It's not a Diet - It's an impossible list of ingredients to live by

It's not a diet, because that term implies there are choices.
They need to call it "These are the 20 items you can ingest for 14 days, your Medical INGREDIENT plan".

Diet implies limitations on hundreds of choices.
Eating plan implies variety within your diet choices.
There is little variety when you are given your first list of 20-ish ingredients you will be allowed to have.

It's kind of like suddenly being dropped in a real life episode of "Survivor" or "Lost". Only like a TV show, there is no glamor, there is no million dollar prize or beautiful castmates or even partners who are in this with you. YOU ARE ALONE. IT IS NOT GLAMOROUS. Instead of foraging the natural elements for nutrition to survive, instead your nightmare is wading through multiple grocery stores FULL of stuff you are forced to see but cannot have. WELCOME TO YOUR OWN NIGHTMARE.

I know I'm not doing a good job of telling you all the positives about this diet. But you need to know the truth I lived for the first 14-24 days. This is the reality they DON'T tell you about. Calling it an "elimination diet" sounds like Whole 30 or 24-Day Challenge... which is a lot like living Paleo. All of those are doable, manageable, and you get used to them. THIS PLAN IS NOTHING LIKE THAT. IT IS MUCH, MUCH HARDER.

First you are given that list of red and yellow foods that you may never have again, or you cannot have freely every again. The reds are never again. Those yellows are not for 6 months to a year, "IF" your body will process them again if you attempt to reintroduce them again. Some of those foods are going to be your favorites, your go-to happiness, and you have to say good-bye. Because I took my blood test before the holidays, I had decided to start it in the New Year when I could be successful and not have to be miserable during the holidays and say no to everything gifted to me or offered to me. So they give you this list of items you may not every be able to have again, and then they move to giving you this very small and scarce list of things you will be allowed to have.

Nothing you have read or been told until this point can prepare you for how SMALL this list is. SO here I am, telling you - warning you that you will be shocked and scared and might hyperventilate. Now you know, you can be prepared.

You wanna know what my personalized "list of ingredients*" I could have looked like? Here you go...
(*yours will likely look different)

PROTEINS:
1) Tilapia (ok, but not my fave, would eat it maybe 4 times a year)
2) Cod (never had it, so this would be new)
3) Salmon (yay, love salmon with blackened seasoning... but now I would have to try it with just sea salt)
4) Egg (here is where my IBS comes into play, I have had trouble in the past with egg yolks... so we would keep to egg whites and try the yolk during this initial phase to test it again){UPDATE: cannot have egg yolk - reaction was same as before with IBS}
{My favorites chicken & turkey - would not yet be allowed. My other favorite bacon, is now gone for a long, long time - "if" I can ever have it again long after many other phases are complete}

FRUITS
5) Mango (good, I love mango)
6) Blueberry (ok, I don't seek them out usually but I don't mind them, I've got a renewed joy for them)
7) Grape (I don't seek them out but I don't mind them...found out I really like the black ones!)
8) Olive (yep, considered a fruit and I don't eat them much, but I used them as a flavor enhancer and it helped)
Olive also means I get to use olive oils as a cooking liquid. Infused are OK as long as it's another approved ingredient on this list.
A note about olive oils... I've learned the FDA really doesn't monitor label claims about olive oil. By going to a speciality store I've learned that if it's not that yellow or green color, it's not a pure olive oil, but a blend of some kind. If it's light in color or called light olive oil - there's probably little olive oil in it and more blend of something you can only guess about. This is a healthy fat, so just use the EVOO, I buy organic, cold-pressed.

VEGETABLES
9) Onion (shocker because this one is my mom's MOST reactive allergen, whereas I rejoiced to have all kinds of varieties to give flavor to my dishes - I don't really eat them as a vegetable unless it's with fajitas - mainly added for flavor)
10) Broccoli (oh little trees - you are OK, I don't usually choose you, but I can deal with you)
11) Mushroom (don't really eat them a lot because hubs isn't a fan, but now I'll get to try new varieties so I have more variety to this ingredient list)
*12) Beet (ew, never have liked them my whole life - dietician said I could replace with the next least reactive vegetable on the list: green beans - yay!!)
*13) Lettuce (could not keep it on the list because it has always been a flare up for my IBS - so I replaced this with the next least reactive vegetable: green pepper - yay!!)

