Days to be restarted...

So it's my last night in Mexico, and I'm writing to say that I really haven't eaten that badly this trip. Given, I have indulged on more than one occasion, and that's not taking into consideration all the alcohol I've drank. Not that I was drunk every day or anything...Pfft, who does that?

So anyway, throughout the trip I had ups and downs as far as stomach pain. I stayed away from eating cheese for the most part. Luckily, real Mexican cuisine doesn't use much cheese at all. I definitely ate lots and lots of guacamole, but also ate some French cuisine, Steakhouse, lobster house, many buffets, and of course; tons of Mexican delicacies.

There was also a tapas restaurant at the second resort we went to. One of the chosen items was a platter of cheese. I'd avoided it until the waitress imposed it on us. It was divine, but I only had small bits of each kind.

I may fill you in more on my eating habits from my trip some time when I get back.Perhaps the gory details will be fun, providing I can remember it all!

When I do get back, sadly, late tomorrow night, I will have to face reality once again and start to eat properly to fix the damaged I caused in paradise.

I'm going to have to restart the phase 1 part of the IBS healing diet. This time, I will keep certain carbs such as brown rice, because I really lost too much weight that I didn't need to. Mexico has helped in that respect too.

All in all I've had a wonderful time and have met some terrific people. Reality will bite, but I think I'm on a much healthier path where I'll eventually be able to eat as I please in a moderate manner. Taking probiotics has seemed to be an integral part of not totally screwing up the repairs that I'd started. I did have to rely on Senekot S twice.

For those that are curious, at Stuffed Ashes I will review the resort(s) I stayed at during my trip. It was a superb adventure, and much more of an adventure than we'd planned, which turned out to be awesome.

Hasta Luego!

Day 13

So as you know from my post yesterday, not only have I given up cheese, but I am now undergoing a healing diet so that my system can get back to normal. I will then be reintroducing foods slowly, according to the guidelines of my IBS help book. It's going to be a big challenge, but I'm really trying.

I will find it difficult next week, because I have to travel for work. It wouldn't be quite so bad if I could buy my own food during the day, but I can't because it's a planned conference with meals included. I'll have to pick and chose, and not eat the bread, etc. I think I'll get funny looks, especially since I'm skinny. We'll see how it goes. I mean, if there's really nothing I can eat without having to 'cheat' then I'll just have to 'cheat' cuz THIS girl ain't starving herself. I wonder how well avocados travel in a suitcase? It's only a 2 hour trip...

So yesterday was the first day of this 'Phase 1' diet. It only started in the evening though, as I hadn't gone to do any groceries etc. Yesterday morning I  still had a coffee with milk and sugar in it. I also had a smoothie for breakfast, which contained the same ingredients as the evening before. Blueberries, Strawberries, cranberries, and honeydew melon. The only thing that would not be allowed from that now, would be the blueberries, oh, and perhaps the cranberry juice added.

For lunch I had Pad Thai from Thai Express at the mall. I added a ton of hoisin sauce to it, some lemon juice, and some crushed peanuts. I hadn't had this in a while, so it was a good treat. I asked for medium spice, but it really wasn't spicy enough. I find that it is give or take with that place. Sometimes you ask for medium spice, and it's VERY hot spicy. Other times, it's much too mild. Oh well. Still flavourful. I think my favourite part about eating Thai express is their little food boxes. They're so cute!

I went to the grocery store, and it was quite the quick trip. Everything I needed was in the fresh produce section, and the meat aisle! That's it. I bought lots of vegetables in the 'unlimited' categories.

At home I made my stir fry, which consisted of the following: Leeks, asparagus, zucchini, eggplant, and AAA grilling steak with no visible fat. I fried it all in butter. Now, here's where I cheated. I used salted butter. I couldn't help it, I needed SOME good flavour... I think that's still really good. Oh, I also grated some fresh ginger root and added that, in addition to fresh ground pepper, and a sprinkle of garlic power.

I think I was too generous with the leeks. I figured there really wasn't going to be much flavour, so I put in two leeks(only the stalks, not the greens). The stir fry was quite tasty, but very onion-y because of the leeks, and it definitely had some kick because I added the grated ginger, around 2 tsp worth. I've never used fresh ginger before. I put a lot of butter, so it was very edible, but that's probably not good. Although the book mentions the butter restrictions as a weight thing. I don't have to worry about my weight, so I'm not too worried about it. I'm having it again for lunch, so I'll definitely need gum afterwards. Leaves you with an awful breath. Blech.

I forgot a very important factor about phase 1. Vitamins.

Phase 1 vitamins required:

Vitamin C: 1500 mg 4 times per day (pure nonoxidizable fully reduced and powdered-not chewable tablets, powder to mix with water as tablets harm your teeth enamel and are not recommended. The vitamin C is supposed to reduce inflammation and stimulate the immune system.)
Quercetin: 1000 mg 4 times per day (helps the body use the vitamin C properly)
Glutamine: 2 grams, 1 in morning on empty stomach, and 1 on empty stomach in evening(helps speed repair of gastrointestinal lining, and assists in balancing your alkaline-acid levels)
Acidophilus: 2 doses of freeze-dried lactobacillus acidophilus, 3 times a day with food.(this is a probiotic, he recommends to continue the probiotic beyond phase 1)

Phase 2 will be a multivitamin, and he lists what it should contain.

On to the vitamin store tonight. I think that because I'm focusing on healing at the moment, I'm not so worried about my cheese being missing. This is good. My reward will pretty much be my trip in 2 weeks, but once back I'll likely have to do a bit more of phase 1 before moving on to phase 2.

Day 7 Already 1 week of suffering

Wow, I can't believe I've made it a week already. That being said, I still have not felt any better. I've been constantly bloated. Not fun at all. I wonder if something in my bird seed mix causes bloating, because I've been eating a lot of that. It's quite tasty, actually.

Yesterday morning, was another too busy for anything but coffee and bird seeds once again.  I was pretty much munching on my bird food throughout the entire day, actually. No one seemed to mind while in our 3 1/2 hour meeting yesterday. Ugh.

Yesterday's lunch consisted of leftovers from my stir fry supper on Day 6. It's a great lunch, and I was happy to not have to leave the office to go and buy food again. I received a 'smells good!' comment too.

When I got home, I really didn't have a clue what to eat. Hadn't I planned anything? Oh right, I'd wanted to prepare Thai Chicken burgers, but the store didn't have any ground chicken available.

When in doubt? BACON.

I had a delicious pumpernickel BLAT again. BLAT = Bacon, Lettuce, Avocado, and Tomatoes. The lettuce is actually bok choy and spinach, though. I really like bok choy. I also added S&P, PC's Chipotle dressing, and some Helman's Mayonaise.

The pumpernickel bread is quite thin, and not as large as your typical bread slice. At least this is the logic I used when convincing myself that at 9:30 PM I needed yet another BLAT.

SOOOO tasty!

The problem has been that every night when I try to sleep, I am super bloated. It has not been fun at all, and even with my typical IBS-C bloating bouts, this is unusual. The good thing out of this? I've been trying some deep breathing exercises to try and combat said bloating, which has actually been helping me fall asleep! I've had a full night's sleep every night so far since quitting cheese.

There better not be a correlation there people, or I'll be pissed.

I'm associating this more towards the fact that I've been breathing through my stomach. I haven't mentioned this here yet, but usually I'll get severe occurrences of insomnia every few weeks for a few nights straight. It's horrible, so I'm thankful for not having had to deal with that recently.