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A really interesting discovery from being dairy free is that I no longer have period pain. Now for me normally that time of the month is associated with main lining Panadeine, drinking copious amounts of raspberry leaf tea and being surgically attached to my heat pad. It is not unknown for me to vomit or faint (or both) from the pain and I have to say it’s been like that for me since my teens.
While having a baby got rid of my PMS forever (see you later moody b*tch), it did nothing for pain and if anything I feel it got worse. Remove dairy and bam the pain is history.
After doing a bit of research, I’ve found that this actually isn’t that unusual. While women need calcium to have a menstrual period, dairy products contains arachidonic acid which increases the prostaglandins in your body which are responsible for uterine contractions. They also cause an inflammatory response in the body. More dairy = more pain in some cases.
Melinda at One Green Generation has commented on a similar response during a 3 week cleanse. Anyways, I have to say the longer I’m dairy free the more I’m not sure if I’ll ever go back to it. I do miss milk as a drink and am a bit bored of drinking water LOL – but am experimenting with different things to try and get a new smoothie happening (it’s a good filler for me). So far rice milk is gross in a smoothie no matter what yummies I put into it.
That's another good effect for you! I was a heavy, painful period sufferer but a Mirena fixed that! But I have found being cows-milk dairy free is helping me be less irritable in general... probably due to not having a bloated, awful feeling in my tummy & body anymore!
ReplyDeleteWe didn't do well with rice milk smoothies either... nothing covered up the different taste enough to get Cheeky A to drink them?
Have you tried green smoothies??
Hi Bec,
ReplyDeleteI love green smoothies but used to make them with dairy. I cant quite get the taste right without it yet.
Little B loves rice milk, so no convincing there. But I've heard you should flavour it with chocolate to start with quite heavily and then ease off on the flavouring once they are used to the taste of it.
I'm going to try coconut water next as a base and see how I go. Frozen banana makes them ice creamy. Hmmm need to put my thinking cap on.
Yes, we were having coconut milk, frozen banana, honey, sometimes dairy-free choc mix and Inner Health powder, and the kids liked those! I also like frozen berries in mine too...
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