This post may contain affiliate links which won’t change your price but will share some commission.
Kira and her family have done the GAPS diet to heal food intolerances. They have 6 children, but at the time they started this diet they had only four boys with a fifth on the way.
1. How long have you been on the GAPS diet?
We started the diet 2 years ago, in July 2011.
2. What was going on that made you decide to pursue the diet?
My husband and our oldest three sons had a number of food intolerances that we hoped to heal.
Only the oldest three had symptoms of intolerances. The fifth boy also seems to have a dairy problem and we’re just starting him on the diet. Our fourth has never had any digestive problems or excema, but I’m beginning to wonder if his speech problems (enunciation) might be a dairy problem.
3. Did you start with Full GAPS or Intro first? How long have you been on each?
We began with Intro. We got through Intro in a little over a month for my husband and the older two boys. Our third son took almost three months, because it took us too long to realize that he was reacting to foods we hadn’t known he had a problem with.
4. What kind of progress or healing have you seen?
Our sons are now healed of all there food intolerances. Dairy and soy in the oldest two as well as corn, onions, and tomatoes in the third. My husband is not healed yet, but he’s getting there. He was dairy intolerant and now he can have everything GAPS-legal except cheese.
When our first was a toddler, his cheeks were always red and a bit rough. Then, as his stool should have been becoming fairly solid, they simply weren’t. I read somewhere that these could indicate food allergies and I had him tested by his his doctor. He came up negative for everything on the panel, but I decided to take dairy out of his diet anyway. Within a week or so his cheeks looked better and his stools were becoming solid. And so we became dairy-free. After a few minor flare-ups, we realized that soy was also a problem for him.
My husband also noticed during this time of having no dairy that his own stomach felt better than he could ever remember it having felt. In his 23 years (at that time) he had never realized that dairy was a problem for him.
When our second was born, I quickly discovered that if I ate even a tiny bit of dairy, he would quickly develop excema that could take months to go away. When he got older, eating even a little himself would cause very loose stools in addition to excema.
Our third son was able to tolerate whatever amount of dairy came through my breastmilk. This Wisconsin girl was very thankful for that! But as he got older, we tried small amounts of dairy on him and found the same symptoms his older brothers had. Later on we discovered that corn was also a problem for him, although he could tolerate a little if it was organic. We discovered the issues with onions, celery, and tomatoes during the Intro phase of the diet.
5. What other strategies have you implemented along with GAPS? Why?
We use primarily homeopathic medicines.
6. Are you off the GAPs diet?
Our sons are off the diet now, my husband is not.
The boys who are now off the diet are 8.5, 7, and 5.5. The younger boys are 4 and 20 mo.
Now that they’re off the diet, we do eat starches and grains, including glutenous ones. I do try to soak most of the grains and the bread they eat is homemade sourdough. I think we eat them certainly less than we used to and probably far less than the normal American diet, but they are still a regular part of our diet. They eat soaked oatmeal most mornings. Some days lunch is soup, some days it’s sandwiches. And we’ll have rice, millet, potatoes, etc. a couple nights a week for supper. So far, we haven’t had any problems come back and the boys have all been off the diet for about a year.
7. Are there areas where you have not seen healing so far?
There were times healing seemed to stall and we began to think it simply wasn’t going to work, but in the end is has.
8. What has been the hardest thing about following the GAPS diet?
Making enough broth for everyone!
Homemade bone broth is a key component of this diet and it is recommended to have at least 1 cup with each meal for each person involved. – Jennifer
9. What has been the best thing about following the GAPS diet?
The best thing has been seeing my sons able to eat what they want without having to be afraid of an excema attack, digestive problems and such. We still eat a very natural, whole food diet, but I don’t stress anymore about what they might eat at Sunday School or friend’s birthday parties.
10. Do you have any advice for a person considering going on the GAPS diet?
Read as much as you can ahead of time. Make as much broth as your freezer can hold before you start. And keep a few jars of Bubbies sauerkraut in the back of your fridge because at some point you will get sick or sidetracked and forget to take care of making it.
Leave a Reply