Day Eleven:

Fritos. Ben's homemade wings. Stubb's BBQ sauce. Cheese. Pepperoni. Tostitos. Lays. And Smirnoff. Yay! I can't have everything, but we've managed to make my Superbowl cheerful.  I feel normal. I feel happy. It's a good day!

Today I went to the grocery store for the first time.... I mean, the real grocery store for my regulary weekly shop.  It was interesting, to say the least. What I thought would be a "quick" shop was more than an hour and a half. What's most frustrating about label checking is that every single one is different.  Some products have a special GF emblem, some have Gluten Free written somewhere on the package, and some say nothing at all.  After spending two minutes on a package, the last thing I want to do is have to put it back because I don't have a clear cut answer.  I can imagine this frustration must be widespread among other Celiacs.  The other question is when a product says, "Produced in a factory with wheat and soy products." So is that just the legal mumbo jumbo in case I need an Epipen? Or does it mean the people that pack the item are wearing gloves covered in wheat flour? This is so puzzling and frustrating, and I can imagine that if you called all of these companies, they would each say something different.  I only ended up encountering one Homer Simpson "Doh!" moment, which was the Lipton Onion Soup mix... my favorite onion dip of all time.  It is produced in one of these questionable facilities.  I have to admit, I ate it anyway.  I'm not blatantly eating gluten, and for now I just need to let it go.  You bet I'm going to call on Monday and find out. The other thing is that I'm just not sure how crazy I have to be just yet.  Maybe these kinds of products are okay for me.  Who knows.  I'm not going to feel bad about it, today at least.

So in my quest to find some lunch products that don't include bread, I landed on Progresso French Onion soup.  It's gluten free.  The funniest part of this snippet is that I ended up putting bread in it, so what was the point?! I made croutons with my failed bread of yesterday, and then melted cheese on top.  It wasn't horrible, but it wasn't good either, because the bread soaked up the soup and still managed to taste like gluten free bread.  I ended up scooping the bread out and eating the broth by itself. Hmph.  Back to square one.

I have to say here, thank you to all of you who have been so super supportive of everything I've been going through.  Especially those of you who have been dealing with my moods (Ben, Mom, Donna).  I am lucky I can vent, but realize this does come at a cost! I'm trying, that's all I can say, and I know it will get better. I am figuring that's why you're all putting up with me in the first place.  And I love having my very own personal Googlio (it's my new word for Cheerio... does anyone watch Glee?).... that's you, Nicky!!!  Thank you, thank you.