Layouts and Recipes

Face-lift in progress

I am going to be playing with the layout of my blog over the next few...days/week/month? Hopefully not a month. If you pop over and find it all kerfundled (is that a word? I feel like it's a word, or I feel like it's not a word and I really want it to be), it may be that I have succumbed to anti-blogger gremlins. Send help...and cookies. I'm really in the mood for cookies.

Which brings me to another topic I wanted to talk about. It's possible you may be seeing more recipes/food things popping up over here. This is mostly due to the fact that I am working out a new diet. I have struggled with "stomach issues" for years. The doc has labeled it IBS but I am still working out all the details of what that means for my body. Over the years, I have gotten more of a handle on what I can and can't eat but it's not perfect.

I recently started getting acupuncture to work on a few issues. One of which is my IBS but the main push for me was that I have been trying to get pregnant for over a year. I'm about to start testing for fertility issues but a few people recommended acupuncture so I decided to try. It can't hurt, right? Anyway, my acupuncturist recommended that I go gluten-free for my stomach and for fertility. I have had many people tell me to stop eating gluten over the years to help my stomach but bread is my life. I mean, come on stomach, you've already taken cheese away from me. But if I'm going to try, now is the time. So, I'm giving it a go for a few months and then I'll reassess and hopefully I'll bring bread back into my life.

It's been interesting so far. I was at my brother's house and I ate a corn chip with guacamole that was too spicy. As I was breathing through the pain, his girlfriend helpfully shoved a piece of bread in my mouth. Just as my tongue began to cool, it hit me "I'm not eating gluten!"

She looked at me funny and then laughed. "I don't think the beer you just drank was gluten-free."

Dammit! Of course it wasn't, but I wasn't thinking about that when I popped it open.

The point is, it's been a process of learning/remembering. Luckily, There are a ton of recipes out there that I have been tweaking to make more to my liking (which usually means leaving out steps/ingredients). I may share a few here, I may even have one coming up tomorrow.

Thanks for listening while I got a bit personal. Anyone out there who is newly struggling with IBS, I am happy to give help and pointers where I can.