Last SOS Push and Going Gluten-Free

I'm working on pairs 17 & 18 for SOS, and hoping to get to 20 by Monday at 10PM, when the Most Socks contest closes. It will be tight. After that, well....hmmm...knitting shawls, reading, watching TV--normal life in other words! Or as normal as my life can be.

I was Plurking this morning about going gluten-free, and got too many questions to answer on Plurk, so here's the quick run-down on that for Plurkbuds and anyone else who might find the info helpful.

First, let me say that I've been feeling bad. And I mean reeeaaaallly baaaaadddd for months. (And not the Isaac Hayes version of badness. I mean bad as in lousy, awful, wretched.) I'm not going for sympathy here, but I'm just saying that I've been pretty much non-functioning for a long time. I drag myself from bed and manage to make it to work and struggle through my three or four hours there, and that's about it. Some days I don't even have the energy to shower (I do spit-baths, as my mother calls them. Don't freak--I'm clean, just not squeaky-clean!) I can't even begin to describe the mind-numbing, bone-breaking fatigue I stagger around in all the time, and I'm fed up with it.

I've been blaming it on the fibromyalgia and lack of exercise, but I've had in the back of my mind that I've not been eating well, so yesterday I got a couple of books on FM and gluten-intolerence, and I am seriously convinced that I must go gluten-free.

Now, I've known for some years that I can't tolerate wheat well. No, let me re-phrase that. When I eat wheat, my abdomen distends until I look five months pregnant, my eyes feel like they sink two inches into my head, and I start feeling too weak to breathe. The natural response to this would be to stop eating wheat, right? Alas, when you have a sensitivity, you tend to crave the very thing you're sensitive to because as soon as you eat it, you feel better briefly--very briefly. It's a vicious cycle. Add to that the fact that wheat and/or gluten is in almost every single processed food we eat, and it's tough. (Last night I discovered that my herb tea contains barley, which contains gluten. Who knew?) Top it off with the problem of not feeling like shopping or cooking, and you end up eating processed junk food all the time, and the cycle continues.

So to answer a couple of questions from this morning: one way to figure out if you're sensitive to a certain food is to think about how your gut feels. If you have any symptoms of irritable bowel, a food sensitivity is a possibility. Here's how I would go about figuring it out (with the caveat that I'm not a medical professional in any way, but I have been through this.) If you find that you crave a certain food--say bread--eliminate it from your diet for a week (some pros say two weeks, but I suspect a week will do it.) That means eliminate completely. No bread, crackers, pasta, croutons, breaded foods, rye, barley, cookies, and so on. Avoid oatmeal as well, as it can be cross-contaminated because of growing or processing conditions. After going the week, fix up a nice dish of couscous or pasta or a couple of pieces of toast and chow down. (Same for any other suspected food; eliminate for a week, then have some and see how you feel.)

Here's what happened the day the light bulb went on for me--I fixed a dish of couscous for lunch and wolfed it. Within twenty minutes I felt like I was dying. I could barely sit up on the sofa for the fatigue, and my heart was thumping--not racing, but thumping harder than usual, if that makes sense. Suddenly it clicked. All those years of bloating, pain, and fatigue could almost certainly be pegged to the fact that I lived on bagels and Raisin Bran. (Seriously, I used to eat Raisin Bran at least twice a day. I thought my body didn't tolerate raisins well. Huh.) I did go to a food allergist and had some other tests to confirm it, but that day, I KNEW.

I've avoided wheat since then. Sort of. But it's really, really hard. Especially when you're a lazy cook, as I am. But I do know that when I buckled down and stocked the pantry with "safe" foods, I felt better. So I have to do that again, only more thoroughly this time, because I discovered from my books that there are more things that contain gluten than I thought. And I'll have to go through a sort of withdrawal from the cravings for bread, and weirdly enough, beer. I don't crave beer for the alcohol, it's the taste, the mouth-feel, the stout yeasty flavor. But it's essentially liquid bread.

