Here's a little bit about me, and what makes me qualified to share my journey with you

Hi, i'm Kayla, Chef Ashton's Mum. I used to think i was crazy, with all my fandangled ideas about food, and their correlation between health, well-being and allergies. But the cat is out of the bag now, and so many people are jumping on the real food bandwagon, so either i was on to something ... or we are all crazy? I don't just mean these diets like paleo etc which have taken the limelight lately, i'm just talking about a commonsense approach to food - you know, the real stuff, that doesn't come with an ingredients list! Yeah, we need to eat more of that!

I am not qualified in health or nutrition. I am not a nutritionist. I am not a naturopath. I am not a dietician. I am not a medical professional. Our eating habits go against the grain and in some cases we do the opposite to the advice you may be given (and some advice i have been given) by medical professionals. So what makes me qualified to share what I know with you?

What i am is:

• A Mum who was first forced to take a good look into what our ‘food’ is made from, and later became curious about what our food has become.
• A Mum to a 5 year old boy who has had allergies to dairy, soy, egg and tomato and intolerance's to wheat and many chemicals, preservatives and sugar added to the ‘food’ on our supermarket shelves.
• A Mum to a one year old boy, who on his first birthday could only eat FOUR foods, with any others causing eczema, rashes, inconsolable screaming, vomiting and intestinal bleeding.
• A Mum to two boys who have been diagnosed with FPIES (Food protein induced enterocolitis syndrome)
• A parent who has seen a remarkable and rapid recovery of her sons and their allergy symptoms since cutting out processed foods and bringing real food to the table.
• A curious consumer who started to ask questions about the information we have been given about food.
• A qualified primary school teacher, who has had an insight into school lunchboxes for the last 5 years.
• A teacher at heart, with an intense passion for teaching and sharing information. I want to help you all gain the knowledge and skills to make nourishing food choices.
• A home cook, I LOVE cooking, baking and creating and i have discovered that we can choose nourishing ingredients to make delicious treats and healthy meals.
• An artist. Pre-children i used to paint, food is now my artwork (since it serves a second purpose I save time that way!) I enjoy photography so taking photos of my food-art brings me great joy.
• A life-long learner, we never stop learning and discovering. Research changes, guidelines change and new studies are coming out all the time. I love reading research papers and i’m fascinated with how our bodies work and the role that food plays in our health and wellbeing. I love reading and learning new information, but the analyst in me takes everything with a grain of salt. The first question to ask is ‘who is this study funded by’!
• An organised housewife! Since choosing to focus on living a more mindful and grateful life, my overall level of organisation has changed (in other words there are piles of washing and toys all over my house). But feeding my family nourishing food is pretty high up on my priority list, so this area of my life is quite well polished. Making real food, daily, from scratch isn’t child's play! Meal planning, meal prep, shopping lists, food budget, sourcing ingredients and recipe practice are daily tasks here. I’d love to share my skills and help you all become organised so you can put real food on your table every day too.
• A scrooge - i did not gain the nickname ‘moth wallet’ growing up for no reason. We have an extremely tight food budget. I can make something for nothing and i’m highly skilled in preparing real food on a small budget. You will seldom find cassava flour or almond meal in my recipes, as we just can’t afford to use these ingredients all the time. I can find the cheapest price and best deal for all things food.
• A University Graduate with a degree in media studies, excitingly, sometimes, I get to use this! You see many of the papers i took focused on analysing advertising, marketing techniques and popular culture. Its made me wary of following trends, encouraged me to question the 'norm' and I can see right through all those terrible marketing ploys and advertising tricks trying to convince us that we 'need' all these packaged foods in our lives!
• A realist - i am realistic about how much time, energy and money we have to spend on food. I want to make real food quick, easy, affordable and delicious for everyday families.

