More About Structure, And Another Gluten Warning

As hesitant as I was to attempt to add structure to my life, it’s turning out to not be as difficult as I feared it would be.  I think the key is to add new things one at a time, with some time in between to adjust.  Well, there seem to be several keys, but that’s a big one.

Someone recently gave me a Palm Pilot.  I resisted initially, thinking that if I can’t seem to make a paper organizer or an online task list work, I wouldn’t be any more likely to make proper use of a Palm.  I was wrong!  It’s amazing.  It fits right into the way my mind works, somehow.  It syncs with the software on my computer and fits right into my purse.  I keep my task list on it (a very long end ever-growing list of every little thing I would otherwise forget to do).  I look at the “Today” view of my task list so that it isn’t overwhelming, seeing all those things I have to do, and it feels like those things I have to do in the day in question are in more manageable chunks.  I’ve been learning how easily overwhelmed I am, and now that I realize that about myself, I can structure (there’s that word again) things so that I don’t shut down when contemplating the enormity of everything.

I keep my shopping list on the Palm, too, with items divided by store, and I just delete them from the list as I go, and then add new items as I think of them.  No little scraps of paper in my purse, and no need to carry a little spiral notebook or start new lists as the old ones get all scratched out, anymore.  I have items in my Office Documents like my list of the supplements I take, which includes brand names, dosages, and prices, so that when I need to buy more I remember which ones to buy; and various gluten-free product, company, and ingredient lists.

I have the little folding keyboard that goes with it, too, and I can use that to work on my NaNoWriMo novel if my laptop doesn’t work and I’m at a write-in.  I won’t be able to write on it in the program I usually use (though I did message the software’s author to ask if he would write a version for Palm for next year), but I could write in Word and then transfer it when I get home.  (My laptop is very old and cantankerous and I’m not sure how much I can count on it to work on any given day.)  The Palm has wifi, and that is awesome, since the wifi on my laptop hasn’t worked for a long time.  I’ll be able to update my NaNo word counts even if I’m not home.

End of commercial for Palm.  For now. 

And other news in the Tampalama Adds Structure To Her Life Saga:

When trying to figure out a glutening not long ago, SS said maybe I should keep a food diary.  I groaned.  I hate keeping food diaries.  But, the more I thought about it, the more I realized how it could have come in handy, had I been keeping one during the last few glutenings.

Yesterday morning, we were talking about the last time I was glutened and neither of us could remember what had caused it, even though I’d figured it out at the time it happened.  I finally remembered.  It was the WalMart Great Value brand corn tortillas I’d bought a few months ago.  The package says “gluten free” on it, but I noticed the day I bought it that it was the last of the old packaging design, and all the packages with the new design had a shared equipment warning.  I debated about buying it, wondering if they changed the gluten info when they switched to the new packaging because they had discovered it was mislabeled earlier due to the shared equipment situation or if they actually had changed where and  how they were made at the same time they changed the labels.  I took the chance and bought them and used them a few times.  That was during a time when I was being glutened in more than one way (also, a store brand acidophilus I was using at the time seems to not be gluten free).  I hung onto the tortillas, though, and gave them a try again Sunday night, just to test, and I reacted.  That was the glutening we couldn’t remember the source of, yesterday.  And that was what convinced me to start a food log.

I created a new blog and made it private (the whole world doesn’t care or need to know what I eat).  I’m keeping the entries simple, with a list of what I eat each day.  I don’t bother with measurements and such because it isn’t a weight loss food diary.  I make notes about things that might or might not be pertinent later, like which Dunkin Donuts location I got my coffee from the last two mornings.  I made categories for the two major reactions I have to gluten (abdominal pain/gas, and bleeding, usually two to three days later).  I made categories for the types of foods I’m eating, as well, just in case that might spotlight any other trends (i.e. I’ve suspected for some time that I also have a problem with dairy, but I’m not ready to come completely out of denial about it.  Many gluten intolerant people also cannot digest casein, a protein in milk.  I generally only react with digestive symptoms to dairy products when I’ve been glutened, but I always seem to become congested and sinusy after I eat cheese.)  I had to laugh this morning when, just beginning today’s entry, my category cloud showed “coffee” in huge letters.  At that point, it was the only category that had more than one entry in it.

