We started doing an elimination diet as the bf was feeling a bit average and wondered if it was food related. After discussing his symptoms and when they had been occurring, it was too hard to narrow down to one food item and he began researching and came across elimination diets.
I had heard of elimination diets like the Paleo diet (not strictly an elimination diet but it does remove foods which often give people grief) and Whole 30 before and understood the concept behind why some foods were eliminated. The elimination diet he decided on was incredibly strict and essentially had us eating fish, rice, fruit (excluding citric fruit and dried fruit – I chose to still eat pitted dates as that was the only ingredient in the packet) and vegetables (no potato’s, tomato’s or eggplant).
I decided to do the elimination diet with him for a couple of reasons;
– That kind of strict diet would be taxing enough without someone eating yummy foods in front of you.
– I wanted to know if there were any foods that were causing me issues as well that I didn’t really notice or just lived with.
So essentially with the elimination diet you cut all the crap out of your diet and just eat whatever you are allowed on your diet and then at the end of the first week (some go 10 days) you add back in one food at a time and leave it a couple of days in between the reintroduction to see if you have any noticeable changes in your body.
If you do have a reaction to something you then know what has been making you feel the way you did and you can put in a plan of attack, generally dropping that item from your diet and implementing an alternative. For example if you found you were getting reactions from Cows Milk you might change to Almond Milk.
I tell you what – eating white fish with rice and frozen vegetables for three meals a day is draining. The first couple of days I couldn’t stomach the thought of fish for breakfast and didn’t end up eating very much, the same happened at lunchtime and I found I was ridiculously hungry as I couldn’t get as much food down as I usually would have.
I also found snacking hard, usually I would have either fruit, a protein bar or a mix of dried fruit, nuts and seeds – now my only option out of that lot was fruit and I personally do not find fruit to fill the gaps.
There is only so many ways you can prepare fish, rice and vegetables and by the end of day 3 we were hanging out for something that wasn’t white fish. We had brought a couple of small packs of Salmon at the supermarket when we stocked up on the white fish. I’m fairly certain knowing we were having that at the end of day three kept me going, it was amazing too!
We did get a little creative and I did create a cauliflower, fish, herb thing that was supposed to be patties however they didn’t stick together as I didn’t think about what would bind it in the absence of an egg so instead it was a just faux rice mixed with fish with some kumara on the side and more vegetables.
Traditionally you do the elimination section of the diet for a week to 10 days however we didn’t have too many foods to eliminate as we generally eat pretty healthy and basic anyway – one of our staples is chicken rice and vegetables so we were both hanging out for chicken to be brought back in to the diet.
At the end of day 5 we had smashed through over 4kg of white fish, far too much rice and discovered that Kumara and avocado are a blessing when it comes to these bland meals. We both looked forward to the meals where we made kumara chips in the oven and could smother some avocado on the fish to give it a bit of extra taste.
We decided that 5 days was long enough for us, especially considering I am fairly certain now that white fish does not agree with me at all. I was the one who felt fine before starting the elimination diet yet now I was getting all kinds of tummy upsets and bowel movements, bring on the chicken! I must admit though I did feel very alert even in the afternoons of the days we were eating fish though, perhaps an argument that I could do with more fish in my diet. The b/f was feeling really good but could not face any more white fish and was on the verge of not being able to face rice much longer.
The next post will showcase the foods we introduced back in, the order we reintroduced them back in to our diet and the results they had on us…
The Results of our Elimination Diet
Interesting in the choice of diet – my partner has been chronically ill for about 3 years (starting to wonder if he is allergic to me, as when we got together he got sick!) and has been put in the ‘too hard basket’ by his doctor. He’s currently on an elimination diet, but the FODMAP one as recommended by Monash University and various dietitians. This diet sees him eliminate gluten, some lactose, certain fruits and veges as these can all trigger his symptoms, or so we’ve been led to believe. I’m sure you’ve done the research but I’d caution about just eating vegetables because there are heaps that my partner can no longer eat at the stage of the diet. It also doesn’t seem like a long period to eliminate – we’re doing ours for 4 weeks to really give the body time to adjust to the new diet and flush everything out before we start reintroducing (which we can’t wait for because our food budget has taken a massive blow!)
I hope an elimination diet gives some clarity, I’ve read a lot about the differences it can have on people so hopefully you can find the trigger. There were a few veges eliminated from our diet, potato, tomato and eggplant although we did it more of an experiment rather than because either of us was chronically ill so I can see how someone who is as sick as your partner would need to eliminate more thoroughly. Our overall process took about 6 weeks before we had everything fully reintroduced it was just the first 5 days that was solely white fish, rice, fruit and vege and it was torture, although would be well worth it if you found the root of the problem! Let me know how he gets on with his elimination diet.