As the doctors loaded me into an ambulance headed for Dallas, I remember being given a morphine pill to start tapering down the strength of my drugs. At Brook Army Medical Center I was on a morphine drip with “the button”. I could press the button any time I felt pain, and mostly I just pressed it because I was afraid of the idea of pain. The ride back home to North Texas was uneventful. I slept most of the time, Mom holding my hand as she rode alongside my stretcher.

Home for the foreseeable future was Plano Rehabilitation Hospital. Nurses wheeled me into a big white room with two white hospital beds and a big window overlooking the parking lot. Everyone was very nice, seemingly excited to see a young person for once. As I started my regimen of occupational therapy, speech therapy, and physical therapy, I noticed I was the youngest patient there. Plano Rehab was full of heart-attack and stroke victims, and a fifteen-year-old was an anomaly.

Being back in Dallas meant I could see my friends again. So many people from school and church came to visit. Some people made banners to put in my room and brought flowers and cards. Others got their whole youth group to write me letters. An elementary class drew pictures and sent individual notes. My school, Trinity Christian Academy, generously organized weeks and weeks of cooked dinners for my family. Our church gave us a journal full of prayers and thoughts people had written during a prayer meeting right after the accident. One time the worship band even came to the hospital to have a night of praise & worship.

Rehab was awful. I think anyone who has to do it hates it. Having a head injury meant I had to complete a certain amount of speech therapy. The phrase “speech therapy” really annoyed me because I didn’t have any trouble talking. It felt condescending. Mostly we worked on short-term memory exercises. Occupational therapy and physical therapy blend together in my mind. For a while I did exercises from my wheelchair, then as my broken femur started to heal, I was allowed to put a certain amount of weight on my right leg while using crutches. It is amazing how quickly unused muscles atrophy. The pictures from BAMC show a recognizable me with a partially shaved head. The pictures from Plano Rehab don’t even really look like me, I’m so skinny. Relearning to walk was strange. I will always have empathy for anyone in a wheelchair, or babies learning to walk.

I began to notice the way people stared at me. Family and friends had this sort of amazed look when they’d see me the first time, or the second, or the third. They kept calling me a miracle. I knew the Lord was working through all of this, I knew I was a miracle. Jesus saved me TWICE. I felt loved and grateful, to God and the people around me. But I was tired of being the center of attention. I wanted to be normal. Every kid wants to be normal, but I was desperate to be normal. I’d always felt different, but now I was so different. I felt coddled, which I hated. But I was also emotionally fragile and wanted special treatment. I remember arguing with my mom and sister over inconsequential things. I bossed my whole family around, sometimes even using the accident as an excuse.

I lived at Plano Rehab for around three weeks. I exercised, ate, and watched The Frugal Gourmet. My drug strength lessened from morphine, to Percocet, to Vicodin, and eventually ibuprofen. Then on Thanksgiving I was allowed to take my first day trip home. To our house. It was wonderful. Soon I moved home permanently. My bedroom was upstairs, but I lived on the first floor because I was still on crutches. Then I learned to climb stairs on crutches. Eventually I didn’t have to use crutches anymore. In December, not two months after the accident, I could walk with equal weight distributed on both of my legs. I had no brain damage. I could eat normal food.

Just a persistent, nagging pain in my left knee remained. I thought being allowed to put my full weight on both legs would fix it, but it didn’t. My “leg doctor” in Dallas, Dr. Simpson, recommended a knee specialist to check it out. After an MRI, Dr. Barber, now my “knee doctor”, suggested an arthroscopic surgery. He suspected it was some loose cartilage floating around my knee, but he couldn’t be certain without taking a peek inside. We scheduled a day surgery for December 29, 1995.

I do not recommend opting for day surgery, ever. Once Dr. Barber had the tiny cameras through tiny incisions in my knee, he saw that my ACL was completely torn. After quickly getting my parents permission to reconstruct the ligament, Dr. Barber performed the surgery. I knew something was different when I woke up in the recovery room. Dr. Barber and my parents explained what an ACL was, and I went home that day as planned. But not before bleeding through every bandage and weeping because of the pain. The knee surgery was by far the worst one I’d had.

I lived downstairs again for a few weeks, on crutches and Vicodin again. I watched reruns of the Dukes of Hazzard and Remington Steele. My friend Tori came over on New Year’s Eve to watch the ball drop in Times Square. 1996 arrived. I wanted to go back to school.

