Milky! Update

A month ago I decided to stop nursing. My milk supply began to decrease and I was only pumping to relieve the pressure, not to keep up my supply. My daughter caught on to me and began rejecting formula. Where before she would take a bottle or two of formula a day, she now refused formula mixed with milk. I was in a bind! I had no milk and my daughter was not eating.

I increased my pumping to no avail. I kept getting frustrated, sitting there with barely any success. I had to do something but I didn't know what I could do. I felt like it was a hopeless cause.

That week I went on a walk around the mall and into my favorite store, Destination Maternity, where I met Jennifer. Jennifer was the first person I met in that store when I began showing my baby bump and she set me up with a great wardrobe that made me look and feel good when I was pregnant. Now, almost a year later, she introduced me to a product that changed my motherhood experience again. I had been following Tia Mowry and her gluten intolerant son Cree’s story and I found their new lactation increasing product exclusively sold at DM. I asked the store clerk Jennifer about it and she said Milky! was a new product they just got in. I figured, I had nothing to lose so I picked up a bottle.

That same day I saw a marked increase in my supply. Since then I have been using this product, which you drink twice daily. The gross flavor of other lactogenic teas is masked by a delicious strawberry flavor. This product contains natural herbs including fenugreek for increased milk production and fennel to improve milk let down. I am so happy with the results and am glad to say that Milky! Is now available through the Need products website. I recommend this product to moms who for any reasons have decreased her supply and need to get back her production. I will pick up another week supply to get back into pumping if I spend a weekend being lazy about pumping. Thanks Destination Maternity and Need Brands for creating such a great product!

86 the Gluten and the Cheese



Small g free snack at the Reagan Library that kept me going.

My employed friends all had a day off Monday, but no plans for the long weekend... that means impromptu day trips!

First was a trip to the Reagan Library Friday (that was a trip I made by myself), then there was the Malibu day with a couple of girlfriends, and finally, there was Solvang and the famous Pea Soup Andersons!

With all these events planned, I figured that this weekend would be an opportunity to test the waters with the gluten free road trip.


Damn, those tortilla chips had gluten. Going to restaurants is tough because you never know what they’re going to serve you. I took a daytrip with my friend Jane yesterday to the Danish town of Solvang to try the pea soup at Pea Soup Andersen's Restaurant and ordered one of the things on the menu I know usually is "g free," nachos! I asked them to 86 the cheese and to put avocado’s instead. My eyes beaming with pride when the delicious nachos came out, I showed my friend how easy it was to order a gluten free dish! Of course, I doused them with hot sauce and salsa.

But, to my dismay, the nachos were not made of corn, but of flour! What was I to do. I just ate around the nachos. Eating around the gluten may be an option for those with a minor gluten allergy, but not for someone with celiacs.

For someone with celiacs a mistake like that means eating what you ordered and suffering from a stomach ache all night. Or, even worse for someone who recently only found out they have a gluten allergy, having to explain to the waitress to take the food back because they have a "disease" that does not allow them to eat wheat.

To avoid this situation entirely, be sure to ask for a gluten free menu. Most chains will have a special separate menu listing the items that do not have gluten or list the modifications that can be made so that the dishes could be gluten free. Good examples are Chili’s, P.F. Changs, Cheesecake Factory, Outback Steakhouse, … (the list goes on).

Vacationers who don’t want to worry about finding a gluten free restaurant can go to a supermarket or Costco before heading out for the day and grab lots of food, stick it in a cooler, and set out for the day. Yesterday, a couple of my friends came to visit and I took them on a tour of Malibu… you know, all the beach spots that locals love. Though I was watching my gluten intake before, it was the first day I really tried to eliminate every trace of gluten from my diet. So, we went to Costco and grabbed some margarita mix, a couple platters of sushi, asparagus hummus dip, some potato chips, and any other g free snacks we found. Armed with all of our supplies, we headed to Leo Carillo to start our lazy beach day. It was packed with windsurfers surfers because of the big waves, making the view even more amazing (there were at least fifteen at any given time!). I had so much fun on my beach day escape from the real world with two of my favorite girlfriends!

My lazy weekend turned out a great success. I got my fill of beach time in and a nice bronze tan (or as close to bronze as I could get). Oh, and the pea soup was delicious!

Great find: Aebleskiver pan to make gluten free treats at home!

Tune in next week and I’ll have my official travel plans for the west coast leg of the trip

Raw food all week, gourmet style

In the past we were able to pick and choose our foods. If I ate cheese last night, then got sick, there were two options, I either had rotten cheese or my stomach was telling me I did not like cheese. Today, everything we buy, from food to furniture, is already prepared. We never see the ingredients in our food, we only know it tastes good.

Going through the cleanse process was not an easy process. The hardest part was figuring out which process worked for me. On the first day (Wednesday) I tried the lemonade and cayenne pepper diet. That failed miserably.

 I am an active person and burn a lot of calories in the day. When I decided to go out to Burbank to browse around IKEA I realized by 5:00 p.m. when I was loading all our finds into the car that this diet was not going to work for me. The next day I woke up (Thursday) and thought, “this next week is going to be aweful if I don’t think of something else.” Luckily I had promised to write this next blog post so I kept going. I then though, “well I guess I have this goal to remove the gluten from my diet, while I’m at it lets see if there are any other allergens I can work out of my diet.” So I said, “why not do the raw diet.”

At first, eating only raw fruits and vegetables sounded disgusting. I imagined myself eating raw broccoli all day. But I actually found that I was feeling better and making better food choices. What I liked about the raw food diet was that the food I picked up had less steps in processing, therefore, I had less need to look up the ingredients. I was also finding that cooking fruits and vegetables often masked the flavor of the fresh produce rather than improves it. Not to mention that produce loses a significant amount of its nutritive value when it is cooked.

Despite a few setbacks, (I have a weakness for cheese), I am on my way to my gluten free diet. I decided that, starting today, I will allow myself to have cooked fruits and vegetables as well as fish to my diet. But I will continue trying to eat raw when I can. I discovered a great cookbook for the raw food diet. It’s called RAWvolution by Matt Amsden. Don’t be put off by his bizarre writing style, these recipes are delicious and fresh! You can find more recent recipes he’s posted: http://www.thedailyrawcafe.com/2010/03/matt-amsdens-recipes.html

That’s all for now folks. Next week I’ll be back with some more stories. In the meantime, you can add me on Facebook “Nogluten Trip” where I post interesting articles and more resources for living healthy and gluten free.

See you next Wednesday!