On the Fast “Tract” to healing???

Aloha from SIBO world!  Not to be confused with sea world…though I do sort of have whale belly sometimes.  I am 12 days off the elemental diet and into eating REAL FOOD!!!!  It’s been a very interesting transition.  As usual, you can read the first installment here, the 2nd installment right cheeeeere, the 3rd installment hurrrrr and the most recent (other than this one) here. I awoke my first day off of the elemental, sooo excited to shove food into my gullet. Like…SO. EXCITED.  I got up early and started cooking my meat broth.  It smelled so gloriously decadent while simmering on the stove.  I cannot even tell you.  I had only broth at first and it tasted like a warm hug; salty, herb-y, and delicious.  My stomach immediately (within about 20 minutes) reacted, but that was to be expected.  I’m sure my digestive system was like, “Whoooooa now, what’s goin’ on here?!?!  We were used to that stinky fart drink garbage you’ve been guzzling!  Now we have to remember how to process this…”

After the first meal, I added a little bit of shredded chicken to the next bowl of broth.  I continued eating only broth and chicken for the first day.  The next day was mostly broth and chicken again, with a little more chickeny-chicken.  I then slowly added back pureed carrots and pureed butternut squash, then red meat, then a little cheese (starting with dry curd cottage cheese, otherwise called DCCC), then a few more roasted veggies (all veggies deseeded and skinned). It was funny because once I started eating, I didn’t want to stop.  I WANTED TO EAT ALL OF THE THINGS!!!  I swear I could have holed up in my house for a week just eating non-stop.  But I tried really hard to hold back.

I had decided to combine several aspects of several diets.  The Fast Tract Digestion Diet (FTD), SCD, and low fodmaps.  Well, that lasted about 3 days.  Trying to combine all 3 was not only miserably limiting, but damn near impossible.  So while I had visions of being able to seamlessly meld these, it quickly became clear that I am an idiot and that was impossible. Certain aspects of the diets are in direct opposition to one another. For example, an orange is considered low fodmap, so yay!  But an orange is considered high in fermentation potential on the FTD, so boo.  😦  Conversely, watermelon is considered high fodmap and is a no-no, but on the FTD it has the lowest fermentation potential of all fruit so it is considered the safest.  WTF? What’s a girl to do?  I’m running out of food options here!  That air diet above is looking more and more likely…

It was then that I decided to hell with it, I was going to give the FTD a sincere chance.  I had done SCD + low fodmaps after all for over 2.5 months with very little results.  Why not try something new and a diet that was created specifically for the little SIBO assholes?  So, I immediately threw all of my combining research out of the window (actually, in a moment of pure hatred and frustration I threw it on the floor, stomped on it, and then threw it in the recycling…and no, I am NOT kidding) and decided to work with the FTD.

Allll my charty-charts for FP values!

Sooo the Fast Tract Diet in a little bloggy nutshell?  The diet is a quantitative approach to gut health (meaning, it is numbers-driven). Like the low fodmap diet (the most common suggestion for SIBO sufferers), it limits lactose, sugar, fiber, fructose, and resistant starch in an effort to reduce foods’ intestinal fermentation potential.  We ingest foods with high starch, fiber, sugar, lactose, etc. and it sits in the intestine, fermenting. These foods are harder for our bodies to process and break down, giving them time to ferment and feed pesky bacteria shitheads that make us all miserable human SIBO zombies.  The point of the diet plan is to limit these foods that have high fermentation potential (FP) so that we can more easily digest what we consume, leading to an ease of SIBO symptoms.  The author, Norm Robillard, specifically addresses SIBO over and over again in book, which was a relief after reading Breaking the Vicious Cycle (the SCD food guide), which not once discusses SIBO.  The book has a total of 15 different food charts so that

All my many food charts!!!

you are able to calculate your individual food’s fermentation potential. The ideal is to have as low an FP per day as possible. This is where it gets tricky for many people, including yours truly.  I hate to be the stereotypical girl that is terrible at math (because that is a dumbass stereotype with absolutely NO merit!) but math = YIKES in Katie-land!  And not because I’m a chick.  Shit people, I can barely add and subtract. And we’re talking algebra, here!  But honestly, once you get the formula down, it’s easy-peasy…even for a math moron like myself. The trick is to not let yourself be intimidated by it, as it’s sort of a lot of work at first.  You must weigh your food by using a food scale to get the correct serving size to calculate the FP.  This is annoying at first, and I was a little forgetful at times (brain fog, anyone?), but after a while, I started making my own charts of foods that I eat regularly, and it became a much quicker process.  And you have to be diligent about writing down your every food particle. ***EDIT: Since writing this blog, an FTD app has come out that has made my life soooo much easier! It has an FP calculator and allows you to search and save foods (and their FPs) that you eat regularly. So read the book AND be sure to get the app for a much easier go of it.*** Shout-out to Norm…your book is amazing and I am seeing great results thus far…thank you and mahalo for your diligence and expertise!  If you want to read a little more about the diet and compare it to other common SIBO diets like SCD, low fodmaps, and Paleo, click here to learn about it from the Digestive Health Institute website.  (where there is a ton of useful information!).  Also, for a Q&A with the author about fodmap versus FTD, click here.  

