Friday, May 23, 2008

My food saga

So, I was glancing over some of my blogs and realized that I really haven't updated any of what is going on with my food problems.

Last I left it all at, I was trying to get fructose out of my diet to see if that helped. Well, a few weeks of that (highly frustrating because fructose is literally in EVERYTHING!) I was seeing some minor improvements but still in a lot of pain and having a lot of issues. After talking it over with my sweet Christopher, I decided to try a totally new route, a naturopathic physician. We had heard of one place with tons of high praise from a couple different sources. I had hit a point of just sheer frustration at feeling sick all the time, nothing helping, doctor's being rather unsympathetic and highly unhelpful, and feeling miserable and run down and just not good.

So, I went to the clinic - Abundant Health and Wellness - and talked to the Christian doctor there (Dr D for ease of writing). First drawing point for me is the fact that he is an MK who grew up in Africa. Has a great accent and of course completely gets the psychological side of me that many other people really don't understand. As we were talking about my background and what's going on, he asked the all-telling question of "Is America home yet or are you still in foreign land?" It's a surprisingly comforting question simply because it tells me that the person I'm talking to instinctively knows some of the issues of my life having experienced them him/herself.

Making a long story shorter (!), we decided to try out the program he recommended for me. I am currently on it - have been for two weeks. It involves cutting out a HUGE amount of certain types of food (think no corn, soy, wheat, sugar, beef, or pork among various other things). I also took a very interesting food stress test which essentially pinpointed many of the foods (surprise, surprise many being high in fructose) that my body is basically not liking right now. Some of these included egg whites, high fructose corn syrup, olives (why I don't know - I don't touch olives! Apparently for good reason), strawberries, and many more. Not that I'm necessarily "allergic" to these foods, but that my body tends to react poorly to them, especially currently.

Along with cutting out high acidic/reactive foods, I'm also taking some different vitamin/mineral/herb mixtures. The basic idea being to be nice to my stomach for a few months and essentially, in the long run, reline the lining of my stomach which is being worn away. He asked me about what has been going on in my life the last few months or so that might be causing extra stress (i.e. why has all this really started bothering me now). I just kind of laughed at that question! But, it seems the next step from just the stomach pain/issues is developing ulcers. And I really don't want to go there.

One of the mixtures I'm taking has aloe vera extract in it and licorice extract. And it tastes probably worse than sounds! The other isn't so bad just kind of gritty when I drink it.

So, what are the results? Well, it's taken about a week, but I've noticed most of my stomach pain has decreased dramatically, and I can tell when I eat certain foods because I start noticing pain and weirdness again very quickly.

On a downside, I have developed quite a bit of acne (I normally have extremely clear skin with only the occasional - think every few months - pimple here and there which becomes a temporary boulder on my face). It's not noticeable, but if I touch my face and even on my arms, I can feel the bumps everywhere. My allergies have also increased quite a bit. On a good note though, in talking to Dr D today, he said this is actually exactly the reaction I should be having because it means I'm dumping toxins and cells and whatnot and replacing the garbage in my system. Unfortunately, that garbage has to work it's way out somehow, and so it's choosing my face!

The other thing I've noticed is that I'm still tired a lot - although a lot less fuzzy-headed - and my body has been a bit more sore lately...all of which he said is normal. And it makes sense. If you're forcing your body to start correcting itself, it's probably going to hurt a bit.

Getting rid of the fructose was actually a really good start because it got my body adjusting to being without certain foods and got me mentally prepping for some of this. It's been an interesting few weeks, but on a two week review, I think it's helping. It may take a few months, but I think in the long run, it will be worth it.

I do really miss my dark chocolate though!

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