Food

As many of you know, I haven't been able to eat dairy for awhile. When Olivia was first born she was very "colicky" if she wasn't eating or sleeping she was screaming, and half the time while she was eating should would scream and wiggle.

So many just pass it off as her being colicky, but I knew there had to be a reason. She wasn't just screaming for no reason. There was something she needed, something causing her discomfort. So I researched, a lot, and I found a lot of articles saying that many babies who are labeled colicky actually have gas, painful gas that they can't release on their own. As I read this I was like YES! Since she was born John had to pump her legs and push them into her stomach to help her relieve gas, she couldn't do it on her own. I read more and I found a common cause of this is an aversion to dairy. So, I decided to test it out. Since I breastfeed this means I had to eliminate dairy from my diet. And I did. Olivia started doing SO much better. The few times I have slipped and had dairy, she is not a happy camper. So, no dairy for me!

Not cooking with dairy is a whole new task. If you really think about it, so much food that we eat, and a lot of food John and I would cook had dairy of some sort. Milk, cheese, cream of whatever soups, cheese....and then there are desserts.

Seriously everything has dairy in it!!

So we had to cook without it. It had been going ok. Going out to eat, unless it's Thai, is usually hard because like I said everything has dairy! Down to things being cooked in butter. Luckily we don't go out that often. Then there is being invited over to people's house for dinner. I don't know why but I feel rude telling people I can't have anything with dairy and I just hope that what they were planning on didn't need much alteration.

Now I have been on a cooking adventure the past few weeks. Not only do I not use dairy in my cooking, but we eat very little meat now because it is too expensive and meat just doesn't settle well with us for some reason, especially with John.

So I have been trying to making new things and things that even without dairy or without meat it is still delicious and filling.

It has been fun and there have been a few things that I won't be making again, but overall I think it has been a good experience and has made me more confident in the kitchen.

I used to have break downs a lot because I would try to make something delicious and it would turn out so gross. I would think about how great a cook my mom is and how that gene must have skipped me. But now I see that it takes time, practice, and testing things out. Cooking is an adventure, it is fun and I love having John walk in the door at the end of the day and smell dinner cooking and excited to eat.

So if anyone has any yummy recipes that are completely dairy free, meat optional PLEASE share them with me!