One thing about the FTD gave me great pause, and well, I’ll just say it (you all have never known me to hold back anyway, right?) suspicion.  Many of the foods in the charts are processed foods.  Even the FP of diet soda is listed!  At first this bothered me greatly.  I’m not a certified nutritionist, but I have worked long and hard to educate myself about food and I know that many of these foods are not healthy.  Should I be taking the advice of a person that tells me the FP of wonderbread and Snickers?!?!?!  However, eventually I came to the conclusion that this book is written for the masses, and that (sadly) most Americans eat a heavily processed, poor-nutrition diet. And as such, many have IBS.  And if those people don’t want to make a major life-style change (because so many people resist), the author gives them a way to eat certain foods that will aggravate their symptoms less.  For dis’ girl though…I’ll be eating only real, healthy foods.  You won’t see diet soda or wonderbread in my vocab (you will see chocolate occasionally though, which is far more exciting, anyway!), but I do think I understand better why the author made this choice.

How am I doing you want to know?  Well, thanks for asking!  Guys, you know you’re gonna get honesty here!  I’m doing really well.  The elemental, I am coming to realize, gave me far more healing than I originally thought upon completion.  After that initial digestion trouble over my first meal, everything has been much improved. Not perfect, not totally healed, but greatly improved.  Totally normal BMs…I’m talkin’ normal poo!!!! For dayssssss!!!!  I know it’s sad that I am this excited about poop, but this is my life now.  I’ve had virtually zero pain and my bloating, while still there, has decreased. I even ate out for the first time in nearly 5 months at the Hawai’i Book and

I’m eating out! IN public!

Music Festival.  It was only a grass-fed, no-hormone, plain burger with swiss cheese, but it was TERRIBLY exciting! I felt like a normal person for a hot second! Several people have asked me if I believe it was the elemental or the Fast Tract Diet that has brought me so much relief. Well, I have no idea. That is a very chicken-or-the-egg question, isn’t it? I guess my best answer is: both. I have a feeling that the FTD would have been a far better option for me about 4 months ago than low fodmaps or SCD. I also think that had I not done the elemental, I wouldn’t be where I am now, either.  I know people in my SIBO forum that have been fighting this SIBO battle for years and I can tell you that I do not want that to be me.  So I am happy with how things have progressed, as I feel like I am moving at a rapid healing pace compared to most people (as of right now…I am well aware that can change in an instant).  I think this is largely due to diligence and determination to be better, to a good caring doctor, and to this new diet that has started to allow me to not bend over in pain after having a simple meal.

Makin’ my glorious homemade almond milk!

Having sung the praises of FTD here, I need to mention that I still keep aspects of SCD around, though. Namely, that I will cook and create most everything I eat with my own two hands. I see many people on the SIBO discussion boards still eating store-bought almond milk, store-bought gluten-free breads, store-bought jams or sour creams…and lamenting that they are feeling awful.  I get it, folks.  I really do.  It’s not only hard as hell to have to cook and create everything you eat (from your own mayo to your

Homemade almond nut butter!!!

