Literally Out of Ideas of What I CAN Eat! :(

Dragonwolf

baum7934 wrote: »

Can you explain why you cannot eat soy? I'm confused that you can eat tofu but yet said earlier no soy. You do understand that tofu is made from soy, right?

I'm not trying to be rude, but I thought I'd question it because if you can tolerate tofu, then you can certainly include lots of other soy products in your diet - like edamame, soy yogurt, ect.

Tofu (and the soy milk that it's made from) goes through some pretty extensive processing. The milk substrate (beans or flour) is soaked for at least three hours, then boiled for 15-20 minutes. This inactivates a lot of the "bad" stuff in soy (like trypsin inhibitors). So it might be that the process neutralizes the compound that she's actually reacting to.

The salts, acids, or enzymes used in making tofu (magnesium chloride, calcium chloride, potassium chloride, citric acid, acetic acid, protease, etc) may actually be helping her without her realizing it.

tiddles_yeah wrote: »

In response to a few other questions - i tried taking digestive enzymes in the past but they exacerbated several other problems so it was decided that they couldnt be continued

How long did you take them? If you have an overgrowth of something like Candida, the resurgence of the good flora can cause die-off of the parasitic flora. This can make things worse at first, but then things will start getting better. You just have to stick with it for long enough (it sucks, I know, but sometimes, in order to see improvements, you have to cut out the bad stuff).

tiddles_yeah wrote: »

For those wanting me to write down the foods i can have, at the moment these are things i usually rotate around:
- millet puffs
- tofu (special types with no soy sauce or other gluten etc)
- pea protein shakes
- pumpkin soup
- blueberries
- strawberries
- chia seeds
- water chestnuts
- cut green beans
- small amounts of flaxseeds
- zucchini
- capsicums

Thats about it, at the moment

If you can do strawberries and blueberries, you should be able to do raspberries, too. Being able to do zucchini and pumpkin suggests that other squashes might be feasible (zucchini is a type of squash) - check out spaghetti, butternut, and acorn squash, too.

Have you tried or ruled out shellfish? Oysters, mussels, and other bivalves, in particular, are insanely nutrient dense, so if you can tolerate even a small amount, it can be hugely beneficial.

Also, have you tried wild caught vs farmed fish, and lower on the chain (sardines, anchovies, etc) vs higher on the chain (tuna, swordfish, etc) fish? Farmed fish are very often fed a diet that includes a ton of wheat gluten (seriously, ever look at the ingredient list of fish food?), which again might be the underlying reason you can't eat fish. If you can find wild caught fish, it might be worth trying. Larger fish on the food chain generally have more toxins due to bioaccummulation, but the smaller fish have less of these toxins, and so might be better tolerated.

tiddles_yeah wrote: »

I know its a hard thing to express online, but it is almost scary eating things i am not 100% sure wont make me sick/in pain after spending years and years of being sick or in pain almost everyday from what i was eating.
Especially at the moment, doing medical school exams, i cant spend time being sick and risk failing. Im not saying it to shoot down any ideas or as a 'woe is me', its merely to provide a bit of additional context to the current situation and basis of a lot of stress for me right now

That's up to you, and being scared is understandable in your circumstance. However, consider this -- the food list you have above is deficient in a number of key nutrients, including several B vitamins, vitamins E and K, and minerals such as zinc and iron. This means that unless you work to find the foods that you can eat, you'll be fighting an uphill battle with your health not even including the underlying issue that's causing these food reactions to begin with. Hold off until exams are done, certainly, but be careful to not find another reason to try to address this head-on. The best residency or job in the world will mean nothing if you become too sick to eat anything at all, or too weak to even get out of bed.

You might want to check out The Patient Celiac. She has MCAS and Celiac, so you can probably find a ton of helpful information on her site.

Even if it's not MCAS proper, your can and can't eat food lists look indicative of a histamine issue (even under normal circumstances, certain foods are high in histamine or cause a histamine release, it becomes a problem when the body over-reacts), so that might be another research avenue, if you haven't gone that route already.