According to the specialists, here are the most likely culprits for food sensitivity: dairy, soy, yeast, wheat, corn, and eggs. Most people who are lactose-intolerant know it, but the others are sneaky because they are in so much of our processed food. And, as much as I love my doctor, I have to say that this is one of those subjects that the mainstream medical community doesn't deal with very much. In all the years I've been treated for FM, none of my doctors has suggested dietary changes or nutritional guidance.

I could go on and on about it, but if any of this raises a red flag in your mind for yourself or anyone in your family, there is a lot of information out there. You have to go looking for it, though, because you probably won't hear it from your doctor. I say "probably" but I'm sure there are exceptions. BTW, although my sensitivity causes me to feel fatigued, in children it often comes out as hyperactivity and irritability.

Sensitivity is different from a true allergy. An allergy causes your body to release different hormones, or whatever it is that it releases (told you I'm not a medical expert!) When you're talking about allergies, it's usually stuff like shellfish or peanuts, where people have their tongues swell up and their throats close and can even go into anaphalactic shock. That's one of the reasons food sensitivities are overlooked or underrated, IMO. If you don't swell up and choke, you must not have a problem, right? Tell that to someone who's lactose-intolerant.

I can't be positive how much, or if I will feel better if I go gluten-free, but I strongly suspect that there will be an improvement. I know there was before, so I'm hanging on to that hope, because feeling this way is just impossible. For the record, let me say that I've had tests for everything from lupus to thyroid problems to heart disease. According to the tests, I'm in perfect health. That's why I sit and cry at my desk at work from the effort of holding my head up. (My, wasn't THAT a pathetic picture!)

On a brighter note: I've scored some Wollmeise! Ravelry was all abuzz the past week because of the Wollmeise releases at The Loopy Ewe. Some of the lovely people who managed to get more than one or two skeins generously offered to sell or trade, so I've got at least one coming, thanks to msknitsox. The nice thing about Ravelry is that for the most part, everyone gets along so well. Yes, there are disagreements, but apologies are freely offered and accepted, and the generosity and sharing spirit are wonderful.

I'm going to go have my last piece of Toll House Pie. If anyone knows of a nice gluten-free recipe for that, let me know, will ya?

Hey, It's Only Been A Week...

So I finally got pictures done and posted to Ravelry of my SOS socks. I've finished 15 pairs, and am working on #16. I'm not sure what the stats are, though I do have some inside info that someone (who shall remain nameless) has more socks done that she hasn't posted yet.  So I know I just can't win this thing. Second place would be nice. Yeah, a silver medal works for me.

Not to mention that I love having all those socks!! I had planned to share the wealth and give away most of what I made, but I've only given two pairs to Missy because she happened to see them and yowled for them. I never "got" the whole sock-making thing before, but now it's one of those little weirdo things that make me happy every morning when I open the sock drawer and see the awesome selection waiting for me. The rest of the day may be a total disaster, but at least I'm wearing cool socks!

Here, as promised, is the Clapotis before washing and blocking:


 



Here are the post-blocking pics:

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It really softened up quite a bit after washing, but I think I spread it out too much while it was drying. It seems to have lost some of its "crinkle" so I may dampen it again and let it dry kind of bunched up lengthwise. Or I may just wear it and let gravity and humidity do its thing. The Noro Sock yarn worked out terrifically, and I do love it. I think I want one in every color they make!

Meanwhile, this jumped on my needles and demanded to be started:



This is the Swallowtail Shawl by Evelyn C. Clark. You can download the free pattern here. The yarn is a really gorgeous cashmere/silk blend from Fila de Crostura--I think it's called "Suprima" but I'll have to check the ball band. I can never remember this stuff. So far it's an easy pattern, but I really must put it aside and make one last surge in the sock contest.

So that's the project update for today. I updated my Ravelry notebook with the latest socks (I'm Spingirl1961 there) so if you want to see them in all their gorgeousness, check it out!

