Confessions of an autism mother: The GFCF equation

June 1, 2:10 PMNY Schools ExaminerKathleen Byrne

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Eating at Work, by gadi.

I’ve recently been experimenting with a vegan diet, and my diet plus Fiona’s gluten-free diet takes some meal planning. Add to that the sibling rivalry of her brother and sister, which often means cooking two different dinners as each vie to make more work for me. After all, Fiona gets her own dinner. Why shouldn’t they? My husband eats what I cook whether he likes it or not (Rule # 237 of the Happy Homemaker Rulebook). The formula looks like this:

Fiona (GFCF) + 2(Colette - Zeke) (Zeke - Colette) + 2(Vegan) = Family Meal

My vegan diet has been going so well for me, in fact, that I began to toy with the idea of Fiona dropping the gluten-free restriction and going vegan with her mother. Then the formula would get slightly less tricky:

2(Colette - Zeke) (Zeke - Colette) + 3(Vegan) = Family Meal

I was not completely comfortable with this experiment, but by necessity I delved in yesterday. I packed a family picnic for our neighborhood riverside park, an old industrial docking and warehousing area made family friendly with the addition of lawns, playgrounds and landscaping that make it possible for city kids to count how many times they can skip the river with stones. I packed enough variety for everyone except Fiona. She still needed a starch (you know what I mean) to go with her blueberries. On the way to the park I ditched the kids and husband and ducked into a corner deli to hunt for a gluten-free convenience-food starch for Fiona. Potato chips are always an option, but I try to avoid them because they’re used as reinforcers at school. I spied a package of Newman’s Own spelt pretzels. I considered what I knew about spelt. From what I remembered, it was a gray area of the gluten-free diet. I decided to try them, thinking that I was going to transition Fiona into a vegan diet anyway.

Fiona loved the spelt pretzels. For the first time, she actually sat with the family and picnicked on our blanket without wandering off. She finished the bag later at home.

She was up all effing night.

My little experiment is over, and the new Family Meal formula went the way of New Coke, a resounding failure. My next experiment?

5 (Vegan - Gluten) = Family Meal

Just give me some time to work out the calculations.