# Question about milk and other dairy products



## Brianmay1975 (Apr 3, 2010)

I'm sorry if this sounds silly, but it's been bothering me for a while.I've noticed that many people with IBS cut off every dairy product they can from their diet and that it's recommended to avoid these products.However, my relationship with dairy products is quite strange. Milk wrecks my gut big style, I get bloated after drinking only a cup and I have a lasting feeling of heaviness in my stomach (fortunately, I don't get diarrhea after only a cup, because my trigger for diarrhea is how much I eat, rather than what I eat). I could assume I could be lactose intolerant, right?But the fact remains that the other dairy products work fine for me, especially cheese and yogurt. And what I think is the strangest thing is that when I have a violent diarrhea episode, I can't anything eat else than a low fat cow's milk cheese and bread. When I had gastroenteritis during a trip to France, I couldn't find this kind of cheese and my body kept rejecting all the other diet foods (boiled vegetables, chicken meat...), so I had to come back home to Romania one day earlier to get on a proper diet. This kind of cheese is also prescribed by doctors in my country to people with GI problems.I find it strange that milk is so bad for me and, instead, the other dairy products are such a blessing to me. Maybe it's not strange, but I can't explain it, because if I were lactose intolerant, I couldn't eat the other dairies. And if I'm not, why is it that milk causes me so much harm?


----------



## Kathleen M. (Nov 16, 1999)

Most people in clinical trials that test positive for lactose intolerance have a threshold of a certain number of grams it takes to set off symptoms.For most people in the clinical trials where they measured how many grams of lactose you can have before you get into trouble is about the amount in a glass or so of milk. Anything with less lactose than that is just fine. So yogurt or soft cheeses (like cottage cheese) have less lactose than milk but still have some.Things like butter or hard aged cheeses have hardly any lactose in them at all.So you sound like the typical person in a clinical trial for lactose intolerance.There is another complication.Conditioned Response.If you eat something you know makes you sick and you know you ate it, you get sick.So many people seem to have a conditioned response to dairy. So when you test all people who can't have dairy some are lactose intolerant and they act like you, whether you give them lactose in a form they know it is in the food or you hide it in the food. Some people react if they know they ate dairy, but if you hide lactose in a non-dairy meal they know doesn't bother them, they do not react.The thing is it DOES NOT MATTER if you do not digest lactose (and it takes so many grams of lactose to make so many grams of gas, so you take one gram of lactose you get whatever gas that makes, and usually it takes several grams of lactose to get above your normal gas levels) or you react to eating dairy from a conditioned response. DO NOT EAT THINGS THAT MAKE YOU SICK. Conversely, if you are great eating something and it is your safe food, eat it even if it bothers other people.It is as simple as that. It doesn't matter WHY you react, but avoid what you react to, and JUST what you react to. Now the good news with a conditioned response is you can "uncondition" it. However this means completely avoiding what you react to for a long time. Every time you eat it and you get sick you reinforce the conditioned response. Eventually that nerve pathway will go away if not reinforced and you can break the conditioning. I didn't eat raisins for about 5 years and finally broke the conditioned response to them (I got car sick the first time I ate raisin bran and the body decided raisins are bad and it had to get rid of them).The other thing with IBS. Some people with IBS are more sensitive to increases in gas volume so that threshold of how much lactose it takes to set it off is, IMO something that can vary. So some people are the standard lactose intolerant person in a clinical trial that only notices the gas after the amount of lactose in about 8 ounces of milk. Some people may be sensitive to smaller amounts, or may eat diets that tend to put them right at the edge of having more gas than they can tolerate.


----------



## SunNsnow (Mar 22, 2010)

Kathleen is correct,certain cheeses and dairy foods haveless lactose because the lactose is removedin the preparation of the food. The problem I see here is that you are eatinglarge amounts of an unhealthy food. Cheese has large amounts of saturated fat and cholesterol.Saturated fat causes heart attacks.Irritable bowel syndrome is one thing.Heart disease is a totally other as 33% of people who have their first heart attack diewithin 72 hours. Another 20% die within a few months.So as serious as irritable bowel is, heart disease isway more serious. I recommend finding other foods as soon as possible.And when you do eat cheese, limit it and find low fator fat free versions of it. Even when it is low fat, stilllimit it.