Two weeks after the knee surgery, I went back to the 9th grade. I was on crutches and wore baseball hats to cover my strange haircut. Only one teacher stopped me for breaking the dress code. Our private school was small, and we wore uniforms. I politely explained to her that I was in a car accident and had permission from the dean to wear the hat. Coach Morrill invited me to share my testimony in chapel one morning. I sat on stage in front of 400 high school students and told them what happened, how God was healing me. Good thing I took speech class right before the accident.

All of my teachers were really gracious. I had done off-season basketball before the accident and would’ve made the team if it hadn’t happened. When I came back to school they let me do off-campus PE for credit. Mrs. Allen said I could read the two books I’d missed in History/English the following summer. Coach Adams excused me from doing the worldview assignment in biology. Algebra was the only subject I had difficulty with. Every concept builds upon the previous, so there’s no skipping a section. I met with Mr. Pendleton for months trying to catch up in math. I believe that people are either good at algebra or geometry. I like geometry.

In February of 1996 I got a pixie haircut. The shaved part had grown out enough, and I wanted a change. Something to signify a new season of life. Three friends from school came with me to the salon when Ron, my hairdresser for the next 12 years, fixed it. We all talked about the older high school boys we liked. We left the salon, and Mom drove us to a TCA baseball game at Jesuit.

That spring I took studio art with Mr. Millet. He was the head of the Art Department and had been my teacher in 7th grade too. For our linoleum print assignment (pictured above), I took the concepts from pieces I’d made in Millet’s previous class and elaborated them: Michaelangelo’s self-portrait in the Sistine Chapel became my own; monkeys aloft became one lonely monkey. I incorporated every scar I had from the accident as iconography in the print, every broken bone, and a few coded messages to myself. I wish I could remember what they say.

I finished 9th grade with my class. I don’t remember much from that summer. Just getting over a gigantic crush I’d had on a boy since 7th grade. Working at St. Mark’s Day Camp with my friend Lindsay. Moving into a new house with my family. Turning sixteen. Getting my driver’s license. Life seemed like it was getting back to normal.

To be continued…

Sixteen years ago I almost died.

In late October 1995 my uncle Ron died suddenly of a heart attack, so my mom, dad, eighteen-year-old sister, and I (then fifteen) went to San Antonio for the funeral. The morning after the funeral, on Halloween, my family headed back to Dallas in our Nissan Altima. It was a drizzly morning, and I remember waving to my mom’s mom, Grandmacita, as we pulled out of her driveway. She always stood out in her front yard when we’d leave, holding one arm up with the other as she waved a long goodbye.

When we got on the highway, the rain started coming down harder, and soon it pummeled the car in sheets. We were near the Walzem Road exit on I-35 when we hit the truck. There was a big patch of standing water on the highway because of a stopped-up drain. A woman in a pick-up truck had almost gotten hit by an 18-wheeler that was jack-knifing, so she pulled over to the left-hand emergency lane. When we ran over the water, our Altima hydroplaned too, and we slammed into the back of the woman’s pick-up truck. The airbags deployed, and the car filled with smoke and powder. We’d never had a car with airbags before, so Mom & Dad thought it was on fire. They told my sister, Jenny, and me to get out of the car immediately. I got out on the left near the median, and Jenny exited on the right near traffic. Mom & Dad’s doors wouldn’t open in the front, so they climbed into the back to get out.

A Methodist minister driving his daughter’s Chevy Blazer hydroplaned next. I was walking away from our car when he hit me, then hit the back of the Altima. Mom & Dad heard me scream, and Jenny saw me get hit; but no one knew where I was. Then out of the corner of his eye, my dad saw me through the chain-linked fence on the south-bound side of the highway. We guess that the impact of the Blazer on my body threw me over the eight-food median. Mom, Dad, & Jenny climbed the fence and found me very broken and bleeding. My eyes were closed, and I looked dead.

Our family was in the middle of a difficult few years at this point: we’d lost our home the previous year, my sister and parents had very little trust between them, and I watched things bubble up and simmer down repeatedly, trying not to get in anyone’s way. As I lay on the highway, seemingly dead, my mom prayed Job’s prayer: “The Lord gives, and the Lord takes away, blessed be the name of the Lord” (Job 1:21). Right then I opened my eyes. Then my sister got on her knees, on the highway, and started confessing and repenting from all the things she’d been involved in the past few years. Jenny was convinced the accident wouldn’t have happened if she hadn’t walked away from relationship with God. Of course it wasn’t her fault, but it was an important moment for her and for our whole family.

