Since January I have experienced tummy upsets, gastrointestinal issues. The cause has been a mystery. A partial explanation has been surmised.
I may be lactose intolerant.
In January I began to eat ricotta cheese with some regularity, because it was a low sodium choice. My issues began in mid-January. Experiments have ensued. The problem was relieved when the ricotta cheese was removed from the diet. Next, bocconcini was purchased, another soft, low sodium cheese. Bingo, within twenty four hours all of the symptoms returned. The next experiment is under way, removing all dairy from the diet. Removing milk from my already highly restricted diet is a hardship. To that end I purchased some plain almond beverage to use as a dairy substitute, which seems to agree with me, at least for now.
We are in the grips of another cold snap. The temperature should begin to rise by the end of next week, but most of March Break will be cold for the kids who are off school this coming week in Ontario. It is very windy as well, so the wind chill is significant. Attila and I are cozy here in our little house, with our magnificent thermostat!
On Tuesday, when I took the car in for servicing, I ran a few errands in town while the car was in the shop. One of the things I purchased was garbage tags. On Friday morning Attila asked me where I had put them. I though they were still in my bag, but when I checked I couldn’t see them there. Then I thought I must have put them away somewhere and forgotten about it. We looked everywhere, which does not take long in our small house. Then I though I might have dropped them when I purchased them, or at the garage when I was paying the bill. Not wanting to call the town office or the garage to ask if they had seen them, I continued to search. A few hours later, after I had removed every last item from my bag, I found them tucked between some papers. What a relief.
I was thinking about this little escapade this morning. I was upset at the time, while looking for the tags. It wasn’t the loss of the money, and the additional money that would have to be spent on new tags, that I found upsetting. It was that I might have come home and put the tags away somewhere, and had not been able to remember a thing about it. The degree of memory loss that would represent really threw me into a tizzy! Luckily, there was no memory loss involved, I didn’t remember where I put them because I didn’t put them anywhere and there was nothing to remember. There was just careless placement of the tags at time of purchase, and a search for them that was less than thorough. I made sure I showed Attila where I decided to store the tags!
The work on the book continues. The book includes the families of twelve brothers and sisters, and at last I am working on the images for the youngest child. Much more to do, adding the images to page layout of the book, captioning the images, including references for each image.
I continue to practice my crochet skills every day. The yarn and hook sit by my chair, ready for me to pick them up whenever the whim strikes. I tried my first single crochet stitch yesterday, it did not go well, but I am undeterred. Today I tried again, it was a little easier, a little bit better, and tomorrow I will try again, and the day after that. It will come. I don’t know what inspires me to spend time with my greatest physical weakness, but inspired I am. I guess I want to push my boundaries a little bit, I have time now, to be patient with myself.
Genealogy and crochet, two projects focused on lines that are woven together to make something beautiful.
Worldly Distractions
Weather
-13°C
Date: 11:00 AM EST Saturday 11 March 2017
Condition: Mostly Cloudy
Pressure: 102.4 kPa
Tendency: Rising
Temperature: -12.6°C
Dew point: -22.8°C
Humidity: 43%
Wind: WNW 25 gust 39 km/h
Wind Chill: -22
Visibility: 24 km
Quote
“Remember that there is nothing stable in human affairs; therefore avoid undue elation in prosperity, or undue depression in adversity.”
Socrates
469 BC – 399 BC
“Marilyn: My uncle once told me about a warrior who had a fine stallion. Everybody said how lucky he was to have such a horse. “Maybe,” he said. One day the stallion ran off. The people said the warrior was unlucky. “Maybe,” he said. Next day, the stallion returned, leading a string of fine ponies. The people said it was very lucky. “Maybe,” the warrior said. Later, the warrior’s son was thrown from one of the ponies and broke his leg. The people said it was unlucky. “Maybe,” the warrior said. The next week, the chief led a war party against another tribe. Many young men were killed. But, because of his broken leg, the warrior’s son was left behind, and so was spared.”
A parable told my the character Marilyn Whirlwind on Northern Exposure.
Memory loss… we have that here. One of us has it much more than the other does. The one who has it really loses memories at a staggering rate lately. Things we watched last night are gone today from the brain. It’s scary.
