Who AM I?

My name is Rebekah. I am relatively new to the GF world. I started eating GF in September ( I think) 2010. It's certainly NOT a voluntary diet for me. I simply adore eating and my husband and I really enjoying cooking together, so to have restriction put on that has been really tough. My mother-in-law (a wonderful and beautiful woman!) recently suggested I start posting the recipes we've tried and liked. There isn't really a good way to do that on Face Book, so I am forced to figure out how to blog!

My GF testimony:

In January 2010 I started experiencing diminishing hearing in my left ear. There was fluid in my middle ear, but the hearing loss I was experiencing was in my inner ear. We thought nothing of it until I was laid out flat with debilitating vertigo, nausea and violent vomiting for 12 hours one Thursday afternoon. Miserable! I recovered over the next couple of days only to have the bout return about 3 weeks later. At first the attacks were always around 3 weeks apart - my hearing would return to normal. It would begin again with diminishing hearing, ridiculously loud tinnitus, and slight vertigo. I was given Zofran that kept me from vomiting, but the recovery from these "episodes" was still several days of exhaustion and refractory vertigo. Fast forward 9 months from the first attack and my hearing in my left ear was functioning at about 80% most of the time, and sometimes much worse. I wasn't having vertigo "episodes" anymore, but still experiencing noticeable balance problems and constant tinnitus. Starting in May, when we moved to Florida for my husbands residency, had clustered together. There was no 3 week break of perfect hearing. It NEVER left! In desperation I made an appt with an ENT who referred me to get an MRI, an audiology appt to test for hearing and to have a "Meniere's disease" test performed (only has 60% success rate but mine came back negative - encouraging,despite the knowledge that the test isn't very accurate), and an allergy test. Turns out I'm perfectly normal. The "Meniere's" test was negative, I'm a HIGHLY UNallergic person and my brain scan was nothing but what was expected - normal. Encouraging, but discouraging. Those of you who've had a chronic, undiagnosable issue know how this feels. You just want SOMETHING to be wrong - at least then you know what you are dealing with.

I'm a "born again" believer. I don't often use the practice of "fasting" but woke up one Friday feeling very strongly that God was leading me to fast. So I obeyed. I was hungry but noticed quickly that I felt better physically than I had in MONTHS! I had energy, and my ear didn't seem to be quite as bad as usual. I'm not positive that this was a physical response or a spiritual response to my obedience, but I felt great. By the end of the day God had made it pretty clear that gluten would have to go. A daunting task indeed, but again, I was desperate for a solution! I cut it out (to the best of my knowledge at the time) and had more energy than I had experienced since before I had become pregnant with my first son over 3 years previous! (I had recently complained to my husband that I hurt everywhere all the time and had NO energy. I was exhausted, always, and didn't know why!) My outlook on life became not quite so bleak and I felt I was able to conquer the world, not to mention the fact that I could actually hear. (again, it had been several months since our move to Florida when my hearing took a serious turn for the worse). The tinnitus didn't disappear (and still hasn't) but quieted down, considerably! If I ate something with gluten the next few days were spent feeling blah and having a left ear "stuffed up" (the only way I know how to describe the sensation in my inner ear). I've learned over the last several months that gluten is in A LOT more than I could have ever imagined. It's been a true challenge to cut it out! I've asked God several times if he's sure I still need to be GF and the reply has always been the same. In fact, I'm not actually convinced I have a true gluten intolerance - I think this is a test of obedience and I am just fine with that. Not necessarily a test of obedience with avoiding gluten, but more a test of obedience in trusting that he really does have my life in his hands. I am NOT in control and he ALWAYS is, and ALWAYS has been and ALWAYS will be! Thats just all there is to it. (I'm sure this sounds crazy-go-nuts to some of you, but I can hear, so thats enough for me!)

Ufta, thats long and I don't know that anyone who sees that many words in succession actually wants to read it, so I'm done with that part. On to the recipes. (again, it will take me some time to figure out how to organize this blog - I'm an EXPERT when it comes to Face Book, but blogging is a serious challenge for me!)