Ulcerative Colitis Diet

How important are carbohydrates in an ulcerative colitis diet?

Has anyone tried the Specific Carbohydrate Diet - ref. the book
Breaking the Vicious Cycle by Elaine Gottschall? I have had Ulcerative
Colitis for 8 years, and although rarely been in remission, have seen subtle
improvement in the severity of my condition with some of the changes I've
made to my diet in the past - homemade soup is a good place to start! I
frankly refuse to believe that food doesn't affect UC, so even though I was
sceptical about trying an elimination diet such as Elaine's, having heard
her speaking at a conference (available on the web) I was persuaded to give
it a try. Would be really interested in anyone elses experiences of this
diet. Jo

I heard about this a while back. I thought about going on the diet but found
there were alot of restrictions and most of the allowed food i either didnt
like or couldnt eat for one reason or another.
I also believe that food does affect UC, especially for me bananas and
possibly milk.

My husband who was then my 'boyfriend' bought me that book when i
first told him ihad ibd..but i went thru it and a lot of stuff used
nutflour which would give me a problem..i dont have the book here in
the rental appartment so i cannot look..but i recall there were
several other things she recommended that i could NOT have..and things
she said NOT to have that helped me..

it might work for some..i guess not for all...like most of these
diets..u have to find out for yourself..

There is a lot of missunderstanding about the SCD, it is not as rigid
as many seem to think. It is rigid about the foods not to eat but the
large range of foods on the acceptable list must be adjusted to suit
the individual. The diet starts by eating a very resticted range for
5 days, even within this very restricted range it can be adjusted to
suit the individual. After the five days other foods on the
acceptable list are gradually introduced one at a time in small
amounts at first. If an adverse reaction is found to any food then it
is avoided in the meantime. Nuts of any sort are problematic to many
at the beginning of the diet

People on the diet often find that the foods that have been causing a
problem are not the ones they at first thought.

The effects of diet are very complex. Sure people do get instant
reactions to eating one food or avoiding it but there are effects that
happen over a long period. There can be over 400 different bacteria
in our guts all reacting against each other in a continuous arms race/
with each other / against our body systems / with our body systems.
Bacteria also mutate at a fast rate. The bacteria colonies that any
individual has will be arrived at by a process of evolution. The
colony that an individual has will be relatively stable and resist
changes to its environment, that environment is mainly the diet of
that individual. Also for any particular individual there can be many
of these stable states. If we assume that an individual with IBD has
a stable colony of bacteria and that this colony of bacteria
contribute to their IBD problem then how do we change it? Small
changes in particular foods are unlikely to do it. The reason that
the SCD has such a good success is that it makes a dramatic change to
the environment in the gut by

1/ Removing all complex carbohydrates
2/ Removing foods that have chemicals added in manufacturing
processes.
3/ Continuing the diet long term because harmful bacteria that are
lingering can easily recover if they get even a small amount of the
food they need.

To answer the original question, I have been on the SCD for 4 months
and have found great benefit. The main improvement came after 2
weeks. I was orignally diagnosed with UC but 5 months ago while in
hospital was told it is really CD and probably always has been. Many
people with UC have had success with SCD too. SCD doesn't work for
everyone but I think it is well worth a try for a month. To find more
people with success stories look at the reviews of the book Breaking
the Vicious Cycle on Amazon (search on "Breaking the Vicious Cycle,
click on the book, scroll to the bottom of the page) there were 102 at
the last count.

To learn more about the SCD read up on the following web sites which
also have many testimonies from people that it has worked for.