I have made it two months on the Specific Carbohydrate Diet (SCD). The first 2 weeks were the hardest. I adjusted to it very quickly, and honestly, it feels like I've been eating this way for much longer than 2 months (but in a good way). I would say I'm 97% good about sticking to the diet. I'm grateful I don't have food allergies, because I can be a little lenient. I can still eat the sacrament bread, and this week I had a tiny bite of Aggie Ice Cream.
Physically, I have felt pretty well, I'm still not 100% better though, and I'm still trying to get off some medication. So I will probably be sticking with this diet for a while. A year or 2 doesn't seem so crazy to me now. Nuts are allowed on the diet, and I've baked a lot with nut flour. But I've learned that I still need moderation, especially with nuts. I made some yummy strawberry shortcake cupcakes for my birthday. I've also made some good muffins, donuts, cookies, granola, pizza, and beef jerky.
I've had to switch my mindset with food though. Food has usually been an inconvenience for me. I felt like spending too much time in the kitchen was a waste of time. I think we ate reasonably well, but I definitely preferred to not cook everything from scratch.
I've come to better understand how important it is to eat real, healthy food. The one common thing in all the books I've been reading is that disease begins in the gut. If our digestive systems aren't eliminating food in a timely fashion (12-18 hours), then that food basically rots in our gut, creating toxins that can cause damage and disease elsewhere.The Western Diet is not gut friendly. Fruits and veggies are really the best at keeping food moving through your body.
Also, probiotics and fermented food are really important. We have a whole ecosystem of bacteria in our gut called our gut flora. But many things can throw our gut flora out of whack, a big one being medication. Especially antibiotics. If you ever have to take antibiotics, make sure to take probiotics to help replenish the good bacteria in your body. Also, mothers pass on their gut flora to their babies. When a child is born, they have a sterile gut. The gut flora is establish through breast milk within the first 30 days. Formula cannot do that, which is one reason it is so important to breast feed, if able.
The thing I found really interesting, is that if a grandmother had mild digestive problems (too much gas, nothing serious), then she will pass on a slightly imbalanced gut flora to her daughter, The daughter's gut flora becomes more imbalanced due to the Western Diet, fast food, and medication (maybe the birth control pill). She then passes this out of balance gut flora to her daughter, which may be manifested through food allergies, ADHD, autism, and a whole spectrum of disorders we see affecting our children today. So what we eat not only affects us, but future generations.
I've also been amazed at how sugar is in almost everything. You don't realize it until you can't have anything that has added sugar, which seems to eliminate 90% of what is available at the grocery store. We are really addicted to sugar here.
Addiction is another thing I have been observing. I don't think it is possible to be addicted to healthy food. I've enjoyed eating most of the food I make now, but I rarely get the craving to have more of something. The only exceptions have been some cookies I made that have a lot of honey in them (so not the healthiest thing). But that tiny bit of Aggie Ice Cream that I had the other day, was like a hook on the end of a fishing line. I almost gave in and ate more. The desire to eat more was intensely strong. So I think we should take good notice of what foods we are addicted to, because we probably shouldn't be eating those foods.
Anyway, this is just a hodgepodge of thoughts I have had while on this diet. I've been spending a lot of time in the kitchen, but I think it is worth it to keep my family healthy. The food we eat becomes a part of us in a very real way, and I want to be the gatekeeper for my family instead of trusting the food industry to do it for me.
