The internal war

Today, after dropping Myra off at school, I wandered down to Petite Provence, home of some of the best baked goods this side of France. Since we are leaving next week, I wanted to get one for Tim -- it used to be a Friday ritual.

The line was slow, giving me plenty of time to ogle all the pastries and muffins and croissants. All things I can no longer have because of my gluten intolerance. I started hearing a little war waging inside me.

Maybe I'm really not as sensitive as I think. Maybe I really can eat wheat or gluten, maybe it was just because I was reintroducing it back into my diet after the elimination diet that I reacted so strongly to it. Maybe it's not that bad if I have something with wheat or gluten.

And then I remembered what happened when I ate one Red Vine before realizing it had wheat flour in it. Within three minutes, my stomach had bloated to about four times its normal size, I was in pain for hours, and then my skin broke out the following day. I remembered what happened when I ate a spelt cookie, and how sick I felt. I remembered how badly my skin broke out after eating spelt for a week.

And yes, it is that bad if I eat gluten. So I won the war, but sometimes I guess I have to remind myself why -- because even though I can't eat that stuff anymore, it doesn't stop me from wanting to eat it from time to time.