One of the things I always admire in people with a food intolerance or allergy is their positivism and that they try to make the best of it despite the limitations. I try that too myself, but sometimes it feels good to throw out your frustrations. And that is my goal with today’s blog post, because, even though, the low FODMAP diet has diminished my IBS complaints hugely, it is sometimes very frustrating and annoying. I think that many fellow-fodmappers will recognise this and that’s why today I will share my FODMAP frustrations with you. I am also very curious what your biggest FODMAP frustrations are!

FODMAP frustrations

• You know those moments when you decide to just don’t care for once and eat whatever you like? I did that last week with a burger. It was without bread and low FODMAP except for the sauce. I got the sauce with it separately, but I thought ahh, what will that little bit of sauce matter.. Well, we all know that with FODMAPs it DOES bother.  The result: the rest of the evening and the day after I had a stomach like a 4-month pregnant woman and I felt sick and bloated all day. ARGH
• In a restaurant, I ate 2 small gluten-free pizza’s and an ice cream (together with a lactase pill) and I didn’t get ANY complaints. The next day I decide to test 3 mushrooms together with a plate of low FODMAP pasta. The entire evening my stomach was rumbling and I felt bloated. Sometimes it is so hard to understand why my body accepts unhealthy pizza and ice cream (low FODMAP ones) and doesn’t accept a healthy pasta with yummy vegetables. SO frustrating!
• Tight jeans and PDS (no explanation necessary)
• Making baked goodies that are entirely low FODMAP, but still get stomach problems because there is too much fat and sugar in it. Whyy, I love cakes so much! 
• The discovery that more than one tablespoon of peanut butter gives me stomach pains too.. And I love peanut butter so much too 🙁
• A bloated stomach with unexplainable causes. A glass of fresh mint tea, WHY? This is low FODMAP!
• The difficulty of the FODMAP diet: too much of some low FODMAP products can give problems because the products together are still too high in FODMAPs. AS IF IT ISN’T HARD ENOUGH YET!
• Finding delicious recipes for healthy bakes online and to discover that they contain dates or cashews. ARGHH
• Inulin or apple fibre in gluten-free products!
• The use of sweeteners, like maltitol, in ‘healthy’ products. WHY not use a low FODMAP sweetener! 
• Fructose in protein powders 🙁
• Losing weight, but never feeling like you actually got skinnier, because your belly always feels big and swollen.
• Reading menu’s in restaurants is not fun anymore. In the past, I spend so much time choosing which dishes I liked and which I wanted to try. Looking at the desserts first to pick a dessert before even starting to eat, but since the low FODMAP diet, it is not fun anymore. My choice is usually limited to 1 or 2 things on the menu (if I am lucky). AHHHH.

That is a small collection of my FODMAP frustrations. It feels good to get them out for once! I probably forgot many of them, but by the time I will remember them I will write a second blog post about it. And now I will go back to being positive about the low FODMAP diet 🙂

Do you recognise any of my frustrations? What are your FODMAP frustrations or frustrations with another food intolerance/allergy?