Any advice for transitioning to a low fat/ no dairy diet?

Coloradogirl1996

Does anyone here have advice for transitioning to a low fat/ no dairy diet? I have been diagnosed with GERD and it was recommended by my doctor to go low fat. And I am pretty sure I’m sensitive to dairy so I might as well get rid of it from my diet. I just have no idea how. I’ve tried low carb (wasn’t a fan though) but it was easy to know what has lots of carbs and what to stay away from. For whatever reason I can’t wrap my head around low fat. I’m trying to slowly go into it because I know if I try to switch everything over night, it’ll be too much and I’ll give up. But I really can’t give up this time, you know?
What I have done so far is quit soda and started to limit my fast food intake. Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

Lillymoo01

Choose lean meat sources like chicken, turkey and fish. Eat plenty of fruit and vegetables and complex carbs like oatmeal, whole grain bread, rice, and couscous.

You still need some fats so choose food with monounsaturated and polyunsaturated fats. Think along the lines of nuts and seeds, avocados, olive oil and fatty fish like salmon.

yirara

Get a food diary and see what works for you. The reasons for GERD can be extremely individual. For example: I might get problems from lean meat, and quite some protein-rich food. Low fat milk, cottage cheese, mozarella are problematic, eggs are the worst. And all vegan milk. High fat diary is fine, goat, sheep and camel dairy is fine. Spices? No problem. Sour? Fine. High fat? No problem. Tea? black tea and rooibos is, green tea, herbs, sour rosehip tea are no problem. *shrugs*

Strudders67

If you don't KNOW that you're intolerant to dairy, I'd start with just reducing your fat intake per your doctor's recommendation. Don't try to complicate things all at once.

Also be aware that many food stuffs that are labelled low fat may not actually be low in fat, they may just be lower in fat than their 'normal' equivalent. In many instances, additional sweeteners or chemicals are added to compensate for the taste change, which potentially causes other issues. Aim for real foods, per Lillymoo01's suggestion, but note what you're eating and how your reactions are each day to work out what's really going on in your body.

lorrpb

Log your food in MFP. LOok at where the most fat is coming from. Swap out lower fat versions. Trim fat, choose lower % meats, grill or poach rather than fry, less oil more herbs, and so on. Try to take it one step at a time rather than one drastic change. Much Dairy has a lot of fat, so reducing dairy will help lower your fat as well.

Maxxitt

Since you already know you're sensitive to dairy, cutting that first makes sense. When my ulcer & gastritis were acting up, yogurt and milk killed me but for some reason kefir was fine. With the "fat" issue, you may find that it is more an issue of amount of fat in a particular meal. Given that a lot of what we think of as "fast food" can be higher fight items, limiting that or really pretty much stopping it altogether might be enough. You could try an experiment of no fast food for a week or two and see how you feel.

Coloradogirl1996

Thank you everyone for your responses. They have all helped a ton. I do appreciate it.

MikePfirrman

My wife had terrible GERD for a while years ago. She bought a book on food combining. I was so desperate that I was wanting to try anything to help her. The basics were eat fruit by itself only. You can eat complex or simple grains or starches with veggies but not any animal products. You could eat animal products with any non-starchy vegetable. You could not eat starchy foods with any animal products (dairy or meat). Along with reducing coffee, it went away pretty quickly if she followed these rules.

This sounds simple, but if you think about it, so many American/Western diet things violate these rules -- Cheeseburgers, Pizza, any Sandwich with meat or cheese, spaghetti and meatballs, etc. Most things we eat now would cause GERD. The book believed that starchy foods and animal products can't be digested well together, sit in your stomach and cause too much stomach acid that backs up into the esophagus.

All I know is it worked pretty quickly.