----------



## BQ (May 22, 2000)

> The problem I see here is that you are eatinglarge amounts of an unhealthy food.


Hmm...You see Sun... I don't see that, as he didn't say _how_ much he eats of it. And you say cheese is an unhealthy food.. but that is only your opinion. ALL cheeses are not bad. Eaten in moderation, they are fine and can be part of a healthy balanced diet.And it may/must be some sort of local cheese that Brian is referring to that has some sort of gut calming properties or else the Dr's there wouldn't prescribe it specifically for those with GI problems.Brian I would just stay away from the dairy that bothers you and enjoy the kind that doesn't seem to bother you.


----------



## Brianmay1975 (Apr 3, 2010)

Thank you all for your kind replies. I understand better the issue and I'm just going to skip milk from my diet (I was avoiding it anyway). I have some recipes for almond milk, they sound quite interesting (I don't think I can find any ready-made almond milk in supermarkets in my country), will give them a try to replace milk.I don't eat too much cheese at once, only a few slices of hard local cheese or a few spoons of the cottage cheese for breakfast and for dinner. I do need to eat cheese (and yogurt), because I need the calcium that I cannot get from milk. And if I don't get enough calcium, I start feeling really bad because of the low levels of calcium (I had health issues related to it in the past). I don't eat much of anything actually, since I get diarrhea or bloating whenever I eat too much...There are indeed some local hard cheese types that cannot be found in other countries. Some of them are pretty low fat. Some are not, it depends on the type. However, they are much easier to digest than cheese from Western Europe (e.g. Cheddar, Mozzarella, Camembert, Gouda - all of which I can only eat when my symptoms are stabilized and in remission for a long time; it takes months to eat them again after an acute episode). So indeed the Romanian cheese is very different. The one the doctors prescribe for GI issues is a very low-fat type, similar to cottage cheese. This one is not necessarily local, as the brand of low fat cottage cheese I enjoy the most is imported from Germany and it's very similar to the Romanian one...


----------



## SunNsnow (Mar 22, 2010)

BQ, That is not my opinion.It is a fact.I have three degrees in nutrition from the topschools in the U.S. and have worked in policy ata national level and have counseled thousands ofpeople on their diet. It is a fact that cheese is the largest source of saturated fatin France, the UK, U.S. and many other countries. Gram forgram, cheese contains more saturated fat than red meat.It is also a fact that saturated fat CAUSES heart disease.No one denies this. The mere fact that a physician prescribes it does not mean it iseither safe or effective. Doctors prescribed thalidomide, haldol,baycol, prempro, premarin, etc. and these pills alone have killedor caused defects in hundreds of thousands of people. He did say how much he eats. He said its the only thing that is okfor his stomach and you see in his reply he eats it twice a dayhabitually. This is not healthy. Again, heart disease KILLS 775,000 people a year. It also causes morbidity (suffering) in hundreds of thousandsmore per year (the ones who have a heart attack and survive.)Cheese, red meat, sugar, tobacco are all causes of these heartattacks. We can not allow our fellow citizens to live without thisimportant knowledge.


----------



## SunNsnow (Mar 22, 2010)

Brian,I understand you feel that dairy consumption is critical tomaintaining proper calcium levels but I can assure you100% this is not true. I can also assure you that as long as youare not eating large amounts of animal protein (meat, fish, chicken,pork, lamb) then your calcium levels are fine.It is a myth invented by Americans that dairy causes strone bones.We invented this myth to sell more of our farmer's milk. Unfortunatelyit was never backed by scientific evidence. When you consume plantfoods, your body reaches normal calcium levels within a few shortweeks. It's called calcium homeostasis. As long as you are not starving,you will get sufficient calcium. Yes, even as low as 300 mg. per daywill suffice.So what causes osteoporosis you ask?Lack of weight bearing exercises such as running,walking, lifting weights, etc. Swimming is NOT a weight bearing exercise. You must do weight bearing exerciseon a regular basis. This is the ONLY technique to build strongbones and prevent osteoporosis. Drinking milk will DO NOTHING.No health problem in this universe requires the consumption of dairyexcept if you are starving somewhere and the only food is dairy.No disease is treated or prevented by the consumption of dairy. And in fact, the opposite is true. As mentioned before, dairy causesheart disease.Also, dairy causes prostate cancer and may cause ovarian cancer.I did not invent this theory - this is coming from the top researchersin the world, including Harvard Nurse's study - the top epidemiologicalstudy in the world. You are consuming cheese and dairy twice a day - I apologize to be thebearer of bad news but this is not healthy. If you are still worried about calcium, take the supplement and find anotherfood that sits well with your stomach.


