Ten months with Crohn’s on a meat-only diet

Eight months ago I wrote this article about my road to a Crohn’s disease diagnosis and how I’m trying to cope with it.

April 6, 2023, marked exactly ten months since I last had fruit or vegetables. I remember that before starting the prep for my colonoscopy, I went to McDonald’s with my girlfriend (even though I used to go there only for coffee) and shared a piece of strawberry cheesecake with her.

I told myself that if they found colon cancer, it might be the last cake I’d put in my mouth for a long time.

In the end, the possible cancer turned out to be “just” Crohn’s disease, and now, ten months later, I figured it was time to show off how I’m doing.

I’m better!

Yes, things turned around at Christmas. I started with short walks around the house to build up the confidence to venture away from the toilet bowl. Then I dared a longer trip to the store, and little by little I got back into my normal work routine.

When I look back today and remember that terrified 77 kg (170 lb) skeleton who was scared to even drive his daughter to school in case he sh… himself on the way, I feel like I’ve won a huge victory.

Keep your head busy

I have to agree with everyone who says Crohn’s is largely in your head. As long as you’re afraid that anytime, anywhere, you could end up urgently looking for a bathroom (or, pardon my French, that you’re simply going to shit yourself), it’s guaranteed to happen.

But once you manage to keep your head busy with something other than your gut, you’ll find that there’s actually nothing wrong with you (at least for as long as you’ve managed to stop thinking about yourself).

I have to agree with everyone who says Crohn’s is largely in your head.

Life without fiber

I have a feeling that fiber is one of the causes of all digestive problems, and that in some cases it may even lead to autoimmune diseases of the digestive system.

It sounds almost unbelievable that fiber, which is recommended everywhere, all the time, for treating hemorrhoids and constipation, could be the very thing causing hemorrhoids and constipation.

Above all, though, there isn’t a single meaningful study (let alone a clinical trial) that confirms fiber is beneficial and helps with constipation.

There is, however, one study which showed that the less fiber people with constipation ate, the better their bowel movements were. Those who cut fiber out of their diet completely had no symptoms of any kind.

As the chart shows, the people who removed fiber from their diet completely (the zero-fiber diet) stopped suffering from bloating, pain, constipation and bleeding. Those who added even more fiber (the high-fiber diet), on the other hand, had worse bloating, bleeding and pain.

Dr. Mason explains it all brilliantly in his video:

Adding fat

Once I got better mentally, physical improvement followed. I still had diarrhea from time to time, but I started going to the bathroom regularly again, always in the morning, half an hour after waking up. That has stuck, and my stools have even become formed.

For a long time, though, I had a problem with water. Whenever I drank anything sooner than a few hours after a meal, I had diarrhea within half an hour. So I tried to limit water and not drink until 4 hours after eating.

About a month ago I worked up the courage to start experimenting with dairy. First I had a thin slice of butter with my meat; after a while I added a teaspoon of sour cream to my eggs.

My body gradually got used to it, and now I eat about half a block of butter a day (some 100–120 grams, or about 4 oz) and 200 grams (7 oz) of sour cream (36% fat).

As for meat, I tried mixing ground beef and steaks. In the end I settled on ground beef from Tesco, the supermarket chain—and not only because steaks get pretty expensive.

I eat 750 grams (about 1.65 lb) of ground beef a day, cooked in a pan three times a day. In the morning I have it with two scrambled eggs and 100 grams of sour cream. At lunch I follow it with 3 ladles of broth made from marrow bones. At dinner it’s broth again, with another 100 grams of sour cream at the end for dessert.

Once I stopped being afraid of fat, two things happened:

• I managed to gain weight, from 80 to 85 kg (176 to 187 lb)
• the diarrhea after drinking water stopped

My theory is that I was getting too much protein, which my body couldn’t handle well without enough fat.

Of course I’m glad I don’t have a problem with lactose; I have no bloating and no pain. Now and then I get cramps, now and then the urge to go, but overall I’m doing a hair better again than in December.