Holiday Food Tips

The holidays can bring with them a bit of dread for people with active IBD. Food becomes more tempting, less controllable, and more painful. Here are a few tips to make holiday foods less stressful this Christmas season.

- Take your cuts of turkey or ham from the inside of the bird / ham spiral to avoid the seasoned outside skins if seasonings bother you.

- Make your gravy from drippings off the turkey and set some aside for your own non-seasoned gravy. Let everyone else have the flavour-packet enhanced gravy. Yours will be a little blander, but mild on your system. All you need is the drippings, a little water, cornstarch and a pinch of salt.

- Make mashed potatoes with water, a little salt and some non-dairy margarine if milk bothers you.

- Cooked squash or sweat potatoes with a little brown sugar are tasty.

- You can make pumpkin pie without any spices or with reduced spices. Pecan pie is a mild alternative that is usually ok for me.

- Avoid the stuffing if seasonings give you problems.

- Avoid salad if fibrous veggies are one of your triggers.

- Don't forget to take your maintenance medications and to relax a bit during all the hectic holiday bustle.

- Avoid alcohol. Drink lots of water.

- Eat moderately. Regardless of how tempting it can be, don't stuff yourself till you're bursting. A massive meal is hard on your digestive system.

It all boils down to making dishes that are safe for you to eat. If you are having a lot of guests, set aside a separate portion for your own blander versions of the dishes. If you are going to someone else's house, offer to head over there early to help with the cooking so you can make your own separate portions, or bring your own.

You don't have to miss out on the holiday feasting - it just takes a little more care and effort.

Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays to you!

New Crohn's Forum

A fellow Crohn's Blogger named William has set up a brand spanking new forum for Crohn's discussion. It's a real challenge to try and get a new community like a forum up and running, so if you're interested, head on over and check it out. Join, post a message or two. Come talk to some of us other bloggers.

http://crohnsdisease.forumotion.com/

I'm there under the name "BrightSide" (of course).

CCFC Video

The Crohn's and Colitis Foundation of Canada has created a new awareness video featuring 2 people suffering IBD. A little boy, and an NHL hockey player.

New/Old Research On Treating Crohn's With Worms

In the recent issue of Mental Floss Magazine (Nov 2009) there is an article about a potential treatment for Crohn's Disease using safe worms and bacteria called Helminths that used to be prevalent in our bodies in the past. The research is/was being conducted by Dr. Weinstock of the Tufts New England Medical Center. The article claims that most of the Crohn's patients who tried the treatment went into remission!

There is also an article about this research at Web MD which says that 72% of people who used the treatment went into remission. These are amazing findings, however the research appears to be several years old. (Here's another medical article about Dr. Weinstock's research.)

Since I'm curious to learn whether this research is ongoing and if anything has come from it, I wrote to Dr. Weinstock asking about the status of his research. I haven't heard back yet, but I will post it here if I do.

I find this to be an amazing sounding treatment and I'm flabbergasted as to why I haven't heard about it before. Why are we only being given the option of expensive and dangerous drug therapies or invasive surgeries? I urge all my readers to look into this research and ask your doctor about it.

Here is an article on Wikipedia about it, it is called Helminthic Therapy.

Wait And See

The phrase "let's wait and see" is as old as the medical profession itself. This pronouncement evokes a strange mix of emotions in any patient; disappointment that no definite answers are forthcoming, and relief that nothing serious was immediately identified. Frustration at the process, impatience and worry.

This was my doctor's response at the end of my recent appointment. The appointment by the way that I desperately tried to get into as early as possible. The receptionist managed to squeeze me into a cancellation that opened up a full 2 weeks before my scheduled appointment.

Fortunately (or unfortunately depending on your outlook), the pains I described in my last blog post had lasted for two weeks and then slowly subsided. Which means my appointment consisted of me saying essentially something to the effect of "Well, I was having pains..." to my doctor who scribbled notes about the description and duration of the pains. In the end however he suggested it may have been something acute (read: temporary) and said "let's wait and see" if it returns.

So, I'm back to my old situation. Feeling pretty good though a bit tender, and wondering what in the heck that was.

Thanks to everyone who wrote comments about their experiences on the last post- that really helped me to not be so scared!

When Pain Comes Back

There's a reason why I say my Crohn's Disease is like a ticking time bomb in my abdomen.

For many months I have been feeling nearly perfect. I was even starting to introduce foods I have not eaten for years- like grape jelly (joy!). I was regularly working out again. But the time bomb never goes away and 2 weeks ago I started getting pains again. Aching pain and tenderness with occasional stabs of pain during the day. At first I thought this was a direct result of stress + fatigue + a huge meal of Chinese food + a tenacious cold. But now, a couple weeks later most of those possible causes have been resolved and I'm left with no excuses.

I have an appointment with my GI scheduled in mid-October, but after a verbal flogging by my loving boyfriend and a reminder that I need to be a vigilant general overseeing my "troops" (you gotta love the dorky-sweet analogies of someone who loves you and is desperate to talk some sense into your stubborn brain any way he can), I called the GI today and got on the waiting list for a sooner appointment should someone cancel. BF was right of course... if it's bad enough that I'm in tears of fear about it- then I should darn well call the doctor and try to get in sooner.

