I have fairly strong feelings about food allergies. I hate them and think they are mostly fake. Yes yes, I know some people will die if I say "peanut" in their presence, but mostly it's a farce.
In early August my mom and I decided to kick start a plan to lose some weight by doing the South Beach diet. It meant cutting out alcohol and all carbohydrates for 2 weeks. I almost immediately stopped getting heartburn. At first I thought maybe it was the alcohol. This was distressing. But then I reintroduced red wine and the heartburn did not return. So I started testing myself, and it's become clear that if I eat bread or drink beer, I get heartburn.
Gluten is the culprit.
What now? It's not an allergy. I mean, sometimes there is going to be pizza. Or artichoke dip and the only thing for dipping will be french bread. Maybe it's best described as gluten sensitivity. I'm trying to avoid it as it's nice to not have heartburn and it's also helpful in the weight loss plan. 12 pounds so far. Not too shabby.
The best news of course is that it was bread and not wine that was giving me trouble. And now that I'm not really eating bread, there's more time to drink wine. Salud!
2 comments:
I generally share your skepticism about some people's allergies (though I know some are real and for kids especially it's sad and scary). But this is the kind of sane food sensitivity reaction/plan that I can get behind. Especially since it doesn't end with you giving up red wine or the occasional slice of pizza--since you will need to have some of both when you come visit me in NYC.
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