Hello my lovelies!!!
Happy Valentines day!!! I hope you feel the love I’m sending you!!
As you know last Friday night I went to a gluten free cooking class, put on by the culinary school here. It was amazing. We made so much. Flour less chocolate cake, pizza dough, hand made pasta, waffles, lasagna!! Omg so amazing! I have no pictures but when I recreate the recipes I will take picture!
If you have been reading my blog you know I have openly struggled with hating celiac, hating my body for having this disease. But over my Christmas break and New Years I decided to really change my attitude about it. I was trying to before but it wasn’t really sticking, so I spent some hard hours thinking about it and meditating on changing my thoughts. While it isn’t perfect yet I can say I’m much happier than I have been in months about dealing with it. Which is why I decided to take that cooking class , if I could make good food that was gluten free I felt like it would help me. And it did, but also what it did was take my mind off feeling like a freak because everyone else there was gluten free and understood what I was feeling! I even made some friends!
So it is going to take baby steps but I will learn how to feel happy and accept this disease!!
Love you all!! Eat some gluten free chocolate today!!!
Xoxox
B
Tag Archives: learning
Learning to cook Gluten free
Hello Lovely people!!
How is everyone doing today!? I am doing great. I have applied to graduate, had an amazing hot yoga class, and am catching up on homework. I love having some free time with only being in 3 courses! It is swell!
I have been gluten free for over a year now, but I have never really learned how to cook delicious meals (pre or post diagnosis). So when the cullinary school in Calgary posted about learning how to cook gluten free meals, I decided to jump all over that!! I think cooking is a great skill to have! And while I may be a mean baker, making meals is not my specialty. So I am gonna learn. One thing being celiac has done for me which I appreciate is it has allowed me to try new things that I previously would not have tried. My class is on February 8th and I could not be more excited! It is just another chance for me to regain control over this disease!
Here is the link if you are in Calgary and want to register!
xoxox
Bri
Education is part of my healing
Hello beauties!!
Happy Wednesday!
When I was thinking about what I wanted to talk about today. I had a few ideas in my head. Learning to love myself with Celiac, why I get so frustrated when people discuss Celiac and gluten free and do not really have any idea what they are talking about, or a step I have taken in what I feel is the right direction to healing myself and helping others.
Well I have combined them all sort of… As you all know I have really struggled with this disease, I have struggled accepting it, I have struggled trusting myself, I have struggled trusting others, I have struggled with people talking about it. I always get so defensive and angry, and I don’t like that about me. I know people stop listening when I get angry because it is a natural reaction. I have been working hard at not reacting like that, and taking a different approach. I have spent a lot of time talking to the association in Calgary, and members I know about this and how I can deal.
So a couple weeks ago I received an email from the Calgary chapter looking for volunteers! I thought what an excellent way to help myself while helping others. I quickly filled out the application and checked off all the boxes that interest me where I would be comfortable volunteering. And last night I went to the volunteer training session. The topics were : The Medical Conditions- Celiac Disease, including Dermatitis Herpetiformis and Non Celiac gluten intolerance, The Gluten free diet and Cereal Grains, Legislative Regulations and finally Product Contamination. It was so great to listen to all the speakers including a Doctor who has been a huge advocate of Celiac disease and proper diagnosis. I won’t get into all the information we learned because it was a 60 slide presentation and 3 hours of discussion included. Plus you might not all be interested!
I feel like the more educated I am in Celiac disease, the more helpful it will be. I want to educate the public and people around me, so that we won’t have to constantly defend ourselves (although who knows if that will ever happen, it might get easier though). For me it feels good when I am able to help someone out in any shape or form, but it feels extra special when I am able to help someone out who is starting down this journey of a gluten free lifestyle. Because it can be scary to start this path, and walk down the grocery store aisle reading every label, and realizing how much gluten is in everyday foods you eat. So if I am able to just give that little bit of help to a person, it feels great.
So this is why I decided to volunteer not only will I be receiving training that is reliable, scientific and up-to-date, but I will hopefully be able to help other people out, which will then lead to more knowledge and hopefully less ignorance about this disease.
My final thought: While I may not like having Celiac disease, I have accepted it and have accepted that I will have this for life, I couldn’t be more grateful for the support that has developed over these past 13 months. The Celiac community has grown dear to my heart, the people in my life who don’t roll their eyes every time I talk about but let me blab on and on, the friendships I am developing with this, and the path I have decided to take with this disease including starting this blog and posting weekly even if not that many people read it.
This has been a huge healing and growing process for me, and one that I really have to take one day at a time. Sometimes I feel great with it, and other days I don’t.
xoxox
B
I’m still learning!!!
Hello beautiful people!!
If you follow me on any form of social media (instagram, facebook, twitter) you will know that I got glutened last week :(. So not fun. All the symptoms were awful. How did it happen, well I wanted a cookie and couldn’t bake, so while at the grocery store in the gluten free section I just picked up a box of cookies and continued on my way. Driving home, ate one, by the time I got home I was not feeling good. So I thought hmm strange maybe I will read the ingredients which I did not do at the store( my fault). And these cookies are not gluten free, the box doesn’t claim it, the website doesn’t claim it either. GREAT, now I understand and take responsibility that I didn’t read the ingredient list! That is like a fundamental rule for us Celiac but for some reason I thought I could trust a gluten free section even though I know better. But I wonder how responsible the store is? If at all. I am in discussions with the manager, maybe it is time for some education lessons by this little lady, only so they don’t run into more of these problems!!
I was going to post about this earlier but the brain fog really got the best of me. I always find that one lingers, extra long for me.
So I’m left feeling a little bummed about that. I have gone so long without that trauma, and now my body is back to healing. But it just reminded me of how much I don’t trust now with this disease, and that is scary. Slowly I am working on that, the more I educate myself, the more I can trust.
Never stop learning
Now for some good news, Saturday was the Celiac market here in Calgary. I love this day. I remember when I first went last year, and I was still so fresh and new to this disease, my mom pretty much bought me everything I looked at. She knew and felt how scary this was, and as a learning tool and to make me feel better, we bought everything we could there. So this time, I went knowing some good things would be there that I wanted, certain spices, gluten free treats. And SAMPLES!! I cannot explain how much I enjoy being able to eat all the samples with only one question ” What is this?” I bought some new things to try that I will be blogging about as I eat them. It was super fun to be there and not feel stressed about food.
This summer I decided I really wanted to get more involved in the calgaryceliac.com so I filled out the volunteer form, and next Tuesday I will be attending an awareness workshop! I can only imagine what this will entail, and I am so excited. I think that if I can give back in someway to an organization that has been so fundamental in my understanding of what this lifestyle means, it is the least I can do 🙂
xoxox
B
nourishyourlove 