so before i make my plea for help and ask any of my 5 readers if you have any good tips on eating wheat free, let me share how we made this little discovery 18 months in to olivia's life. i may or may not be feeling inclined to brag about my instinct to investigate this problem and it definitely reaffirmed the idea in my mind that doctors are awesome and i particularly love our good ones that we seem lucky enough to have, but it's just not reasonable to think that their brains are little crystal balls that are 100% on point all the time. and we can't necessarily expect that of them either, in my opinion. that's when crazy moms like me have to get to work on google and let the diagnosing begin! ha. not really. but you get the idea.
anyway- over the past few months, some of you may have heard me joke/complain about the serious 'tude olivia has developed. granted lots of times it's probably really just been toddler attitude at its finest, but a lot of times it almost seemed like it was something else. like she didn't feel good or something so she was being grumpy. yet aside from the occasional ear infection, etc., she was fine. she would sometimes have noticeable stomach issues, but i didn't think much of it. she was also extremely lethargic a lot of days. she's always been an awesome sleeper and was/is sleeping 12 or 13 hours a night plus at least a 2 hour nap during the day. this gives no reason for her to want to lay around with her blankie an hour after waking up. and, last, her eczema came back (she had it pretty bad as a baby but it was only on her face and it just disappeared around 9 months, i think), but only on her body and in weird rough patches that looked more "allergy-ish," if that's possible.
SO- after some google-mania, i decided maybe her symptoms were indicating that she could have an iron deficiency. i told the pediatrician about these symptoms and she agreed we might as well test her. came back negative. back to google. found out that anemia symptoms can also be symptoms of food allergies, particularly wheat or even full blown gluten. super. made an appointment with an allergist that i luckily did not need a referral for because adam's work has bomb insurance. so i felt like i was cheating on our pediatrician, but i took her in.
we go to the allergy appointment and they test her for the "big ones" which are soy, peanuts, wheat, egg, egg whites and dairy i think. to my surprise yet almost relief, the wheat spot blew up to what looked like a big bug bite and the other ones just stayed little dots. not that i wanted something to be wrong, but i almost felt relieved that i didn't go through all this trouble and go to this appointment 7 days after a c-section (with my mom in tow, of course) for nothing. the doctor then went on to explain how these allergens attack the lining in the stomach and something about antibodies blah blah i don't really even remember. but we left with a big green folder of how to deal with this ridiculousness and the hope that she will grow out of it in as short as a year or as long as 6 years. or maybe not at all. no way to tell at this point, he said. and i guess the reason it's really only showing itself now is because only in the last couple months has she really developed an adult like diet. before that, around 1 year and younger, she was eating very basic babyish foods and jarred baby food. and before that, formula. so it wouldn't really be of significance back then...or something.
that was kind of long and more like a journal entry for me i guess, but does anyone have any products they like that are wheat-free? i am finding that the biggest struggles are dinner options and on-the-go snack options. she is kind of a picky eater these days anyway, so i seriously feel like this is all she eats:
any and all fruit (does this make up for the fact that she hardly eats any veggies?)
yogurt
popcorn
regular corn
hot dogs (though she is known to refuse them regularly too)
wheat free chicken nuggets
wheat free waffles
dora fruit snacks
she'll eat soups or chili or stuff like that too but since pasta is out it makes that hard too now.
the fact that bread and any cracker-ish type snack have been eliminated from her diet has really put a damper on things so i'm looking for some ideas. there is a allergen free bakery like 15 minutes from our house so i may go check it out and see if the loaf of bread for $6.99 and the 1 dozen hawaiian rolls for $4.99 (they did look delish) are worth a purchase.
i think the poor baby will be most sad to lose out on her favorite snack.....
we still have a half-full bag in the pantry... guess i better throw them away. or just eat them myself.
