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Does diet really help?

Hello everyone

I've got pretty aggressive crohns, been unwell for a year now, going through different drugs without success. I'm so tired of being ill (fast weak pulse, low blood pressure, nausea, fatigue, no appetite, feeling like I'm going to collapse). I could also really do without having to phone in sick again for a good while work wise.

So my question is, have any of you had good results from any of the diets, and if so, which one? I just want to know if they're worth trying.

Thank you very much.
 
I have read so much on diet my brain hearts. I have a PhD in nuclear engineering and I feel like I have read more about crohns that I should be given a PhD in Crohns! As I am sure most people here have.

As for does diet work. I don't think you can get a definitive answer to that. I have read the evidence that suggests diet works. But there have also been people that claim diet has done nothing for them. I think supplements not diet have worked pretty well for me, I have mild crohns. I often wonder weather people truly commit to diet or supplementation to make a noticeable difference. Like people might try the SCD diet for a week and say, "it doesn't work". I think food and supplementation are not potent drugs, they will take time to work. There is some research on the SCD and lowfodmap diet as well as as bunch of research on supplementation and the effect on crohns.

I would do some reading and come up with something you can fully commit to, talk to your Dr and go fully in for months. Some people have said it took 3 months for a certain diet to help. Some people have said that it took 6 months to a year before they felt better on a certain supplement.

I think most people would agree that a SCD diet or similar really can't make things any worse, so give it a try.
 
Hello, I have read enough about different diets that my head hurts as what you can eat one diet, you can't eat on another. If I were in your shoes, my first stab would be to try the SCD diet or at least a variation of it. My son has moderate to severe crohn's and food doesn't seem to be the culprit, although he does take supplements - Curcurmin, Fish oil, probiotics, etc. I bought the book to read up on SCD diet and definitely might be worth a try. I believe there are many threads on diets on this forum that could be helpful. Good luck.
 

Bufford

Well-known member
I've been on a diet since my diagnosis almost 20 years ago and don't stray off of it much for the pain is not worth it. I've cut back on sugary foods, stay well away from pork, but eat some red meat. I mostly stick to chicken and some fish for my meats. I limit fat intake and avoid processed foods. I limit fiber, peel all my fruit and vegetables. When eating an apple I take my time to chew the food well, not doing so can and will create cramping.



Anything with seeds, including pop corn, corn, nuts unpeeled fruit and vegetables are forbidden foods. Vegetables must be peeled and cooked until soft.



I keep my portions small, and instead of 3 meals I have four smaller meals daily.


Every day I mix one teaspoon of Turmeric (from the seasoning section of the grocery store) into a glass of cold water between breakfast and lunch on and empty stomach and drink it.



Once in awhile I will cheat, and go for some favorite foods. Once in a while one must have a break.



Finally, manage one's stress. Stressors can elevate Crohn's very quickly.
 

Scipio

Well-known member
Location
San Diego
I think diet can help, and in some people it can a lot. But one thing I know for sure is that no two Crohn's cases are exactly alike. For both diet and medication what works great for one might be a dismal failure for another, and vice versa.

For mild Crohn's the benefit from diet might be for some patients sufficient to manage the disease all by itself. But for someone with "pretty aggressive Crohns" I'd be reluctant to recommend a purely dietary approach. You probably need something stronger than that. I suggest you continue to work with your GI on optimizing the medication, and at the same time see what additional benefit you can derive from optimizing your diet.
 
I agree that diet an help but in my opinion its not the cause or the cure - at least not on its own.

I've recently been having blood sugar issues so have started eating high fat low carb. I was extremely sceptical when I started as I felt high fat was bound to upset my Crohn's but its been to opposite - its worked out really well so far. Crohn's feels really settled.

As well as lots of fat, this diet also means no sugar and no gluten which seems to help a lot.
 
Yes diet needs to be part of every person's medicine! Food can be just as powerful as prescribed meds if you take the time to learn what you are doing. Of course everyone is different, but the absolute best thing you can do for yourself is trial and error, keeping track of what you eat with a food journal (I had to do this over the course of several years). Keep track of everything including vitamins, drinks, and meds. Track your symptoms and bowel movement consistency.

I also very much like the comment about controlling your stress level, thank you! Self care in all departments is key.

Since everyone is different, you can't go specifically by what anyone else says works or doesn't work for them nutritionally. For instance, I don't do well with fish and probiotic supplements, but most of what you read on Crohn's Disease will tell you that those things should help.

