So intolerant

There is a lot of cake in my office. It is served to celebrate various birthdays, graduations, baby showers …

I think I’m allergic to it.

Whenever I eat a slice I start getting stomach cramps.

I have continued eating cake whenever it is handed to me … just to be certain.

Yesterday there was a giant, thickly iced vanilla mud to celebrate a co-worker getting her MBA.

It did not go down a treat.

It is possible the cramps are stress related, because I am sooooo under the pump at the moment. But I’m pretty sure it’s cake that is to blame.

Or a combination of cake and stress.

It’s not actually the cake, I think it’s the sugar in it.

And Google tells me people don’t have allergies to sugar, they’re just intolerant to it.

This is quite plausible in my case as I have form in the area.

Long-time blog followers will remember my multiple disaccharide deficiences from waaaay back in my magazine editor years.

After I had the youngest I started vomitting and having endless intestinal upsets, which was eventually diagnosed as the aforementioned disaccharidase deficiencies.

My body couldn’t process sucrose, fructose, maltose or lactose. The gastroenterologist was beside himself with excitement when he diagnosed me as apparently it was very rare to be unable to process so many “toses”.

It was not an easy time in my life before I was diagnosed and it was not much fun afterwards, as I was forced to subsist on a diet of lettuce, steak and eggplant for three years.

I got very skinny in the process and wrote a column in The Australian about it.

It went something (well, exactly) like this …

I have achieved many things in my life. I edited Woman’s Day for five years. I walked 250 agonising kilometres of the pilgrim trail in Spain. I am raising two gorgeous children. But nothing I have done has attracted more praise than losing 10kg.

It has been fascinating – and slightly disturbing – to see how excited people are by my weight loss. If I catch up with an old friend they mention it almost immediately, often before they even say hello.

I was never what you would call “fat”, but I wasn’t thin, either. My passion for sausage rolls and Peking duck was greater than my desire to diet. But two babies in two years gave me a jelly belly and little time to exercise. So I simply bought size 14 pants and loose-fitting tops. One day, the office lunch-trolley man congratulated me on being pregnant again. I wasn’t.

When I suddenly started losing weight for no apparent reason, I put it down to breastfeeding. I bought a pair of skinny black jeans in a size 12 to celebrate and the compliments started flowing. So did the requests for diet tips. What everyone – and I – didn’t realise was they needed to develop an enzyme deficiency to mimic my efforts. My weight loss coincided with a succession of “tummy bugs”; about a year after the first bout, I was diagnosed with “multiple disaccharide deficiencies”, meaning my body has trouble processing sugars. I’m not allowed to eat carbohydrates in any form. No bread, no rice, not even broccoli. It’s easier to explain what I can eat – meat, fish, salad, a few vegies, cheese, eggs and grapes.

The months of carb-free living that have followed (it’s now been six) have been tough. Breakfast is a boiled egg, a tomato, half an avocado and a little fetta. Lunch is chicken and salad. Dinner is grilled meat and zucchini. Dessert is a handful of grapes. It’s so worthy I could scream, if I only had the energy.

For the first month all I wanted to do was sleep. But I had two children to look after and a job to hold down, so that wasn’t going to happen. I constantly fought with my husband because I was so grumpy.

I also got even thinner … and I liked it.

There is nothing quite like the feeling of trying on a pair of pants and thinking, “Ooooh, I look great!” rather than, “Well, they fit, I suppose.” I started wearing miniskirts and heels for the first time in many, many years. I noticed men checking me out for the first time in many, many years. It was fun.

But the people who paid me the most attention were other women. You’d swear I’d won the Nobel Peace Prize from the back-patting I received. It made me smile – partly because of a misplaced sense of pride, partly because it was ridiculous that my thinner appearance was regarded as so important.

A particularly enjoyable moment came on holiday in Hawaii. When I asked to try on some size 8 pants the shop assistant cheerfully exclaimed, “No, no! You’d be a size 4 or 6!” And, to my surprise, I really was a size 6. I felt like buying every single size 6 in the shop, then having the labels stitched on to the outside of the garments so everyone could see. (Of course, in Australia I’m more like a 10.5 – but God bless America!)

My dietitian thinks I might be able to eat carbs again one day. I should be thrilled, but I’m actually a bit scared. Will the fat pour back on my bones? Will my new, sexier clothes still fit me? Will life be so much fun without people telling me how good I look all the time?

It’ll be wonderful to eat a pie or a plate of curry and rice. Then again, maybe my illness has made me appreciate the pleasure of eating healthy, fresh food. I hope so. At the very least it’s taught me the bizarre lesson that nothing makes a better impression than being thin. Being rich, successful or philanthropic aren’t nearly so admirable if you’re overweight. I’m not sure what that says about western civilisation, but it can’t be good.

The fat eventually did pour back on my bones, then it poured off again when my husband left me, then it poured back on again during menopause.

It really needs to pour off again, but I am struggling to find the willpower to diet.

That said, I reckon I could give up sugar, well, mostly give it up. Maybe that would help on multiple fronts?

Oh, and for old time’s sake … here are some of the cakes I made way back when I was trying to be mother and wife of the year …