Counting Down to the finish line? Day 28 of Whole Food Diet

It's day 28 of my Whole 30 Diet and I'm facing the final days with mixed feelings.  I've had successes.  My skin is more clear, my brain less foggy, my joints less stiff.  I look more toned - though I've actually moved and exercised much less.  I've told you about other benefits in previous posts.

There are days though when I want to respond to, "How's the diet going?" with, "other than feeling like I have razor blades shoved up my rectum, I'm great."  But that would be rude.

Oh, it's better than it was when I first started experimenting with eliminating foods from my diet a year ago.  No longer does the pain run high into my large intestine (what I later came to understand as muscle spasms in my sphincter and inflamed diverticulum) but it is amazing how a small anal fissure can be so excruciating.  Yes, I just said anal fissure in a public space.  Get over it. 

 No, I'm not constipated and never have been. No the fissures were not caused by the diet.  They drove me to it.   And they went away completely within a few days of being on the diet.  Then returned with a vengeance. 

My first experience with the searing pain happened almost 2 years ago.  I saw a doctor.  I had a colonoscopy.  I was cleared of "anything serious."  Medication helped.  Until it didn't. 

I had blood tests - ordered by a naturopath - that suggested I need to stay away from 60+ foods - at least temporarily. 

And for a short period of time, not one of those things passed my lips.  I felt physically good - but hungry. And alone with my weird intestinal challenges.  I had a pity party, (how can I live/eat/socialize/travel/ be normal when I can't eat bread and cheese?).

 I did a Google search.  I confirmed that IgG food sensitivity testing really isn't scientifically sound.  

That's all the reason I needed to load up on all things delicious and highlighted in blue. And I was fine (stupid alternative medicine).  Until I wasn't.  

Going on The Whole 30 diet was meant to give my system a break from irritants.  With the Whole 30 I didn't need to be alone in my strict eating.  Thousands of others do this.  I was joining friends.  Shared suffering is always better.  Isn't it?

 I thought, maybe if I eliminate dairy, sugar, legumes, booze, additives & grains my system would be healthy enough to manage whatever other triggers I may have.  

A nice frittata for breakfast, a handful of nuts for a snack may be fine for others, but not me. 

 A carefully crafted dinner to entertain friends, that doesn't appear too ascetic but is in keeping with The Whole 30 and I spend the immediate hours following, clutching the porcelain goddess and feeling like I'm shitting razors. 

I check back on "my list" and see I've eaten something forbidden: a dash of curry, a few glasses of soda and mango juice (as if it that could take the place of wine), and some chocolate mousse with raspberries - hold the mousse.

So, when I'm asked when I'm going to be off this "silly diet" so I can have some pizza or lasagna, my answer isn't,  "In 3 days."  It's, "Maybe never.  I'm not sure yet.  Maybe 30 days isn't enough." 

But go back and look at my list, nowhere does it mention that I shouldn't have wine.  My glass is ready. 

Two weeks without sugar & wine (dairy, grains and legumes), and no more hot flashes

It's a good thing this elimination diet isn't about weight loss because I'm quite sure I'm not losing any. 

I NEED to see a scale.  But I promised I wouldn't.  For 30 days.  "Just notice if your clothes seems looser," they say.  Ha.  I wear yoga pants most of the time. They're handy when you don't want to know if you're packing on a few pounds.  Less handy for establishing loss.

I don't feel skinnier.

Perhaps that's because I'm really not depriving myself of anything.  My meals look like this:

Sunday night dinner of steak AND chicken.  Yum. 

Locally made beef & mustard sausages.  Less yum.  

But I'm not doing it for the weight loss.  Really.  And I need to remind myself of that in the lower moments.

The whole point of this 30 day program is to feel better, and to have a better relationship with food.    

One that doesn't involve me hugging a ginormous bowl of buttered popcorn and a glass - or 4 - of wine -just because it's what I do on Friday nights (and sometimes Tuesday, and Thursday... occasionally Wednesday), or I'm tired, lonely, bored, aggravated, overwhelmed, underwhelmed, happy, mad etc.  

It's about listening to my own body's cues - like I try to teach my yoga student's to do in class (wouldn't it be nice if it was easy to take all of your own advice?).  It is NOT about worrying about some numbers on a scale or tape measure.

And yet... while I did agree to not step on a scale for 30 days, I did not take off my Fitbit.  It not only measures my steps (which I've been slacking off on) but also my my heart rate and my sleep. 

Yes, I'm still relying on external data to tell me how I'm doing.  I'm a work in progress.  And sometimes that progress is slow. 

I always knew that my heart rate and blood pressure were affected by what I ate  - despite having my (former) doctor tell me that was nuts.

Perhaps not so nuts.  At least not about this.

I've always been a restless sleeper.  I snore, toss, turn, and - in the last year or so - whip covers off because I'm breaking out in a full-body prickly sweat despite the fact that the room is 10 °C.  It hasn't made sharing a bed easy.  Nor does the fact that if I get within 6 inches of my husband, my temperature spikes.  Not in a good way.  More like there's molten lava in my bed and  I can't get away fast enough.  

Before the diet this was a pretty typical night for me.  

 I couldn't figure out why I'd wake up tired even on days when I went to bed so early. 

This was last night. 

What the chart doesn't show is that I snugged my covers up to my ears and  wrapped my arms around my husband.  No more night sweats. Or  daytime hot flashes for that matter. At all. 

Perhaps these changes are coincidence rather than cause and effect. Maybe it's too soon to start bragging.  I'm not sure.  But I like it.  

Day 8/9 of Whole Food Cleanse is Less than Perfect

NOOOOOOO! 7 days of eating nothing but vegetables, fruit, meat and a few nuts and I’m bloated.

And the IBS is back.  With a vengeance. It hurts. 

I hoped changing my diet would help.  And it did.  Almost immediately.

And then it didn’t. 

I wonder if this is just a day 8/9 thing like the book, The Whole 30, suggests and my gut is “starting to heal and rebalance”  (sure, that's one way of putting what I'm experiencing) or if I need to take the dietary changes a step further and exclude FODMAP foods.  Things the IBS society (who knew there was a society?) recommends you avoid if you happen to have IBS.  

I read the list.  I throw things. I swear.  

Seriously?  Garlic?  I need to give up garlic?  And onions?  And beets?  Really? Broccoli? Cauliflower?  KALE?  

What the *&^% will I eat?  What's left? I can live without the sweet peas and corn that the diet prohibits if I’m allowed these veggies.  I love roasted beets & garlic.  Yesterday I had a heap of them, with a side of kale chips.  Yum. I had a handful - maybe 3 handfuls - of nuts together with  an apple to stave off hunger. All high FODMAP foods.    And today, before 9 a.m. I’ve raced to the toilet 3 times.    Make that 4.  Great.

I just noticed that avocado is on the FODMAP list too.  I stare glumly at the 2 fresh ones I bought yesterday.  I’m the only one in the house who will eat them.  They are such a good source of fat.  So filling.  I had some drizzled with aged balsamic vinegar this morning for breakfast. Do I actually have to find another source of Omega 3 fats?  That tastes good?  Maybe this whole Real Food thing is a waste of time.  

I  want to comfort my distress with a warm buttered baguette.  But I won't.  

Postscript:  I did a little more research.  Fodmap lists are inconsistent. The only ones I will look at from this day forward do not include Kale and suggest that limited beets and avocado are fine.  Whew.  Kale Crisis averted.