Please don't discount nutrition as medicine if you have a digestive disorder.

I had a small bowel resection 11 years ago and have been healing myself with nutrition after several meds failed and after a lot of trial and error. I know not everyone can be completely off meds and I respect that. Read as much as you can, take everything into account, consult with your doctors, but most importantly (in my opinion), do your own research on your own body.
 
Hi,

First I want to make it clear that I don't believe in diet (or for that matter anything that's not scientifically studied).

Now to my story: I'm 27 years old, I was diagnosed with crohns at age 11.

I was put on the SCD diet (by my mother) almost right after my diagnosis, I was doing semi good on it, however as a young kid it was very hard for me to adhere to the diet 100% (I did various thing at different times sometimes eating rice and potatoes which isn't legal on the diet etc.).

Then I switched to a different diet that was less restrictive but with lots of supplements which also worked somewhat but not perfectly.

I've been on medication (on/off Entocort, 6mp, asacol, metronidazole) as well all this time but my mother was really trying to limit the medication as much as possible.

At age 25 (married) I had a major flare, I lost moe then 40 pounds in 3 months ended up in the hospital and getting a picc line and taking TPN for about 1 and a half years (it was great not having to eat).

The TPN (actually i think it's more the not eating?) took some time to start working and I got frustrated, so after about 8 months on TPN I started the SCD diet again, however this time I am doing it 100% as I'm really not so used to eat that much after my time on TPN so it was much easier to restrain.

Then 3 months after starting the diet and about 11 months after starting TPN I was approved for Stelara (then a brand new FDA approved med for CD) and thats when I started feeling much better not sure if it is because of the TPN, SCD diet or the Stelara?

Now I'm off TPN for one year and still on the SCD diet (100%) and taking Stelara injections every 4 weeks and feeling generally good.

Please feel free to DM me if you have any questions.
 
Hi,

Sorry to hear you're having a rough time. Like the others have said here, Crohn's is tricky to say this will work or that will work beyond each individual. I've had it for decades but only diagnosed about 7 years ago. For what it's worth, I've found holding to a routine of getting a solid night's sleep and minimizing stress are super important, but food has been the biggest trigger.
Keeping a food journal could help you notice what sets you off. Spicy food is a common problem, for example, and lactose. Your doctor could perhaps send you to a dietitian to give you some extra guidance to be sure you give your gut a good rest and then try reintroducing foods.
I also have had success with B12 injections monthly (because I'm missing the section of bowel that absorbs it) and a daily dose of Vit D and Vit C.
Take care and hope you're feeling stronger soon.

Peggy

noworries.home.blog
 
Thank you so much everyone for your advice. I agree it seems to be necessary to go all in and commit in order to get results (if you're going to). I like the idea of a diary to monitor patterns. I will be doing this alongside meds because this disease has made me extremely ill in the past so I have to fight it on all fronts.

In terms of specific diet, I'm torn between SCD and perfect health diet (the latter is high fat, meat fish veg potatoes and rice, no sugar no gluten no grains). Just because the latter sounds slightly more doable and I read (in Jon Brisson's fix your gut) maybe more adrenal friendly after a year on steroids which I tapered a month ago. I have started building in earlier nights and more prayer and reading time and feeling a little better this week.

Has anyone tried PH diet and if so any advice?

Thank you all again so much, God bless you all xx
 
I agree that sometimes the meds are necessary especially when facing more severity. You should try the diet that you think you can stick with and then tweak it if necessary. Good luck and best wishes.
 
Hi,

First I want to make it clear that I don't believe in diet (or for that matter anything that's not scientifically studied).
OOF, that statement brings pain to my heart. It's ok, everyone has a right to believe and express what they want.

But... I do believe that diet has been scientifically studied, at least to a certain extent. Part of the reason why you don't hear more about it (unlike prescription ads that run 24/7) is because large companies don't have a profit to be made from people making themselves healthier with nutrition. I know this is conspiracy theory territory, but it's pretty clear by this point that money rules the world.

Medical professionals have written books (one example: Brain Allergies, by William H. Philpott, M.D. and Dwight K. Kalita, Ph.D.) referencing the fact that diet and nutrition are barely mentioned, if at all, in their medical studies. This is not because diet is ineffective, but because there's not enough financial motivation to dive into the subject.

