My Story

Creating a blog of the recipes that I have come up with to compensate for my food allergies was one of my co-worker's ideas.  I also have a few past roommates that were hoping to get some recipes.  Here is an easy way to share one of my hobbies.

To begin with, I have an allergy to bleached foods.  This means that things like white rice, white flour, and white sugar have unpleasant consequences when I eat them or handle them too much. 

Growing up, I had an upset stomach ALL THE TIME!  My parents believed that I just got sick when I was stressed.  For many years, this was the answer that I accepted, but I still missed school for vomiting and stomach pains frequently.  In addition, I had red, enflamed hands that looked awful.  Because of the cracking and bleeding, we thought it was dry skin.  However, after years of dealing with the problem and realizing this was no ordinary dry skin, we believed that I was allergic to the cold.

Finally I turned eighteen and was still experiencing these "stress stomach aches".  When I said farewell to my parents and hometown to move to college, I also decided to give up some unhealthy eating.  I tried cooking with whole wheat flour.  Surprisingly, I was sick much less often.  Occasionally, it would flare up and I'd miss a class, but for the most part, the pain had improved.  My hands, however did not.  After one evening, I went out playing night games and returned with a bad rash not just on my hands, but everywhere!  I thought that I had really made myself too cold.  (In hindsight, I had made a white cake that day...)

When I moved back home between semesters, my healthy cooking gave way to the preferences of others in the house.  My stomach problems returned to their previous intensity.  Moving back to school and choosing to be healthy, I noticed the pains disappear.  Now, I was starting to wonder if there was a pattern.  One weekend, I went camping for my roommate's birthday.  We had pizza and store-bought muffins (junk food compared to what I normally eat).  I was sick when we got back.  I freaked out about all the junk food that I had had and began to worry that I was diabetic.

In talking to my mom and sister, I relaxed about the diabetes.  Some things that pointed away from diabetes was the fact that not all carbs made me sick.  I could eat brown sugar and honey without problems.  However, I now knew that the refined flours and grains seemed to cause illness.

After some trial and error, I recognized that unbleached (yet refined) flour did not make me feel sick.  After researching, I found that they actually use chemicals in the refining process to bleach these foods.  These chemicals are what make me sick.