For years I’ve been telling any doctor who will listen that there is a medical reason for the difficulty I have in controlling my weight. They’ve always responded with an empathetic “that must be difficult” or a lecture about portion control and exercise.
The thing is … the calories in and calories out formula doesn’t apply to me. It seems to defy the laws of physics. I can work out at the gym 6 days a week and not lose weight. I’ve been vegetarian since I was a teenager, and I have the healthiest diet of anyone I know. Most of my food comes from the farmers market, and is over 95% plant-based. I cleanse a couple of times a year with juice fasting. Mysteriously I sometimes gain weight while I’m on a fast or a cleanse. That was incredibly mystifying and counter-intuitive when I was consuming only water, teas and vegetable juices for as long as 30-40 days in a row.
A few months ago my research went in a new direction when I started reading about gut health. Suddenly it seemed like the topic was popping up everywhere, and I was learning more every day about leaky gut, good bugs and the gut biome.
Leaky gut and autoimmunity
The more threads I followed, the more it made sense. If the bacteria in my gut is out of balance, that could finally explain not only the uncontrollable weight gain but also the other digestive problems I’ve experienced through the years, like inexplicable vitamin deficiencies and constipation, even on a high-fiber, nutrient-rich, plant-based diet.
Since I was a child, I’ve had problems with my immune system, although I didn’t realize it until later on. I had chronic throat and ear infections, so I took round after round of antibiotics. At 9 years old, I started to grow at an alarming rate. My folks took me to the doctor when I grew almost a foot in one year, reaching the height of 5’11” at the age of 10. I was diagnosed with congenital Hashimoto’s disease, which is an underactive thyroid gland caused by an autoimmune condition. My mom had recently received the same diagnosis.
At the time my father was in the air force, stationed at McChord AFB near Tacoma, Wa. An endocrinologist at the military hospital asked if he could study me and our family, as I was the first person he knew of to be diagnosed with Hashimoto’s disease before puberty. He found thyroid disease on both sides of the family going back for generations. We learned that one of my great grandmothers had a goiter and suffered from “poor health”, which was likely an undiagnosed autoimmune condition. She traveled by train to some of the earliest health spas in North America, for rest and to try to regain her health in places like Beverly Hills and Banff.
For 5 years as a pre-teen and teenager, I was prescribed and ingested the maximum daily dose of an antibiotic called tetracycline. A few years ago I started seeing a new doctor and was sharing my medical history. When I told her about the tetracycline, she winced a little and said it’s considered a dirty drug these days. I’ve since learned that my symptoms were misdiagnosed and tetracycline could not have helped. No disrespect to the doctors … as I said, more is known about autoimmune disease these days.
The lack of knowledge about autoimmune diseases when I was growing up meant that the doctors treated symptoms, often with antibiotics. And more antibiotics. While they are attacking the infection, antibiotics also wipe out the good bacteria that helps us to digest our food and absorb nutrients. Between the antibiotics prescribed for ear & throat infections and the 5 years of tetracycline, it’s possible that I’ve never hosted a healthy gut biome.
Good bugs
In March 2016, I decided it was time to try to grow some good bugs. The research showed various remedies, some of them contradictory or even bizarre. When I searched online for “leaky gut diet”, the first link recommended an entirely raw diet … including raw meat! I decided that I needed someone to help me find the right path, and found a naturopathic doctor with expertise in gut health. She asked about my background and agreed that it was likely that I had leaky gut. The recommended treatment is an elimination diet and probiotics.
What’s an elimination diet?
An elimination diet is a very simple diet that excludes all of the foods that commonly cause digestive problems or allergic responses. After following it strictly for at least 3 weeks, you start adding foods back in one at a time and document how you’re feeling.
I eliminated the following foods:
- caffeine
- all sweeteners (sugar, corn syrup, rice syrup, chemical sweeteners)
- all grains with gluten
- dairy
- soy beans, soy milk and tofu products
- alcohol
- eggs
- nightshade vegetables (peppers, tomatoes, potatoes, eggplant)
- corn
- tropical fruits and melons
- citrus fruit other than lemon and lime
- peanuts, cashews and pistachios
- strawberries
- table salt (sea salt is fine)
- fried and deep-fried foods
- all chemicals / processed foods
While following this simple and natural diet, I used a probiotic supplement and ate fermented foods like kombucha, kimchi and sauerkraut daily to introduce good bacteria.
The results were stunning. After 3 days, I had lost an astonishing 15 lbs. Then life intervened and I found out that I was being laid off from my job, so I went off the diet for a long weekend. The 15 lbs came right back on, of course. I re-started and once again lost the same 15 lbs. This time I stayed with the program.
I followed the strict elimination diet for a month, then re-introduced a few of the plant-based foods and tested some fermented foods. Throughout the elimination diet, I applied castor oil packs for at least 4 consecutive nights each week.
After 10 weeks, my weight was down 65 lbs.
Discipline, socializing and eating out
My diet was very clean before I started the elimination diet. I already didn’t eat meat or sugar, and limited my consumption of dairy, soy and gluten. As long as I ate at home, I found the new plan easy to follow. I ate salads, smoothies, curries and soups with plenty of legumes and gluten-free grains. When I wanted something rich and satisfying, almond butter or avocado on crackers was my treat. I made my own almond milk for creamy salad dressings and smoothies.