MinnieInMaine

Two things:

1) Go to a different nutritionist. While that list is daunting, they should be able to help you develop a healthy balanced eating plan with alternative foods

2) As someone else suggested, start building a list of foods you can eat and try to focus more on that. While that may sound obvious, it can really help to change your perspective from "there's nothing I can eat without getting sick!" to "huh, look at all these interesting things I can eat". I know it's helped me when trying more restrictive diets in the past.

VeryKatie

Did you find out about these allergies through a skin prick test? My doctor stopped me from getting one of those because you WILL react to pretty much everything - the concentrations are too high and the test is a terrible indicator of actual allergies. Just curious.

I also find it really ... generic? that you're allergic to ALL meat. Is that true (just verifying)? Did they test you for chicken, beef, pork, lamb, goat, turkey, duck, goose, bison, ostrich, fish, deer, moose, insects, etc? These are all meats that should be alright to find in a city.

But it does look like beans and veggies are your friend. And... maybe you want to give insects a try. I'm actually serious (especially with the number of things you can't eat). They're nutritious and if you get used to it, maybe it's the way to go?

EDIT: Ah, didn't see you were vegan. I also read that you can't eat most meat so it's not vegan by choice (even though it's also by choice haha). You really might need to branch out though and keep yourself healthy and eat just a few non-vegan items. You said you can't imagine life as not being a vegan... but is death by malnutrition really an option when you're also recovering from illness? I'm concerned.

Whatever your choice, I hope you can find food that works for you! Here's a list of other things to consider:

All other veggies - broccoli, cabbage, bok choy, cauliflower, turnip, parsnip, carrot, endive, spinach, kale, chard, squash, pumpkin, kidney beans, chickpeas, black beans, fava beans, lentils, lima beans, pigeon peas, lupins- there are lots and lots of bean types and you can buy them dry and hydrate them yourself if your concerned about any additives... you may want to look into more ethnic veggies (like from China or South America - their varieties tend to be different than what we would typically eat in North America).

Fruits - Oranges, apples, strawberries, etc - you didn't really list a lot of fruit allergies so the sky may be the limit here other than the Goji berries, cherries, and pomegranates.

Grains (you'll need to research the gluten part yourself) - Others have mentioned quinoa, but there's also bulgur, oats, barley, rye, millet, teff, triticale, amaranth, buckwheat... you could also try some seeds like sunflower, pumpkin, flax, etc. to bulk up your food a bit.

Oils are your friend instead of butter products too.

Edit: Aw crap, I should have looked at the FODMAP site earlier. Oh well... maybe I will have at least listed one or two things you can eat..

chalk_and_chaturangas

Hi there,
Have you ever heard of Diane Sanfillipo? Her site is http://balancedbites.com/. She is a Paleo cookbook writer and I know some of her recent work includes FODMAP alterations. Obviously, not all Paleo foods would work for you (meat & honey), but some of her recipes may open up some doors for you.

Best of luck with your nutritionist and gastroenterologist. I hope they're able to help you find a solution.

-R

Dragonwolf

VeryKatie wrote: »

Grains (you'll need to research the gluten part yourself) - Others have mentioned quinoa, but there's also bulgur, oats, barley, rye, millet, teff, triticale, amaranth, buckwheat... you could also try some seeds like sunflower, pumpkin, flax, etc. to bulk up your food a bit.

Oats, barely, and rye contain gluten (oats generally by cross contamination, though). She stated that she's severely reactant to gluten, so those four are out.

wkwebby

Broccoli and spinach weren't on that list of veggies you can't have. I would live on those if I was a vegan. MMMMMMM. Also, there are some beans that weren't on the list, maybe you could incorporate some of those.

Try stress management as well. It sounds like you have a lot of stress going on which can always make IBS worse. Try yoga and meditation in addition to everything else?

Basilin

Hi Tiddles (hehe), I don't have any advice I can give but I wanted to say I feel for you and I hope you figure out a diet that works. It sounds like you've been through a lot. It's neat that you are going to medical school. Perhaps that isn't surprising.

The only thing I can think is perhaps looking into different ethnic cuisines; perhaps there are some that don't use a lot of these foods. For instance, Ethiopian foods have a lot of vegan, gluten-free and dairy free recipes. Shiro is chick-pea based, Injera is made with teff flour. I'm not sure what kind of starch you can't metabolize, but you might want to see if teff is digestible for you like millet or sorghum.

