Wednesday, July 21, 2004

Little Miss Muffet

Sorry for bloggin' at ya again so soon, but I do it when I get the urge. Don't you? Anyway, I have come up with a theory regarding why my calves, sometimes thighs, and forearms and biceps too have all been seizing up and feeling grumpy since Friday.

Whey protein powder!

When I was shopping for protein powders after my diagnosis, I avoided the whey powders because I am allergic to milk. Not cheese or yogurt, just milk. Almost all the protein powders are whey-based, but I did find one which was not. The other thing which concerned me about the whey powders was the list if ingredients the package showed. One of them was glutamate. As you may know, glutamate is implicated in causing ALS nerve damage. I'm no biochemist, but the glutamate in the whey powders scared me. I don't have the non-whey powder container here in front of me. I will try to go get some today, just to read the label. But I recall checking the label and being reassured. Either because the ingredients were listed and glutamate was absent, or because (blush), no ingredients were listed.

The week before last, we had a guest. He brought his whey protein powder. He left on Sunday and forgot to take his powder with him. My non-whey powder ran out on, probably Wednesday, maybe Tuesday. I went without for a day, perhaps. But I decided to try his whey powder Thursday. Probably. Anyway, on Friday I noticed my muscles being a little grumpy. Saturday they were still grumpy and we drove for about an hour to visit my family. The grumpy muscles continued each day, including this morning, and are still with me. Each night I drank the concocted whey powder.

Today in the shower, the Eureka moment hit me. The package on the whey powder I have been taking says each serving contains 3290 mg of glutamate per serving. I am going to dump the whey powder in the trash! We'll see what happens!

11:09 AM:

OK, I went to GNC and got the Protein 95 powder, which lists glutamic acid 4990 mg, but no glutamine at all. Again, not being a biochemist, I don't know what happens to the glutamic acid once it hits my tummy, (does it turn into glutamine?) but as I said, I had no ill-effect.

I don't plan on using the Protein 95 until my cramps clear up.
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