I would love to study food and nutrition, to help further my knowledge and understanding of the stuff we fuel our bodies with, hopefully this is in my future. But for now, this is me, who i am, at this moment. These small people that hang around our ankles in the kitchen and swipe at us for tid-bits (does that just happen to me?) are our future. I am so damn passionate about making sure every small person has access to ‘real food’, food that has grown in the ground or on a tree, food that has been raised from the ground up, food that’s pure and doesn’t come from a packet with a mile long ingredients list or a bunch of added sugar. I want to help fuel a change and i won’t be satisfied until I see it!

If you want to follow us for our day to day food inspiration you can do this on Chef Ashton's facebook page.

Why I'm so grateful for having kids with food allergies

 

It did take me about 4 years to realise it. But having kids with food allergies is one of the best things that has ever happened to me.

They say every person that comes into your life does so for a reason. My boys have taught me more in these 5 short years than I learned in my entire life time. They have taught me love and dedication like I never thought possible. They have taught me compassion and empathy.

They have taught me gratitude and mindfulness. They have shown me I am a powerful force to be reckoned with, fierce with strength, courage, determination and passion. They have taught me patience and persistence. I thought I had it all figured out, but they have changed me in ways I never imagined. They have taught me that perfection is just a word, not something to strive for. That there is beauty, peace and love in every day, and it is our job to find this, be it within our environment, or ourselves. I have learned that the universe doesn't owe us anything and being happy is our responsibility.

I spent a long time after the birth of Ashton, trying to find myself again, I searched in all sorts of places and I realised later that I would never find what I was looking for. Having a child changes you, but having a child with extra challenges also changes you.

I had this beautiful premonition as I set up the baby’s room, 8 months pregnant, of what life will look like. I would will feed the baby calmly and quietly to sleep in the rocking chair. I would go for picturesque sunset walks along the beach with the baby and the dog. Life will be hard and I will be tired but being a parent will be so rewarding. Fast forward two months, I am taking the baby for a walk but it's 9am and he has been screaming for 6 hours straight, he has done nothing but scream for the last week. He is covered in rashes and vomits up all his feeds. I'm pretty sure the dog hasn’t been fed in two days and i’m not sure when I last had a shower. I'm very seriously considering which house to drop the baby off at (like actually, this was a legit plan, my mum had to come and rescue him!) I haven't slept in 10 days. Unfortunately it didn’t get much better for about 6 months! At which point the doctors said that I was only partially crazy, and Ashton actually had food allergies. Parenting was not rewarding. I was all “why me, why us, why him”, “what did we do to deserve this?” Everything was always about poor Ashton and how he couldn't have this or that. There was a lot of moping around about how we missed out on the first year of his life because I couldn't get a doctor to diagnose his allergies sooner. He was on all sorts of medications for reflux and stomach issues and it was all quite a sad state of affairs.

The days were long but the years were short, the fog of depression lifted and as I slowly gained more knowledge I began to realise that we were not helpless onlookers to some video game. We had the controls, and we could control the present and the future. We could control our actions, but most importantly our thoughts and feelings. This is what was missing, I fought for Ashton from the day he was born, everyday I was doing things to try and better our situation. But I wasn’t happy about the hand we had been dealt.

When Felix was born we were dealt a similar hand, but a change in thinking can really change your life. Felix also did nothing but scream for the first 8 weeks of his life, I got 4 blocks of 45 minute sleep a night - by the time I had pumped breastmilk for him, cleaned the equipment, breastfed and bottle fed him, then got him back to sleep. I’d then get up and look after 2 kids for the day. Tired and weary I would say things like ‘it won’t always be like this’  and ‘at least he doesn’t vomit all the time’, ‘he’s so cute when he sleeps’, ‘ these days will pass quickly’, and ‘how lucky are we to have two boys’. I never wanted to put him back and I certainly could not fathom dropping him off on someone's doorstep! This kid has taught me resilience like no other. I could have given up the feeding routine, we could have put him on a bunch of medication, we could have loathed the countless hours we spent walking his screaming body up and down the dark hallway. While I wouldn't volunteer to go back to that time (or for round 3!), i’m glad that it happened to us. It has made me appreciate every minute that a baby is asleep and without pain, every second that our children spend happy and content and every day that they are alive and well, because sadly, some people are not so lucky.

