Elimination Diet

The elimination diet is a experiment you can perform on your own to figure out what food intolerances you may or may not have. Here's how it works...

1. Jot down all of the health issues you currently have - skin blemishes/breakouts, gas/bloating, constipation, diarrhea, headaches, mental fog, lethargy, mood, allergies, systemic inflammation, itching, nausea, joint pain, etc. I'd recommend keeping a food diary for a few days before you begin the elimination diet - it can give you a few clues as to what foods are your problem foods.

2. Now remove all of the foods that are commonly associated with food intolerances for 21 days. These include:

• Milk
• Wheat/Gluten
• Eggs
• Soy
• Dairy
• Alcohol
• Caffeine - you might want to ween yourself off of this one before going cold turkey
• Nuts - optional

Important things to remember - make sure you use alternate foods to supply the nutrients that you would normally get from the foods that you're avoiding. You will need to be careful about eating out or eating pre-made foods, and it would probably be best to steer clear of all pre-packaged food. When eating at a restaurant, you will need to be that annoying person who grills the server about how everything is made. Even better, call in advance and ask before you get there, or check online. As an example, one thing to watch for that you may not be able to tell from the menu is whether the dish contains soy - soy is in a lot of different products, and some restaurants cook with soybean oil.

3. Keep a food diary. Track how you feel throughout the day - energy, mood, digestion, mental functioning - especially after each meal. For a sample template, here's a simple one.

4. Then add foods back in one at a time. Pick one item and eat it twice in one day. See how your body reacts for the next 48 hours. If you don't have any negative reactions, eat it again. If you still don't have any bad reactions, then add a second food from the list. If you do have a negative reaction, remove that food from your diet because you have a food intolerance. Keep tracking your reactions in your food diary.

Background

A food intolerance is an adverse side effect to a food, drink, or food component. A food allergy, on the other hand, is an adverse immune response. Certain proteins are not broken down during digestion and are then tagged by the Immunoglobulin E (IgE). This tag tricks the immune system into thinking that the tagged protein is a foreign invader, and is thus swarmed by white blood cells. Say hello to your allergic reaction.

Please note that a food intolerance is very different from a food allergy, though some of the symptoms may be the same. An elimination diet, or at least the portion where you add foods back in, should not be undertaken by someone who knows or suspects that they have a food allergy. 

Why am I doing this?

Two reasons...

Number One: This past weekend was the 2015 Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo Cook-off. Basically it's a 3-day party revolving around excellent food. It was a great weekend, full of energetic and welcoming friends (man, do I love hanging out with a huge group of huggers!). My team got 3rd place in ribs and 11th place overall, so there was a lot of celebrating to do, intermingled with working the serving line and working as a bartender. After a weekend of indulging in whatever I wanted, I desperately need a detox.

Number Two: I'm tired of feeling bloated, suffering from headaches and stomachaches, and having knee pain. Systemic inflammation can be an underlying cause of many issues with the body, so I want to make sure that I can exclude food intolerance as a possible cause of any of my ailments.

Look for my follow-up post in just over a month once I figure out what my results are!

Eye Dominance

Did you know that you have a dominant eye? Surprise, you do! And no, it's not necessarily the same as your dominant hand. I'm right-handed and left-eyed. The term is ocular dominance, and refers to the brain's preference of visual input from one eye over the other.

How To: Test Eye Dominance

1) Hold your hands at eye level in front of you, thumbs and forefingers touching. Your hands should be vertical, as if your hands are pushed against a wall.

2) Move your hands closer together, so that the triangle formed by your thumbs and fingers has gotten to be about the size of a quarter.

3) With both eyes open, focus on an object in the distance through the triangle.

4) Now close your left eye. Can you still see the object you focused on? Congrats, you're right-eyed. If you can't see the object, you're left-eyed. Just to make sure. Reopen your left eye and close your right eye. What do you see? If the object is no longer in your field of vision, you have confirmation that you are in fact right-eyed. If you can still see it, congratulations, you are one of the rare people who do not have a dominant eye.