The tough part of the diet was socializing. I had re-located to a new city a few months earlier and was building a new social group. The most common activity was going out for food and drink. I found that the diet wasn’t restaurant friendly. Even the raw vegan bar used cashews and tomatoes in most of their dishes. Understandably, my new friends were self-conscious having a meal or drinks while I sipped a glass of water. I maintained my commitment, though, and we found work-arounds. Sushi (not normally my favourite because vegetarian sushi is boring and has no protein) was generally fine as long as I stayed away from soy sauce and yam rolls. The local noodle house offered brown rice as a gluten-free noodle substitute. I could often find a salad on the menu that could be adjusted to fit the diet.
And I have to say that the commitment was worth it. I felt better than I have in years. My digestion was working more smoothly, I was sleeping better and my skin was smooth and clear.
Re-introduction of foods
The concept of an elimination diet is to remove all potential trigger foods and let your body rest and heal for a few weeks. Then the foods are re-introduced one at a time so you can understand how they affect you. I used a slow and measured approach, because I felt that the restricted diet was manageable and so beneficial. I started re-introducing the excluded foods one at a time, eating each new food twice per day for three days while noting any changes in digestion, weight or general well-being.
I thought the food I would miss the most and re-introduce first would be coffee. Coffee is my chocolate – I love the rich flavour. It’s so satisfying. After several weeks on such a simple diet, that craving for coffee had disappeared. The thing I missed the most was spice! I eat hot sauce almost every day, and add a dash of cayenne, smoked paprika, or chopped jalapenos to most of my soups. While the fresh herbs that are allowed on the strict diet were lovely, I missed the heat.
I decided that I would add the vegetables back first, to add nutritional diversity. The first food I re-introduced was tomatoes, because I missed them in salads and soups. Next was spicy peppers, and sweet peppers. Here is the order I used for testing:
- Tomatoes
- Spicy peppers
- Sweet peppers
- Kombucha (more about this later)
- Watermelon
- Taking a probiotic twice a day instead of once
- Coffee – I take it with milk, but since I hadn’t re-introduced dairy yet I used my home-made almond milk
- Cashews – not just raw, but also blended in rich and delicious salad dressings
- Strawberries – it was late spring by this time, and the local organic strawberries were in season
- Peanuts
- Milk in coffee
- Goat cheese
- Quinoa – while not a gluten-containing grain, I suspected that I had a sensitivity
- Corn (fresh on the cob)
- Maple syrup, 1 tsp or less in a serving
- Eggs
- Yogurt
- Sourdough bread, leavened with fermentation
- Sour cream
- Beer
- Wine
- Yeast leavened bread
There are some foods that I didn’t bother testing, as they’re not part of my diet. I didn’t add sugar, artificial sweeteners, chemicals, meat, heavily processed foods, table salt and heavily salted foods, or corn syrup. I also haven’t added bananas and other tropical fruits or canned foods, which I have avoided for years.
Fermented (Probiotic) Foods
During my testing, I had a few mildly negative reactions, and one very positive reaction. When I tested drinking 1-2 cups of kombucha (fermented tea) every day, I felt GREAT. My digestion worked better and it sparked a jump with my weight loss.
As I researched more, I found other fermented foods to try as well, like kimchi, sauerkraut and pickles. The list was even longer after the elimination diet, as I could add natural sourdough bread, kefir, miso, raw cheese and yogurt.
Ukrainian heritage meant that I had a taste for one very important fermented food: sauerkraut. My great grandparents emigrated from Ukraine around 1900. Like many immigrants, they came to North America to avoid persecution in their home country and were very poor farmers here. They raised animals and worked the land. When an animal was slaughtered, the choice cuts of meat were sold to buy necessities. The family kept the remainders for soups, sausage, head cheese, and lard. A staple of their diet in the winter was sauerkraut, made from cabbage grown in their summer garden. My dad used to tell me that when his grandmother lifted the lid of the sauerkraut crock in the root cellar, his eyes would water on the second floor of the farmhouse.
Kimchi is similar to sauerkraut, with more spice and variety of vegetables. So delicious. It’s a regular condiment in my house now, to be stirred into soups or salads. Sometimes I even eat a few spoonfuls as a snack.
Antibiotics and Gut Health
After 3 months, life intervened again. I found out that I needed to have routine dental surgery to remove 2 wisdom teeth, and the procedure was scheduled for June 9. Because I tend to be vulnerable to infection, I was slammed with antibiotics. I’m grateful for antibiotics, but … damn! It meant starting from scratch with building my gut bacteria. I was given a double dose of intravenous antibiotics during the surgery and a course of oral antibiotics the next week. I think that’s called a clean slate.
I was still re-introducing foods at the time of the surgery. While I continued to sleep better and re-introduce foods slowly after the surgery , the antibiotics caused the weight loss to abruptly stop. Frustrating! In early August, I visited my naturopath to ask how long it takes to rebuild healthy bacteria. She said it could take up to 3 months.
And today …
During the summer, I continued to buy most of my groceries at the farmers market and exercise daily, taking long walks and swimming at a nearby lake. I went out with my new friends, drank some red wine and ate good food at our local restaurants. I also continued to take my probiotic supplement and eat fermented foods every day.
Here’s the exciting part: I have not regained the 65 lbs I lost on the elimination diet. For the first time in my adult life, I am maintaining my weight without starvation or 3 hours at the gym every day.
That brings us up to date. As autumn arrives, I feel like the time is right to get back on the program. Stay tuned!