I'm not an extremist, yes meds are necessary in certain situations, and paying attention to diet has to be necessary too. You know this from experience. I just couldn't resist a follow up to that. :)
 
OOF, that statement brings pain to my heart. It's ok, everyone has a right to believe and express what they want.
Hi RenLPC,

Sorry if I wasn't clear enough:wink:

I didn't try to imply that diet doesn't work (I'm on the SCD diet for almost 2 years now and not planing to get off anytime soon).

And I do understand the fact that there is a lack of financial interest to research none medical approaches to cure/treat illness.

I also understand that medication arn't the magic bullet for all, however when taking a medication I at least know what my odds of success are.

However, until there is credible published scientific studies about the effectiveness of diet in treating/curing CD/UC my "opinion" is that everyone should try whatever they feel comfortable doing but be informed that these are just based on anecdotal evidence and personal experiences.

My main point is that there will likely be big variances in the response between different people with different diets due to the lack of solid credible research.

Summary: When choosing treatment options, weigh the pros against the chances of benefit.

All the best and peace.
 
I think it’s what your body can handle. Like what causes flare ups and the upset stomach. Each person is different. Some say that a vegan diet will help. Some will say a gluten free diet will help. I think it’s what you can handle and what your body can handle.

I’m a 23 year old woman having been diagnosed with Crohn’s at 9 and I tend to stay away from dairy and processed food as I can get really ill. I also tend to say away from deep fried food as much as I can and I if I do decide to have a homemade burger or chips, that would be once a month as a treat. I did try a vegan diet when I was at university and it did help a lot. My stomach was at its best but I had to stop as it was getting expensive for me and also we don’t that much vegan food here
 
Nutrition alone is not enough, though. It's the first step to remission but you MUST get control of your mental, emotional, physical and environmental stresses.

Keep in mind that conventional medicine only focuses on the symptom and not the cause. It's a very narrow-minded approach that leaves the rest of the body and its signs out of the equation. This is the reason most cannot get control of disease symptoms and it's a major failure in the medical system.

There's a reason natural methods have worked for thousands of years, literally. Do your research on places like PubMed.com, MyRebelliousColon.com, DrAxe.com, Mercola.com. There are MANY more sites but that's beside the point here.

Am I qualified to say any of this and how confident should you be in my words?

The proof is in how I live and what natural methods such as traditional Chinese medicine, relaxation techniques such as acupuncture and meditation (prayer and reading my Bible).

I was diagnosed in 07' with Crohn's disease. It came out of the blue like so many of you. It was a VERY confusing time. I couldn't understand why my body was doing this. The doctors told me there's no cure, no diet, no exercise or medication that will take it away. That's encouraging, right? (That's a whole other topic)

It took me years to figure this out but I now teach others what I've learned to provide hope and encouragement. Not to mention the possibility of remission forever!

This disease is no joke and if you take it that lightly you will NEVER reach remission. You cannot rely on other people to tell you what to do either. Take control of this disease, do your due diligence, research, research, research and NEVER listen to conventional medicine. They do not understand this disease (as is the case with many diseases).

Now, please don't get me wrong. I'm not saying there's not a place for conventional medicine. Most doctors are not out to harm you but to help you. That's why they became doctors in the first place. However, their education does NOT teach nutrition. It's not even a course that's included in most medical programs. I know this because I pursued a medical degree myself.

Look for medical offices that provide natural methods. There's plenty of resources on the web but BE CAREFUL about where you get your information.



Follow these people on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, etc. and learn about these people and their methods, habits, teachings, etc. It will change your life!


Consider natural treatments such as acupuncture, chiropractic, Functional Medicine, Holistic and Integrative methods such as traditional Chinese medicine is amazing and it's been around for 3000 years. Think about how long medicine as we know it has been around. Not long!

Why mess with your health? Without it, you can't function, work, play with your kids, or do the things God created you to do. Life goes down the toilet without your health. (pun intended)

Take initiative today, take your health back!


Best Regards!
 
Just to update. I started the perfect health diet a few months ago, it wasn’t easy initially but not too bad, since then I haven’t had to call in sick but not feeling brilliant either. Which is a big improvement over having to have time off sick as I’m self employed 😀. Can’t put it all down to diet as I started entyvio once the Remicade had worn off. So who knows. But I’m grateful to be well enough to be functioning so I will be sticking with the diet.

