Don't Mind Me While I Stare at Your Eyebrows (and fat belly)

I have developed a new habit that is rather unseemly.

If we meet one another on the street and you catch me staring at your eyebrows, I apologize in advance. I can't help it! I see the results of gluten intolerance written all over some of your faces . . . and your big bellies.

Gluten intolerance can lead to all sorts of hideous autoimmune diseases, including being hypothyroid. I am hypo, or was hypo until I found a wise doctor who actually believed me and got me on the correct medicines (dessicated thyroid + adrenal support with low dose cortisol). Your thyroid can be run down thanks to a sensitivity to gluten.

If you are hypothyroid, you might very well have lost the outer edges of your eyebrows. I look for that now when I meet people. Those whom I care deeply about I might mention it to, but mostly I am learning to try to keep my mouth shut because I find that many (most?) people do not want to hear that they have an autoimmune problem or that they may, in fact, have to give up bread (and ketchup and cake and cookies and beer and, and, and the list goes on)

A sensitivity to gluten can make you too fat and puffy (as well as it makes some folks super skinny and once was called "the wasting disease"). I watched a very over-sized family near us at the Pappadeaux's restaurant where we stopped on our way home after enjoying Christmas with the family in Baton Rouge.

I once would have thought not nice thoughts about this family's lack of self-control. As I watched them eat two baskets of complimentary bread, followed by fried everything and finishing off with a flour-laden desserts, I felt sorry for their lack of information.

As my wise father tells me all the time, knowledge is power and I thankfully have the knowledge that gluten is lethal for me. Thus, we sent our free bread basket back and didn't touch that poison.

We ordered non-fried food and we left without partaking in floury desserts. We nearly skipped out of the restaurant because we felt good after eating a light meal . . . the overly-large family rather waddled out the door.

Instead of judging them, I just felt bad for them and hoped that one day they learn about gluten and what it does to a body. Nothing good!

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