Food, Healing, Migraines... updated

I don't normally post personal posts, but I thought I would do one on foods and healing. Over three years ago, I absolutely did not believe that food could heal. I mean really... I am eating good and bad. Surely the good was working, right? Not such the case.

Rewind to 3 1/2 years ago, I wasn't feeling so great back then. I was overweight, having tons of headaches and migraines, and developed a new symptom which scared me. I started getting very light headed when getting up and walking around. I few times I nearly passed out. This went on for a few months.  I went to my dr. who gave me lots of tests and found nothing wrong. She suggested taking a blood food allergy test. I thought she was nuts. I took it and waited weeks for the results, meanwhile feeling horrible. When I got the results I was shocked. It showed I had food intolerances to the following foods: Wheat, gluten, eggs, all dairy (including goat), beef, pineapple, a few nuts and mustard. You know how I knew it was correct? I have always gotten sick when I eat pineapple. I get and upset stomach and I almost throw up. So there it was a GIGANTIC list of food I should no longer eat.

I immediately got rid of all of all those foods from my diet. My symptoms went away and I finally felt good. I had energy and migraines were only once a month at the most instead of 5-10 a month. I did great on this diet for two years. According the food intolerance books, I could try to add back foods and see if I had adverse reaction. I added back eggs first since this seems to be in EVERY recipe, even gluten free ones. I felt fine. I decided to add back a little dairy.  I mean a little bit such as a tiny bit of butter to cook fish. I felt fine. Since I felt fine, I decided to add back more and more.

Fast forward to a few weeks ago. Now I have basically added all dairy back to my diet and as I look back I can remember my migraines increasing. I just thought, "maybe I am one of those migraine people." These migraines were different. They lasted 1-3 days, yes 3 days! I had to take three days of migraine medicine just to function. They day after the migraine was almost a lost day. I would be having a sort of hangover from the pain and medicine. So, basically my migraines went back to up around 5-10 days of migraines/month. That is a lot of time to be miserable, right? I tried so many things during that time, exercise, sleeping better, supplements, nothing worked.

This was it, I knew what I had to do. Dairy was staring me in the eyes. Let me saw that I love dairy: cream, American Cheese, Cream Cheese, whipped cream, aged cheeses, and of course BUTTER. I finally came to my senses and cut it all dairy again. Yes, every last bit. So far, my headaches are gone and I haven't had one migraine. I am sure I will still get one or two a month just from hormones or something like that, but I am hoping that this will do it.

I also cut back on soy, corn, and potato. No more soda at all. This is not true Paleo but it is a do-able version that seems to fit into my life. Her is a list of things that I eat.

Things I might eat for breakfast (not all at one time):
Almonds and dried fruit, fruit, coffee, Kind bar, Juiced fruit and veggies

Snacks (not all at one time): Fruits, small amount of popcorn, carrots, nuts

Lunch (not all at one time): Lettuce wrapped turkey sandwich with avocado, onions, cucumber, tomato, and other veggies; turkeydogs without bun; organic potato chips; popcorn; juiced fruit/veggies; baked potato; baked chicken; plain fruit and veggies; squash; almond milk

Dinner (not all at one time): Whatever we are making that doesn't have wheat, dairy, red meat, pineapple, mustard, etc. (I eat) Chicken, fish, turkey, pork, veggies, rice, potato, squash, almond milk etc.  I also usually juice fruit/veggies.

Desset (not all at one time): Enjoy Life chocolate, Lollipop (yes I do eat badly a bit), or Paleo dessert

It works for me and I hope this will help somewhere out there with finding some relief to problems like migraines,  headaches, dizziness, excess weight, fibromylagia pain, tiredness, and other problems.

-Pam