exercised on a regular basis, but now I actually enjoy my chosen exercise - digging in the garden and doing other garden chores. I work hard, use my muscles and get the old heart pumping and it feels good, which is a huge surprise to me! I even enjoy sweating ( a little)(no reason to go to excess...)

I hate not knowing what the future holds. I am lucky that the treatment for my AIH was successful back in 1995. My goal was to live as simply and healthily as possible and see how long I could go without getting sicker.

So, now I am a little sicker, so I have to re-adjust to a new normal, and hope to stay stable for a bunch more years. That is the plan, at least. But you all know about making plans for how your illness will progress...

Exercise, meditate, keep laughing, and digging, and eating no salt. Have amazing sex with my long term boyfriend (oh, too much information...sorry). I want to raise chickens in the backyard. Wonderful BF says if I lose a bunch of weight (for my health, obviously), he will buy me some chickens. And he hates farm-type animals. He is a good egg. Oh, that was a bad pun. I am sorry.

Thank you again
Susan

Wow! After reading that I gotta go to KFC.

Chickens are a great hobby. Love my roosters. They are so colorful and fun. Whenever I get an urge to eat junk, go outside and hang out with the roosters and work on getting our 2 chicks used to being handled. I still can eat KFC, as long as I don't personally know the chicken!!
Angie1953

I wonder how much sodium is contained in KFC food? I'll bet it's off the charts.

On my low-sodium diet of less than 1000 mg a day (and usually quite a bit lower than that), my most recent labs show a blood sodium of 130, with normal being 135-145. Which means you really have to watch what goes into your body, in order to stay within normal limits.

Hugs,
Connie

Cayotes in CT?? And are you using your phone again to post?

Hugs,
Connie

Only chickens these days.

They lost the farm and are in a rural area where chickens are not prohibited, but not usual.

So no more ducks, turkeys, geese, horses, bunnies.

They have been replaced by the aforementioned chickens and one bearded dragon and two tropical fish tanks.

So babysitting is complicated.

It must be 85 tonight, in CT in May.

Carol

Susan,
Just remember that pizza and bagels contain lots of salt.

David, I don't eat the bagels or pizza or other processed deli foods! Even before I was on this strict diet, I avoided those items, at least most of the time. For me, just having a bite can often satisfy my desire for stretchy mozzarella cheese and warm everything bagels dripping with full salt butter.

I have giant sized boys who eat like it is their last meal. Teenagers are voracious!

Connie, thanks for the tomato reminder. If I recall, I think celery has quite a bit of sodium too. Sigh. Two vegetables that I actually love.

I am going to take the no-salt diet one day at a time and see how long I can take it. When I can stand it no longer, I'll up the salt to under 1000mg/day. But so far so good. Unless all hell breaks loose around here, which does happen with my illness and the teenagers, I should be able to keep it under 500mg a day.

Feel Good, All!
Susan

David, are you saying that local, farm fresh produce might have less sodium than produce in the supermarket?