Irritable Bowel Syndrome Message Boards | Re: Okay, what happened??? What could have done this to me ?

I don't think the "figure out what's wrong" and the "accept it's going to happen sometimes" positions have to be contradictory. I think you do the first and then you do the second. That is, see if you can find some food choice that might have caused the attack. If so, resolve not to do it again, accept, and get through as gracefully as possible. If not, skip the resolve part and go right to the accept and get through as gracefully as possible portion of the program.

I think it's always worth doing at least a quick mental food check when an attack flares up - you never know when you'll have an "oh, look, I ate a Near East rice dish and by gosh, it's got autolyzed yeast protein in it" moment. And for people who are relatively new to Heather's approach, it can be reassuring to have someone else take a look at what they've been eating: maybe they're worried they've misunderstood something basic, maybe they're eating stuff they're unsure of. Once they've gotten a food checkup and possibly some encouraging words, they can take whatever advice they're given and decide how to use it or not.

It is, of course, possible to "hyper focus" on food and, if you took everyone's advice about personal triggers, you'd probably never eat anything, but I think that obsessive focus is normal for the first few weeks or maybe even months of following Heather's approach. I suspect most people are saved from getting stuck in that mode because it gets boring after a while.

And I absolutely agree that guilt is not an appropriate response to an IBS attack (whether it was caused by food choices or not). However, guilt over food, over not "sticking to a diet", just seems to be built into our culture. Years ago I read a book or article that pointed out, very cleverly, all the parallels between how our culture thinks about eating - particularly eating anything not considered 100% healthy - and how the Victorians thought about sex. It's very easy to think of Heather's approach as a "diet" and to transfer all that guilt over eating McDonalds to guilt over eating "wrong" for IBS.

I think your riff on New Age/cancer was both dead on and a good analogy. People want to feel they have control, especially over their own bodies and health. It's terribly difficult to just accept that sometimes you get blind-sided and there's not much you can do about it.

And I agree with Imp - please don't go silent. Your perspective is interesting, helpful, and funny.

Oh, and King George? Porphyria. Great movie.

--------------------
[Research tells us fourteen out of any ten individuals likes chocolate. - Sandra Boynton]

Print Remind Me Notify Moderator