Jeff & Anne Marie Creekmore, a deputy sheriff and former paramedic, were on their way to Oklahoma to visit family when they saw us on the highway. They stopped immediately, climbed the fence, and helped us. Anne Marie tried to assess my wounds while she asked me my name and age. I could only respond in unintelligible groans. Jeff directed traffic away from us. A hispanic pastor stopped to pray with my parents. Pretty soon the paramedics came and took me away to Brook Army Medical Center. Daddy stayed with me, while Mom & Jenny were taken to another hospital for their more minor injuries.

At BAMC things progressed quickly. Initially there was a line for the CT-scan, so I waited, sedated, since I had fought the doctors trying to examine me at the accident scene. Then my blood pressure dropped suddenly. Doctors took a sample of my stomach fluid and found a tremendous amount of bad bacteria, so they rushed me into the CT-scan. It showed that my liver was lacerated and bleeding, and that means you’re going to die. So the doctors prepped for immediate surgery. Once inside of my abdomen, they saw that my liver was perfect, completely unscathed. We believe the Lord healed it instantly. My pancreas, just behind the duodenum, was completely intact. My duodenum, however, had exploded. So the doctors re-routed my intestines. In an experimental surgery I will be forever grateful for, they put in a false part to work while my duodenum healed; but once it healed, the false part would shut down. Ostensibly I’d never have to have another stomach surgery.

My skull was cracked in two places, so the doctors shaved a quarter of my head and drilled a hole to release the brain pressure. My right femur was broken into three pieces, so they inserted a titanium rod down the shaft of the bone to hold the pieces together, the rod held in place with screws in my hip and near my knee (pictured above). My left leg was incredibly swollen, but at this point the doctors couldn’t tell if there was any serious damage. Three teams of surgeons worked for two days to stabilize me. I was in a partially medically-induced coma, and there was no guarantee I’d survive, or even come out of the coma.

The doctors at BAMC were realistic with my parents: people don’t just wake up from this kind of head trauma. If she survives, Mandy’s most likely going to be in a coma. If she’s not in a coma, she’ll likely have amnesia. Expect the worst. But Mom & Dad refused to accept this. They prayed. Our whole extended family in San Antonio prayed. Our church, my school, and all our friends in Dallas prayed. Friends in California flew to Texas to stand with us in prayer. Friends from Florida did the same. Our story got on the 700 Club prayer list. Churches and youth groups all over the country were praying for us. And it worked. God answered.

After five days in a coma, I woke up. My dad’s youngest brother, Mark, was in the ICU room with me when it happened. I looked up at him and said, “Hi Uncle Mark.” Soon my parents were with me, praising God for a miracle. One of the first things I remember is singing The Doxology by myself in the room.

After I woke up from the coma, they moved me to a regular room. It was small, with only room for my hospital bed and an awkward recliner my family took turns sleeping on every night. I was on a lot of morphine at this point, so I don’t remember much, but I do remember watching a Fabian movie on the television in my room. Jeff & Anne Marie brought me a model of a red VW bug. The Walkers came from California to see me. All of my nurses were big Army men in fatigues. My sister bought me The Beatles Magical Mystery Tour and the soundtrack to Bye Bye Love on tape to play on my Walkman. I dreamt that God wanted me to go on the roof of the hospital and throw down balloons like basketballs. And I remember Lieutenant Colonel Murray, my head surgeon, telling my parents and me that I was a testament to the power of prayer and the greatest medical technology they could offer me. My recovery was going miraculously and quickly. Ten days after the accident, it was time to move me back to Dallas.

To be continued…

We sold Pepe on Sunday. He died in February of this year, but we had him in our driveway till yesterday afternoon. I’m sad. I’m really sad. And a little confused. It seems over-reactionary or shallow to have such deep attachment to a car. But he was my friend.

He was my first car—a beautiful, black 1995 Toyota 4Runner with tan leather interior and a sunroof. I remember driving to the dealer’s with my dad in 1998 to test drive him. It was just a month before I started my senior year of high school, and I had all the money to buy my dream car. It was some of the first official paperwork I ever signed, and I still have every page.

