Foreign Body

Two days ago Chris and I were roaming through a store when I came upon a clearance rack with a sweater I thought would fit. Finding clothes here that fit me and look alright is a rarity, and winter clothes even more so, and so I picked it up. They had 3 sizes near my size so I figured I should try on what I thought was the right size, just in case the cut was a bit narrow in the chest.

Once in the dressing room I took off my sweater and t-shirt and turned to take the sweater off the hanger, and caught a glimpse of myself in the mirror. Now, our house only has 2 mirrors, a tiny one big enough to see your face in in the bathroom, and a full length one that is in the "stuff" room that isn't easily gotten to, so I rarely see my whole body in the mirror.

As my eye caught my reflection I gasped, looked away, then looked back in a double take. I couldn't believe what I was seeing, it took my breath away for a moment. It was like I didn't even recognise the body that my head was attached to. This was not the body that I came to New Zealand with at all. Since being here I went through a phase where I gained over 50 lbs in the course of about 4 months, thanks in part to a lovely issue known as PCOS. As if gaining the weight wasn't enough, it also prevents you from getting it back off, at least, until you find a doctor willing to meet you halfway. I do my part. I eat well, cut back on grains, have an elliptical machine that I get on as often as I can (except for when I'm banned from it by the doctor because my arthritis is being a bitch), but in the end I can only do so much and when I can't find a doctor who will read the latest studies and work with me to get this thing under control, well, I'm fucked.

So I'm left with this...foreign body. It is. It's foreign. This is not me. I don't recognise it. I work so hard to nourish and care for my body and this is what I get? Why?

After regaining my breath I tried to smile at myself in the mirror, say "I love you, it's okay, we'll find help soon.", and pull the sweater over my head. It was a bit too small. While I used to have to buy clothes to fit my bust because it was the biggest part of my upper body, now I buy to fit the massive tire situated around a "beer belly" situated around my waist. It's not fair to have a beer belly when I don't drink beer.

I got dressed quickly, grabbed the next size up, and got out of the store. Don't get me wrong, I love me, but I feel like I'm living inside a foreign country, and I'm not talking about New Zealand.

I ran away from home!

After reading my last post I realised I forgot the "life-wise" part! *snort*

Life is not bad. Busy, random, too slow and WAY too fast all at the same time. My life is good all things considered.

I did run away from home last week, which turned into one entertaining trip. Well, to be more specific Chris and I BOTH ran away from Auckland, in hopes of enjoying the sunshine that decided to grace us with it's presence after the 2 weeks of gray hell. I guess it had been on vacation too. *wink*

We left the computer/internet at home and went to Coromandel....and stayed in Coromandel Town. Now I really should have known from the name that it might be one of those "exists just for tourists" towns, but I read about the history of the town and so figured it wouldn't be too bad, right?

Wrong! Granted, we got a good deal at the place we stayed, but the town? Can I just say that $27 for a main dish at an average place anywhere in NZ outside of Auckland is absolutely ridiculous. Seriously, they should rethink their prices. How do "locals" afford to eat there? There were a few cafes with a bit better prices, but still pretty much Auckland prices... The grocery store was a little 4Square with prices higher than what I pay here, but I expected that as well. After having an interesting dinner at the fish and chips shop that charged a price I'd have never paid for a chicken burger had I any other food choice, we ended up picking up brown rice, broccoli, and a lentil dhal at the 4Square to cook in our room for dinner, kicked back on the bed, and enjoyed the movie channel. I think that was the first time we've watched TV in months.

When we set out for Coromandel Town we didn't know exactly what to expect having never been there, but we did know we wanted to make a day trip of Wednesday to see the other side of the peninsula. We arrived Tuesday night and came back to Auckland on Thursday, so that really only gave us the one day to explore, plus, rain was in the forecast for Thursday night and Friday, not the best driving/exploring conditions, so that helped to keep our trip really short. Unfortunately, when we wet out on Wednesday to follow the road through the mountains, we ran into a problem--a "Road Closed" sign to be exact! After a quick moment consulting the map we saw there was one more route to the other side, a bit longer than the first, but still not too bad. So we turned around and sought out the other road over the mountains. Just when we thought it would be smooth sailing we ran into a big construction crew that was stopping traffic because one side of the road was closed, so the other side (one lane mind you) had to be used for traffic in both directions (something I've noticed in NZ a lot). Seeing the long line of traffic waiting to be let through and not knowing how long the construction would last for, I looked at Chris and said "I think this is a sign we're meant to stay at the motel and chill for the day. There will be no going over the mountains!" And that's how we ended up in our room for the afternoon/evening.

