I am so intimidated!

[transformed]

Seriously. I have toyed with the idea of doing the elimination diet for so long....ever since my ds was little (3 years) and I never have yet because it is so intimidating!

I already fight with my 2 yr old dd way too much as it is and I am a little scared.

How intimidating was this food sensitivity thing to you, in the beginning?

Did you just "jump in?" Or were you like me and avoided it for as long as possible.

I should be willing and able to do whatever is nessicary for my lo's health but I think I need to actually get back on my B vitamins before I am even going to have the energy for this.

[Chinese Pistache]

Yes, it can be very intimidating

The thing that helped me was to come up with a meal plan, get some safe groceries and have lots of safe snacks on hand. Then, jump in Check back here for daily support and commiseration, too

[matey]

It is very scary the first time. The first time I was so overwhelmed. The second one is just like, "Oh, I am doing this again, where's the squash!"

I recommend making a weekly meal plan and sticking to it, so you know exactly what you are preparing for each meal all week. Even if you get to the point that you are so sick of what you are eating that you would rather not eat, make up your dish and shovel it in. The first time I just tried to wing it, and I would just not eat or I would scarf on safe potato chips, because I didn't want to think about or deal with it. This time, I made a meal plan, and it has really helped.

[lil_miss_understood]

It might sound crazy but the first thing I did was scour my pantry and fridge for all the stuff we *couldn't* eat anymore. Anything (non-perishable) that we couldn't eat got piled in the middle of the kitchen floor. Anything perishable that we couldn't eat got put on a specified shelf. Then I went shopping for things which could replace the items we couldn't have anymore. Then I searched for recipes for the things I couldn't find store-bought (or which I considered prohibitively expensive). After finding a few, I was convinced that this was doable, gathered my courage and gave away all our "non-edible" food.
I felt so incredibly overwhelmed, but I guess I handled it pretty well (for the most part) because a couple of months later, I was freaking out about what to make for supper (I'd gotten behind on meal-planning) and my brother called. When he found out what I was stressing about he said "oh, I didn't realize it was that big of a deal."

[changingseasons]

VERY intimidating. And then VERY frustrating when it didn't work. (I finally, after 7 months, *think* I've figured out all DD's triggers.)

I think another important thing is to keep food around (and prepared) that you can snack on. Because when you're into the ED and starving, the last thing you want to worry about is cooking a bunch of food.