Roughly 2/3 of the population is right-eye dominant. A small percentage of people show no eye-dominance, however that still leaves us with about 1/3 of people being left-eye dominant.

What this means: if you shoot bows and arrows or guns, you might need to change what side you shoot from. For archery, you'll hold the bow with your right hand and pull back on the string with your left. It allows you to aim better. For shooting guns, you may want to adjust your stance so that your right foot is is front and your left arm is straight, using your right hand to steady the gun.

An interesting fact about people who have left-eye dominance is that there seems to be a correlation between people who suffer from with migraines (particularly auras) and left-eye dominance. (1)

And for something fun (thanks to BF for introducing me to this):

"I shake my ears back and forth"

1) Aygül R, Dane S, Ulvi H., Handedness, eyedness, and crossed hand-eye dominance in male and female patients with migraine with and without aura: a pilot study. <http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/16158700>

Rumspringa 1

Yesterday, KS, SD, and I went to Cafe Adobe for a girls lunch out before going to see Avengers with a few friends. I ate chips and salsa and a taco salad (with the flour tortilla shell) for the first time since starting Paleo and let me tell you, my body was not so happy. About 10 minutes after we left the restaurant and walked over to the movie theater, my head started pounding. KS fortunately shared her Excedrin Migraine with me in time for the headache to dissipate before we went into the theater. After the movie we got burgers and beer. I got my burger sans bun and just ate it lettuce-wrapped (I'm not going too crazy with the grains).

I ate Paleo for most of the day: breakfast consisted of lots and lots of carrots, and lunch was leftover burger. This evening however, Z and I went to Star Pizza for some Chicago deep-dish pizza. It wasn't as good as Mellow Mushroom, but I do have to admit that eating pizza crust and cheese was amazing! My stomach didn't appreciate it, but my taste buds bowed down and worshiped the awesomeness of dairy and cereal grains. With their forces combined, they are Pizza!

Bad Eating Habits

This past week has been very busy and stressful for me. I haven't had a lot of free time in the evenings to cook food for lunch during work, so I've been snacking at work and eating unhealthily. A couple Mondays ago, I posted about dark chocolate, how eating it made me feel sick, and how I was going to restrict myself... Yeah, that didn't happen. My breakfast for the past couple days has been nonexistent and my lunches have consisted of a dark chocolate covered nuts and single serving packets of nut butter (I tried walnut and cashew this week). If I had a health-o-meter, it would be pointing at the red zone of "Worst idea ever."

Couple my diet this week with the stress levels I have from work and preparing for moving next week (I just arranged for movers today - which is about 2 months behind schedule for me. One week is my version of waiting till the last minute), and it's no surprise that I haven't been feeling great lately. Today I had a headache that was bad enough to have me curled up in bed at 2 p.m., where I stayed until roughly 30 minutes ago. I also had accompanying nausea that would kick in every time I attempted to stand up. Even sitting on my couch right now is leaving the left side of my head throbbing. However after napping sporadically this afternoon, I decided food was probably a good idea. So I made myself some Roasted Brussels Sprouts, though this time I took a slice of bacon and sliced it into small pieces to cook with the Brussels sprouts. Delicious! If my stomach had emotions, eating the Brussels sprouts would make it smile and shout with joy! Even eating some of the raw leaves while I was prepping the Brussels sprouts made my body feel better.

This is why I think that my food habits this week have had a big influence on my health today. I basically set up my own personal perfect storm for migraines:

1. Lack of sleep/changes in sleep patterns
2. High stress levels
3. Unhealthy eating
4. Chocolate (this kind of falls under number 3, but it deserves its own section because chocolate is a common migraine trigger independent of other eating habits)
5. Weather changes

I think I've had a lot of small failures the past couple weeks. I'm hoping to get myself back into line over the next couple weeks.

P.S. I've heard of some people wanting to cut out the core of the Brussels sprout before cooking to promote fast and even cooking. Personally the core is my favorite part, so I suggest trying this cabbage-like veggie with the core.

