Common Mistakes Made On The Elimination Diet

Starting an elimination diet can be a great way to learn what foods are triggers for your condition, and it can ultimately help you feel better when you know what foods to avoid (I recommend starting an elimination diet that eliminates corn, soy, gluten, dairy, and eggs). However, there are a few common mistakes that people make that can cause an elimination diet to be less successful. I asked my fellow practitioners at the Blum Center for Health for their experience with elimination diets; here’s where we found were the most common mistakes:

A proper elimination diet requires a time commitment of about five weeks, including the reintroduction process. Scheduling this over a vacation, wedding, or a bunch of parties can be very challenging. Sometimes it’s better to wait until you have the time to do it correctly.

Don’t just aim to follow trendy labels like "gluten-free" or "dairy-free." Eating an excessive amount of processed foods, even if they're free of the eliminated foods, may not lead to the results you want. Try to stick with all-natural, whole foods.

Because you are eliminating foods, it’s important to plan and make sure that your body gets the nourishment it needs. An easy way to do that is to add in plenty of vegetables, fruit, and clean sources of protein. By doing this, you'll also feel less restricted.

Nuts, avocados, and maple syrup and honey are common staples that people tend to enjoy a little too much when on the elimination diet. Eating these in excess can cause GI distress, which can interfere with your ability to pinpoint food sensitivities and give your gut the rest it needs. These foods are also either high in calories, fat, or sugar, which can lead to unintended weight gain.

While some people do use elimination diets to lose weight, restricting calories can create unwanted symptoms like fatigue that mask how you ought to feel. You shouldn’t be starving yourself or skipping meals; rely instead on natural reductions from cutting out processed and inflammatory foods.

During the reintroduction phase of the process (when you add back the foods you’ve eliminated), you have to write it down and analyze everything you consume right away. Otherwise, you’ll never be able to remember accurately, you’ll never see the patterns, and the whole experiment becomes a missed opportunity. Here’s a simple chart for keeping track.

Did you know that elimination diets are a great way to pinpoint undiagnosed food allergies?