A change of topic...

Well I'd originally intended for this blog to be more about fun geeky type stuffs but since a recent prognosis from my doctor, I've decided to head in a more health/food area mostly to help me process this new dietary lifestyle that I have to manage.

So what's the deal? My lovely new holistic doctor (who charges a small fortune! eek!) had me undergo some blood tests. After the majority of my blood was drained from my body (ok, maybe only a dozen vials but seriously that much blood being taken when you've been fasting is a little woozy-inducing) and then waiting a couple of weeks for the test results to come back, I went back to my doctor to get the results.

The main thing of interest was the result of the 5 food allergy test that I had done. This test measures your tolerance to cow's milk, wheat, nuts, soy and white fish and are measured from 0 to 4 (0 being no problem to 4 being the highest and meaning cut it out of your diet completely). I was already expecting a need to remove cow's milk from my diet from my long term queasiness that I have always gotten from having too much milk or cheese which I had previously thought was a case of mild lactose intolerance (something I had been told that I probably had from a previous doctor but was never tested). Seeing my cow's milk reaction come back as a 4 was a little surprising though, I didn't realise it would be that high! The other foods tested all came back as a 2 which means to cut them out of the diet for at least 6 months and hopefully I'll be able to slowly reintroduce them later.

As well as having to avoid these foods, my doctor also advised me to go on a Low GI diet and to take 5 different supplements a day - Vitamin C, fish oil, iron, a women's multivitamin and a dairy-free probiotic.

So now I was faced with the task of working out what the heck I could eat. My wonderful fiance showing all of his support announced that he could no longer cook for me as he only does Italian style. Thanks sweetie that helps a lot! Thankfully the wonderful Zuckerbaby has been very helpful and supportive with my transition. The main thing is trying to organise myself enough to plan meals for the day and eventually a week. We'd become so used to staggering home exhausted at the end of the work day and either grabbing something quick and easy to pop in the oven to eat for dinner or getting take away so this aspect of it is probably going to be the most difficult.

The other part is taking all these supplements because for whatever reason I really hate taking pills. As in I have difficulty swallowing anything larger than a Herron tabsule. So far I have only 3 of the supplements as my local Macro hasn't had the other two in stock (but hopefully will this week) and I've been able to get these supplements in either liquid or powder form. The Vitamin C powder is simply mix it into water or juice which I have with my breakfast in the morning and I actually quite like it. I think it tastes a bit like the Tang orange powder stuff we used to have when I was a kid. Floradix that I take for iron is also fine. Just a spoonful in the evening before going to bed and it tastes kinda like blackcurrant. The fish oil liquid though is rather gross, but still better than trying to swallow a capsule the size of my little toe. The fish oil liquid I got says it's "peach flavoured" which does nothing really. If you wait a bit there is a very very faint peach aftertaste but the very fishy fish taste is still overpowering. So what I do is prepare the vitamin c juice, have a spoonful of fish oil and then quickly start drinking the juice to try and avoid that fishy flavour. The probiotic (Polybac 8) will be another liquid to take but the women's multivitamin will not be and I have no idea how big those pills are going to be.

So there's a bit of background info. From here on I'll be posting some of my success with cooking (I've already had one!), how I'm dealing with these changes in my life and any research I might do on certain aspects of it all.

Oh and I'm getting married in four months. No, I don't have any stress in my life at all.....