healthy habits – Page 2 – kateneedsfitness

When you’re going through food sensitivity struggles, it can feel like every little thing will be an issue. It can be intimidating to even try new foods because you don’t know how it will affect you after. But once you know your trigger food(s) you can start healing your gut and know that you will be able to eat the things you want to in the future. I was throwing things against the wall to see what would help me, but I felt like I was stuck going in circles without any real solutions. Between 2018 and 2022 I felt like things were never going to change, and because psoriasis is an autoimmune issue, I thought there was nothing I could do.

Fast forward to 2022, a new program came out, The 4 Week Gut Protocol. Just like Whole30, the Gut Protocol program calls to eliminate the most common food allergens from your diet for four weeks, then reintroduce them one by one to see how things make you feel. The only real difference is in the GP you have guidelines to help you calculate how much food you should be eating, where the Whole30 just gives you the foods to avoid. This taught me how good I can feel when I’m getting all the essential nutrients my body needs instead of trying to piece together meals and *hope* I’m getting what I need. Which honestly, I didn’t think about nutrients at all during my first round of W30. Live and learn.

After four weeks of elimination, I felt AMAZING! I used to feel bloated almost all the time, pretty much as soon as I would eat something in the morning – I’d feel bloated all day. But eating whole foods in the right proportions helps the body truly work the way it’s supposed to. The best part – I started noticing a difference in my skin. It was nowhere near clear, but it was different. I didn’t reintroduce any foods right away, except I added ONE of the food categories back in – legumes. I *thought* this one would be fine and as someone who eats vegan + gluten free I wanted a little more variety in what I was eating day to day. Fast forward a week or two and my skin was changing again…but it was going BACK to the way it was before GP! Again, this is the part of the process that’s annoying – testing different foods to see what works and what doesn’t. Sometimes it feels easier to stick with the allergen free, whole foods way of eating instead of trying a food, waiting a few days to see how things go, adding it back in, waiting a few days again. It’s a process, but is so worth it I promise!!

Again I went back to the original plan, back to no foods that are on the common allergen list – including legumes – and I decided to continue on with it indefinitely. I wanted to see a difference in my skin again; I was determined! I was loving all the foods I was eating anyway, and my gut was feeling awesome! So it didn’t feel difficult to stick to. Reminder: it took five years of trial and error and winding down different paths trying to get here. It certainly did not happen over night!! Feeling confident about food, especially when you have to relearn every wrong thing you’ve ever been told by any media source, takes time and effort and will feel like a full struggle sometimes.

Fast forward to today, I’m still working on figure it all out, but have seen about 60% improvement in my skin. At one point I saw about 90% improvement – that was when I was eating completely clean with no hiccups in my diet. I have a new mentality about food and life, because, yes I want to feel my very best every day and I know that happens through what I consume. BUT, I’d also like to ENJOY life by eating fun foods that are not necessarily “clean.” For example, France is in my future travel plans and I KNOW I will eat macarons while I’m there – of course, not a vegan or gluten free or allergen friendly food. But would I really fly all that way and not enjoy the best of what they have to offer?? (the answer is no).

I am still following The Gut Protocol so my skin can maybe one day be back to 90% clear (or more), but I am OPEN to what life has to offer, and sometimes if I want to stray from my plan for the real important life moments (like croissants in France, not just pizza because I don’t feel like cooking).

Life is short, I believe we should treat every day as a celebration! You never know when the party is over. Eat the foods you like, but don’t forget we run on essential nutrients. Start with the very basics to help your body work the way it needs to, and add in the fun from there.

Want to see an improvement in your life through gut health, skin, energy, sleep, and more? Click here for the 4 Week Gut Protocol.

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I have an entire section on this blog dedicated to my personal experience with the Whole 30 program; thirty days of food elimination to figure out which, if any, foods are causing different reactions in the body. Anything from bloating and gas to skin irritations and mood swings can be the result of food sensitivities! (In the United States alone, 60+ million people suffer from food related issues 😮) Talking to your wellness professional can help you get to the bottom of these issues, but in this country, that’s not always an option (read: our healthcare system is wack). Here are my personal opinions and experiences having completed one round of the Whole30 program, and made an entire lifestyle shift after the Gut Protocol program.

It’s not the easiest process to go through, but if you have a plan in place then it can be pretty simple. If I didn’t make a plan for every single week there definitely would have been a point where I would have slipped up. Without a plan, I would have given up the first time life felt too busy, or overwhelmed with all the tasks that present themselves throughout a normal day with kids and pets. There is a reason that the quote -fail to plan, plan to fail- is so popular. It is so true for most things in life! I’ll be the first to admit sticking to a plan has not always been the easiest for me, even when I am interested in whatever it is I’m trying to stick to.

When I first considered the Whole30 program I asked my husband, Matt, to do it with me for accountability because when he decides to stick to something, anything, that’s it – he does it. So I knew having him with me would help me stay the course. Thirty days later we felt pretty amazing…but we jumped right back into our old habits. This is when I started to feel pretty terrible. Although I had gone through the reintroduction phase and knew how things made me feel, I decided to ignore that, and wouldn’t realize until later on that I was feeling bad because I was still dealing with food sensitivities. I didn’t take what I learned from the Whole30 program and use it to better my life. It was more of a “can I finish this program,” and once I did I felt accomplished – but didn’t realize the true impact until later.

A few months after reintroduction I started to develop psoriasis patches on my skin, something I had never experienced before, but runs in my family. At first I had NO CLUE what it was and went into panic mode. But after a few days of wearing a band-aid over the new patch on my hand, I realized what it had to be, and used Google to confirm. Some might not make the connection between the two, but I think the Universe helped me find that relation. Before Whole30 I was eating the Standard American Diet, then after eating a squeaky clean diet for thirty days, I went right back to that S.A.D diet. In my head it made complete sense that they were related, but I was positive at the time it was only dairy that was contributing to my new skin problems. So I cut out dairy and meat. And still the psoriasis continued to spread. But I thought I just needed more time.

Click for part 2

Tag: healthy habits

Improving My Skin Part 2

Improving My Skin Part 1