I’m including a section in each day’s entry for soaps, lotions, detergents, etc., which I’ll just paste in from the day before and only change when I change brands.  I’ll make notes of anything unusual that happens, like the times I have opened a file folder of paperwork from Boss and had a half-cup of bread crumbs fall out onto me (I spoke with him about it, explaining what crumbs can do and asking for his help since I was trying to rule out as much as possible in my attempt to figure out how I was being glutened, and he said he will be more careful about eating lunch near the paperwork he is working on).  I have a section in every entry where I’ll go back in and make a note if I have any reaction, and I’ll put it into the appropriate reaction category.  Eventually, I should be able to pin down what causes the mystery reactions I have sometimes.

Speaking of mystery glutenings, I have another entry in my drafts folder that will be published soon . . .

And speaking of WalMart (as in the mention of the Great Value brand corn tortillas, above), I was looking at their gluten free products on their web site (a search feature I had touted in a previous entry) and was still very impressed with it . . . until I got several pages into the list and saw Goldfish crackers, fudge brownie ice cream, and bread.  Wheat bread, yes.  In the gluten free search results.  So, I have to add a warning here, to anyone who took my advice and went to look at the list: Be careful!  Take nothing for granted!  And always read labels before you buy, because even if something was gluten free last time  you bought it, it may not be anymore.

More soon.

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Possible Gluten Warning

I previously mentioned OreIda Easy Fries in an entry from July, and although I didn’t specifically say in that entry that they were gluten free, I’m concerned that anyone who must eat gluten free may have read that entry and trusted me that they were gluten free, since I mentioned really liking them.  I’ve been eating them off and on (when I’m not being careful to watch my IF ratings; white potatoes are inflammatory) for a while now.  Well, it turns out, they may not be gluten free, and I didn’t know that.  I don’t know what to think, really, now.

• According to the ingredients list (Potatoes, Vegetable Oils [Sunflower, Cottonseed, Soybean, Palm, Canola, and/Or Partially Hydrogenated Soybean Oil], Salt, Dextrose, Disodium Dihydrogen Pyrophosphate, Annatto [Vegetable Color]), there doesn’t seem to be anything in them that would raise any red flags for me.  It even contains a soybean warning, but no other allergen warnings.
• They show up in WalMart’s list of gluten free items.
• I can’t time my own consumption of them with the glutenings I’ve gone through.  The thing that further muddies my ability to figure it out is that I often buy and eat these fries when I’m going through a time of craving comfort food, and one of the things that happens when I’ve been glutened is that I crave comfort food because I feel so awful.  If they do contain gluten, I may not know, if I’m mostly eating them after I’ve already been glutened.  But I do recall eating them when I hadn’t been glutened, and I don’t remember ever making any sort of connection between them and any gluten reaction.

However, when trying to figure out a recent mystery glutening (twice over a period of weeks), I went back over everything I could remember having eaten, and when I checked the list of gluten free items on the OreIda web site, these fries weren’t on the list.  I called, and the girl I spoke with said they weren’t on her list either.

I’m going to contact OreIda and ask them to look at the ingredients and manufacturing process and either add them to the gluten free list if they are in fact gluten free, or put something on the label that explains why they aren’t, such as that maybe they are made in a shared facility that also produces products containing wheat, or something, if that is the case.  It could possibly be that they are produced in a facility that produces products containing barley, rather than wheat, and since US companies are not (yet?) legally bound to disclose barley on their labels, that could explain why it would not be on the gluten free list and also not have anything on the label that would cause concern to a gluten intolerant person.

It’s just very odd, though, because I am so hyper-sensitive to gluten, even in items that are simply made in shared facilities, even if they don’t contain gluten in their ingredients, and I can’t say I’ve ever reacted to the fries.

