Tuesday, December 11, 2007

About Me.

Hi! My name is Catherine, and I'm living wheat-free. I learned that I had a problem a few years ago, when I went on an elimination diet. I'm now healthy and happy living without wheat.

Celiac disease and wheat sensitivity have been linked to a lot of things, including the reason I went on the diet, endometriosis. My endo is actually controllable through diet. Amazing. I'm less tired, achy. I can actually function when I have my period, although I'd still like to curl up and die.

Its a challenge at times... I'm an active member of my Roman Catholic church, and it sometimes seems like the church carries the bread motif a little too far! There's bread and flour at every event. Father bakes. The church ladies bake. There is coffee and doughnuts on the first Sunday of the month. But I have lost weight on the celiac diet. I used to be huge, and I firmly beleive it was because my body was looking for nutrition that it couldn't get. And now it is getting the carbs, the protein, all of that. (I also think that its probably why the nation as a whole is fatter, because our foods have less nutrition in them, being produced and picked for prime shippability).

Although I miss bread, French, rosemary, croissants, bagels...and I miss, God how I miss, pasta. Ravioli, fresh pasta....mmmmm I now eat almost anything else I want. Cheese, good chocolate, ice cream..... and I've made cakes that people love. Tall, fluffy, yet dense chocolate cake. Homemade caramels.....

Living without gluten is a wonderful adventure, and I love it!

2 comments:

Prince Andrew and the Queen Mum said...

Love the blog... what do you do for communion wafers? just curious...

CatherineMarie said...

I take communion using only the Blood. Father blesses a glass of wine without the Host in it, just the Blood.

There are apparently gluten-free communion wafers, but in my last researching, they had a teeny-tiny bit of flour to satisfy the religious requirement (we cannot bless something that Jesus Himself did not bless).

I have not had a problem training Father, my problem comes from the deacon and Eucharistic ministers who will, sometimes, offer me (if there is a glitch of some sort and my regular cup doesn't get up there) the remnants of the consecrated wine which does have crumbs of the Body in it.

Go in ahead of time and talk to Father. Explain the problem, and see what you can figure out. If you can tolerate however much gluten is in the 'low-gluten' hosts, or if you can take wine from a chalice reserved for you.