When The Invisible Becomes Visible

I have no doubt you have an example of this of your own, so I’m going to share with full disclosure a moment of clarified stupidity, assuming I’m speaking to a compassionate audience here.

When we drove to Uluru in August, there was a lot of road time. A lot of space to see the exquisite subtle beauty of the desert. A lot of life-reflection, formulation of new ideas and introspection. We were also traveling with a whole bunch of other families, which meant thought-provoking conversations and opportunities to see the world differently.

One of those families was two kids, Mum, Dad, Grandma and Grandad. Three of them celiacs, three of them that carried the celiac gene - the latter of whom were all gluten intolerant.

Now - as you may have seen from my very public, brain-broken breakdown, I have been afflicted with migraines for 40 years. The last decade or so, certainly the last 5, they have been escalating again with the onset of perimenopause making it more challenging to know what are the best choices for each day in relation to my cycle -because my cycle now has as much pattern as a Jackson Pollock! With this escalation has come an elevation of looking, refining, shifting, adjusting! The inflammation in my body - constant, chronic pain, particularly in my neck and shoulders for decades, getting worse and worse. The small nausea I’d lived with for most of my life, hidden beneath hangovers and migraines, was a revolting constant.

So there we were, sitting around a campfire in Coober Pedy, when this family shared their celiac-ness, just offhanded commentary to dismiss some cake on offer. But those comments landed between my eyes like an arrow.

  • ‘Holy shit,’ I thought, as these thick clouds started to give way to a shining truth.

    ’I am gluten intolerant.’

    You see, my sister is a celiac and I carry the celiac gene. And I had always been a bit of a dick about how I could eat all the gluten in the world (but did wonder why I never really liked pizza or much bread but give it to me round, deep-fried, covered in sugar with a hole in the middle, and suddenly I could push through, then puzzle at the pain and nausea!!) but still I kept eating it. Not once thinking that I was one of those people that had to say, ‘sorry, I can’t eat gluten.’

    I came home and I gave it a test run - plan was do two months with no gluten and see what happens. It’s been three months now and the past two months, I have:

  • Been completely without chronic pain!!

  • completely without nausea!!

  • And in 8 weeks, this little wombat who thought she just had high metabolism but was actually malabsorbing - has stacked on a whopping 8kgs!! The food I’m eating, actually being processed! I have tried to put on weight my whole life, I wanted to be strong and robust, not scrawny with corners where curves could be!

The point of this tale has got nothing to do with gluten and everything to do with the blindness that comes from our own stories, IN SPITE OF ALL EVIDENCE. And the incredulous shock of how obvious something is once we see it.

Stay open, stay malleable, do things differently, explore those old stories and challenge them with a smile on your face. You never know what you might see when your eyes are open.

A reminder down the bottom of this email is a couple of gifts from us to you and some info about some really important things we’ve got going on that you will love.

Sending all the love from this little gluten-free dumpling to you

Lissie x

Lissie Turner