P.P.S. I saw the trailer for Thundercats today. I find Vin Diesel with face paint very amusing, but give me Brad Pitt, Vin Diesel, and Hugh Jackman any day!

Why Paleo? Part 2 - Migraines

I'm one of those unfortunate people who gets migraines and has headaches on a daily basis. It's a family thing I guess, because my dad gets the same sort of thing and he's learned that his headaches are triggered by changes in pressure (a.k.a. weather) and correlates to eating wheat gluten. I know that my headaches correlate very strongly with a lack of sleep (as I've experienced lately), and my headaches usually get worse right after I eat, regardless of what I eat (though the intensity may vary). Additionally, the other week my doctor told me that processed foods can cause migraines. Well, Paleo fits in REALLY well with that. And the result is that my daily headaches aren't as bad and sometimes take a day off from tormenting me.

A migraine is a throbbing headache usually associated with nausea, vomiting, and sensitivity to light and/or sound. Usually the headache is focused on one side of the head. The exact chain of events that cause a migraine are still unclear. It's theorized that migraines are caused by swollen blood vessels in the brain pressing on nearby nerves. The attack begins in the brain, and involves nerve pathways and chemicals, affecting blood flow in the brain and surrounding tissues (1). Migraines are often seen in adults 25 to 55 years old (2).

Migraine symptoms vary based on the individual and the trigger. Most of them occur without warning, though some warning signs may include:

• Aura (usually vision disturbances)
• Numbness or tingling in lips, face, or hands
• Weakness in arms or legs
• Difficulty focusing

The "migraine hangover" are symptoms that linger after the migraine has passed:

• Feeling mentally dull, like your thinking is not clear or sharp
• Increased need for sleep
• Neck pain

The following are a list of common triggers (1):

• Caffeine withdrawal
• Changes in hormone levels during a woman's menstrual cycle or with the use of birth control pills. (Women are 3 times more likely to have migraines than men by their early 20s.)
• Changes in sleep patterns
• Exercise or other physical stress
• Missed meals
• Smoking or exposure to smoke
• Alcohol
• Stress and anxiety
• Certain odors or perfumes
• Loud noises or bright lights

And now for a list of common food triggers (1) (I've highlighted the ones that the Paleo diet excludes):

• Any processed, fermented, pickled, or marinated foods
• Foods containing monosodium glutamate (MSG)
• Chocolate
• Nuts
• Peanut butter
• Dairy
• Foods containing tyramine (red wine, aged cheese, smoked fish, chicken livers, figs, and certain beans)
• Fruits
• Meats containing nitrates (bacon, hot dogs, salami, cured meats - a.k.a. processed)
• Onions

There are three types of medication to take as a preventative measure:

• Blood pressure medication
• Anti-depressants
• Anti-seizure

In fall 2010, I had done my own little experiment where I went gluten-free for a month and a half to see how my body responded to it. Gluten-free resulted in fewer headaches than when I ate gluten. Also, the number of stomachaches I experienced decreased when I didn't eat gluten. To be honest, switching to the Paleo diet has actually been easier for me than just doing gluten-free. My assumed reasoning for this is that I still wanted wheat bread, crackers, and the like, because I was eating other grains. Sure I sometimes want chips and salsa or bread now, but it's easier for me to restrain myself.

Plus the paleo lifestyle promotes exercise and sleep. It's recommended that you go to sleep when it's dark out and even blackout your room (already done!). You shouldn't use an alarm, instead you should wake up when you feel rested. This infographic is decent summary of the history of today's version of the paleo diet. I'm set on the exercise front, but I need some work on setting aside time for sleep.

References:
1. "Migraine," PubMed Health; A.D.A.M. Medical Encyclopedia. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmedhealth/PMH0001728/
2. "Understanding Migraines," Relpax; http://www.relpax.com/understanding.aspx?source=google&HBX_PK=s_migraine&HBX_OU=50&o=32174861|210521462|0&skwid=43700003069423602