1. Doing so forces us to rely on quality meats, broths, eggs, vegetable-based ferments, and fats from the insides of animals. These are very healing foods, yet many bodies in a compromised state veer away from these and again and again toward old stand-bys instead. This leaning -this permission to ourselves to still rely so much on our previous approach- can keep us in a perpetual state of compromised health.

2. Letting dairy go forces us to get creative. Here in Canada, a dairy advertisement relying on reverse-psychology screeches, “Can’t get your [adult] kids to leave home? Stop cooking with cheese!” Implied is that cheese makes everything taste great, while nothing absent of cheese can. Pre-GAPS, I lived that philosophy: cheese on toast, cheese on broccoli, cheese as an entire meal, cheese to top an already protein-rich salmon loaf…  It wasn’t until I gave up dairy and became forced to find other sources of “delish” that I finally came to appreciate the flavour of dairy-free dishes and also became able to invent them ad hoc. That is, I learned how to bring other ingredients together for equally satisfying results. As a result, I created a new habit of relying on meats, veggies, vegetable ferments and fats which has served me well long term, including long after I finally reintroduced dairy into our diets.

3. Dairy -even fermented dairy- is hard for some people to digest. I like to see a person’s healing programs open with the lightest, easiest, gentlest, fastest, most effective approach to healing. I believe that for most (though not necessarily all) people, temporarily excluding dairy is one aspect of this.

Now, it’s not just dairy I have this perspective in relation to. Much of the above goes for other GAPS foods that many of us tend to rely on over meats, fats, ferments and broths: nuts, fruits, etc. With rare exception, I like to see a 4-6 week intro free of our common cravings, frequently used ingredients, etc.

So, how long is it really necessary to exclude dairy for? As I say again and again, every person is different, and every decision you make about your program is your own. If your intuition, body or practitioner say to include dairy earlier than six weeks, and it works for you, I celebrate this! For those wondering about my personal opinion on how generally to approach dairy, this posts -in conjunction with this one- sums it up.

Note: My son and I used no dairy for the first weeks of GAPS, then just ghee for about six months. We then introduced yogurt, then kefir, then cheese. Because it benefits us to do so, we still regularly cycle dairy, nuts and/or fruit out of our personal programs.

Other aspects of note in this news clip that many GAPSters know all too well but that too few in the medical profession yet recognize: severe allergies without hives or trouble breathing, without reaction to skin tests, with ‘unusual’symptoms, with no relief through anti-histamines, etc. (I’m curious how many of us will have reported similar experiences before such a profile is no longer considered ‘unusual’or ‘rare’!)

Folks with kids dealing not with anaphylaxis but with an inability to take in any or most foods may find this post helpful.

• quickly changes gut flora, for fast whole-body (including mind and behaviour) results
• allows our body a huge infusion of nutrition, by focusing on key foods and removing barriers to digestion
• helps us reestablish any fundamental aspects (broth, ferments, etc) of GAPS which we’ve let go by the wayside
• allows us to create new food habits one step at a time
• helps identify food intolerances not before recognized
• helps us get past food aversions and refusals; expands our interest and ability to take a wider range of foods
• helps us appreciate the incredible variety within full GAPS
• helps kill sugar cravings and leaves us with a stronger sensitivity to (need for less) sweetness day to day
• helps us learn about stool types, body signals, body needs
• allows us to see how simple a day’s meal prep can actually be (simply make one pot of soup each day!)
• frees our time to do other self-care things, like read, go for walks, be with friends

All that, gained in only 3-6 weeks of your life!

As for die-off, that’s much more manageable if we follow the steps outlined in the GAPS Guide book, starting page 28. The book, as well as this website, has remedies for alleviating it. If you could benefit from any of the points listed above, consider joining us April 11th!

After a few months of eating mostly GAPS, but also more and more regularly ‘other stuff’, I was fascinated to find this problem and this problem returned. Oh well, nice try   It’s a little bit funny that I  thought I could get away with this -I did, after all, post about this phenomenon here.

My son, on the other hand, is doing well regardless of also eating other foods regularly. It’s quite common to see that those who heal while young can indeed tolerate much more deviation, while those healing later in life may well need to maintain 95-100% strictness permanently. Is it worth it? In my experience, from severe illness to incredible health, yes! So… Who’s joining me in intro, and when shall we start?

I advised his mother to return to intro, with a few modifications.

Recently, I very reluctantly took my own advice. Those of you who’ve read GAPS Guide know of the incredible recovery my son has sustained. His teeth, stools, speech, tolerances for baths and sounds, etc, all resolved early in our implementation of the Specific Carbohydrate Diet then GAPS.

Two issues persisted, though: night-time peeing and, aside from a few nights early on, night-wakings.

Because full relief from nightwakings was the absolute first sign of healing, I knew this symptom was diet related. I’d also heard of several other kids for whom nightwakings and/or bedwetting had been resolved by a change in diet. I was, however, resistant to returning to a stricter stage of GAPS -so I didn’t. Beyond happy with our progress in all other areas, I continued waking with my son 2-12 times every single night.

Finally, I posted to our support list. A number of different suggestions, based on what had worked for different families, came in. I collated the responses into one document, then pondered my starting point. I first tried the easiest potential solution: magnesium baths before bed. No luck.

