When Rules Backfire...

I have never been a parent who caters to her children at meal times. What I cook is what you get. Period. You might be surprised to hear that, considering I have a child w/ Asperger's Syndrome. I've read that many children who are on the Autism Spectrum are very particular about what they eat; often it is regarding the texture. My Aspie, on the other hand, eats anything, when he remembers that he is hungry! (Of course he's limited now by our GF/CF eating style.) To be quite honest, it's my two neuro-typical children that give me the biggest problem w/ meals. B is my texture freak, w/ an extreme dislike for beans, and M just won't sit still & hush long enough to eat!

So, w/ all of this in mind, what happens when you, the parent, cooks a meal that you don't particularly care for? That's what happened at our house tonight. 

One of the things that I promised myself when we began this journey in to GF/CF was that I wouldn't spend a fortune trying to replace gluten filled items w/ the gluten free counterparts. However, there is one exception - pasta. And I have been in a maddening search for a gluten free pasta that actually tastes & feels almost like the real thing. (See! I'm willing to compromise. I said "almost".) Finding a decent replacement is important for our family, b/c one of the kids' favorite meals is spaghetti! I've tried quinoa pasta, rice pasta, & corn pasta. The quinoa was AWFUL - a big pile of mush! Then I tried rice pasta, but I think I undercooked it b/c of my fear of it turning out like the quinoa pasta!! Lastly, I tried the corn pasta, which looks the most like regular semolina pasta, and it turned out okay - last time. Tonight was a different story! I don't know what in the heck I did wrong,... but YUCK! The children were not at all phased by the starchy pile of stuff resembling spaghetti! They devoured it & asked for more!!

What did I do? Blow my cover? NEVER! I took little tiny bites while they busied themselves w/ dinner conversation, and the moment JG asked for more I gave him my plate, stating that I just wasn't very hungry! Then I had almonds & grapes for dinner while no one was looking!

Today's menu:

Breakfast: pancakes (Namaste pancake mix), sausage (Jones Farm), & oj
Lunchbox: pork t-loin, apple slices, & Jello w/ water
Snack: Enjoy Life Cocoa Loco Chewy Bar & Juicy Juice
Dinner: Spaghetti - organic ground beef, Newman's Own Sauce, & corn pasta 

A long day...

So, JG got sick w/ his first cold of the school year & stayed home Thursday & half of Friday, and we continued to lay low through the long weekend. He never ran much of a fever, and I never gave him any medication - just ran the humidifier a couple of nights. He still sounds a little nasally today, but he went to school all day. What I find disheartening, though, is that a nice long weekend that most of us would love actually wreaks havoc on JG. The lack of routine is just so hard on children on the spectrum!

The last few days have included some major meltdowns - the kind that wear me down to a puddle! In fact, as I sit here blogging, I'm having a beer & trying to come down from the day. It's hard, especially when you know that you'll probably have to face the same thing the next day. I know that all of you Aspie parents know what I'm talking about, for sure, and probably some of you other parents, too!! I need to look back at my own blog & read about the day that we had the "awakening" - when JG apologized to his little sister & wrote a letter to God! I need to read it & be reminded that there will be more of those kinds of days to come. We're just at the  beginning of this path to healing!! "Awakened" days will multiply & meltdown days will diminish!! That's my prayer for JG today.

All of the whining being said, I warned ya'll that I wouldn't have much shopping this week - so what should I tell you about? Recipes? Menu? Maybe a little of both!

Breakfast: Rice Chex, Rice Dream milk replacement, & orange juice

Lunchbox: Thinly sliced pork tenderloin (grilled on Sunday), leftover          sauteed red potatoes, whole green beans

Snack: Mareblu nut clusters, a plum, and Juicy Juice

Afterschool Snack: Luigi's Italian Ice Philly Swirl Stix NEW DISCOVERY!

Dinner: Homemade White Bean & Ham Soup - In the crock pot combine 1lb. dry white northern beans (previously soaked); 1 whole onion, chopped; 2 stalks of celery, diced; 1 carrot, diced; 2 cloves of garlic, minced; 2 bay leaves; salt & pepper to taste; and some leftover ham, diced. Cover w/ plenty of water & cook until the beans reach your desired texture. 

