The first thing I will say is that something that works for me/didn’t work for me might work or not work for you, everyone is different!

One of the hardest parts of this gut healing journey was the not knowing what was going to make things better or worse… it was and is all very overwhelming , every time.

When I didn’t get better after antibiotics and food was making me sick, I went to several nutritionists and dietitians and doctors about food and my weight… I knew that there would need to be a lifestyle change, and that would need to include my diet.

Diet

Most Americans live off processed, sugary, unhealthy, low fiber diets of junk food, alcohol, etc. I was no different! I was young and in college, I didn’t pay attention to food or nutrition at all. Go check out the full journey if you haven’t, I go into detail about life before and during c diff.

What To Eat During C Diff

Plain foods that sit well with you, honestly not a lot of food sat well for me, but here are some STAPLES:

• Bone broth (chicken or beef)
• Rice cakes
• Crackers (saltines)
• White rice
• Toast
• Bananas
• Potatoes
• Chicken
• Ground meat (beef, venison)
• Beef jerky
• Applesauce
• Whatever you can keep down…

Once I was done with antibiotics, I usually felt okay for awhile, but it would progressively get worse for some reason.

SIBO Diet

When I got SIBO shortly after my first c diff bout, I tried doing the diet on my own. I couldn’t find consistent information for what was ok, moderately ok, or bad. Foods suddenly had labels, some sites said one thing was “good” for sibo and another website would say it was “bad”. The small list of things I COULD have, I either didn’t have access to in a small town in a landlocked state or couldn’t tolerate it.

Developing Food Intolerances & Sensitivity

I’ve noticed in the online community, many people ask if others have developed food sensitivities or intolerances since c diff, in fact some medical professionals even warn that c diff makes people lactose intolerant for awhile.. but for those lucky folks like me, it’s normal to not be able to eat all your favorites (but doesn’t mean you never will again, healing takes time). Like I said, I went to several nutritionists and dietitians – so I can save you at least one trip to one with just the tiniest tidbit here: gut journaling.

The first thing a doctor, nutritionist, or dietitian will probably have you do is keep a food journal, but many people don’t do it correctly (so check out that gut journaling post), while doing some sort of elimination diet.

Elimination Diet

The elimination diet is a 2 phased meal plan that removes ingredients to create a baseline to then slowly reintroduce those ingredients to determine food sensitivities or allergies. It’s pretty restrictive, like you can only eat 10 foods at a time type of restrictive. Here is a list of the only items you can eat on the elimination diet:

• Apples or apple juice
• Apricots
• Asparagus
• Beets
• Cane or beet sugar
• Carrots
• Chicken
• Cranberries
• Honey
• Lamb
• Lettuce
• Olive oil
• Peaches
• Pears
• Pineapple
• Rice (including rice cakes and cereal)
• Safflower oil
• Salt
• Sweet potatoes
• White vinegar
  • This list is from webmd.com

This is not long term, realize it’s not for weight loss either – so make sure you’re at a healthy place, physically and mentally, before doing any diets and reach out to a nutrition professional for more solid guidance. This still was frustrating for me!

Low Fodmap Diet

The low fodmap diet (fodmap stands for fermentable oligosaccharides, disaccharides, monosaccharides and polyols, which are short-chain carbohydrates – so basically sugars) is a 3 phrase elimination diet that is predominantly used in the ibs community. Now this is similar to the sibo diet, I was sort of convinced they are they same type of diet there for awhile really. It’s also the diet I kind of tend to fall back on when I am searching for recipes, when my ibs is flaring, or if I was recently sick.

Here are some low fodmap resources, like an app that helps you track/know what foods are, some recipes, and a little more about it. But here’s the breakdown, on low formal you avoid:

• Dairy items (milk, yogurt, ice cream, etc.)
• Wheat items (cereal, bread, crackers, etc.)
• Beans, lentils
• Some veggies (this is a hard group, because it’s some things like artichokes, asparagus, onions, garlic, etc.)
• Some fruits (again, a hard group because it’s some things like apples, cherries, pears, reached, etc.)

So, what can you eat on the low fodmap diet? Items like:

• Meat (chicken, beef, venison, bison, lamb, etc.)
• Eggs
• Almond milk
• Some harder and aged cheeses like cheddar, Camembert… To be safe, I usually just avoid cheeses.
• Grains like rice, rice cakes, quinoa, and oats
• Veggies like potatoes, zucchini, cucumbers, tomatoes, etc.
• Fruits like grapes, strawberries, blueberries, pineapple, etc.

How Does The Low Fodmap Diet Work?

Basically, you stop eating high fodmap foods, then slowly reintroduce them (like every 3 days, you can add a new item) to see which ones are troublesome &/or triggers for symptoms. Once you have identified the foods that cause issues, you avoid/limit those items and eat everything else without any worries!

My Modifed Diet After CDiff, SIBO, & IBS

Yeah, as mentioned above.. The low fodmap diet is a short term diet, but people have to eat forever, like everyday, so how do I manage?

My everyday diet is just a modified version of the low fodmap, I try to focus my meals around a protein, a veggie/fruit, and some sort of starch/carb that I can eat. I tend to avoid sugars or a lot of high fodmap items, even without any triggers from them, sometimes I go outside the box! This is healthy, even if I suffer later lol. It’s good to still be exposed to my trigger foods because I love them and I also don’t want to be a 100% antisocial being. The more I expose myself, the better my tolerance usually becomes.. But you gotta start slow and it may not work for every trigger. Sometimes a good might be “safe” one day and then murder your intestines the next day. So I TRY everything, just a little bite, I use my digestive enzymes when I think I should/need to, and I mainly avoid:

• Dairy – not really all dairy, things made with some dairy are usually fine for me, but just rich dairy like cheeses, creams, milks I really can’t/shouldn’t
• Greasy/Fatty – deep fried foods, restaurant items, even avocados do a toll lol
• Raw Veggies – I know what you’re thinking, but for some reason, I can have the cooked/steamed/roasted veggies without issues usually – broccoli, tomato skins, peppers, even lettuce, parsley, cilantro come out looking the same as it went in
• Non-Blended Fruits – yup, blended usually has no issues, berries and grapes worked well, but any fruits with a skin – apples, pears, I can’t tolerate very well
• Alcohol – to this day I won’t have more than a sip – ok, sometimes I literally just stick my tongue in to try it lol I really don’t want to mess with this one, I guess alcohol changes your gut biome quite a bit and can lead to c diff relapse due to the environment shift

Trial & Error

I know plenty of c diff survivors that don’t follow any diets, those that have gut issues and those who were lucky enough to go through c diff with no lingering issues. Some drink alcohol and some suffer daily, so your journey is YOUR journey, ok? No two cases are alike.

It will take some trials and there will be errors! If yore serious enough about helping yourself, you will try the diets to figure out what triggers your symptoms.. Maybe you will do it more than once. Maybe you’ll try it for awhile and need to restart, God knows I have had to. Here’s my message:

Don’t Give Up!

You gotta eat, that’s life. There is a lot of feelings for me towards food, here is a post on that.

Supplements

Something I haven’t went into detail with yet is supplements, what type, when, how much, etc. I think this should be its own post – so go check out my fav supplements here.

FMT – Any Help?

One of the first items that Dr. FMT went over, was that the fmt doesn’t help with any post infectious ibs. At this point, I wasn’t sure what damage was from what, I took a gamble and went through with it. But it wasn’t a magic cure all, go read about the fmt here.