After years of stomach issues, an endoscopy, gastrointestinal doctors, and more recent ER hospitalizations I've found out at least 1 part of my internal problems. I am living with a garlic allergy. This came out part through self-diagnosis and partially a great allergist's office who thought something was wrong. I had the blood testing for garlic -- it came back negative. Then came patch testing for common allergens -- all negative. Then we decided to run a patch testing for garlic -- I physically brought some fresh garlic into my allergists office -- and soon I knew what it was like to have a positive reaction. It was to to fresh garlic.
I'm currently doing my best to avoid all garlic (powdered, fresh, minced in a jar) and it is a truly life changing and not an easy transition.
So far I'm realizing: Italian will never been the same to eat.
Salad dressings and sauces are hard to come by.
I tried eating at Subway this week and ended up with two sauces that include garlic, none there are currently garlic-free (although you may assume that some do not contain garlic -- red wine vinaigrette anyone??? ). Its been a difficult transition, but its happening for the better. So I'm going to start documenting the process of living garlic-free in an overly processed and flavored society.
