My Gluten Free journey….

ThoughtfulEscapes — Sat, 10 Feb 2024 21:38:40 +0000

We don’t know where our journey leads. But we do know God has the perfect plan,
and we do know He is with us at ALL times. Especially, when we can’t see around the corners of life.

First of all — my kids and I have just spent the first five days by ourselves. In the house. With no one else here. We’ve left twice, for a total of four hours in the last five days. Did I mention it has been just us? I’ve been looking forward to this since April of last year…..

I have had my pantry and kitchen in 100% my (& my children’s) control for the first time since having to be gluten free. I know, I know, that is a weird thing to say or care about. But it’s because you don’t really get the layout of our house; I live in an apartment attached to my parents’ home. I have my own kitchen and bathroom. My daughter and I share the one bedroom in the apartment, and my son has his own in my parents’ house. We share a laundry room, which we call the “in-between room”. So anyway, I knew that even though I have learned to not cross-contaminate my sugar, spices, condiment containers, etc., others haven’t. Not to be mean, but out of lack of understanding. It’s just normal – when mom or I need something, rather than make a special trip out we check the others’ kitchen and pantry first. (we do check with the other before just using)

I have had lingering symptoms of something from somewhere – gluten or allergy to something else? I don’t know, but they are symptoms I didn’t have last summer when I was gone. Yet, they are symptoms I’m all too familiar with, and especially since January of 2010. So tired, falling asleep standing up kind of tired. My hands, feet and abdomen were so swollen and ached. It’s funny, I was so physically miserable but didn’t know why. I tried to eat healthier, which was to lean towards whole wheat – which I grew up on. I quit drinking Pepsi and moved onto to Mug Root Beer, I thought maybe it was caffeine bothering me. But it just got worse. Tongue swelling, can’t think – let alone think straight kind of worse.

Jump to just 14 months earlier and the events were: my mom had an appendectomy and spent 10 days in the hospital; two milestone birthdays-my son turned 13, my daughter 10; an attempt at my children going to school instead of home school; dad completed another round of chemo; finished up another campaign; another job change; 10 years of being a single mom; my mom had knee surgery; another miserable winter; more pounds gained; more swelling; more pain; excruciating exhaustion – but 14 classes later, on April 10^th, my school was finally done. Yes, 2010 was kind of brutal :-D….but God was, is, and always will be faithful!

{there are two truly horrible photos coming here – the first is painful to even look at. My eyes were NOT closed – they were swollen, even the eyelids. My hands hurt so bad opening that envelope, but it held my diploma — I had to open it. The second photo is almost four months to the day later. My kids playing with the iPhone – we were in Lowes (of course). Totally blurry, but as you can see – I do have eyes}

May 14, 2011

May 23^rd, I finally went to the doctor. I went because my aunt had visited in January and my dad had come home a couple times – they both said it was obvious something was wrong. I kept saying, “It’s just stress. School will be done soon. I don’t have time to deal with making an appointment and then going.” I knew my thyroid was totally messed up too and that was going to take a few needles and months to get sorted out and on the right dosage. So I put it off.

When I found out I was going to get to take a wonderful trip out of state for six weeks and a good portion of it would be with my aunt, my mom basically black-mailed me by saying, “You know she’ll {my aunt} want to know why you didn’t listen”.

Ugh, mothers! {I’m kidding, :-D} Fine. I’ll go.

I don’t have insurance; I hate needles and medicine…so I went to a naturopath. I knew this naturopath had a reputation of wanting patients to go gluten free and dairy free (or at least easy on dairy). I was dreading the appointment for that reason.

You have to realize, I wasn’t concerned about what I’d be “missing”. I don’t enjoy food, never have. It’s a necessary evil in life as far as I’m concerned. I told her I really didn’t want to “do gluten free” to see how well I would feel. I felt it was the new fad food. It’s too expensive. I didn’t doubt people would feel better, but unless there was a medical reason for it I really didn’t want to go there. I didn’t want to know how good I could feel if I wasn’t going to keep it up. {please don’t think I was being calloused. I have friends with Celiac, I was in no way referring to them. It was the idea of “doing gluten free” like so many “do organic”, because it’s “better” – in Alaska, it’s EXPENSIVE, and I am very choosy where I will spend money. Food is not it – it’s not a priority to me.} She convinced me to try it for three months, then we’d re-evaluate the necessity of it. … well, I decided I would do what she said – go gluten free (GF) and dairy free (DF) for three months. I would be good, I would be thorough, I would be diligent. And I was. Within three weeks, all head aches were gone, the swelling in my fingers and toes was down to the point of my shoes fitting comfortably and I could make a fist again; and my abdominal swelling went down by a couple inches. The biggest thing for me – I was traveling and not sick, tired, achy, or having headaches. Unheard of! I had all summer and much easier access to GF foods, and lots of feeling wonderful to get used to this new way of life.

