As many of you know, this past year has been a bit of a piece of raggedy toilet paper stuck to my shoe, well, in the health department at least. I know I should probably not make light of health struggles, but one of my favorite coping mechanisms is humor, especially the self-deprecatory kind.
That said, over the past few weeks I have been getting...worse, like barely functional, am I devolving into an amoeba worse.
Since I had my bi-annual tribute to the medical cartel coming up, I figured if there was anything awry they would maybe catch it, but honestly, I'm used to feeling pretty awful at this point.
Well, I got salmon slapped right in the life-change sector of existence at my doc's visit.
To start with, I got to meet my new doc, a PA actually. Her dad was the practice doc at our office and has been retired from practicing for quite a while. I liked her instantly. I really liked her when she told me she did her fellowship at the Functional Medicine Institute.
However, once she got down to business I quickly became aware that this wasn't just going to be a blood draw and bolt typical doc's visit.
Let's just say my carcass is in a state of inflammatory unhappiness and my new doc was actually impressed that I even function at all. I'm not going to go into any great detail about all my ailments, some possibly scary diagnosis possibilities, and all the other medical jazz, but there was one thing that she dropped on me that has really upended my life.
I am allergic to dairy.
And I am not allergic in the way a person is who has a life threatening response, nope, my allergy is the kind where it just puts my body in a constantly-inflamed antibody forming and attacking my carcass misery.
As I sat there listening to her break down how it all worked, my existential pattern horror started increasing. My friends, I have always hated milk. Like, despised it. But I absolutely adore butter, cream, and cheese.
Let's just say I had a bit of a ponder and a pout on the way home.
But I have had practice at this eating without foods allowed thing, For ten years it was assumed I was allergic to beef. The reality is, I have a reaction to public beef. I have been eating my homegrown, grass fed beef for years now with no adverse health reactions at all (my thyroid used to swell my throat shut when I ate public beef).
So, I am going to cut out dairy for awhile, One, to see if I start feeling better, because let me tell you, the last month has been especially miserable. And two, once I get un-inflamed and my immune system quits trying to destroy my form, then I am going to try introducing certain items of raw, grass fed dairy back into my diet.
Because honestly, I could look at this whole change in a couple of ways. I could pout, throw a fit, eat dairy anyway and get sicker, and just be miserable, or, I can choose to see this as what it is, a thing I get to grow and learn from. You all know I love to cook and bake, so now I get to do that in a different way. It might even fun.
It's all about mindset anyway, right?
That said, I'd really like to dip my mindset in garlic butter right now...
Guess it's going to take a few days to get my mindset fully on the non-dairy track.
And as not most of the time, the cover image is from Pixabay because I didn't want to go look at any of the delightful dairy products in my fridge, the other images were my own from my very dairy-free iPhone.