From the piles of used tissues and empty cough drop wrappers surrounding me, any observer would be able to tell that I have the flu. But my flu is much more than a reaction to the dramatic changes that mark freshman year – it’s a direct result of eating in the dining halls.

Let me first say that my case is not typical, and although it has happened in the past, my aim is not to make any of the hard working members of food service staff cry. See, I’m special. I have gluten intolerance.

What is gluten? It’s a protein found in wheat, rye and barley. In the United States, there is not sufficient segregation between these grains and oats, so oats cannot be safely considered gluten-free, even though they do not contain gluten on their own.

Furthermore, gluten, extracted from wheat, is a favorite industrial filler because it is cheap, adds significant mass and makes products more stable. The contaminated pet food scare earlier this year? Guess which staple of processed food was contaminated. Yup, gluten.

As a freshman, I have been given an apartment-style residence hall in 319 Huntington Ave., giving me the option of preparing many of my own meals in my own kitchen. Which I have. But I do have the freshmen required 10 meals a week meal plan, and in the mornings or between classes, it’s easier to just swipe a card than cook.

Breakfast is pretty straightforward: eggs, potatoes and orange juice. But lunch and dinner are another thing. As a person who does not eat meat, I am offered basically two options – salad or stir-fry. Most of the salad dressings have soy sauce (made with wheat) or gluten as filler, which further limits my options. Stir-fry, which without sauce is gluten-free, is cooked on the same griddle as the gluten-laden sauces.

So after a request for the staff to cook my food on clean cooking surfaces, I accepted their assurances that the griddle would be properly cleaned.

My lunch and dinner diet during the past few weeks has consisted mainly of the salad bar (where there is no guarantee that the serving utensils are used only in their respective bins) and stir-fry made with oil and vinegar. Yet despite my due diligence, I have been feeling increasingly sick , culminating in my inability to sleep Tuesday night.

I was up until 3:30 a.m. because I couldn’t get enough mucus out of my clogged sinuses to kill the massive headache I had. Fifty milligrams of Benadryl and 400 milligrams of ibuprofen later, I was blissfully sleeping. On Wednesday morning, I slept through three alarms, waking up at 1 p.m. to discover that not only had I missed what is probably my favorite class, but that I also had a fever. Such a bad fever I couldn’t see straight.

Where does my gluten intolerance come in? Every period of my recent life in which I have consistently eaten gluten has ended with a flu. And that is what I have.

Most problems have a solution. Mine may or may not. But next time you’re at the salad bar, and you grab some croutons, don’t use that same utensil in the Parmesan cheese or the lettuce.

And, food service employees: when you’re deciding which vendors to buy from, keep more than your own budget in mind. Look for the least processed foods, and try to give more options for those of us who suffer.

Now I’m going back to my apartment-style residence hall to fill my bloodstream with over-the-counter cold medication, and then I’m going to try to sleep.

– Daniel Stoller is a freshman journalism major.