• Welcome to Phoenix Rising!

    Created in 2008, Phoenix Rising is the largest and oldest forum dedicated to furthering the understanding of and finding treatments for complex chronic illnesses such as chronic fatigue syndrome (ME/CFS), fibromyalgia (FM), long COVID, postural orthostatic tachycardia syndrome (POTS), mast cell activation syndrome (MCAS), and allied diseases.

    To become a member, simply click the Register button at the top right.

What do you have for Breakfast?

Messages
44
Considering most of us consider diet as part of a treatment plan, I hope 'general treatment' is the right place for this.

What do you have for breakfast and why?

Given we all probably take various supplements at breakfast time, my question is more focused on the meal.

Oats? Cereal? Breads? Meats? etc….. Has anything given you more benefit than anything else?

I understand we are all different. But still, it may be helpful.
 

SOC

Senior Member
Messages
7,849
We rotate porridge and home-made fruit sauce combinations: oatmeal, barley, corn grits, rice, millet, buckwheat, and sometimes tapioca pudding. We also have kamut, spelt, and cream of wheat, but we try to limit (not exclude) gluten-containing grains, so we don't use those (or the barley) as much as the others.

Any of these can be made on the stovetop in 5-10 minutes with minimal effort. We usually make a batch big enough to have enough to freeze extra portions. Single-serving portions are ready freezer to microwave in less than 2 minutes, so are great for days when we don't feel up to cooking in the morning.

Fruit sauce can also be made in bigger batches and frozen into single-servings in ice cube trays. A quick zap in the microwave gives nice warm fruit sauce to top your porridge.

We can't do dairy, but milk or milk substitutes add a nice creaminess along with protein and calcium to your porridge.
 

Kati

Patient in training
Messages
5,497
Cereal and milk. Easy peasy and yummy. Low cal. Diet is not part of my treatment, because as far as I know most here are still sick.
 

Misfit Toy

Senior Member
Messages
4,178
Location
USA
Kati's response cracks me up. When I wake up in the morning the last thing I want to do is eat. Actually, I usually wake up around noon so I guess I should say when I wake up at lunchtime, I have no appetite.

If my appetite is really bad I have some nuts and a protein drink, which really doesn't do much. Sometimes I'll throw a banana into the mix.

Sometimes I have bacon strips or I will have a KIND bar.

I have hypoglycemia so for me cereal really doesn't do much. Doesn't help me, it makes me more tired. I will have quinoa though.
 

Lillybelle

Senior Member
Messages
110
Location
Australia
I try to pack as many vitamin/mineral giving foods as I can. Not usually that hungry so I eat about 10.30 am after a short walk with my dog. Green leafy vegetables have the densest amount of nutrients per calorie: they have all the major vitamins B, A, C and K. Dr. Wahl's recommends at least 3 cups of these a day to get the required nutrients.

Usually a salad of kale and or spinach with tomato, cucumber,olives, mushrooms, celery, seaweed flakes, onion raw garlic, tumeric and or cumin, flaxseed oil apple cider vinegar, then a boiled organic egg on top or poached egg. I have one cup of good organic coffee and boil some coconut milk seperately to add to it. Alternately I'll make a stiry fry in garlic tamari and sesame oil with most of the above plus broccoli.

I never ate much dairy but stopped completely after reading several books on the inflammatory properties including the Wahl's Protocal and 15,000 Canaries can't be wrong. Also after reading the long term studies on milk and meat from the Forks over knives docco and milk/meat role in inflammation, heart disease and other autoimmune diseases milk is gone.
 

brenda

Senior Member
Messages
2,263
Location
UK
If I am not very hungry I will have chia seeds disolved in a glass of water with presoaked pumpkin seeds. If I am very hungry which is usually, when I get up at about 7 am, I will have defrosted brown rice, half a portion of wild Arctic Salmon, onions and peas sauteed in ghee with coconut aminos. Or it could be porridge with flax seeds, and sweetened with coconut nector, all followed by a mix of camu, barley grass powder, protein powder in water with whatever vits I am taking. Eating a highly nutritious diet has brouight my body into healing mode including correcting my sleep cycle.. The reason why people fail with diet is due to not doing enough and not cutting out enough things.
 

maddietod

Senior Member
Messages
2,859
I rarely eat breakfast foods, but amaranth is my new favorite grain, and it's pretty amazing with maple syrup.
 

Mij

Messages
2,353
I need a high protein breakfast so I normally eat meals that I prepared the day before in my crock pot, chicken dishes, pot roast etc.
I feel worse in the mornings so this way I don't have to spend my energy preparing food- I just heat it up. This keeps me full until mid afternoon.

