Goodbye cruel world

I'm in two minds as to whether I am about to enter a dark desolate place or whether I am about to find nirvana. Hoping for the latter of course.

Yesterday I spent the better part of the day at the Royal Prince Alfred (RPA) Allergy Clinic.
Known as the best in Australia, this clinic sees thousands of people a year for a variety of reasons, mostly allergy based of course.

Now I don't really have allergies, although skin prick tests did show I'm not good with seafood - crustations in particular, that's lobster, crabs and prawns. (This is no secret, Daniel will not let me have lobster since his birthday dinner made a reappearence at a posh Sydney seafood restaurant one year.) But I do have intolerances. And the more I described my symptoms to the dietician the more she seemed to indicate I was probably intolerant too.

[Just an aside, Daniel can atest to the fact that I can smell anything anywhere. He can have some onion in his lunch and hours, 7 or 8 hours, later I can smell it. In fact sometimes I can still smell it on him the next day. I can smell coffee from miles away - and it turns my stomach. There are other things I can smell, and lots of things I can't stand the smell of. Many things seem to smell stronger to me than other people. I'd always just thought I was super sensitive like this and not really met anyone else like it. I can't stand strong tasting foods either. Onions, leeks, garlic, strong herbs, really upset my stomach. People always try to tell me that onions are good for you and this can't happen. I had confirmation yesterday that it certainly can happen and it normally means an intolerance to chemical levels in foods - by this they mean amines and the like. The dietician's husband is exactly the same as me. I'd never met anyone like that, and she'd never met anyone else either. It was quite a funny thing as we were going through the smells and dislikes. She often thought he was kidding because he didn't want to eat things, but when I reported the same thing she was amazed. It also gave her a stronger indication of how sensitive I was to chemicals in foods... a level I didn't really realize myself. Anyway I'm kind of feeling good about knowing there are others out there like me, and kind of a bit worried about what that means for me and my intolerances.]

So what does this mean to me now. Well I'm on a limited diet for a few weeks.. rice, lean meats, pears and a few vegies (not the nice ones, we're talking Brussel Sprouts, cabbage and choko type vegies) until my body comes back to, hopefully, a non allergic state. Then slowly foods are reintroduced to see what I can tolerate and at what level.

Although this diet is extremely restricted I'm almost looking forward to it, if for no other reason than I might get a break from some of my symptoms (she says in the middle of a three day migraine caused by Chinese food).

There is also some talk that I might have coeliac disease. I always thought coeliac's were skinny people whose food went straight through them because the gluten aggrivated their intestines. This, apparently, is one side of coeliac there is more to it than that and I have many of the symtoms. To test me for coeliac disease I would have to eat a gluten intense diet for 6 weeks. I am pretty much gluten free at the moment so the thought of it almost makes me sick.

So that's where I am. I've been to the shops today and stocked up with all the right foods. They don't ban sugar or fat, and seeing as there's not a lot else to eat I'm not sure I'm going to lose weight on the diet, but you never know.
I'm starting tomorrow, wish me luck. Wish everyone else in the house luck.

Oh, and I think I said above I'm not allergic to anything, I am I'm allergic to pethadine and morphine. The Professor wants me to wear a medic alert bracelet saying so. hmmm not sure about this but I guess I should look into it, I guess when you really need those type medications will be the exact point that you can't tell them to use them. I'm just not a huge jewellery person so a permanent bracelet/necklace doesn't appeal to me.