Elimination Diet Update

Well the first week of my elimination diet is going both good and bad. Breakfast is cream of rice or buckwheat and a chopped up banana. I'm used to eating eggs for breakfast with cereal and a banana. So it doesn't stick with me as well as my old breakfast.

For a while I was cooking lunches every day. I got tired of that. I used to eat leftovers for lunch much of the time. Or make a soup and eat it over days with an add on of cheese and bread. Now when I make soup it lasts only two days as I need to eat so much of it. So I made some cut up veggies and found a good tasting rice cracker and I make too much protein one day and eat it as a semi sandwich for a couple days after. So now at least I don't have to think ahead every day before lunch. Because cooking really isn't the issue. It is planning. I know I have to plan for dinner, but I'm not used to having to plan for lunch. Now I don't have to if I'm busy with something else. I can just throw lunch together.

I've also found that I've gone tropical. For some reason I'm eating pineapple, plantains, and mangoes. Plantains are especially nice as I've had trouble getting fat into my diet. I'm used to snacking on nuts and cheese which satisfies my hungers. But with all the lean meat, rice, veggies, and fruit I feel like I'm starving not long after I eat. But plantains fried in olive oil really kill the hunger. I've also made a dip of mangoes, olive oil, salt, ginger, and garlic for my veggie sticks. That helps too.

My biggest issue is my meds. I went off two of my OTC ones. The undenatured whey was the hardest. It really helps my asthma. I had to switch my OTC antihistamine so it didn't contain corn starch. Sadly now it contains sorbitol. You just can't win. But I can't go off some of my prescription meds and two of them contain lactose. So the diet isn't perfect. I did switch my toothpaste too. Most have carageenan in them. Whether it is a problem or not is debatable, but if it is a problem, what it does is inflame the gut and the whole point of this exercise is to heal the gut. I took it out.

Another big issue is cross contamination. My husband snacks on whole grain crackers that were kept on the kitchen counter. The crumbs get all over the place. Ie all over the fruit in the bowl, the counter, my inhaler. Not good for me. I don't know of the other proteins are as bad, but I know even a little wheat contamination can keep you from healing up at all if wheat is your issue. And to a certain extent even if it isn't as wheat makes everyone's gut a little more permeable for a short time after eating it. So I really have to keep the cross contamination to zero.

All in all the diet isn't that hard to follow. But I'm used to cooking from scratch to start with so not much has changed except the lack of variety. I'm guessing it will get a little boring over time. But I only have to follow it for a month before I start putting things slowly back in. I thought the hardest thing to give up would be my nightly indulgences. Chocolate and an after dinner drink. Instead I've been eating these yummy little yellow mangoes for dessert. Or occasionally an apple or banana. So it has been OK. Though I've been having the hugest craving for cinnamon rolls. I think there is nothing in a cinnamon roll I can have except the cinnamon. Sugar, wheat, and dairy are all forbidden.