# Interested in hearing about citrus problems



## rmiller1985 (Sep 13, 2011)

Hi,

I recently started the Specific Carbohydrate Diet to see if I could get my mild IBS under control. It's pretty much impossible for me to start it as directed by Elaine, as I'm a vegetarian, and I'm not (yet) willing to go back to eating meat. So instead I simply started eating only the allowable foods, even though some aren't supposed to be allowed until week 2 or later.

One thing that I've thought for years, even before my IBS kicked into a slightly higher gear a year and a half ago (triggered by an appendectomy), is that my body somehow doesn't know how to deal with fluid. I can go an entire day without drinking more than a few ounces of water and still urinate regularly (and mostly clearly), and then on another day I'll drink many glasses of water and still be thirsty.

I took a SIBO breath test about five months ago that tended to indicate SIBO, but my gastroenterologist considered the result borderline, and we decided on a diet and probiotic approach. There hasn't been much change with "just being careful" with my diet, so I decided to try the SCD. I thought I'd ease into it by eliminating some easy items, one of which was the orange juice that I've drunk virtually every day of my life.

Interestingly, I noticed that my symptoms decreased very slightly during this period. It's hard to quantify, since I'm still taking 1mg (one-half of one pill) of Immodium twice a day, but I definitely noticed a slight change. Then a couple of days ago I started the SCD in earnest.

Yesterday afternoon I ate a large tangelo. A few hours later, despite not drinking a large amount of water during the day, I started having to pee frequently. My nightly glass of red wine added to the effect (I know there's some controversy about alcohol on the SCD, but since it generally hasn't been a problem for me, and since it actually seems to help very slightly, I'm keeping it for now, at least occasionally/frequently). Between 8pm and 9pm, I think I urinated 4 times, and there were several times before and after. My gut kicked in as well, and I pooped more in the evening than I usually do.

I know that I've seen posts here from people who were "citrus-free." What I'm looking for is some information on why people have gone citrus free. Although I can't peg this incident on the citrus fruit conclusively, I'm just wondering what problems others have had to see if there's any similarity with my experience.

Thanks,

Rich


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