I haven’t been 100% compliant (you’re supposed to eat certain foods like bone broth a lot which I haven’t started making yet) but I have been doing the vitamin d and k2 first thing, no gluten, no grains except white rice, cut down sugar a lot, no beans except peas, no seed oils, lots of veg/ potato/ sweet potato/ rice, meat fish and fruit, little bit of dark choc, magnesium before bed.

If you are desperate and struggling I would say it’s worth it. The trick I found was to have a big lunch (and plan ahead because sandwiches no go) otherwise sugar cravings in the afternoon.

Interesting that there is now talk of the Crohn’s disease exclusion diet which sounds a bit similar to perfect health.
 
This is very interesting. I have had Crohn's from late teens (am now 76) and, after many difficult years and numerous operations, had part of my small intestine, my large intestine, rectum and anus removed - a total proctocolectomy plus - some 20 years ago. I have not taken any medication for my Crohn's since then but have concentrated on diet, plus trying to keep fit to give my body the best chance of fighting back.

What I eat is very close to what you are describing and what the diet itself says, although I find that most of the onion family - with the exception of cooked and leeks and spring onions - cause me problems, as do all nuts except skinless walnuts and macadamia nuts.

I do eat sourdough bread, which I seem to tolerate well, and quite a bit of dairy. I am fortunate in that I have easy access to grass fed lamb and fresh local fish. And I have one square of dark chocolate with sea salt at the end of my evening meal!

Bone broth is really worth making yourself or it is available from many wholefoods shops. Both ginger and turmeric are good for guts and for inflammation - I add ginger to most of my main meals.

Keep experimenting - all we Crohnies seem to be somewhat individual in what we can and can't tolerate.
 
Hello everyone

I've got pretty aggressive crohns, been unwell for a year now, going through different drugs without success. I'm so tired of being ill (fast weak pulse, low blood pressure, nausea, fatigue, no appetite, feeling like I'm going to collapse). I could also really do without having to phone in sick again for a good while work wise.

So my question is, have any of you had good results from any of the diets, and if so, which one? I just want to know if they're worth trying.

Thank you very much.
I have been doing a very restrictive diet over the past few months that has worked wonders for me. I talked about in in another thread, but it is relevant here as well. In short: I had my colonoscopy in March to confirm Crohn's. In April, I began a very restricted diet with the goal of improving my well being as much as possible before my first gastro appointment (which is forthcoming next week). I knew that it was likely that meds were going to be pushed at me, so I wanted to avoid that as much as possible. My doctor was also pretty adamant that diet was not a factor, which just didn't make much sense to me. I just told her, "we'll see".

Well, I have attached two blood tests. One I had last November (when symptoms were at their worst) and my latest from today. Here were the results:

November 2018:
Sedimentation rate: 33
C-Reactive Protein: 23.9

Today:
Sedimentation rate: 2
C-Reactive Protein: <1

As far as the diet is concerned, here was my basic regiment and philosophy for each decision:

I have been a vegan for seven years now, so I already didn't eat meat or dairy, so this is not in the diet. I also eliminated: processed foods, oils, grains, beans, nuts, most vegetables, and additives. Pretty much everything that could be hard to digest or have a hard time working its way through my system. I whittled myself down to two basic meals that I found were "safe and soft meals" for me and have stuck with them for over two months now (boring as hell, but it appears to be working).

For two meals a day, I make a BIG smoothie that includes:
bananas, skinless dates, 100% pure pumpkin, gooseberry powder, ground clove powder, cinnamon, and filtered water. Sometimes I put some avocado in as well to add more calories and make it creamier. My logic for this meal is that it is calorie dense (dates and bananas are high in calories, low in fat), pretty tasty (tastes like pumpkin pie filling), and is VERY SOFT on the system. Gooseberry powder and cloves are two of the best anti-inflammatories, and this is an "inflammatory" bowel disease. I soak the dates in water overnight so that I can peel the skin off of them easily and avoid any hard material going through my system. I figure if there are open wounds inside my system, scratching them as little as possible is ideal while trying to heal.

I also take a few swigs of a probiotic during this meal (I have been using the "Gut Shots" fermented drinks, as well as a fermented Kvass - nothing with any carbonation, added sugars, caffeine, etc.). Bananas are a great prebiotic, which is why I include my probiotic drink with these smoothies.

For my third meal, I have a soup comprised of:
sweet potatoes, vegetable stock (free of any additives), and spices (turmeric, coriander, onion powder, ginger, cumin, and cinnamon). I blend that soup into a paste (usually with avocado so that I am getting some fat into my diet). I know some people with Crohn's are sensitive to sweet potatoes. I found I was not and that they soften to the point of basically melting in the mouth once boiled, but I take it a step further and blend it after it's cooked. Again, I'm trying to make food as soft and easy on the system as possible.

