When I started this blog, it was to vent and share our life. Then it shifted to a cooking blog, a setting for me to share the recipes I was creating. Looking back at the things I used to cook, it astounds me at how far our life has come from that point.
Most people know this, but if you don't, I'm throwing it out there now: our youngest has a severe dairy intolerance. She also has a milder soy intolerance, which honestly frees us up a bit since she can do soy in moderation. Just how bad is her dairy intolerance? One Cheeto. James gave her just one Cheeto since he felt bad that she wanted one, and he's just not very good at denying her. Lol. She is definitely Daddy's Little Girl. So, what's the big deal about one little Cheeto? It seems innocuous enough, right? Wrong. One Cheeto caused her 72 hours of severe constipation and discomfort. The only way to eliminate this was to give my miserable little girl a suppository. To be quite frank, if you've never had to experience doing this with a miserable, squirmy toddler, I do not recommend it.
As I reread my past blogs, I realized how far my cooking has come in the past almost 6 months (we discovered Melanie's intolerance at 13 months old). We have eliminated cooking with cheese. I don't use milk in most my cooking; if I have to, I make a separate batch of whatever it is for Melanie. Cooking separate batches of food is highly time consuming, so it's become simpler to eliminate the dairy. We don't do most pasta sauces unless I make them from scratch. We now read every label on items we plan to buy. I cannot even risk purchasing things she *MIGHT* consume if they were cooked/packaged in a plant that handles milk. Cross contamination is a very real thing. What else is gone from our house?
- Ranch dressing (gasp!)
- mashed potatoes
- macaroni and cheese
- pizza
All things I love, all things I dearly miss. However, I have not eaten a meal without having to share it in about, oh, 5 years. So it's not worth the risk.
I'm that mom at restaurants. I have actually asked managers to show me ingredient lists in specific foods (like batters on chicken or shrimp) before I will order them for her, just to make sure she does not get anything in her system that will hurt her. I stop people from feeding her if they have food with dairy on their plate. I am so hypervigilant on what she consumes because I have to be.
Not only that, but she's allergic to blue food dye. That's fun!
If you saw her, though, you'd never guess she's got a serious food allergy. This child is such a little chunk! As long as she's not had foods on the "no way Jose" list, she is such a happy little ball of sassy energy!
Did I mention sass? This girl is my biggest personality. She is my sassy diva. She will not walk across grass barefoot. She does not like sandals that go between her toes. She HATES jeans. She prefers to be running around in a dress or a skirt. She has an obsession with giving me attitude. But, she exudes empathy at a young age. If I am having a rough day, she is the first one crawling up into my lap, giving me her sweet, wide-eyed concerned look, begging me to tickle her, and kissing all over me. I seriously have no words to describe all the sides of this girl. She has Mommy's sass, vibrancy, and energy, plus Daddy's sense of humor and his German stoicism when she's mad. The pout kills me!
When we got the dairy intolerance diagnosis, I had no clue where to go or what to do with it. I had no clue how to cook for her. In just 6 months, I have learned so much. Our diets have cleaned up immensely. It's crazy how much I've grown just from needing to change things for her health.
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