_Terrapin_

For the OP just 'cause. Top 10 Paleo Power foods for those who thought this made sense for the OP--dark chocolate(NO), cherries(NO), grass fed beef(NO), wild caught salmon(NO) so this leaves kiwi, coconut oil, seaweed, free range eggs, kale. Folks, giving someone advice who restricts their intake and has medical issues may not be great advice in fact it may just be pretty sad. OP best of luck. Allergist, dietician, endo specialist would be my stops but that is just me.

nephalime

And i thought my diet was restrictive ! Hang in there, i feel for you .. Best of luck in your exams

Basilin

_Terrapin_ wrote: »

For the OP just 'cause. Top 10 Paleo Power foods for those who thought this made sense for the OP--dark chocolate(NO), cherries(NO), grass fed beef(NO), wild caught salmon(NO) so this leaves kiwi, coconut oil, seaweed, free range eggs, kale. Folks, giving someone advice who restricts their intake and has medical issues may not be great advice in fact it may just be pretty sad. OP best of luck. Allergist, dietician, endo specialist would be my stops but that is just me.

Oh Terrapin, you are so smart! I can't believe no one else figured out that Tiddles wouldn't be able to eat everything in the paleo diet; even the mere suggestion that it might have some good ideas for her was absurd. Everyone is so stupid compared to you. You have so much knowledge and wisdom, please, tell us how we can make our lives less sad and miserable.

BTW she can't eat eggs either.

tiddles_yeah

The idea to look into ethnic cuisines is quite a good idea, so thanks for that. It will probably take a bit of research but may be at least one area to investigate.

I think someone covered it but yes i can eat tofu. The main problem with soy sauce (which is quite often in a lot of types of tofu so i have to check) is that, unless specified otherwise, it can contain gluten which i am extremely sensitive to
I used to eat puffed tofu/puffed bean curd but i had a problem with what i believe was mislabelling of cal/macro content on them and ended up gaining weight at an unusually quick rate (see another of my posts for more details if you need), so thats where i hit a major road block recently

Broccoli i can only have a max of about 1/4 of a cup a day or have problems, the same with most beans/legumes

I really hope the gastorenterologist has some ideas when i see him soon, but otherwise I will accept my current situation and do the best i can to remain positive. As someone who should have died several times by now, I guess a restricted diet is still better than having no life at all

tiddles_yeah

Oh, and i do have supplements for quite a number of micronutrients - eg vit B, iron, calcium, folate, magnesium, copper, zinc etc

_Terrapin_

Basilin wrote: »

_Terrapin_ wrote: »

For the OP just 'cause. Top 10 Paleo Power foods for those who thought this made sense for the OP--dark chocolate(NO), cherries(NO), grass fed beef(NO), wild caught salmon(NO) so this leaves kiwi, coconut oil, seaweed, free range eggs, kale. Folks, giving someone advice who restricts their intake and has medical issues may not be great advice in fact it may just be pretty sad. OP best of luck. Allergist, dietician, endo specialist would be my stops but that is just me.

Oh Terrapin, you are so smart! I can't believe no one else figured out that Tiddles wouldn't be able to eat everything in the paleo diet; even the mere suggestion that it might have some good ideas for her was absurd. Everyone is so stupid compared to you. You have so much knowledge and wisdom, please, tell us how we can make our lives less sad and miserable.

BTW she can't eat eggs either.

Simple, eat a balanced diet and forget the gimmicky diets. Oh and feel free to workout once in a while your body will thank you.

NaeTeaspoon

Hi Tiddles,
I don't have any specific advice (and it looks like there have been some suggestions far more expert than I could make here anyway) but I just wanted to say it does get easier and you're doing really well. I have suffered from major allergies all my life and just recently have discovered the list is longer than originally thought. It is so demoralising to go to the supermarket and feel like you're going to cry because your options are so slim.
It does get better

111grace

I LOVE LOVE corn and cherries, I would eat them everyday if I could.
I agree with Cailin " Maybe a better idea might be to write a list of things you can eat. Then try and plan out different meals that way. "
How do you get your protein intake right?? This would help me very much? because, I don't like eating meat proteins, eggs etc.