I will update when I know more, but I wanted to be sure and clarify this, just in case.

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Celiac City

It’s not a real place.  It’s just a concept, based on my assertion that I must live in a bubble to feel completely safe from gluten.

I wondered, last night, what it might be like if masses of people with Celiac’s / Coeliac’s and Gluten Intolerance (and our gluten free partners and family members, or anyone who avoids gluten due to ADD/ADHD, autism, or Parkinson’s Disease) were to move to a centralized place and start our own city.

This thought came to me while discussing how wonderful it would be if someone opened a completely gluten-free fast food restaurant, with some newly perfected soft-bread rolls for the hamburgers; rolls that tasted as good as the gluten ones that all the other fast food places have now.  This would be a place where the Gluten Intolerant could feel safe going through a drive-through and picking up a quick burger and fries when pressed for time or simply satisfying a craving.  The convenience of running through a drive-through is something I would never take for granted again, were I to have that option again in the future.  But I realized that the percentage of the general population who would frequent an all gluten-free fast food establishment, which would entail paying more for a meal than at a regular fast food place, since gluten free food is more expensive to produce, most likely wouldn’t be great enough to make the business profitable enough to pursue.

“However,” I thought, “In a completely gluten free city, everything would be safe!”

Just imagine:  No gluteny crumbs sticking to the grocery store’s checkout stand conveyor belt.  No worries about cross-contamination from babies eating zweiback toast while riding in the grocery cart and dribbling on the handle bar.  Being able to go to buffet restaurants, or eat at the salad bar.  Company picnics with coworkers!  Sharing lunch room or break room facilities with coworkers without fear!  Covered dish neighborhood parties!  Safe holiday dinners!

I know.  It would be extremely inconvenient if one’s extended family did not live gluten free and would have to travel very far to visit.  And what would the rules be about what visitors from Outside The Bubble could bring in with them?  Would there be a checkpoint at the entrance to the city?  X-ray machines, looking for smuggled-in contraband Oreos in an Outsider’s luggage, intended to be a covert bedtime snack when nobody was looking?  What about visitors traveling with pets and bringing in their pet’s food, which may not be gluten free?  Or Heaven forbid, what if they packed their favorite non-gf skin creams or cosmetics and then hugged and kissed residents Within The Bubble?

What would the penalty be for attempting to bring in banned items?  It could get nasty.

Well, it seemed like a good idea, before I thought it through . . .

Getting Back Into The Swing of Things

It’s always hard to get back into the normal routine after a long holiday weekend, but today it was particularly hard.  I got to work this morning and couldn’t remember very much of last week.  It felt as if I’d been away for a couple weeks.

That is probably because the wedding occupied the minds of everyone in my family for so long.  It was a long day, Saturday, but it sure did turn out beautifully, in spite of all the things that didn’t go according to plan.  My sister did such an amazing job.  She’s a wedding planner and a minister and does this all the time for people, but this was her son’s wedding, so of course there was a whole extra special layer to it.  My new niece-in law (is there actually a proper term for one’s nephew’s wife?) is from The Philippines, and my sister incorporated some Filipino traditions into the ceremony.  That was very cool.

It was sometime Monday before my feet, legs, and lower back stopped hurting enough to walk right again, but I’m really glad I was able to help with the setup and cleanup.  My mother and sister both overdo, and my mother’s fibromyalgia is about a hundred times worse than mine, so I was glad to at least be able to take some of the burden from her shoulders.  I learned that next time, though, I need to wear working clothes and sneakers and change into my nicer clothes before the wedding, then back into working clothes again later.  Or at least sneakers.  I should have known better than to expect to work in wedge shoes when my feet are used to all-sneakers-all-the-time.  Or no shoes at all (or slippers) at home, but sneakers if I’m going to be spending any time at all on my feet.

