A Great Book for those First Few Weeks
Remember that first week after your celiac diagnosis? Perhaps you have actively wiped it out of your memory, but I still have vivid nightmares about it. I remember leaving the doctor’s office thinking that I simply needed to take certain baked goods out of Amy’s diet. And then I got home and Googled it. Then I went to my kitchen and searched through my pantry. When it was all over I just sat down and cried.
Fortunately I had the name and number of a mother who had a son with celiac disease. That phone call changed my life. She sent me a couple of books and a list of safe products. The homework was still intimidating, but it somehow appeared to be a bit more do-able. I had a hand to hold, and an ear to cry out to. I had someone who I knew understood.
That’s really what we all need the weeks and months after the celiac diagnosis: a hand and an ear – preferably attached to a body who has been through it all before. I recently read a great book that successfully fulfills all of those requirements. Jules E. Dowler Shepard’s Celiac Disease and Living Gluten Free: A Patient-Expert Walks You Through Everything You Need to Learn and Do the First Year, is the perfect read for those first weeks and months following the celiac diagnosis. Shepard divides her book into the first day, second day, third day, etc., until the first week is complete. She provides short insightful and sometimes inspiring readings for each of those highly sensitive days. Then she continues her book with readings for the first week, second week, third week, and fourth week, and finally provides reading for each of the first six months. I liked that the readings were short, informative, sensitive, and perfectly placed. She provides just the right information that is necessary at each stage of your introduction to gluten-free life. She walks you through these first few weeks, holding your hand and slowly guiding you through the maze that is celiac disease and gluten-free eating.
Even a seasoned gluten-free mom like myself could gain something from this great book. Did you know that before gluten was singled out as the cause of celiac symptoms some doctors put celiac sufferers on an all-banana diet? Could you imagine eating nothing but bananas your whole life? The bananas seemed to take care of the diarrhea (no gluten in bananas!), so the doctors thought they were on to something. (These are the same people we go to for medical advice!) Shepard also provides some great (and always needed) recipes at the end of her book.
We all need that special hand to grasp during the first few weeks after our celiac diagnoses. With this book, Shepard has provided us with that warm comforting hand.
——————————————————————————————————————————————————————
Jen’s Gluten-Free Website Update #2
Well, it looks like we have no choice if we want to get started in less than six months. We really wanted to unveil our supersite in one impressive
swoop. But, alas (I like that word 
, it’s not going to happen that way. Instead we are going to have to take one step at a time and at some point
down the road integrate all the pieces into a funky new design.
So the question is, where do we start? We have decided to start with the single most important aspect of the gluten-free diet: the food. We have started working on programming the shopping cart and choosing our first 300 products. Please give me some feedback here. Which products would you want us to offer first? What GF food have you not been able to find at all or not at a good price?
Please give me your feedback ASAP so we can start with the best possible product mix. Looking forward to hearing from you.
I’m excited again!
–Jen
One Responseto “A Great Book for those First Few Weeks”
Leave a Reply
Set your DVR’s and VCR’s for The Rachael Ray Show on Tuesday January 5th 2010. Kitchen Table Bakers will be featured for the third time as Snack of the Day. Rachael always mentions that we are Gluten Free.