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Abstenuary February, anyone?

MrsA2 said:
Dark chocolate was a migraine trigger for me, for decades. I was so worried when I started lc and everyone was sayng eat dark chocolate BUt I find a square or 2 doesn't trigger a migraine. Probably a whole bar would. Am having fewer migraines since going lc, but cannot identify what triggers the few I do.
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I used to have a migraine almost once a month. Definitely much better now.
One thing I have noticed is that every time I would eat out (I usually cook all my meals) I would have a migraine.
Finally pinpointed it to canola oil. I don’t use it at home.
It is the oil of choice at most restaurants here.
 
Up until March 2019 I was getting about 15 migraines a month. I had found that dehydration, and dark chocolate made things worse but cutting them out didn't fully eliminate them. When I went low carb I hoped that they would disappear but that didn't help much I was still getting between 12 and 15 a month. Then after a tummy bug and suffering really bad caffeine withdrawal headaches for a couple of days I cut out caffeine - slowly over about 6 weeks. I used to drink a couple of litres of diet Pepsi a day. Since stopping that I have not had any migraines. I am not sure if it was the caffeine or the sweetener which was the cause but things I have read make me wonder if it was the sweetener. I am now sugar and sweetener free and only drink decaf coffee.
I am another one like @Goonergal who needs to avoid rather than restrict.
Dealing with food issues is hard at the best of times and these strange times that we are living through can hardly be called that. It is just a case of one day at a time.
Today was better than yesterday and tomorrow is a whole new day.
 
Bildad said:
Up until March 2019 I was getting about 15 migraines a month. I had found that dehydration, and dark chocolate made things worse but cutting them out didn't fully eliminate them. When I went low carb I hoped that they would disappear but that didn't help much I was still getting between 12 and 15 a month. Then after a tummy bug and suffering really bad caffeine withdrawal headaches for a couple of days I cut out caffeine - slowly over about 6 weeks. I used to drink a couple of litres of diet Pepsi a day. Since stopping that I have not had any migraines. I am not sure if it was the caffeine or the sweetener which was the cause but things I have read make me wonder if it was the sweetener. I am now sugar and sweetener free and only drink decaf coffee.
I am another one like @Goonergal who needs to avoid rather than restrict.
Dealing with food issues is hard at the best of times and these strange times that we are living through can hardly be called that. It is just a case of one day at a time.
Today was better than yesterday and tomorrow is a whole new day.
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I'm thinking sweetener is a trigger too. Maybe its a certain one or 2 or maybe the amount or a build up.
There's a keto migraine specialist called Dr Elena Gross who is worth listening to on you tube and various podcasts
 
Brunneria said:
I suspect that the negative effects (if any) will be to joints, energy levels, digestive tract and weight gain, but will wait and see.
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If I'm reading this right, you find that veggies aggravate joint pain.

Do you have chapter and verse on this?
I sometimes get joint pain but I haven't tracked down a linked factor yet.
 
Not wanting to answer for @Brunneria @LittleGreyCat but veggies / plant based foods definitely aggravate my joint pain, which has been much improved since going 90-95% carnivore.

The Christmas before this one, when I cooked for my dad and his wife gave me one of the clearest insights into this. Eating veggies / nuts etc as a one-off doesn’t give me any problems. But over a 10 day period when I generally ate veg (green/above ground) daily, as well as considerably more nuts than usual, I returned home with knee pain and swollen, painful joints in my hands.

Within a few days of returning to carnivore, they’d gone again. It’s a n=1, but enough to convince me.
 
LittleGreyCat said:
If I'm reading this right, you find that veggies aggravate joint pain.

Do you have chapter and verse on this?
I sometimes get joint pain but I haven't tracked down a linked factor yet.
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Wotcha!

To my regret, I spent several years rolling my eyes every time my mother went on about how tomatoes affected her arthritic thumb joints. Mea Culpa. It all seemed an utter absurdity in my youth. I doubt if I would believe it now, if I didn't have predictable pain to prove it.

Now I have reached the crumbly 50s, my body is following the same hereditary track, and I can - like clockwork - predict that after eating tomatoes, both my thumb joints flare up with arthritis (or rheumatism, or whatever). And potatoes annoy my knees. I also get a rather miserable overall things-don't-feel-right from leafy greens and the cabbage/cauli/brocc family. My digestive tract whinges vocally if it gets veg, but seems to tolerate fibre from seeds and nuts with glee.

