An introduction, this blog is for those that love food, travel, new recipes, and being adventurous. But, also have the joys of food restrictions! This is a look into my journey to low fodmap, learning how to live with a fructose intolerance/low fodmap lifestyle. I was diagnosed with fructose intolerance ~ 8 years ago after I finished breastfeeding my oldest daughter. She is now 9 since beginning of January! (time flies) …
How my Journey to low fodmap began
For history, I was having digestive issues before pregnancy. I was following up with a gastroenterologist after a bad stomach bug that never got better. I was to the point of next step was going to take out gluten as a trial. Well, I became pregnant and miraculously was better throughout pregnancy and breastfeeding. After I stopped breastfeeding my daughter, my digestive issues returned. I couldn’t eat anything but bland boring foods. This was hard because I love food! Every meal is an experience. (Ryan thinks this is hilarious as he would eat the same meal every day. Food is just food to him not an adventure!) I lost a lot of weight, and I am already slender, so this was frustrating.
Low Fodmap Diet
I began researching, (I can’t help it as it’s my medical thinking Dr. Google 😁) and found the low fodmap diet. For those not familiar, this is an amazing diet that looks at how our bodies digest different carbohydrates (another post will be coming soon for further explanation of the diet). Some of us (raise hand) have a harder time digesting foods which leads to digestive issues. For me, these include fructose (which is in everything this includes: onions, garlic, fructans (gluten), honey, agave syrup, and fruits and veggies high in fructose such as apples, pears, and asparagus just to name a few).
The low fodmap diet helps you look at and not layer so many carbohydrates that are hard for the body to digest. Categorizing the food by low to high fodmaps. You then can decide which fodmaps your body can digest. First, though you take out all food except for bland foods. You then slowly add in different carbohydrates to see what your body can and cannot digest appropriately and create your diet from there. Well, this helped significantly with my symptoms, but I still wasn’t sure what exactly was going on. For reference here is a great description of the low-fodmap diet: Monash
Diagnosis
With further research, I found that you could do breath tests for different things like SIBO (small intestine bacterial overgrowth), fructose intolerance, lactose intolerance, etc. I suggested these to my MD, and she agreed. Well low and behold my fructose intolerance was through the roof which explained a lot of my symptoms. My diet mainly consisted of foods high in fructose think onion/garlic in all meals, apples with peanut butter, honey, etc. Hence, all my digestive woes.
Next steps
I began looking on Pinterest for different recipe ideas. I began to learn to adapt recipes to accommodate my food restrictions i.e…….. gluten, garlic, onion, and fructose. Slowly, I began to become more comfortable with the foods I could and could not eat. I began to find digestive relief and I was able to begin to enjoy and experiment with foods again! It took a while to get to that place though and at times it could and can still be very frustrating. Over the years I have also started taking medication in addition to the low fodmap diet to help with digestive woes (I am by no means a medical practitioner this would be a discussion with your doctor if needed).
What I learned and now in my low fodmap journey
One thing I learned though was travel was really difficult!! I would end up bringing food with me and wouldn’t feel comfortable without a kitchen to be able to prepare food in. We stopped eating out as much and I began to fear food as I never knew how I would react to it. Fast forward to 7 years later a Pandemic where you COULDN’T go anywhere and an itch to have a different environment. We began traveling more as a family. Our first big trip was to Disney, which I survived and learned most places are happy to accommodate weird food requests (of course it’s also Disney which is amazing!).
This blog is a place for me to share my food adaptations, recipes, and restaurants/places in my travels and at home in the Raleigh/Durham/Chapel Hill area. Places that can accommodate the low fodmap diet. To empower others that are struggling that there is a life with food restrictions and you can enjoy food!
Food is such a social activity and what I learned was what I was missing most about not being able to eat. I am not going to lie it is still a struggle many days. Especially when you may not be able to participate as easily at parties socially or work where you may be unsure about food options. But you still can go and have fun even if it means bringing your food or eating before you go. I hope you will join me on this adventure! As I embark on more adventures in the kitchen, travel, and eating out and you can also find hope in a life with food restrictions!