Here's the thing. And it will probably sound crazy but its true with me and I think these nutrients effects others with UC as well, atleast as far as UC symptoms go. It seems that there is something screwed up in my body that regulates a few nutrients. So I need to regulate them on my own by making sure I continuously ingest these nutrients, But I need not too much of these nutrients and not too little. There are four nutrients that I need to regulate. Magnesium, calcium, beta carotene and choline. Magnesium is found in nuts and seeds and spinach. beta carotene in spinach, carrots and most vegtables contain some. I get calcium from cheese and milk and I get choline from meats and eggs. Eggs have an especially high amount of choline. You see, what helped me to figure out the nutrients that I need is I have severe depression when these nutrients get out of whack. I have learned to control my depression by continuously ingesting these nutrients in proper amounts. When I keep my depression away with these nutrients it keeps my UC away also. So having these nutrients messed up in my body (unless I regulate them on my own) as I have found that they are is effecting my brain as well as causes uc symptoms and also causes other symptoms with me when they are out of balance such as muscle cramps, weakness low energy etc. So having depression along with UC has helped me to pinpoint what nutrients I need and in what amounts, because I can feel in my brain/mind what nutrients is low and too high. Sounds crazy but its true. I have gotten really good at regulating these nutrients now though so I feel good and energetic most the time and am UC symptom free. Keep in mind ingesting all these nutrients are important for keeping symptoms away, but more is not always better, I need to keep them balanced. Not too much and not too little.
For me the things that will cause UC symptoms to return the quickest is too much choline and too much high calcium foods and too little magnesium and too little beta carotene. For instance I can be in complete remission and if I was to eat a lot of cheese such as on pizza for two days in a row I could start to have mucus and gas on the third day. I ingest milk on my oatmeal everyday and many days have another glass of milk or a little cheese and this helps me feel my best, its just when I ingest high calcium foods in excess it will throw things out of balance and cause problems, so some calcium foods is good daily to keep things balanced but excess is bad. The same thing with choline, I eat chicken a couple times a week and beef a couple times a week and sometimes if I feel im still a little low on choline I will eat an egg for a choline boost and this keeps my choline in check. I usually only eat a couple eggs a week. One egg contains the choline of about two chicken breast. But if I eat 5 eggs one day and a couple the next on the third day I will start to have mucus and gas because my choline gets too high. I have experimented with this many times and everytime my choline gets too high it will start to cause UC symptoms, and if it gets low it will start to cause problems too.
for regulating magnesium I just make sure I eat a fair amount of high magnesium foods every day, usually have 4 or 5 handfuls of sunflower seeds a day and eat oatmeal every morning and eat other nuts and seeds pretty often and spinach sometimes and this keeps my magnesium in check.
For beta carotene I eat spinach and baby carrots and salads. It don't really take me a lot of beta carotene, 4 baby carrots every other day is enough for me usually but if I feel its getting a bit low I will eat some spinach for a boost. I think people trying to get in remission should have a bit more beta carotene than I have but this keeps me feeling good and in remission.
From looking at your diet I can almost guarantee your getting too much choline from you eating the eggs daily. So I would reduce your egg intake to eating two eggs only once or maybe twice a week. I would try eating two eggs once a week to start though. I think your getting too much beta carotene with all the spinach and carrots. I would eliminate the cans of carrots that you are eating and try eating a half of a can of spinach a day or one can every other day. or even experiment with one can every three days to try to find the right balance. And try to eat sunflower seeds or sunbutter nearly every day.
Experiment with trying to find the right balance of nutrients that I mentioned and I think it will put you in remission. If you try this please let us know if it works for you so it may help others.
Also one other thing that I have found that can cause problems with UC is extremely salty foods. For example eating 5 large pickles in one seating with a bunch of salt on top of already salty pickles, I used to do this. I eat fairly salty things all the time with no problems( such as fast food, chips, salsa, etc) because I like salt but extremely salty foods like a bunch of pickles or a bunch of green olives, or drink pickle juice, you get the picture, will cause problems with UC so avoid things with very high sodium till you get in remission.
I also want to add that this is not as complicated as it sounds. The average diet will put choline levels just about right so most probably don't need to pay a lot of attention to choline intake. But for someone who eats eggs every day or a lot of eggs they may want to reduce them to see if the reduced choline helps. And for one who has a vegetarian diet they may want to try boosting their choline intake by eating a few eggs or other foods high in choline such as beans.
The average persons diet are probabably good with calcium intake. But if your ingesting high amounts of cheese and or milk and having a hard time getting in remission from the sunflower seed spinach diet you may want to reduce your high calcium foods a bit and see if that helps.
And of course eat a lot of spinach and sunflower seed butter or sunflower seeds for magnesium, beta carotene and other important nutrients.
Post Edited (Cfromutah) : 4/15/2009 11:12:06 AM (GMT-6)