Newly Gluten Free
Trying to Live a Gluten Free Life
Gluten Free is at the forefront of my life right now. You see, I have graves disease and have been doing months and months of research trying to figure this disease out. It's an autoimmune disease of the thyroid. My doctors all want me to have RAI, that's radioactive iodine (I-131) that you take in a pill form. The radioactive iodine goes through your body just like natural iodine and gets sucked up by your thyroid because that's it's job. Once in the thyroid, the radioactive iodine burns the thyroid out. It burns it until it's completely destroyed and you no longer have a thyroid.
During my research for graves disease, I had gotten very far but I still felt like I was missing something. The immune system is attacking the thyroid so really, the thyroid is the victim in all of this. But why does the body attack it? That's what I've been trying to figure out. I made leaps and bounds on my research and gotten my FT4 to come into the normal range but my TSH is still lagging behind. My thyroid is still a little swollen so I figure something has to be causing that. They all said on the forums that it has to be because something is still stimulating the antibodies that are going crazy in my body. But no one has any idea how to get those to calm down. The best advice I could get was to cut down on my iodine. A little trickier than it sounds I might add.
Still feeling like something was missing, I continued on with my never ending research and happened upon a website. www.celiac.com Lo and behold, there's a definite connection between graves disease and celiac disease. I read that getting celiac under control will usually stop those crazy antibodies in approximately 3 - 6 months! Is this the connection I'm looking for? Could celiac's be what's causing the terrible stomachaches I've been getting? Three weeks into the gluten free diet and so far so good! I'm hoping this is the final missing link in my research and the thing that will finally make my graves disease go into remission. Why don't you stick around? I'll let you know how it goes!
Gluten Free Cookies
Peanut Butter Chocolate Chunk
Mmm.. I found a great recipe for Gluten Free Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Cookies! They are delicious!
Tacos!!
I was very happy to see that tacos are pretty much gluten free! Just watch a few things and you're good to go!
Many brands of taco shells are naturally gluten free. It will say right on the box if they are. Cheese is gluten free and so are all of the vegetables that go on top. Tomatoes and lettuce are great toppings.
Spinach Quiche
I love quiche!! There's a great crustless spinach quiche recipe somewhere on the internet. I modified this recipe a little bit to fit my tastes and it still turned out great!! It made a wonderful lunch at work the next day with a salad. Yummy!
Another One of My Favorite Meals
I was very happy that steak and potatoes fit into the gluten free diet. Unfortunately, I'm having a little bit of too easy of a time with it all. I love eating good food and most of my favorites fit in it. I really have to watch it or I'm afraid I might just eat too much! Gluten free doesn't mean calorie free or diet friendly.
Gluten Free Cookbooks
It's not hard to find a gluten free cookbook for every food category. Whether you are looking for easy to make recipes or special recipes, there's a cookbook out there for you!
Check Your Local Grocery Stores Website
They might have some invaluable information to share with you!
The local grocery store in my area is Pick N Save. The one by my house is an older smaller store but I love it for that reason. It doesn't take me 15 minutes to walk to the back of the store to get milk. They update often but they don't re-do the entire store every six months. There's nothing more frustrating to me than constantly having to search for items. And recently, I found the absolute best thing on their website - a complete list of everything they sell that's gluten free. It's 34 pages long! Awesome!!
If you're just beginning a gluten free journey, check to see if your store has the same thing. Once you see how much gluten free food is available right in your local grocery store, you'll realize how painless this is really going to be!