Diet

Disclaimer: as always, this is my personal experience, and not professional medical advice to anyone.

Most importantly in “diet” – eat only what does not upset your stomach or aggravate any condition you have. Dont justify eating food that you find delicious, that you KNOW is making your condition worse. Dont let your cravings/brain trick you, because giving into cravings too much can end up overtaxing your digestive system, to put it mildly 🙁   

I will share my personal current diet first, if anyone is interested. I am currently, short-term, on a liquid diet, because my symptoms are so bad. Throughout the day, I make sure I get “X” amount of calories (what is right for my body). I sustain on organic or nongmo vegetable baby food, unsweetened dairy free yogurts (with probiotics), unsweetened almond milk with sugar free/gluten free/ organic protein powder & collagen powder to help heal the lining of my digestive system. Sometime I have a little organic smooth peanut butter (not anymore, i realized i have terrible sensitivity to peanuts). I try to only drink spring/filtered water and decaf green tea / herbal teas. This liquid diet will not be forever, just an experiment to help me through right now. Things seem to calm down when I do this.

My diet before this was alot of veggies (raw and cooked) / proteins  / nuts / seeds / rice / potatoes / olive oil / coconut oil / pink Himalayan sea salt; and I ate gluten free – dairy free – sugar free. I’ve experimented with everything from Vegan to Paleo to Keto. All have their good points.  I think the general diet I ate was very healthy, but I ate TOO MUCH OF IT. And my stress levels were off the charts. And when you eat too much, especially if you eat too late, your sleep can be crap – which mine was. A racing stressed upset mind x a stuffed upset stomach = insomnia squared / nightmare land.

Diet is very individual, and also needs change within an individual during a lifetime. Sometime even within a season. Right now, my season, is sustaining on a liquid diet so I can try to calm down all this inflammation and let my digestive system rest. I also am able to do my breathing exercises better, which is why I mentioning it here. This is what I intuitively tried, and is working for me. I am very careful to get enough protein and vegetable baby food and calories. I am looking for a liquid daily multivitamin I could take. (If anyone knows of a good one, please leave in the comment section, thank you). I am also juicing cabbage juice and celery juice sometimes for extra nutrition. I had read medical studies on cabbage juice helping ulcers, so that is why I started juicing in first place.

Thank goodness for books. Books that knowledgeable individuals have written are great reference and starting points in recovery, and can give you a lot of interesting and informative food for thought. Things to try out and experiment with in your own life. And if you have a thorough, more holistic minded doctor, he/she is giving you proper diet guidelines for your condition (or referring you to a nutritionist to work with you). But it ultimately lies within your personal experience.  For starters, I would recommend a food journal. Everyday. Diligently. See what upsets YOU personally. See what makes you feel better. I just use a large spiral notebook, and I write down EVERYTHING. This helps me visually see what could be tripping me up.

Secondly, my starting eating times can vary (although now I seem to be drinking a protein drink at around 830am), I only eat until  5pm or so. No later. Then I go on a walk to help with digestion of my last meal. Then I drink only spring/filtered water or herbal tea until bed time. I think this probably can help anyone with digestive issues to never eat late. It seems to be really bad for acid reflux, as we have all experienced most likely. Its best to set a TIME for yourself, whatever is right for you, where you say – “I do not eat after _____p.m.” and that is something you live by very strictly. If you have to take medications before bed that require you eat some food with it, make sure whatever you eat is very light and will personally not upset your stomach.

Thirdly, learning portion control is absolutely key. Number one issue from observing myself over the years. Overeating (even on healthy foods) is a big, big problem for digestive issues. I have done it more times than I could ever count. Mostly I have overeaten from anxiety (not feeling grounded), not being mindful, feeling stressed / overwhelmed / annoyed / angry, or I would think…..”Just f*** it, Im eating what I want and how much I want, and i just dont care.” But alot of these feelings and thoughts I was not even aware of. All I was aware of was…. “IM SO HUNGRY!”  I would just munch away while reading things online, or watching shows. It’s a hard habit to break. It’s really hard if you are always used to overeating, even a little bit, on a daily basis. I always felt like I was stretching out my stomach, distending things, but I just thought…”well, I will do better tomorrow.” However, tomorrow slapped back HARD, with a vengeance. (Or the night of, when I couldnt sleep due to my eating choices.) This is a chronic behavior that must be overcome to heal. It’s also very hard to do breathwork, if your stomach is stuffed full to maximum capacity. I am working on trying to “fill” my life with other things, especially breathwork and healing practices, instead of with too much food in my stomach. I am learning to relax my body, so I dont freak out and try to soothe myself with excess food. I am slowly learning to cope with life, without OverEating.

Fourth, chew chew chew chew chew chew chew your food. Enough said, I think you get. Pulverize your food in your mouth. It will be much better for your digestion and for healing. And slow down your eating in general. Relax. Dont eat when you are very emotional. Do some walking, deep breathing, talk to a friend, whatever you need to do, to help you through those emotions first.

Lastly, just a personal tip, sugar and junk foods/highly processed foods will never help you heal. Mostly, they just become yet another addiction that you waste your money on, and hurt your body with.  Again, learning new methods to cope with anxiety and life is key. Sometimes it’s sad to say goodbye to treats and drinks you love. I actually felt grief giving up favorite foods/treats/drinks. Is that weird there is sadness and anger giving up foods/drinks/treats that are hurting us? I dont think so. I think they become our friends, in a strange way. Especially when others have let us down, life has let us down. Our own brain can let us down. We let ourselves down. But I have hope we all will get used to a new way of eating and drinking if we persevere. We will exchange any personally inflammatory treats in our life for a Calmer Body. And our Body will say, “Thank you, thank you, my dearest friend. Thank you for listening to what we needed….”