As much as I hated the idea of focusing on GF/DF foods for the summer for myself, while in others’ homes – God totally knew what He was doing {of course, duh!}. It was an amazing summer. For the first time in my life I felt hunger; and when I ate, I felt satisfaction. Food tasted good. I understood why people wanted food. I actually enjoyed tossing menu ideas around with my cousins. I never once in those six weeks felt icky. So mind boggling to me.

After the initial three months I realized the GF was with me to stay, but I begged to have cheese again. Real cheese. I promised to keep it limited to just pizza once a week, and nachos/other dishes/cheeseburger a couple times a month. I love cheese. Not fancy cheese. Plain, mild Colby Jack- generic brand, thank you.

Until a couple years ago I didn’t realize cheese bothered me. I knew milk did, but chose denial when cheese was involved. I didn’t go back to milk, because it’s always bothered me and I’ve found I like the canned coconut milk in my coffee in place of half-n-half; and I can actually eat cereal now because I use coconut milk (not canned, the drinking kind). If I’m out and about and pick up a coffee, I will put half-n-half in it, but not too much or it gives me a tummy ache. Nothing new there, no big deal. So, I have been really particular and pay close attention to the GF. I’ve checked my lotions, shampoo, conditioner, soaps – all those hidden places.

four months later

I have “been glutened” a couple times – each time I’ve had no question whether I should have eaten _____ or not. Basically, I mentally and physically shut down. I can try to fight it, but it just makes the headache worse. About six hours go by and it really doesn’t matter what my “mind over matter” plan might be, I fall asleep. Hard. The first time was three days. When I can get up, I am crabbier than crabby, and there is still a residual headache and intestinal yuck to deal with, for a couple weeks. But it’s a headache I can work through and at least I’m up, not sleeping.

So – lately I’ve been wondering if I’m blowing this out of proportion and being over conscientious of where gluten is lurking. I’m tired of reading ingredients (why is it written in huge, non-normal people language words, in all caps, on rounded containers? Seriously!). I’ve wondered if I allowed myself to be lured into thinking I “needed to do this”. After all, what would happen if I just quit? So what if I don’t feel as well. It can’t be all that bad, right; I lived that way for 38 years. That has been a looming thought for me over the last couple weeks.

Well, my dad was home last weekend. On the way to the airport we stopped to eat. I had looked the place up online, they had good reviews for accommodating GF…but they were from 2008. I took food with me, just in case. I had it in my purse.

Anyway – to make this a bit shorter I won’t go into much detail. But, I will say I was told unless I was Celiac {as in just gluten intolerant} I would be fine. I was not comfortable with the food not being contaminated (not even a salad). He already had the other three orders, I mentioned I would just eat my own food. He said, “No, we won’t let you eat your own food in here.” In the end I ordered a cheeseburger with just lettuce and tomato, and they were going to treat it as gluten intolerance.

Bad, bad choice on my part…. I was near tears within the hour, but I had promised my kids we’d stop at Barnes & Noble to read; then I had to stop at Costco before heading home. I had the stupid headache, and my stomach hurt so bad. When we were getting ready to leave Costco, Vince looked at me and said, “Are you sure you can drive? Your lips are really white, like creepy looking.” We got home fine, my kids unloaded Costco, and I don’t even remember laying down on the couch. I slept from 7pm-10:30am; then again from 1-6pm before that stupid headache let up and I could wake up.

I’m so very thankful God has blessed me with good children, children who care for and about others. They just came in the house, did what needed to be done, including unloading and putting away Costco stuff. They woke me up to go to bed, then the next day just did their school work on their own. When they woke me up at 6pm, dinner was waiting. Amazing. Thank you, Heavenly Father. I know a lot of this is because we home school and they are used to life – and what needs to happen each day. But they made the choices, and good ones. Repeatedly. Together.

It’s now five days later – and I still wish I hadn’t eaten that meal. I forgot how much your head, stomach, and joints can hurt – and all from something I can’t even see!

I can say with confidence God has answered my prayer and questioning thoughts of whether I should just quit GF and who cares, I’ll get over it. …Uh, never mind – I will stick to being gluten free, thank you. I can be confident He will provide the finances to buy the more expensive foods too. He promised to.

He is faithful. All the time.

My reasoning for dragging you all through this ridiculously long post – besides for me to remember by – is just in case there is someone who needs to make that phone call, or who is thinking of ignoring something health wise. This is your encouragement to take the time, make the effort – do it. {It probably won’t go away on it’s own without some kind of help or additional knowledge.} Also, and more importantly, for the reminder once again – we have a loving Heavenly Father who cares and hears EVERY request. Only God knew how much I was wrestling with this. He could have quickened my heart to not order, or if I didn’t listen and ordered it anyway, to not eat it. Yet, He chose to let me be reminded by feeling the pain because He knows that is how I learn best. {yes, I am consistently stubborn-not proud of it, but it is the truth}

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My Gluten Free journey….