The Battle Within

For the past few months I've been struggling with an inner battle-literally. A couple of years ago now I contracted an intestinal infection that resulted in the loss of a baby and a residual diagnosis that means I have to watch carefully what I eat. Mostly, for the past year, I have been symptom free but moving to a new country with new foods has brought some new challenges. Unlike the UK and USA, not all foods are labelled-so sometimes I don't know if what I am eating is going to harm or hurt me. Even things labelled are hard to read-my Arabic and French are not that good! Often the English ingredients are covered with a label written in Arabic! Of course lots of food products are in English but sometimes it's still trial and error.
I like to eat fresh unprocessed foods and tend to cook pretty much everything from scratch and those things often have no ingredient lists-breads, meat, chicken etc.
Yesterday I about had enough. I strayed off my safe foods this week big time and ate items I wasn't really sure I was supposed to eat. There are just some days when I miss eating good food and yes, junk food!  Every now and then I test my body to it's limit! The Spaghetti bolognaise, pizza, quesedillas and a soda pop 3 days in a row I now realise was SO not worth it.


Then I get angry. Partly because things will be forever different. There are foods that I can't enjoy anymore. Family meals that everyone else gets to enjoy. Even tonight with homemade pizza, I have to skip the best parts-sauce, onions, mushrooms and the soda pop.
But today it suddenly hit me. Thankfulness. I am so thankful that I am well enough to be here. I am so thankful that my symptoms can be controlled by what I eat. I am so thankful that I have a supportive husband who has always been there for me.
I am trying to look on the positive and enjoy the things I can instead of focusing on what I can't.