Anyone who knows me knows I like the odd drink. And I am not talking soft drinks, here. I mean hard drinks. Drinks like cider, vodka, wine and gin. Hic.
My parents were wine merchants so I reckon it’s a genetic thing. I once bumped into someone I hadn’t seen for a long time when I was in a cider tent at a festival. He said, “I should have known I would find a Fletcher (my maiden name) in here.”
I don’t think alcohol has ever made me feel well – and I don’t mean your bog-standard hangover. If only! I am slowly coming to the painful realisation that there is nothing I can drink that doesn’t cause some kind of strange reaction.
Every type of alcohol makes me bloated and some make my face flush and give me blotchy, bright red/purple patches on my face, neck and shoulders. Sometimes I feel nauseous after the first few sips.
I even get hives (an itchy skin rash and little white bumps), especially on my arms. Vodka makes me feel really ill. And when I drink wine, the next day my nose runs and I feel totally congested.
But hardly any of these reactions are consistent, which means I can’t pinpoint the type of alcohol, quantity or whether it’s certain mixers.
I have to follow a low FODMAP diet (see this blog for more information) and can’t have most things that contain fructose. I can’t have fresh apples and most ciders are now a no-no. Strongbow and Magners, however, are the best things that I can tolerate. Very, very odd when they are made from apples. I think sulphites are perhaps causing a slight issue but why do I get congested from wine and not cider? Why do I only sometimes get a flushed face? Surely if it was an alcohol intolerance, I would get symptoms all the time but, then again, I do get bloated. It is all so very puzzling.
Mixers are as big an issue as spirits – on the low FODMAP diet, you can only have a tiny bit of fruit juice and a lot of mixers contain either apple or fructose syrup, too.
When I was doing the elimination part of the FODMAP diet, someone at work asked me what I would want back the most: pizza, bread, chocolate or cider.
It was a no-brainer. Cider. Which just sums up the effort I am going to in the search for a suitable tipple.
By Karen Woodford – a slightly tipsy coeliac, lactose intolerant and low FODMAPer