----------



## aishy264 (Apr 7, 2010)

My consultant put me on the elimination diet.. and made me cut milk , cheese and eggs out my diet for 3 months.. and then introduce each one every other week to see what happends. Now I can't even put milk in my tea .. have a tiny bit of cheese or have an egg without my stomach bloating after 5 mins , getting to the point where i look like im about to have a baby....ITS DEFINATLY CHEESE!!!


----------



## BQ (May 22, 2000)

Well I think cheese in moderation is fine for those that can tolerate it. Sorry for those of you that can't tolerate it or other dairy products.


----------



## Molly47 (May 29, 2010)

I love ice cream & ive noticed that my gut doesn't! I usually have a bowel movement soon after eating it. Sometimes, it doesn't affect me until the next day. But either way, I usually end up with an upset stomach. Is there an ice cream that agrees w/people that suffer from IBS?


----------



## Kathleen M. (Nov 16, 1999)

You just have to play around.See if low fat or non dairy ice-creams made from rice (soy can cause gas).Depends on what bothers you generally.If you do low fat milk fine, then low fat dairy ice creams may be OK. If you can't tolerate any milk, then go for the rice milk ice creams. Or try a sorbet that has no milk in it.


----------



## IBS4ever (Jun 11, 2010)

Hi Brian! I too, am lactose intolerant, though I really had no idea until until I became a vegetarian and quit drinking milk 6 yrs. ago. As I became more aware of what I needed to do to get healthy, I also quit eating white rice, white sugar, white flour and white potatoes. My belly aches vanished almost immediately. I was able to continue with ice cream, cheese, ect. though, with only occasional problems. The normal(for me) gas, bloating and diarr/constipation was so much better, I didn't feel I couldn't handle it. It wasn't until recently(last December) that I started having problems again....bloating, terrible gas cramps from gas I can't get rid of, and months of diarrhea, that I finally had to start giving up the rest of dairy. I kept a food diary and started the elimination diet and one by one had to eliminate ice cream, yogurt and now cheese. I had also switched to soymilk when I stopped reg. milk, and now I find out that soy is not good for your stomach or your thyroid, which I have been taking meds for, for 8yrs. Not one doctor in all that time, even my nutritionist, ever mentioned not drinking soymilk. Anyway, I have found now that I have problems with eating sugar, any kind, even fruit....also breads, pastas because they are high on the glycemic index and are easily converted to sugar in the body. My options seem to be dwindling quickly. But back to you...have you tried the elimination diet? Are you working with a doctor or nutritionist? Perhaps it is more than just lactose intolerance? One final word on that: *humans are the only animal on the planet that drink milk from another species, and continue to do so even after weaning*. I personally believe that the biggest cause of a lot of the health problems people have today is from all the drugs the big milk and meat corporations shoot those animals up with, but thats a whole other can of worms.


----------



## katyd1d (Apr 5, 2010)

I have heard that once a dairy product is cultured (for yogurt or cheese), it becomes easier to digest. I think that the bacteria in the culturing process start eating up the milk sugars that so many people have trouble digesting. This makes sense when you think about how new refrigeration is, and how in many areas of the world, for thousands of years, we had to let milk spoil a bit (into yogurt and cheese products) before we ate it. It's only the last century or so that fresh milk became so commonly available to everyone. A lot of us just don't have the capacity to digest fresh dairy, but cultured dairy is easier.I'm going through something (after many tests, I suspect the doctor will finally say IBS at my next visit) and I'm super sensitive to everything. I can't do cheese at all right now. As far as concern about saturated fats, there's a lot of controversy. French people (who LOVE their cheese) have a much lower heart disease rate than Americans, so you're probably safe. The way I understand it is that you want high hdl and low ldl cholesterol. Saturated fat in diet raises both (so it helps with hdl but not ldl). "Good" oils like olive oil raise hdl and lower ldl. Exercise also lowers ldl. Everything in moderation is good. The only thing you want to stay away from all the time is transfats, since they lower hdl and increase ldl.