If you have a google, you will find that potatoes, peppers and tomatoes are all in 'the nightshade family' which various sources claim has a detremental effect on arthritis. Lectins and phytic acid are also on the guest list.
Also that leafy greens and brassicas are high in oxalates, which are known (in some ppl) to cause unwellness.
https://www.greenwisdomhealth.com/antinutrients-and-nightshades/

It is all rather tiresome, and makes selecting vegetables extremely boring, so I suggest you find out which may/may not affect you before you make any assumptions.

My suggestion would be to do an elimination diet for a couple of weeks, and then re-introduce things one veg at a time. For me, the nightshades are the biggest baddies, but I guess we all vary on personal reactions. Also, how much we have eaten of them in recent years. The more you eat, the more your body gets tired of having to deal with the endless influx of oxalates and nightshadiness, and the more twitchy your joints may be.
 
Dr Snoddy said:
Over and above the poor syntax, spelling and punctuation in that quotation, are you suggesting that 99.9% of all animal species are edible? Is this in any way relevant to this thread?
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It was following on from a conversation about how plant based foods often cause people problems in both joints and digestion.


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Guys, this has been a supportive, wide ranging thread to date, and being on a topic close to our hearts - food - was likely to drift into side conversations and areas not of universal interest.

I suggest that the conversation on plant v animal sources of food is now taken elsewhere by those who wish to pursue it, so that this thread is not further derailed.

I’m happy to move the relevant posts to a new thread if that is the easiest option.
 
Perhaps I'm cheating a bit but I'm abstaining from even looking at all the keto sites popping up now selling fancy tempting cakes, etc. This is hopefully permanent rather than just for the month of Abstenuary as I'm tempted enough by my own low carb/ketogenic baking efforts.

Regarding migraines, I was a chronic sufferer from my teens, and would often have at least one a week (some lasting several days) before the advent of the medications now available. I was taking sumatriptan daily until I ended up T2 and low carbing. Now no more migraines for nearly seven years and no more migraine meds, and I can have my few trigger foods without any problems - but not wishing to ever tempt fate I'll only go as far as 85% dark chocolate and definitely abstain from the 90%+ kind. One "side effect" of this painful issue with certain foods is that after I was diagnosed with T2, and being advised to avoid carbs, I had no problem, apart from being somewhat resentful, with avoiding all the higher carb stuff I used to eat.
 
Another day to tick off success at keeping to my planned food and keeping portions small. I had very little cream with my coconut ‘porridge at breakfast time. May be I’ll work my way down to no cream :wideyed: Also kept my pledge to go for a walk.
 
I’ve managed to succeed today too! It’s only 3 days in LOL but I’m not craving nuts or nut butter. Definitely better off without any than trying to cut down.
I might add cream to my list of foods to abstain from as I’ve a feeling it’s putting my tum in a bad mood.
 
Yay went for a brisk walk at lunchtime and wore my ‘barefoot’ (completely flat, thin soles, mega-wide, light and comfy) hobbit shoes. They don’t rub and are cut differently to my walking shoes so don’t even touch the blisters from last week. Not so good in the wet though - which is why I wore the goretex articles last week. But on balance I’d rather have damp feet than blisters!
 
I lapsed today (deliberate decision to give guts a rest), and I’m already feeling the benefit.
Kefir, liver and mushroom soup, then lamb shish kebab, no pita, but lashings of garlic dressing.
The lamb was fabulous.

I've put a few things on next week’s shopping list that I am now questioning. A little coleslaw. A little hummus. Olives.
Don’t have to make that final decision until Sunday, so I could remove them between now and then...
 
Mixed day for me yesterday. Stuck to the official plan - i.e. no chocolate, but completely over ate some extra thick double cream which my neighbour bought for me. He kindly offered to pick a couple of things up for me on his supermarket visit and while I explained that Elmlea wouldn’t be suitable, hadn’t thought to say that I meant runny cream for putting in my tea!

Anyway, that’s all gone now and there’s no chocolate in the flat, so hopefully a completely successful day today.
 
Reasonable day yesterday. Managed to steer clear of cream until a zoom church meeting at 7. 30pm then had a coffee with cream. Better than my usual cream with coffee!
Not sure how today will go. My head is not in a good place today and I am home alone.
 
Have had 3 days with no cream. To help me, I didn’t order any for my weekly grocery shop which was delivered today. So could be 10 days if I wait until next week. Or perhaps will be able to refrain from ordering next week too.
Have switched to pumpkin seeds instead of walnuts with breakfast yogurt.
My usual cheese fest has been limited to a sliver of cheddar, size of my delicate finger tip.

Snag, I have a craving to raid Mr Pipp’s bread supply for a thick doorstep of bread to toast to a crunchy crisp, and slather with butter.

Somebody save me!
 
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