Why Confidence With Food Takes Time when you are Gluten Free

Have you ever looked at someone who's been gluten-free for years and thought, "I wish I were that confident?" 

They seem to know exactly what questions to ask at restaurants, confidently decline unsafe food, and bring their own meals without a second thought. 

Meanwhile, you're standing in the grocery store reading the same label three times, wondering if you're overlooking something important. 

If that's you, I want you to know that confidence with food doesn't happen overnight. It's something that develops over time through experience—one grocery trip, one restaurant meal, one awkward conversation, and sometimes one mistake at a time. 

In today's episode, I'm sharing why confidence with food takes time, what helped me build it, and why where you are right now is completely normal. 

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Transcript

Why Food Confidence Feels Hard

Carrie Saunders 0:00

Quick reminder before we get started on this episode. This podcast is based on my personal experiences and isn't medical advice. Have you ever looked at someone who's been gluten-free for years and thought, I wish I were that confident? They seem to know exactly what questions to ask at restaurants. They confidently decline unsafe food. They bring their own meals without apologizing. And meanwhile, you're standing in the grocery store reading the same label three times, wondering if you're missing something. If that's you, I want you to know that confidence with food doesn't happen overnight. It is built. One grocery trip, one restaurant experience, one awkward conversation, one mistake at a time. In today's episode, we're talking about why confidence with food takes time, what helped me build it, and why where you are right now is completely normal. And stick around because I want to share an analogy that completely changed how I think about this journey. Let's dive in. Welcome to

The Gluten-Free Learning Curve

Carrie Saunders 0:54

the Gluten Free Engineer Podcast. I'm your host, Kiri Saunders. In 2011, I was diagnosed with celiac disease, a moment that changed everything. But I was determined not to let it hold me back. With my two engineering degrees, I set out to reverse engineer the gluten-free lifestyle, breaking down recipes, safety tips, travel hacks, and everything in between to rebuild a life I love. Whether you have celiac disease, gluten intolerance, or simply choose to live gluten-free, this podcast is for you. Join me each week as we simplify the gluten-free lifestyle, make it fun, and prove that you don't have to miss out on anything. Welcome back to the show. Today we're talking about why confidence with food takes time when you're gluten-free. This is something that many times people think I should know this by now, or they feel like they should learn it so much faster. But the reality is that nobody teaches us this unless you have a parent who's celiac or a parent who's gluten-free. There isn't like a general gluten-free manual, and it takes practice, especially in modern day food and living where gluten is everywhere, unlike it was not really anywhere long, long, long ago. So confidence isn't something you wake up with one day. It's something you build through experience.

Early Fears And Label Doubt

Carrie Saunders 2:09

So I want to first talk about what confidence looked like for me early on. I've been doing this for since about 2011, and it may seem that I'm pretty confident with gluten-free. And I in general I feel like I am compared to where I used to be. But where I used to be is I used to second guess every label. I used to read ingredients repeatedly and over and over again. I tried to remember those nuanced names for wheat that weren't really that commonly known. I would feel like I was going to miss something and I was afraid I was going to miss something. I would go to restaurants and worry about not necessarily asking questions, but getting honest answers back and being uncertain about safety. I wasn't one that was very shy about asking, but I was just always afraid I wouldn't get maybe a very specific answer back, or they would kind of tell me something just to make me feel better, but it would put me at risk for getting cross-contaminated. And I used to feel guilty bringing my own food. I didn't want to inconvenience other others, and I didn't want to feel different. It was something I had to learn. I wasn't lacking confidence because I was doing something wrong. I was learning an entirely new way to navigate the world, and I knew nobody else around me who had to do this before me. So I was a bit of, you know, the first person in our family and friend group that needed to be gluten-free. Now it's totally different now. We found out our children have celiac. I have first cousins that have celiac. My dad had celiac and didn't tell anybody. I have other people who are gluten sensitive or celiac around me now. But in the beginning, I was the only one. So I

Repetition Builds Real Confidence

Carrie Saunders 3:49

want to encourage you that confidence is built through repetition. For example, every grocery chip is going to give you more confidence. Every successful ref restaurant is going to give you more confidence. And every safe social event is going to give you more confidence. You don't build confidence before doing hard things. You build confidence by doing the hard things. I'm going to repeat that again. You don't build confidence before doing the hard things. You build confidence by doing the hard things. So know that confidence is going to build and going to happen for you.