INTERMITTENT FASTING: I try and pack all three of these meals into an 8-10 hour time span, so that my gut is mostly resting for the remaining 14-16 hours of the day. I have read about people having success with intermittent fasting, which is why I've included this. I started off the diet spreading it out over six meals for the entire day and the progress was not as drastic as it has been since doing the fasting.

LIQUIDS:
I drink a special blend of teas with a liberal amount of unpasteurized, raw honey three times per day (first thing in the morning, one between meals, and one before bed). The tea is a combination of slippery elm powder, marshmallow root powder, and fresh ginger (I shave the ginger and steep it, no hard pieces in the tea). My logic here is that honey acts as an anti-bacterial and these teas are again providing me with more anti-inflammatories.

I also only drink filtered water from home. I do not drink water that is not filtered, no bottled water, drinking fountains, etc. I don't want to take the chance of any outside forces messing with my gut microbiome while I'm trying to heal. It's a countertop filter that removes a lot of stuff, but a level down from reverse-osmosis.

That's it. It has been my regiment for three months. I did lose over twenty pounds on this diet, which could be looked at as a positive or a negative, depending on where you're at weight-wise. It is not a sustainable long term diet, but for the short term it seems to have served its purpose in eliminating my blood inflammation markers. I do not know if there is anything else still going on within me unmeasured by the blood tests, but I no longer have any symptoms and my stool is the best I can ever remember it looking. I will soon begin to slowly reintroduce other foods back into my diet.
 

Attachments

What great results. I am really happy for you :)
Do you feel well in yourself and have enough energy?
I feel good in general, but I live a relatively sedentary lifestyle. I'm not experiencing any of my Crohn's symptoms currently, so that's wonderful. There were some days of low energy, but they usually coincided with days where I was either burning a lot more calories or just wasn't getting enough calories (or both). Also, when I was doing it without avocado, I often didn't feel as satiated as I would have liked. The diet without avocado's has almost no fat in it. Ideally, I think for a really low fat diet like this an adult male like me would need at least 3000 or more calories, but I have been taking in 2000-2500 because of the intermittent fasting (it's really all I could reasonably fit in me within the 8-10 hour time period and I didn't want to overload my system too much during my three meals).

There was a ten day period in there where I really went to an extreme and only ate one smoothie per day, and supplemented the rest of my calories with raw, unpasteurized honey (alongside which I drank the teas mentioned above more frequently as well). So, I was taking in around 1200 calories of honey. That was a very low energy ten days, but I will say that it was ten days where good digestive progress was made. But I just had to stop after ten days and start getting more solid foods into the diet again. Also, I began to suspect there could be consequences to doing too much honey in bulk like that over the long term.

That diet is more of a struggle of will power than anything else. I've avoided things like going to restaurants with friends, and was lucky that my partner limited her diet when eating around me so that I wasn't seeing and smelling all kinds of tempting foods. There is no doubt that if I was a person whose social and personal life circled more around restaurants and food, it would have been even harder.

Also, I didn't cut out everything at once. I started slowly eliminating or limiting certain foods in my diet at the beginning of the year and had seen some improvement, but just couldn't seem to get beyond a certain point with my symptoms. I did a couple of weekends of this diet in the month prior to making it my "summer diet". I had to build up to it mentally, like training for a marathon. It isn't the lack of energy, it is the mental and social aspects of food and completely changing your dietary habits that have been the hardest.

That's all just a lengthy way of saying that I look at this as much as a mental accomplishment of endurance as I do a physical one. I'm going to try and keep these meals heavily in the routine as I try to reincorporate more foods, and will fall back on them if I start to see signs of inflammation.
 
I feel good in general, but I live a relatively sedentary lifestyle. I'm not experiencing any of my Crohn's symptoms currently, so that's wonderful. There were some days of low energy, but they usually coincided with days where I was either burning a lot more calories or just wasn't getting enough calories (or both). Also, when I was doing it without avocado, I often didn't feel as satiated as I would have liked. The diet without avocado's has almost no fat in it. Ideally, I think for a really low fat diet like this an adult male like me would need at least 3000 or more calories, but I have been taking in 2000-2500 because of the intermittent fasting (it's really all I could reasonably fit in me within the 8-10 hour time period and I didn't want to overload my system too much during my three meals).

