Will gluten-free packaged foods sabotage your results on the Wahls protocol? I mean, it's gluten-free. How bad can it really be? You just need a little something for this diet to not feel so strict. So what's a little snack here and there? Let's find out. And spoiler alert, be prepared to be surprised by my response. And my friend, if you want a more personalized approach to creating your MS diet and lifestyle, check out my private coaching program. It includes a comprehensive assessment, personalized strategies, and lifestyle support. Each month, I accept only three new clients. So if you are interested, apply at alenebrennan. com/ backslash coach. Now onto today's episode.

Hello, my friends. I hope you are enjoying season four of my MS podcast, which is all about MS and nutrition. Basically, what's the connection between food and MS or other autoimmune and chronic conditions? And so far we have covered a broad range of topics. We've touched on everything from the best foods to support brain health, how to eat for better energy, how to not feel so deprived on the wall's protocol, the five key elements of an anti-inflammatory diet. We touched on intermittent fasting and even eating out on the wall's protocol. And the feedback that you have shared has been so incredible. I get messages from you every day, and I love hearing from you. So thank you for those emails and DMs. They help me to know like which topics are really resonating with you, and what topics. As you know, or maybe you didn't, we have new listeners every single week. And if this is your first episode tuning in, welcome to my MS podcast! I'm so, so glad that you're here, and I hope that you choose to come back every Wednesday for a new episode. But if you are new or a veteran here, I have a private coaching nutrition practice where I work one-on-one with clients who really need help personalizing their

And of course, I also provide the accountability that so many people need to be consistent, so that we don't feel so alone in this journey, living with a chronic illness and following the Wahl's protocol. Well, recently I've had several conversations with many of my clients, just like you and I, who are following the Wahl's protocol to manage our diagnosis. And most people have MS, but other people, as I said, are managing other autoimmune and chronic conditions.

It can help you to feel better in your body on a daily basis and give you the energy and health to live and enjoy your life. And I don't know about you, but I don't care what my medical record says. I care how I feel in my body day to day. And am I able to do the things that are most meaningful to me and that bring me joy? That's what I want.

To get them. And then there are the days when motivation isn't so high. You still don't want this disease to progress, but there is not an immediate or intense pain point, so to speak. You've just kind of slipped into your new norm. And those are the days when things aren't perfect, but you're likely dealing with some fatigue or brain fog again, just like a gentle little reminder that you have MS or another chronic illness. And you've kind of become adjusted to this as your new norm. And therefore, you may be tempted to loosen the reins on the protocol. Because again, there isn't an immediate or intense pain point for you. You're not in the shock of just being newly diagnosed, or there's not like a new symptom or a flare or like something really intense that is screaming at you and creating that undeniable motivation to again, follow this to a T

week. There are now entire aisles and corners of the grocery store dedicated to gluten-free products. And I've been getting an increasing number of questions around them. Are some better than others? Is there a limit to how many of them I can eat in a day? What are the best brands? And is there anything that I should avoid? So whenever a topic like this pops up and I get lots of questions around one particular area, I want to bring it here on the podcast because it means that those are just a small representation of a bigger community of people who are asking this question.

It's not helping anything because the only thing that does is make you feel more alone in this. And if nothing else, I want this episode to help you realize that this is something that a lot of us are struggling with. So you are not alone if this is something that you have been asking yourself or something that you've been dealing with. And maybe you're listening to this episode and you're like, 'Alene,' I eat gluten-free packaged foods all the time. I don't have any guilt around them.

But to dive a little deeper into this topic, I busted out the Wahls Protocol book. This is the revised version that Dr. Wahls released in March of 2020. And at the end of each of the chapters where she talks about the Wahls Protocol, well, first of all, there's, as we know, three levels of the Wahls Protocol, level one, level two, and level three. And I'm going to read straight from the book here. It's on page 172, and it's The Wahls Diet at a Glance.