I got a kick out of this blog post. I SO feel her pain!! But at least I got my Dream in Color Smooshy the other day (in a gorgeous lavender/blue colorway) so I'll live at least another day without Wollmeise!

Breaking my Silence

For some reason, keeping up with computer stuff was not something I did while on vacation. Maybe it was because I was too busy winding yarn balls (or cakes, as they're called on Ravelry. Too bad I don't have the little icon that pops up for "cake".)  Ennnyway--that was a whooooole bunch of yarn-winding, and I at least can see what I have waiting to be knitted.

That, however, huge pile that it is, did not stop me from just ordering more sock yarn. It was just one skein, I swear! And I haven't ordered anything online for more than two weeks! Well, not counting a couple of things I got on ebay. They don't count, because they weren't knitting related. (I love my rationalizations, don't you?) But I needed  the Wendy Knits "Ribbon Candy" pattern for the pink yarn that came in the "Boobie" sock kit because I don't like the "Boobie" pattern that came with the yarn, and while I was at The Loopy Ewe site, I thought I might as well get some of that great Dream in Color Smooshy yarn everyone else seems to love. I would have ordered some Woolmeise, but it goes out of stock exactly 73.2 seconds after it's listed, apparently. I need to get on the advance notice list or something!

I still haven't taken pictures of the things I've been working on. Not the ball-winding part. That would be just too dull. No, I mean the socks that I've still been half-heartedly knitting for SOS08, and the other project that I mentioned. I might as well admit it here and now. I joined the lemmings and made a Clapotis scarf.

If you haven't heard of that, where the heck have you been? Not on Ravelry, that's for sure! The pattern is from knitty.com, from sometime in 2005, and it's the most downloaded pattern they've ever featured. In fact, the latest Interweave Knits magazine has an article about the designer and the impact the Clapotis had on knitty.com and the knitworld in general.

When I first saw it, I thought, "Meh. What's the big deal?" But the more I looked at it, the more I liked it, and I kept reading that other people felt the same way until they saw a finished scarf, then they fell in love. Well. I had three skeins of Noro Kureyon sock yarn, and the more I petted it, the less I thought I would like it as socks. It is kind of wiry and rough. But three skeins is more than enough to make a cool scarf, so I started looking through my patterns and books for just the right thing, and that turned out to be the Clapotis. (BTW, it's pronounced something like, "Clah-poh-tee" in some Frenchy manner. Accent on the last syllable, I think. That makes it sound a little less like some weird STD.)

So that's what I worked on between socks, while listening to "Persuasion" on the iPod. It's an easy pattern, once you get the rhythm of it, so it didn't take long and was fairly mindless. I haven't washed it yet, so it still feels a bit wiry, but it drapes nicely now and I think it will be even better once it's washed and laid flat to dry. The general consensus seems to be that you don't want to block it hard, like you would a lace shawl. I really will get before-and-after pictures, but the resident expert photographer is mortally ill (i.e. he has a cold) so I won't bother him today.

In other not-so-exciting news...well...that's about it. Except that I did finally get to my violin lesson, and I've been practicing a lot. I've loved all my teachers, but this one and I communicate so well, and she spots immediately what I need to work on and explains it perfectly. It's encouraging, because we agree that I am making progress, yay!! Violin is tough at any age, and when you start at the age of 46, you've really got your work cut out for you. Part of it is the simple fact that holding and bowing the instrument are new motions, and if you haven't been doing it since you were four or five years old, your body rebels a little. I got a new shoulder rest, after test-driving about nine of them, and that's made a tremendous difference.

So I'm loving my music more and more. One of my favorite pieces is "The Lark Ascending" as played by Hilary Hahn. (Go buy the CD. Even if you don't like classical music, you'll LOVE this. I promise.) I bought the sheet music, even though it's way beyond my skills, and can actually play snippets. That makes me so happy and keeps my enthusiasm up for continuing to slog through the Suzuki books. I have my own pet names for the pieces in Book One: "The Not-So-Happy Farmer" and "The Stinkin' Gavotte" are a couple of them. And, yes Virginia, playing your scales does improve your overall playing.

