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Learning to Live with Celiac Disease: A Mom’s
Story
by Lorna Shafir
When I look at my daughter today – tall and
athletic, studying hard in college, playing on a varsity sports
team, it’s hard to believe she was once an incredibly sick baby
who was failing to thrive. At 14 months, she started to lose
weight (she went from 24 pounds to 19 pounds), became lethargic
and suffered from terrible diarrhea. Our pediatrician ran
tests, but could not give us a diagnosis. One day our daughter
woke up screaming in pain and could not stop. We rushed her to
Children's Hospital in Boston where she was admitted for nearly
a week. During her stay she was tested for leukemia, cystic
fibrosis, and finally celiac disease. At the hospital after
hearing the diagnosis, I remember worrying about how she would
grow up without bread, cereal, pasta and pizza. Looking though
the vending machines after the dining hall closed, I realized
that I could only give her potato chips or a chocolate bar. How
were we going to feed her? Would she be able to go to college?
That was 1989 and we are fortunate that so
many things have happened to make it so much easier to follow a
gluten free diet – starting with membership in Celiac Sprue
Association and Gluten Intolerance Group, followed by the
availability of information on the Internet, a celiac support
group at Boston Children's Hospital, the magazine Sully’s
Living Without, the Celiac Disease Foundation newsletter,
the Healthy Villi adult celiac support group newsletter and
meetings, gluten-free product listings at Whole Foods and Trader
Joes, gluten free menus at Legal Seafoods, P.F. Changs and
others, countless creative and kind chefs at many different
restaurants, celiac summer camp and a whole host of gluten free
products. In sum, gluten free life got easier.
Just before our daughter was born, my
husband founded Kettle Cuisine, a soup company whose mission is
to make all natural, refrigerated soups for restaurants and
supermarkets. For years she ate our soups made without gluten
ingredients, but many of our products were off limits. Our
daughter and so many people with celiac disease are in need of
products with high protein and fiber that taste great, and there
was little to be found in the marketplace. In response, this
year we decided to reformulate select Kettle Cuisine recipes to
be gluten free by using rice flour and rice noodles. We now run
tests for the presence of gluten and have changed manufacturing
procedures to ensure no cross contamination. We now sell five
(5) varieties of frozen, 10 oz., gluten free soups including New
England Clam Chowder, Grilled Chicken and Corn Chowder, Chicken
Noodle Soup, Chicken Chili with White Beans and Angus Beef Steak
Chili.
When I heard about Kettle Cuisine’s plans to
launch this line of gluten free soups, I thought that people
with celiac disease would be very excited about them. I know
how important certain gluten free products were to my daughter’s
childhood and knew that these soups could be that kind of
product. I read the buzz when gluten free beer first came on
the scene and I thought that a natural gluten free chicken soup
with rice noodles could be just as exciting. So I have signed
on with Kettle Cuisine to sample soups at stores, work at food
shows, reach out to celiac support groups and generally spread
the word about these wonderful soups. |
