Celiac Awareness Month: What's for dinner?

Eating gluten-free isn’t easy. It forces you to do research on what is safe to eat and isn't. It forces you to research menus online before hitting a restaurant. It forces you to cook. It forces you to be healthier and get creative.

Since my son’s Celiac diagnosis two weeks ago, we have been out to a restaurant as a family only once. This is a big change for us. While I love to cook, I work full-time and therefore have limited time to cook on weeknights.  A couple of nights a week, we'd opt for pizza or go out to eat on a whim. 

Overly indulgent, I typically make two meals a night –  sometimes three meals – because the kids don’t fancy quinoa; and my husband and I don’t like eating hot dogs and Mac N Cheese. When I have had a particularly stressful day at work, going to a restaurant and being served is an enormous treat. Impulsively deciding to go out to dinner on a random weeknight is something that we have had to curb as we discover which restaurants (that we actually like) have options that The Boy can eat.

The website and accompanying app Find Me Gluten Free has been helpful when trying to identify restaurants that offers gluten free options although it is not ideal. Often chain restaurants are listed or placed listed as offering gluten free however as a pick kid who likes pancakes, pizza, and cheese burgers, the menu items at this restaurants are not the right first. If he were a 30 year old yuppy, they would be perfect.

Instead of going out to eat as much as we have, I have opted to make some of the foods that they would typically order at a restaurant, like chicken fingers and french fries, at home using gluten-free ingredients. I've also tried baking using GF ingredients, which wasn't too difficult. Thankfully there are lots of GF options and I have been able to buy a lot of transitional food items that the boys like to eat, things like donuts and waffles. So far, no one has noticed anything.

This is often not gluten free or Celiac friendly

One major issue is that GF foods are expensive, although I have read that you can save by buying things online and making things from scratch is even cheaper. Realistically thought this is not going to happen. I am going to get my food items where I typically get them and I frequent stores like Whole Foods Market more frequently. It is all a journey and it is all a part of the process.

Gluten-free day two for me? So far. So good.

Trending: with Celiac, gluten, and a toddler

It has been two and a half years since I wrote a blog entry. It feels like both a very long and short time. Today is May 1. The date is significant because it marks the beginning of Celiac Awareness Month.  You will not see the word “Celiac” previously in this blog because it was not even a blip on my radar before two weeks ago.

Besides watching Elizabeth Hasseleback, controversial and former co-host of The View, confidently refuse certain baked goods on air, I never knew of anyone who had this condition. What I know is that gluten has become a buzz word during the last year. I have a few friends and family members who have chosen to go gluten-free for “health reasons” or as a new dieting regime.  Admittedly, I didn't take this seemingly odd preference all that seriously except to revel in how annoying it was to eat with them. Sorry guys.

It was two weeks ago when my youngest son, who just turned three, was diagnosed with Celiac Disease. He has been sick for a while.  My family and I did not know what was causing his incessant diarrhea and related symptoms. I was at my wits-end trying to find out what going on. Why did he have a bowel movement after eating and drinking anything – sometimes up to 10 times a day? Why was he always getting stomach bugs? What was going on with my sweet little boy?

After surmising that food allergies may be to blame, I took him to an allergist. Tests did confirm a couple of allergies, including one to apples. The allergist also tested him for milk and wheat allergies, which came back normal. I took him off apples and apple products (which are in everything by the way) but to my chagrin, there was no improvement.

Still not knowing what to do but knowing that I needed to do something, I decided to eliminate ­­dairy because some internet “experts” opined that dairy is linked to ear infections. My son has had many ear infections, requiring tubes along with the gastrointestinal issues. I figured ... maybe.  Again, not much seemed to change.

Our once voracious eater was no longer interested in eating anything. He would play at the dinner table with his beloved Thomas the Train engines rather than eat. It was his older, skinny brother whose dining habits worried us, not Mr. Boy. Mr. Boy was a tank.  His dad referred to him as Bam Bam. But Bam Bam was starting to lose weight.  He was often tired and his constant movements resulted in brutal diaper rashes that would cause him to scream out in pain while being changed.

Nothing helped. We were at a loss. Me. His dad. His Nana. His daycare provider.

When he turned three earlier this month, I took him for his annual exam and brought up the issue once again. Our pediatrician said that he had Toddler’s Diarrhea, which may have been causing the issues. She asked about his diet and I began to list his favorite foods: waffles, pancakes, peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, and it dawned on me – gluten. Damn-it. Gluten, that trendy little bugger. It was one of those come to whomever moments. How could I have not thought of this earlier!?  I should have known.

Immediately, I stopped the medical student who was training with our pediatrician and excitedly shared my revelation. I asked her to tell the doctor the connection I made. The doctor came back into the exam room and said that she had the very same suspicion, but thought it was unlikely. She would run some tests.  A few days later, the blood tests were in … Celiac Disease.

