The "wheat" thing...

The internet has its share of "cool kids" who make their name - such as it is - by talking down about things that matter to other people. One of the things a lot of cool kids like to make fun of is gluten intolerance and the growing demand for gluten-free products. This isn't entirely without provocation; "Gluten Free Evangelists" sometimes talk at a little too much length and with a bit too much enthusiasm sometimes. But the pushback among the cool kids is pretty aggressive and there's no shortage of people who are ready to say the entire controversy about gluten is a non-issue.

I'm not as well-studied on this subject as some people, and I'm not in possession of all the data. But here's what happened to me: On December 17 I started doing a juice diet (which, in itself, draws a lot of unkind armchair commentary from cool kids). On December 24, I took a "cheat day" in which I gobbled down a bunch of Bad Things™. I explained all this already so I won't bore you by repeating myself.

I took a second cheat day a few days later when I had a friend over and all I really had to feed him was pancakes (as I haven't really got much in the fridge or the pantry but juice-fixin's). So I decided to make some truly amazing pancakes and just enjoy them with him. One meal's worth. Didn't seem so bad.

After my cheat day on the 24th, I felt fine. Not so much as a hiccup or a burp. After my second cheat day, I did not feel good. At all. Immediately I felt weak and sick to my stomach. Within the hour, I was covered in hives.

I suppose you can make a case for there being something wrong with the maple syrup or the eggs or the milk. Someone could possibly even say it's some kind of delayed reaction to the cheat day on the 24th. Others might say I was imagining it and it never happened at all (I've heard this argument before). But if someone asked me, I would say that some people have trouble processing wheat, and others are allergic to it. I'm a fan of Occam's Razor, and I think my removal of wheat and gluten from my diet created an additional sensitivity to something I've been experiencing quite a bit over the years: I have some sort of wheat intolerance and, for me to be healthy, I need to steer away from it.