Carey Jane Clark

Why Gluten Free? Part II

April 13, 2012 by Carey Jane Clark

{Note: This week’s episode of Hold the MSG, Mandarin Lessons 4 Kids, is now live.}

In yesterday’s post, I began to explain why our family chose to eat gluten-free.

As I spoke with this woman about her family and her son’s autism, she mentioned that I might consider therapies she used for her son to help with what she thought might be ADHD in Sweetpea.

This was something I had never heard, although I confess I had wondered about ADHD. As it happened, we were about to head back to Canada for a visit. While there, I had Sweetpea diagnosed by our family doctor as ADHD, but the diagnosis process was troubling. There was a checklist, and much of it was done by observation.

At any rate, I thought I’d give the therapies a try. They were simple enough, although somewhat expensive. To learn about them, there was a book and a website, although everything I learned, I later discovered, was available through the website.

We had already started Sweetpea on the foundational nutritional elements for good brain function: a comprehensive multivitamin, probiotics and essential fatty acids.

Now, we started her on enzyme therapy. This launched the first radical change in our daughter. The first change we noticed was that she was no longer getting sick all the time. Since three weeks of age, she had seemed susceptible to every illness going around. They hit her harder and hung on longer than with our other children. Now, she hardly ever gets sick (if she remembers to wear her coat when it’s cool)!

The next change we noticed was observable. Remember those reports on Explode the Code I mentioned yesterday? The erratic pattern stopped, and her scores began to rise steadily, just like her brother’s!

Explode the Code

And Math was suddenly more memorable. In fact, she began to excel, doing two-digit addition in her head.

At approximately the same time, we switched Math curriculum to Math-U-See after reading about it on a forum for homeschool parents discussing ADHD in children and how to best help with their learning. We have since added complementary approaches from Right Start Math and Dreambox Learning, but Math-U-See is our core. Our kids love math and they “get” it. Math-U-See works because it’s visual, it’s explained very well, and it uses manipulatives–engaging the kinesthetic learner.

But as I talked to different people about the issues I had experienced with Sweetpea, over and over again, people suggested a gluten-free (GF) diet. I kept dismissing the idea, since we already ate very well–organic wherever we could, no dairy, and whole grains like spelt and kamut for breads and pasta, brown rice if we ate rice. Did I really need to make another change?

Then, last April, when we were back in Canada, I had the opportunity to attend a homeschool convention. At the convention, there was a seminar entitled, “Homeschooling Is so Hard, and I’ve Tried Everything.” I almost didn’t go. The seminar title frankly sounded whiny to me, and really, homeschool USED TO be hard. It wasn’t any more. Things had improved radically.

Sweetpea’s focus was better–where she couldn’t seem to hold extended eye contact before, she had improved. Her retention and memory seemed better. I wasn’t giving nine instructions out of 10 during math time just to keep her on task. Things were better, really.

But attending that seminar unlocked some things for me. I began to understand what some of the roots of the issues we’d dealt with could have been. The speaker, Sylvia Funk, talked about essential foundations for proper neurological development. Things I might have dismissed if they didn’t ring certain bells.

Like if your child has difficulty visually tracking while reading (losing his or her place at the beginning of a line of text), it could be they didn’t spend enough time crawling. Hmmmm….Sweetpea started walking at nine months!

And the solutions were relatively simple. For example, for tracking, take the child back through some crawling exercises twice a day to help their visual tracking improve, because the brain can pick up where it left off.

Ms. Funk doesn’t believe in ADHD either. She believes a myriad of these labels stem from missteps in neurological development.

And Ms. Funk had another suggestion: go gluten-free. I gave her the standard excuses about it being difficult for us in China, but she made a reasonable suggestion: try it for six months and see if it makes a difference.

Believe it or not, I still didn’t listen. It took a chance encounter with some new friends and some old friends to bring me around. We were with some friends at their home, and other friends of ours were visiting, one of whom was gluten intolerant. As we began to talk about her challenges, the other mother spoke up. “It’s okay, we understand,” she said. “We ate gluten-free for two years to help my daughter with her behavior.”

She began to relate how her daughter, now a lovely teenager, with no evident issues, would defy them and how they were at a loss with what consequences to give her for misbehavior. JavaMan and I looked at each other. This rang a huge bell. Although things weren’t as bad as they had been, we wondered if they could be better.

