Can You Eat Lasagna?
How do you deal with family members who don’t understand that you can’t eat certain foods?
I had a conversation today with an extended family member today about what I could eat for dinner when I visit, and I seriously had to shake my head at some of the questions. Can I eat lasagna? How about potatoes? And carrots?
This only a few days after Thanksgiving dinner, where I was hardly able to eat anything. Apparently, the thing to do this year was to put bread crumbs on all the vegetables. I was able to have the basics: turkey, ham, mashed potatoes, and cranberry sauce.
I’ve generally decided to explain to extended family that I just can’t eat wheat, and that it’s an allergy. It’s difficult enough to get people to understand that pasta and bread are made of wheat, so talking about gluten? Nah.
I realize that celiac disease is fairly rare (despite its growing numbers), and I’m going to have to educate a lot of the people I encounter. But it’s frustrating and exhausting; I imagine those with peanut allergies went through something similar 10+ years ago.
I’m really lucky as most of my friends and co-workers are aware or are actively avoiding wheat themselves. Whenever I go to a gathering I always bring something I’m allowed to eat which ups the number of things I can have. But it is still hard. For Thanksgiving I went to a friend’s house and she thickened her gravy with cornstarch so I could have it but I forgot about the crumbs from the stuffing that fell out in the pan. I’m still feeling ill from that. It can be so hard.