Last night, I felt positively awful. I had a depression episode, and to top it off my binge eating tendencies came back. This continued in the morning and the afternoon – if anything I felt worse today. I managed to drag myself to the gym, but it was tough.
My strong gut instinct was that it was all of the nuts and seeds I consumed yesterday. Nuts contain an anti-nutrient called phytic acid. This is indigestible, and worse, binds to essential nutrients such as zinc and iron. If you soak nuts and seeds you can remove this phytic acid. In the past I used to eat a cereal consisting of sunflower seeds and pumpkin seeds and had no issues, but I always soaked them overnight. I ate the seeds yesterday without soaking them, and this could have significantly irritated my gut, leading to IBS, leading to depression.
Incidentally, in the past I also developed awful IBS when I started using almond flour. I discovered today that almonds are super high in phytic acid. Again, evidence that it could be a prime culprit for depression.
Today I had brown bags under my eyes – evidence that my body wasn’t getting enough nutrients. Another piece of the puzzle that makes sense.
I resisted the urge to binge on ramen, and decided to go super duper healthy and to attempt to get as many nutrients as I could in my body. I decided to take a half raw half paleo approach today. I’ll save the pros and cons of the raw diet for another post, but it’s clear that eating lots and lots of fresh vegs couldn’t hurt at all.
Lunch: Gazpacho + Over-Roasted Salmon
Gazpacho: Blend chopped tomatos, cucumber, bell pepper, onion, garlic and a bit of apple vinegar. Salt and pepper to taste/
Oven-roasted Salmon: Salmon w/ asparagus, mushrooms and spinach, soy sauce and butter to taste.
Dinner: Thai Salad + Thai Fish Curry
Thai Salad: I got the recipe from the Raw Chef’s cookbook. So far, all of his recipes are pure alchemy, it blows my mind how he comes up with the flavours he does. This one is a great dish as it has *so* many vegetables and herbs in it: courgettes, peppers, cucumbers, basil, mint, spinach, spouts….basically anything green you can bung in there. The dressing is made out of tahini, lime, garlic, ginger, tamari, and agave nectar. As the tahini in my cupboard was dangerously out of date (read: six years old) I made my own from scratch. I know I used sesame seeds but I thought a bit on dressing shouldn’t irritate my gut too much. I also garnished the salad with some roasted butternut squash seeds as I used butternut squash for the curry. I soaked them for an hour before roasting them.
Thai Fish Curry: Standard. Green curry paste, coconut milk, kale, mushrooms, onions, cod, butternut squash.
I had a very, very satisfying meal. We’ll see how I feel tomorrow.
Although…. I have a confession, because I had coconut milk left over I made chia seed pudding out of it. A quick skim on the internet said that if they’re soaked their fine, but after consuming them and reading further it doesn’t seem to be good for people with IBS, so I may have counteracted my dinner by having this dessert. Ah well. I’m hoping the ridiculous amounts of veggies I consumed today will help.
Oh, and don’t mistake ‘cumin’ for ‘cinnamon’ when making dessert. Doesn’t make for a good flavour….
Peace out.
