Yesterday was day 16 of my Whole30 experience. For some reason, I thought that I would just feel increasingly better or the same during the whole month. Not at all. First I had some upper eyelid inflammation that I remember having with other elimination diets. It only lasted a few days. Now, I experienced a full-blown histamine reaction. I sneezed and my face swelled up a bit.
The whole reaction lasted about 3 hours. It was majorly disappointing. I wanted to attribute it to one particular food I ate and could eliminate, but which one? I had a salad, pulled pork, eggs, and olives. I had been eating these things all along without a problem. So what to eliminate?
How to proceed after a reaction
I wanted to change up everything and see if there was one particular food allergy. I’m honestly struggling with doing that. Eliminating your favorite foods is very difficult. I’ve already eliminated dairy, grains, and sugar. I toyed with the idea of doing the paleo ketogenic diet again without vegetables. That is really hard initially.
Now that the inflammation has subsided, I think I’m just going to keep an eye out for future breakouts during the rest of the 30 days. At the end of the day, you have to eat something. Eliminating everything from your diet may just leave you starving.
I’m hoping this is a one-time thing. I will reassess if I continue to sneeze and break out in rashes.
The next steps
So, since I decided to continue the course and how I have been eating. The next steps will be to decide on the diet to follow after Whole30. I can gradually add foods back into my diet and see if I have a reaction. (Clearly, I don’t know what to do if I do have a reaction since I’ve just decided not to change anything.) Or I can do a stricter diet, like the GAPS or paleo ketogenic diet, and see if that works for me. Both of those will be very hard.
I think my goal should be to do a week of the Paleo Ketogenic diet, which is very similar to the GAPS intro. I know if I can get through a week, I can keep it going longer.
Testing, testing 1,2,3,
It has been a whole month since I tested my TSH and vitamin D levels. I think that I will wait two more months before testing my vitamin D levels again. That will give me a good idea of where my levels are and I can determine if I feel better or not. I’m hoping to get my vitamin D levels closer to 60.
Since my TSH levels were in the normal non-Hashimoto’s range when I tested them the last two times, I may save my money on that test. I don’t seem to have a lot of Hashimoto’s symptoms.
I could test some inflammatory markers to determine if I was inflamed after this reaction, but my symptoms have subsided. It may not show up on the test and I’m not entirely sure what to do if it did. So, I’m not going to bother with any extra blood tests.
Emu oil
One thing that I’m going to try on my scalp will be emu oil. I was reading up on the Weston A. Price Foundation website about emu oil and some doctors were using it topically with great healing results. Apparently, it is full of vitamin D and soaks into the skin well. It would be interesting to see if the vitamin D that soaked into the hair follicles could trigger new growth.
So, I ordered a bottle of emu oil. I should get it in the mail today or tomorrow. I’m super excited to start using it. My biggest challenge with topical applications is remembering to apply it! I’m not someone who has ever used lotions on my skin much at all. In fact, I don’t use any products on my skin unless they are edible because they can absorb into your body. Also, I’m super cheap and it saves money. So, there’s that. 
In conclusion
The [easyazon_link identifier=”0544609719″ locale=”US” tag=”mcurle08-20″ cart=”n”]Whole30 diet[/easyazon_link] doesn’t magically make you feel amazing all the time. You may have a histamine response like I did. My next steps are going to be to simply continue on with the diet that I have been eating without changing much and wait for another reaction. In two weeks when the diet is over, I will start a GAPS intro type of diet for a week.
Testing out new protocols is a matter of trial and error. You may discover something that works wonderfully for you. But you need to be honest when something that sounds so ideal doesn’t pan out for you as well. Whole30 is one protocol that I’m still deciding about. I have started charting my daily symptoms that aren’t that noticeable like constipation, sneezing, and ringing in the ears for a few seconds. I’m hoping that I will see fewer incidences of them on a chart as I progress with the diet.