NUTS/SEEDS/OILS
14) Pecans
15) Almond
So this was a lengthy conversation with the dietician about nuts and consumption in regards to diverticulitis. Conventional wisdom has been that diverticulitis patients must eliminate all nuts, seeds and popcorn from their diets, so that they do not become trapped in the diverticula pockets and create potential cancer and inflammation. A newer 15-year study of diverticulitis patients published a few years ago showed that patients who consumed nuts on a regular basis suffered no set-backs or flare ups. So we have opened the door to nuts so long as I am consuming appropriate levels of water and healthy fibers and oils in my diet. This also means I can enjoy almond or pecan butter, if the only additional ingredients on the label is sea salt or another approved ingredient on my list. Same goes for almond and pecan oils.
Also, this means I could have almond milk and flour.

STARCHES
16) Barley (while I tried this initially, it wasn't awful and at least offered another "something" to eat. I eliminated it next phase believing I should eliminate all wheat-related and wheat-derived products off my list for the duration of this elimination period). Barley is kind of a chewy, steel-cut-oatmeal-type nutty-ish substance lacking flavor, but it is another ingredient you can flavor up where allowed.
17) Amaranth (I could only find a flour or a seed - due to the "seed" nature, decided to nix it for diverticulitis pocket reasons).
18) Tapioca (It's ok, never been my favorite, but given this small list, I was eager to have some kind of "sweetness" flavor).
Tapioca flour became a staple in my gluten-free pita/crust recipe. It's a very fine flour I mix with other flours to make a GF blend flour in recipes for baking and cooking. I found barley flour too - if wheat is not an issue for you, then yay - Whole Foods had it in their bulk aisle.
And I made Tapioca with my almond and coconut milks and it was actually quite good! (I found smaller containers of "coconut milk for cooking" that weren't in cans, but in small shelf-stable milk kind of containers - made using it easier - comes out like a paste and not liquid, FYI).

FLAVOR ENHANCERS
18) Cane Sugar (ok, I asked for this one as there was NO kind of sweetener on my list at all allowed yet - she caved to agree to unprocessed organic cane sugars)
19) Cinnamon (I don't usually use it a lot, but would become happy I had it in the first days)
20) Coconut (never really liked coconut that much, but was glad to have this OIL available to me for lots of reasons, and I was willing to give coconut another try) Also meant I could use coconut sugar, coconut flour and coconut milk! (Keep reading labels, I tried a coconut milk "creamer" that had a few added ingredients that were "untested" and they did NOT agree with me!)
21) Garlic (praise the heavens, I would get SOME kind of flavor for my cooking)
22) Paprika (while paprika doesn't lend to the big flavor I prefer, and I have to limit my ingestion of "smoked" items - I use smoked paprika and it really has provided my food with some wonderful flavor).
I found coconut chips that gave me a crunch I was looking for saying good-bye to potato chips. I found a brand called "Dang" with 3 flavors I would be allowed to consume, based on the ingredients included in their making. they brought a little happiness to my small list.

FREE ITEMS
23) Salt - sea salt preferred
24) White vingar
25) Baking soda

OK. So my first days of making my meals felt more like a primitive picnic. But I was rotating and trying new foods. Some were foods I just never added in that I found new joy for, because this list is so small. There were new things I tried that I don't ever plan to eat again. (Sorry cod, you smell horrible and I just couldn't get you to flavor up nicely despite different approaches.) Tapioca became a treat being allowed to make it with my almond and coconut milks, and a friend shared a recipe with eggs she liked - I used the egg whites with cane sugar and it added a nice fluffy texture to the tapioca. I never used the white vinegar for anything. The baking soda I only used to make my pita bread.

I survived the first week to ten days on fresh salmon from whole foods (definitely a more expensive treat over my frozen, but it really does taste better when I need a pick-me-up and feeling forced to eat things I wouldn't normally eat. I made little picnic bags and ready-to-grab bags of grapes and washed fruits. I found barely processed fruit juice at Costco with no added ingredients which was a nice addition to my water-only liquid intake.

It was hard. I did cry that first week more than once. I felt so small and incapable thinking FOOD had this much emotional control over my life. I remained committed despite wanting to quit, even when I met with my dietician after my first 10 days and she asked me if we needed to stop. I REFUSE to waste any of those hard-earned, tear-soaked days of eating COD and depriving myself of anything I truly loved to eat. NO WAY. I'm not gonna do that AGAIN.

At my second appointment after my first 10 days of the diet, came a small ray of hope. Another very small list of items was discussed for me to try to add back in to my diet. ONE new food or ingredient every TWO days. It would be slow - but it meant NEW flavors, and the longer I go, the more food I get to try and add back in if my body agrees. Closer to family meals again... not too soon, but not as far away as I imagined during that first week of hell. It was just hell week.

Once I pushed past my emotional hang ups, my disappointment of feeling like I would never have food with real flavors and seasonings again, I remained focused on committing to my health... I was able to pull up my bootstraps and focus on my goals. I know you can do the same. Just get through your first 10-14 days and your ray of hope will come too. You can do this. WE can do this.

Kodi