It didn’t seem that I had quite the same length of paying-for-it time that I used to have after doing something strenuous, which was a big relief, especially since the wedding fell right into the worst week of my PMDD time.  A few years ago, I would never have made it.  So, progress.  And I didn’t get glutened, even though I helped with some of the food.  Lots of reasons to be happy.

Sunday and Monday, I did some more fear-facing that I may write about at some point.  It was (and still is) a hard thing for me, but I’m doing ok, and the fact that I made some of the decisions that I made is huge.  Decisions about trusting someone in ways I never quite have with anyone else, ever.  Big stuff.

And so, having added that cryptic rambling, I have summed up my weekend.

And now I’m back at work, and Tuesday feels like a Monday, and I got a very loving care package in the mail today, and I actually have accomplished some things at work.

Slowly, I’m remembering my job and how to do it as the Holiday Amnesia lifts.

How’s everyone else doing?

I’d Like To Buy A Vowel (If I Can Read The Label First)

Something just occurred to me that was amusing.  

To the Gluten Intolerant, oats are like the Y to the vowels.  You know, a-e-i-o-u, and sometimes Y?  Those who can’t have gluten must avoid all wheeat, rye, barley, and sometimes oats (unless they are absolutely certain they are gluten free).  As the site that link points to says,

Oats, in and of themselves, do not cause this (gluten) damage. They are naturally gluten free. They have been unsafe for people with celiac disease because they are normally grown in fields shared by gluten-containing grains and they become contaminated.

I have been using Bob’s Red Mill Gluten Free Rolled Oats for quite awhile, by the way, and have never had a reaction to them.  It’s such a treat, because I always loved oatmeal.  And oatmeal cookies.  Ohhh, yeah.

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I haven’t done so well at sticking to the theme for NaBloPoMo, but so far, so good, on posting every day.

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I’m getting ready to accompany a friend of my family, who is visiting from out of state, to a book signing today for a cookbook she had published.  That should be fun.  Plus of course, I love a chance to hang out in a book store.

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Palpitations, Migraines, and Fatigue . . . Oh My!

Because symptoms like depression, fatigue, and migraines are associated with every health issue I deal with, when one or more of those symptoms becomes worse, I tend to look to one of those issues to blame.  Do I also have IBS-like symptoms accompanied by gas and bloating and intestinal pain?  I must have been glutened.  Do my arms and shoulders and upper back hurt and has the weather changed recently (from cold to hot or humid to dry, or the other way around) or did I overdo something physically?  It’s just a Fibromyalgia flareup, then.  Could it be hormonal?  It could be related to the menopause, or the PMDD, or maybe the PCOS.

Update 3/24/09: If I experience “brain fog” or an inability to focus on or begin a task, this could be caused by (or due to a combination of causes related to) gluten, Fibromyalgia, or ADD.

But when it’s accompanied by intense feelings of panic or anxiety (as if my chest is going to explode or I’m going to jump out of my skin), palpitations, chest pressure, a heavy “sinking feeling” (sometimes accompanied by a feeling like grief or dread) in my chest, or a really uncomfortable “fluttering” in my chest, as if my heart has turned itself upside down, I haven’t known what to do with that.

My sister, who was diagnosed with Mitral Valve Prolapse about 25 years ago, has been telling me for awhile that I need to mention it to my doctor, because so much of what I describe sounds just like what she experiences.

“Anxiety, panic attacks, and depression may be associated with mitral valve prolapse. Like fatigue, these symptoms are believed to be related to imbalances of the autonomic nervous system.” - MedicineNet.com

I’ve been having palpitations at times for about 25 years (most often after eating, and they last for at least an hour, usually longer), but the other stuff is newer, over about the last year to year-and-a-half.  It took me awhile to bring it up to the doctor, because I don’t see my GP very often, and every time I’ve gone, they always said my heart sounded great, though I do know that MVP is difficult to hear.  I did have a different doctor, about 12 years ago, tell me she heard a “click”, and she asked me if I’d ever heard of MVP.  I said yes, that my sister had it, and she suggested that we look into that.  I changed insurance companies shortly after that, though, and changed doctors as a result, and when the new (my current) doctor and nurse practitioner never heard it, I just assumed it was a mistake the other time.  My blood pressure and cholesterol are always very good, but that probably doesn’t indicate anything in this case.  I’ve just always been kind of proud of having a healthy heart and haven’t wanted to concede that anything could be wrong (as if I had anything to do with it; with the way I eat and my lack of exercise, I definitely can’t claim credit for my good fortune in the healthy heart department).

