Exactly one year ago, I was wearing a hospital gown and about to undergo general anaesthetic. Why? How can I put this delicately? Let’s just say some skin in a certain area kept splitting and the doctors thought poking around and giving me a jab of Botox would sort things out. And it did. For 10 weeks. Then the splitting started again.
Fast forward a few months and you may remember me cooing about a gut reset I did.
I crowed over the good things that came of it, little realising there was one more problem it would solve. Yep, the splitting ceased, and all because I’d increased the amount of fibre in my diet. (If you’re still in the dark, just think about digestive transit and how when something soft is released, it’s far less likely to cause tearing.) TMI? I do apologise. But I feel it’s necessary as a precursor to my feelings about fibre. It only recently occurred to me my problems began after I was diagnosed with coeliac disease.
Before you start panicking, coeliac disease itself wasn’t to blame. It was my gluten-free diet instead. Cutting out wheat, barley and rye meant I was no longer eating cereals like Weetabix and Shredded Wheat or chomping on muesli and wholegrain sandwiches, and I hadn’t replaced them with fibrous alternatives.