Week 4 on the GAPS Intro Diet

Patience is a virtue.

All good things come to those who wait.

Trees that are slow to grow bear the best fruit.

Patience is bitter, but its fruit is sweet.

He that can have patience can have what he will.

The theme of Week 4: you guessed it.

I got in a hurry.

When we left off with week three, we were already moving into stage 5. We were eating fresh vegetables like cucumber and lettuce again, and juicing every morning with carrot and beet juice. Then it hit me that something was up.

I messed up.

You see, before the diet began I had made two big half-gallon jars of sauerkraut, expressly for the diet. We went through the first jar pretty quickly once we introduced sauerkraut, but then something happened with the second jar – it didn’t turn out. Some air got in the airlock and reminded me why I don’t use airlocks anymore. (This is the fermenting jar that never fails me.)

Somehow I forgot about sauerkraut and the balance it gives with providing beneficial flora and enzymes and all that jazz. I moved us on into Stage 5, introducing more and more foods with higher amounts of sugar than we were used to. Foods such as carrot/beet juice, nuts and seeds, applesauce. . . and I just completely forgot about the ferments. Yikes.

My second son’s eczema, which had been doing SO well, flared up again. Oh, no.

In the middle of this, my son had a birthday. So I made a sunflower seed cake and let them have 1 piece of that. They loved it. I’ll have a post up about it soon.

So somehow, it finally hit me.

Whoa, nelly. Slow DOWN.

In my hurry to introduce more foods and feel more normal, I caused a reaction in my son, and there were probably other reactions I didn’t catch on to. I’m not sure what it was, but the diet kept confusing me. Brain fog? I don’t know and I guess by this point it doesn’t matter. Somehow I got confused.

So, I decided to take us back into Stage 3 for a while. As opposed to being in a hurry to get this intro diet over with, we were going to just camp out here for a while, where it’s safe. Where we can handle things.

We are having:

• boiled or roasted meats
• boiled veggies, GAPS-legal
• ginger tea w/honey (and ginger honey gummies)
• Coco-Honey Fat Bombs
• Pureed avocado
• store-bought fermented sauerkraut and pickles until my homemade ferments are finished fermenting

The week was easier, but still so hard. This diet, in case you can’t tell, is hard. LOL. Have I made it clear?

A Wreath of Roses

Feeling particularly beat up one morning last week, I stopped chopping carrots long enough to lean over, close my eyes, and meditate on Jesus for a few seconds.

All of a sudden, without expecting it, I got a vision in my heart. I saw (in my mind’s eye) Jesus walking toward me with a wreath made of red roses, a large one. Then the image left as quickly as it came.

I was a little confused. . . what was with the wreath of roses? What is that? It kind of reminded me of when horses win races, and how they hang the wreath around the winner of the horse race.

I told my hubby what I saw when I closed my eyes and asked him if he knew what that was. He said, Yeah, that’s what they give to the winner of a competition. He agreed with the horse race winner concept. Then all of a sudden it hit me. BAM. Oh, I love it when God speaks to us!

What I saw with the eyes of my heart was a promise: God was telling me that there would be victory! He was telling me not to give up. I can’t explain to you how much it impacted me at that moment; it was exactly what my heart needed to hear and see. And I am so grateful.

Even as isolated as I feel on this diet, God is right there with us, encouraging us, and reminding us we are not alone in this, and we will have victory.

Then, the next day, I ran to the grocery store for the umpteenth time. Man, you have no idea how much food we are going through. It’s no wonder I saw a horse wreath – we’re eating like horses! 😉 I heard the song Overcomer by Mandisa. Oh, if you haven’t heard this song, and you are on the GAPS diet (especially Intro), please read these lyrics and maybe even watch the video I’ve embedded. It will be exactly what you needed to hear.

Staring at a stop sign
Watching people drive by
T Mac on the radio
Got so much on your mind
Nothing’s really going right
Looking for a ray of hope

Whatever it is you may be going through
I know He’s not gonna let it get the best of you

You’re an overcomer
Stay in the fight ‘til the final round
You’re not going under
‘Cause God is holding you right now
You might be down for a moment
Feeling like it’s hopeless
That’s when He reminds You
That you’re an overcomer
You’re an overcomer

Everybody’s been down
Hit the bottom, hit the ground
Oh, you’re not alone
Just take a breath, don’t forget
Hang on to His promises
He wants You to know

The same Man, the Great I am
The one who overcame death
Is living inside of You
So just hold tight, fix your eyes
On the one who holds your life
There’s nothing He can’t do
He’s telling You

– Overcomer by Mandisa

Oh man. That song is exactly what else I needed to hear! It always makes me cry. God is so good.

So far on the GAPS Intro Diet:

• All of my children can have ghee.
• Three of my four children can have egg yolks, eggs baked into bread, and scrambled eggs (whites included) without a problem. I no longer worry about feeding these three eggs. Thank you God! This is pretty amazing, really. They all reacted to eggs when I was nursing them and would eat eggs. Even right before the diet, any time I ate bread with eggs in it, my daughter would get a mean diaper rash since she’s nursing. Now, I am eating like 5 eggs a day and she shows no reaction to that or to eggs given directly to her. How amazing.
• My oldest is still reacting to egg yolks. He keeps good spirits about this, thankfully.
• They all have eaten almond bread with eggs baked in it and have had no immediate reactions, no reactions that we can see. We have stopped giving them the bread for now, though.
• They all passed the sensitivity test for butter and yogurt, and actually today they all had yogurt with no problems. We’ll see how it goes with repeated doses and tiny gradual increases.
• My son’s eczema worsened, and then improved a tiny bit. Still not enough though. Working on this.
• There is no constipation or diarrhea in any of the kids, which is great.
• My 18-month-old daughter’s vocabulary has exploded. I know removing grains and sugar has something to do with this. She was saying only a few words here and there when we started. Now she repeats things we say and babbles all day long. (This started even during the first week, but I kept forgetting to put it in my posts.) Last night she said the word “detox” – I kid you not. That’s a very difficult word for a toddler. I’m absolutely positive it is due to this diet – it’s a side effect I wasn’t expecting and am pleasantly surprised to see. There is a gut-brain connection.

I guess that’s all I can remember for now. It’s getting late and I am beat.

I am still so ready to see my oldest be able to eat eggs with no problems. The hard work we’ve put into the GAPS intro diet will be worth it; in so many ways it already is. Thank You God, for being there for our family during this difficult change. Thank You for healing us in so many ways.

Love,

Dandy

Read on for week 6 of the GAPS Intro Diet