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The Gluten Free and Elimination Diets Effect the Entire Family: A Personal Perspective

   
GF Frustrations - Can you relate?

    Remember that moment when you discovered YOU NEEDED to adopt an elimination diet and/or gluten free lifestyle in order to live a better life? It have been because you have a clinical health condition or maybe experience chronic pain or maybe your doctor recommended the diet change. It is difficult for one person in a household to adapt to a gluten free diet, let alone a large family. Wow! Talk about a curve ball in life. Adopting a GF and elimination diet changes everything about family meal time.

      When your family wants to eat pizza, you have to make 2 pizzas; one with a GF crust and sauce and one with regular crust. When its Italian cuisine night, you have to boil two pots of water, one for GF pasta and one for any other kind of pasta your family would like to eat. If you have ever eaten GF anything that is trying to mock a wheat flour product,( pizza crust, pasta, cookies), you know that the wheat flour tastes better and cooks easier. I feel bad when I have to feed my family the pizza crust that I must eat. It really does taste like cardboard. [Shout out to 312 Pizza Co in Nashville, TN that features a delicious in-house made gluten free pizza crust.]

     Have you tried GF at Christmas or the 4th of July holiday with 17 people that are not eating gluten-free and you are? What? I lost 4 lbs last Christmas because I could barely eat anything. Pies are out, stuffing at Thanksgiving is out, grandma's homemade dumplings are out, crackers are out, cookies are out, no buns with your hamburger...and the list goes on. It changes everything.

Needs v.s. Wants

     For many of us, including me, the benefits that come from GF eating outweigh the inconveniences of it. We learn to adapt our lifestyle to fit with others. We know that we can make a cornbread recipe with cornmeal and rice flour and it will still taste as great as a cornbread recipe with wheat flour. Vegetables are the same for everybody, but the protein choices are not. Many meats contain some type of wheat when prepared. I do not miss the skin on fried chicken, but I know many people probably cry themselves to sleep at night because they miss it so much. Or that moment when you see the Oreo cake balls at the Starbucks counter and you just can't eat them. It makes my heart cry just a little bit every time I see them. Nothing, I am sure is a GF equivalent to Oreo cake balls. I always miss my mama's yellow cake with powdered sugar icing and cherries in that corn syrup wheat gummy stuff that is so bad for you, but tastes so good. At some point, I will have eat it regardless of the body consequences the next day.

Silver-lining

    One of the positive effects that developed from being gluten-free for years is that I do not have bread cravings anymore. You know...that uncontrollable..craving that is so strong you jump in the car and drive 7 miles to the grocery store to get the one bread item that your body says you need, but you don't really need. Or, when you would see the homemade NY everything bagel on the cable cooking channel and you just had to find a place that had fresh bagels right away. I don't miss that uncontrollable craving at all.

    The silver lining in all of this diet change is that I feel better on a daily basis and have less pain and suffering through daily health obstacles. My hope is that eating healthier has the same effects for you too. So the next time we see that person eating 2 hot dogs with 2 buns, remember that we are GF, NF (nitrate-free) and will probably, just maybe, live a bit longer, are closer to a pain-free life and a bit healthier too.

Live long and prosper GF friends.

Have a Happy Health-a-licious Day!

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