In the end nothing went to plan, and I got annoyed, but then reminded myself that we were being spontaneous, plans often never go by the book, and that's okay, there's no one here to yell at me for it. Chris and I both help each other laugh it off. It's good. Living with Chris helps me feel less like I have to obsess and manage every little thing all the time. Old habits die hard, but they are dying, and I feel a little less weighed down by the day. I have to remember my "wabi-sabi" mantra!

But something tells me this is just a shadow of things to come if we plan a trip to the South Island. Not to mention Chris says the roads are even scarier down there, and I thought that driving on sea and mountain roads without a foot of road for a shoulder was scary enough!

I'm a bad, bad blogger...

Yes, I am. I'm neglectful of my blog. In my defense though, I think of things to post here all the time, I just never actually get it typed! Sad excuse, I know...

Really, this blog is me trying to keep track of all the odd things I get up to health-wise and life-wise. So, how about an update?

Health-wise: Doctors suck. Insurance companies suck more. After deliberating over the "pay out of pocket to play Russian Roulette with the Endocrinologists listed in the phone book" I've decided maybe my best bet is to save my money and go see the "Holy Grail" of doctors when I get back to the US. Granted, that'll be a while from now, but hey, if the medical community as a whole can ignore my problems and keep playing pass the buck, I suppose I can keep coping with it on my own for a little while longer and save myself the humiliation, frustration, and about $360 per doctor's visit! *big grin*

So, I've decided to monitor my blood sugars at home, especially post meal. I know my fasting glucose is never in the "bad" range, but the more reading I've done, the more I've learned that the current "medical guidelines" are missing tons of women with diabetes because while their fasting glucose is normal, their post meal glucose levels are too high, so damage is already being done to their body and they don't know it. We really have something wrong in our medical system when something like 50% of people diagnosed with diabetes will be diagnosed with a diabetic neuropathy at the same time they get the big "D" diagnosis. That means they've had it for years and it's been slowly destroying their body while their doctors have being saying all is well.

I refuse to be that woman. PCOS and it's lovely weight gain puts me at a high risk, family history at an even higher risk, and a previous Glucose Tolerance Test that had me sitting on the edge of "prediabetes" means that odds are with no treatment I'll be diabetic within the next 6-10 years. Except, we don't know how long I've been this way, and if I've had these things since I was 19-20 (which is what I'm quite sure of) at 26 I'm getting rather close to that 10 year mark. Too close for comfort. Now, the elliptical machine in my living room paired with my already healthy eating habits carb and portion wise are fighting back that risk, but with my hormonal profile the way it is nothing is going to help this as much as the medical treatment I need that everyone is too busy twiddling their thumbs to provide.

I should clarify that I'm not bitter, just tired, and frustrated. Both for myself, and others I know of who are getting shafted by the medical system. In the last month I've heard of a friend whose 2 yr old baby died due to gross medical negligence, and another friend whose uncle was diagnosed with terminal cancer, thanks to a doctor who didn't take anything seriously and let his illness to get much worse without proper treatment.

I'm not dead, or dying (at least not today, far as I know) so I think I have an obligation to throw a fit for those that can't anymore. Something has to change. I don't know how I'll change it, but I'll figure something out.

Day 17

17 days into this no gluten thing and although I have to get rather creative with food, I think it's worth it. Yesterday I unfortunately ended up eating some real (with gluten) bread and it was just...eh. My stomach was surprisingly not impressed, I didn't expect it to hurt from eating bread. Remember, I don't have Celiac's or anything, so I didn't figure I'd have any problem eating it if I had to (and I had to yesterday, long story...). So I don't know what that means, I'm guessing it may have been unhappy with the combination of food I ate, but either way, this requires further thought.