Having kids with food allergies has taught me empathy and compassion. During the 10 months I breastfed Felix, 9 of those months I lived off 10 foods (sometimes less and that was counting salt and pepper!) It taught me empathy for these kids of ours who can’t have a piece of birthday cake, who sit and watch their classmates eat christmas chocolates, or watch everyone eat cheese and crackers at the family lunch. That was me, for nearly a year I got to be that kid. And at times it sucked. There is no feeling quite like it. Knowing this, I make sure the boys don’t miss out on anything. They always have homemade safe versions of most things, and I usually one up them by making it healthier. It has given me the opportunity to explain to them, that though they can’t have what everyone else has got, they don’t want it, because for the most part it’s full of processed ingredients that are going to make them feel like crap. It has given me the understanding and self control to model the behavior by avoiding the foods alongside them. I also took on the mindset of, instead of us missing out, everyone else was really missing out on the opportunity to put real, nourishing food into their bodies. Today I appreciate food more than ever, I don’t want the cake and that’s my choice. What I've learned from having such a limited diet has changed all our eating habits for the better and made me realise what it feels like to be truly healthy, happy and energized, and I am so grateful for that!

This experience has taught me that there are some truly wonderful, kind and just generally kickass-amazing human beings out there. Some of these people were complete strangers and they have given me advice and knowledge that has changed the course of our life. Some helped us see specialists for Felix and one lady gave me personal advice on how to pursue a total elimination diet, which was the start to us ending Felix’s pain and suffering. From that, we have never looked back. I am so glad I have met some of these people and experienced how kind and caring our human race can really be. I endeavor to pay this forward whenever I can, to be that kind human being that reached out to help another fellow mum in need.

When I am up late preparing safe snacks for the boys to take to a birthday party, I am grateful. I am grateful they are not filling their bodies with junk. I am grateful they are learning about what they can and can’t eat and how to manage their allergies responsibly. I am grateful that I love to cook and can use this opportunity to do so. I am grateful that we are aware of how different foods can affect our bodies and can make healthy choices based on this. I am grateful we are not filling our bodies with chemicals, fake foods, colours or preservatives.

When I open the fridge to get ‘starving Felix’ a snack and there is nothing right there, he can eat, I am grateful. I am grateful that the kid who was once fed through a tube down his nose is asking for food. I am grateful that I can find any fruit or vegetable and prepare this for him to eat, 5 months ago he could only eat 4 foods. I’m so grateful for that. I am grateful that though I often have to spend time preparing him something, rather than grab it off a shelf, I am teaching him patience, as he watches me find something and helps me cook it. Don’t be fooled there is often squealing involved and it ends in pots and pans pulled out all over the kitchen floor! But that’s ok because he has also taught me that perfect isn’t having organised cupboards or clean floors. Perfect is that moment right now, because life is happening and we are all OK.

I have learned that we all have problems and challenges. Sitting next to my child, limp and lethargic in the emergency room after he has vomited until he is passed out because of something he ate, is not much fun. But neither is sitting in the doctor’s waiting room, waiting to have your child's 5th ear infection that month, diagnosed. Neither is dealing with major scream-cry-and-throw-shit temper tantrums all day. Nor is getting up every.single.hour overnight to an unsettled baby. I am no more super than the rest of you. You can have your unsettled baby and your ear infections, and i’ll have my children with food allergies, because that’s what I do best.

So last year I found something, I discovered this resourceful, passionate, driven, strong, truly blessed woman. She wasn’t quite what I had been looking for, she was better. I have food allergies to thank for that. The experience has helped shape me into the person I am today and this, I am so grateful for.