Beach Blues

So even though I was known as a picky eater, I absolutely loved food!  My favorite part of ball games, carnivals, and beach trips was the fried foods that were delicious and available.  So in July, I packed up and headed to the beach with my extended family.  Now let me tell you...We have a blast!  We spend all day on the beach and spend the evenings eating!  We eat pizzas, subs, sandwiches, and snack on desserts all week!  (FYI - All of these items contain gluten.)  Herein lies my new dilemma!  What do I eat?  Now keep in mind that, like you, my family was not educated on Celiac Disease so they were not sure what food/drinks contained gluten.  I was also in the stage of quitting where you would do anything for just one bite of that delicious food (which was a poison to my body).  My emotions and frustration level were really high.  A few things really upset me that week.  The first was my mother.  She had been dealing with my dad and his Celiac Disease for a while and to be honest when he was away she and I would eat all of the gluten containing food that my dad couldn't eat before I was diagnosed.  In my emotional state, I began to feel like she didn't care about how I felt as much as she did my dad.  My perception was that she would watch what she ate in front of my dad and then when he left she didn't care anymore and the foods that I missed so much would be paraded in front of me by her and the rest of my family!  This began to grate on my nerves!  I remember having an emotional breakdown one day when my family decided to order pizza from our favorite pizza parlor.  I did not have the ability to drive and I felt that there was nothing to eat in the house.  I begged and pleaded for them to eat something else, but they were on vacation and did not understand how I felt.  I remember busting into tears and sobbing about how bad it was.  Everyone looked at me like I was an emotional basket case (which I was) and then finally my aunt volunteered to drive me 15 minutes out of the way to get Moe's to eat for lunch.  I remember sitting in the car feeling sorry for myself, upset at myself for being so upset, and embarrassed at the way that I reacted.  How was I going to be able to handle people eating gluten in front of me?  Didn't they understand how bad I craved it?  Would this obsession with forbidden foods ever go away?

An interesting side note - After reading this blog entry to my mother, she told me her perspective on the beach trip.  She felt that as a 30 something year old adult, living on my own, she did not need to watch what she ate around me.  However, when discussing my feelings during the beach trip with my dad (who has Celiac Disease), he understood how I felt.  (Another example in life when you don't understand a person's struggles unless you are in their shoes.)