My birthday is always during lent…except in 2008 when it was actually ON Easter Sunday (once in a lifetime).  I’ve always given myself a ‘bye’ on my birthday when it comes to Lent and giving up a certain kind of food.  This year I didn’t give up food for Lent–I’m already gluten-free, sugar-free and nearly carb-free–so there’s not much to give up.  I do feel better when I don’t eat, but completely giving up food seems…well…extreme.
     On my birthday I received a large box from Mayo Clinic for some at-home testing. [Let’s just say it involved: specified eating for five days, tedious collecting for three days, a 20 mile trip to a store for dry ice {purchased in lbs but must be labeled in kg on the box=math} and a bio-hazard sticker for the return ‘exempt human specimen’ shipment.]  Not necessarily the kind of ‘gift’ I expected on my birthday, but I did have a bold birthday prayer request.
   For whatever reason, I decided if I had to eat a specified diet for five days–I was going to give myself a birthday bye and eat everything on my ‘free’ list:  my Fat Tuesday Food Frenzy ensued.  [Who am I kidding, I started eating on the ‘free’ list an hour after I saw Dr. K.]  Needless to say, I have felt pretty rotten for the past two weeks.  When my face and scalp started getting oozy sores from the gluten, I decided to stop…stop gluten.  Today, after the ice cream and ensuing carb coma, I decided to stop the frenzy altogether. I was miserable and the new medication and herbal formula didn’t seem to be helping, however the midst of a Food Frenzy was not the best time to evaluate its effectiveness.
   This convoluted, rebellious attitude often happens when I’m waiting for test results and I’m weary from the discipline and emotions and nauseousness and pain.  Dr. K from Mayo was out all week, so I wasn’t expecting anything, but late Friday afternoon, one part of the testing showed up as abnormal.  I’ll wait for the rest of the testing to be done and hear what to do next.

Melodramatic Melancholia