In other news I decided to try taking a digestive enzyme supplement again. This one is totally different than the others that I've taken (and have made me ill). In addition, I'm taking a pre/probiotic with a pretty impressive composition, so I'm very happy with it too. I got them in the mail today so I've been taking them and things have been pretty peaceful, a nice change from yesterday and last night!

I made mexican food tonight and found the best rice recipe ever... http://www.recipezaar.com/117892 It is soooo good. Reminds me of the type I used to eat in restaurants before moving to "The Land of No Good Mexican Food" (well, except for the one place some Americans moved here and started, but it's more Cali-Mex).

Day 10

As of today I've been gluten free for 10 days, and I have to say it's been going pretty good! Most days I haven't had the bloated tummy feeling I was getting after eating bread or pasta, my body feels a bit more in balance, and my head feels a bit clearer.

Now, I think that is probably because with most grains gone my food choices have been easier to balance protein/carb wise, but it could be because of not eating the grains themselves. I have an endocrine problem which causes me to be pretty much pre-diabetic. As a result I have to be careful about the balance of food I eat to prevent my blood sugar from spiking. No, I don't have to monitor my blood sugar or anything, but I know trying to keep my eating habits close to those of a diabetic will help keep me from developing diabetes in the future.

Anyway, the food in general has been really good! Since I eat a lot of fruits and veggies I have plenty of variety in my diet. I have to make more effort to cook these days, but that's a good thing IMO. Grain foods are convenient, we throw something on two pieces of bread and call it a sandwich so we can eat and go back to what we were doing, but I think that often we can do better. I've been eating a bit of rice, as well as some rice crackers (I've always loved them). I decided that quiona is just not for me, at least not in it's whole form, too crunchy. The texture is what I imagine caviar must be like to eat. Blech. But, I'm going to try cooking with the quinoa flakes I found at some point.

Tonight, I had my first taste of gluten free bread. Chris found out that a local burger place offers gluten free buns for their burgers, so I got one with grilled chicken, pear, caramelised onions, and brie (along with other burger toppings). Soooo good! The bun was interesting. The parts that had become damp from the tomato relish were almost a mealy texture, not doughy like you'd find with regular bread. It had that almost stale texture too, but I expected that since I've had baked goods that use "alternative" flours before. All it all it was really good though. I'd eat it again. And I'm glad I got to try it and appreciate what that restaurant is doing for the gluten free community around here. Offering diverse food choices that cater to food allergies is a great thing. They even took the time to point out on their menu that their fries are not gluten free (though I think most gluten free eaters would assume that!).

Mixing it up in the kitchen...

My body once again hates the food I eat. So what's a girl to do?

Go gluten free for a while.

"Gluten free!" you gasp. Yes, gluten free. Bye bye wheat and all your little gluten filled buddies, for several weeks I'm cutting you out!

"But why?" you ask. Simple. Something I've been eating on a daily basis is making the natives VERY restless, and that's just no way to live! Now I love bread and pasta as much as the next person (and maybe a little more considering my vegan years) but no food is worth feeling miserable all the time. And what good is any food when it can't stay in my body long enough for me to absorb any nutrients from it? None. So, I've got to figure out what's going on. And how many foods to we really eat consistently every day? For me, not that many. I eat as wide a variety of foods as I can. The only sure things in my daily diet are bread of some form, oatmeal, peanut butter, odds are some form of dairy, and whatever fruits and veggies cross my path.

Since the only tried and true way to figure out food intolerances is by some form of rotation diet, that's what I'm doing. It's always worked before. Either one food I'm eating isn't right for me anymore, or a combination of them together is causing the upset (sometimes this is found with dairy and grain together). My solution therefore is to go 3-4 weeks without gluten or oats. That gives me enough time to see if it makes any difference. During that time I'll eat some form of dairy every day. If I'm still noticing problems every day then I'll cut out the dairy and peanut butter. By then things should be calm. If not then I can only assume there is something more complex going on with my digestive system in general, and I'll suck it up and go talk to the doctor.

I should also point out that I have an autoimmune disorder (some arthritis like thing) that is flaring at the moment, so could be influencing this whole drama. However, when trying to find the source of my long standing iron deficiency anemia (still a bit of a mystery) the doctor tested me for Celiac's disease and the blood work came back negative. So I'm pretty sure I'm not having an autoimmune response to gluten at the moment. But the blood test can't tell you anything about intolerances (since they occur in different ways) so the only way to figure it out is to cut it out of my diet entirely for a while.