Anyway, I finally brought it up when I saw my nurse practitioner last week, and she ordered a consult with a cardiologist for this morning, and I’m on a Holter monitor for 24 hours.  (I told my coworker when I got back to work, “Don’t freak me out; I’m wired.”)

I’d mentioned to my nurse practitioner that certain foods trigger the symptoms I’m experiencing.  She told me to eat some of those foods today.  Peanut butter and corn chips are two biggies, and I had temporarily forgotten (over and over again) that M&M’s belong on the list, too.  It seems that every time I eat M&M’s, I have a reaction, but in the month or two before I buy them again, I manage to forget that I reacted to them in the past.  Denial is a powerful thing.  In fact, I had completely forgotten (until one day last week when I was talking to my sister about it) that a few years ago, when I was dog-sitting for some friends and was sitting and eating M&M’s while watching TV, I had some pretty intense chest pain afterward.  Most people don’t forget that sort of thing, you know?

But anyway.

I’ve been thinking it was more likely that this is a food sensitivity thing than MVP, but from reading the information on the Conscious Choice web site, I learned that they could go together.

“Multiple Chemical Sensitivity and MVP
In the new field of environmental medicine we are identifying a type of patient we call a “universal reactor.” This is a person who appears to be reacting with hypersensitivity to many environmental influences, including food additives, chemicals in the environment, dry cleaning chemicals, smells from plastic or vinyl, or the detergent aisle in the grocery store. These stimuli can set off a cascade of distressing reactions. Conventional medicine views this as a delusional state, and suggests that these people are becoming phobic to foods or smells, and suffering from depression or panic disorder.

“A more enlightened view is that these patients have suffered various environmental insults, such as living or working in an unventilated space with overwhelming paint or new carpet fumes, which have triggered their multiple sensitivity. People with mitral valve prolapse may have an underlying susceptibility to environmental stimuli that helps trigger this condition.”

My sister was the one who pointed out to me that not only am I gluten intolerant and extremely sensitive to even the slightest cross-contamination, but I also comment often about strong smells that others around me don’t find to be nearly so strong as I do.  Just last month, on the final day of NaNo, I was down to my last 1000 words, and I took a break and was looking through some old stuff in a drawer and I found several packages of incense that I haven’t used in years.  I couldn’t quite remember why I had stopped using it, and I got a stick out and lit it, and had chest pain, which was when I remembered why I had stopped using it before, so I put it out and I’m going to give all the incense away.  I can handle scented candles, but if I’m too close to them, I sometimes will feel choked up.  I also remember having chest pain when I used to use oil warmers and essential oils, which was a huge disappointment to me, since I loved them.

(I’m including all this excess information in this post just in case someone lands here in an effort to understand some weird symptoms they are having.  If I can help someone else, that’s great.)

At the risk of looking and sounding like a raging hypochondriac, I made a spreadsheet where I copied and pasted the main symptoms for each issue I deal with, and made a column for each issue and checked off what the symptoms apply to.  I alphabatized the list and combined same or similar symptoms and those that were lumped together, and I can clearly see that my top complaints in how I feel and function do indeed apply to all the issues.  I wound up being glad I spent the time to make the chart, because now when I’m depressed or having a migraine or feeling painfully fatigued (yes, it really does hurt), I can remind myself it’s just something I’m going to have to keep consciously working to overcome and not a personal weakness or character flaw to beat myself up for.  And I can’t help but to keep hoping that it is still within my power to reduce my symptoms significantly, by losing weight and avoiding trigger foods and by exercising, which I haven’t really done with any long-lasting regularity yet.

