Prawn, Baby, Prawn & Soy-onara

I love to eat. I enjoy healthy foods but also the occasional (or frequent) unhealthy food. I gave up meat when I was 20 years old. The nightmares from my childhood upbringing on the farm and the trips to the slaughterhouse caught up with me. I never missed meat; not even for a second. However, I still eat fish and seafood. I thought I could kill a fish or a prawn if I had to, so in my eyes, it was a fair fight.

I learned to love vegetarian meals when I moved to California. Healthy eating was part of the lifestyle. Salads tasted amazing and meatless pasta dishes were creative. Plus, veggie burgers were up and coming and more and more soy meat substitutes were available at the supermarket. There was soy sausage, soy 'cold cuts' and even soy minced meat. I was in vegetarian heaven. Seafood and fish were also incredibly fresh, inexpensive and readily available.

I had my food-life all figured out. Even once I moved back to Europe, I learned how to navigate around the meat-heavy diet. And then, a trip to Thailand changed everything. Who knows, maybe it would have also happened if I had gone to Italy or New Jersey. Nonetheless, it happened in Thailand. The first few days, I thoroughly enjoyed the Thai cuisine and the great variety of seafood. On the fifth evening, the resort we stayed at had a Mediterranean dinner with an elaborate seafood and fish buffet including oysters, lobster and several shrimp and prawn creations.

I tried pretty much everything and it was delicious. About two bites into my dessert, my stomach started to inflate rapidly and I immediately felt nauseous. I told my husband - did I mention this was our honeymoon? - that I needed to run to our room. I jumped up and raced across the beautiful garden. I didn't even make it past the illuminated pool when I got sick right there in the beautifully groomed grass. Back in our room, I got sick once more. I figured I must have had a bad oyster or scallop.

The next morning, we informed the kitchen staff about my problems from following last night's dinner. They were surprised as no one else mentioned any issues. I accepted it as an unfortunate incident - a fluke. My stomach felt fine by the end of the next day, so we signed up for a snorkeling trip for the following morning. That night we decided to try a beachfront cafe about a 30-minute walk up the shore. It was a beautiful night. The waves crashed against the sandy beach and the occasional rocks. Once at the cafe, I ordered a typical dish I would - and have in the past -order at any Asian restaurant around the world: pineapple fried rice with shrimp and peanuts plus asparagus in oyster sauce. It was delicious.

After my last bite, my stomach once again inflated. I could literally watch it grow. The waitress walked by me with full plates of food in both hands. The smell of the food was unbearable and made me nauseous. A sour taste emerged in my mouth. I told my husband, I need to get away from the food smells and sprinted towards the water. I rubbed my belly hoping to alleviate some of the tightness in my stomach. My husband joined me after he had paid. We walked for less than 5 minutes when I became violently ill. Rice in reverse is no fun. Luckily it was completely dark by that point and I crossed my fingers that no one saw me. I sunk down on my knees and crawled on all fours in the sand.

We sat down outside the nearest resort to rest. Suddenly, a wave of heat went up and down my body and my skin felt like it was on fire. My arms became incredibly itchy. And then, by lips and tongue started to tingle and became numb. I was scared. Really, really scared. We took a cab back to the resort and called for a doctor. In the light of the hotel room, I saw for the first time that I was incredibly pale and covered in hives. The doc told me that I had an allergic reaction to something I ate. No idea what. He gave me a shot and some cream for the itching. The snorkeling trip was no more.

I only ate pizza and pasta for the rest of the trip. Once I was back home, I took an allergy test. At 38 years old, I became allergic to prawns and dust mites. Apparently, those are related to each other and often show up together. Over the next six months, my body drastically changed. I rapidly gained weight, the skin on my back became bumpy, I started to have dandruff and was bloated ALL.THE.TIME. No matter what I ate. Food was not my friend anymore.

I had a gazillion more doctor visits and allergy tests. During those tests, a lump was found in my thyroid (see my previous blog article) and eventually a soy allergy was also discovered. A vegetarian's nightmare closely followed by being trapped at a Brazilian restaurant. That was the end of soy lattes and soy patties in my veggie burgers. I thought those were all the adjustments I had to make. I was wrong. After having severe stomach cramps following the consumption a protein shake that contained soy, I spent some time on researching the issues of a soy allergy. The first sentence I read was: soy is the most difficult allergen to avoid. After that statement, the website listed a number of names that are also used for soy including lecithin.

I started to examine everything I purchased. Soy or lecithin is in a lot of food. And all kinds of food. Bakeries use soy flour. Soy is used as a binder. Lecithin is in almost all chocolate cookies and other sweets. I immediately stopped eating chocolate and became very careful about the bread I ate. I was also very thankful for all the allergy letter codes next to meals in restaurant menus.

Food suddenly was the enemy.

I am now in the process of making some serious changes to my diet. I feel a bit lost and overwhelmed. It also sounds like I need to start doing something I have never enjoyed much: cooking.

To be continued...