Ever thought about giving up gluten, but haven't had the motivation to do it on your own? Well, do it with me! And Troy. You know, that one guy I married.
Let me preface this by saying, I don't think I have any problems processing gluten. I'm kind of like a goat - I eat something and my body will process it. I don't get tummy aches from certain kinds of food, and the only reason I'm ever sluggish or tired is because I rarely get enough sleep. I also have the immune system of Charles McNeversick - a fictional person I just made up who never gets sick. The last time I called in sick to work was January of 2011, and it had been six years since the last time I called out.
Troy though? Troy get colds more often than a new preschool teacher. The term "man cold" was designed just for Troy. He also seems to need more sleep than most toddlers. Part of it is his crazy work schedule that has him burning the candle at both ends, but even when our lives were normal, he required much more sleep than anyone I know.
I've been kicking around the idea that his body is working too hard to process gluten (and he eats A LOT of gluten) for awhile now, but he's always kind of brushed me off. Then I suggested that he should go gluten free for a month. And I'd do it with him for moral support. So basically, I cook everything in the house, and prepare all the meals he takes to work, so if I'm in, he doesn't really have a choice but to participate.
I promised him that I would do this with him to encourage him and so that he wasn't alone in this endeavor. This won't be like the time he offered to give up sugar to support me when I had to go dairy-free because of Jack's allergy. He made the decision at about 9 am the morning we found out about Jack's allergy, and by 2 pm I found him shoving his mouth full of ice cream cake at my niece's birthday party. Thanks for the support pal.
So, if you're interested in doing this with us, we'll be cutting out gluten from July 15th - August 15th. I picked a somewhat far off date to give myself time to prepare; gathering recipes, etc. Generally when eliminating something from your diet, you need at least 20 days for your body to get it out of your system. We're shooting for a full month to test my theory that his health will improve.
When I refer to gluten, I'm just talking about us giving up the glutenous carbs like bread, pasta, etc., I'm not referring to checking every single sauce and condiment to make sure that our ketchup is gluten-free.
This is going to be a bit weird for me because when I cook, I use meat as a small part of the dish/flavoring. I know this gluten-free month is likely to increase our meat consumption.
Let me know if you're interested in participating! I'm kicking around the idea of offering a few prizes for people who try this out for a month. That decision will be made and announced before the challenge starts! If anyone out there has an etsy shop, or is a crafty person and wants to offer up some giveaways, please shoot me an email. If I don't get any giveaways, I'll just use some Swagbucks to purchase some cool prizes from Amazon.
Also, if you're daring (and I am. Kind of), take before and after pictures to see if cutting out the gluten made a change to your physical appearance. My sedentary lifestyle at work has added a few pounds to thee old backside, so this will be an interesting experiment for me to see if there is any slim down of my sit down.
