Canker
sores have never been a problem for me.
Until 2020. Doctor Google informs
me that canker sores are usually caused by stress or a food trigger. While stress may have been a factor; there
was some stress involved in surviving 2020; I don’t think that has been the
sole cause for all of 2020 and 2021.
I’ve spent the last almost two years trying to figure out the food
trigger; not an easy task when it may take several days between exposure and an
outbreak, and several weeks to get through the cycle and back to a new starting
point. That’s a lot of suspect foods to
eliminate, and keep eliminating, searching for that elusive trigger.
I
thought I had a solution last summer with, not a food to eliminate, but with
Lysine, an amino acid supplement. That
worked like a charm. Until it didn’t. Last November though, it finally occurred to
me that since there is a fair amount of gluten sensitivity in our family, maybe
that could have a bearing on my dilemma.
Maybe the source of my issue has been so hard to figure out because my
problem is not caused by a single food, or just a few foods, I have issue with
a whole group of foods.
It’s
not that hard to go gluten free. Meat,
potatoes, rice, fruit, vegetables. They
don’t have any gluten in them. Dairy. Ice cream for dessert. No problem.
For foods that do have gluten in them, like bread and pasta, there are
gluten free substitutes that promise to be “almost as good” as the real thing,
but the simplest approach is to just skip any baked or boxed goods altogether
for a while. Every night for dinner,
cook enough for leftovers, and eat them the next day at lunch, instead of the
usual sandwich. Eggs, potatoes, and
coffee for breakfast are naturally gluten free.
If I want something to hold a blop of jelly, or dip in coffee, toast a
slice of gluten free English muffin, don’t expect it to taste like bread, and
call it good. Apples make good afternoon
snacks to get me through to dinner. It
only took a few days gluten free to realize that I was on to something; some
late blooming reaction to gluten had finally caught up to me and I can be
canker-sore-free if I avoid gluten. In
fact, I don’t seem to be super-sensitive to gluten so if I eat mostly gluten
free, that seems to do the trick just as well.
That was November. Still
canker-sore free in January. Problem
solved.
Life
is a learning experience, isn’t it.
