My Bump In The Road

If you're like me then you probably love pasta, pizza, macaroni and cheese (the cheesiest), and anything chocolate and sweet. My favorite summer treat was ice cream. Being a chocoholic, I would always choose anything chocolate: Rocky Road, Belgian Chocolate, Chocolate Chocolate Chip, and Moose Tracks. My favorite go-to pastas were lasagna and Alfredo. My favorite sack lunch to bring to school was sandwiches which was such a simple food item!

Little did I know that those foods were slowly killing me inside. My stomach was tearing itself apart trying to digest these foods that I've been eating since I was four years old. Every kid loves milk. Heck, even my 22 year old sister-in-law loves milk.

Every day of my senior year I woke up sick to my stomach, could barely eat breakfast and never felt satisfied with the food from my school. My sack lunches from home were just a little better. After consulting my doctor he suggested taking dairy products out of my diet. So we did that. It got a little better. But it was extremely difficult to cut it out of my life completely because dairy is in everything. Cheese, cream, butter, protein, etc... After I graduated I was still waking up with stomach pains, diarrhea, and nausea. We went back to the doctor who suggested taking gluten out of my diet which meant no bread, tortillas, pies, and pasta. My world was literally turned upside down. I couldn't eat anything I loved anymore.

Because of that I spiraled down into a case of depression. I felt like I couldn't eat therefore I didn't eat. Nothing tasted good, nothing was satisfying. I was always hungry. I craved things I couldn't ever have again. When I relapsed and ate those foods it was worth it for a split second before my stomach realized it was unable to digest those foods. I was exhausted.

My mom was the only one keeping me alive. She went to every doctor's appointment with me. Went to the stores with me looking for foods I was able to eat. It was absolutely tiresome. We had to look at every single ingredient on the list of each nutrition label. We had to look up things we didn't know about to make sure they weren't a product of dairy or gluten. By the time I'd found full-time job and had a boyfriend I was ready to give up.

But then we found stuff. We found things that were different but tasted delicious. My tastebuds were dancing again! We found ingredients to use in recipes in place of the ingredients I couldn't eat, and they tasted good. And I'm going to share my revelations with those out there that need those recipes and store bought items.

Rule #1: ALWAYS READ THE LABEL