How Did We Get Here?

A point I like to drive home to anyone who will listen is this didn’t happen to you overnight, so don’t expect overnight success. When you’re suffering from underlying health issues it often doesn’t come at you all at once, even though it may feel like it does. There are always much smaller symptoms that happen along the way. Symptoms like gas, bloating, headaches, migraines, sleepless nights, menstrual cramps, PMS, moodiness, unexplained aches and pains, acne, rashes, thinning hair, lowered resistance to stress, excess weight concentrated in your midsection, joint pain and discomfort, and the list goes on. How many of those symptoms do you experience from time to time? Or all the time? How about your friends? They can relate to your struggle because they often have the same problems? The more you experience these symptoms, along with your friends and family, the more normalized these symptoms become. They no longer become symptoms but just “normal stuff my body does”. But just because it becomes the “norm” doesn’t mean you should disregard these symptoms. The longer you ignore and dismiss them, the louder they become and often more persistent.

For as long as I could remember I always had a “sensitive stomach”. I loved to eat, but I never knew how things would go. I bounced back and forth between constipation and diarrhea (sorry TMI), constant cramping, gas, bloating and discomfort. Throughout high school it got progressively worse. I didn’t know much about diet and nutrition back then, I ate a lot of meat, potatoes, pasta, bread, milk and cheese - minimal fruits and vegetables.My diet was HIGHLY INFLAMMATORY. Growing up we didn’t eat out alot but once I got to high school and started working my first job I lived for the deep fried goodness of french fries and chicken tenders that my hard earned money could buy. Towards the tail end of high school my mom had finally had enough of me leaving school early for my stomach aches and made me a doctor's appointment to get things checked out. I was quickly dismissed and sent home with a prescription for medication used to treat gastritis. No guidance, no suggestions, nothing. I actually thought it was NORMAL to have all these issues. I thought this was something everyone struggled with. Sometimes you ate and felt good, other times you felt like crap. That was life. Boy was I wrong!

It wasn’t until YEARS later that I was able to identify all my previous issues and symptoms as IBS - irritable bowel syndrome. In my late teens early twenties I began to focus my attention on educating myself on the fundamentals of nutrition and incorporating more vegetables into my diet. Without knowing or too much effort, my symptoms began to quiet down. I would still suffer from time to time (when I made poor choices) but things started to kinda work themselves out. I became more focused on diet and exercise and rolled with the fad diets of the time. The moral of this story? Symptoms are how the body communicates with us and you don’t know what you don’t know. Many of our questions are now addressed with a quick google search. We live in an incredible time where we have so much information at our fingertips. Navigating all that information is a different struggle for a different day but if there is something you want to explore it is much easier to do so. With the rise of social media there is an even greater abundance of information available to us. Health and wellness practitioners, like myself, share our stories and knowledge to help better the lives of those around us.

As I embark on week four of my gut healing journey, I hope you’ve been enjoying the meal plans I have been sharing. If you’re not able to commit all the way, even making small changes and trying some new recipes are a great step in the right direction. And just because you aren’t ready to fully commit to these changes right now doesn’t mean you won't be in a month's time. If you can relate to my story or see yourself in my list of symptoms, it’s time to start thinking about how you want to feel everyday and get ready for step one in the gut healing journey: Deciding you are ready to make a change. Once you decide that you're ready to make a change and enter that headspace of healing, the following steps become that much easier to navigate.

Here is the final meal plan in my Four Week Gut Healing Journey. I’ll be continuing on this journey past the four week mark, because it’s something that feels right for me. Next week I’ll be talking about some of the supplements I've been taking this month to support my healing journey. I always like to focus on food first and then supplements as a supportive secondary measure because you can’t out supplement a poor diet.

gut-healing-program-week-4.pdf

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