Yes, I Am ...

Kevin on Mother's Day 2010

Yes, I am going Gluten Free with Kevin. This is something I have thought about doing for such a long time, now.  I really fought myself on this, too.  There are so many things I will miss, but I really need to try this for not just Kevin, but for myself.  You see I've always had a problem with concentration and retaining things that I read.  But, lately it's getting worse for me.  The other day I went on my Facebook page to find a web site that I had posted on there last month. While I was scanning my home page I saw this one post and I just looked at it in amazement. I had no idea what I was trying to write there. The sentence made no sense at all.  There was no subject, so I couldn't even figure out what it was pertaining to.  I deleted it and thought wow I am really having more of a difficult time with focusing then I thought.  Granted last month was stressful for me, because it was my last month working part time out of the house. I was trying to make sure everything was in order for my boss when he took over my job.  The thing is I don't think it's just that alone that is effecting my concentration.  The day before yesterday I felt so foggy brained and I couldn't shake it.  I've had that feeling more than once, too.  I can't tell you how many times I've read about people with gluten intolerance & celiac disease feeling foggy and once they have removed the gluten it's like the fog has lifted for them. I have a friend and her brother who has celiac actually described it that way.  He had ADHD and found out by accident (a car accident in truth) while in the ER that he has celiac disease.  He said that after going gluten free it was like the fog had lifted for him and he didn't have any of the problems with the ADHD anymore.  Let me remind you that it takes months for you to heal from the damage that gluten can do to you, so if it's not working in a week remind yourself of that.  I'll be reminding myself, too.  Plus you have to stick to it. You can't do a little gluten here and a little gluten there. This is different than Kevin's addiction to gluten.  I had to wean him off of the gluten to help him to deal with the withdrawals. So, I'm going to be telling myself "stick to it girl."

In Kevin's case I think this will be great for him.  I've been wanting to get back to baking for him and if I'm eating what he is eating then I will know for sure how something actually tastes.  Yesterday I made Pizza and for the first time in a long while I made the pizza crust myself.  I want to work on the recipe a little more, but it really did taste good.  On my half I want cheese less.  Yeah, I know what is pizza without cheese!  It's good that's what it is. LOL  Truth is I'm use to cheese and Kevin is use to dairy free cheese. The taste is different and I haven't been able to adjust to it myself. Garrett, my youngest, says he really likes the dairy free cheese himself. Go figure.  Garrett will eat almost anything.  I do remember reading that if you are going to change to a dairy free cheese that you shouldn't eat any cheese for a while.  This way you don't really remember the taste of cheese. Huh, truthfully I think this works best with little children, because I think I'd remember the taste of cheese after all these years.  I don't plan on going dairy free myself or at least I hope I don't have to do it.  Anyway, back to going gluten free for myself. I was just sitting here making my grocery list and started to write down this soup that Garrett really likes and it's my favorite, too.  That's when it hit me!  I can't eat that soup anymore.  Well, I'll just have to make a gluten free version of it then.  Yes, a lot will change for me, but I think it will all be helpful to Kevin. Going to a restaurant will be interesting for me, but in the end I'll have a better picture in my mind of what I can order for Kevin if I should decide to take him there later.  Honestly, we don't do a lot of eating out with Kevin.  I'm too afraid of cross contamination issues even if I give him some GlutenEase during dinner, but there will be times when we will eat out such as vacations or to Biltmore Estates.  Oh boy, this will be interesting.

Rough Weekend

Kevin's Dragon

Yeah, we had a rough weekend with Kevin and I'm out of practice with this. It's been so long since he's been like this to tell you the truth. It started Friday when I picked him up at school. I noticed he was dragging his feet getting into the car and I was thinking it was because he was tired.  As soon as he got in the car I could tell it wasn't that at all.  I gave him his medication and dropped him and Garrett off at the house where their grandmother was waiting for us.  I had to get back to work, because I was the only there that afternoon. My boss had to go pick up her grandson after school herself.  Friday's are usually my days to be there, so she can have a half day off. So, when I dropped them off I asked Garrett to give him some tonic water to see if that would help Kevin.  I called to check on them and the tonic water along with the extra medication seemed to help him.  Saturday rolled around and it started all over again. At this point I knew the best thing to do was to keep flushing whatever he got out of his system and hope that's the answer to his problems. No extra medication on Saturday.  Sunday I was going to take Garrett out for some driving time, which he needs badly.  We went up to help my mother with putting her awing frame down on her trailer, which didn't turn out well at all, and Kevin started back up while we were there.  I ended up driving us back home, because when Kevin gets like this it's hard for Garrett to focus on driving.  We got back home and I ended giving him extra medication along with more tonic water.  Why keep giving him the tonic water you ask?  It takes time to flush out any Gluten or Casein he may have gotten in his system.  Did you know that tonic water helps with leg cramps? Back to Kevin.  If you remember when you first remove Gluten it takes several months to remove it completely and to allow the stomach to heal.  When he gets a small amount it's a setback and there's no telling how long it can take to help his stomach to heal again.  It can take a weekend, a week or even a month.  Casein isn't as bad and usually with Kevin it's out within a day or two. All of it depends on how much he gets. For Kevin (everyone is different on this) it takes about 4 hours for him to react to the gluten.  As far as I can tell Casein takes about the same amount of time, maybe a little less.  So, for today I'm keeping my fingers crossed. I sent him off to school giving him more tonic water this morning just to play it safe.