On Mom
By Judy Herod

Your mother was a remarkable woman. I hear it everywhere. To us, the qualities that set Mom apart and made her extraordinary in so many people’s eyes, were quite ordinary. To live meant striving tirelessly, it meant being fueled by passion for one’s beliefs, it meant railing against injustice and forging one’s own path. All of these were the norm in our house.

But you know this about my mother. The reason I chose to speak is to share with you some of her life story -- much of it through her own words. She began writing her autobiography at the request of Judy Gorman of New York, who is writing a book about her experiences with the Specific Carbohydrate Diet and her autistic son. Mom did not get as far as we wish she had, but what she wrote offers many clues into the shaping of a character that was truly 90 per cent grit, spunk and determination.

Elaine Gloria Reichbaum was born at home in a suburb of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania on August 18, 1921. The family was poor. Her father was not around much. Grandparents, uncles and aunts lived together in the small house. Her mother, Jenny, was an invalid from the time of Mom’s birth, but her love was a powerful force in Mom’s life. Mom writes… “She, Jenny, adored me and I think that first year of love gave me the strength to carry on through the rest of my life  - until Judy became ill.”

From her earliest days her boundless energy showed. She was into everything, and her German granny called her a Koch leffel – a mixing spoon. Sadly, she was blamed for her mother’s ill health, but she did not accept this.
“I knew that I did not make my mother sick, and I think that was the start of my losing respect for authority figures and what they proclaimed,” she writes. “If that is the start of believing in yourself, then it started there!”

Many years later, when a New York gastroenterologist blamed Mom for my colitis, she writes: “I would die before I would believe this and, thus, began the fight of my life to save her and save me.”

She grew up during the Depression, and the family moved every school term as her father searched for work. From Pittsburgh, to Brooklyn, back to Pittsburgh, to Baltimore, back to Pittsburgh and on and on… Mom never got over this. The most crushing move came six months before she was to graduate from Forest Park High in Baltimore, where the family had finally put down roots. Her mother, Jenny, died and the family’s short-lived stability ended. “All dreams of going to college were smashed,” she writes. She was forced to move in with relatives in Brooklyn and her working life began.

The war was on.  I continued working as a secretary and sold war bonds in front of the Astor Hotel every night.  How I remember the mobs of people at Times Square. At the start of 1943, after a few trips back to Pittsburgh and my Father's death, I returned to New York and decided to change jobs.  Little did I know that the employment agency across the hall at my old job, was recruiting help for the Manhattan Project.  I thought that when they sent me to the Teacher's College at Columbia University for an interview, I would be working for some faculty member. In two days, they called and gave me a map of the campus
 and told me to go down 3 flights of stairs to the geology building.  When I descended, I saw two guards standing at a barricade and, giving them the pass, they opened the door to the… "beginning of my life."

The first person she met was introduced to her this way: “Elaine, this is Herb Gottschall, and he won't forget your name because his fiancée’s name is Elaine.”

I thought, "Oh, what a lucky girl she is!"  

I don’t need to refer to Mom’s words to tell you this part of her story – I know it well because she never let us forget that Dad was her knight in shining armor. Obviously, his engagement to that other Elaine didn’t last. Mom and Dad were married in New York on October 8th, 1944. He proposed to her by leaving a small wrapped package on her typewriter – a diamond engagement ring – on her birthday, August 18th, 1944.

When the pilot plant project at Columbia University -- separating Uranium 235 from Uranium 238 – ended, they moved to Oak Ridge, Tennessee. Joan was born in Oak Ridge on April 23, 1947. Five and half years later, I was born in New Jersey on December 23rd, 1952.  

Mom writes that she recognized signs of illness in me from early on. Nose bleeds, night sweats, months of persistent diarrhea. The awful night terrors began when I was 3. I remember them vividly, then the toilet filled with blood – many of you know the story of my illness.

A parade of doctors across the United States, lots of emotional trauma to an entire family, a dying child, surgery imminent, many scars, so let me skip to our beloved Dr. Sidney Valentine Haas, the 92-year-old New York physician whose Specific Carbohydrate Diet saved our lives. I was eight years old.

Unfortunately, Mom’s story stops here. The last words she wrote of her autobiography are these:

When we started making arrangements for the surgery, I began to cry.  That was when this doctor said, "What are you crying about, Mrs. Gottschall?  You've done this to her!"  I went home and closed my bedroom door and cried for about two days nonstop.  It was then that my friend called.  On her way to visit me, she stopped in the supermarket and bumped into a third person and told her about Judy.  This woman said, "Tell your friend to call me immediately and I will give her the name of the doctor who saved our celiac twins.”  I called and she gave me Dr. Haas's telephone number and within 48 hours we were at 91st and Park Avenue.”

Finally, to fast forward this story even more… I showed improvement within days on the Haas diet. There were setbacks over the years, but ultimately a total cure. On Dad’s urging, at the age of 47, Mom entered university and began her scientific pursuit of the truth. She earned degrees in nutritional biochemistry and cellular biology. In 1987, Mom and Dad published Food and the Gut Reaction. Ten editions later, Breaking the Vicious Cycle, as it was renamed, has sold over one million copies in seven languages. Mom’s unwavering commitment – which is today her legacy – to get the word out and spare others from needless suffering, never abated.