own nut butters!) it’s like a damn part-time job. And the clean-up? Crazytown.  I swear I spend half of my life washing dishes. But these (and many, many other) foods have all sorts of terrifyingly disgusting things in them.  And for people with digestive illnesses, they affect us more than most.  Things like carrageenan, MSG, high-fructose corn syrup, artificial flavors and preservatives, and soy. Hell, I have even read appalling things being included in our foods like human hair (HUMAN HAIR, PEOPLE!!! Otherwise known as L-Cysteine), Sawdust (used as a caking agent in spices and in cheese…in our glorious cheese, ya’ll!), anti-freeze (I shit you not, it’s also known as Propylene Glycol) and much MUCH more. And we wonder why we have gut issues when we are eating human hair and sawdust, right? I feel like a cat when I read that stuff…like I should be hacking up sawdusty hairballs every morning or something.  The point is, just because you buy it at Whole Foods or Trader Joes, or just because it says it’s organic or healthy or gluten-free, does NOT mean that it’s good for your body.  And it most certainly does not mean it is good for your gut.  Hell, if it hurts some of us with gut problems to eat organic cauliflower, you bettah believe ingesting sand (otherwise known as silicon dioxide and found in canned soups…yeah) is gonna do a sad little number on your intestines. I actually recently had a friend say to me, “I’m really lucky that nothing bothers me, food-wise. I can eat pretty much whatever I want!” This was AFTER she confessed to me that she suffers from cystic acne and rosacea and often has such severe constipation that she has to get regular colonics.  I just blinked at her.  I didn’t say anything…what was the point?  If you are in such denial about your body, a lecture from me would not only be unwelcome, but would fall on deaf ears. Still, it shocks me that people don’t connect what they put into their body with how they feel. Even people with diagnosed digestive issues still want to believe that food is not key.  I am here to tell you…you’re wrong.  I’m so very rarely right about anything…trust me, I’m often wrong about many things…but this is one thing I KNOW to be true. So if you want to get better and feel better, start looking at what you’re consuming.  If you want to continue with your symptoms, happily munch away on your jet-fuel laden cereal (also a real thing).  I won’t say a word (I’ll just sit in the corner judging you silently).

Now that I’ve lectured you, if you’re still with me (thanks for hanging in while I rant on like a smug lunatic), I will happily admit to falling with a mighty KERPLUNK! off of that high horse.  We can’t eat perfectly all of the time.  We just can’t.  We’re bound to cheat now and then, we’re bound to slip up and not read a label perfectly, or we’re bound to just get depressed and say screw it, I NEEDS MY CHIPS!!!!  It happens. When it does, just accept it, try not to beat yourself up too much over it, and get right back ON that high horse.  🙂  So, confession time.  I learned last week that my last breath test for SIBO was “contaminated” and couldn’t be read.  They think that perhaps the seal on one of the test tubes was faulty.  I have been on PINS AND NEEDLES wondering what my numbers are and how helpful the elemental was.  I was super frustrated when I heard that I’d been waiting 2 weeks for nothing, and that I’d have to re-test all over again (and wait all over again, too). My doc felt horrible delivering the news to me, I could tell.  I looked her straight in the eye and said, “I. AM. EATING. INDIAN. FOOD. TONIGHT.”  She didn’t even try to talk me out of it.  She knew I meant business.  I think she was probably scared.  I likely looked like some sort of deranged masala-drooling zombie.  I went home, ordered my favorite dishes, and went to TOWN on those puppies. And you know what?  I don’t even feel guilty. Firstly, it was my first and only “cheat” in 5 months.  Secondly, it amazingly didn’t really bloat me (just a little more than my average dinner) or cause me any pain, and no all-night parties with my toilet, either! Everything came out normally (**trumpets sounding!**). And lastly, it was crazy, crazy, CRAZY good.  Now I must admit, the fact that it didn’t seem to derail me took away from my guilt exponentially.  I must have had some serious healing happen over the elemental and the million and one other things I’ve been trying.  So I don’t recommend this until you are pretty sure you have successfully beaten back this SIBO dragon significantly. Otherwise, it’s not worth it.  But in this case, it totally was.  😛 My always long-winded point being, I f*ck up, too. So please don’t take my lectures as sanctimonious.  They are as much for me as for you.

So I just completed my 2nd SIBO retest and am eagerly awaiting the results. The last few days have been a little more rough.  Just slight tummy pain here and there, and I think it’s due to that damn lactulose solution that we have to drink to complete the test, and the fact that I had to drink it twice in 2 weeks. I handled it MUCH better than in the past (a little bloating but no running to the toilet or pain) but I feel like my stomach hasn’t recovered yet. Which makes me MAAAAAAD!  However, what can you do?  It’s the only way to test for this trollish bacteria-eyed asshat.

On that note, have you heard the news about the new SIBO (blood) test to diagnose IBS?  It was just released today by Dr. Pimental.  Check out the video here.  And the press release here from First Line Media!  Exciting things are happening!!! Maybe doctors will start to actually take us seriously?!?!?!

I’ve been putting together a recipe page for you, since that is a huge topic of discussion for many with digestive illnesses, but it is taking some time.  I’ll be following the FTD while doing so, but I invite you back soon to check it out! That’s all I’ve got from this side of the Pacific!  Thanks for reading, and for stopping on by the SIBO world according to Katie.  🙂