Grateful Friday: Blessings in Disguise!

We first learned that my daughter had severe food allergies in September 2013. We were totally overwhelmed when we met with the nutritionist and learned of all of the foods we had to eliminate from her diet. This would mean a complete changed in our daily lives, no eating out, packing lunch for school, and basically traveling around with meals on the ready for her. It was a tough transition. Since then we have added back dairy, eggs, and fish to her diet with great success. We still have not learned what the culprit is, but wheat/gluten remains a big no-no. Wheat/Gluten is in everything such as, condiments, snack foods, pasta, baked goods, etc.

As you can imagine, for a kid this could be devastating. As difficult as this time has been, we have gained an unexpected huge blessing. My daughter has discovered a love of cooking. She has become quite the gluten-free chef. She has prepared turkey meatballs, chicken and broccoli stir-fry, oatmeal pancakes, oatmeal muffins, and she can scramble a mean egg. Let me tell you I am thoroughly impressed with her persistence and her resilience in the face of adversity. She has mastered reading labels and knows what foods she can and cannot have. Now she is collecting cooking magazines and learning how to swap the ingredients for foods that meet her dietary needs. I am ultimately blessed that we learned about her condition at this age. She is 11 years old and learning life-lessons and skills that she can carry with her the rest of her life.

So the next time you are faced with adversity, don’t become overwhelmed and wrecked with fear. If you pause and wait patiently, you may just discover that what you fear is really a Blessing In Disguise.

(pictured left: Maya’s Oatmeal -Wheat Free Muffins)