*This is the kind of recipe that makes it clear that I threw things together & left it, but it turned out soooo yummy! Even my bean hating, non-Aspie loved it & ate 2 bowls!!

This Week's Shopping

I have a dear friend that gets a laugh out of the fact that it seems like I am always "at the store" when she calls. Her jests are not too far off base! Mind you, most of those shopping trips are rather small. With the GF/CF eating style I have found that it's very difficult to "stockpile" items in my pantry, b/c we typically just eat meat, fruit, & veggies. You wouldn't want to stockpile fresh items like produce b/c some of the items could spoil before you use them, and meat (predominantly "green") is too expensive to stock up on! And have you ever noticed the limited amount of coupons that are floating around for fresh foods?!

This time last year I was a coupon queen!! We didn't eat a large amount of convenience foods, and there were a lot of coupons that were useless to me back then. However, I still managed to save "mucho dinero" w/ the coupons that remained after my weeding through! Now,... good luck on finding coupons for fresh organic meat & fresh produce!! Yes, every now & then I'll have some good luck & find some in a copy of my Kiwi magazine or in the Sunday circulars, but it is extremely rare! With all of that in mind, I've gotten a really bad attitude about how those of us who live on a tight budget are strong armed in to eating unhealthy. Or, at the very least,  I feel comfortable in saying that it is quite difficult for a frugal family to eat healthy. I'll refrain from discussing my conspiracy theories!

All of that rambling being said, I have developed some tricks to feeding my GF/CF family frugally. And yes, Coco, it means I make multiple trips to the local stores! Here are some examples w/ this week's shopping:

On Sunday I went to Sam's Club to pick up a few staples that I had found the week before. Mareblu Naturals makes a yummy nut cluster, Blueberry Pomegranate Trail Mix Crunch, that is peanut-free, gluten free, & dairy free. My non-Aspie son thinks that they taste like blueberry waffles! I also picked up a Sam's Club brand spiral sliced ham that is certified gluten free, a big bag of corn tortilla chips ('cause taco salad is just so yummy & can easily be GF/CF), and a bag of romaine hearts. On my last trip to Sam's a couple of weeks ago I also picked up some frozen berries for smoothies, frozen whole green beans, hummus, organic baby carrots, and Multi-Seeded Crackers. I've also spotted a good deal on some chicken & apple sausage that is certified gluten free, but I haven't been able to bring myself to buy that large of a package of sausage!  

After Sam's I stopped at one of our local farmers' markets & bought a bag of red potatoes, some sweet potatoes, a bag of onions, cantaloupe & some peaches. Then I stopped at Publix for our Rice Dream, orange juice, Van's Waffles, Juicy Juice, and a few other essentials. That was it for the day,... but then I made another stop by one of our other grocery stores today! I only got 7 items at Bruno's, though - paper products (recycled) & meat! And, to be honest, those items, added to the ones that I already had, will cover us for another week or so.

Menu:

Monday breakfast: Van's waffles w/ fresh cut fruit salad
           lunchbox: leftover grilled sausage, fruit salad
               snack: nut clusters & Juicy Juice
              dinner: ham, potato salad, & green beans almondine

Tuesday breakfast: Van's waffles w/ fruit salad
             lunchbox: ham, potato salad, fruit salad
                 snack: nut clusters & Juicy Juice
                dinner: leftovers! (red beans & rice or ham & potato salad)

Almost Done

I hope that it's okay that I start counting down the hours 'til the weekend on Thursday! Who am I kidding?! I probably start on Monday! It's not that we do anything particularly exciting on the weekends,... but I'm just happy to not have to get JG anywhere for 2 whole days. So, only one more morning struggle left before I get a 2 day reprieve. These are the thoughts that get me through a day.

JG had a much better day at school yesterday. His tics had settled down quite a bit after a good night's rest on Tuesday night. He does seem extremely tired, though - even more than he did during the first week of school. It concerns me, but I'm doing all that I can do. He has had 3 nights in a row that he's fallen asleep instantly, and that is absolutely not the norm!

