I don't know what to eat any more

[tinacarroll27]

Hi all!! I am having a real problem with food!What every I eat gives me gas, stomach pain and hours on the toilet! I am scared to eat!! At the moment I am eating fish and eggs and broccoli. I seem ok with eggs and the fish (usually salmon or some white fish like cod) without major symptoms but the broccoli is not agreeing with me and I may need to cut it out. As you can imagine I have lost a lot of weight with this diet. I have tried lots of different combinations of foods but with no improvement. I have tried taking HCL with food, enzymes and bile salts but they just make my gut worse.

I would love to eat more varieties of food but I don't want the hours of colic pain that comes with them. I don't or vary rarely feel nausea it is just gut pain that has me rolling around in pain feeling like I am going to give birth but only after food. My appetite is good but I can't seem to tolerate much!! Has anyone else got this and any solutions?

 

[Eve18]

Did you get tested for SIBO?

 

[Learner1]

Have you been tested for mast cell disease, which can cause reactions to foods? Treatment is H1 and H2 antihistamines, cromolyn sodium, mast cell stabilizers like quercetin, and several others.

Thr Food Intoletance Bible by Anthony Hayne is also a good resource

 

[Shoshana]

Have you tried any gentle veggies, such as cooked carrots or cooked orange squash? I find them easier to digest than broccoli and many other foods.
Also, perhaps can of chickpeas/ garbanzo beans. They come all cooked and digest easily. And not gassy or spicy.



Just offering ideas, I know they might not be right for anyone else.

 

[tinacarroll27]

Yes I have SIBO. I probably need to get this sorted but difficult to get the antibiotic prescribed in UK and have tried herbs but die off was horrible and made me crash! I also have the PEMT gene so don't know if this is contributing to SIBO. Might try antibiotics but GP wouldn't prescribe and will need to get them without prescription unless I can find private doctor to prescribe.

 

[Learner1]

Have you looked into mast cell disease?

 

[tinacarroll27]

Have you been tested for mast cell disease, which can cause reactions to foods? Treatment is H1 and H2 antihistamines, cromolyn sodium, mast cell stabilizers like quercetin, and several others.

Thr Food Intoletance Bible by Anthony Hayne is also a good resource

No not been tested for mast cell problems. I do have allergies so it is possible.

 

[tinacarroll27]

Have you tried any gentle veggies, such as cooked carrots or cooked orange squash? I find them easier to digest than broccoli and many other foods.

I haven't tried orange squash. Might give it a go.Thanks.

 

[Learner1]

You might find treatments for it help. Blood tests for prostaglandin D2 and Chromagranin A are the most useful., though most docs will stop at histamine and tryptase which are not aleays active.

The websites mastattack and mastcellmaster may be helpful, too.

 

[wigglethemouse]

No not been tested for mast cell problems. I do have allergies so it is possible.

There is some info and a nice video on MCAS posted just yesterday by the MCAS guru Dr. Afrin from 2016
Thread : https://forums.phoenixrising.me/ind...hink-mcas-eds-3-gerd-sibo.62187/#post-1014155

 

[tinacarroll27]

Did you get tested for SIBO?

Yes I had the test and was positive. Came back high hydrogen.

 

[tinacarroll27]

There is some info and a nice video on MCAS posted just yesterday by the MCAS guru Dr. Afrin from 2016

Thanks will watch!

 

[tinacarroll27]

You might find treatments for it help. Blood tests for prostaglandin D2 and Chromagranin A are the most useful., though most docs will stop at histamine and tryptase which are not aleays active.

The websites mastattack and mastcellmaster may be helpful, too.

Thanks!!

 

[Shoshana]

@tinacarroll27
Obviously the other posters are correct, that it is best to try to find the root cause of the problem.

Meanwhile, you do need to eat, so perhaps choose from some generally easy to digest foods, to try some,
in addition to try possibly eating small portions of the fish and egg that you are eating, more times per day, if that is all you can eat.
Other ones to possibly try, have drawbacks, but might be worthwile, even temporarily. "Baby foods" , or canned cooked foods, include mashed peas, carrots, banana, pumpkin, (orange) squash, sweet potato, chicken....

I would also consider to try adding back, some food that you could digest in the past, but stopped for some other reason.
I know that many people might disagree, and for good reasons,

And it might be better to read and try one of the other food ideas highly recommended such as the Food Intolerance Bible, suggested above, a very good source for you to consider.

Yet when my foods became too limited, enough that I was not getting enough of either nutrients or calories, and my weight and strength, was dropping scary low and fast, I added back a few foods, I had discarded in the past...
thinking that prioritizing "eating" had become more important , in my personal case, than some other goal I had.
So potatoes, and broth, even possibly rice or other grain, even wheat or oats, if you tolerate it .... helped me, to halt my downward spiral.

A new-to-you food might also not trigger you to react, such as amaranth, (a healthy seed) or buckwheat groats, (which is not wheat or oats)
either of which is easy to simmer in water. And are palatable, digestible (often fed to babies) and not unusual tasting, though you might be unfamiliar to you.