And so we began to eat gluten-free. The very next day.

And a miraculous thing happened. The little girl who since infancy would ball up her fists and shake when she was upset–or even sometimes when she wasn’t–who would seemingly rather disobey and put up a fight than cooperate, suddenly became the sweetest, most obedient girl you’ve ever seen. Instead of an argument or refusal when asked to clean her room, or called to come, she responded immediately with “Yes, sir,” or “Yes, ma’am.”

I still believe in healing. I still believe that we were designed to live whole and healthy in every respect, but I also have learned that the reason so many are struggling with issues with gluten is because the wheat supply in North America in particular was genetically modified in a misguided attempt to provide more protein to the diet. This resulted in more gluten in our food–more gluten than our bodies were designed to cope with. There are a myriad of side-effects that have been connected to gluten consumption beyond the ones you hear about with Celiac disease. Did you know that gluten can cause infertility? Hmmm…

I’ve realized that eating gluten-free isn’t all that difficult, or even all that expensive. It gives me a challenge in the kitchen, and it can be very tasty. (The best brownies ever are gluten-free. Seriously, you’ll thank me.) The rewards are amazing.

Sweetpea Today

How is my daughter doing today? Check it out for yourself. She took the lead in this week’s episode of Hold the MSG.

For more resources on gluten-free living, including a checklist to see if a gluten-free diet may help you, check out this helpful eBook.

Why Gluten-Free?

April 12, 2012 by Carey Jane Clark

A reader wrote to ask more details about our family’s choice to go gluten-free, and I realized it was something I hadn’t given a lot of time to explain, and perhaps the explanation might help someone else.

So I’m going to do my best to share the reasons behind our choice to go gluten-free, and what brought us to this point.

First of all, no one in the family that we know of has Celiac disease, nor does anyone have a known digestive issue with gluten, although my nutritionist would tell you that everyone would benefit from a gluten-free diet. And it’s true, as we have all gradually switched to make life easier for the one in our family who benefits most, it has helped all of us.

Part of the reason I haven’t shared some of this here before is that Sweetpea, who is the child who benefits from a GF diet, doesn’t like to feel different or centred out, and I haven’t wanted to talk about her situation on this kind of public forum. But as I’ve shared with other parents, I’ve realized that this kind of issue is not uncommon, and other parents might benefit from the path we’ve taken.

When we first moved to China, we had already been homeschooling for a couple of years. We started when Sweetpea reached preschool age because it was very apparent that more than Pumpkin, she needed routine and structure and something to keep her busy during the day. Seeing the way Sweetpea engaged with the world made me wonder if I was up to the task of homeschooling–something I’d decided even before my children were born was what I wanted to do for them.

At that point, I did the right thing. I called Sonlight Curriculum and spoke to one of their curriculum advisors. The lovely person on the other end of the line–to whom I am forever grateful–suggested that maybe what my very active daughter needed was more time with mommy, more attention, and some structured time sitting on the sofa reading together. She encouraged me to take advantage of their money-back guarantee and give it a try, starting with their Preschool curriculum.

I’m so glad I did.

The Preschool curriculum, which we took two years to work our way through, was just what the doctor ordered.

But that did not mean that my challenges were over. During the kindergarten year, we moved to China for the first time.

And we began math. I do believe part of the problem was the particular curriculum we chose–full of little pictures, and not strong on building understanding of patterns. Sweetpea spent most of her time looking at the little pictures and coloring them in, and very little time learning math.

old math curriculum

And I was frustrated. About this time, we also had some huge behavioral challenges on our hands with her. It seemed that no strategy for correction worked. Instead, she seemed to feed on any negativity–any form of correction–and come back for more.

And the next year, math continued to be more and more frustrating. One day, she’d whiz through her math problems. The next day, it would be as though she had no idea what 1 + 1 meant or that we’d ever discussed it before.

Because we were in China, we had abandoned the book-based Explode the Code for phonics that was part of the Sonlight program, and moved to the online version. The program contains tracking information to show the student’s progress. A similar phenomenon to her math “progress” seemed to be showing in her scores in ETC. While Pumpkin’s scores rose on a steady incline, Sweetpea’s were erratic, with no discernible pattern.

I knew something wasn’t right, but what?