I have scheduled a meeting w/ a woman for horseback riding lessons for JG. She lives right down the road, and we're going to meet w/ her on Friday afternoon. She said that she teaches them everything, not just how to ride. He'll learn how to brush the horses, how to clean their hooves, and all of the parts of caring for them, in addition to slowly learning how to ride. She doesn't have any particular experience w/ Asperger's children, but she seems very open to learning about JG. She asked some particulars, and she said that she was going to do some research about his difficulties. She has, however, worked w/ other children w/ various special needs. So,... it looks like we'll be teaching her, as well. I can't wait to tell him!

Also, I've realized that I'm not posting as much information about food as I had planned on doing, so here's a little re-cap.

Tuesday night I cooked spaghetti w/ organic meat, Newman's Own sauce, & corn pasta & it was a hit!! Spaghetti is one of JG's all time favorites, and it has been a long time since he has gotten to have some. I've warmed some up to put in to a thermos for the past two days for his lunch at school. (I also cut it up to make it easier to eat out of a thermos.)

Last night we had breakfast for dinner, and we had pancakes made from a Bob's Red Mill mix, Jones Dairy Farm turkey sausage, and cantaloupe. Everyone was happy! It amazes me that those pancakes are soooo much better fresh! FYI: We use Earth Balance spread as our butter replacement & Log Cabin syrup.

And this morning the kiddos had Van's waffles for breakfast, which has actually been requested repeatedly by my non-Aspie son! I cut up a little bit of cantaloupe on the side, and all the plates were cleaned!

The boys are going to get a special treat for their snack at school today, as I threw together a package of Betty Crocker Gluten Free brownies last night after dinner. And I also did some couponing yesterday in order to purchase some LaCroix Sparkling Water, in the lemon and orange flavors, so that the boys could have something else new & exciting in their lunchboxes! I'll be anxious to hear how they like them, but they were already excited just based on the fact that they were getting to take something that resembled a soda!!

The First Test

I passed it! Not with flying colors, mind you, but I passed it!! Wondering what sort of test I passed today? I sent my Aspie to his first day of school as a GF/CF convert! I wasn't worrying about whether or not my kiddo was going to have fun on his first day back to school, though that would have been fantastic! I just wanted him to get through the day without a meltdown. Success!! He saved the meltdown for me!! (He's generous like that!)



We've been working on our transition, as a family, to a gluten free & casein free lifestyle for most of the summer. My hope is to heal, or at least lessen, the symptoms of my 8 year old son's Asperger's Syndrome by taking a bio-medical approach. And, yes,... we've tried the medical approach, leaving doctors', therapists', & psychiatrists' offices with stacks of prescriptions - literally. At the beginning of our adventure we had a particular psychiatrist that we visited who thought nothing of handing me 5 or 6 prescriptions at a time, never knowing how my little boy's body was going to react to the medication. It was scary!! So at the end of his 2nd grade year we decided that we had had enough. If we were handing out anti-psychotics to our son when he was 8, what were we going to do when he was 18?! So my search began!

Today's menu:

Breakfast - French Toast made w/ brown rice bread, rice milk, eggs, organic sugar, & cinnamon
fresh fruit
orange juice

Lunch - Leftovers! - ham, potato salad, & broccoli
water

Snack - Juicy Juice
apple slices
peanut butter (which he wasn't allowed to eat b/c of another child's allergy)

Afterschool Snack - GF/CF Chocolate Cupcake w/ powdered sugar on top

Dinner - Pork Roast
Baked Red Potato
Broccoli

I know today wasn't a stellar performance, but I have many ideas up my sleeves! My loftier ideas will have to wait a bit - until I get my groove! I had a very brilliant friend, who happens to be the mother of 2 children on the spectrum, remind me to not put too much on myself. That would only make me even crazier than I already am!!

Quote of the day: While helping JG relax & fall asleep by concentrating on what I was referring to as his "yoga breathing," he said, "yea, it kept you from pulling out your hair this summer!"