The Ideal Diet for Ulcerative Colitis

There was a time when I was suffering the worst I ever had from ulcerative colitis that I began to fear food and their effects on me. Twenty minutes within eating breakfast I would begin to feel excruciating pains, and non-stop diarrhea would commence just five minutes before I would have to be in class. And yet I would still be in my dorm room bathroom, which is about three minutes away from the classroom, simultaneously keeled over from pain and wondering what to do about the impending lecture. Ditch it again? Well, obviously I couldn't go to class, considering that ten minutes later, I would still be on the toilet. Then I would stress about what I would say to the professor. How can I face him? Will he believe me?

So you can understand why I avoided food: too many ramifications. So I would quit breakfast, and feel better. Then I would be famished by lunch, weak with hunger, but since I had classes, I would also skip lunch. By dinner time, when my schedule was freed of any classes, social obligations, etc. I would allow myself to eat. And boy would I eat. I'd eat three hamburgers at the university cafeteria, mashed potatoes, five of my favorite melted-cheese sandwiches, and finish it off with soft-serve ice-cream. I'd feel good, comforted, satiated (well, overly so) and then about thirty minutes later my stomach would be acting up, but I didn't care, I had all night to hang out in the bathroom. I just had to avoid thinking about the torment of the following day.

At any rate, I broke off this twisted relationship with food. I began to slowly eat mini-meals, and with each meal, I used digestive enzymes. This turned my view of food right around. I now had the ability to digest what I needed to eat. The next step was fixing my diet. My terrible one meal at the end of the day was filling, but completely unhealthy for me. Below are the foods I began eating, and what a difference they've made! By the way, I rarely eat out (perhaps once a month or less) and try to make all of the meals myself. It's cheaper this way AND I have better control of what goes inside my belly.

For grains:

Try brown rice, spelt, quinoa, kamut, amaranth, barley
Look up ways to incorporate these wonderful, easily digested grains into your diet.

Beans and Legumes:

Try black beans, red lentils, green lentils, mung beans, pinto beans, and chickpeas. Chickpeas are excellent, as I make falafel out of them, make homemade hummus out of them. I never miss meat as long as I have chickpeas in my diet.

Seeds:

Try raw pumpkin seeds, flax seeds (I put this on everything, even in homemade pizza and my skin looks clear, and the skin on my body has become softer), sesame seeds
All vegetables and fruits (organic if possible)
Organic plain yogurt twice a day

Tons of spices to each meal:

With anything sweet, such as yogurt or porridge, try cinnamon, cloves and nutmeg. Cayenne on basically anything. Ginger, garlic and grated onion in soups. Cumin and turmeric in eggs

One of my favorite things to make:

Coconut milk, coconut flakes, garam masala (an Indian curry powder spice of coriander, cumin, fenugreek, turmeric, etc.) and cook it with zucchini, broccoli, chopped garlic and onions, and spoon it over brown jasmine rice with a scoop of plain yogurt and chopped cilantro.

Also, whenever I want to make homemade pizza, I make the crust out of olive oil and brown rice flour (plus other ingredients of course), and lay on it organic tomato sauce, garlic, red onions, fresh spinach and tons of oregano. It's easily digestible and delicious!