Last October I started my healing journey with food. For months I cut out sugar, gluten, dairy, corn, soy, gmo’s… the list goes on and on. Fast forward a year. I still have not included most of these back in my diet, but I know I need to make a change because my health has plateaued for the last few months. I know the answer isn’t adding gluten, dairy or sugar back into my diet. Keeping these ingredients out of my diet is giving my gut time to heal.
Since July 31st I’ve been tracking my everyday activities and symptoms on an excel spreadsheet. It’s pretty in depth tracking – everything from what time I wake up, my pain levels, my fatigue levels, what I ate, how long I left the house, how far I crutched (calculated with my fitbit) and so many more data points.
I haven’t been able to put 2 and 2 together yet, so I have to make a change. As I looked at my options, the only real changes I feel like I could make, other than going vegan or pescatarian, is to switch to full paleo. Currently, I eat legumes, rice, peanuts, non-gluten grains and haven’t really added red meat back into my diet.
I’ve already cut A LOT from my diet, but this will be a bit of an adjustment with focusing on meat and fat. Here’s a great info graphic that gives you a bit more information:
There is the autoimmune protocol for the paleo diet which is geared towards those who have chronic illness. I’ve been reading The Paleo Approach: Reverse Autoimmune Disease and Heal Your Body and Your Personal Paleo Code and I’m learning more about exactly how this approach heals. Since I’ve been through the stages of an elimination diet I do know that nightshades don’t bother me, peanuts don’t bother me, and a few other things, but I’m still not sure if there’s a specific reason that Dr. Sarah Ballantyne has them x’d out on the AIP version. I’ll be learning and figuring it out as I go. Lately I’ve been reading lot of data that suggests cutting out ALL grains and legumes can help heal the gut and help autoimmune diseases. Crossing my fingers it works!
As this proves – there is no ‘one diet fits all’. Now I’m branching out to explore what I need to do to feel my best.
Thoughts after week one:
The first meal I had was a beef stew. I was really excited because I hadn’t had anything like it in a loonnnggggg time. As soon as I ate it I started having an upset tummy. Within 10/15 minutes I was laying down and passed out for an hour. I woke up, wrapped up with my heating pad and my bottle of digestzen and fell back asleep until midnight. Needless to say, I wasn’t too excited about the beef stew after that.
Since then I’ve had a few meals with pork and beef and have been actively trying to make sure I have a good protein intake at each meal.
Thoughts after week two:
I HAVE NO ENERGY AT ALL. Literally, for the past week, it’s taken me a ridiculous amount of time to get out of bed. My yoga mat has been missing me because I just can’t get myself to move. My digestive system hasn’t been really excited about all the changes I’ve been making either. I know that it’s a know fact that the first 2 weeks of a low carb diet your body is detoxing and readjusting so you may feel like crap. Here’s to hoping that next week I’m a million times better. If I’m not, I won’t be able to keep this up. Not worth it.
Keep up with my new diet changes!
Let me know if you’ve tried or are on the AIP or paleo diet – share your knowledge!
Wishing You A Pain Free Day!
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