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Listen to Your Gut

2/27/2013

In follow up to my last article on the benefits of a gluten-free diet, I want to go a little deeper into gut health with you now by talking about an elimination diet. While gluten is a hot topic in the health & wellness industry, for some of us gluten intolerance may only be half the picture.Say you remove gluten from your diet and you are feeling great. But a few weeks later you start feeling blah again: chronic fatigue, joint pain, stomach upset, headaches or even migraines. Well it could be that in addition to gluten, you also have food intolerance to dairy, soy, egg, yeast or corn.

According to Tom Malterre, Nutritionist and Fonder of Whole Life Nutrition, practitioners around the globe have found that taking potentially irritating foods out of the diet for a period of weeks and then adding them back in can cause changes in a person’s body that will clue them in to what is working and what is not. When people eliminate potentially problematic foods for three or more weeks using the elimination diet some pretty amazing things can happen when your gut is allowed to heal: rheumatoid arthritis, chronic fatigue, headaches, stubborn belly fat, unexplained diarrhea, nausea, and constipation all can be resolved.

Really? Yes.

Because everything comes from the gut – nutrition, immune health, brain health. Remember when your mother told you – just listen to what your gut tells you. Well, she was right. Scientists are now starting to look at the importance of gut health as it relates to brain health (here’s a great article from SA on this subject, if you really want to nerd out on this: http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=gut-second-brain). The net, net here is that if your gut is not healthy and happy, neither are you!

So if you are game for trying an elimination diet – it can literally change your life and I highly recommend it! It can be a little time intensive because you really have to be careful of what you are eating and going to a restaurant is pretty much a no-go. The elimination diet is a 28-day process and you can read more about it on Mr. Malterre’s blog to see if it’s right for you: http://www.nourishingmeals.com/2010/01/elimination-and-detoxification-diet-its.html.

I hope you are encouraged to learn more – if this seems at all overwhelming, you know who to call for help/advice ;)

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The Skinny on Gluten

1/31/2013

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So let’s talk about the hot topic of gluten to kick things off. Many people are now beginning to understand that you don’t necessarily need to have celiac disease to have issues with gluten. Many people are simply sensitive to gluten and/or are unable to properly digest it. The best way to determine if your body has issues with gluten is to remove it completely from your diet for two weeks, and this includes sauces which might have gluten in them (e.g., ketchup, soy sauce, pasta sauce, soups, etc.) because gluten is used as a thickening / stabilizing agent. Once you have removed gluten from your diet for two weeks, add it back in and see how your body reacts. (And this exercise can be used to test your reaction to any potentially problematic food: milk, eggs, citrus, nuts, etc. – more on this in the next newsletter.) Personally, whenever I add gluten into my diet I experience bloating and constipation.

But on a very serious note, the effects of gluten can be dangerous. According to Dr. Vikki Petersen, author of “The Gluten Effect” the major problems associated with gluten intolerance is the “silent”, insidious nature of it. While many people notice immediate symptoms when eating gluten, about 75 percent notice no digestive symptoms, and some notice very little symptoms at all. Unfortunately that doesn’t lessen your chances of developing autoimmune diseases, nervous system damage and intestinal cancer, to name a few. Some of these serious conditions do develop silently and your first knowledge of the damage comes with the diagnosis of a disease.

If you decide that removing gluten from your diet is for you – rest assured there are still lots of options for you. There is an amazing array of gluten-free products on the shelves these days and with the upswing of the Paleo diet (Paleo’s don’t eat grains), there’s lots of Paleo cookies, breads and snacks made from things like almond meal or coconut flour. I want to throw in one word of caution with gluten-free products here and that is when you are removing gluten from your diet to clear up your gut – please don’t replace it with processed foods that contain potato starch and/or xanthan gum because these can also gunk-up your gut. So be sure to read the labels - the idea here is too keep your gut clear so vital nutrients can pass through your gut and be delivered to the rest of your body.

Grains that contain gluten are wheat, barley and rye. Also, it’s important to note that commercially-produced oats are typically processed in the same facility as wheat so cross-contamination can be an issue. To avoid this, make sure you are getting oats that say gluten-free on the package (same goes for corn tortillas, chips). A gluten-free diet basically resembles that of a Mediterranean diet without pasta and commercially-baked goods. So a diet full of a balanced variety of foods derived from plants (veggies, whole grains, beans, olive oil, nuts, fruit) plus organic eggs, wild-caught fish and occasionally grass-fed poultry / meat.

So what are the benefits of ditching gluten? Well since you will be replacing processed foods with fresh, raw ingredients, there is a very high likelihood that this will lead to weight loss, clearer skin and reduced “brain fog” – these are all things that my clients have reported back to me after going gluten-free. Now if you are already on the slim slide, cutting out gluten might actually lead to a little weight gain, which is okay. This is due to the fact that gluten has been blocking the absorption of nutrients through your gut.

Now I realize the reason our society is reliant on gluten-containing products is for the “fast-food” convenience. Trust me, I get it. I’m busy too. But when I see the long-term damage that can be caused by gluten, I remind myself that the extra time it might take to make something fresh is worth it. And with you in mind, I will provide some fabulous gluten-free recipes that take no time at all to prepare….it just takes a little planning. And I know I have a lot of type-A readers out there, like me, so this should be a piece of (gluten-free ;) cake!

In my health coaching practice, the first thing I do to introduce my clients to the benefits and joy of being gluten free is give them a recipe for muesli to have in the morning. It’s fast, easy and delicious – it just takes a little planning ahead the night before. And if you have kids, this is a much, much healthier option for them than commercially-produced toast or cereal. For a great recipe, please click here: http://www.choosingraw.com/raw-vegan-bircher-muesli-superfood-inspired/.

And because I love you – here’s a link to bake something yummy for this Valentine’s Day:http://taliafuhrman.com/?p=936.

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Listen to Your Gut

The Skinny on Gluten

Nicole Risdall

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