Review: It Starts with Food

Title: It Starts with Food

Authors: Dallas & Melissa Hartwig

Date Completed: 16 July 2016

Although I strive to be healthy and maintain my body well, I'm not a workout or dieting fanatic. I do have to pay attention to all the additives snuck into food these days (MSG, yeast extract, artificial and "natural" flavors, etc.) and try to keep my sugar consumption down so as to not re-enter pre-diabetic territory again. But my goal is mainly to eat "real food" and keep my body in motion.

Back in the spring, I watched a Facebook friend's Whole30 journey. She's in her mid-30s, ate somewhat healthy, exercised regularly, and was diagnosed with some pretty serious inflammation involving her heart. Her doctor didn't prescribe medication right away though, but instead told her to give Whole30 a try and come back for testing in a month. It worked---just by changing her already thought to be decent diet made a big difference. I was intrigued and just filed away that knowledge.

Fast forward to June. I had been doing pretty good until I accidentally consumed a big dose of MSG on Father's Day. :-( I'll spare you the gory details; it was not pretty. The problem is I haven't recovered despite taking probiotics to help out my gut and eating a MSG-free diet for weeks. But it's not just my intestines that have been rebelling....my joints have been hurting more, I've had more headaches/migraines, I've been tired despite getting my usual hours of sleep, sores on my tongue/mouth, increased seasonal allergy symptoms, random bouts of nausea & diarrhea, painful menstrual cramps, bloating, etc. It all adds up to a general sense of "unwellness." Most of these symptoms can be explained by chronic system wide inflammation and a bell went off. Isn't that what Whole30 combats?

So I ordered the It Starts with Food and Whole 30 books. It starts with Food is all the science-y details behind why Whole 30 is designed the way that it is. You know me, Miss Researcher wants to know the details before committing. Most of what they wrote matched several other things I had read and heard from trusted sources, and really how much harm can a diet of meat and loads of veggies and fruits do in a month? So I'll be conducting my own experiment on myself. If this works, I'm sure you'll be hearing me talk about it aplenty.