Friday, April 6, 2018

My New 4-Day Rule For Testing New Foods

Hello my fellow ICers!  I hope this Friday finds you well.  If you are familiar with the standard Elimination Diet, it advises to test new foods in small and increasingly larger quantities for three days in a row to see if they irritate your IC or are safe to add into your IC-friendly diet.  This is the rule I have gone by for nearly 10 years, but a recent experience has completely changed my protocol.  Three days is not enough.

When I re-tested organic green seedless grapes earlier this year, Day 1 was okay, Day 2 was a little iffy but it didn't cause a flare so I continued onto Day 3.  Day 3 caused zero irritation, so I got very excited and added it into my diet as a safe food, or so I thought.

Day 4?  ONE OF THE WORST FLARES I HAVE HAD IN YEARS.  So please, when you do the Elimination Diet and/or test new foods, please add them in in an increasing quantity for FOUR days straight, not three.  I have had similar experiences with other foods I have tested since then so have made it my standard rule.  I highly suggest you do the same.  It's really important to be sure and it's also important to do the Elimination Diet more than once. 

Looking back, when I first came out with my (faulty) results the first time around, almost everything in my diet was an irritant.  It was just that it was keeping me at a consistent level of pain so nothing stuck out as a problem.  At least 15 of the foods I was eating back then were MAJOR irritants and if I ate them today, I would end up in so much pain that I would be vomiting, crying and fainting on the bathroom floor in an hour or less. 

I realize that I am especially sensitive with an especially bad case of IC, but that is why I created this blog:  For the super sensitive ICers.  Most of the other IC blogs out there are unfortunately not helpful to me when it comes to food because I'm too sensitive for what they advise.  Of course, everyone with IC is different and that is why the Elimination Diet is so important, because individual results differ greatly. 

I wish you all the best testing new foods – if you try out the 4-day rule, please comment to let us know your experience!   Good luck!

Sincerely,


Kat 😘