About this time, I had a discussion about adoption with a fellow expat here in China. She and her husband had adopted special needs children. Since they already had children of their own, I asked her how an adoption agency had approved them (since in exploring the idea of adoption previously, I’d learned that it was difficult to be approved for adoption if you already had three children). Her statement was, “If you want special needs children, the requirements aren’t as stringent.”

Now I wanted to know, “How do you know you’re ready to take on that kind of challenge?”

She shared with me that her firstborn–a son–was high-functioning autistic. This is something I never would have guessed.

I don’t remember how the subject changed to Sweetpea, but at some point, she said, “You know, ADHD is on the autism spectrum. Your daughter might benefit from some of the therapies we’ve used with our son.”

ADHD? My Sweetpea? ADHD was one of those conditions I’d always figured was a figment of parents’ imaginations–an excuse for bad parenting.

And what were these therapies?

More tomorrow.

My Chinese Kitchen: Gluten-Free Victory

April 10, 2012 by Carey Jane Clark

With all the benefits we’ve seen to going gluten-free since it started as a begrudging experiment back in October, I was determined to make GF work in our new environment.

But I wasn’t sure how.

I knew that restaurant food and dinners at others’ homes wouldn’t accommodate our choices, and no one seems to have ever heard of people choosing not to eat flour, but I was willing to try and make it work, at least at home.

Quick breads, muffins and cookies aren’t a problem. When we lived here before, we were already eating a gluten-reduced diet, and I’d discovered buckwheat flour, which is very accessible and easy to use, and if you don’t mind the slightly drier texture and earthy flavour, it’s a wonderful substitute for anything baked without yeast.

Bread was my big challenge. But in eating gluten-free over the last number of months, I’d had some experience with what a gluten-free bread dough was supposed to look like and how it was supposed to perform. I’d even figured out the culprit in my previous failures: too much moisture, which may have had more to do with climate than the recipes I tried, since we lived in the south of the country at the time, in a sub-tropical climate.

But i hadn’t officially figured things out. And I was still in search of a simple recipe–one that didn’t involve a lot of fancy ingredients I was unable to get my hands on, like flax seed, applesauce, amaranth. I didn’t want to have to use a whole lot of different flours.

This thing can’t be time-consuming if I’m going to do it every week without a bread machine!

I finally found THE recipe. Of course I tweaked it so it’s barely recognizable as the original, because it was intended for bread-machine use and I don’t have one. Also I wanted to use my kefir (a yogurt-like lactose-free dairy product we make ourselves) instead of skim milk powder.

Finally, I typically substitute honey for refined sugars in recipes, so I wanted to accommodate that change as well.

Here is the final product. It’s super-yummy. Everyone has declared it so (with the exception of JavaMan because he hasn’t been around. We can’t wait to see him tomorrow).

Finally, we have a winner!

Note: neither xanthan nor guar gum are available in China. I brought my own. Both gums replace the role of gluten in helping the loaf “stick” together. Xanthan gum is preferred for baking bread, but is to be avoided by anyone with severe allergies to corn and corn products.

The ingredients for this recipe are simple and relatively easy for me to get my hands on. I can buy brown rice at our local market, and I bring it home and grind it with my hand grinder. I can buy little packages of potato starch at the market as well. Tapioca flour was a little harder to locate, but I managed to find it at Walmart.

GFbread

Ingredients:

2 cups brown rice flour
½ cup potato starch
½ cup tapioca flour
2 ½ teaspoons xanthan gum (or guar gum)
1 ½ teaspoons salt
1 ½ tablespoons honey
⅔ cups warm water
⅔ cup buttermilk, plain yoghurt or kefir
1 ½ tablespoons dry yeast, granules
¼ cups butter, melted
1 teaspoon apple cider vinegar
3 eggs, room temperature
1-2 tablespoons cut up sunflower seed (optional)

Directions:

1. Combine 1 1/2 tablespoons yeast with the water and allow to proof.

2. Mix together all the flours, xanthan/guar gum, salt and sunflower seeds (if using).

3. Beat the eggs.

4. Combine water, butter, vinegar, eggs and buttermilk/yoghurt/kefir.

5. Mix wet and dry ingredients together and beat with a stand mixer or a hand mixer with bread hooks for three to five minutes. Texture should be like stiff cake batter. (I use a hand mixer with bread hooks and the mixture often “crawls” up the hooks.)

6. Pour into greased loaf pan and smooth top. Cover with saran and a towel and set in a warm place to rise approximately 30 minutes, or until dough rises to the top of the loaf pan (mine rose a little more).