The first time I heard Switchfoot, Pepe & I lived in Seattle, Washington. I had taken a year out after high school to do a discipleship training program called Master’s Commission. My friend Lucie & I plotted our escape from MC in Pepe on days when we didn’t feel like attending class, scheming to drive all the way to Portland. I got my first 3 tickets, and only moving violations, in Pepe with Sam Richards in 2001 at Frankford & the Tollway in Dallas. I remember listening to Coldplay’s Rush of Blood to the Head on repeat in the 4Runner, and all of the mixed CDs Joshua made me when we were first falling in love. I would sing to The Cardigan’s Long Gone Before Daylight like it was the last time I’d ever sing as I drove down the Tollway or 635 or I-75. The day we moved to Boston, Joshua backed into a dumpster and broke the right rear-view mirror. We never got it fixed. My friend Melissa broke the sunroof late one night when my sister & brother-in-law were first married and lived on Skillman. I never got that fixed either.

Pepe took me from senior year in high school, to Master’s Commission, through college, through my years working at the Trinity Trust, through the first 4 years of marriage, living in Dallas to Seattle to Boston to South Carolina. I carried my nephew and niece in him when they were first born. Joshua & I drove Pepe to San Antonio the weekend we got engaged, and then 4 or 5 more times to plan our wedding. So many memories with that truck, and now he’s gone.

Joshua says it’s normal to have feelings like this for a vehicle. Throughout time people have set up memorial stones to remember, and that’s how it is with Pepe. He was my memorial stone. He was the symbol of my young adult life. From the time I was 18 to 30. I turn 31 this week, and my friend won’t be there.

It was a relief when he died and I knew we’d be getting a new car, a Prius. Better gas mileage, more modern, more indicative of the life we want to live… but no more Pepe. No more hauling recyclables in him, no more florescent green paint stains in the way back, no more putting a tape-thing in to play a portable CD player or rigging an iPod from a cigarette lighter charger. No more buzzing from the front left speaker because the odometer cable had fallen out of place. No more oil leaking from the rear main seal that needs replacing. No more sitting on faux-sheepskin covers my parents bought because the leather seats were cracked and gushing foam stuffing. No more cracked dashboard because I never put up a sunscreen when Dad told me to. No more cracked windshield that grew and grew since the first day I owned him.

I named him Pepe because of the movie Romancing the Stone. When we were kids, my sister and I watched the edited-for-TV version that we’d taped on the VCR at home ad nausium. Our whole family had it memorized. “You want to kill me?! Take me back to Queens and kill me!” an irate Ralph (Danny DeVito) says to his brother Ira. “Aw, dammit man, the Doobie Brothers broke up!” Jack Colton (Michael Douglas) laments in a marijuana smoke-filled haze. “Angel, you are hell and gone from Cartagena,” Jack Colton tells Joan Wilder (Kathleen Turner) who’s looking for a phone. But Pepe appears when Jack Colton and Joan Wilder approach a local Columbian drug-lord, Juan (played by The Three Amigos’ El Guapo, Alfonso Arau), for a lift: “Oh, the men in the village told you I had a car? They’re such comedians. They mean my little mule, Pepe.” Cut to the next scene where Juan, Joan Wilder, and Jack Colton bust through a gate in a monster truck. Pepe the Columbian monster truck was a hero, and my Pepe was no different.

I’ll miss you my little Pepito. Thank you for all the years of faithful service and sweet memories. I’ll never forget.

It reminds me of a scene in Sabrina, the 1954 movie with Audrey Hepburn, Humphrey Bogart, & William Holden. Linus Larrabee (Humphrey Bogart) is explaining to his brother David (William Holden) the virtue of moving their plastics industry into the Caribbean: “So a new industry goes up in an underdeveloped area and once barefooted kids have shoes, washed faces, and their teeth fixed.”

I would certainly consider myself an idealist. It doesn’t matter how much something costs in the moment if long term the benefit outweighs momentary outlay. I say let’s invest in research for the best green energy possible (solar, wind) rather than settle for another fossil fuel source that will carry us for the next 20-50 years. Cradle to Cradle innovation is far and away better for everyone and everything than recycling plastic, for example, and merely postponing its eventual death in a landfill.

But there are those times when a 90% or even 70% solution is the best right now. Compromise is better than stagnation. How do you decide if idealism or compromise is the win?

