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To:
scd-list@longisland.com
Subject: 6 month report
Date: Sun, 7 Jan 2001
Greetings:
Yesterday I hit the 6-month mark on following the diet rigorously,
so thought I'd take the opportunity to give a testimonial.
To give
a little history: I started seeing occasional B on stool around
6/98 (at age 43). Fall of '99, started seeing M, plus B on
its own. Gas, bloating, urgency, and occasionally what seemed
to me explosive M. Occasional D or loose stool. This was all
more annoying than debilitating, so I didn't race to the doctor.
I started keeping a food/symptoms diary in March 2000. I noticed
during Passover that my symptoms lessened (I would have been
eating far fewer illegals during that week.) I got diagnosed
6/00 with UC and was put on Asacol. Shortly after, found out
about the diet from the Internet, and started cutting out
foods. It made immediate sense to me, especially with the
evidence from my own body from Passover, even though my GI,
like just about everyone else's, denied the power of diet
in this illness. Still, it took a few weeks til I decided
to really commit myself to it. Took Asacol for 3 months, then
when my prescription ran out and couldn't be automatically
renewed, I decided to stop it. Early in the diet I noticed
some lessening of gas and urgency, but was still seeing B
and M. I seemed to improve more once I stopped the Asacol,
but was still seeing B and M. Currently I am very close to
symptom free. I have not seen any B since early Nov. (that
was 5 months into the diet), and am only seeing occasional
small amounts of M--maybe twice a week, as opposed to every
time I sat on the toilet before I started the diet.
I'm feeling
very pleased with the diet and have been telling lots of people
about it--I'm finding, as others have, that there's an IBD/IBS
sufferer or relative of one everywhere you look.
I think
not getting hit with this illness til age 43 made me very
skeptical of my doctor's claim that I would have to take medicine
to control it for the rest of my life, and I am pleased to
have proven him wrong. It still seems to me that my body should
return to its former excellent digestion on or off SCD, but
I have absolutely no plans to go off the diet.
As to
what brought the disease on, my best guess was my diet. I
had been a vegetarian for about 20 years when symptoms showed
up, and had been eating a nearly vegan diet for probably the
last 7 to 10 of those years. (I hadn't eaten refined sweeteners
in probably 15 years, and maybe that slowed the onset of the
disease.) I think I eventually overwhelmed my body's ability
to digest foods like grains and beans. I'm now eating lots
of eggs, legal dairy, and some fish (as well as vegetables
and fruits). Am still struggling with feelings about eating
fish, and may remove it from my diet in the future, but it
seems to make sense to eat it right now. (I haven't tried
adding beans in yet, and won't for a while.)
I'm grateful
to the diet not just for my health, but for this great food.
I'm eating better than I ever have. I had been a chocolate
fan in former days, but I find that I don't much miss it,
and that not being able to eat it has given me the chance
to eat things with other flavors that I had always liked--like
lemon and coconut--but which had taken a back seat to chocolate.
Friends
and family have been supportive. Last week, I planned to have
dinner with a male friend. We had a phone conversation during
which he grilled me on what I could and couldn't eat, taking
notes on his computer. He arrived later that day with 2 bags
of legal groceries which we turned into a lovely meal. What
a treat!
And another
thing I'm grateful for, which I know my mother would tell
me not to discuss in public, is that if I have gas, I no longer
have to hold it in, for fear of something coming out with
it! That and the return of other ordinary bodily functions,
like just feeling hungry, have also been a pleasure.
Enough
of this. Thanks to Elaine and everyone else. I think being
on this list, even as a quiet member, has made all the difference
in being able to stick to the diet. I love feeling like part
of a community of people who are in this together.
Warmly,
Johanna
UC, SCD 6 months, no meds
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Johanna's Testimonial