Hello and welcome to my blog! The place where I share with you everything I've learnt along the way about healing naturally.
I’m Bea, a French woman who has been diagnosed with an autoimmune disease (ankylosing spondylitis) in February 2007.
After almost 11 years of taking a lot of strong painkillers (from Sulfasalazine to NSAIDs and anti-TNF drugs: Enbrel, then Humira and finally Simponi for more than 4 years) I decided to try healing myself naturally.
Finding the best diet for myself
It took me a while to find out the best diet for myself. When it comes to food, you can read so many books and articles on the subject. And not one agrees with the other!
Some say you should be a vegetarian or vegan because everything coming from animals provokes inflammation. While others on the contrary will say that you should eat a lot of meat.
Then, there’s also the question of should I cook my food or should I eat everything raw?
Should I go on a gluten free, dairy free, whatever free diet?
Taking a food intolerance test
After spending many nights and pretty much all weekends reading about all kinds of diets, about people going gluten free and learning about gut health I was convinced that I should try something out. But I was scared about doing this alone.
So I went to a functional medicine doctor and he got me to take a food intolerance test.
The one I took is the Imupro test (which is available worldwide).
People within the US can get a 10% discount on the imupro test by using the coupon code : BEA10 (this is NOT an affiliate link).
Thanks to this food intolerance test I discovered that I had to remove 18 foodstuffs. Amongst them are very common allergens like gluten, cow dairy, yeast, eggs. But also some that are usually not suspected as potential culprits (click the link if you want to see my full intolerances list.)
A little over a year on this diet I quit taking Simponi and about 9 months later I was off all medication!
The thing is, my own food intolerances differ from other's. Because everyone is different.
So the best diet for you is the one that is custom-made for you.
If you can afford it, I strongly recommend an IgG test to find out your own food intolerances.
What if you can't afford a food intolerance test?
If you can’t afford it, try to figure them out by yourself with an elimination diet followed by reintroductions. There are a few different elimination diets out there. You can look into AIP, GAPS, low FODMAP, whole30...
Healing naturally is about so much more than just diet alone
In my personal experience, diet alone is not enough. Healing naturally is much more than just diet. In order to heal naturally an autoimmune disease or other chronic illness you will have to consider :
- reducing stress
- get enough quality sleep
- reducing toxicity in your environment
- exercise
- learn to listen to your body
- reconsidering your career if you hate your current job
- staying away from toxic relationships
amongst many other things!
What is the purpose of this blog?
Sharing my gluten free recipes with you
You won’t find on this blog any indication on what you should be eating. Because, again, everyone is different.
But I’m going to share my recipes with you. As a flexitarian, you will find recipes with meat or fish, but also vegan or vegetarian recipes. All my recipes are gluten free, many of which are also paleo, AIP or whole30 compliant.
My goal here is to show you that you can have a gluten-dairy-egg-whatever-free diet without being miserable and frustrated.
As a real food lover (yes all clichés on French people loving their baguette or cheese or pastries are completely true when it comes to me LOL), with a cooking passion, I decided that going gluten-egg-cow dairy free wouldn't keep me from enjoying my meals.
Because enjoying your meals is absolutely essential for this to work out. If you don't enjoy your meals or feel frustrated with your free-from-food, you won't be able to keep up the distance. You will fall off the wagon from this "diet" probably even before seeing the results.
But most importantly, if you don't enjoy your food, in the end you might "get the blues". Or you might even feel depressed (believe me I've been there!).
And if your mind is not feeling well, your body won't. That's the reason why I want to share my recipes with you.
Sharing my healthy tips and tricks
Like I've said healing naturally is about much more than just diet alone.
So I will also share with you all my tips for a less toxic life (about cosmetics, makeup, feminine hygiene, cleaning your home...). And last but not least, how to reduce stress, get better sleep and feel better.
The most important thing to know is that your mind and your body go together. In order to heal yourself you need to take care of them both.
With this method, not only did I stop taking any drugs for my ankylosing spondylitis but I also lost 15 kilos of overweight (click the link if you want to read more about my weight loss), cured my keratosis pilaris, gained a lot of energy, stopped being cranky when I’m hungry, learnt to listen to my body and much more.
Hope this blog will give you some tips on healing naturally!