Just need to start

I had a dream within the past week or so, where I was having a spiritual, or philosophical, conversation with my mother, and as she left, she said, "People do get healed, you know." (Or something to that effect.)  Short, somewhat forceful, and matter-of-fact (though not mean.)  And then she walked away and I woke up.

And on Monday, my library hold came in (which I'd forgotten about once I'd placed it) for "Clean Gut" by Alejandro Junger, M.D.  I've read most of it, now I just have to go on the elimination diet. It's only 21 days, it either makes a difference or it doesn't.  I feel so much resistance, and you have to do it cold turkey, that's easiest.  And it's half as long as the time my doctors put me on it before.

Anyway, I'm eating my way through my cupboards for the next few days, as this version takes out all grains except quinoa, and all fruit except berries, limes, and lemons, but allows eggs, usually those are out.  Common enough trigger for people.  (Then you have to take out all the usual suspects: wheat, corn, soy, dairy, solanins, legumes, coffee, sugar (all forms, previous version allowed for small amounts of maple syrup and honey), and alcohol.  He recommends a bunch of supplements, but those are mostly out of my budget, so I'll do what I can.  I'm off work next week, so seems like a good time to start.

I generally have a healthy diet, though I haven't been good about it lately:  too busy, not cooking enough, too much sugar and alcohol (lately), etc.  My mood and energy are usually fine, it's the inflammation I want to deal with.  When I did this before, I felt fantastic (except for the dinner party in the middle, which must've had every trigger food for me, and I had to go curl up in a fetal position on their bathroom floor because every part of me hurt. Though that did highlight for me that there were things I shouldn't eat, I just was so hungry after six weeks that I didn't challenge the foods correctly and never figured out what those triggers were.)  Oh, and I was hungry all the time.  All the time.  It's hard to sustain it.  In that sense, the authors of this book take a gentler line in their approach, giving general guidelines, but recognizing that everyone is different and that it's hard to change how we eat (for most people).  After the initial 21 days, you test things, and rotate them through the diet, and they explain what's going on in your body and why.  But most of us have emotional attachments to food, it's tied to memory and identity, and sometimes when you are told to give up something, you might feel like you have to give up the memories as well, or who you are, and maybe that's why there is so much resistance (to any change, really.)

My biggest resistance is coffee.  I don't think I'm physically addicted, but man, is it a comfort "food" for me.  I have so many emotional attachments to it: safety, joy, freedom, community.  If there's coffee, I'll drink it.  Interesting.  I've given it up before, but it's usually the first thing I add back into my diet.  See how that goes.  Drinking my "farewell" cup right now.  It's gone cold.