I’ve finished the “bottom” round of my new crochet bag and am on the first row up the sides. The yarn is some I got from England and it’s so lovely to use…thick and soft as can be. The feel of the yarn on the hands makes all the difference. xox
Bex, memory loss is scary. I had come to accept a bit of memory loss, nothing significant, as I’ve always been rather focused and absent minded simultaneously, I have developed pretty good coping skills. It shook me to the core though, to think I had taken something out of my bag, put it away, and had abosolutely no recollection of any part of the process, not a clue. That is more extreme than my usual, which is not age or health related.
I feel for both of you, the one with more significant memory loss, and the one with every day its-good-to-be-gettin’ old memory loss. Sending you both kind thoughts, knowing that your house is full of love, the best thing in the world.
I am still practising with my $! dollar store yarn, which isn’t the softest, but it will do until I get the hang of things. Today the vacuum cleaner jiggled the table with yarn on it, the ball fell to the floor, the end of the yarn got caught in the beater bar and the winding began! I managed to get the machine turned off after only a few yards had been wound round, but I had to take the beater bar apart to get the yarn out. Now I am using those few yards to practice with. 🙂
I thought I had a memory loss issue yesterday. I was carrying a bottle of pills from the bathroom to the living room. Later that evening couldn’t find them. Checked my table, checked the mantle, checked the bathroom and bedroom. Nothing. Told DH about the vanished pills. Within a minute he’d found them, they’d somehow fallen between my chair and my table.
Had to giggle at the yarn around the beater bar. Even with the hassle, that yarn disappearing under the vacuum would still be funny. 😀
I loved the parable—just shows you can’t control everything (or anything, for that matter!) I think many of us have lactose intolerance to some degree as we age, and the stomach acids diminish. I gave dairy up two years ago, due to excessive gas whenever I ate it. I’m on almond milk now, and enjoy it. Thanks goodness there are tasty substitutes!
The memory loss issue is worrisome. Attila points out that I have always been rather absent minded when it comes to interacting with the physical world, and that I am not any worse than I was when he met me 25 years ago. I decided that if I can remember complex passwords, then my memory must be in fairly good shape. The garbage tag thing was a total blank though, couldn’t remember a thing, that had me worried.
Thinking about the pill bottle falling unnotived, I once dropped my cell phone in the parking lot at the Canadian Tire store without realizing it. Some kind soul found it and turned it into a store clerk, who returned it to me, just lucky!
The yarn winding was funny! I am glad I caught it when I did, as it took me quite a while to unravel the length that had already been swallowed. I will be moving the yarn to the dining table, it is stable, the next time I vacuum!
I loved the parable too Diane! We are watching the Northern Exposure series again right now, and thorougly enjoying it. There are many such gems in the program. The character who tells the parable in the episode is really interesting, her efficient mode of communication is direct, to the point, and seldom off the mark. Only once did she behave in a way that I would not admire, when she checked the private medical records of the men she was dating, and rejecting them due to their private health information. She eventually thought better of this. The characters in the program are multidimensional and masterfully written and acted.
That is interesting, I hadn’t thought that age would have anything to do with lactose intolerance, but I have not really looked into it. I have used almond milk since Friday, and the symptoms are beginning to ease. But I am going to have cheese on my pizza this week, “damn the torpedoes” as they say! 🙂
With lactose intolerance, I find that I have no problem with cheese but some types/brands of ice cream can cause me problems. I put that down to ingredients and/or processing differences.
Now, what I do find changing as I get older is my tolerance of raw garlic. It’s causing me more and more problems, but then intolerance of garlic is something that’s known to happen as people age.
Hope you’re able to find some milk products you can tolerate. I hope that at the very least you won’t have to remove it completely from your cooking.
Interesting about the garlic Teri, we don’t eat it raw as a rule, but my Brother-The-Middle-Boy had a real showdown with raw garlic, he was eating quite a bit of it.
It would be nice if I can tolerate some kinds of hard cheeses, and the occasioanl glass fo milk! I am finding the almond beverage quite pleasant, for my oatmeal breakfast, and in my morning coffee, breakfast is the meal where I consume most of my daily dairy products. The positive thing is that when I react to lactose, I get an upset system, but it isn’t fatal, just uncomfortable and somewhat socially unacceptable. A little bit of pain and isolation might be worth it from time to time, in order to eat a pizza, or drink a glass of milk with a cookie. Time will tell of course.
DH likes green olives that are stuffed with a raw garlic clove. I tried them a few times and liked them but the reactions were not pleasant.
The biggest problem was some garlic sausage from our local butcher. They weren’t pre-cooking the garlic at all and it didn’t cook enough when the sausage was cooked, so I had problems. So far, no problems with cooked garlic, however.