What Is The GAPS Diet?
Time and time again you’ll hear us recommending the GAPS Diet while using our Candida Cleanser. This is simply because there’s much more to getting over a systemic candida infection than just popping back a magic pill.
This is not to disregard the power of the Candida Cleanser, let me tell you – it works! Regardless if you change your diet, it helps your body quickly kill the invasive fungus like nothing else I’ve seen. However, after the Candida is gone from your body, there is a LOT of cleaning up to do.
STEP 1: Start The CCWS Candida Cleanser
Head over to our shop and grab your CCWS Candida Cleanser kit.
STEP 2: Heal The Damage That Occurred While Candida Was Living Inside You
To fully heal from a candida overgrowth you must heal and seal your leaky gut, which you inevitably have because Candida causes leaky gut. Candida grows hyphae, or roots, that penetrate your gut lining to make it leaky.
You also have to restore microbial balance to your gut flora, which you also inevitably have an imbalance of because the lack of beneficial bacteria in your gut is one of the reasons you have a Candida fungal infection in the first place. (Sorry to be the bearer of bad news, but I promise it’s going to get better.)
Your body has an innate ability to heal itself when given the opportunity.
Dr. Natasha Campbell Mc-Bride developed the GAPS Diet (based on the Specific Carbohydrate Diet) as a natural treatment to heal leaky gut and gut dysbiosis and treat neurological conditions and digestive problems that manifest in the body due to chronic inflammation and toxicity in the intestines.
The GAPS Diet acts as a strict elimination diet designed to foster digestive healing naturally. The protocol is divided into 3 stages without an exact time line.
The 3 stages include:
1. The GAPS Introduction Diet, which itself is divided into 6 stages.
2. The Full GAPS Diet
3. Coming off the GAPS Diet.
The diet focuses to:
- Quickly heal leaky gut by reinforcing the gut lining.
- Remedy gut dysbiosis by repopulating the digestive system with beneficial bacteria while evicting pathogenic strains of bacteria.
- Introduce gut nourishing foods that are easy to digest.
- Balance out mineral and nutritional deficiencies.
- Remove aggravating and inflammatory foods that trigger autoimmune reactions and hinder the healing process.
- Reduce inflammation and toxicity in the body.
Dr.Natasha Campbell strongly advocates listening to your body and using the process of elimination to quickly learn which foods work as your medicine and which ones are actually hindering your healing process because everyone is different. One man’s food can be another man’s poison.
The Benefits of the GAPS Diet
The GAPS Diet focuses to heal leaky gut, and since your gut is the foundation of your health, the benefits are far reaching. Many people start feeling the effects within the first 3-7 days.
- Find relief from digestive issues like: bloating, constipation, diarrhea, abdominal pain, indigestion, acid reflux, IBS
- The reversal or reduction of food intolerance and sensitivities
- Boosted immune system and strengthened detox pathways
- Improvement in mood, anxiety, depression, and cognitive function
- Losing stubborn belly fat and maintaining optimal healthy weight
- Improved energy levels that last throughout the day
- Balancing out hormones and reversing insulin and leptin resistance
Foods To Eat On The GAPS Diet
As you progress through the 6 Stages of the Introduction Diet and move into the Full GAPS diet you’ll be sticking to simple and easy to digest foods that work to quickly repair leaky gut.
- Meat stock and bone broth
- Organic animal proteins: chicken, beef, eggs, wild game
Wild caught fish - Healthy fats and oils: ghee, lard, pastured butter, olive oil, coconut oil, avocado
- Nuts and seeds and nut butters (preferable soaked and or sprouted)
- Well cooked non-starchy vegetables
- Certain GAPS approved fruits
- Homemade fermented foods: sauerkraut, yoghurt, kefir , sour cream, beet kvass
The GAPS Introduction Diet
The Intro Diet is a progressive processes divided into 6 stages. Stage 1 is the most restricted and requires the most patience and persistence as you remove almost all fibrous foods while sticking to simple and easy to digest foods. The staple of the early stages of the GAPS Intro Diet is meat stock, bone broth, vegetable soups, and animal fats.
Dr. Campbell-McBride explains, “The more fresh animal fats your patient includes the quicker he or she will recover.”
You stick to specific meal plans as you progress from stage 1 through 6, moving at your own pace. Each stage slowly introduces a new food item at a time such as raw egg yolks or ghee, and teaches you how to properly introduce fermented foods.