While in a daze, I wrote down what the doctor was telling me on the phone - "Celiac", "gluten", "small intestine", "endoscopy" ... "Children's Hospital" - while The Boy ate something that may or may not have had gluten in it in the kitchen with the rest of the family.

She explained that she was going to schedule an appointment with the Chief of Celiac at Children’s Hospital and less than a week later (this past Tuesday), we had our appointment.The specialist confirmed that Celiac is to blame for many of my son’s health issues and in order to confirm the diagnosis, he would need to do a biopsy.

This surgery will happen in the next week or two and then we will forge full-speed ahead into a gluten-free lifestyle – for The Boy and likely for the rest of the family as well.

We have already started him on a GF diet, although we were advised to keep some gluten in his diet, so that the endoscopy can do what it needs to do and confirm the disease. It is so counter-intuitive to knowingly give a child, your baby; your baby who has been suffering for so long, something that we know is hurting him. But … doctor’s orders.

As soon as I learned of my son's Celiac, I did what people do in 2014, I started researching the topic online. I came across a tweet from the National Association for Celiac Awareness and that in acknowledgement of Celiac Awareness Month, they were looking for folks who want to blog about their experience, so here I am, two and a half years later.  Ready to embark on yet another journey.

Ante Up

I am not putting any money on the line, but I am putting my reputation on the line. Like so many people during this time of year, I am going to challenge myself to be more healthy. Stress reduction is one crucial way I can accomplish this, but, hey, that ain't going to happen - right now anyway. Instead I am going to try to kick-start good eating and exercise habits which will inevitably eliminate stress and this always a good thing.

When do I start? Today? Not necessarily. Tomorrow? Probably not. So, when? January 2 is when I will "officially" start my self-created detox program. The reason I chose January 2 to begin fully embracing "the new way" is that I want to give myself a break until after the holidays are officially over and the celebration continues until after New Year's Day - January 2.

In the meantime, I will embrace elements of the program, but allow myself wiggle room for indulgence. As long as I don't over do it, it is important to eat, drink, and be merry during this time of year when so many of friends and family members are around to join in the conviviality of the season. Laughter and merriment is crucial to good health or at least to my good health.

Another reason I am delaying jumping into the program is that my family and I are just getting over the stomach flu. You do what you gotta do to survive the bug and its aftermath even if it includes eating white toast with butter. Being gentle with ourselves, being gentle with myself is a part of my program or any program worth considering.

The saying "be gentle with yourself" is one that I constantly remind myself, friends and family members. It is so important to remind ourselves that most everything we stress and agonize about now will not register a blip on the map of our lives. The reason I am not *that* nervous about embarking on 'the program' is because I will falter and I will get up. This a part of the process. The key is to get up whether it is that very minute, an hour later, the next day, or a month later. Getting up is success.

Thankfully I have not had to diet much in my lifetime due to good genes more than anything else. After I had my second child and while I was still on maternity leave, I decided to try Weight Watchers and begin Pilates to lose baby weight. It was amazing and I lost all of my baby weight, plus some. A couple of months later, I decided to embark on losing 5 lbs which would bring me to just about where I was before I had kids. Weight Watchers and Pilates worked again. Like others, after accomplishing my goal, I stopped the program. Some of the weight, about 5 - 9 lbs of it came back, and this is where I am now. I want to lose about just under 10 lbs and as importantly I want to approach the loss in a healthy and strategic way. (More about what this means to me later.)

So, why not go back to Weight Watchers and Pilates when it worked so well before? I loved Weight Watchers and would highly recommend it to anyone. I loved Pilates as well and can honestly say it is the only exercise program I have ever actually enjoyed. I would go back to either program in a minute, which brings me to the reason I am not going back on Weight Watches or joining a Pilates studio: money. Each of these programs cost money, money that I do not have right now. So, I am going to try to use resources that are free or are of minimal cost. If my self-directed program does not work, then, I know I can always go back to what has worked in the past.

Stay tuned.

Pine Street

Fleeting it may be
the moment is now
to notice
to embrace
to listen
to believe
to stop
to play

In that space between that which defines the dailiness of our days, I am want to remind myself that this is *it*.

This is the "ever after", the "someday", the "if only".

Time to plant flowers and leave dishes.
Bake bread and ignore laundry.
Build tents out of blankets and make a sleep-over with my family.

The dream exists. It is here between me and you and them and us.

Write now.
Paint now.
Absorb now.

That which we pine for is here.
It will never be perfect.
Weeds will always need tending.
Paint will need to be peeled.
Baby clothes need to be rotated.
Dinner to be made.
Laundry to be folded.

The key, it seems, is to carve out space within our reality and challenge ourselves to enjoy it ...

the bubbling water, the stained, yet, clean t-shirts, the rocks and sand that artfully litter the backyard, and the strewn about DVDs with mismatched cases.

This is what I will yearn for now. 10 years from now, 10 days from now, 10 minutes from now. I yearn now.