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The only way of knowing if you have a food intolerance problem is to eliminate suspect
foods from your diet and then test them. If you need to do this for more than one
food or for any food chemical you will inevitably get confused.
Trying to remember what you ate, when you ate it, and how you felt is never easy. Just try remembering what you ate a week ago and how you felt - it's virtually impossible. Information on how to test foods can be found in the section on Food Intolerance and in the book Change Your Diet and Change Your Life What is a food diary?A food diary is a detailed record, kept by you, of the food you have eaten and tested and your health during that time.If you are serious about your food testing you will need to keep a detailed record of everything that you eat and the best way of doing this is through a food diary. A food diary is your record and your evidence of the changes that take place. Make using one an absolute priority. Where do I get one?You can make your own or receive a 'Print for Yourself' Diary free with any book purchased (on CD) from this site.If you want to make your own, purchase a notebook and mark out the pages so that you can write down the foods (all the ingredients) you eat on one side and how you feel on the other. Allocate a page to each day and away you go. Remember your diary becomes your evidence - keep it neat and tidy so that if you need to show it to a doctor he can read it. 
The Print for Yourself Diary is based on the A4 Spiral Bound Diary that I used to produce
for myself and, at one time, sold via this site. A single page is allocated for each day over 6 weeks. Additional pages are included
to help you deal with complex foods - i.e. those containing more than one food. Also included
are pages to help you keep track of which foods are safe and which are not.
This diary was produced as a result of my own experience with notebooks that soon got into a mess. I wanted something I could check through quickly and find the information I was after. Getting organised was the only way - hence the food diary. The pages in the Print For Yourself Diary can be printed as often as needed, and in whatever quantity you need, and can be either spiral bound for you by a local copy shop or kept neatly in a file or a ring binder. You could also have pages for each family member. An added bonus of this diary is that it will make your food intolerance testing look more professional and also any doctor will find it easier to follow than a homemade notebook. Having said that please do not be put of from making your own. It is far more important that you use one rather than worrying about how it looks. I am occasionally asked for a diary that can be completed on a computer. I have not developed one of these as, although it may work for some people, I remain convinced that the best place to keep a food diary is in your kitchen - as you prepare your meals you can note immediately all the ingredients used. If the pages become stained or untidy you can simply print some fresh pages and transfer the information over or at the end of each day you could transfer the information onto your computer - any word processing format should be quite adequate. The Print For Yourself Diary contains all the key pages that you need to create your own diary. The Diary is included as a free bonus on all the Food Can Make You Ill CDs. |