Food-sanity; Are You Losing It?

All people who are exclusively gluten free in the long term eventually begin to suffer from a very specific set of memory problems. This is a bold claim, I know. But I also know that it is something that as a community we seem determined to throw a sheet over and pretend we can't see it. It's well past time that we all admit to, and finally begin to cope with, this degeneration of vital memory.

If you have been exclusively gluten free for 18 months or more and eaten more than 5-6 typical gluten free breads or baked goods, you are undoubtedly already suffering from some degree of Textural Transience.

Transience, according to Harvard Health Publications, "is the tendency to forget facts or events over time." Textural Transience is a specifically targeted form of transience where all memories of what specific foods should feel like are ultimately obliterated. The most notable food memories attacked are those of breads, cakes, and pizza crusts, which most of us could no longer describe with any accuracy. Textural Transience results from the combined effects of the gluten free diet, and the normal passage of time, on the human memory. All humans experience some degree of memory transience. It is a normal and even beneficial function of the human brain where by unused memories are dumped to make room for new, more relevant experiences. It is only under the influence of exclusive adherence to the GF diet that this normal function turns pernicious.

When we abstain from those evil, gluten laden breads we once loved, the memories of the way they felt, the nuances of texture and flavor which made them so comforting, are no longer being reinforced, which alone can weaken the memories. If gluten free substitutes for that bread are then consumed, we begin to amass those experiences as the newer and more relevant information in our memories. Each consumption of a gluten free substitute furthers the power of memory to favor the relevant, there by specifically targeting and gradually replacing our memories of what real bread ever was. It takes surprisingly few of these gluten free encounters for us to begin to loose our hold on food-reality. In my experience by the 6th new GF experience, there is some weakening of our memories of gluten. By the time we are a year in, we are almost definitely suffering on some level from not only Textural Transience, but often from Flavor Transience as well. Luckily, most of us prove slightly more resilient against the effects of Flavor Transience, since ideas of whether or not things taste pleasing are still generally reinforceable even on the gluten free diet. But over time and with repeated exposure to lousy baked goods, the new GF experiences will target, weaken, and eventually destroy flavor memories as well.

Even further into long term GF diet adherence, we begin to fall prey to an even more insidious threat, that of Suggestibility of Delectation. The vulnerability of human memory to suggestion has been well studied from many different angles. When we are struggling to recall a memory that made only a fleeting impression on us, or that has been weakened as through the effects of Textural Transience, memories of things we have heard or read that relate to what we are struggling to remember can step in to assert themselves as fact in our minds, as if they were actually our own memories or perceptions. Once there is sufficient cumulative damage wreaked upon or memory by Textural and Flavor Transience, we become highly susceptible to the suggestions offered by product advertising and reviews.

Imagine that you have read reviews of a new GF bread online, stating that it's "just like the real thing." You decide to try the bread. As you bite into the bread and begin to chew, you search your memory for what "the real thing" was like. If you are already suffering from Textural Transience, your memories of this will be fuzzy, tinged with doubt, or altogether missing. You will try to think harder, imagining that the memory is just a little rusty, rather than failing, but with nothing else to offer you, your memory will instead throw at you a combination of the newer more relevant experiences (what the GF bread you've had recently has been like) and what you've heard about this product (glowing reviews) and if it is better than at least one other GF bread you've had, you will conclude that, yes indeed, it is like the real thing! Your faulty memory will have not only dulled you perception and ability to compare foods, but it will have deluded you into even ENJOYING what is often an utterly substandard, texturally revolting, aftertaste hiding, doorstop of a loaf of bread.

My fellow Celiacs, join with me in finally admitting that we are losing our food-sanity. If we weren't we would not be seeing glowing reviews and genuine enthusiasm for things like Schar's white bread or shortbread cookies. I've tried both of these recently and through the eyes of someone constantly evaluating her own recipes, I can tell you in no uncertain terms, they are NOT good. Neither has any flavor beyond a slightly stale, dusty flavor to the cookies and that of yeast in the bread, and they both have appalling textures. The bread, touted in a review on amazon as "by far, the best gluten free bread," is brittle and dry, unless toasted, at which point it also becomes hard. The cookies, "just like butter cookies that I used to enjoy,"  according to an Interested Customer, are actually crunchy, uncomfortably crunchy, and prominently feature the unmistakable sandy texture of rice flour. They're like eating a beach, but without the salt. Yet they have enthusiastic fans! In fact, at least one of you out there reading this will balk incredulously at my comments because you are one of them. Case in point. Your memory has been compromised.

When I was first diagnosed, I saw the warning signs in the obviously quacks product reviews, the worst ones always coming from the those on the diet the longest. Accordingly, I tried to shield myself. I remained skeptical. I consciously tasted and critiqued every new food. I baked my own recipes to reverse some of the overwhelming exposure to lousy foods. But I am now nearly 5 years into my gluten free life having intentionally lapsed only once, and no matter how I struggle, my food memories have wasted as well. I do not know what anything tastes like anymore. I no longer have an intimate understanding of the way toast reacts to buttering, or the precise balance of moisture in a good loaf. And I also realize this could easily transform into the complacency with unfortunate food that I so abhorred in others when I was newly diagnosed.

But I will fight it! We all should. I will fight by requiring feedback from gluten eaters with accurate memories before publishing recipes so that I will not propagate the nasty side of the GF diet. I will do all I can to produce a ray of hope to those of us with our memories of amazing cupcakes lingering only as the merest shadow at the back of our minds. You should do your part by being more critical of what they try to feed us. Demand more. "Really good for gluten free," is not praise, it is a red flag. It tells us that to look upon this food item favorably, we have to used a rigged scale. Beware, and remind yourself that all food, GF and otherwise, is still food. No matter what your medical conditions require you to omit, you should still only admit what is really good, both the truly nourishing and the truly pleasant and satisfying to the palate. Typical GF rice flour concoctions are neither of these.

Don't go 'round the bend! Fight for your food-sanity!