I've been trying to resist starting a shawl, but my Plurkbuds tell me resistance is futile. So, if I can find that cashmere-blend lace yarn somewhere around here...

Vacation!

My stay-at-home vacation started today, though I've been considering myself on vacation since I got home from work on Friday. No, I haven't tackled the basement yet, but I intend to work on that later this week. In the meantime, I have a tiny problem.

I can't lift my arms.

One of the plans for the week was to start doing regular exercise, whether by going to ballet class, joining a club, or working out at home. I've gone too long without any exercise at all to jump back in to ballet class, so I thought I'd better get a few workouts in first. I checked in at Curves, and they're having a special this month, and the lady said I could come and try it this week. So I thought I would do that tomorrow. Today, however, I finally grabbed my exercise ball, stuck the DVD in the player, and did my own at-home workout.

That was two hours ago, and I can hardly raise my arms above my waist. The exercises didn't feel that hard while I was doing them (though I did feel hideously clumsy--trying to drape myself over the ball without falling off was a hoot. Probably I really hurt my arms from flailing them in vain attempts to keep from sprawling on the floor. The cats were clearly baffled by the whole ugly scene.) Anyway, the pain didn't set in until about  half an hour ago. Which is a more holistic treatment--a pain pill or a shot of Old Crow? Pain pills have fewer calories, which is a consideration.

The really bad part of this is that I had a violin lesson scheduled for this afternoon. I was so embarrassed to call and cancel only an hour beforehand, but I have a wonderful teacher. She started laughing and said, "Oh, I did that once. I had to call in to the XXX Symphony (a fairly large orchestra) and tell them I couldn't play because I'd done a workout and couldn't move my arms. I was tempted to lie and tell them I had the measles or something--anything but the truth." So we had a good laugh, and she was totally cool with it. THEN she told me she'll be in China next week, playing with the orchestra for the Olympics! How cool is that? Bet she doesn't do any workouts between now and then...

So I obviously can't clean the basement today, which leaves me doing more of what I've been doing since Friday afternoon: cleaning the sewing/weaving/stash room, knitting, loading my iPod, knitting, adding to my Ravelry queue, knitting, winding yarn balls, and knitting. Obviously, I have a short attention span.

Since I have to set up the swift and ball winder on the dining room table, I'm trying to get all my skeins wound and stored neatly. I pulled out the bags and boxes of random yarn items--leftover bits, odd skeins, acrylic, novelty yarn from the scarf craze a few years back--and have decided what to keep, what to give to the Knitting Guild for community projects, and what to throw away. I've kept some yarns for small projects, but a lot of it is going to the guild. They do hats and mittens and lap ropes and such, so they'll make good use of it, I'm sure. And I didn't give them crap yarn, so I feel virtuous.

I didn't realize how much laceweight yarn I have, and that's what remains to be wound. I'm not looking forward to it, especially after the 2500-yard skein I wound the other day. I thought it would NEVER end. (But now I'm looking for the perfect shawl pattern for it. That's where Ravelry comes in. I've seen pictures of some breathtaking shawls, so I'll have to go through all my "favorited" items and see what calls to me.) And once I get all this yarn wound, I'm going to "repurpose" the clear storage bins hubby bought for the basement last week. Heck, we can use cardboard boxes down there. I need to see my yarn! I just need to get them up here before he comes home and sees me doing it. I hope I can carry them. Heck--I hope I can walk down the stairs and back up again!

I'm still plugging along (sort of ) with SOS. After I started digging through all the yarn, and figuring out how many projects I have planned, I decided that the priority list needed revamped. It's not an official List yet, because I'm still sorting, but by the end of my vacation week, I hope to have a better idea of what I really want to do.

Moving my arms will be high on the list, I'm sure.