I make sure i always eat something in the morning so on days that I'm not too hungry I'll eat a banana with almond butter- no bread.
 

mango

Senior Member
Messages
905
The reason why people fail with diet is due to not doing enough and not cutting out enough things.

i'm sorry but i'll have to disagree with this. it's not always just about the diet. sometimes it's just as much about strengthening/balancing the digestion itself and the body's overall ability to remove toxic residue. in my opinion, it's an unfair and unhelpful oversimplification to suggest that people are "not doing enough".
 

msf

Senior Member
Messages
3,650
I tried to eat oatmeal with almond or soy milk for a while, but I found that when my gut symptoms flared up that this was too 'challenging' for my digestion. I know have boiled Jasmine rice (low resistant starch) and scrambled eggs. I also have rice for dinner, and my digestion is much improved, even if mealtimes have become a bit boring...as I have a Yersinia infection, this is a integral part of my treatment plan, albeit part that I had to discover myself. The main part of the puzzle was the FODMAP diet, which I have altered slightly to also exclude foods high in resistant starch and foods high in insoluble fibre. This leaves me with a very simple diet, but the effect on my health has been dramatic. I would say I feel half-normal on this diet, which is a big improvement on how I felt before. I realize that other people's illnesses may be less driven by gut symptoms, but if yours is I would recommend this diet, or a variant of it.
 

ukxmrv

Senior Member
Messages
4,413
Location
London
I'm very limited in what I can eat for breakfast. Do better on a high protein diet but in the mornings I shake, faint, feel sick and nauseous so most foods have been throwing up if not careful.

Was brought up on porridge and home made muesli but both of these are on the list of foods I cannot tolerate now sadly. I've never been a milk lover so was happy to eat these plain or with water when I could. No longer now.

Diet has been the area I've put in the most effort and had the least results so I go for something really quick now that I can stomach - white toast, croissants or brioche with a little jam, butter or honey. Black coffee. A little cold meat or leftover rice on other days. Sometimes fresh fruit and yogurt but not often due to digestion problems.

I did strict exclusion diets in the first 10 years so I know what works and doesn't for me.
 

PennyIA

Senior Member
Messages
728
Location
Iowa
Without jumping on the bandwagon... I don't think diet is a CURE... it is however, something some of us have managed to find that helps us manage our symptoms when nothing else does.

I'm also very limited in what I can eat, compounded by working full time with NO free time to speak of...

So, I buy the Udi gluten free frozen muffins which is my breakfast some days (esp. the no appetite days - because I HAVE to have something in my stomach for some of my supplements). If I can spring for it and have some, I also buy some local gluten free banana bread...

BUT, when I have time & energy & appetite. ... I make up a skillet-free 'packet' ...

I buy pre-cubed ham and pre-cut onions and peppers and freeze them on a cookie sheet
Scramble up 3-4 eggs
And put some ham, onions, peppers, some egg, some crispy frozen potato rounds, and maybe a sprinkling of daiya cheddar cheese into a plastic baggie and freeze them.

Then I can grab & go in the morning - nuke it for 2 minutes and top with salsa - and it increases my protein intake, doesn't create any digestive issues and helps with some of my OI issues as I can eat it salted (and I need to get my blood pressure up - and try as I might - neither a muffin NOR banana bread taste good with salt added).
 

mermaid

Senior Member
Messages
714
Location
UK
I used to have smoothies made in a Vitamix with all kinds of things whizzed round, but recently my stomach has protested.
So my latest breakfast is stewed fruit (usually a mix of pear and banana, though sometimes apple and banana), cooked with some ground almonds, soaked seeds, and a tablespoon of a gluten free porridge mix and a little water. I top it with a mix of sheep or goat yogurt and cashew nut kefir.
 

Timaca

Senior Member
Messages
792
It seems that I have LOTS of food intolerances so I am basically eating a low histamine, Blue Zone style (meaning healthy), auto immune type diet.

Meaning, I eat yams and sweet potatoes for most meals, really fresh fish, and low histamine vegetables and fruits. I eat like this for each meal of the day, including breakfast.

I can now do some exercise classes at my local athletic club, which was not doable for me last year. You can check out my blog if you are interested in diet and how I feel: http://www.youseasonwithlove.com/blog-posts/

Best,
 

helen1

Senior Member
Messages
1,033
Location
Canada
I either eat egg yolks (sensitive to whites) and an avocado or leftover veggies or all leftovers from dinner, which is pasture raised meat with veggies. No dairy as this gives me rosacea. No dairy substitutes for other reasons.

No grains except occasional quinoa as I think grains impair my digestion. Plus cutting out grains (and some fruit) resolved my hypoglycemia so it seems to be good for me.

Since I've been ill, my digestion has improved partly with this diet, partly with other anti SIBO measures. I'd already healed my IBS-C by 80% using acacia powder and eliminating insoluble fibre before getting ill, and then this way of eating helped even more. Better digestion and good blood sugar levels from eating this way but still ill.
 
Last edited:

bertiedog

Senior Member
Messages
1,738
Location
South East England, UK
I have a couple of sticks of celery and some cucumber sticks with about 3 grapes, goats cheese and Swiss cheese followed by a small amount of natural yoghurt with groundup flaxseeds.

On some mornings I will have a boiled egg with about 1/2 no sugar oatcake plus some cheese and pate.

I still need to eat a couple of hours after but only something like a small amount of salted peanuts and a cup of tea.

Pam