7. Bake in 350 degree (F) oven for 50 minutes. Top should be nicely brown. Cool on cooling rack.

Note: This bread freezes well. For convenience, slice before freezing.

- Carey Clark

April 3 in 30: Simplicity

April 8, 2012 by Carey Jane Clark

I’d like to be able to declare that all the bins are unpacked, my house is completely organized, and I am on top of it all.

In reality, it’s been a whirlwind since we arrived, with jet lag and the cold. We are furnitureless. We had houseguests approximately two weeks after our arrival and since they left, JavaMan has been in Korea addressing a visa issue. He returns on Wednesday. I’ll be so glad to see him.

I was so tired tonight, I sat down to watch the end of a movie with my kids and fell asleep on my bed fully clothed, with a sweater and an apron! THEY kissed ME goodnight, and I woke around 2:30 a.m. bewildered at what had transpired!

However, the homeschool room is looking like and functioning as a homeschool room, we’ve been posting weekly at Hold the MSG (Mandarin lessons for kids), and the kitchen is up and running. In fact, I’ve been downright experimental there. I’m determined to make gluten-free work here, since we’ve seen such benefits for Sweetpea. So far, I’ve located recipes for and/or experimented with:

pizza dough – nailed this one. It’s so good, and yes, I will share very soon
bread – found a simple recipe with easily accessible ingredients and tweaked it–the mix was slightly wet the last time, which with gluten-free results in a fallen loaf (although it wasn’t too bad). But going to take another run at it tomorrow and see what we can do to perfect things
dumplings! This is a huge coup! We’ll still end up in situations where we’re at someone else’s house or at a restaurant and can’t avoid it, but if we can make our own dumplings at home, gluten-free, it will go a long way.
crackers – yes indeed, homemade gluten-free crackers
matzah – this won’t be something we’ll eat every day, but it came in handy over the weekend for our traditional Seder dinner

I’ve continued to work on freezing strawberries and mulberries so we’ll have berries to eat for the rest of the year, and I even located a simple pectin-free strawberry jam recipe so I can deal with some of the strawberries I’d rather not throw away, but aren’t good enough to keep for eating. Today I figured out how to get my hands on jars for the jam.

But as more and more time gets consumed by living–not to mention that this week we slipped back into the homeschool routine–I’m feeling the need to simplify my online activities. So this month, I’ve joined the 3 in 30 featured challenge: Simple Blogging.

Here are my goals for April:

Work through Simple Blogging – This involves reading a set number of chapters per week of the eBook and incorporating changes into my blogging life. For the most part this week, I felt pretty good about what I read, although I confess to allowing myself to succumb to online distractions when I’ve sat down with the intention of blogging–what the author, Rachel Meeks, calls “productive procrastination.” At some points, I was able to pat myself on the back–for having a clear purpose for my blog, for example, or for using Evernote for organization–and at other points, I felt a gentle wrap on my knuckles for things I know to be doing and don’t do enough–like planning posts in advance. I tend to keep mental notes, which clutter up brain space and can be easily lost! I have begun to implement some of these suggestions, but still have work to do.
Get into a proper routine – Because our days are exactly the opposite to North America (12 hours ahead means I’m sleeping when most everyone I know is active), it’s very tempting to check email and Facebook first thing in the morning. Did so-and-so get back to me? Are there blog comments? What are my friends and family up to? However, this doesn’t work well with our family, and means my kids greet me in the morning with a computer on my lap. Not okay. It can also delay getting breakfast and homeschool started. I am determined to get back to a proper morning routine. We live here now, and if people have to wait longer to hear back from me, or I have to wait longer to hear back from them, so be it. My family is more important.
Get Hold the MSG posts on a better schedule – There’s quite a bit involved in posting the weekly posts. It takes 3 hours via VPN to upload the posts to YouTube, for example, and after a little meeting with the kids last week, we decided to break up the work into segments, so it’s not too much all on one day. We’re planning and working on the next post right after the last one is live. The great side benefit to this is that our kids are focusing much more on their own Chinese learning, and much more motivated to practice.

What does April hold for you? Are you spring cleaning or making any goals?

- Carey Clark

Carey is a homeschooling mother of three and author of the contemporary inspirational novel After the Snow Falls. She blogs here about the many adventures of her expat family.

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