I had been feeling pretty good toward the end of last week and over the weekend (after a really bad bout of constant anxiety and all the symptoms in paragraph two, along with depression).  I cut out caffeine (with the exception of a few small pieces of dark chocolate), peanut butter, corn chips, and M&M’s.  As each day passed, I felt better than the last.  Then last night, I bought more M&M’s so I could eat some today for the test, and of course, the temptation monster was extra powerful and I ate some last night.  I had anxiety and palpitations all evening, during the night when I was trying to sleep, and this morning.  Maybe now I’ll finally start to remember what they do to me.

My sister has told me about how her doctor had asked her if she had any recent, irrational fears or phobias at the time she was diagnosed, and she’d remarked that she’d been suddenly afraid of thunder storms for no aparent reason.  Her doctor told her that irrational fears or  phobias can also go along with MVP.  I’ve been noticing that for a year or two, I’ve been way more paranoid than I ever used to be (mostly about the state of my job, and the way my focus and concentration problems cause trouble in my ability to do my job properly).  There is a basis for some of the paranoia, but not to the extent I seem to take it in my head.

My sister also told me that ever since she began to have symptoms, she finds that she can’t stand to hear music that has a heartbeat-like rhythm or watch a scary movie where they use that heartbeat-like sound to induce tension.  My “thing” is (and has been for several years) being near a car with one of those booming stereo systems turned up loud.  I’m generally a pretty passive, live-and-let-live sort of person, but if anything can make me feel like getting out of my car and pulling a stranger out of his/her vehicle by his/her hair and beating the crap out of him/her for no reason, that is it.  Of course, I’ve never acted on those feelings, and I haven’t been noticing those kind of stereos f0r at least a couple years anymore.  I think there were new noise laws passed awhile back that must account for that.

So, I’ll know what’s going on soon.  Of course, I’m not automatically assuming it’s MVP.  It still could be another food sensitivity issue (though what is in peanut butter, corn chips, and M&M’s, I don’t know; corn syrup or corn oil seems like the most likely possibility, except it’s not listed as an ingredient in my peanut butter), or it could be pure anxiety, possibly magnified by menopause.  And, this is a particularly stressful time in several ways.  It’s Christmas time, which has always been hard for me, and money problems have been continually worstening for most everyone.  I made the decision to go back to school for Medical Transcription, and that brought a whole host of questions to the surface that I don’t know the answers to (Am I physically capable of the kind of commitment it will take to go to school for two to three years, probalby two to three evenings a week, in addition to working full time, when for the last few years, holding down my job has been about the limit of my functionality?  And if I don’t go back to school, where will I be in two to three years?  And, of course, there are the lack-of-confidence issues, like the fact that I haven’t been a student in 24 years, and I wasn’t a good student even then.  The last time I was a good student, I was in 6th grade.  That’s probably a whole entry in itself.)  Coupled with the stess is the fact that I drank more coffee in November, during NaNoWriMo, than I generally drink in probably three months.  Fortunately, I didn’t continue the candy thing all month, but the amount I ate was way too much.

I just feel that I’ve spent so many years researching, trying new vitamins and supplements, new diets, etc., avoiding medications and all their side effects, only to have most things seem to work wonders at first and then gradually lose effectiveness.  So I’m tired, and yeah, as bad as it sounds, I would love for this to turn out to be a clear-cut physical condition (especially one as relatively minor as MVP, as opposed to heart disease) that I can take medicine for and feel better.

Gluten Free Recommendation: Scotch Clear Glue With 2-Way Applicator

This past spring / summer, I went through a few months where I was getting some kind of mystery gluten and couldn’t pinpoint where it was coming from.  I did a lot of comparing with others on Celiac forums and learned a lot that I hadn’t known prior to that, such as the fact that I needed to replace anything porous in my kitchen (plastic or rubber spatulas, wooden spoons, plastic spoons, wooden or plastic cutting boards, colanders [plastic or metal, as gluten can stick in those tiny holes], plastic measuring cups, plastic food storage containers, etc., and even non-stick cookware.)  Since gluten is not like a germ or bacteria that can be “killed” with bleach or antibacterial cleaners, those items must be replaced to ensure that they are not causing cross-contamination.

