I have met hundreds of people who are now on gluten free diets. My daughter used to be one of them. How can this grain that has been around since time began suddenly wreak such havoc on so many individuals. Well it is definitely causing a lot of problems, but I was never one to just do something with out understanding the reasoning behind it. I want to know the answers for myself and not just take someones word for it. So when my daughter developed IBS (irritable bowel syndrome) and couldn't eat wheat and every week the list kept getting bigger with things she couldn't tolerate. I became a woman on a mission to understand what was going on. One of the things I have always hated about modern medicine is that they slap a band aid on problems such as blood pressure, cholesterol and a host of other problems. My question is why do you have high blood pressure and why can you suddenly not digest wheat and other foods? What causes the body to develop these symptoms. This is the best part of all our beautiful bodies. They call out to us with problems to get our attention. They are our best teachers and when you start having troubles there is much to learn.The only way to do that is to go within and become attentive to something we take for granted. The inner world of our bodies. I will share with you what I learned. This is my journey to understanding and yours may be different but maybe I can shed light on something that will help you.
Every morning my 16 year old daughter would climb out of bed and drag her self to the kitchen. Each morning I would pray that she would feel better that day. Her words were always the same. " I never feel good mom,"' It broke me. She was only 16 and she hated getting up everyday to a life filled with pain. I took her to doctors and they wanted to remove her gallbladder for really no reason. It was just a guess. Then I took her to an acupuncturist. This was my first lesson in the bodies ability to talk to you. With much kindness our Chinese acupuncturist talked with Maci. He said things to her like," you have to much hurry worry and your body is hurting because of this." I remember as those words came out of his mouth, I fought back tears, because it was so true. She came home that afternoon and broke up with her boyfriend and than the journey really began.
I started researching the foods that hurt her gut the most and eliminated them from her diet. Here is what I found.
The reason she was having so much trouble digesting grains is really two fold. First her gut lining was damaged. Stress and foods she was eating and a lack of nutrient dense foods was destroying her gut lining. Not enough of the right bacterias to turn her foods into vitamins and fatty acids was causing much stress on her gut. There was nothing to protect her lining. Years of antibiotics had stripped her of all her good bacteria and left her defenseless. Just eliminating the food will eliminate the pain but then you need to fix the lining and add foods to do this. The best foods for this are cultured foods. She had a cultured food at every meal. Kefir for breakfast and 1 to 2 tbsp of cultured veggies at lunch and dinner. Then kombucha or coconut kefir to drink at every meal. She also had a lot of bone broths made into soups. They are healing to the digestive track because of the collagen in the broth. She also ate a ton of coconut oil by the tbsp. Usually 3 tbsp a day. I would watch as she got a burst of energy from this and was always amazed. All these foods are healing to the gut. Each one plays a different part in the healing. As she got better I discover why we have such trouble with grains now.
Grains are not the same as they used to be. For 100 of years they would cut the sheaths of grains and stack them in the fields and leave them to gather the next day. The dew would make the grains sprout and unlock the nutrients and deactivate the phytic acid, and enzyme inhibitors. Than the workers would gather the grains and take the seeds off the stalks to be used. Today we have combine machine that take the seeds off instantly never allowing the grains to sprout. Then for years and still today in European countries we always used sourdough starters to rise our breads, which transforms the bread in the same way that sprouting does. It puts lactobacillus into the bread. These wonderful bacterias that not only change our breads into a healthful foods, also change our bodies the same way. Now we have instant yeast and the bread never has a chance to transform. Couple this with guts that are so damaged they can barely digest anything and you have a recipe for disaster. Grains take huge amounts of B vitamins to digest and when you are under a lot of stress you don't have what you need. Sprouting a grain activates all the B vitamins that are locked in there, giving you what you need to digest it.
So the formula. Remove or deal with stress. Heal they gut with fermented foods and nutrient dense foods.Then once it is healed add sprouted or sourdough grains. This is what I did and have watched many others do. My daughter can now eat anything and is free from a life sentence without grains. She loves life and can't wait to get out of bed. Food is not something that she is afraid of but something that brings her great joy. If you are reading this blog chances are your body is trying to tell you something.
Your body is your best teacher are you listening?
How to make Strawberry Gingerade Coconut Kefir
This Drink is so delicious you'll want to drink it everyday. it is fizzy and bubbly and full of flavor.It is a great way to get probiotics in your kids because it taste so good!
Heat 1 quart of young green coconut water to 92 degrees or skin temperature. (You can find coconut water in the Asian sections of your grocery store or health food stores.
Add entire foil package of Kefir culture packages ( purchase here. http://www.culturesforhealth.com/Milk-Kefir-Starter-Culture.html) and stir to dissolve thoroughly.
You can also use kefir grains about 3 to 4 tbsp per quart of coconut juice.
Add 1 tbsp of fresh grated ginger
Pour into a close able vessel.Such as a bottle with a clamp down lid. It will now take 4-5 days for the kefir to culture at room temperature. The coconut water will become cloudy as the culture grows and it will become "fizzy" and lose it's sweetness and become tart. When the coconut culture is done,add 4 or 5 frozen strawberries to about 8 ounces of the coconut kefir and whirl in a blender. Then sit down and enjoy this delicious probiotic drink. Or refrigerate for later.
If you used the Kefir culture packages ( purchase here. http://www.culturesforhealth.com/Milk-Kefir-Starter-Culture.html) save 6 tablespoons from each batch to inoculate the next quart of coconut water. It will culture faster each time. Many times it will only take a day to culture. You can do this up to 6 times on each package or until it stops culturing. Mine can go up to 13 times.
If you use kefir grains you will start over each time with your kefir grains in new coconut juice.
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