How Changing My Diet Affected My Health
How Changing My Diet Affected My Health
Food has never been simple for me.
Since childhood, I have lived with pain, digestive problems and a body that reacted strongly to things I did not yet understand. Those experiences affected my relationship with food long before I had the diagnoses that could help explain them.
It took 21 years from my first emergency visit at ten to receiving my Crohn’s diagnosis at 31. I was later diagnosed with scoliosis, fibromyalgia, Hypermobility Spectrum Disorder and adenomyosis, with endometriosis also suspected.
Finally receiving those answers made many things fall into place.
But understanding how food affected my body took much longer.
When food became connected with control
I stopped eating meat when I was 14.
I have always loved animals, and that was the main reason behind my decision. But if I am completely honest, it was not the only reason. At that age, I also hoped that becoming vegetarian would help me lose more weight.
Somewhere around middle school, I developed eating disorders. My relationship with food, exercise and my body became increasingly destructive.
After five years—and an experience with a psychologist who made things worse rather than helping—I decided that I had to find my own way out of the cycle of starving and purging.
Stopping those behaviours did not immediately heal my relationship with food.
That took years.
Food had become connected with weight, control and guilt. At the same time, eating could leave me in pain or make me feel seriously ill. I did not understand why my body reacted as it did, so food also became connected with uncertainty and fear.
Eating was rarely easy
Being vegetarian in the 1980s and 1990s was very different from being vegetarian today. The available options were limited, and many people had little understanding of how to prepare satisfying vegetarian food.
Eating out was often stressful.
I had to explain what I could not eat while also trying to work out whether people had understood me. Sometimes they did not know what was in the food. Sometimes they believed removing one obvious ingredient was enough, even when it had already been cooked with everything else.
I could rarely feel completely confident that the food I was given was safe for me.
That uncertainty followed me into travel too. One meal could make me ill for days—or much longer.
Food was meant to be a source of nourishment, pleasure and connection. Instead, it often felt like a risk I had to manage.
Making changes when my health became worse
After several years of being seriously ill, I began changing how I ate.
I removed products made from cow’s milk because my body struggled with both the lactose and the milk protein. I removed gluten and added sugar. I had already stopped drinking alcohol, which made my digestive system feel as though I had swallowed acid.
None of these changes happened in isolation.
During the same period, I was also working with stress management, yoga and meditation. I was trying to rest more and support my body in several different ways.
Gradually, I began to feel better.
My asthma improved, although it still comes and goes. I had a little more energy, and my body did not hurt quite as much.
I cannot say that changing my diet alone caused every improvement. Health is rarely that simple, especially in a body living with several chronic conditions.
But changing what I ate helped me notice patterns I had previously been unable to see.
Recognising my individual reactions
When you are in the middle of a severe flare or your entire body feels chaotic, individual signals can become almost impossible to distinguish.
Everything merges into one overwhelming blur.
After I had removed certain foods for a while, I became more aware of how my body responded when I ate them again. The reactions felt different from one another, and over time I learned to recognise some of those differences.
These are some of my personal patterns:
All types of onion can leave me feeling as though I have stomach flu.
Carbonated drinks can cause painful bloating and digestive distress.
Very oily food can be difficult for me to digest and may cause nausea.
Products made from cow’s milk can make me extremely nauseous.
Gluten used to create an intense burning sensation throughout my digestive system. I can now tolerate small amounts when I am feeling relatively well, but my body may react differently when my health is worse.
Added sugar can make my body feel as though it is burning from within, particularly through my muscles and connective tissues. However, I can sometimes enjoy it in small amounts without the same reaction.
Gluten and sugar can also be followed by greater joint pain and stiffness.
Alcohol caused intense burning throughout my digestive system.
What I can tolerate is not always the same
One of the things I have learned is that my food tolerances are not completely fixed.
For a long time, I avoided gluten and added sugar entirely because of how strongly my body reacted. Today, I can sometimes eat small amounts of gluten when I am feeling relatively well. I can also occasionally eat a small amount of sugar.
I love candy, and I have tried what feels like every gluten-free, sugar-free and vegan alternative available. But I have not found an alternative that I both enjoy and tolerate. Instead, I have discovered two particular types of regular candy that I can eat in small amounts without becoming nauseous.
That may not sound like a major discovery, but it matters to me. It allows something I love to remain part of my life without pretending that my body has no limits.
How I respond can depend on the amount I eat, how I am feeling and what else is happening in my body. Something I tolerate one day may be more difficult on another.
This is another reason I do not want my diet to be built around rigid rules. I need enough awareness to recognise my patterns—and enough flexibility to respond to the body I have that day.
These are descriptions of what I experience—not a list of foods that everyone with Crohn’s, IBS, inflammation or chronic pain should avoid.
There is no single diet that works for every person with Crohn’s or ulcerative colitis. A food that is easy for one person to tolerate may cause significant symptoms for another.
Food can affect symptoms without necessarily causing the underlying inflammation or a flare-up. That distinction matters.
My diet is not completely plant-based
Most of the food I prepare and share publicly is plant-based.
I have chosen that focus partly because I enjoy plant-based food and have not eaten meat since I was 14. But it is also because plant-based recipes can be useful to a broader audience.
Not everyone can tolerate eggs or dairy products when they begin exploring what works for their digestive system. Plant-based recipes provide options that do not depend on either.
Personally, I can eat goat’s and sheep’s cheese because I tolerate them much better than products made from cow’s milk. I also eat eggs occasionally, especially when travelling, because they are sometimes easier to find. I can now also tolerate small amounts of gluten and sugar when I am feeling relatively well.