I also learned that the cat food I had been using as treats for my cat was not gluten free.  The vet said that brand-name cat treats are junk food for cats, and that since Emily has developed a sensitive stomach over the last few years, he recommends a specific brand of food, which fortunately is gluten free, and he suggested that I buy a different flavor of the same food to use as treats.  That’s what they do in their office, in fact.  I was doing that and all was well, and then one day I (without thinking) picked up another brand of “all-natural” cat food to use as treats because money was tight that week and it was a little cheaper.  (I won’t ever do that again.)  I hadn’t even thought about Emily’s food needing to be gluten free, since I don’t eat it, but as several people pointed out to me on the forum I was on:

1. cat eats food

2. cat licks self, distributing lots of gluteny saliva on her fur

3. I pet her, and now it’s on my hands

So, Emily is happily gluten free along with her Mama.  And interestingly, I had noticed some very uncharacteristically aggressive behavior on her part while she was eating that other food, and it completely stopped the moment I switched her back to only what the vet recommends.  She’s normally the most loving, affectionate cat, but during those couple weeks, she bit me hard enough to draw blood and leave tiny little tooth-holes and bruises on my arm three times.  I counted eleven punctures after the third bite.  That is very, very unlike her.

Well, during that time of cleaning out all the porous items in my kitchen and switching my cat’s food, I also made other changes, like deciding to no longer lick envelopes.  Some envelope glue is safe and some is not, and since I seal all sorts of envelopes at work (not only the ones we buy but also the return envelopes that come in with many of our bills), I decided to never lick any envelopes at all, ever, to be safe.  I bought some Scotch Clear Glue with 2-Way Applicator for envelope sealing, and I love it.  It has a sponge applicator on one end that is perfect for sealing envelopes, and a narrow pointed applicator on the other end for applying a thin line or several “beads” of glue.  It dries quickly and isn’t messy or awkward, as the water envelope sealers (and even glue sticks) can be. 

I called 3M today, before posting this entry, just to make sure, and they said it is gluten free.  I believe I called when I first bought it as well, but I couldn’t remember, and since I have been using it for months with no reaction, I felt confident that it was gluten free, but I wanted to be absolutely sure before recommending it to others who can’t tolerate gluten.

I will share other gluten free recommendations here in future posts.

Stay tuned!

NaNoSnacking

After I quit smoking in 1996, I barely wrote anything for almost a complete year.  I’d always associated smoking with writing, and it took me a long time to reestablish new habits that felt natural to me.  One of those habits was Totino’s Pizza Rolls.  Just imagining the taste of them was inspirational.  The years went by, and when I started participating in NaNoWriMo, I would prepare by stocking up on Totino’s Pizza Rolls, frozen bagels, and cream cheese.  And, of course, coffee.  Lots of it.   If I wanted to really treat myself, on a weekend morning, I’d go through the Dunkin’ Donuts drive-through and pick up one of their bagels and coffee.  This became such a nice writing ritual to look forward to, and added another fun level to the preparation phase for November each year.

And then, in April of 2007, I realized I was gluten intolerant.  And everything changed.