Mistakes Without Self-Blame

Carrie Saunders 4:24

And I want to normalize that mistakes are part of learning. Unfortunately, you know, nobody wants to get glutened. Nobody wants to feel bad, but it's just part of the learning. Sometimes we get accidentally glutened. We think we know what we are getting into, but we've made a mistake, or somebody else has made a mistake. It can be super, super frustrating. But I want to encourage you when this happens, try not to get too frustrated. Try to look at it from a place of curiosity. What could I have done differently? What could somebody else have done differently? How could I have made this a better situation? So when a mistake happens, try not to beat yourself up. Use curiosity to help you learn and to do a better job next time. It doesn't mean that you're failing whenever you make a mistake. We are learning in that case.

Advocacy Gets Easier With Practice

Carrie Saunders 5:18

And I do want you to know that about advocacy gets easier with practice. We are, you know, in the beginning, you might have uncomfortable, you might get uncomfortable questions, you might apologize, you might feel like you're being difficult, but over time you can ask more confidently. It's going to become more muscle memory and just something you naturally do. You're going to advocate without guilt and you're going to understand your needs matter. It's something you're going to build over time and you're going to feel so much better. Advocating for yourself is a skill. Just like teenagers and you know young adults need to learn this. And like any skill, it gets easier with practice. Now, even though I've been doing this since 2011, some situations still can feel hard. Going over to other people's homes and eating their food. There can be uncertainty there. I want to make I want to try to trust the person, but sometimes you can't. Other can be social pressure as well. Um, new restaurants, you know, we've tried quite a few new restaurants lately. We've traveled all the way from Ohio to Texas and back. And there can be unknowns there and unfamiliar systems, unfamiliar people that you're talking to. So it can really um change how you feel whenever you're trying to do these things. Again, it feels like you might be starting back from zero, which is can be very normal. So even if you get confident and then you feel like you've been set back some, that's also very normal too. Confidence doesn't mean never feeling nervous, it means trusting yourself to navigate those situations. And

The Toddler Walking Analogy

Carrie Saunders 6:54

then I want to encourage you that learning to live gluten-free is a lot like learning to walk. At first, you crawl, you pull yourself up, you hold on to things. Eventually, you take a few steps while you're holding on to something, and then you might let go and take a few steps out and out in the open. And sometimes you're going to fall down. But what happens to a toddler? They get back up, they keep trying until one day walking becomes second nature to you, and that's going to be similar for you as well. No one expects a toddler to walk perfectly on their first try. So, why do we expect that from ourselves with gluten-free living? I want that to hit home for you because I feel like it's so easy for us as human beings to beat ourselves up and to self-judge. So, what I want you to know, no matter where you are in your gluten-free journey, you are not behind. You are not bad at this. You are not overreacting. You are learning, you are adapting, you are building skills. The confidence you're looking for comes from continuing to show up, even when it feels hard.

Trust Yourself And Keep Going

Carrie Saunders 8:00

So I want to reiterate the confidence grows through time, repetition, learning from mistakes, self-advocacy, and giving yourself grace. At the end of the day, confidence with food isn't something you're either born with or not. It's something you build one label, one meal, one restaurant, one conversation at a time. And even if you stumble along the way, you're still moving forward. So the biggest takeaway I want you to take from today's episode is confidence isn't the absence of fear. It's trusting yourself to handle what comes next. You don't need to know how to run yet. Right now, maybe you're just learning to take your first steps, and that's enough.

Share, Subscribe, And Resources

Carrie Saunders 8:41

Thank you for listening to this episode of the Gluten Free Engineer. If you found value in this story, please share it with someone who might need encouragement on their own gluten-free journey. For more tips, recipes, resources, and even links to my YouTube channel, head on over to theglutenfreengineer.com. It's your one-stop hub to make gluten-free living simple, fun, and full of flavor. And don't forget to subscribe so you never miss out on an episode. And we will see you next week. The Gluten Free Engineer Podcast is for informational and entertainment purposes only. I share my personal experiences and stories about living with celiac disease and navigating a gluten free lifestyle. This podcast does not provide medical advice. Always consult with a qualified healthcare professional for medical questions, concerns, or advice specific to your health.