... and it just gets better

I've had a rotten few weeks getting used to this gluten crap. And I know that people are sick of hearing me talk about it. I ended up in tears the other night because my husband said, "what can your gluten intolerant self have for dinner?" He didn't realize that I'd had a bad few weeks; well, he kind of did because I'd told him a few things here and there but things just start to snowball and then one comment just sends you over the edge.

Brittany came into town for Memorial Day and we took her to Tomo, one of our favorite Sushi restaurants. Ben and Brit sat down and started going through the menu... and I did too... and I slowly realized that all of my favorite rolls except for one have tempura. Which, of course, is on my bad list. So Ben and Brit order a few of the rolls that I can't have, and I order the one that I think I can still have and a new one that Tina, waitress extraordinaire, recommends I try. Oh, and I get to try the gluten free soy sauce. Yay. At least they had it and I didn't have to stoop to being that person who pulls the huge bottle of soy sauce out of my bag. We have dinner and I get kind of quiet because at this point I'm starting to really realize that this is sucking, especially as they are devouring rolls that I have always enjoyed. And really, 95 percent of the rolls on the menu have tempura. Now I know that I don't have to have rolls. I can have sushi, I can have sashimi. But I really like Tomo's rolls. I did order some sashimi. Mmmmm...

Life goes on, right?

The next weekend I fly out to Jupiter to pick up Brittany to drive with her back to Austin. On my way to West Palm, I eat at Pappadeaux and order a salad... there's something hidden in the salad that decides to attack my system. Now that was fun, feeling totally sick for a 13 hour drive from West Palm to Mississippi, where we had a two night stop.

We get to Mississippi where we stay with my grandparents... I hadn't been to Mississippi in about 10. maybe 11 years. My grandmother is a phenomenal cook. especially southern cooking. Brittany had made the special request months ago that Lala, my grandmother, would make her chicken fried steak; since I make it for her and Ben on occassion and she wanted the original chef to make it. :) If you'd ever made chicken fried steak, you'll know that you dip it in seasoned flour prior to frying it. So that means I can't eat this recipe anymore. My grandmother is awesome. She did some homework and created a gluten free version of chicken fried steak for me. She used rice flour instead of wheat flour and though the texture was a bit different, it was still delicious. She even made me my own gravy! Now that's love, people! I thought it was really sweet that she did for me.

We got back to Austin and since I've been back, I've been trying to be really good; reading labels, coming home for lunch more than going out so that I don't have to play a guessing game at restaurants to figure out what is and isn't gluten free... I'm not comfortable yet being that person in a group who has to ask the waiter/waitress questions about how food is prepared, is it seasoned with flour prior to grilling it, etc. I'm just not there yet so it's easier just to come home and make a lettuce wrap. :(

I was told by my GI to meet with a nutritionist. We've met twice now. The first time we met she looked over my symptoms and asked me some questions and told me that she thinks there is something that I've been eating still that has gluten. I racked my brain and couldn't figure anything out. Finally I sent an email to the cafeteria at work... every morning, I get to work. I dock my computer, I get my wallet and go to the cafe. I go to the breakfast bar and Jose makes me a breakfast taco on corn tortillas with refried beans and red onions. It is my happy way of starting the day. All the above ingredients are safe, but I thought I should check, just in case.

I get an email from the cafeteria manager:
The refried beans have SOY SAUCE. WTF. WHY!?!?!?!

So now I can no longer have my damn daily breakfast taco. Steal more joy from me, celiac. Keep it coming.

Nutritionist had me take a zinc test. She dropped zinc on my tongue and asked me what I tasted. Uh....nothing? Evidently this means I have a severe mineral deficiency. I'll use that as my excuse for having thin hair, crappy nails and being short. YES!!! So she now has me on four supplements that I have to take with my meals (temporarily, this is not permanent) to help with getting some of my innards working appropriately again and hopefully speeding up the process of healing so I can increase my nutrient consumption.

Whatever.

So on Friday Brittany and I have a date night where she and I go to sushi. We go to Tomo again. I order and I ask for the gluten free soy sauce and this time I ask the waitress if the tempura is MAYBE made with rice flour? No such luck... but this triggers her to realize that I can't have the wheat and she tells Steve, the owner.
1.) It turns out that my favorite sashimi dish that I like to have - I shouldn't have been eating that, Steve had to modify that. (it still tasted good, so it's okay)
2.) The two rolls that I was able to order that time with ben and brit... yeeeeeeah... they served them both to me, this time with absolutely no tantalizing sauce which makes the dish that much better. Just naked rolls. No love. It was depressing and quite honestly a really good lesson. I do need to communicate with people when I order about this stupid situation because I don't know what is in the things I'm eating, even if I think I do.

