Gluten is a sticky protein found primarily in wheat, rye, oats, and barley. It’s hidden in a wide variety of processed foods. Human bodies have a difficult time digesting gluten so it triggers a range of symptoms—fatigue, bloating, gas, diarrhea, headaches, migraine, and rashes. These are considered the simpler symptoms. The more serious ones are mal-absorption of nutrients, infertility and even osteoporosis. Many people are considered gluten sensitive, which means they must scale back on the amount of gluten they consume as compared to those with Celiac disease who MUST adhere to a gluten-free diet—forever.

Peter H.R. Green, MD, director of the Celiac Disease Center tells us that none of us digests gluten very well. Gluten is the only protein in nature that humans cannot completely metabolize. So it causes irritation and inflammation to the gastrointestinal track.

For people with chronic conditions, dealing with a life change as big as going gluten free can seem overwhelming and even useless. My clients often ask:

“What difference can a change in my diet really make when it’s my head (legs, or insomnia) that’s the problem?”

The answer is: A BIG DIFFERENCE.

Think of nutrients as medicine. Since all our nutrients come from the foods we eat, it makes sense that the digestive track is one of the most important areas of the body to keep healthy as its where the body breaks down and absorbs nutrients and most medicine. Also, for anyone dealing with neurological issues, (pain or sleep) neurotransmitters are made in the stomach.
So, before you role your eyes and turn away from gluten free I encourage you to give it a try. Write down a list of your symptoms and then cut out gluten for six weeks and see if you have any improvement. Or, go to your doctor and get tested for gluten-sensitivity or Celiac (though the test can be costly and the elimination diet can tell you a lot.) I also recommend cutti ng out all soy products at the same time. But that’s another speech…

While living with chronic pain, I tried very hard to keep a positive attitude. I felt that it was important for my healing and a way I could support the people I lived with. It’s not that I pretended not to have pain. Those that helped me and visited me understood that my body hurt. I just didn’t talk much about the pain, keeping the harsh realities of my life to a minimum.

Yet, one can’t be positive all the time. Especially when symptoms are flared and intense. This journal entry came from a time when I realized the softening power and importance of having a good cry and being alone.

Julien’s Pain Journal:

The house feels big and empty. Shasta, my Australian Shepherd, lays next to me on the bed, her large, warm body a reassuring presence. Madera, my small dog is curled up in the crook of my folded legs. I reach out and press my fingers against her little form, feeling her belly moving up and down as she breathes and I let myself take a breath with her, and I relax a little deeper. She will not leave my side.

My husband left a few hours ago on a business trip and I have let a deep sense of relief bubble up from inside myself. It’s not that I’m not missing his presence, his company, that sweet smile he gives me when he walks in the door after work, or the warmth of his hand stroking my hair as I fall asleep—I do, I will. The relief I feel is coming from the fact that I don’t have to be well. I don’t have to. Because sometimes ‘carrying on’ is what I do for the one’s I love.

Maybe you know what I mean?

I don’t have to even try to not have pain tonight, or to pick myself up and say, “I can do it!” and endure with some semblance of sanity. No, not tonight. In this black room, with the moonlight and my dogs for companionship, I can sink into the pain my body feels, and let myself have a good cry about it. A deep down, drudge up the bottom of my heart, past endurance, past ‘never give up’ kind of a cry. I can let my body weep for its long and persistent struggle to be vibrant and beautiful while pain slices and stabs at my will power. These tears that are the water of my spirit, the rain of my invincible and immortal heart, yes, tonight, alone with the darkness I am free to give up and give in to these tears and surrender to the weight of persevering every day. Everyday.

I don’t feel sorry for myself. I don’t feel depressed, or deprived. This is essential to understanding the wonder of this night. These tears wash me. They scrub down the gritty cling that pain has clogged my heart with. The sobbing moves my blood like a fresh spring through my chest, and I can breathe more fully. And after I weep, my eyes are filled with pools of compassion for all the people in the world that suffer in any way. These tears bind me to them, not in hopelessness, but in the universal courage that it takes to live in the face of suffering.

I let the blackness of this night swallow me up, the wonderful, invisible dark that can hold a woman’s heart in its vastness.

Alone is good.

Crying is not giving up.

These things I’ve come to know from pain.

As I read this article I couldn’t help but smile at the similarities between the theoretical models of energy healing that have been passed on to us through the world’s wisdom traditions and the theory behind this new medical treatment. Essentially what doctors are doing with light, great healers have been doing with the mind for millennia. To the healer, the mind is the laser and the light is the image or essence projected into the body before them.

I encourage you to take a few minutes, right now, and use your mind to rest in an image or sense of light. Direct that light to any area in your body that needs healing.

I've found that illness can often be a guide that brings us back to a gift or talent we have suppressed or walked away from. For many of the people I work with as well as myself, I've seen remarkable healing happen when that talent is re-engaged. The act of creativity--any creativity--is an act of Self-Healing. I encourage you to explore your gifts and talents and bring forward something that has heart and meaning to you. Make something. Sing something. Touch someone's life.