What happened when a skeptic went gluten free

My general approach to nutrition is if God made it and put it on this earth, it's probably ok to eat. So why have I spent the last year avoiding gluten? Read on for more.

What happened when a skeptic went gluten free

January 8, 2019 Health, Nutrition Comments (1)

I have a secret I’ve been hiding for a year now.

Despite my previous snarky comments, eye rolls, and overall irritation with the term, I’m (mostly) gluten-free.

I know. If you’ve been with me for a while, you’re probably calling me hypocritical.

How did we get here?

My husband has been afflicted with psoriatic arthritis for several years. Psoriatic Arthritis (PSA) is an autoimmune disorder that affects your joints causing pain, stiffness, and swelling. You can read more about it here.

It’s a condition that bothers him sometimes more than others. His spine aches, neck seizes, and his thumb and pinkie ache and throb. Additionally, when he’s in this state, his back easily spasms while working out.

Despite his pain, he understandably wants to avoid prescription meds as long as possible.

In an attempt to heal him from the outside out, I basically started shoving supplements down his throat. Curcumin and Tart Cherry Juice capsules for anti-inflammatory effects and Omega-3’s for … well, I don’t know exactly how that impacted the arthritis but I know they are good for him. Of course, a multivitamin was added for nutritional insurance.

As much as possible, I prepared anti-inflammatory meals: lots of fish, little red meat, whole grains, plenty of veggies.

Sometimes all this helped and other times he was laid out on the couch in pain.

May the experiment begin

This past January, we decided to experiment further with his diet. With the holidays behind us and an intentionally empty social calendar, January is a great time to reset and try new things. As I wrote in this article, approaching changes as an experiment, rather than a directive, helps me stay focused and not get overwhelmed.

How did we experiment? We both removed gluten and dairy from our diets. “Both?” you ask. “But he’s the one with this issue.”

True.

But I wanted to support him. I wanted to understand his restrictions. Going “all in” with him would encourage me to holistically think about what we ate. It also encouraged me to stay accountable to his goals and not place a loaf of bread on the table and just tell him not to eat it. (Because there’s nothing fair or right about that.)

If I’m honest, I also wanted to see how and if it would affect me.

I love gluten

Before we go any further, I need you to understand something. I love bread. Wheat. Pasta. And honestly, gluten, which gives bread that soft, stretchy feeling.

I also have a deep spiritual conflict with taking out a God-given food. My basic nutritional approach is I eat as many God-given foods in their natural state as possible. I try to eat more foods with roots than faces.

I also struggle with taking out a type of food that’s been on this earth since ancient times. I mean, the Bible documents Jesus breaking bread with his disciples, for crying out loud.

Jesus. Bread.

So how is something that’s been around for so long bad for us? Is it actually bad for us?

What happened?

I had this conversation with multiple people who all have different philosophies on eating. Men, women, different ages. Each time, we came to the same conclusion: we humans messed it up. The growing and harvesting process is not the same as it was 2000 years ago.

Several years ago I discreetly removed most gluten from my diet, allowing one serving a week. I hoped it would help manage my high blood pressure. It didn’t. I did, however, notice a magnesium deficiency. Each night as I was drifting off to sleep, my legs would twitch and wake me up. Grains are high in magnesium, so taking out my Ezekiel 100% whole wheat bread meant I was giving up nutrients my body needed. In fact, this is when I started really paying attention to magnesium, which I discuss in this post.

My body missed the grains and I just as quietly resumed eating my fried eggs with a piece of toast.

What changed?

My biggest challenge with our experiment was finding a “go-to” meal for my husband. He needs something he can easily and quickly prepare. He’s good at a lot of things, but creatively putting together a healthy meal is not one of those. Previously he heated up a frozen hamburger patty and slapped that on a whole wheat bun.

We transitioned to a fully cooked turkey burger that he could top with individual guacamole packets from Costco. Pair that with some pre-cut veggies and he was content. It’s not a perfect meal but it was fuel.

We tweaked other meals and settled into our January nutrition. I serve more rice and potatoes now (read about it in this post), and to the delight of my pasta-hating son, we rarely cook Italian food.

The results

About three weeks into January, my husband looked at me in cautious bewilderment.

“I just realized my thumb and pinkie don’t hurt.” We looked at each other in a “huh” kind of way and filed that into the “maybe this is a solution but we aren’t ready to admit it yet” category.

A week later, we went out to dinner and enjoyed the restaurant’s fresh, hot bread. We readily dipped that in the oil and spices.

The next morning: achy thumb, forefinger, and back.

Again: “huh.”

We started seeing other benefits. He wasn’t getting injured as easily while working out. His neck’s range of motion increased and his general achiness faded.

As for me, I found a few benefits of my own. My nagging left hip subsided, and my sleep quality increased substantially (hallelujah!).

So is gluten-free the answer to everything?

I don’t believe gluten is the root of all health problems. Removing gluten will not magically heal any ailment, and is not the right answer for many. While it’s helped my husband, that doesn’t mean I’ll preach the benefits to anyone with an ache or pain.

Even though our dinners reflect a new way of eating, I’m still slapping peanut butter and jelly on whole wheat bread for my boys’ lunch.

And while I’ve more or less avoided it for the past year, I’m also adaptive.

Both of us refuse to be fussy about it. Over the holidays we didn’t worry about what we ate while with friends but still controlled it at home.

We won’t ask anyone to cook anything special. And sometimes we break our own rules by grabbing the pumpkin bread at bible study or going out for Smashburger at lunch (I’ll let you guess who does what.)

If I think about it, I’ll request gluten-free soy sauce at sushi restaurants, but that’s only if I can do so without my husband brushing it off. He says he feels too much like a millennial when we request it. I can’t say he’s wrong.

Despite the exceptions, we’ve adapted to this new way of eating. We refuse to be slaves to it, but embrace the restrictions for the sake of feeling better.

Are we gluten-free? Sort of. Do I think gluten is harmful to everyone? No. But am I confident that where we are is right for us? Absolutely.

1 thought on “What happened when a skeptic went gluten free”

Heather says:
April 13, 2019 at 2:44 pm
So happy to hear that your husband got relief! I agree that this isn’t the answer for everyone, necessarily, but we have found the same relief in our family. And I must say that there are some very delicious GF breads out there these days. 😉 Every once in awhile, a girl just needs a grilled cheese or toasted PBJ (maybe that’s just me)!
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