​

 

[jesse's mom]

A couple of things that I can usually eat are plain hummus, and cauliflower steamed until really soft. I might be off base, just brainstorming.

 

[wonderoushope]

I would see a dietician trained in IBS.

It's too hard to know what is best for you. I tried also figuring it all by myself for years, but ultimately the dietician was the best bet. I wish I had just done that in the first place.

You might even find you have FODMAP issues. Broccoli is a FODMAP.

I also went on the RPAH elimination diet with the dietician, as I had and still have food intolerances also. So I had food intolerances and FODMAP issues which made it pretty hard. I find if I keep to low FODMAPs and low chemical diet my stomach is pretty good. It took about 6-8 months for my stomach to settle down (even on the strict diet). In the last 3-4 months, I have hardly got any bloating, cramping etc That's a first for me in like 20+ years! I've noticed keep low fodmap allows me to enjoy a more vast array of foods.

 

[Insomniac]

I had something similar to this in 1996.

The dieticien told me that the easiest to digest vegetables of all are boiled pumpkin and boiled zucchini.

He gave me this recipe for chicken bone broth and vegetables and this saved me:
Chicken boiled in water with a leek (white part only), with pumpkin and zucchini.
Put it all together in a large saucepan and boil till chicken is cooked. It doesn't matter if the vegetables get overcooked and mushy.
Eat the soup and the vegetables and chicken.... Or just the soup, because that is the therapeutic part.
You can add parsley if you really want but don't eat that and take it out immediatly after cooking.
I still make this whenever I get a bout of stomach problems.

Don't be tempted to add other vegetables to thus soup till you feel more stable.

This article talks about anti inflammatory effects of chicken soup in colds but logically it should have the same effect on the gut.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/11035691

Brocolli, cauliflower and cabbage are all hard to digest. Don't touch them.
Don't eat anything fried.

 

[wonderoushope]

He gave me this recipe for chicken bone broth and vegetables saved me:
Chicken boiled in water with a leek (white part only), with pumpkin and zucchini.
Put it all together in a large saucepan and boil till chicken is cooked. It doesn't matter if the vegetables get overcooked and mushy.

See this is why I think it's important to see a trained dietician. You see at the time, I was reacting to AMINES which is increases when you make it into a broth, especially if you boil the broth for 24 hours. Also leeks can have issues for some people too.

I really think it be worthwhile for the original poster to see a trained dietician, as what works for one doesn't work for others and a good trained dietician will know the ins and outs of food combinations.

 

[Insomniac]

I totally disagree with the chickpeas/garbanzo beans suggestion. All beans or pulses should be avoided by anyone whose digestion is weak

 

[Wolfcub]

Hi all!! I am having a real problem with food!What every I eat gives me gas, stomach pain and hours on the toilet! I am scared to eat!! At the moment I am eating fish and eggs and broccoli. I seem ok with eggs and the fish (usually salmon or some white fish like cod) without major symptoms but the broccoli is not agreeing with me and I may need to cut it out. As you can imagine I have lost a lot of weight with this diet. I have tried lots of different combinations of foods but with no improvement. I have tried taking HCL with food, enzymes and bile salts but they just make my gut worse.
I would love to eat more varieties of food but I don't want the hours of colic pain that comes with them. I don't or vary rarely feel nausea it is just gut pain that has me rolling around in pain feeling like I am going to give birth but only after food. My appetite is good but I can't seem to tolerate much!! Has anyone else got this and any solutions?

I have to agree with redrachel76 about the beans and chickpeas. They suit me very much and I somehow feel better energy and strength after eating them, but they are high-fibre, just as lentils are. And I don't have the gut problems like others do.
Cauliflower, cabbage and even carrots are also high fibre, and many foods like that can cause gas.

Foods are so strange because what suits some people doesn't suit others. I made a lovely vegetarian supper once for friends, and one of the people suffered badly afterwards as the meal was high-fibre. He had belly-ache all night. He had gut issues unknown to me at the time, and was used to low-fibre food.

Bearing in mind that any foods I suggest here may NOT be suitable, and are not part of any special diet protocol, you could consider trying:
Quinoa
Rice (well cooked)
Bananas
Baby spinach (well steamed)
Iceberg lettuce
Plain slightly salted crackers
Chicken breast (well cooked preferably stewed/simmered, not roasted.)

I did briefly have an upset gut at the beginning of my 8-month "journey" into this, and found that there was very little I could eat for about a week.
What I could tolerate were the foods listed above, as well as white fish and eggs. I also found I could happily tolerate butter and small amounts of wholemeal bread. Though of course, you may not.

I steamed/poached the fish in some water with salt added and a little parsley, and thickened the juice slightly with cornflour. That was tasty and well tolerated even though my gut was upset. I added some steamed spinach on the side and it was okay.

I had to eat like that for about a week, then gradually could introduce more foods. I tried one "new" food a day to see how it went. Graduated back to my normal diet.

I do hope you find a solution to your problem. It is no fun not being able to eat, especially if you are hungry.