I then tried a low oxalate version of GAPS (which intro basically is). I am very excited to report that my son has now slept through the night for four consecutive nights. Since he’d only ever achieved one night at a time ever before, I have trouble believing this is a coincidence. I will enjoy exploring the matter of oxalates and their effects, as well as finding the magic amount my son is able to tolerate. My plan is to stick with “no oxalate” and “very low oxalate” foods for two weeks, then start adding in “low oxalate” foods until his tolerance is determined.

It’s interesting to note that many GAPS children struggle with spinach and nuts, both of which are high oxalate foods, as are many commonly-used GAPS fruits. Apparently, one of the issues with oxalates is that in sensitive people, they can cause crystals to form, their sharp points actually inflicting pain internally.

Below is a detailed list of the foods we’ve been focusing on the past four days. On each day I have accidentally or in one case intentionally (to allow him to enjoy a surprise birthday party) included very small servings of some oxalate-containing foods such as onions or peanuts. These small amounts demonstrate that the goal is sufficiently “lower oxalate” and not “no oxalate”.

Note: To determine what I should narrow my son’s foods to, I cross-referenced several Low Oxalate Diet lists (some of which conflict with each other, so I looked for the lowest common denominators) against GAPS’. His list currently includes:

Fruit-Ish
Apricots
Cherries
Coconut
Green (not red) Grapes
Lemons
Mangoes
Peaches

Vegetable-Ish
Avocados
Bok Choy
Cauliflower ONLY IF WELL-BOILED
Chestnuts
Cucumber
Lettuce
Mushrooms
Peas ONLY IF WELL-BOILED
Pickles
Red Pepper
Turnips (not for early SCD/GAPS)
Zucchini

Animal Products
Butter
Cheddar Cheese
Eggs
Kefir
Meats, including fish
Yogurt

Other
Honey
Mustard
Nutmeg
Salt

School snacks are: hard-boiled eggs, leftover stew, canned salmon.

I would like to extend a huge thanks to the mamas -Kathleen, Anne, Maria, Millie, Cara, Irene and Teri- who submitted their experiences to help out my dear son and I. I am, of course, deeply grateful!!!

Update May 11th, 2010: In response to Noel’s comment below, I wish to provide an update on this post. Yes, Noel, reduced oxalates has been very effective! My son continues to do full GAPS, but with a focus on meats and other low-to-no oxalate foods. He does have small helpings of nuts (up to about 1/8th cup per day) and eats any fruits and GAPS veggies he wants at a birthday party. So long as his oxalate count over any given week is low, he sleeps right through the night. If he has increased oxalates for several days in a row, the nightwakings start up again. His night-time peeing has continued, but I’m not worried about that at all.

Update June 4, 2010: See also this post.

One of my favourite pre-GAPS meals was Mujadara: lentils, rice, carmelized onions, salt, pepper and butter. When I’d defrosted my first tiny portion of lentils, it happened that I had in my fridge leftovers of a “rice” (grated cauliflower, steamed), mushroom, onion, garlic mixture, so heated this mixture and lentils together in butter. YUM!

We’ll see what my body thinks of the fermented lentils, two years into healing.

One thing I will be aware of is the effect of anxiety: The first time I tried raw eggs on GAPS, I experienced tingling throughout my hands and arms, felt weak, and developed light nausea and a headache. For a few hours, I felt yucky. To this day I don’t believe that was a physical reaction to raw egg, but rather anxiety about eating a raw egg! I’ve since eaten 4-6 raw eggs every week for over a year, with no problems.

When food has affected us in the past, or when we spend thirty years being told that fats and raw eggs, etc, are bad for us, we can develop an intense fear of food. Where food has given us severe physical symptoms in the past, the fear is justified and reasonable. At some point, though, we need to trust that the healing process is valid, that it works, and start re-introducing healing, nutritious foods.

I’ll let you know how it goes

In the past week, my son had two terrible nights, horribly reminiscent of our pre-SCD days. As I had added nothing new to his program, I couldn’t fathom what the problem might be. Suddenly, it dawned on me: He’d been guzzling kefir, asking for several cups per day (above and beyond his usual cup or so of yogurt). Because he’s done so well with it, I didn’t think to limit it. It made sense, though, that kefir would have the same remaining amount of milk sugars as SCD yogurt does. I reduced his kefir intake to one cup per day: he’s been sleeping peacefully and soundly since!

Thanks so much, dear Elaine!

This quote is from a recent newspaper article in our area. It struck me that bears and humans experience the exact same problem of having addiction to junk foods triggered upon exposure.

It’s interesting to me that even animals who until days earlier had only lived directly off the land, eating whole, raw foods, can develop a struggle upon a single exposure to non-foods. I always consider animals to be far wiser than us, far truer to their actual nature. Even so, non-foods present a threat equal to that experienced by humans.

And, as with humans, the issue isn’t really the single exposure –that in itself will not harm them deeply or longterm– but rather in the fact that a bizarre addiction is so quickly established.

Because this is true for me, I find it easier to steer clear and to avoid the slippery slope.

While on SCD and/or GAPS, have you completed an accurate test of pure, organic cocoa and noted your results? Please note: An accurate test would involve:

• having been in a state of wellness for at least a week
• the cocoa being the only new item you have added in the past week
• the item being pure, organic cocoa (ie. not cocoa with chemicals, cocoa plus cane syrup, cocoa with milk, cocoa + flour, a chocolate bar, etc)

If so, was it fine in your (or your child’s) body or did you (or your child) react to it?

Please tell us here, so that we can provide informative results for other SCDers: