There are a lot of new people to the page this week so I just wanted to say Welcome! and thanks for liking my page! I started this page about a year and a half ago in the hopes of finding others here in the Laredo, Texas area who are living a gluten free lifestyle. A little bit about me and my story: I have been gluten free for two years now, and Im gluten free to LIVE not because Im dieting or trying to lose weight, or because its the new fad thing to do... I am 100% gluten free, 100% of the time because I have to be to survive and thrive. I have Celiac Disease, and it was a long and difficult road to a diagnosis. Its hard to say when my symptoms started because I believe theyve been there in mild forms my entire life. But the symptom that sent me to the doctor was an incredibly itchy rash that started after my daughter was born. It began on my waist and around my sides, and at first I thought it was an allergic reaction to detergent, so I monitored it for a few weeks. After about a month it didnt seem to be getting any better, and was in fact a little worse. So I went to my family doctor and was told it was contact dermatitis and given some medicated cream. It didnt work and the rash got worse and started popping up down my legs and around my knees, so I went back to the doctor, was given a stronger steroid ointment and an antihistamine in pill form, both of which didnt work. At this point I had been dealing with the rash for about two months. I was referred to a dermatologist and over the course of the next 8 moths or so we exhausted every option as far as treatment. During this span of almost a year, the rash (later diagnosed as dermatitis herpetiformis) became unbearable. Ill refer to it as D.H. from here on out... I dont wish it on my worst enemy. This is not your typical itchy rash. I had an expert in the field who has D.H. herself, describe perfectly what it feels like... LIKE ROLLING IN STINGING NETTLES NAKED WITH A SEVERE SUNBURN, THEN WRAPPING YOURSELF IN A WOOL BLANKET FILLED WITH ANTS AND FLEAS. For almost a year I felt like this 24 hours a day. I would go home from work at night and take the hottest shower possible, because scalding my skin was actually relief... and then Id go open the freezer and stand there for a while to cool down. I would scratch my skin so strongly in my sleep that I would wake up having made my skin bleed... so I kept my nails short, only to wake up to bruises instead from still scratching. My health and my sanity were slowly slipping away, and more than once I stood in front of the mirror and told myself I knew I was slowly dying. On December 29th, 2012, I had an early 7am follow up with my dermatologist (which I was now seeing every three weeks to try something new) before I headed out of town to a friends wedding. I had seen in his face in a previous visit that he was trying to help me... but was running out of options. At this appointment I had a really bad patch of the rash on my knee... and when he looked at it... he looked at me with wide eyes, and asked me if there had been a blister. When I said yes, i saw the light bulb go on, and he told me i know what this is! He said to me this is dermatitis herpetiformis... you need to stop eating gluten. He did a biopsy on my knee and sent me home with a few sheets explaining what gluten was and what I couldnt eat. I went to my friends wedding later that night and ate nothing. From that day forward I have been gluten free. Things would get way worse before they got better. I didnt know that my body would need to detox all the stored gluten I had in my body. All those years of carb loading before long runs, and weekends of hand crafted wheat beer, my daily whole wheat toast and whole grain cereal breakfasts... all of that had to work its way out of the cells in my body. Immediately I started losing weight fast... fast enough for people close to me to be concerned and try to feed me all the time. My DH got really bad. I went on a medication called Dapsone, that I refer to as the devil in pill form. It doesnt get rid of the D.H., it merely helps mask the symptoms so its bearable. After about a month and a half on the dapsone my immune system was almost non existent and I was so anemic I ended up in the E.R. It took me about three months after that to slowly come off the dapsone... and about three more months for the D.H. to mostly go away. (Today, two years later, I have one stubborn patch on the side of my neck that refuses to go away, and flares up from time to time if I get glutened). To get the diagnosis of Celiac Disease I had to have genetic testing done to see that I had the Celiac genes... and I also had a panel of tests done that showed how my bodys immune system responded to foods like gluten, corn, dairy, soy, and eggs. For me, gluten is not an allergy... my body can not process and break down the protein of gluten that is found in wheat and other grains. If I ingest gluten, even a crumb from a piece of bread, or a dusting of wheat flour... my body recognizes it as a danger and mounts an attack... not only on the gluten but on my body itself. Symptoms I have personally had with Celiac Disease: D.H., migraines, bloating after eating, joint pain in my hands, feet, shoulders, knees and hips, my eyelashes fall out completely, incredibly dry skin, brain fog, bouts of unexplained anger, extreme sadness, water retention, sneezing and congestion after a meal, fatigue, infertility... and Im sure I am forgetting a few. If youve read this far... THANK YOU! :) Its now a goal of mine to help spread awareness about Celiac Disease and about all the misconceptions that go along with a gluten free diet. There are more than 300 symptoms of celiac disease... including a link to diabetes and thyroid problems... I personally think everyone should be tested... but especially if you think you have the symptoms. At my day job Im a News Anchor and Journalist for the NBC affiliate in Laredo. While news is my passion... so is food! I love being in the kitchen, trying new recipes, and seeing how I can turn an unhealthy recipe into something totally healthy that I can eat. :) So thanks again for liking my page and if you have a good gluten free recipe or see a new product... send it my way! ~Ann :)
Posted on: Wed, 07 Jan 2015 03:39:28 +0000
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