This post probably falls under the TMI category (Too Much Information)
I’ll confess that Thanksgiving isn’t my favorite holiday. I love the idea of Thanksgiving and have many, many things to be thankful for each Thanksgiving so that part of the day is great. Where it all goes south for me is the food. Since I was a baby I’ve had severe allergies to many, many things.
Here’s a partial list of the big stuff:
- Turkey
- Chicken
- Salmon
- Soy
- Walnuts
- Peanuts
- Dairy (Milk, cheese etc)
- Wheat (so basically all flour and most grains)
- Barley
- Trees
- Weeds
- Grass
- Dust
- Dogs
- Cats (basically most animals)
That’s a partial list. I was never tested for allergies for the first 32 years of my life so most of my life consisted of avoiding things that I knew consistently made me sick or caused reactions. I’m sure most of my friends and family secretly wondered whether I was just nuts. To be honest, I questioned that myself more than a few times over the years.
A few years ago I finally decided to go to the allergy doctor because I was having some new problems with eczema and was having trouble swallowing. When they did the first round of allergy testing on me the doctor stood there looking down at me as if I was an alien. His first comment, when he saw the results were, “You are a very interesting case. This is very A-typical”. They had done three rows of drops of various substances on each of my arms. They put one drop of the substance on your skin and then prick the skin under each drop to see if your body reacts. If there is a reaction they rate how big the welt is. When they were done pricking, it looked as if I’d stuck my arms in a beehive.
That’s probably too much detail but the reason I’m telling you this is because I won’t be eating most of the traditional Thanksgiving food today (which is why it isn’t my favorite holiday). There will be no turkey, stuffing, gravy or pie, unfortunately. There will be some ham, potatoes etc at my mom’s today which I’m hoping to have a bit of. A week ago I had to have my esophagus stretched out (for the fourth time). I have a disease that’s connected to my allergies that causes my body to attack food in my esophagus which scars over time making it very restricted (to the point that I can’t even swallow saliva). So, I’m still dealing with the soreness and pain from that procedure and most of my diet consists of mashed potatoes, scrambled eggs, and other soft foods right now. So, I know I’ll be eating the mashed potatoes today, at least. Maybe I’ll have some nice blended ham to go with the potatoes.
All that being said, I am very thankful for many things today. At the top of the list are my wife and daughter. They are the most wonderful, kind, happy people I’ve ever been around and I appreciate them so much. I’m also thankful for being employed, having a roof over my head, having food to eat (mostly of the soft variety these days), and having so many friends and family. I could go on and on, but I’ll leave it at that today.
Anyway, what a long drawn out way to get to, “Happy Thanksgiving!!!!”