There was a ten day period in there where I really went to an extreme and only ate one smoothie per day, and supplemented the rest of my calories with raw, unpasteurized honey (alongside which I drank the teas mentioned above more frequently as well). So, I was taking in around 1200 calories of honey. That was a very low energy ten days, but I will say that it was ten days where good digestive progress was made. But I just had to stop after ten days and start getting more solid foods into the diet again. Also, I began to suspect there could be consequences to doing too much honey in bulk like that over the long term.

That diet is more of a struggle of will power than anything else. I've avoided things like going to restaurants with friends, and was lucky that my partner limited her diet when eating around me so that I wasn't seeing and smelling all kinds of tempting foods. There is no doubt that if I was a person whose social and personal life circled more around restaurants and food, it would have been even harder.

Also, I didn't cut out everything at once. I started slowly eliminating or limiting certain foods in my diet at the beginning of the year and had seen some improvement, but just couldn't seem to get beyond a certain point with my symptoms. I did a couple of weekends of this diet in the month prior to making it my "summer diet". I had to build up to it mentally, like training for a marathon. It isn't the lack of energy, it is the mental and social aspects of food and completely changing your dietary habits that have been the hardest.

That's all just a lengthy way of saying that I look at this as much as a mental accomplishment of endurance as I do a physical one. I'm going to try and keep these meals heavily in the routine as I try to reincorporate more foods, and will fall back on them if I start to see signs of inflammation.
I’d rather die than live on a diet like that!!
 
I’d rather die than live on a diet like that!!
Depends on your perspective, I've got a baby and a mortgage so being well matters a lot more than my tastebuds! I just wish there was consistent advice. Pretty much every food group has one expert saying eat nothing but and another saying don't touch it.
 
Yes this whole diet thing can be terribly confusing. I have done so much research on what is best to avoid and there is no consistency. So pretty much whatever works for you, and of course, eating balanced and trying to avoid refined foods, etc is pretty much the rule for everyone including those who don't have IBD. I think it is great if you can find what works for you - some have more challenges with their diets while others don't have any problems. Very confusing for sure.
 
Yes this whole diet thing can be terribly confusing. I have done so much research on what is best to avoid and there is no consistency. So pretty much whatever works for you, and of course, eating balanced and trying to avoid refined foods, etc is pretty much the rule for everyone including those who don't have IBD. I think it is great if you can find what works for you - some have more challenges with their diets while others don't have any problems. Very confusing for sure.
Yes, diet is a confounding and contradictory topic to research today. We're really still in the dark ages when it comes to understanding nutrition and there is a lot of money fueling biases from all around. For Crohn's, I just ended up going with a simple logic that made sense to me...

1. The gut is inflamed and damaged, with exposed wounds.
2. Wounds need rest to heal and you don't want to eat foods that aggravate or scratch along those wounds while digesting.
3. So, let it rest, eliminate all hard foods, hard to digest foods, and make things as easy on the gut as possible through predigestion (blending).
4. Add as many natural anti-inflammatories along the way as possible.

There are very few foods that most people seem to agree upon online, but bananas are amongst the few that almost everyone can safely eat, which is why I centered my plan around them. Not green bananas, but ripe, brown-spotted SOFT bananas (unripe or only partially ripe bananas would not be so easy on the system). I am that guy in the store feeling and buying all the markdown bananas for ridiculously low prices.

I personally think that it is the bananas that were the most important food in my diet. They are a soft, easy to digest, calorie dense, nutritious, prebiotic, soluble fiber food. Before I moved to a banana centered diet, I tried a rice centered diet (mixing in veggies, tofu, and things like that). Most websites will say that rice is a great food during a flare with Crohn's. I will say that I did stabilize and get a bit better eating rice centered meals, but I could only progress to a certain point. Again, I think the problem here is that rice and vegetables are harder and not as simple to digest as fruit (fruit has more water and sugar amongst the fiber, so it is easier to process). It's also easy to just let rice slide down your throat without too much mastication, so your body doesn't have as much of the predigestion process started. In short, I suspected that these harder foods could have been scratching the open wounds and/or not allowing my gut to properly rest and heal.