----------



## ziggy7 (Oct 24, 2009)

SunNsnow said:


> The problem I see here is that you are eatinglarge amounts of an unhealthy food. Cheese has large amounts of saturated fat and cholesterol.Saturated fat causes heart attacks.I recommend finding other foods as soon as possible.And when you do eat cheese, limit it and find low fator fat free versions of it. Even when it is low fat, stilllimit it.


SunNsnow these words you said are 100% in every way Wrong. however i do not blame you society has been intensely brainwashed with these lies and it's not entirely your falt for falling for them. just remember satan controls all the nations of the world you can't follow after the government health care system and what not.now il explain how things worksaturated animal fats are 100% good for you in everyway they have never caused a heart attack they help your body in many ways don't ever try to avoid them.the whole saturated fats being bad for you was a 100% lie made from thishttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v8WA5wcaHp4as you see in that video thats not much of a test to find out about saturated fats. well its no wonder heart disease kills 775,000 people a year with soo called health professionals like this.now you look at people who eat naturally in nature they all have 0% heart disease not a single one has heart disease why? now look at eskimos who eat there native diet they eat a diet of up to 80% fat! with loads of saturated animal fats yet not a single one has heart disease or type 2 diabetes or obesity there body fat is only 11% which is very lean!now why are they soo darn healthy when eating a diet of up to 80% fat and loads of saturated animal fats? don't you think atleast one would have a heart attack if saturated fats caused heart disease?truly saturated animal fats from healthy animals are healthy and good for you and they will never ever give you heart disease i promise you this.now as for cholesterol that is healthy too! but it's a little more complicated there are different types of cholesterol for example there is the small dense LDL this type of LDL can get stuck and turn rancid you don't want too much of this type of LDL.and then there is the large healthy fluffly type of LDL this LDL does not get stuck and does not turn rancid and has zero health risk now this is the type of LDL you want and guess what? saturated fat helps produce this good large healthy fluffly type of LDL.now then there is HDL and what HDL does is it recycles your LDL!LDL is needed in the body you would die with out it now healthy food produces lots of the large healthy fluffly LDL that has no health risk. while a unhealthy diet will produce lots of the small dense LDL which has health risks.i would also like to point out one of there tricky scams they use to trick people into thinking there cholesterol is bad. now lets say you ate unhealthy grains for along time and got loads of small dense LDL because of it now lets say all of a sudden you eat just healthy saturated fat rich foods like eggs, butter, seafood, grass fed meats, animal organs for 2 months and then get a cholesterol test. now the total cholesterol test will come back as this your LDL will have Skyrocketed and your HDL will have slightly gone down and your doctor will go berserk and say your diet is bad. but that is NOT what truly is happening here!!you see you got a large spike in the good large healthy fluffly LDL after the 2 months however you still have the small dense LDL floating around in your body since your HDL recycles it. it takes a full 6-8 Months to fully get rid of all the bad small dense LDL. a total cholesterol test will combo your small dense LDL + your new large healthy fluffly LDL that has NO Health Risk and come back at insainly high amounts scaring your doctor and makeing your doctor put you on health hazardous cholesterol meds which only make your cholesterol Worse!!! because cholesterol meds remove all types of LDL the good and the bad! and have terrible side effects.so you see your cholesterol was geting better all along! but because of the useless total cholesterol test it comes back saying it's bad when it's not so thats why if you ever bother with a stupid cholesterol test only get one after 6-8 months of eating 100% healthy and only get a full pannel cholesterol test this will show all sizes of LDL.and also to explain why your HDL temporary is slightly lowerd i believe this is because your body wants your HDL to stop recycleing the small dense bad LDL so it slightly lowers it for awhile at first to help stop recycleing the bad small dense LDL. then once the bad small dense LDL is gone and just good large healthy fluffly LDL is mostly left it will bring your HDL levels back up to normal.but in short a total cholesterol test will say your cholesterol is bad for the first 0-5 months of eating healthyand then in short 6-8 months of eating healthy cholesterol tests will be forced to say your cholesterol is healthy or atleast has gotten alot better.but all this doesn't really matter cause you eat healthy and you won't get heart disease.heres how cholesterol workshttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=awA2fsa94MInow glucose and other forms of sugars cause MUCH more heart disease than haveing bad cholesterol ever could!!! so before you worry about the type of LDL you have first worry about your glucose and other forms of sugars intakefor example foods that cause the most heart disease are candy and refined grains like bread like from sandwiches and hamburger buns, pasta,pizza crust,candy,soda pop,list go's on.what also causes heart disease is hydrogenated oils and man made trans fats these are man made trans fats and not the naturally occurring ones found in foods like butterhere is an video example just how deadly these foods are but will post it next post cause says i reached my media files limmitalso ever wonder why type 2 diabetics have far more heart disease? it's cause they can't handle there glucose! but they can if they ate healthy. which would have to be extra super low carb for them.so ya you don't want to be following the health care system it's what 40% of people will suffer a heart attack? compaired to 0% of people who eat naturally in nature will suffer a heart attack? so 40% of western people with doctors compaired too 0% of people who eat naturally with no doctors. really with differences that BIG it's obvious the health care system is corrupt so don't fall for there scams.also a side note the only animal fat i would avoid eating is large amounts of fat from pork and shellfish cause they are toxic animals and toxins are stored in your fat cells.also when eating cattle try to eat grass fed cattle only cause there is an extremely valueable vitamin in grass fed beef fat vitamin K2-MK4and cattle can be labeled organic and still grain fed so becareful.eating high fat is normal a human mothers breast milk is 50 to 57% calories from fat. and a chicken egg is 61% fat