Funny how you start to believe you are just fine and you've put this disease behind you... and then bam! The return of pains can reduce you to a terrified ball of misery. I should not have been blindsided by this. When I had my abscess surgery a year ago, the surgeon (a wonderful woman with a fantastic bedside manner), told me that my section of small intestine had major fibrosis (hardening of scar tissue) and would have to come out "sooner rather than later". My Mom and I had exchanged scared glances and asked what she meant by "sooner". She said something like "a year or so". At the time I sighed in relief that I was not getting a resection then and there, but my my my how fast a year goes by. I now wonder whether these pains are the harbingers of that fateful prediction the surgeon made. Am I headed down the road of a resection surgery?

I pray that option is not in my future, but since I can feel the 3-4 inches of hardened small intestine by lying on my back and feeling along the path of it - like a piece of garden hose in my abdomen - I will not be surprised if that's my only choice. It's just frightening.

Have any of you readers had a resection? How do you feel now?

Crohn's Disease, Food, And Travel

I recently returned from a one week trip to the west coast of Canada and this got me thinking about how my Crohn's Disease has settled into one particular area of my life: food.

My disease is currently managed. I feel fantastic, bathroom trips are normal, pains are practically gone, I have a lot to be thankful for. I credit my blessings with two main things: the anti-inflammatory drug 5-ASA, and my complex and tightly controlled diet.

To briefly summarize, I kept a food journal for months and went through a lengthy elimination diet process and I now eat zero: dairy, spices, acidic foods (fruit, vinegar, tomato, citric acid, ascorbic acid, lactic acid, etc), gassy veggies, fried or fatty foods, caffeine, whole grains, fibery foods or alcohol. There might be other things I eliminated but I can't remember right now. It's a long list.

This means that I have to cook or prepare most of my food from scratch. Nearly every prepared or pre-packaged food product is spiced, seasoned, covered in sauce or preserved with citric acid or some such. Or contains dairy. Ug. Over a longer period of time I've found a few replacement products at my grocery store like soy cream cheese that tastes good, rice milk, soy cheese slices, un-spiced bacon, egg whites, milk-less bread, margarine etc.

As you can imagine, nearly all restaurants are a no-go for me. You may THINK you are getting a cooked from scratch meal at your favourite expensive restaurant, but no. Most foods are prepared ahead of time or from a box. (But I want PLAIN mashed potatoes! Sorry ma'am they are all pre-mixed with garlic and butter. But can't you just mash me up a fresh potato? Nope.) Which means I am often left with a compromise of plain pasta noodles (brushed with olive oil) which they charge me usually $10 for (!) and some deep fried shrimp appetizer. I realize deep fried is bad, but if I just eat a little bit I'm usually ok. I can eat at sushi places b/c that is fresh, plain and made to order as well as some stir fry places like Mongolian Grill.

However travelling makes me feel a bit panicky. Even with half my suitcase stuffed with food, I still need to make a bee-line for the nearest grocery store upon arrival and cook most of my own meals, so I need access to a kitchen. We went out to restaurants a couple times and the fantastic sushi place we went to was to die for. But the rest of the time I just got noodles and shrimp.

Not knowing where you are going to get your next meal... or being trapped in the airport system with nothing but a few peanut butter sandwiches stuffed in your carry-on can be nerve wracking. It's almost like being reduced to your survival instincts. Food is no longer a given guarantee.

If you are in the same boat as me- I sympathize. I possibly have a cruise coming up next year which is even scarier: no grocery stores!

Here are a few travel food tips:

- Most airlines pressurize their luggage cabins. You can transport food in your luggage except for fruit and meat. Actually anything that needs refrigeration is out of the question. Seal things in zipper bags in case they leak.
- Most restaurants will have a small number of un-spiced things you can get. Plain pasta, baked potatoes, rice, veggies etc. Ask about any un-marinated meats like steaks, seafood etc.
- Sushi places are great for controlling what goes into your food. You CAN get cooked sushi like shrimp and crab, and you can even get vegetarian. Basically veggies wrapped in rice. If you don't like the seaweed wrap you can ask for it to be made without it: wrapped in rice only. Betcha didn't know that!
- If you are travelling in a foreign language country, ask someone to write out your list of food issues in the local language for you, so you are not stuck trying to explain.
- If acid-y things are a problem- ask for no lemon in your water.
- Some accommodations come with a kitchen area- check out bed and breakfasts, cottages and vacation homes instead of hotels.
- Some restaurants or hotel kitchens will warm up your food for you if you bring your own.
- You can bring your own non-liquid food onto a plane in your carry on. Avoid meat or anything that can spoil. Fruit is often not allowed to cross borders, nor can several meats.

On the up side of life, I seem to be growing more tolerant of 'risky' foods and can eat some of them in small amounts. I hope this trend continues!