Should be fun I think! I'm always up for a challenge in the kitchen. After working in food service for years I've picked up some skills and am a pretty decent cook if I do say so myself. So I say bring it on...lets see how creative I can get with this! Life is too short to eat bad food (or food that hates you)!

I love food, but sometimes it doesn't love me...

I'm a food geek, I admit it. I think about the food I eat more than most people I suppose. The nutritional composition of it, where it's come from, what's in it, who made it, how it could be made better, it's all swirling around in my head every time I take a bite of something. I suppose growing up with various food restrictions (my mom was Seventh Day Adventist) caused me to pay attention to what exactly I was eating as a kid, and with a mother who was rather particular about the food she ate in general, the habit just became more complex as I got older. When I was 14 my parents decided we were all going vegan. VEGAN. Us kids were less than impressed with all that. I mean, vegetarian we could get behind, but vegan?? They had good intentions though. My siblings both had rather severe asthma and my mother was hoping cutting out dairy products would impact their asthma for the better (it did, substantially' and was so worth it.)

And then when I was 19 I developed my first food intolerance--corn. I was heart broken, it was my favorite vegetable and suddenly I couldn't eat it without becoming violently ill. It was strange to say the least. I suspect a bad case of the flu I had immediately prior to reacting to corn caused my body to be in the perfect state to have a reaction, but we'll never really know for sure I guess. All I knew was that it sucked. But, I learned to live with it and get on with life, carefully avoiding a food I used to wolf down with gusto. Then, later that summer I got the same reaction to watermelon. Oh you can imagine how mad I was. The peak of summer in the southern US? All you feel like eating is watermelon! But after pushing the issue a few weeks after the first reaction I quickly made peace with the fact that my body was less than impressed with watermelon. It was okay though, I figured I'd just eat cantaloupe or honeydew melon instead, since they were in season and had the cool, refreshing qualities I loved so much in watermelon. But my digestive system had other ideas, and they were quickly added to the growing list of "foods to avoid".

Over the next few years oranges, tomatoes, lettuce, most greens, all bagged vegetable products in the grocery stores, and even apples were added to the list, as well as whole grains. I could eat highly refined grain products like pasta or bread products made with white flour, but any whole grain would have me writhing in pain. I think that was the most mysterious of all. Why whole grains? Why was the processed versions okay? I began to notice the trend with a few other things too. Like, fresh tomatoes--bad. Ketchup--fine. Oranges--bad. Small amounts of cooked orange juice concentrate--fine. Musing about it one day my mom and I decided that perhaps the reason they worked was because the offending food was processed to the degree that my body didn't quite recognise it as offensive....either that, or whatever was offending me was removed in the processing. We figured maybe I was reacting not to the foods, but the pesticides used on them as they grew? In time I had to leave my vegan way of eating in order to diversify my diet a bit. I'd read several studies done that showed some people with a family history of food allergies can "activate" them after restricting their diet radically and was concerned maybe veganism had helped trigger it. After that the development of new sensitivities halted for the most part, which I took to be a good sign!

Fast forward several years and I found myself living here in New Zealand. Moving to a new place is always a challenge, but when you have various food sensitivities that have you living in your bathroom for days, well, it's even more so. I recall many days when I first got here spent curled up on the bed, sick from some food that somehow contained something not compatible with me. But after living here for a while and trying new "safe" things and such, I began to notice my body calming down in some ways. One day I ended up eating something I didn't intend to (tomatoes) and yet an hour later I still hadn't had a reaction. Can you imagine how elated I was? I called my mom and almost bawled over the fact that I wasn't sick, and she spoke the words that had been milling around in my head "What else do you think you might be able to eat?" What else indeed. Apples, lettuce, and tomatoes turned out to be just fine here. My only guess is that either they are a different variety, or whatever chemical I was reacting to in the US is not in use here. In the last 6 months I've added in some whole grains as well!

But, last month it started all over again. Nothing seems to sit well, I dread eating, and I know every detail of my bathroom (if I owned the place it would be totally redone by now). Not good. So what's a foodie to do? Start a new post about my solution...LOL