Happy Friday!
I was diagnosed with Primary Sjogren's earlier this year. While there is a wealth of information here and across the internet, I feel more confused than ever. More specifically, I am having a hard time getting my head wrapped around my next steps in terms of changing my diet.
I want to heal my gut, go on the anti-inflammatory diet, stop eating night shade vegetables, go gluten free, cut out dairy, cut out alcohol and caffeine.........AND I WANT TO DO IT ALL NOW...but, there is no magic pill, so to speak. I understand it is going to take discipline and lots of trial and error.
My inflammatory markers are all normal, so does that mean that I should not be concerned at all with foods that cause inflammation?
What did you do at first to try and heal your body? What advice do you have for me in terms of food choices or just mentality while I am tackling the beginning of this journey?
I appreciate your response.
First of all, I understand wanting to do it all now, but patience has now become the name of the game. Patience is really necessary when we have autoimmune illness cause nothing happens overnight.
First of all. you will drive yourself up a wall trying to make all these diet changes at once.Not only that, it will be really hard to tell what food that you dropped has changes things for you. Doctors and dieticians advise that you drop one thing at a time. I would advise dropping the easy things to start with while you research the harder things. Doing gluten free is much more complicated but not really.
I say this because I had a hubby who had celiac disease who was gluten free for 35 years, a son gluten free for about 10 years and his 7 year old son gluten free for 3 years. It is not that hard. Go to http://www:celiac.com and you will find a whole much of info.
The main thing is to read labels and make a lot of food from scratch yourself. It is amazingly easy now days as there are so many gluten free products on the market that are not costly. The biggest expense is the cakes, cookies, etc and those are easy to make at home also.
When you have dropped each product for probably a month you should know if there is a difference. There is no magic to this and it just takes time. Also, be very aware that much of the stuff that bothers us is just our immune systems trying to kill us off. We can be sick as a dog for a while and get up one day and feel considerably better---and we will never know why. The autoimmune disease is just taking a rest.
Also, make sure that you get your thyroid checked out as many times this can cause symptoms that we blame on Sjogrens such as fatigue, aching, etc. If you are wanting to get rid of foods that can cause inflammation don't worry about your blood markers. We can also be sick as a dog and have negative blood markers and then turn around and feel pretty good and have positive markers. This is the way it is with autoimmune disease. The main thing is to learn to adapt and cope and accept our condition and take each day as it is. Learn to make changes in your day as your health dictates as that will make your life less stressful. Hope I answered some questions. There will be others with lots of good info.Good luck. irish
Francie, the reason I made changes in my diet was that I noticed certain foods made me flare. MSG, nightshade veggies and then finally gluten. Now that I am on meds, I noticed that the foods don't make me flare quite as much and sometimes I cheat. I also noticed that I don't wheeze when I don't eat gluten. Whole Foods has some great gluten free breads. I also noticed my blood sugars got better when I went gluten free. Good luck to you. Do what you can easily live with and that makes you feel better.
Francie
When my rheumy told me to drop gluten and also go organic then the following week my endo said the same - I EEKSED. It seemed so overwhelming to overhaul my diet and on a fixed income I was also eeksing on the assumed costliness.
I dropped gluten first, and went to organic salads, dropped most processed foods. It was an adjustment for sure. And it wasn't as costly as I thought it would be. I also started reading labels in depth on everything I bought. Instead of bottled salad dressing, I use organic cottage cheese, sprinkled with a little organic unfiltered apple cider vinegar, a dollop of olive oil or grapeseed oil, etc. Quite filling actually.
What made it easier for me is I do have a Trader Joes' near me. As for produce, organic produce will have a 5 digit code usually starting with a 9. The non-organic produce has a 4 digit code. I also found they carry dairy with NO rBGH. So I get my dairy there also. (TJ's) They also came out with their own label of gluten-free bread which tastes ever so much better than Udi's
I am give to understand that Wal-Mart also sells organic foods, but I don't know about gluten-free. Aldi's does have some gluten-free products but their choices vary week to week. Whole Foods is very pricey comparatively. Some things (non-perishable) I get on Amazon, such as my supplements, raw honey etc.
The suggestion that you have your thyroid checked is a good one. I also have Hashi's (status post total thyroidectomy). Which brings to mind that Synthroid does contain gluten, so in conjunction with my docs' orders to go GF and organic, my synthroid was changed to Tirosint - a gluten-free version of T4 replacement hormone.
Quinoa pasta is what I use in lieu of regular pasta. I use honey for a sweetener instead of sugar. There's a wealth of info on the internet and recipes for a GF diet.
I've been eating this way for about a year and a half - with an occasional "cheat". I pay for that occasionally cheat within hrs of eating gluten.
But my gut is much happier, my stomach is no longer distended like it was (used to look pregnant in the wrong place). I've been able to also drop miralax almost entirely finally.
As for inflammatory markers - all mine were negative, however my last colonoscopy revealed patchy chronic inflammation, upon exams at doc appts, my docs can VISIBLY see my inflammation even tho my inflammatory markers are negative. I still haven't figured that one out.
Another thing you may want to ask your doctor about is checking your Magnesium level. Even tho Mg is mostly stored in the bones, ergot making the serum test for it an unreliable measure, Mg was added to my supplements about a year ago and has made a huge difference on my pain aspect. Not it isn't a fix all - but whereas I was having to get trigger point injections every few months, I haven't needed them in a year now.
And if your D hasn't been checked, another one to ask your doctor to check. (D-25 OH I think the test is)
Basically it's one step at a time. There is no one size fits all, but thin out your changes to a little at a time.
It took me about 6 mos to sort out what foods were problematic for me which turned out to not only be gluten, but also soy and corn, as well as a number of preservatives found in processed foods.
Amanda