I also knew that if it had taken me years for my digestion to reach this level of inflammation, it was not going to be something that would likely be resolved without some time and tough choices. DarrenB's comment is what most people have told me when I explained to them what I've been doing over the past few months, and I probably would have said the same thing a couple years ago. But I'll tell you, if at some point in the next year I have a diet that keeps me healthy, where I can generally eat a sensible range of mostly healthy foods that I love, but can even cheat once or twice a week with a restaurant meal or something harder on the system at home, that one year will be well worth it in the long run. And success breeds momentum.

Significant changes in dietary habits is probably one of the hardest things to mentally wrestle with. And here's a blunt, unfortunate reality: most people don't have the resolve to do what it will take to heal them. I'm not saying the solution is following what I did, I'm just talking in general I believe that there is some hard path available for most people to stabilize, improve, or even beat their conditions (it all depends on the severity - there is a tipping point for everything), but most will always choose something closer to their comfort zones that keeps them in their cycles. These comfort zones are full of bias and justifications. Our social circles and personal relationships are intertwined with food. There are even people who, whether consciously or subconsciously, don't want to see you succeed because it threatens the very idea of staying in their own comfort zone.

Food isn't just something we eat three times a day.
 
When I was flaring badly and eating basically all white foods, my older sister also said: "I'd rather die than have to eat a plate of food that looked like that!"

Well, I'm alive and leading an active life - travelling, gardening, enjoying my dog - and she died last year from the results of heavy smoking all her life.

Rice cooked until it becomes porridge - what the Chinese call "congee" - is excellent for upset stomachs and intestines, easy to digest and nourishing. You can make it with savoury broth - chicken, bone or vegetable - but be careful of the salt content of the broth as it will become more concentrated during cooking.
 
From my own personal experience what tastemaster posted pretty much applies to me when I have a flare up. When I am in remission I really have no food restrictions and I can even consume some alcohol.
Do you induce remission via diet? If so, what is your diet plan? Do you have certain foods you know are triggers for relapse? Just curious.
 
Do you induce remission via diet? If so, what is your diet plan? Do you have certain foods you know are triggers for relapse? Just curious.
My last remission was a result of the Qbiologics study I am in. Right now I am eating what I want. I never really had a bad diet so I don't and never did eat much junk food. For me there was never any food that I can pinpoint would cause an attack I would assume that it also matters where in the GI the problems are.
 
Using diet as a way to help with your digestive tract disorder, first just seems like good common sense to me, it's not something that can be ignored and will absolutely be beneficial in the long run. Maybe not a the only intervention, but definitely as part of one's treatment. Also, using diet to help decrease negative symptoms does not necessarily have to be overly restrictive. I'm a fan of keeping things simple as far as setting rules, cut out obvious triggers, do the work to figure out other triggers, and make your own diet based off what works best for you while trying to incorporate as much tolerable healthy food as you can.
 
Diet is the ONLY thing that works for me.

I stopped responding to Humira and Remicade when I was 22 and nearly died before realizing I have to run an ultra strict diet. If I flare, I need to alter my diet until it's back under control. I still don't fully understand why it responds to certain ingredients the way it does. I can eat mostly meat, but not too much or I start to react to even small amounts of it. I can eat a lot of sugar, like endlessly, but not to my pleasure.

I cannot eat most fruits and vegetables. Strawberries, citrus fruits and blueberries are safe, beyond that not sure. I know potatoes, nightshades like peppers and tomatoes, all make me sick.

Most food additives and artificial sweeteners, especially sugar alcohols, make me sick, nitrates/nitrites.

Plant oils.

Nuts, legumes, lentils etc.

So my current diet is basically small amounts of chicken/fish with shrimp, oats, candy/sugar, coffee and Fairlife milk. It's atrocious nutritionwise but it manages me flares.

My doctor confirmed endoscopic / colonoscopic managements of my symptoms as of early 2018 and I have not been on medication since 2012ish.
 
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I felt great on the low fodmap diet, but I think part of it may be that when I'm flaring, or anemic and exhausted, the food I eat is whatever is convenient that won't increase the torture. So I was missing a LOT of nutrients. I got started by sitting down with a nutritionist. I kept a food journal for 5 days before going in, and I hadn't realized that almost everything I was eating/drinking was refined carbs and sugar.

I think diet definitely plays a role, but of course it varies for each of us. I do great with sweet potatoes, red bell peppers, etc.

My job got really stressful just as I was trying to reintroduce or test gluten (gluten is not a fodmap, but there's a related carbohydrate), and over the course of a weekend I started craving bread and fell off the wagon.
 
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