Gluten Free

My family is full of food allergies or sensitivities.  They show up in rashes, upset stomachs and behavior changes.  I'm not talking little behavior changes, I'm talking all out uncontrollable, unreasonable behavior changes.  My husband and I didn't have a doctor helping us out with this, they mainly prescribed creams and medicines.  When we told them we were going to try some other things they basically said good luck with that and expected us to be right back, but we didn't end up going back to them for years.

It started by going to a class a local chiropractor was having about our foods and what's in them, and how they effect our bodies.  We went home and literally cleared out our kitchen. The first thing we got rid of refined sugars, dyes, hydrogenated oils and processed foods. That's one way to empty your cupboards in a heartbeat. Yet with just those things we saw huge improvements.  My oldest daughter suffered from serious asthma, ending in many hospitalizations.  She could finally sleep laying down, and get off of 3 asthma medications just by eliminating sugars, dyes and hydrogenated oils. Then we began doing elimination diets and got rid of gluten, rice, beans and some vegetables and fruits.  My youngest follows Dr. Finegold's diet which helps her with both allergies, asthma and the huge behavior changes.  My middle child is the one that's sensitive to rice, beans of all kinds, gluten and peanuts his horrible eczema that looked like burns on his bottom and legs completely went away.

So what do we eat? We eat good fresh fruits and veggies, meats, and everything else we make from scratch.  We use honey instead of sugar in all our recipes.  We use some gluten free oat flour, some millet and some almond flour when baking cakes, pancakes or muffins. If it's a birthday or Christmas we might splurge and use India Tree natural food dyes.  I regularly have a whole chicken cooking and then the bones boiling so that we can consume good bone broth and I make soups often in the winter months.  I don't feel like my family is limited in their eating choices, but it's still tricky at times.

Lets face it eating healthy and navigating food allergies is difficult in our society. Every corner has a fast food giant that has absolutely nothing we can eat.  I always have to think ahead and have snacks packed like hard boiled eggs, carrots apples or another veggie choice.  We can't stop at the local drive thru or even many local stores to fill our tummy tanks and thus have to be home when it's close to feeding time. There are days that I feel I'm really a kitchen companion and not a homemaking, homeschooling mama. There are days that appointments run long and snacks run out and I have to run through a store in search of something we can actually consume.  It always amazes me in the massive grocery stores filled with candies, chips and pop with isles and isles of food, I can only find a handful of things that are okay and not produce. Yet when I see the changes in their health for the better it's all worth the eliminations.

What diet do you follow? GAPS, Cellular Healing, Paleo, Dr. Finegold's KP diet, or some other one? Have you seen your family benefit in amazing ways. Share with us. 

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