God’s Son, Jesus Christ, came to earth and lived among us, died to pay the penalty for our sin, and rose from death. The Bible says that “the wages of sin is death” (Romans 6:23). Death is the penalty for all human sin. In our sin nature, we are under the wrath of God and will spend eternity apart from Him in Hell. But through belief in Jesus Christ—believing that He is the Son of God and paid for our sins, for my sin, and rose to conquer death—I am no longer under God’s wrath but under His grace. I can have direct relationship with God through Jesus Christ. God is so kind, and so wonderful, that He met the requirement for His holy law when I couldn’t. He paid the debt that I owe and could never pay back. This is the ultimate gift. And I want it with my whole heart.

I believe that God is one, infinite, all-powerful Being. There is no other God besides Him. Yet while God is inseparably one, He is in three persons (the Trinity): Father God, Jesus Christ, and the Holy Spirit. The Bible is God’s inspired Word to humanity, and from it we learn the truth about everything. Human science and logic, indeed, all of the physical world and universe around us is evidence that God is the Creator of all. It is beautifully planned, wonderfully executed, and perfectly intricate, so the Creator of all this must be astoundingly clever. The fact that plants, animals, and humans reproduce at all is a miracle of miracles. Only the highest, most holy, wonderful Being could have thought of that and written it into our DNA.

I was raised in a Christian home, and so it certainly has been reinforced as truth in my life from a young age. But my parents never coerced me into believing; they never made me do anything faith related. I was by myself when I chose to believe in Christ. I prayed alone and believed in Jesus, and He revealed Himself to me from that point on. He reveals Himself through the Bible and through the Holy Spirit who lives inside of me (I’ll address this concept more fully in a later post).

My belief in inherent human sin is based in the creation story about Adam & Eve. The Bible tells us that Adam’s “one trespass led to condemnation for all men,” and “by the one man’s disobedience the many were made sinners…” (Romans 5:18, 19). As a Protestant, I believe that Jesus Christ is my only mediator with God. Though there are many saints who have lived before me, I don’t pray to any of them, nor do I need a priest to speak to God on my behalf. This is the beauty of believing in Christ: Through Jesus, God made a way for me to be in right relationship with Him. I have unhindered access to Him. I don’t want to believe in anything that puts an obstacle in my way, that makes it difficult to know God. Jesus paid the price for my sin, and now I don’t have to be separated from Him anymore.

In his last email, Moein asked me to respond to some deep questions by way of blog post. I’ll be addressing each one individually, and I would appreciate other friends to chime in as well. I hope to stimulate some enlightening and entertaining conversation for Moein. Yay!

So then, over on the left side of the website here I have an “About” section. There I divulge that “I am passionate about God, Green living, good health, and the correct use of the English language.” What do I mean by “The Correct Use of the English Language” Moein wonders? Well, I mean this…

Too many Americans nowadays have little respect for our language. People constantly redefine words so that words lose their meaning. Some colloquialisms are inevitable, but (for example) when “bad” means good, and “good” means weak, the true weight of using the word “bad” to signify evil or “good” to mean wonderful (not mediocre) is completely lost. I wonder if this problem exists with the Persian language too (or even Spanish, of which I have a more than cursory knowledge).

In the United States popular culture has always redefined language, and to an extent I think this is good. It’s how the younger generation sets itself apart from the stodgy ways of the old. But when language can no longer adequately communicate, or you have to use SO many words to explain your thoughts (to get just the right meaning across, because simply saying what you mean could be misinterpreted by the hearer), language has lost its purpose.

There’s a movie called My Fair Lady that was filmed in the 1960s where one of the characters laments “Why Can’t the English Learn to Speak” in a catchy song. In the movie it was more of a class problem (upper/richer classes valuing proper use of language, lower/poorer classes demeaning it). I suppose upper, middle, and lower classes in the United States have the same issue, but it definitely seems to be more of an age gap.

What do you think?

And so, I began making my own concoctions. I’m voting for health with my money. Every dollar I spend on raw ingredients for toiletries & cleaners means less toxins in my body. And wouldn’t you know it, it’s cheaper. Now I’m paying LESS for a better product.

