Jacqueline Whitehart - The 28-Day Gut Health Plan - Lose weight and feel better from the inside

THE PROBLEM WITH PROCESSED FOODS

Here’s the thing: processed foods are bad for you. We all know it. But they are immensely hard to avoid. They are the primary cause of the modern obesity epidemic and the root cause of so many food allergies and intolerances. Honestly, I would prefer it if you ate a huge slice of homemade chocolate cake, rather than one ‘healthy’ shop-bought granola bar.

Processing brings preservatives, colourants and flavourings. But it also has no regard for the delicate balance of our gut. The refining and sanitizing of the product, together with hidden sugars and unnatural chemicals, means that any processed or pre-prepared meal is an alien invader on the sensitive gut.

How do we define a processed food?

As a simple rule of thumb:

‘ If it has an ingredients list and that list contains more than three ingredients, then that is a processed food .’

This isn’t as bad as it sounds! Obviously meat, cheese, milk and vegetables are all fine as they don’t have an ingredients list at all. And we are not ruling out food that has been tinned or processed for longer life, either. Tinned tomatoes, for example, are fine. As is smoked salmon. You’ve also got all those blessed timesavers like pre-cooked rice, ready-to-eat lentils or beans, or pasta. You can even have bread – as long as you make it yourself …

But we are getting ahead of ourselves. A lot of these foods need to be banished temporarily while we get on top of the current condition.

TIME FOR A REBOOT?

Think of the 28-Day Gut-Health Plan as a month of bed rest and recuperation for your gut. At the end of the programme, not only will your gut health have improved and your weight reduced, but other seemingly unrelated conditions such as migraines and eczema might also have cleared up.

‘ The 28-Day Programme cuts out some real food … but only temporarily as a way of short-circuiting and rebooting the system .’

The ultimate goal of the plan is for you to be able to eat all the trigger foods in moderation, and the key to that is a life-long avoidance of processing. Yes, that means more cooking. And it means if you want a cake or a cookie, you’ll have to make it yourself. But there are plenty of ways to prepare healthy food quickly. And through the recipes and guidance here you’ll find speedy and simple ways to make real food from scratch in minutes.

DENIAL VS BALANCE

Some digestive issues come from an overindulgence in foods like wheat and dairy over time. You may need to deny yourself these foods during the plan because of many years of overindulgence. But when the plan has finished you should know much more about your trigger foods and how to avoid them. Foods that you thought were a problem might not be a trigger at all. And the majority of people find that their trigger foods can be incorporated on occasion with no ill effects.

Moderation is the key. A really big meal containing lots of your trigger foods or one which is exceptionally fatty or calorific might well trigger a problem.

‘ Your gut is a sensitive soul who can easily take offence. Treat it nicely and it will reward you by behaving sensibly for many years to come

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