I’ve known about,
and have written about, the YorkTest for many years. But I’ve never been brave
enough to do the test myself – I just couldn’t bring myself to prick my finger
and squeeze the blood out.
I was happy to do
this for a friend, some time back, though, and the process was gruelling. Her
blood was thick and jammy and it took - I'm not joking - about 20 minutes and a lot of finger massaging to get
it out. Sorry if you’ve now fainted.
I don’t know why,
but even this protracted squeezing of her blood didn’t make me feel at all squeamish. But the
thought of doing the same to myself still brought me out in hives.
Then came another
YorkTest invitation – last week – to have tea at the Lanesborough Hotel and
hear about York’s new research revealing the link between food intolerance and
depression (very high, it turns out... Who knew you could be on
antidepressants, when all you needed was to drop a food or two from your
diet!).
The other
journalists were talking about their food intolerance test results – and I realised
that, still squeamish, I had mentally blocked my invitation to do this.
But, determined
to find out what it was all about, I asked the lovely PR Julia to do the test
for me as I averted my eyes and hoped my blood wouldn’t get too close to the jam
for our scones.
It took Julia
seconds to get the blood she needed, and, this week, I learned the results: I
have intolerances to cow’s milk, yeast, egg white, beetroot, and a few wine
grape varieties.
This was
fascinating news. I already loathe egg white and beetroot, and always have
done. I also hate milk – on its own.
But, while
dropping beetroot and egg white from my diet poses no problem for me, milk is
another matter. I am a cheese-aholic, and also love to start the day with a
bowl of natural yogurt and fruit, and, later, a 50:50 milky coffee.
Yeast could be
even more of a problem – it means no bread, no wine (although I happily note
that champagne is a minimally yeasty wine!), and, according to a kinesiologist
who also told me I was yeast intolerant about 12 years ago (and whose advice I
ignored, because frankly it was too tiresome), nothing that is fermentable –
including fresh fruit and raw vegetables. Mushrooms, being fungii, are
naturally yeasty, and, of course, Marmite is out of the question now.
I had just bought
a nice lot of Greek yogurt when I received the results, and there was a lovely
olive baguette waiting to be eaten too – so I decided to delay my new regime.
After all, I don’t have any symptoms that I know of – though I do want to see
if anything changes when I stop eating these things.
According to Dr
John Mansfield, author of The Six Secrets of Successful Weight Loss, food
intolerances lie behind seven out of 10 weight problems. And York’s medical
director says I may suddenly feel more energetic and have (sorry!) happier
bowels when I avoid my culprit foods.
So today I went
off shopping for dairy and yeast free breakfasts to replace my lovely yogurt.
It’s not that
easy!
What will I put
in my coffee?
I hate soya milk,
and other options such as almond milk tend to contain additives and sugar (and
sugar is another food we avoid when we can’t eat yeast).
And, if I go for
black coffee, I will find it too bitter unless I sweeten it...
I have plumped
for a new cow’s milk that doesn’t contain the milk protein – hopefully the York
nutritionist will say that’s OK. My plan B is something called oat drink (I’ll
let you know what it’s like).
I can put this in
my coffee and use it to make porridge instead of eating yogurt (though I do
recall oats making me bloated in the past...). If I get clever I may even make
some yogurt with it (once I’ve found out how to get the start up culture
without resorting to normal yogurt). And I will sweeten my porridge or home
made yogurt with pure granulated Xylitol.
Instead of toast,
I will try Matzos or rice cakes – with peanut butter, instead of dairy, and
banana (if the nutritionist says it’s not too sugary and fermentable).
Steve is already
muttering that he doesn’t like the idea of me becoming an even fussier eater
(he can’t understand the no beetroot or egg white thing!). But I reckon most of
our evening meals will be OK – as long as he uses my milk for any Bechamel, and
doesn’t try to tempt me with a glass of wine and the cheese board.
I’ll let you know
how I get on!
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