Fortunately, I didn’t go for another year without writing.  I recognized that I was going to need to plan for this and figure out some new NaNo food rituals.  I discovered Glutino bagels, which don’t taste like Dunkin’ Donuts bagels, but are the best gluten-free bagels, in my opinion, that I’ve found.  I like them. Very much.  I haven’t found an alternative to Pizza Rolls, however.  (I did email the Glutino company one day not long ago, and I told them what a happy camper I’d be if they could come up with a gluten-free snack that tastes like Totino’s Pizza Rolls, and also a cracker that tastes just like Cheez-Its, though to be honest, I used to keep eating Cheez-Its until I’d get sick. I never learned how to stop when I’d had enough.   So maybe wishing for a gluten-free version may not be in my best interest.)  The gluten-free bread that I like the best (not counting home-baked) is very good when used to make grilled cheese, patty melts, tuna melts, etc., so I had an idea last year to make grilled cheese with mozzarella and pepperoni (maybe a few mushrooms) and cut them into bite-sized pieces and dip them into heated pizza sauce (I believe Ragu’s is gluten-free, if I’m not mistaken). I never actually tried it, but I may give it a try this year.

I’ve been seeing a lot of mention on the NaNo site this year of writing while under the influence of Halloween candy.  I don’t remember seeing so many mentions of it in past years, but maybe I just wasn’t paying attention.  This year, I got to thinking, and liking the idea of Tootise Pops and Peanut Butter Kisses while writing.  I bought a variety of candy, doing my label-reading and web-site checking to make sure everything was gluten-free. I bought Tootsie Pops, Necco Mary Jane Peanut Butter Kisses, small-sized Hershey bars, and a Starburst Fruit Chews and Skittles mix-bag.

I’m on the Harris Whole Health emailing list, and got an email the other day that included the updated list of Gluten-Free Halloween Candy.  (It’s under Recent News on their site.)  It confirmed what I’d learned about the candy I bought, and I felt comforted by that.

Well, I had one hell of a gluten reaction to something over the weekend.  It started Friday night and I didn’t start to actually feel “better” until Wednesday.  As often happens when I’ve been “glutened”, I wasn’t sure where to start, to figure out how it happened.  Was it one of the brands of candy, and the manufacturer didn’t realize they have a possible cross-contamination problem?  Or was it just “being out in the world” and not living in a bubble?  I mean, all it takes is the tiniest crumb, or fraction of a crumb.

Those who were good at the “cootie” game as kids probably have the best aptitude for living gluten-free. When I first began exploring the world of the gluten-free and reading posts on message boards where people discussed things like the spatulas in their kitchens and the wheat-germ in their hair products, I thought they were over-reacting and being paranoid.  But then I learned.  You have to be paranoid.

Sometimes someone will post on one of the message boards and say that one need not worry about things like hair gel or skin cream or soaps, because the gluten reaction only happens when the gluten is introduced into the digestive system and that what is absorbed into the skin makes no difference, but these people are completely missing the point.  Anything that has the slightest trace of wheat, rye, barley, or oats, and touches your hands, can make its way into your digestive system.  If you ever touch your mouth, eat finger food, or nibble a cuticle, there is your introduction.

So, this recent gluten reaction may have happened when I wasn’t thinking and set my coffee cup on the top of the microwave at work, where the coffee maker is, and where my coworkers leave their crumbs from sandwiches and frozen pastry-type foods that they microwave.  I am usually extremely careful that nothing of mine rests on any surfaces where coworkers eat or prepare food.  This can be tricky at times.  If I picked up crumbs on the bottom of my coffee mug, I may have transferred them to my desk, and then to my hands.  Or maybe, when I went to the grocery store, I may have used a cart that someone used who bought flour.  You know how there is always some flour on the outside of the bag?  It gets on their hands, then on the cart handle, and then on my hands.  I’m more careful not to touch my face when I’m out in public, until I can wash my hands, but mistakes happen.

Just to be on the safe side, I triple-checked the listings for the candy I bought (and even emailed one of the companies to ask if they use shared equipment – they responded and said that that candy is the only one made on that equipment), and I’m comfortable that the candy is gluten-free.  I’ll “test” it over the next few days by only eating one kind each day and making sure I have no reaction, but I suspect the cause of the reaction I had was something else, and something I may never know for sure.

So I’m ready to head into NaNo with my Glutino bagels, experimental grilled-cheeze-pizza-bites, and Halloween candy.

And coffee.  Lots of coffee.