HAS ANYONE HAD ANY SUCCESS WITH RAW FOOD DIETS OR OTHER ALTERNATIVE TREATMENTS?

I met a woman at our local CFA group who had acheived a 7 year remission of Crohn's disease by strictly following a macrobiotic diet.  After 7 years the diet failed to keep her in remission so she was back to local meetings looking for other options.

As for me, I tried many alternative approaches to treat my UC, see my signature line, but did not find personal success in any of them.

Sue

Mamaluke, you may want to not use the all caps for your subjects. In internet etiquette this is considered screaming, and many people will not even read a thread that has all caps in the title or the thread. Just FYI.

I tried many different diets and supplements with no effect on my symptoms. I was fortunate enough to be helped by Remicade, I'm sorry this is not the case for your son.

Be aware that the only cure for ulcerative colitis is total colectomy (removal of the colon.) The medications do not cure, nor do they "mask" the symptoms. What they do when they work well is to control the inflammation so the symptoms go away. Also, please be wary of anyone who claims to have a "cure." These are false claims which prey on your hopes to separate you from your money. While some people find that specific diets help them, they are not cured, merely in remission.

I hope your son finds something to help him soon.

I'm sorry to hear your son is so sick and that the meds aren't helping him. I haven't tried any specific diets myself, but conventional doctors often recommend a low-fiber, easy-to-digest diet while flaring, such as the BRAT diet (bananas, rice, applesauce, toast). I would personally be scared to try the all raw food diet while flaring, b/c it seems like all that roughage would hurt going through an ulcerated gut, but if he wants to try it, that's his choice. I'm not trying to discourage you from it.

There is a book called What to Eat with IBD and another called The New Eating Right for a Bad Gut. The first is written by a nutritionist who has Crohn's Disease herself, and was originally diagnosed with UC. They are easy to follow and might give him some ideas of "safe" foods to eat that he could try. This disease affects us all differently though and some people can eat whatever they want while others are helped by avoiding certain foods.

Has your son tried rectal meds at all? Rowasa combined with Asacol really helped me. I hope he can find some relief soon.

I also looked at David Klein's diet, but I was so sick at the time, I knew I couldn't handle the roughage of raw food, which can be very irritating to an inflamed gut, and I wasn't willing to juice everything.

Kudos to you for looking for alternative/supportive therapies for your son. I'd highly recommend a couple of books for both you and him to explore: Optimal Digestion and Listen to Your Gut. These are both packed with information on ways to treat UC beyond the usual meds. Optimal Digestion also offers alot of eye-opening information on how a healthy digestive system is supposed to work and the ways we contribute to things going south - diet, antibiotic use, stress, etc.

I have been mostly in remission for several years due to a combination of ASA maintenance drug, clearing the system of bad gut flora, reestablishing good gut flora, dietary changes and lifestyle modifications. It's not easy and it's not quick, in my experience, it's what you have to do to get your life back.

 

I was successful in putting myself into remission using various supplements when mesalamine was not working for me and I did not want to use steriods. However, the supplements did not help me maintain remission although I continued to use them. That being said, I was also pregnant at the time and then breastfeeding so those hormonal changes were also at work on my gut. I did seek the help of a natureopathic doc to help me with the supplements. The ones I used are as follows: probiotics(culturelle and another I cant remember the name of....but not primal defense or VSL3), slippery elm and marshmellow root tea - I would make a big pot in the morning and drink it all day, boswellia, digestive enzyms, folic acid, fish oil, l-glutamine and a herbal mix called Roberts Formula (it is a mix of slippery elm, marchmallow root, echinsea, cransbill and goldenseal).

I will second Judy when she writes to be careful of magical cures. UC is a cronic disease and while there are some people who experience miraculous remissions, most of us struggle along. For me supplements are used in conjunction with traditional meds but they are not the magic bullet I hoped they would be when I first looked at alternatives. jo

Keep in mind them meds sometimes don't work for everyone and can actually make things worse. Of course doctors never seem to believe that. I just recently switched to the cheaper Sulfasalazine drug on a low dosage and my symptoms improved overnight, the Colazal actually was making me worse as I think Asacol did as well.