Hi,

About 3 years ago, I began getting severe pain when I would eat.  The only thing that would help, a very little, was to take some raw organic apple cider vinegar in water.  Mostly, though, I would just writhe in pain.  I already had been contending with migraines, fatigue, and very stiff, painful muscles in my shoulders and neck.  Neither exercise nor massage made any lasting difference to my muscle pain, though gyrotonic was the most helpful.

What I finally worked out when I started getting the severe pain was that I could not digest starches.  I had already been avoiding wheat because of my migraines, but I was still eating things like rice and sweet potatoes.  I had to give up all starches, as well as sweeteners, including natural ones.  I had already stopped most processed foods, not only because of the starch, but also because of the chemicals.  I define processed as including anything not a whole food, so low fat cheese would be processed, for example.

Now, almost three years later, I can again include small amounts of sweet foods in my diet.  I can eat starchy foods that I've sprouted, such as sprouted wheat grains and sprouted chickpeas.  I almost never have a migraine, my shoulders and neck are loose.  I don't get any pain after eating.  Best of all, I have my energy and strength back.

The reason I'm mentioning all of this is that some of your symptoms are so similar to mine that you might want to try going a few weeks without starchy or sweet foods to see if it makes a difference.  What you would have to eat instead is meat/fish and veg.  Ideally the meat would be from grass fed animals and the fish would not be conventially farmed.  You would probably need to eat your veg cooked, either stir-fried in butter/olive oil or steamed with butter,olive oil, or flax seed oil on top.  It took me about two years before I could begin putting raw vegetables back into my diet.  The one exception might be if you have a vitamix and can pulverise your raw vegetables into a soup.  Even then it would still be best to add a little fat in order to absorb the fat soluble vitamins - flax seed oil, avocado, olive, or butter.

What you would have to avoid is:

processed food

refined grains

whole grains

potatoes, sweet potatoes, corn, jerusalem artichokes, possibly parsnips (though I didn't)

beans, peas

fruit

vegetable juices and fruit juices

any sweeteners, including sugar, honey, black strap molasses, maple syrup, agave etc.

artificial sweeteners

refined vegetable oils, any oils other than high quality cold pressed olive or flax seed oil - a high quality coconut oil might be okay for you, though it doesn't work for me

refined salt - celtic sea salt is okay

probably nuts, though you could try soaking them for at least 7 hours in water and sea salt, then drying them in the oven at 50 degrees

milk products, unless you want to make your own yoghurt/kefir, or unpasteurised milk might be okay

You might also find that your body is so sensitive right now, particularly with your ulcers, that you need to avoid other foods as well for a time.  I also ended up avoiding adding too many spices to my food, though herbs seemed to be okay.  Also, lamb worked out to be the best meat for me.  For the longest time I felt sicker if I didn't eat lamb once a day.  I believe that this was at least partly due to being iron deficient.  Also, I stopped all supplements for a while as I wasn't digesting them anyway and many contain starches.  If I did take any, I searched for liquid versions.   Suprisingly, also, butter, especially raw butter, was far better for me than olive oil.  It's individual though.  My husband does better on olive oil than butter.  I do better with red meat, whereas he seems to need more fish.

To become healthy again today, I found the Specific Carbohydrate Diet helpful, but it only got me part of the way.  Recently I've noticed that the way of eating that works best for me seems to be closer to the diet found in Nourishing Traditions by Sally Fallon, The Weston A Price Foundation, and the Price-Pottenger Foundation, though they still eat too many starches/ sugars for me.   I am experimenting with lacto-fermentation now and have also found kefir to be even more beneficial for me than yoghurt or taking probiotics.  Another book that I found helpful in understanding how the whole acid/alkaline debate applied to me was The Nutrition Solution by Harold Kristal.

In regard to the weight loss, cutting things out of your diet that you can't digest right now might help with that.  It might be, though, that you have to carry more weight than you'd like to until your body can heal itself.  It might take a while to get back on track.  Your doctor might be right that it does have to do with hormones, but your hormones fluctuating may be a symptom rather than the root cause of your weight or other problems.  I've come to believe that healthy fats are necessary for healthy, balanced hormones.

This is the first posting I've ever been motivated to make on any website ever, in the hopes that it might help you or someone else.

Thank you,

Rhonda