Dr. Campbell-McBride recommends that you stay on each stage of the Introduction Diet for 3-5 days, only moving onto the next stage as your body allows.
What this means is that with each new food you introduce you wait and listen to how your body responds. Negative symptoms indicate that you are not ready to move on and need to stay in your current stage for a while longer. Some people move through stages faster than others, it all depends on the state of your gut.
Symptoms indicating that you are not ready to move onto the next stage include:
• Diarrhea or constipation
• Bloating
• Excessive gas
• Abdominal pain
• Rash
• Migraines
• Mood swings
I highly recommended you use a food journal to keep track of what you eat, how you feel after (both physically and emotionally), and the quality of your stools. I do this with all my clients because writing everything down will help you better identify which foods are causing you problems and need to be avoided while you work on restoring your digestive system.
The Full GAPS Diet
Once everything from Stage 1 through 6 is well tolerated and healthy digestion persists you move onto the Full GAPS Diet by introducing one new food at a time from the GAPS Approved Food List which you can download here.
As you progress from the Intro Stages to the Full GAPS diet you accumulate a large list of foods that you know are nourishing your body. This is your very own, custom designed for you by you, nutritional plan to recovery. Sticking to it will get on you the fast track to recovery.
Where To Start?
It is recommended to start with the GAPS Intro Diet, however, you can first start with the GAPS Full Diet if you need more flexibility and time getting used to the dietary changes as it is much easier to implement and still encourages the healing of your gut to deliver overall therapeutic benefits.
Dr. Campbell-McBride advises that if you are suffering from constipation that you start with the Full GAPS diet until your bowel movements are regular before moving into the Introduction Diet. This is because Stage One removes all fibre from the diet which is very much needed to make healthy bowel movements for a person who is constipated.
For the full details of how to do this protocol properly I highly recommend you pick up Dr.Natasha’s book titled, “Gut and Psychology Syndrome: Natural Treatment for Autism, ADD/ADHD, Dyslexia, Dyspraxia, Depression, Schizophrenia.” This is one of the best books on solid nutrition you can come by today and a great resource to build your foundation of wellness upon.
Going Beyond ‘Fad Diets’ & Quick Fixes
At first glance the GAPS Diet can sound a bit intense. You may be saying to yourself, “Why would I want to restrict myself like that?” or “I could never do that!”
I’ll be frank with you, at first you may feel restricted, but very quickly you will become empowered because throughout the process you’ll learn to listen to your body and see that you have do have a choice, and you choose to eat foods that make you feel good. This diet helps you to know exactly what those foods are! As you remove Candida from your body, fix the ratio of good bacteria to bad bacteria in your gut, and heal leaky gut, you will no longer be a victim to guilt-ridden cravings instead your mouth will water for nutritious foods that support your thriving health.
Once you get a taste for greatness you won’t want to go back to your old, self-sabotaging, negative eating patterns. You’ll actually crave the foods that are good for you! You’ll have achieved freedom from the conflicting (and dangerous) nutritional advice from mainstream media, governmental dietary guidelines based on bad science, bias fraudulent studies influenced by food industry and pharmaceutical companies for profit. Amongst all this misinformation it can be frustrating trying to figure out what to eat, and today we are more confused than ever!
Remember, there is no “one size fits all” diet.
We all know that this theory doesn’t even apply to pants, so why do we think it applies to something so tantamount to our well-being as our nutritional needs?
The truth of it all is quite simple: no one can tell you what to or what not to eat. Your body will tell you. You just have to learn how to listen.
Of course there are some general obvious guidelines: don’t eat light bulbs or plastic, eat real food. For some of you this may be the beginning of a journey into discovery what “real food” is because there is so much processed crap out there.
The best way to know what works for you is to decide for yourself. And this is precisely one of the greatest gifts an elimination diet such as the GAPS diet has to offer you. This process teaches you to tune in and listen to your body every step of the way so you become empowered for life knowing exactly what food is good for you. This is a valuable skill that will serve your well-being for the rest of your life.
When you decide to cleanse candida with us you’ll instantly have access to our Facebook Support Group so if you decide to try the GAPS Diet for yourself, myself and the team will be there to help guide you through the process.
Head over to our shop, grab your cleanse, and get started today.