I am not interested in presenting my way of eating as a perfect label or asking anyone else to follow it exactly.
My focus is on finding food that nourishes me, brings me pleasure and works with my body as it is—not on fitting myself into another rigid set of rules. Instead of allowing my diet to be defined by everything I have to avoid, I want to focus on all the amazing things I can still eat, make and enjoy. There are so many possibilities within what works for my body, and exploring them has helped food become a source of creativity and pleasure again.
When someone else made the decisions for me
During my worst flare, a friend helped me create a meal plan that reflected what I could eat.
That support made an enormous difference.
For one month, I had inspiration and a clear plan for what to eat and when. I did not have to begin every meal by making another decision.
When you are completely exhausted, even small decisions can feel impossible. You may know that you need to eat, but working out what to prepare, checking whether you have the ingredients and finding the energy to make it can become overwhelming.
The meal plan reduced some of that mental load.
Someone had already done the thinking. Instead of using my limited energy to make repeated decisions, I could use it to prepare and eat the food my body needed.
The food mattered—but so did the structure around it.
From restriction to possibility
For a long time, I focused on everything I had been forced to remove.
Every additional food restriction felt like one more thing my body had taken away from me. I felt as though I had to sacrifice everything I enjoyed for the possibility of feeling slightly better.
Eventually, I began shifting my focus.
Instead of looking only at what I could no longer eat, I began exploring what I could create with the foods that remained available to me.
I experimented.
I began baking and making desserts without added sugar, using fresh or dried fruit for sweetness. I discovered spices and ingredients I had never used before. I learned how much flavour and variety could be created from food that worked for my body.
Today, I make most of what I eat from scratch.
That requires energy, which is not always easy when I am fatigued or in pain. But it also gives me greater understanding and control over what is in my food.
Most importantly, it helped me find new things to love.
Necessary adaptations can still carry grief
Changing how you eat is not always a simple wellness choice.
For people with digestive conditions, allergies, coeliac disease or multiple chronic illnesses, food adaptations may be medically necessary. They can also affect identity, family traditions, social occasions, travel and the simple pleasure of choosing something from a menu without analysing every ingredient.
Rika, who lives with Crohn’s, lupus, rheumatoid arthritis and multiple food allergies, describes restaurant menus as feeling like a trap. Choosing the wrong dish can have serious consequences, while repeatedly eating the same limited options can create a sense of isolation from everyone else at the table.
Read more about Rika’s story on the blog.
Amy lives with ulcerative colitis, coeliac disease, rheumatoid arthritis and multiple sclerosis. Coeliac disease required her to give up foods she loved, but it also showed her that some necessary changes could be worth making when they reduced her pain.
Read more about Amy’s story on the blog.
The emotional impact of changing what you eat deserves to be acknowledged.
Gratitude for the foods you can eat and grief for those you cannot can exist at the same time.
Food awareness without food fear
My history makes this distinction especially important.
Because I have experienced eating disorders, I know how easily “healthy eating” can become another form of control, fear or self-punishment.
I do not want my current way of eating to recreate the mindset I worked so hard to leave behind.
Awareness helps me notice what happens in my body.
Fear tells me that food is dangerous and that I must control everything perfectly.
Those are not the same thing.
I can pay attention to patterns without judging myself. I can make informed choices without believing that every symptom means I have failed. I can eat something because it brings me pleasure while also understanding that there may be consequences.
My body does not always react predictably, even when I do everything “right.”
That uncertainty is part of living with chronic illness.
I no longer eat to become a certain size
Thoughts about fitting into clothes I used to wear can still cross my mind. I am human, and changing a deeply rooted relationship with body image does not mean those thoughts never return.
But they are no longer the purpose behind how I eat.
I eat to nourish my body and soul.
I eat to give myself energy.
I eat to experience flavour, comfort and enjoyment.
I eat in ways that respect what my body can tolerate while trying not to turn those needs into another demand for perfection.
Food should be allowed to contain pleasure, even when it also requires adaptation.
There is no universally perfect diet
Changing my diet affected my digestion, pain, energy and wider health.
It also changed my relationship with food.
But my experience is not evidence that everyone should remove gluten, cow’s milk, added sugar, onions, alcohol or anything else I personally avoid.
There is no single perfect diet for Crohn’s, inflammation, fatigue or chronic illness.
What helped me was becoming more curious about my own patterns, making gradual adjustments and noticing what changed. When larger food groups are removed, professional support can also be important to ensure that the body continues receiving the nutrients it needs.
The goal is not to eat as I do.
The goal is to understand what supports you.
Awareness around nourishment
Changing my diet did not cure my Crohn’s or resolve every health problem.
It did help me understand my body more clearly.
I learned that nourishment involves more than the nutrients contained in a meal. It also includes the energy required to choose and prepare it, the safety of knowing what is in it, the pleasure of eating it and the freedom from constantly fighting with yourself.
Awareness around nourishment gradually made some of my wider energy patterns easier to understand.
I stopped seeing my body’s reactions as random acts of betrayal and began recognising them as information.
That shift did not give me complete control.
It gave me a more compassionate place from which to respond.
This article describes my personal experience and is not individual dietary or medical advice. Food needs and tolerances vary considerably, particularly for people living with digestive conditions, allergies or multiple chronic illnesses. Speak with a qualified healthcare professional or registered dietitian before making significant dietary changes or removing major food groups.
Sources for the medical information in this article:
