Yes, it's true. Vance was recently diagnosed with Dermatitis Herpetiformis, which is an extremely itchy rash made of bumps and blisters. It is linked to gluten sensitivity, so Vance is no longer allowed to eat anything with gluten in it (unless he wants to break out in this blistery rash again). Which means he can't have any wheat, oats, barley, rye, flour, and a few other things. In other words, he can no longer eat bread, noodles, pizza, hamburgers (the bun), brownies, cereal (except for chex!), cake, battered chicken, etc... Unless it is made with Gluten-Free products. His lifestyle has completely changed; well pretty much OUR lifestyle has completely changed. The funny thing is that I think I'm having a harder time with it than he is. Since Gluten-Free products are so expensive only Vance eats those foods. The other night I made spaghetti and I had one pot with Gluten-Free noodles for Vance, and another pot with regular noodles for the rest of us. I'm sure this will be the case with a lot of our meals.
Just to give you an idea on how much Gluten-Free products cost, a loaf of bread is $5 and the loaf is 1/3 the size of a normal loaf, and the slices are 1/2 the size of a normal slice. Pancake batter, flour, cornbread mix, etc... all cost $5 for a 22 oz bag (which is very small compared to normal), and soy sauce is $4. A cake mix, brownie mix, or cookie mix is $5 at Smith's, but was very pleased when I found it for just over $3 at Wal-Mart.
But the part I have the hardest time with is that he most-likely has Celiac Disease (which means the gluten problem is in his gut also) and that can lead to many different kinds of Cancer. It's a scary thought when you find out that the chance of your husband ever having Cancer just increased.
Vance has had this rash for a few years now and we have seen doctors about it before, but they always just sent us home with a cream and said it was Psoriasis. We finally found a doctor that took one look at it and knew what it was. He took two skin grafts from his elbow and sent them to two separate labs just to verify it, and sure enough, both labs confirmed it. He recently went to an Gastroenterologist and they ran a bunch of more tests on him...now we just wait for more results...the crucial ones. So Pray hard!
If any of you know of any place to buy "Gluten-Free" products or have any info at all please let us know! We are still pretty new at this huge adjustment in our lives.
Just to give you an idea on how much Gluten-Free products cost, a loaf of bread is $5 and the loaf is 1/3 the size of a normal loaf, and the slices are 1/2 the size of a normal slice. Pancake batter, flour, cornbread mix, etc... all cost $5 for a 22 oz bag (which is very small compared to normal), and soy sauce is $4. A cake mix, brownie mix, or cookie mix is $5 at Smith's, but was very pleased when I found it for just over $3 at Wal-Mart.
But the part I have the hardest time with is that he most-likely has Celiac Disease (which means the gluten problem is in his gut also) and that can lead to many different kinds of Cancer. It's a scary thought when you find out that the chance of your husband ever having Cancer just increased.
Vance has had this rash for a few years now and we have seen doctors about it before, but they always just sent us home with a cream and said it was Psoriasis. We finally found a doctor that took one look at it and knew what it was. He took two skin grafts from his elbow and sent them to two separate labs just to verify it, and sure enough, both labs confirmed it. He recently went to an Gastroenterologist and they ran a bunch of more tests on him...now we just wait for more results...the crucial ones. So Pray hard!
If any of you know of any place to buy "Gluten-Free" products or have any info at all please let us know! We are still pretty new at this huge adjustment in our lives.
1 comments:
Chex cereal is gluten free, not only is a good breakfast food but you can make some really good treats with it!!
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