----------



## ziggy7 (Oct 24, 2009)

couldn't fit my last video on my first post also this is a good reason to never eat junk food not even on your birthday.http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BCwVAkrHLq4also il add some nice health linkshttp://www.westonaprice.org/http://www.biblelife.org/myths.htmoh and soy has been marketed as a healthy food for so long but truly believe me when i say this soy is extremely deadly and toxic no one should ever eat soy.http://www.soyonlineservice.co.nz/


----------



## faze action (Aug 6, 2009)

I have a similar "relationship" to dairy products. Milk itself absolutely kills me. I have not had a glass of milk since about 1993 or 1994. Ice cream usually bothers me unless I eat only a little bit of it (I don't actually like ice cream all that much anyway, so no big deal). Yogurt and cheese I am usually fine with, although this can vary, and I typically don't eat much of them anyhow. In fact I've read that most people have fluctuating levels of lactase in their intestine at any given time, so symptoms can vary from day to day, even for people who are usually lactose intolerant. (I'm sure someone posted that already, but my computer is being freaky so I can't really read all the responses). Case in point: this morning I had a bagel with cream cheese (which would normally bother me, since I have issues with carbs as well), and was okay afterward. However, I just made a big mistake. I ate some frozen macaroni & cheese from Whole Foods and my abdomen is extremely distended and uncomfortable. I looked at the ingredients on the label and bingo: milk is the second ingredient (not cheese, just milk). I really need to be more careful about label reading and I'm usually good with it!Of course, I'm supposed to go out in a little while and I look 5 months pregnant. Wonderful.


----------



## Dagmar (Aug 31, 2010)

I would like to share my dairy problem as I believe it can shed another light on the subject. I was diagnosed as being allergic to milk which is different than being lactose intolerant. I am allergic to the milk protein "whey" which is found in milk. Whey is also hidden in many processed foods. I can tolerate a small amount of it but when I go over that threshold it causes great pain for days and days. However, when milk is put in a prepared food and reaches high temperatures (such as when it is boiled), this process destroys the protein and I can tolerate it just fine.


----------

