Strange things are happening

The Husbandlet is away on the Big Sea. So of course (well, actually for real of course) I decided now would be a good time to start Ngaire, Liam, and myself on an anti-candida diet.

We are eating meat (non-processed), eggs, veggies, brown rice and rice cakes, almonds, coconut products, olive oil, avocados and cucumbers, and gluten-free oatmeal. I’m going to give quinoa a shot. That’s really about it. It has to be about that restrictive for the first three weeks; then we have four weeks of slightly less restrictive (we can add back sour fruits and sweet potatoes), and then after that we get to start slowly re-introducing foods … though the recommendation is to stay gluten- and casein-free for another five to six months.

The kids are doing OK. Ngaire, in particular, asks for off-limits items fairly often, but she accepts calmly when I tell her no. Except for when I denied her cheese; then she stated quite calmly and forcefully her exact opinion of that aspect of the diet. I seem to recall that one of her first words was “cheese.” Liam is trying to get around things by subsisting mainly on rice cakes, and I’m probably giving him more than I should, but he’s also eating a far amount of meat (no eggs, yet) and significantly more veggies than previously.

Rhiannon isn’t technically on the diet. I’m still giving her milk, peanut butter, and a little bit of sugar on her coconut custard. However, and this will probably surprise no one, she has been eating my diet-friendly concoctions more happily than all the rest of us put together, and that includes the weird “cookies” I attempted last night.

For my part, I really really miss baking … almost more than I miss eating baked goods. Almost. I love baking, and it’s been one of my hobbies, de-stressers, and chores-that-I-enjoy for my entire tenure as a SAHM. I’ve been looking at gluten-free baking recipes, just to plan ahead, and I must say I find the prospect a tad depressing.

So, you will ask, have I yet seen any happy results of this experiment? Well, we’re only on day five, so it’s hard to say. Both Ngaire and Liam seem a LOT calmer. They’re not running around crazily quite so much, and Ngaire seems very happy and cuddly. Ngaire has been following directions more easily. Liam is almost worrying me. He isn’t making the living room into an obstacle course or climbing the walls anymore; in fact, he’s requesting a lot more TV than previously and then sitting down to watch an entire movie. I’m not sure what this all means. Is it good? Bad? A sign of an increased attention span? A normal part of switching over from a high-carb diet to one that involves protein and veg? A sign of starvation? He did have horrible growing pains in his legs on the second night of the diet, probably because he’s been getting all his calcium from rice milk, and I took him off that. I started giving him calcium supplements, though, and he hasn’t complained of his legs hurting again. (I’ve also been giving both kids D3, grapefruit seed extract, and B12.)

As for me, I used to feel queasy and anxious a lot of the time, and I don’t anymore. I’m not experiencing the sudden head-clearing some people talk about after a candida cleanse; but then I’m not 100% certain I have a candida problem.

Thoughts on Day 5 for the long-term? I’m super hoping to be able to reintroduce dairy and gluten (oh, please!), but I’m definitely planning to skew our diet more towards protein and good fats, and less toward carbs, after this.

In other news, I miss my Husbandlet! Last year, we were able to exchange emails pretty regularly and I even got a phone call on our anniversary, but this year there’s only one email-enabled computer on the ship, and I haven’t heard anything from him since he left last Wednesday. Here’s hoping he’s enjoying his glamorous outing and not getting too seasick.

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