Based on her body frame, her level of activity, and her metabolism. So that was the amount of vegetables and fruit that she needed to consume in a day to not only heal her body, but for her to stay full. Now she has said many times over, she even said it when I interviewed here right on this podcast, that the nine cups, they were designed for her. So the goal is to get the

protocol, eat the nine cups. Next, eat grass-fed or wild-caught meats. And then she has a note in here if you're vegetarian, kind of like what the adaptations are that you need to make. And then lastly, you may eat gluten-free starch like gluten-free grains or potatoes, but try not to overdo it. Ideally, don't have these starchy foods every day. So there's one little note for us to acknowledge. Ideally, we're not having starchy foods, which is the base of the majority of

sweeteners, including soda and diet soda, all trans fat, partially hydrogenated oils. She goes into like the whole vegetable oil thing of corn, soybean, canola, grapeseed, palm kernel, and then anything with preservatives or flavor enhancers such as MSG. Biggest takeaways, the majority of your foods should be vegetables. Get those veggies in. And she also said

, 'It's really thick and it's really dense with a lot of information. It's why I ran that book club many years back. We went through the book chapter by chapter and it was something that helped to break down such dense information for us so that we could absorb it a little bit easier. But my point here is that if you're not at that stage yet, okay, what can you do today to get one step closer? But I am trying to help us answer the question, what's the deal?

What is your typical response in these moments? Is it to walk away feeling empowered that you are choosing your health over momentary flavor of the food? So when somebody brings in that banana bread, are you looking at that and saying like, of course I want a bite of that. It's warm. It’s delicious. Everyone's raving about it. Of course I want that. But no, I am choosing not to eat it because I know that that will not support my body and I want results. I want results.

Say, screw it. I’m just eating it. It won’t make a difference. I’ll start again tomorrow. And maybe you will, or maybe tomorrow will turn into next week, next month, after summer, or in the new year. And that time never comes. Until a new symptom pops up. And then you're back to square one, but feeling more motivated than ever because now you're dealing with the intense pain point. So which do you find yourself to be in most often? Feeling empowered that you're choosing health over food, feeling deprived and depressed, or feeling like you're gonna live for the moment and turn a blind eye until tomorrow. You know that it's not good for you, but in that moment, you don't care. You'll deal with whatever comes up later.

If you're in the first camp, amazing. I salute you. That's the ideal mindset to have. You're acknowledging that you can eat whatever you want, but you're choosing to eat based on the health that you want to create and maintain in your body. Keep going. And if you're in this camp, I want to hear from you. What have you found to be most helpful in developing this mindset? You know, I'm always game for a good conversation around mindset. All right, if you were in camp too, feeling deprived and depressed, I highly recommend that you check out season four, episode six. So just a few weeks ago, when I dedicated an entire episode to not feeling deprived on the Wahls protocol, that would be a fantastic episode for you to check out. And of course, keep listening to this episode because what I'm about to share will be helpful for you as well as that final group that's likely just to throw the protocol to the wind.

Do those who are far more successful than the ones that try to achieve perfection. They try to check all of the boxes on day one, and then they burn themselves out so quickly. So again, let's go back to the book here. Dr. Wahls got the results that she did, and many others in the community have gotten the results by eating more veggies. Veggies have the nutrients that our cells need to heal,

the foods that are causing inflammation, gluten, dairy, and sugar. And yes, I recognize that the first two are very hard, but the third one may be one that you're like, I'm not going to fully eliminate it, but I'm at least going to reduce it. Fair game. But these are the primary principles of the Walsh Protocol. Obviously, there are different levels to the Walsh Protocol, each of which has its own nuances, but these are the main principles.

To bridge the gap from eating gluten to not eating gluten. And if that is where you are at, that is what is going to be so helpful here. Because if you are having a craving for pasta and it's just not getting satisfied with the spaghetti pasta or those zucchini noodles, they're just not cutting it, you will be far better off opting for a gluten-free pasta than just, again, throwing things to the wind and grabbing the regular box of pasta. Similar with cookies,

Because we know gluten can compromise our gut health and contribute to inflammation in our body, even when you feel fine after eating it. That's one of the most dangerous scenarios, in my opinion. You find so many people saying that they don't feel any different after eating gluten. So they start to wonder, does it really apply to me? I mean, I've eaten gluten my entire life and been fine. So why do I suddenly have a sensitivity?

Response: you're eating something that may contain gluten and you feel fine. You feel fine that day, maybe even the next day. But then as time progresses and as gluten stays in the diet, it doesn't even need to be a lot. It can be a little bit here and there. You start to just like not feel well. And it's so easy to say like, this is just MS or this is just aging or whatever it is that you attribute it to. But that's not always the case. I find so many people in my private coaching

I didn't know how bad I felt until I felt this good. And they often find too that they're like, and I was able to find a lot of swaps. So it doesn't even really feel like I'm craving it anymore. That is the dream. That is fantastic. So let's help get you there if you're not there already. The first thing is, again, going back to those veggies. How can you fill more of your plate with those veggies? I love this crowding out theory because you're focusing on what you're adding in versus eliminating. So can you get more veggies in?

