A Young Wife’s Tale

I have failed as a caregiver. This is really an epic fail. When David first went gluten free, I was so careful to read labels. I got a little more comfortable as time went on. When David went dairy free as a part of his anti-inflammation diet, I was cooking everything from scratch anyway, so I wasn’t as careful. There are only a few prepackaged items David eats now. One is tortilla chips, the other is cereal.

The cereal David has been eating has gluten.Thank you Arthritis Ashley for pointing this out to me. I completely forgot about malt.

I wish David had a definitive diagnosis of Celiac Disease or Gluten Intolerance. Without the diagnosis, we can’t say for certain if trace amounts of gluten are okay. I’m not always buying certified gluten free products. As long as the ingredients don’t have wheat, I’ll buy it. David has taken buns off of burgers, and eaten lots of food that has touched gluten products. We really don’t know if this is hurting him or not. He doesn’t have any symptoms when he consumes trace amounts, but that doesn’t mean it isn’t damaged his stomach if he does have Celiac. It’s frustrating.

We survived our second week in New Jersey.

Monday when David came home from work, he said, “I put in a request to go to a training conference in Virginia. It’s Wednesday through Friday. They’ll never approve it on such short notice.”

Tuesday afternoon, David calls me and says, “Pack my bag. I’m leaving in three hours.”

I was right. I knew it. David got sick after eating pizza Wednesday. Whether it’s a gluten allergy or Celiac Disease, we don’t know, and we won’t be finding out until we get better health insurance. David is doing pretty well. He’s continuing to lose weight, and he’s gone from swimming at the gym for [...]

Going gluten free hasn’t been nearly as hard as I thought it would be. Even eating out wasn’t too hard. My mother found some gluten free Betty Crocker mixes at her local Kroger. The brownies were good. Very rich. They tasted like dark chocolate brownies. So David hasn’t even missed out on baked goods.