Recovering From Cheating

I promised I would share how I was feeling after having consumed a substantial amount of gluten yesterday. So here it is.

About 30 minutes after having consumed two hot dogs including their buns, and a helping of nachos with ultra-processed cheese, I started to feel what I believe are effects of having eaten what I did.

Despite that I didn’t have any beer, I felt like I was hung over. Food coma hit hard—and it hasn’t reared its ugly head in my life for weeks. My body wanted to lay down but I forced it to sit upright. I kept stretching my legs out in front of me at the game and kicking them around to be sure that I kept myself in the game, but I kept getting distracted; losing concentration.

And although I knew I was full, I still wanted more. I could have eaten two more hot dogs but I wouldn’t allow myself to be that vile. That, for me, would have been just too much excess.

Interestingly, according to an article on LiveStrong.com, Tommy Jönsson, researcher at Lund University in Sweden and author of a paper published in the December 2005 issue of "Nutrition and Metabolism," proposes that gluten could contribute to the development of a resistance to leptin, which is a hormone involved in sending satiety signals to your brain to tell you that you’re full. The article states that if you have become resistant to lectin, you would be hungrier, eat more between meals, and could gain weight.

After returning home and blogging, I headed straight to bed, and just like someone drunk or hung over, fell asleep as soon as my head hit the pillow.

This morning was…different.

BEWARE! BODILY FUNCTION ALERT!

I don’t recall ever having had so much flatulence in my life. I presently share a room with someone and although the gas that I was passing had no odor, my toots were not kind enough to be the discreet sort. They sang. I felt bad when I woke up ripping one as my roommate was looking in her closet for something to wear. Must have been doing that all night in my sleep.

Other than that, I am bloated. From the bottom of my sternum to my hip bones, I am the softest I have been in the past 18 days. Last night, about an hour and a half after eating my hot dogs and nachos, my fingers started showing signs of what was to come. They started puffing up into what I call my “sausage fingers”. This phenomenon happens when I’m hiking and retain fluid. Apparently it happens when I eat hot dogs, too. And I really hate sausage fingers!

Hinging fingers to hands and arms and so on, my joints are more achy than they have been in over a month, which is irritating—especially when I decided to run today. It felt like a bit more of a struggle.  

And presently I’m experiencing a little bit of reflux.

I look at last night; it wasn’t even the bread I had wanted, but the savory taste of the hot dog combined with the sweetness of pickle relish, the tang of ketchup and the zing of mustard. I don’t even really like nachos, but they were free…and I was deliberately cheating.

In the end, it wasn’t worth it.

Lucky for me, I am not my best friend who is allergic to gluten. It takes her a week to start to feel better after consuming a product containing it. The experience has been eye-opening and has inspired a longer-term avoidance of products which contain this interesting little protein.