It’s just been a bit of pants day for Juneathon Day 25.

It all started with my dieticians appointment at St Guy’s this morning, it’s a follow up appointment as I have been on a low FODMAP (Low Fermentable Oligosaccharides, Disaccharides, Monosaccharides And Polyols) diet since February, as I suffer with ‘virus induced IBS’ (I don’t know about you, but I feel the diagnosis of IBS is a bit of a cop out and really an umbrella term for ‘we don’t know what’s really wrong with you’) and I really should now be re-introducing foods, but I have developed a bit of a phobia of eating these foods now as I don’t want to have stomach cramps and feel ill, not that the low FODMAP diet has completely eliminated my symptoms, it hasn’t! The first follow up appointment I had, turned out it could have been the chips and toast (gluten free bread) I was eating that was still giving me symptoms, as this ‘retards the starches or sugars as they have already been cooked which can makes them more difficult to digest leading to the my symptoms blah blah blah’! Basically I need to make my own chips if that’s what I want to eat! Though subsequently I feel potato doesn’t agree with me anyway – along with so many other things (though technically should be fine on a the low FODMAP diet).

This appointment, when I explained what I had been eating – it turns out it’s my bloody bowls of cornflakes I’ve been eating that are probably making me bloated and have a grumbly tum! Argh!!! If you know me well, you will know that I love my breakfast, it’s my favourite meal of the day, and I have two huge bowls of cereal in the morning (I love cereal) – none of this 30g crap – and in the book it says cornflakes were fine, what I didn’t realise was the portion size!!! It’s fine if you have half a cup – this is an exceptionally measly 15g – so my lovely dietician, bless her, as she didn’t want to tell me to stop eating something else said maybe to mix that with half a cup of rice crispies, because again these would have too much oligosaccharides if you have a larger portion! I just wanted to cry! My one flipping decent meal of the day…
I could buy the gluten free cereals – but they are about £3 for a tiddly box that probably wouldn’t last me three days! It’s just all so costly!  The Genius white sandwich loaf I buy is £3 a go – to put it perspective I can buy two loaves of normal bread for a £1 in Morrisons – it’s just ridiculous – and I appreciate higher manufacturing costs etc, but more and more people are going gluten free – so it’d be nice to see the price go down a bit, I make use of my NUS card and buy my bread in the Coop and get 10% off – yay!!!

This whole thing is making me miserable, as I don’t feel I eat enough to do my running anymore, my diet is so limited it’s embarrassing and makes going out for dinner with friends practically impossible – as things like onion and garlic are off the menu! Part of me wishes I’d never gone down this route, and had just given up dairy and gluten (wheat).  I wish there was something out there that could truly test what I was intolerant to and not just this constant guessing game, as this brings on my anxiety issues which just exacerbates my symptoms! It’s all very much a vicious circle and rather depressing!!!

Part of me wishes I could just go “Sod it” and start eating normally again – but it just doesn’t work like that, unfortunately! So now I wait for a referral to a gastroenterologist at Guy’s, I have to make an appointment with my own GP if I feel I need some mental help with regards to the phobia I have now developed with food and I can investigate the likes of Symprove and Align – probiotics that are meant to be very good but again are really expensive!!! I, again, am also apprehensive about taking them!

The only good thing was I did lots of walking – which was good for Juneathon Day 25, and I recorded my walk home from the station as a workout!

Then this evening I went for very pleasant walk with the lovely Helen – who kindly let me bend her ear with all the above, poor girl! I was a bit ranty and I got worse as to add insult to injury I went to my MapMyWalk app to record our walk and it’s logged me out and when I have gone to log back in – it tells me it doesn’t recognise my email – I tried signing in using Facebook to no avail – so I have no photo of my step count (which I know was already over 6000 after walking up London) or my work out walk back home from the station – I’m seriously hoping it hasn’t lost my whole account history, will be emailing them presently – hence after today I think I am entitled to feel a bit grumpy!!!

Apologies for such a rambling and moany post – but just needed to get it off my chest!

Tomorrow is a new day – praying that it’s a better one!!!

Has anyone else suffered like this – do you have a happy outcome you can share with me? Or have you used Symrove/Align or the equivalent – can you share your experience with me? Has it improved your quality of life?

😛 xxx