So although I've been trying to be good, I've still got a LONG way to go.

I think I'm going to eat in more and try and do more research on restaurants before I go to them if I possibly can.

This. Just. Sucks.

On a postive note, I do want to recognize my friend Bryan at Vino 100 Round Rock. We had a party for my cousin who is moving away (waaaaaaah) and he was kind enough to make me awesome gluten free mac and cheese since we served mac and cheese to everyone else. For those of you who haven't been there, Vino is not just a wine bar, it's also got amazing food... and the mac and cheese is out of this world!!!! So though the situation sucks, kindnesses like Bryan's effort, (plus he made a super sweet (no pun intended) dessert), my grandmother's chicken fried steak, and efforts of my friends who try to understand and proactively send me links and tell me about foods and things they learn about are pretty damn cool.

I'm BACK!

So it's been more than three years since I've posted anything on a blog. But recently I've had something that I really want to vent about and I'm sick of talking about it so I think that blogging about it is a great idea.

I've had the chance to go to the web and see a lot of blogs that are out there about this particular topic (a lot) and now I GET IT. I understand why people blog about this. Because it's frustrating and it SUCKS. What am I talking about? Celiac. Yes. That. So I decided that rather than bend everyone's ear, I'm just going to start blogging. I figure that this can be therapeutic.

All my life I have not been a fan of some of the simple things in life... bread. Pasta. Pizza. My friends would tease me and tell me I was a freak of nature. "Who doesn't like BREAD?" "Really? You don't like Pizza? You're weird." Over time I realized that really, when I would actually be polite or humor my husband and go to an italian restaurant for dinner, I would feel really sick after eating one of the above items. I always wondered in the back of my head if I had an allergy or something but I figured that my body just wasn't used to dealing with that type of food and so I had a hard time digesting it. Well, about three months ago, I ran home for lunch. We had no food in the fridge that looked decent. All that I saw that appeared remotely edible was some Velveeta Mac N Cheese. How much harm could that do, right? Within 30 minutes I just wanted to die. I sat at my desk for the remainder of the afternoon and wallowed in self pity. I still didn't take any action but I realized that I really did have a problem.

Luckily, since I live in the Austin metro area, the capital of ALLERGIES, I had an appointment with an allergist, Dr. Thomas Leath. AWESOME allergist, btw. I asked him to test me for a wheat allergy. I sat there for my 15 minutes of itching, with many allergins poked in my back. I waited with excitement to get the results... and nope. No allergy to wheat. Dammit. So he sent me to the lab and said that he would send my blood to be tested for celiac disease. I knew that the chances of that being the case were pretty slim.

A week later I get a call from Dr. Leath. Lab results are in and I've tested positive. My initial reaction was honestly one of utter joy - in fact, it shocked him. But I explained to him that I finally felt validated that I wasn't crazy! And hell, I don't like bread. I don't like pasta. This can't be that bad, right?

Next step: go to my GI and get an endoscopy just to get that final stamp of confirmation.

I go to GI a few weeks later and he reviews the test results - based on the blood work he doesn't doubt it but still needs to do the endoscopy. He schedules it for the next week. I won't bore you with the details; but I will tell you that I had the best nap ever during that endoscopy and I will raise my hand to have that done any day. Results come in and everything is confirmed. This girl has to go gluten free from now on. Again, this can't be that bad, right?

My brother in law's stepmom has celiac as does her daughter. She was kind enough to send me an email with tons of resources for me to read and review. I went out and bought a book, The Gluten Free Bible, which she recommended and proves to be pretty interesting reading. In addition, I bought my first of what I anticipate to be many cookbooks. This is easy.

It was a Tuesday night, which of course means it's Taco Tuesday at the Bernfeld house. When it's beef taco night Ben particularly likes to use Taco Bell dinner kits (which is endearing since I love Taco Bell) - Don't JUDGE. I open the box... I take out the shells... all is good. I put them on the tray. I put the beef in the pot. Brown. Smells good. I take out the seasoning. Ingredient number one... WHEAT FLOUR. DAMMIT. Luckily I had some extra Penzeys seasoning that my sister bought me for Christmas and they looked safe so I used those. Ben started to sulk and I had to start explaining to him that life was going to be changing. Okay, so maybe this wasn't going to be so easy after all...