The following is an email correspondence between one of our 30-Day Nutrition Challenge participants, Erika, and Doug DiPasquale, That's Fit.ca's Healthy Foodie. Unlike our other two participants, Erika has been struggling with the challenge and not feeling well. Her story is important so that others can learn of possible reactions to eliminating many of their usual foods from their diets (gluten, sugar, dairy, caffeine, alcohol, processed foods).

If you missed the beginning of the 30-Day Nutrition Challenge and want to get caught up, or you want to give the challenge a try, check out the following posts to bring you up to speed.

The 30-Day Nutrition Challenge

What exactly you can and can't eat.

How to wean yourself off coffee and start eliminating the other items.

Recipes and resources to get you through the next 30 days.

Erika: Hi Doug! Sorry it took me awhile to get back to you. I've been crazy, busy with work and battling a mean bout of insomnia so my brain, unlike most of the food I've been eating, is fried.

I've had a couple of lapses on the challenge - mostly due to an emotional need as opposed to an actual dietary need.

This has actually lead to a few insights. Firstly, when finishing this 30-Day Nutrition Challenge I will not be going hog wild into "regular" eating habits. A cafe au lait and an almond croissant (my cheat food) were so, so tasty at the time, but by 9:30 that night I was feeling absolutely wrecked physically from having eaten those things.

Do you find yourself eating mindlessly or shoving cookies into your mouth every chance you get? According to Judith J. Wurtman, author of The Serotonin Power Diet, it doesn't have to be that way. Here, she offers her opinions and tips on how to eat to turn off your hunger.

Q: What role does serotonin play in how and what we eat?

A: It plays an extremely important role. The most important and overlooked thing is that serotonin will shut off your appetite. When it's working properly, it makes you feel satisfied. You can eat less food than you would like to eat, and you can decrease your portion sizes if you need to lose weight, but triggering serotonin will make you feel full. My co-author, Nina T. Frusztajer, and I use this example all the time: You go to a restaurant for dinner, and you're very hungry, and while you're waiting for dinner to be served, you munch on some bread and a little salad. Twenty minutes go by before your dinner arrives and when it finally does you say, "Gee, I'm not hungry anymore." It's not from the roll or the bit of lettuce, it's because once you digested those carbohydrates your brain makes new serotonin and sends a message that you're not that hungry. It's a natural appetite suppressant.

Dear Healthy Foodie,

Can you explain something to me about cravings? I've read some things that say that cravings are your body's way of asking for nutrients it needs, but I often get cravings for stuff that I know isn't good for me. Is my body really telling me it needs fries and gravy?

Sharon


Hi Sharon,

I doubt your body is telling you it "needs" fries and gravy. I'm not sure where you're getting your snacks from, but I'd be willing to bet your fries are cooked in hydrogenated oil, the salt on them is refined table salt and the gravy is probably a chemical concoction with MSG featured prominently on the ingredient list. Not exactly everything the body needs to thrive.