On trusting your gut, and lactose intolerance
I was at a big family party (big, subject to COVID regulations) last weekend, and discovered the hard way that I have become lactose intolerant. The dessert on Saturday lunchtime was a lovely creamy affair, meringue piled high with cream and more cream, and I allowed my taste buds to over-rule any concerns expressed by my digestive system and lapped it up.
Perhaps an hour later I was seized by intense stomach cramps, followed by bloating and other symptoms which need not be further described, and retired to bed and could not get out of it (apart from repeated urgent trips across the landing) until the morning. I was already aware that too much cheese disagrees with me (but then again, that's what "too much" means) and now I must add cream and probably all dairy products to the caution list.
It was pretty unexpected, though. At a gathering of relatives, I seem to have been the only one affected. I think that a couple of years ago I would probably have been all right. But it won't do me any harm at all to drastically cut down on the (already low) amount of dairy in my diet.
And of course this puts me in line with the majority of humanity, whose tolerance for lactose ends with childhood. We who are (or, as in my case, were) able to digest dairy products as adults are mutants.
Perhaps an hour later I was seized by intense stomach cramps, followed by bloating and other symptoms which need not be further described, and retired to bed and could not get out of it (apart from repeated urgent trips across the landing) until the morning. I was already aware that too much cheese disagrees with me (but then again, that's what "too much" means) and now I must add cream and probably all dairy products to the caution list.
It was pretty unexpected, though. At a gathering of relatives, I seem to have been the only one affected. I think that a couple of years ago I would probably have been all right. But it won't do me any harm at all to drastically cut down on the (already low) amount of dairy in my diet.
And of course this puts me in line with the majority of humanity, whose tolerance for lactose ends with childhood. We who are (or, as in my case, were) able to digest dairy products as adults are mutants.