Changes to the AIP Diet Reintroductions (Autoimmune Paleo - April 2019) 

Oh I'm so glad to hear you've just reintroduced eggs! That's exciting!! You've worked hard, glad to hear it's going well 😀

Thanks so much!

My main site is thrivingonpaleo.com and healing your gut can range a lot. To determine if yours has healed enough - do you feel significantly better than you did before you started? If so, you can start reintroductions. Being scared is VERY normal - I think everyone feels that way. You've spent 3 months in a safe zone where you know how things will go. But just take it slow at first to really get your feet under you and you'll start to feel more confidence.

I've been coaching clients and community members for over 8 years in this and have heard ALL the things, lol, so I never think anything is strange anymore. If you aren't reacting to the milk chocolate it's most likely not chocolate that's causing problems but perhaps either something used in the bar or even a pesticide or something used on the cacao? I'd be interested to see if you had that same reaction to a different brand of dark chocolate some time (like a few weeks) in the future. Sometimes it's just a weird one-off thing and perhaps you had something else going on as well..

Ugh, so sorry to hear you've been going through this! So.. typically if you haven't done an elimination diet yet (which 20 days into AIP is on your way, but you'll need more time), it's hard to discern whether those symptoms are from a flare or from a food sensitivity. It could be both at the same time. Having a leaky gut, which you most likely have, can exacerbate it all since it's really hard to discern at that point what foods are even causing any issues. Pretty much anything can cause issues at that point. So I wouldn't worry necessarily about the past. Instead, keep on AIP and once you start feeling better, your leaky gut should be healing, and when you get to the point that you can reintroduce foods, then you'll start to be able to tell if a particular food is causing you an issue or not. Like I mention in the video, once you get a few months into your reintroductions and get to the Stage 4 ones, it gets harder to tell what food might being causing an issue, but usually you can pinpoint it to one or two. When you get to those Stage 4 ones and after, a flare can be caused by a few things, but it's easier to figure out by what you've been doing. I wrote a blog post about Hashimoto's flares in particular but it really applies to any autoimmune flare that might help understand that: thrivingonpaleo.com/dealing-with-a-hashimotos-flare/ Keeping a symptom and food log can definitely help too so that you can see a pattern - like if you eat X you get Y symptom every time. Then you know that food is causing issues at that time.

The best thing I was able to find for my leaky gut is *Artichoke Leaf Extract* (AIP) and *Slippery Elm* (non-AIP). To reduce bloating try to eat low FODMAP foods. Also drinking collagen peptides aids in gut reparation. Maybe Oregano oil to kill off that gas-causing bacteria (it helps me to avoid being bloated if I happen to eat high FODMAP foods). Speedy recovery!

The very first time I did it, back in 2014, I stayed on the strict elimination diet for 3 months, then started reintroducing foods. I felt better almost immediately, but major gains came around the 6 and 8 week marks for me. It took me about a year total to get through all of the reintroductions though as paprika kept giving me issues (but I was mainly on a Paleo-style diet by 6 months). I've done AIP a few more times after totally going off the wagon (like eating only gluten-free junk food for a while, lol, during busy times in my life) but those I've only done for a month (just the elimination without the reintroduction part) and it's gotten me back on track. So I really think it's only necessary to do the whole full shebang once, and I highly recommend that if you're not feeling better after 3 months that you work with a doctor or functional medicine practitioner to determine if you have any underlying issues, like a gut infection, parasites, food allergies, etc going on. 3 months should be long enough to really flesh out all issues that can be solved by diet alone. I also have a video on fear of reintroduction, in case that is an issue: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-sHQeQOuMSRw.html

No, haha, you're fine. Have you watched my latest video? If not - go do so and pay particular attention to Tip # 9: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-znZtZMLFphA.html. - I go into more depth there, but especially if you were planning on 3 months you should be good to go.

@@MicheleSpring thank you

yep, many if not most people do. You just need to be on the elimination portion for at least 30 days or until you start to feel a marked difference and then you start to reintroduce foods. The diet you wind up with can look different for each person, but it helps you determine exactly what foods you may be reacting to. I personally am on a mostly Paleo-style diet now with white rice, garbanzo beans, and oats being ok, plus I eat some gluten-free grains on occasion (but not often).

I'd watch this video that I just put out that may answer all of your questions about the Reintro process -- ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-qWxXg_xKHJo.html

@@MicheleSpring great. I will check this out. I wonder if this diet can help vertigo, as I’ve read something that diet is important for ear fluid and balance and problems associated with it could be linked to insulin. How interesting.

You can eat raw veggies any time you'd like - they're allowed on the elimination portion of the diet.