IBS tips

[badatlife]

ok, ok, no funny business here this is a very sensitive topic

For those of us cursed by nature with a weak stomach... how do you manage? What are your secrets/life tips to living with IBS? Any special dietary elimination (ex. no dairy, wheat, etc.)

Have you tried the low FODMAP diet? Did it work?

Share your recipes here

 

[Snow as White]

I have a good friend who just got diagnosed. She's currently trying elimination diets to see what triggers she has. Dairy is up first. I've also eliminated dairy from my diet and a trick we've both found helpful is when we crave cheese we eat some avocado since the base desire is for some filling fat. If you love milk, I've found that cashew milk is the most "like" regular milk. It has a good taste and works wonderful in oatmeal and cereals.

 

[Peter Deadpan]

No dairy, no grains (although I think white rice and corn tortillas and sometimes authentic sourdough bread are fine), no beans, possibly no spicy foods, possibly no alcohol

You'll have to explore with trial and error. Be careful with strict elimination diets because newer research indicates that it may reduce oral tolerance, thus further restricting what foods your body can handle.

Manage stress. I'm serious. This is MAJORLY important.

Drink lots of water. Avoid ibuprofen and other meds that are hard on the gut.

 

[Snow as White]

No dairy, no grains (although I think white rice and corn tortillas and sometimes authentic sourdough bread are fine), no beans, possibly no spicy foods, possibly no alcohol

You'll have to explore with trial and error. Be careful with strict elimination diets because newer research indicates that it may reduce oral tolerance, thus further restricting what foods your body can handle.

Manage stress. I'm serious. This is MAJORLY important.

Drink lots of water. Avoid ibuprofen and other meds that are hard on the gut.

....@ bold... that is really interesting. I hadn't seen that so looks like i need to read up on that.

 

[Peter Deadpan]

....@ bold... that is really interesting. I hadn't seen that so looks like i need to read up on that.

It's somewhat anecdotal (last I knew), but a doctor who built her entire practice around AIP over time saw many of her patients become more limited in what they could tolerate. She started shifting focus to having a healthy relationship with both healthy food and the body/disease itself. She does some work with the microbiome too, tailoring it only after testing her patients.

 

[rav3n]

This isn't a condition that I have but know someone who has it. He went on an elimination diet until he figured out what foods hindered. Eliminations were staggered on an 8 - 12 week schedule. It took him years to settle on the right diet for his problems. For your information, he can't eat nuts like cashews, macadamias, pecans or walnuts but he can eat almonds and pistachios. No problems with whole grains but has problems with refined flour. Fatty meats like ribs and dark meat are forboden. He also avoids cruciferous vegetables and beans, fresh and dried. There's plenty more but at least he's not experiencing the debilitating effects of IBS.

 

[badatlife]

Thanks for the helpful comments! I started having symptoms randomly in ~September 2017. I'm embarrassed to say it took me roughly a year to accept that I had become lactose intolerant (it was obvious after drinking milk, plus they did that hydrogen breath test with 20g lactose in the doctor's office and mine rose to 19 ppm after 3 hours). It took me another few months to admit I have a problem with more than just lactose because my symptoms had not gone yet and would get worse sometimes with nondairy foods like coffee. It sucks because I had really wanted to go vegetarian on my own and that's what stalled my progress as I kept trying, but the diet is too restrictive to follow and a lot of plant foods make it worse. I don't know if my digestive system is just temporarily irritated from a year of stuffing it with dairy, stress, getting sick, etc. both my mom and uncle have 'IBS" so there could be a genetic component too.

I've finally started the low-FODMAP diet yesterday and I am slightly excited. Feeling hopeful and optimistic for the first time in many months. Yesterday I had a banana for breakfast, bland roasted chicken wings + quinoa + pasta + spinach and small amount of chickpeas for lunch, and the same for dinner except with two slices of lean leg of lamb instead of chicken. (I don't have celiac)

 

[Snow as White]

It's somewhat anecdotal (last I knew), but a doctor who built her entire practice around AIP over time saw many of her patients become more limited in what they could tolerate. She started shifting focus to having a healthy relationship with both healthy food and the body/disease itself. She does some work with the microbiome too, tailoring it only after testing her patients.

That's a really interesting approach. Gonna google the search nao, thank you.

