finding the answers

So what do you do with all this stuff that you wrote down in your food journal? Here is the fun part - getting to your aha moment!

The first step is to read and reflect on what you have written down. If you see a trend over the days and weeks that when you eat dairy, your tummy feels queasy, you have major gas, or whatever - think to yourself - maybe I should crowd dairy out of my diet. 

Next, it is important to trial different things - take one food out of your diet for a couple of weeks and then try it again. Do you get the same results as you did before? If so, you may be intolerant to it. If not, yeah! Keep eating it and try a different food and see what happens. 

Take note - if you have taken a food or foods out of your diet, be sure to add one food back in at a time AND be sure to only try adding in a food every 3-4 days. You need to let your body have time to respond. That response won't necessarily happen overnight. In my case, it happened in 6-8 hours. I knew by then that my body does not like dairy or gluten. Talk about a long night of not so fun stuff. Ugh!

This is not the fastest way to determine how food effects you, but it is the truest test you can do. Be patient and the answers will come.  It is a step towards creating a healthier, happier you.

If you want to take a test and have a sense of what may be ailing you and perhaps find a starting point of what foods to try removing form your diet, I would recommend you get an allergy test done. Beware though, there are a lot of false positives that come up. Skin tests can just be an irritation to your skin - not that you are really allergic to it. 

You could also have a serum test done. This type of test can give you a sense of how severe the intolerance or allergy is. These are helpful guides too especially if you do the IgG and IgE testing. Not everyone agrees that these tests are accurate. 

Allergy tests can be done through an allergist or a naturopathic doctor (ND), both who will help you decipher the results. Just be careful on who you talk to and remember to listen to you. Don't make the mistake I did and believe that the allergist has all of the answers. The ND will probably not be covered by insurance. The MD may be. If you prefer to do it on your own, there are also kits that you can purchase. The test on your own, is on your own. Both through the ND and on your own, the test can be around $300 a test.

The most accurate way is to listen to your body and write it down. Hell, I can't remember what I had for breakfast yesterday let alone how I felt 30 min, an hour or 6 hours after. I need to write things down. Take your time and trust your gut - literally. Listening to your body is the best start to a new you.

This is just information and in no way intended to be medical advice. Any testing or decisions a person makes to improve his or her health is a decision made by that person and not by me. This information is just to help educate people and not intended as medical opinion or prescription.

Let's Grow!

Today I took my son to a PBS event in Madison. It was a lot of fun to see the Cat in the Hat and Super Why! They even had Mr. Steve performing. My son's favorite part, besides having his picture taken with the Cat in the Hat, was pretending to plant, grow and eat vegetables! The Madison Children's Museum brought out a garden plot with vegetables for the kids to grow - keep in mind this is a large event so this is not real dirt and veggies :) My son donned his vegetable apron and grabbed a shovel. He dug in the dirt and planted beets, eggplants, pumpkin, lettuce, and carrots. He had fun making the grasshopper jump on his shoulder and the bee buzzing by as he harvested his food. I love that they give kids a chance to learn about food and growing it in such a fun way! It is the perfect opportunity to talk about the different veggies, how they grow, and how we should eat them. My son was having so much fun! When the event ended, we decided to continue the fun at the Children's Museum where he proceeded to pretend he lived in a hut, invited friends in to cook and harvest the the garden together. Seeing the world of healthy food and gardening through his eyes helps foster my enthusiasm for healthy, fresh food! Yum!

journaling your way to health

As you are going through your day, do you find that you feel tired or queasy, or are visiting the restroom often? Do you feel like you have brain fog and can't concentrate? It may be the food that you are putting into your body. Most people know that you need food and that it helps fuel your body, but food is so much more. What you eat affects your moods, your skin, your energy, your immune system, your concentration and more.

Did you know that it is estimated that 40 million people are lactose intolerant? And that gluten intolerance is the most undiagnosed disorder in the US? You should feel great after eating and if you are not, then you need to find out why.

The best way I have found to find out if I have a food intolerance is to journal. I kept a food journal for about 6 - 9 months and boy did I learn a lot about my body. I learned more than the medical doctors could tell me. Here is what you do:

1. Go out and get yourself a spiral notebook like you are going back to school or download a food journal template from the internet.
2. Figure out what is it that you want to figure out :) This means identify your symptoms. If you are having horrible acne, you will want to note what your skin looks like each day along with what your are eating. If you spend more time in pain or in the bathroom than enjoying life, write it down.
3. Be consistent - write down the same topics each day. Make headings so you can do this. Examples are food, time, symptoms, etc. This way you are comparing apples to apples and not apples to oranges.
4. I would recommend keeping track of your moods too just for fun! This could be an extra bonus finding out what literally makes you tick. Do you feel like a ticking time bomb or does the food you ate make you super fun to be with! Perhaps you had a really yummy spaghetti meal, but within an hour you find you are hungry, tired, and have turned into a grizzly bear! Yikes! Maybe save that meal for when you will be alone and can take a nap.
5. Make note of your bowel movements. I know this thought makes some queasy just reading the words, but seriously, your poop can tell you so much. Write down the frequency, the color, the consistency and anything else interesting about it. I'll tell you more about interpreting your poop on a different day. It is a skill that you will want to learn.
6. Write down the medications that you take and when. How do you feel after taking them? My medical doctors insist that I have IBS. They put me on psyllium husks to increase my fiber. I was quite regular, but I felt awful. I had some serious gas going on and most of the time, it was stuck, painful and I wanted to curl up into a ball and cry. Once I stopped taking it, I felt a lot better. I think I am more regular now! Weird. I figured this out by writing it down.

Take a couple of weeks to write it all down. Check back with me, and I'll let you know what to do with all of this info! Until then, eat well and be well!