DEODORANT
5-6 Tbsp. Extra Virgin Coconut Oil*
1/4 cup baking soda
1/4 cup Arrowroot Powder
Several drops fragrant essential oil, optional

Place mixing bowl with ingredients over warm water in the sink—EVCO* is solid at room temperature, but melts when warm. Mix until ingredients are combined. Pour into deodorant container and place in refrigerator until solid again. Refrigerating the deodorant ensures ingredients are uniformly mixed and that EVCO doesn’t rise to the top.

Elements Bath & Body has lovely little deodorant containers for those of us who don’t want to reuse an old deo tube. I like the 2 oz. Natural Twist Up, but this deodorant is also easy to apply with your hands. In fact, you can just rub the leftovers on like lotion.

LAUNDRY DETERGENT
1 cup Dr. Bronner’s Sal Suds
2 cups water
1/3 cup salt
1 cup baking soda

Warm water, salt, and baking soda in a sauce pan over Low-Medium heat on stove until mostly dissolved—the baking soda will not completely dissolve. Pour into a gallon container with Sal Suds (I use empty distilled white vinegar bottles). Fill rest of bottle with water, and shake well. The baking soda will settle to the bottom, so shake bottle before each use. Use 1/4-1/2 Cup of detergent for each load of laundry.

For a natural fabric softener, whitener & color brightener, and to remove static cling, use 1/4-/1/2 cup distilled white vinegar in the rinse cycle.

(Thanks to Lindsay Edmonds at Passionate Homemaking for these recipes. They work like a dream!)

So we must give up joy in the form of bread, pizza, pasta, and other grain-rich foods. Or so we think. But nowadays gluten-free options abound. You just have to know where to look.

LABELS
If you’re trying to avoid gluten, reading food labels is a MUST. Sadly, the gluten in wheat can’t be taken out, so look for grains that don’t have it in them in the first place: corn, potato, rice, millet, quinoa, tapioca, and amaranth are a few. Keep an eye out for hidden ingredients in prepared foods; if you see the words “wheat,” “rye,” “barley,” “kamut” or “spelt” (both are types of wheat) on any food label, run the other way. Oats, while they don’t have gluten, are most often processed with wheat and are therefore contaminated.

RESTAURANTS
The gluten-intolerant person can eat some off-limits items now and again, but someone with celiac disease can’t afford to indulge even a bit. Thus all breads, pastries, pastas, pizzas, crackers, croutons, cakes, cookies, etc. are a big no-no. Unless the menu states plainly that it’s made without gluten, veer on the cautious side. But you can always ask your server. Some Asian restaurants may serve rice noodles instead of durum wheat (the most common noodles), and certain pizza places offer gluten-free dough (yay Mellow Mushroom!). Also watch out for sauces and gravies: most are thickened with all-purpose flour or corn starch, but make sure you know which one. Corn starch is ok, flour is not.

ALCOHOL
Remember the mantra “Beer before liquor, never been sicker / Liquor before beer, you’re in the clear”? Well, it’s a good rule of thumb for gluten-intolerance. Beer is almost always made with malted barley, wheat, oats, or rye, and is therefore an incredibly poor choice for the gluten-intolerant. Wine and spirits (such as brandy, gin, rum, tequila, vodka, and whisky), however, are perfect beverage choices. I was somewhat shocked when my doctor told me (in all sincerity) it was better for me to drink hard liquor than beer—though I’ll be honest, I’m not sure why the grains in whiskey are ok to drink and not those in beer; I’m trusting Dr. Grisanti, and his advice has proven very reliable. I have since developed an affection for bourbon that my husband finds comical.

BRANDS
More and more companies are paying attention to consumers’ special diet needs. When cooking at home, I substitute gluten-free products for regular ones in any recipe I’m making—except tortillas. Still haven’t figured out how to replicate my Grandmacita’s perfect flour tortillas without gluten. But other than that, the substitutions work perfectly. The Julia Child soufflé I made using gluten-free all-purpose flour was delightful. AND my Grandma Jolly’s Chocolate Pound Cake was a total success. Here are some of my GF staples.

Udi
Bob’s Red Mill
Tinkyada Pasta
Ener-G
Arrowhead Mills
Mary’s Gone Crackers
Lundberg

A FINAL ENCOURAGEMENT
Going gluten-free often means you’re eating healthier because you’re opting for a wider variety of whole grains as opposed to refined ones. Whole grains mean more nutrients and fiber, and the standard American diet (or SAD) is in desperate need of those. Here’s to a healthier life!