Thanks for the helpful comments! I started having symptoms randomly in ~September 2017. I'm embarrassed to say it took me roughly a year to accept that I had become lactose intolerant (it was obvious after drinking milk, plus they did that hydrogen breath test with 20g lactose in the doctor's office and mine rose to 19 ppm after 3 hours). It took me another few months to admit I have a problem with more than just lactose because my symptoms had not gone yet and would get worse sometimes with nondairy foods like coffee. It sucks because I had really wanted to go vegetarian on my own and that's what stalled my progress as I kept trying, but the diet is too restrictive to follow and a lot of plant foods make it worse. I don't know if my digestive system is just temporarily irritated from a year of stuffing it with dairy, stress, getting sick, etc. both my mom and uncle have 'IBS" so there could be a genetic component too.

I've finally started the low-FODMAP diet yesterday and I am slightly excited. Feeling hopeful and optimistic for the first time in many months. Yesterday I had a banana for breakfast, bland roasted chicken wings + quinoa + pasta + spinach and small amount of chickpeas for lunch, and the same for dinner except with two slices of lean leg of lamb instead of chicken. (I don't have celiac)

nothing to be embarrassed by here. unless you have an immediate reaction to a food, it's really hard to connect the two. Lactose intolerance for example: you eat something with dairy and it tastes delicious. 30-60 minutes later you have a problem. Your body hasn't connected the two so there is no innate mechanism response of repulsion when next you see dairy.

the good news is that there are sooo many products and recipes and blogs and videos out there to help give variety to people who cant eat certain foods. I tried an elimination diet about 10 years ago and it felt so impossible. now you can go out to eat and still adhere to your goals and needs.

 

[rav3n]

It's somewhat anecdotal (last I knew), but a doctor who built her entire practice around AIP over time saw many of her patients become more limited in what they could tolerate. She started shifting focus to having a healthy relationship with both healthy food and the body/disease itself. She does some work with the microbiome too, tailoring it only after testing her patients.

No offense to your doctor but gut microbiome can differ between fecal samples, particularly in magnitude, and what's actually in the gut. So if she's treating premised on fecal sample results, I'd be leery of experimental treatment premised on this since forms of treatments have barely skated the surface. To obtain a full gut microbiome sample would require invasive extraction which is expensive and currently, treatments of 'imbalances', require a fecal transplant from a healthy donor. The definition of healthy is still being researched and hotly debated by scientists.

So, while she might not do any harm, I'd wait for more research, information and ethical standardization of treatments.

 

[Peter Deadpan]

No offense to your doctor but gut microbiome can differ between fecal samples, particularly in magnitude, and what's actually in the gut. So if she's treating premised on fecal sample results, I'd be leery of experimental treatment premised on this since forms of treatments have barely skated the surface. To obtain a full gut microbiome sample would require invasive extraction which is expensive and currently, treatments of 'imbalances', require a fecal transplant from a healthy donor. The definition of healthy is still being researched and hotly debated by scientists.

So, while she might not do any harm, I'd wait for more research, information and ethical standardization of treatments.

She's not my doctor. I don't do any of the stuff discussed in this thread currently and have never tested my microbiome.

 

[rav3n]

She's not my doctor. I don't do any of the stuff discussed in this thread currently and have never tested my microbiome.

Fair enough about her not being your doctor. I knew that this wasn't directly applicable to you but wanted to inform you and anyone else who might be reading this thread to be wary of jumping the gun, relative to experimental treatments. It's similar to what happened with probiotics where people jumped onto supplementing with insufficient proof of their effectiveness since we're not necessarily what we eat and that different body ecosystems process food and supplements in different ways and that science isn't even certain what a healthy microbiome looks like and that microbiota aren't necessarily good or bad. They're like multivitamins. Profiteers are quick to take advantage of people's naivety when it comes to buzzwords.

 

[Snow as White]

Fair enough about her not being your doctor. I knew that this wasn't directly applicable to you but wanted to inform you and anyone else who might be reading this thread to be wary of jumping the gun, relative to experimental treatments. It's similar to what happened with probiotics where people jumped onto supplementing with insufficient proof of their effectiveness since we're not necessarily what we eat and that different body ecosystems process food and supplements in different ways and that science isn't even certain what a healthy microbiome looks like and that microbiota aren't necessarily good or bad. They're like multivitamins. Profiteers are quick to take advantage of people's naivety when it comes to buzzwords.

it's a good thing to keep in mind. there are so many fad sciences out there now that companies immediately start marketing off of because people are always looking for that magic quick fix.