stage 3/4/5 update: crash & burn

Crash by Images by John 'K', on Flickr

This is a bit of a long story; the summary is I had a major adrenal crash, likely due to too much detoxing, and thus temporarily ceased GAPS. Up until the crash, I was enjoying the food just fine, and my deterioration was gradual and didn't seem extreme, so I just puttered my way through stages 3, 4 and 5 until BOOM!

stage 3 food

Stage 3 adds avocados, pancakes made from nut butter, eggs & squash, scrambled eggs and fermented vegetables.

I added avocado with enthusiasm, as it's a favorite.

I will write another post about prepping nut butters and meals later, but I wasn't crazy about the pancakes overall and only did them a few times.

I was quite pleased to add the fermented veggies as opposed to just the juice.

I didn't care about scrambled eggs. I was so incredibly enthusiastic about soft-boiled eggs! I haven't had them since childhood, and was just loving the heck out of them. I have my method perfected, so the white is cooked entirely through, just the outside of the yolk is slightly cooked, and the rest is completely yummy. So I wasn't very interested in scrambled eggs, nor the GAPS-pancakes as I just wanted soft-boiled eggs.

My other fond childhood food that came back was yogurt & honey. As an adult, I mix plain yogurt with fruit and usually a bit of sugar-free DaVinci syrup of one flavor or another. The DaVinci syrups, being entirely chemical and having no food value whatsoever are completely illegal on GAPS. And at this stage, fruit remains illegal too. But just a cup of plain yogurt, mixed with a tablespoon of raw honey, is utterly scrumptious. Maybe a lot of this is due to the whole childhood memory thing, but this became my go-to snack in stage 3.

I enjoyed a pumpkin custard a great deal during this stage also.

Stage 3 recipes will be posted shortly.

my adrenal history

Vertical section of kidney,
from Grey's Anatomy,
on Wikimedia

This is an image from Grey's Anatomy showing a sliced kidney; the adrenal glands sit on top of each kidney. So if you've ever had a kidney infection, that spot in your mid-lower back where you felt pain is pretty close to where your adrenals are located.

When I had adrenal issues, I drove the moderators of the Adrenals Yahoo! group half nuts with my demands for explanations for every recommendation they made. Val was pretty patient about providing me references when she had time, but one thing it never occurred to me to ask was why she said people should not try to do any sort of detox while healing their adrenals; she just said detox was hard on adrenals. Since I had absolutely no plans to do any detoxing at that time, I never asked, and don't have references. I will likely look them up at some later time, but for the purpose of this post, I am just accepting this as a very true statement.

This will be a very long post as I need to cover my previous health history, which is a bit of a long story.

But before I begin with that, I need to point out that I am not a doctor of any sort. The labcoat on my avatar is because I used to be a biochemist. Furthermore, you ought not take avatars seriously anyways, even if I add a stethoscope! ;)

crockpot carnitas

uruapan carnitas by goodiesfirst, on Flickr

During stage 4, I had carnitas, sliced avocado and sauerkraut for dinner.

This recipe does most of the cooking in the crockpot, but you do have to broil a bit at the end to get that characteristic crunchiness.

crockpot pulled pork and turmeric green beans

Pulled pork by beardenb, on Flickr

This was my dinner for stage 2. I had a 10 lb pork shoulder in the freezer, and since GAPS is all about fatty meats, it seemed like the thing to do. However, stage 2 only allows stewed meats, so I saved the other half to make carnitas for stage 4.

This recipe is time-consuming since you both brine and then crockpot the pork, but requires very little hands-on time.

egg drop chicken soup

Stracciatella alla romana by Sifu Renka, on Flickr

Of course, eggs and soup being stage 2 foods, my mind immediately went to egg drop soup. But this is NOT your takeout type egg drop soup! It's thick and full of meat.

stage 2 was foggy

Fog by Rickydavid, on Flickr

detox

brain fog

As I write this, I am currently in stage 4. I had a lot of brain fog throughout stage 2 & 3, so while I kept a few notes to remember what was going on, I really wasn't up to writing updates, or doing much of anything.

To my mind, the big question is... what is the difference between a detox reaction and a food intolerance and how do I know which I'm experiencing.

I've always been a bit suspicious about detox reactions. On the one hand, I completely understand that the Jarisch-Herxheimer reaction actually exists and is real and documented.

On the other hand, it seems like every type of snake oil out there claims all the good effects are due to the snake oil and the bad effects to Herxheimer reactions. This strikes me as very convenient for those who sell snake oil.

In the GAPS book, Dr. Campbell-McBride makes it clear that both detox reactions and new food intolerances can occur, and in either case, she feels you should back off on the changes that brought on the reaction and go slower. She believes detox should be done slowly and gradually so as to minimize symptoms.

Cara, author of the What Can I Eat Now? 30 Days on GAPS Intro Handbook, has an article on her blog What is a Healing Crisis? in which she discusses the difference between a healing crisis (detox) and a reaction (food intolerance).

ginger squash soup

Butternut Squash Soup! by prideandvegudice, on Flickr

Technically, this is a stage 1 food, but I decided this soup, along with a couple soft-boiled eggs, would be my breakfast for stage 2.

One of the advantages of posting to blog carnivals as I've been doing lately is that I am exposed to so many new blogs. And I've screened them all for you to bring you the best of the best! This month, many of them are science-oriented, but I also found a few awesome recipes & other tidbits.

Crockpot Pumpkin Custard for Fall (GAPS Legal)

Cara, author of the 30 Days on GAPS Intro ebook, What Can I Eat Now?, has an utterly scrumptious and easy pumpkin custard recipe for the crockpot. Given that I am currently drowning in neck pumpkins, I need great pumpkin recipes. Thanks Cara!