The Only Poison Plant I Fear

I sit with the most deadly poisonous plants as a spiritual practice. I handle flowers historically used in human sacrifices with my bare hands. I save seeds that can disfigure animals and drive people insane. I’ve become comfortable working with all plants, no matter their reputation - all, except one.

There is only one that makes me physically recoil, as if my body wants to stay as far away from it as possible. It will never be found in my thriving poison garden. I avoid touching it. I feel the stress rise in my body just thinking about it.

You want to know what plant I’m afraid of?

Wheat.

Wheat is one of the most common food crops in the entire world and doesn’t usually strike fear into peoples’ hearts. It’s quite the opposite - this is a plant that has been nourishing the human race for around 12,000 years. It’s become such a major part of our lives that religious ceremonies and mythological deities have been developed in its honor. Artists have elevated wheat fields as idyllic landscapes in their paintings, romantizicing our relationship throughout history. We use phrases like ‘breaking bread’ as a saying for having a meal, and emphasize its value when we use terms like ‘dough’ for money. This plant has a presence with so many facets.

It’s also kept up with the changes in humanity to remain relevant. Triticum aestivum is the species that we consume today, also known as ‘common wheat’. This specific type was developed around 9,000 years ago through hybridization. Triticum urartu (a form of einkorn wheat) and Aegilops speltoides (an edible goatgrass) performed the initial hybridization to create Triticum turgidum, known as ‘durum wheat’. This durum wheat continued on to hybridize with Aegilops tauschii (another goatgrass) to develop Triticum aestivum, which is what we use as food for everything from crackers to cakes to thickening sauces.

The development of wheat and grain marked one of the reasons that humanity pivoted from nomadic lifestyles into agricultural systems. Agriculture brought domestication of livestock, settling into cities, and even organized government. It is the spark that lit the fire of civilization as we know it. These plants aren’t just interwoven with our culture; they’re the foundation for it.

As our own human species shifted into a reliance on cultivated crops, most bodies were able to adapt and accommodate these foods. But most doesn’t mean everybody. The bodies that didn’t adapt developed food intolerances, sensitivities, and allergies - essentially rejecting specific foods with differing severities. While our understanding of these reactions has grown exponentially in the past century, they’ve always existed. Historically labeled as ‘malnutrition’, ‘poor development’, or ‘failure to thrive’, people have been dying from the inability to digest common foods for as long as we’ve been farming.

My body is one that has resisted the development of civilization in many ways. Most inconveniently, this shows up in its decision to be allergic to wheat.

When I say that I can’t have wheat, I don’t mean I get a stomach ache or indigestion if I eat bread. If I inhale one particle of wheat dust, I become partially blind and lose function in half of my body like I’m having a stroke. The symptoms last for days and cause my life to come to a screeching halt. There is no cure, no medicine, nothing to alleviate the reaction - all I can do is retreat deep into my internal catacombs and lay in a dark room until it’s over.

Wheat is everywhere in our world and this allergy defines much of my life. Eating in restaurants is impossible; if a cook touches a piece of bread and then touches my food, I will be lost in the ethers for about three days. Sharing a meal at a friend’s house paints me as a rude guest who has to refuse hospitality. I cannot even kiss my kids after they’ve eaten a treat containing gluten or I’ll be thrown into an unwanted psychedelic experience. This plant has put up so many walls in my life that it’s become a labyrinth to navigate its existence.

While wheat may not elicit such reactions in your body, mine experiences it as poison even at a microscopic dose. I have to be constantly vigilant outside of my gluten-free home, even if it’s just touching the steering wheel of a car that someone ate a burrito in or avoiding the flour aisle at the grocery store. My particular toxin is so common in our culture, forcing me to move with intentionality where others don’t need to think twice. The invisible danger draws a dividing line that people without food allergies don’t see. Because I have to be so careful whenever I am in a shared space, I find myself often carrying a dose of fear.

Tending to brugmansia or hiking alongside poison hemlock are, comparatively, much less of a threat to my body because their existence is contained within their own. I know to be careful around their presence - and then I have the ability to walk away and relax. No one is grinding up datura seeds and then using the same machine to break down my lunch. I’m not going to find castor bean crumbs on someone’s couch. And even then, sometimes it seems like the toxic dose for these powerful plants is more lenient than my body’s rigid rule against wheat.

I’ve written a lot about how poison is verb, not an all-defining label that we can assign. The dosage needs to be considered just as much as the substance itself; even something as essential for life as water can kill you if used at an incorrect amount. But there is another facet in the equation to determine a reaction: the specific person interacting with the so-called poison. Each person’s body is wildly different and processes the world in unique ways. Poison ivy can be responsible for blistering rashes persisting for weeks to some, while other people can touch it without any problem. Adding to the complexity is that bodies are always growing, which means reactions can suddenly change or worsen throughout a life. Blanket statements about particular diets, exercises, and herbs do us all a disservice, deferring the very connection we have with our own selves. It was only when I listened to my body’s particular needs did I finally get a grasp on how to care for it. My faulty assumption that I could eat what everyone else was feasting on led me to suffer. And my naive ideas of what poison looked like did irreparable harm.

What nourishes one person could kill someone else. The only poison plant I am afraid of may be your favorite food. And much like how biodiversity indicates a healthy ecosystem, it’s these variations that enrich the human experience and make each of us important to the whole.