gf4life's Blog

Okay, I've never done this before, but figured it would be a great outlet for me to be able to talk about all the little things that come up when no one is around to chat with.I am still recovering from an incident that occurred Friday, two weeks ago. I am on the tail end of the recovery from a gluten incident and the irritable intestines are getting back to normal. My standard reaction is 2-4 days of pain, gas, bloating and diarrhea and exhaustion, sometimes with a DH rash. That is followed a few days later by constipation, usually for about 2-4 more days and the exhaustion sticks around for about 2 weeks. I also am not able to sleep well. My whole sleep pattern is messed up and that just adds to how tired I feel. I hate it, but it is my own stupid fault for not being more careful. Here is what happened. I had a doctors appointment out of town. I was going to take the kids with me and go without my husband, but he insisted that he wanted to go along. Then he was late getting home from work. My appointment was at 2:45 and the doctor's office is 45 minutes away. My husband got home at 2:15 and had to shower really quick. So we were already late when he got in the shower. He asked me to mix his protein shake for him, since he was hungry and wasn't going to have time to eat. So I did. It was a new brand that he started using and I hadn't read the label. I wasn't going to eat it, so why should I read the label. It didn't even dawn on me that it would be a good idea. I sniffed the powder when I opened the package and it smelled DISGUSTING. I can't believe he drinks two of those a day! So I start mixing it and I'm trying to hurry. I mix it with some water, then open the cup to add ice. I toss in a few ice cubes and some of the mix dripped down on my hand. I put the lid back on and without even thinking I licked the spill off my hand. I swear it was only a few seconds and my brain started working. Here is my train of thought: "man, this stuff tastes nasty". "tastes?!?" (picture me spitting into the sink at this point and washing my mouth out, oops, too late I already swallowed it) "what the heck did I just do?" "I wonder what is in this?"So I grab the package and I swear the first ingredient in the mix is a carbohydrate complex that is made from barley, oats and oat bran! Man, I was so mad at myself. I walked out to the car with the shake and told my husband what I did. My husband hadn't even read the ingredients and didn't know it had gluten in it. Now he won't let me mix his shakes anymore. He is worried I'll make myself sick again. The next day I went to a birthday party (only had fresh fruit & veggies and a soda). I went swimming and I was fine, so I thought that maybe I was going to luck out. No such luck. That night I had a bad stomachache, gas and bloating something terrrible. I slept so poorly that the next day on Sunday I was not able to get up early for Sunday School (Thank God it wasn't my turn to teach it!), and by the time we left for the church service my stomach was rumbling something awful. I was back and forth to the bathroom 4 times during the first hour, and it was all I could do to force myself to stay there until the service was over. I practically flew home. I think the delayed reaction (which for me and wheat gluten is usually 12-24 hours) is because it was barley and oats. I hardly ever had barley before, not whole barley that is. Occasionally barley malt mixed in other foods. And none since going gluten-free, unless some of the syrups I've had accidently had it in there. It took almost 36-48 hours for the full effect and that seemed like a long time for me. But since that is the only thing I had that contained gluten it had to be what caused it. On Wednesday I was still feeling bad and I brought it up in our Bible Study group. My husband was shocked to find out that I still felt bad. I think this was the first time that he actually listened when I said that one gluten incident hurts me for at least 2 weeks. I am thankful that he finally learned that. It already has helped tremendously in his keeping the gluten out of the kitchen/eating areas. He is more careful with the cups he mixes his gluten shakes in too!