You can't pronounce, or you don't know what they are, or they're super long jumbled names; see if you can find a better option. Because that's just kind of like processed foods one-on-one. We want to make sure that we are getting the best ingredients possible. So how can you find options that have the least amount of ingredients in them and the ones that are most familiar to you? And if you're not familiar with it already, if you're not familiar kind of with reading

Can you upgrade them? Maybe you're debating between two options and you look at this and you're like, all right, this one has just more, this one has cleaner ingredients. A perfect example of this is I really enjoy tacos. We have tacos in this house and there are gluten-free tortillas that you can get. When I look at the back of the package, there are so many ingredients in there that I can't pronounce and I'm not familiar with. And I'm like, I don't want to eat that. That just, I don't care how good it tastes. I'm not going to eat the regular tortilla, but this gluten-free version is packed with just garbage in my opinion.

I could get the gluten-free options that have a billion and one different ingredients in there, or I could get the corn tortillas. I opt for the corn tortillas. If I'm making a quesadilla, I choose the cassava flour tortillas from Siete. They are fantastic. So that's a perfect example of being able to kind of like look at stepping stones. So that's just a great way of upgrading whatever ingredients you have now. And then I also get asked about specific brands, like what brands do I recommend?

Siete is a brand that I like for kind of like Mexican-type foods. Jovial is a great brand when it comes to pasta. So they have a tremendous variety of noodles and they come in both a rice-based option, which obviously is a gluten-free grain, but they also have a cassava flour option. So that is completely grain-free. We had the cassava flour ones this past week. I didn't love them as much as I liked the rice-based, but if you are trying to avoid all grains

and enjoy life, that's one that's kind of like it teeters a little bit. They have more of like the baked goods, the cookies and things like that. They're not perfect, but they are clean on allergies. I think they're free of the top nine allergens. So something like that, I am going to have very sparingly. But if I need like a little fix, so to speak, that's my go-to. And I'm curious, what brands do you guys like? Send me them, email, DM,

packaged foods in there. And maybe you're at the step where you're saying, Allie, I really want to have just more whole foods based options or just cleaner ingredients. Make them yourself. You can make things like energy bites, which is basically a combination of some dates. If you use nut butter, you can put that in there. You can put tiger nut flour in there. What else do you do? Like cinnamon, shredded coconuts. I mean, there's not all of them together,

And then last but not least, pay attention to the results, regardless of what you eat, always pay attention to the results because that is what is going to be most motivating and most insightful for you. I can tell you until I'm blue in the face, all these different things about what gluten does to your body and what artificial sweeteners do and all the hydrogenated oils and all of that stuff. But it's not until you experience it in your body that it's going to click. And that's what you need. Because if you can get quiet enough to feel a difference in your body, paying attention to the day that you eat it, the next day, and even the days that follow, that is when it is most powerful of being able to say like, whoa, I never realized the subtle difference, but I actually do feel a little bloated. Or I didn't realize this, but I am far more constipated when I have the package.

As I've said before, this is going to be different for each person and it's going to be different for each stage that you are at in adopting the Wahls protocol. But when you are choosing a processed food, you want to read labels, specifically the ingredient list, not the nutrition facts. You want to read the ingredient list. Like I've shared with that example with the corn tortillas, you want to just see like one, two, maybe three ingredients on there.

Is another good gluten-free pasta option that I did not mention, but they can be just as good as Jovial as well. Enjoy Life. And I didn't mention this, but I did want to add in that I'm not a big fan of the gluten-free version of major brands. Like when major brands just all of a sudden offer a gluten-free option, I find them to be more processed than a brand that is exclusively gluten-free. They tend to be in the gluten-free section and they just have more natural options.

So, really pay attention to the results and download a copy of my MS Wellness Tracker so that you can pay attention to all areas there. Okay, I'm going to wrap this here. There is so much more that I could continue on. But as always, I just want to give you some quick wins of being able to take one step further with being consistent on the WALS protocol. So wherever you are at today, can you get one more serving of veggies in?

Well, my friend, we've reached the end of this episode. Pick one lesson from today's discussion and put it into action now. It's time to reclaim your body, mind and life from multiple sclerosis. And for more resources, events, and programs, head over to AleneBrennan. com. See you on the next episode of my MS Podcast.