The beginning...

It all began last week.

Home sick, I see a phone call from my doctor. I was in the middle of catching up on my DVR, and grumpily paused Law and Order: SVU in the middle of a plot line twist. The nurse on the phone begins to tell me about my blood work from my physical: good cholesterol, good red blood cells, etc. I am thinking to myself, “Ok- thanks for the call. Let me get back to my stories.” But, then she says that the doctor is concerned about one thing. I have a large amount of something in my blood, which indicates that I have Celiac Disease. Apparently, the normal range is between 0-19, and my count is 32.

The nurse goes on and says that the best thing to do is to go to see a gastroenterologist, where they will do an endoscopy and take a biopsy of my intestines to confirm it. If I do have Celiac, then I will have to maintain a gluten free lifestyle.

Ok- so not the end of the world, you say. Gluten free is manageable. People do it all the time. Restaurants have gluten free menus. Grocery stores are selling gluten free stuff all over the place. Totally not the end of the world.

And, you’d be right. Except, I love me some gluten. Like, LOVE.

In fact, I love food of any kind. I love cooking it, eating it, trying new kinds…I love food so much that my specialty is culinary history. I am a historian – almost done with my master’s degree. My thesis has to do with culinary history. I read food history books and historical cookbooks for pleasure.

I don’t love food just because I’m a fatty. I associate food with memories. For example, I remember the first date that I went on with my husband- what restaurant we went to, what I ate, what I didn’t eat. (In case you’re wondering: I purposely didn’t eat anything pasta related with long noodles. I didn’t want to have to handle the noodles while trying to make conversation with this hot guy I was trying to impress.)

I remember the anadama bread that my grandma always made for each holiday. She always overcooked a batch for my grandfather because she said that he liked them that way. I remember the first time my oldest daughter ate one of my "famous" grilled cheese sandwiches and how she gobbled it up. I took a picture of her eating it and sent it to my college roommate to prove that indeed, everyone loved my grilled cheese.

Just as pictures do, food has memories that are attached to it. People remember food: the flavor, the smell, the texture, where they were when they ate it, and who they were with. Food is a human necessity and as humans, we have been able to make modifications to it in order to make it more palatable and enjoyable to eat. I enjoy testing out new recipes, making modifications accordingly, and enjoy the memories that go along with it.

For me, this whole Celiac Disease possibility wasn’t good news.

So, naturally, I do what any normal person does when they hear this news…I turn to google. I look up Celiac Disease, I start looking at things that contain gluten. I then call my husband to tell him that I got an interesting call from the doctor. After taking a minute to reassure him that it wasn’t THAT phone call and that I am not pregnant, I tell him about this potential gluten-free new life I’ll (read: we’ll) have to lead. Like me, he thinks that this is going to be a major shift in our lifestyle.

I sit on this news for a little while. I digest it. I take it all in and mull it over.

I am downstairs later that night, feeding my girls some dinner. Pasta…figures.

I start looking through my cupboards at all the types of food we eat. Gluten. Gluten. Gluten.

I look at the post it hanging on the cupboard. Here’s a picture:

This outlines everything that we are eating for dinner this week. (Organizational freak, you ask? Why, yes, I am.)

Everything contains gluten. Like, everything we are eating for dinner.

This would be the point where it hit me, and I start crying. I cry for the Bertucci’s rolls I may not be able to eat and the memories of hanging with my cousin on a “sick day” from work over glasses of sangria. I cry for pizza from Sorrentos that I won’t be able to enjoy with my colleagues on early release days from school. I cry for my grandma’s recipe for anadama bread that I won’t be able to make. Every time I bite into one, it reminds me of her. She’s gone, and I can’t even enjoy that memory. I cry for brownies, cookies…I just cry.

But, my husband gently reminds me that we don’t know anything for sure yet. So, we order Chinese food. With extra gluten.

Later that night, I’m in bed, and my mind is racing. I decide that I am going to live it up. Until my appointment with the gastroenterologist, I am going to eat gluten to my heart’s content. I am going to savor every last bite, knowing that it could be my last.

I am going to take pictures of it, and document my last days with gluten.

And- if these aren’t my last days- sweet. But, if they are, I will do what everyone else does when they are not given a choice about something: I am going to learn to live with it. I will buy gluten free cookbooks, I will go to support groups for Celiacs, and I will somehow learn to make my grandma’s anadama rolls without gluten so that I can still think of her whenever I eat them. If and when that time comes, I will make new food memories. In the meantime, I will enjoy every last bit of gluten that I can.