The Challenge Continues

It's now the 3rd week into my gluten challenge, & I thought it was about time for an update. It's been quite a journey so far...

Nope, not pregnant.
How my stomach is looking right now

Pain. Pain is the best way of describing how & what I'm feeling daily. Yesterday it was too much, & I didn't eat any gluten at all, & not much of anything else. Over the past couple of weeks, I've indulged in food I haven't eaten in ages; different types of bread, having pizza at a restaurant, homemade lasagna & cinnamon rolls. Living in Sweden, it's been nice to sample some traditional things that I haven't been able to since I arrived here. & I had beer again (but that's a big no-no. Was not feeling good after that). But it's all come with a painful price. So painful that I'm now wondering if it's worth continuing. The last five days have been the worst, & I can only see it continuing to get worse.

Gas. So much gas. My stomach is so irritated that it doesn't matter what I eat now. I save the gluten intake for when I get home from work, so that I don't get gas & cramps at work. It's at the stage now that my breakfast of steamed vegetables & the salad for lunch causes the same gas & cramping as a piece of bread does. Sometimes when I'm hungry & my stomach growls, that in turn sets off cramps & then gas. It's all a no-win situation.

With the cramps & gas, also comes nausea. It's mainly when there's a swirling feeling in my stomach. I also have burning sensations in my stomach & intestines, mostly at the same time, & I tend to feel nauseous when this occurs.

I've also been getting migraines here & there, something that I used to get a lot, particularly in high school. I'm starting to draw a lot of connections to previous health issues. My chest tends to feel a little tight at times too. I'm asthmatic, but I haven't had an attack for a very long time. I just feel when I draw out the last of my breath, there's a tightness there that I haven't felt in a long time.

The bloating continues. I noticed on Friday night that my ankles were swollen, & that calmed down a little today, but I think that was mainly because I didn't eat any gluten yesterday. Otherwise, my whole body is swollen, particularly my thighs & breasts (the boy is complaining about the latter).

So, I'm going to ring the clinic this week & see if they can give me a date or even an estimate to how long it's going to be. I really just want to stop eating this right now. The food adventure has been fun, but the fun is being overshadowed by pain.

Not so pretty

After a couple of days of relative peace stomach-wise, today I was assaulted with, well, there's no nice way to say this: diarrhea. Nasty. It hadn't let up the whole day, finally easing sometime into the night. Now I'm sipping on nippon soup, one of several cups today.

Yesterday I dared to have about a tablespoon of regular cream. The boy & I had semlor, & though we'd usually have lactose-free dairy, I decided to try some regular dairy as he'd bought it & I react to the lactose-free anyway. I also ate a few of the vege chips from the store, being selective in what I got & making sure that it was mainly squash. My experiment there seemed to work; I think the squash is safe.

The dairy, however, not so. That can be the only thing that has caused this rampage of the runs. If I have too much lactose-free dairy I'll feel it the next day. Usually a bit runnier than usual. But not like this. This was painful, & there was no way I was leaving the house. All the plans I'd made for the day were cancelled. I didn't feel great about it, but it was a safer position to take.

So now, rather than dwell on it any more, I'm off to relax before bed. My mind needs a mental break from this constant considering the what-&-why.

Oh, my ovaries!

An explanation as to what the hell is happening inside me right now would be really nice.

My body has been sore the last 24 hours, & in a rather strange way. I feel like I've pulled muscles in my lower intestinal region. I hadn't done anything strenuous besides walking yesterday, nor any kind of intense exercise for a couple of weeks. My neck has been sore to touch to, like I've pulled muscles in the front of my neck. Strange is the only way to describe it, as I've never felt anything like this before.

Now, I can feel balls of gas roaming around my stomach. It groans intermittedly, & travels through my intestines. My stomach burns slightly & a nauseous feeling lingers. Bubbles pop in my gastro tract. Piercing pain emerges at times, feeling like I'm being slowly stabbed at several different spots at once: under my breast, around my ovaries, to the left of my stomach. Strain in my lower back. Oh boy, this isn't fun.

I also feel very weak & light-headed. I'm finding it hard to concentrate (the amount of typing errors I've made on this is causing it to take longer to write than I would like). My eyes feel heavy, like I could pass out. Yet it's only 7:30 in the evening.

The only big difference to my diet in the last 72 hours has been cheese. I haven't eaten much of it; yesterday it was a scraping of soft cheese from a tub; on Sunday I'd had some kaffeost, which consisted of 4 small cubes of a melting cheese, plus when I got home I had some thin slices of Edam & a little bit of mjukost. Today again it was a small scraping of mjukost. Today & Sunday I took an extra probiotic (still staying within the recommended daily allowance) as extra protection for my stomach. No discomfort was felt on Sunday, & these feelings in my muscles only emerged last night.

The last time something like this occurred was when I went to hospital. It had lasted for hours that day. & it was unbearable. Looks likely I'll be missing another day of school tomorrow :P