Quitting dairy was the very last item on my “Find Out What’s Causing My Chronic Congestion” to-do list. I’ve been struggling with this issue since I moved to Tampa five months ago, and I am pretty sure it’s related to allergies, but I wanted to exhaust every possible scenario before opting for an ENT specialist. So far I have tried: prescription allergy meds, saline sprays, a Neti pot, hypoallergenic pillows, a humidifier, an essential oil diffuser, nasal sprays, and Breathe-Right strips. I even had the maintenance team at my apartment community do a mold inspection. Though, since these apartments were built in 2014, I was pretty certain they wouldn’t find anything. They didn’t.
So, dairy. Dairy is on the list of things to eliminate if you struggle with congestion. I’ve always had a certain sensitivity to milk, but it’s never been something that has affected my life so much that I needed to eliminate it. I just… need to be close to a bathroom after drinking a Frappuccino, is what I’m saying. But, I figured, let’s try eliminating dairy! Who knows… maybe my sensitivity morphed into a full-blown allergy and just randomly coincided with my move. Stranger things have happened, right?
Last week, I eliminated dairy from my life and it led to some really interesting epiphanies on my end. First of all, I never realized how much dairy I consume on a daily basis. I drink a cup of coffee with full-fat creamer most mornings. I like pizza and pizza rolls and cheddar-and-bacon potato skins and cereal with cow’s milk and sub sandwiches with mayo and butter on my veggies. I like cheese – string cheese, feta cheese, mozzarella cheese, all of the cheese. And chocolate. Oh, do I love chocolate. Milk chocolate, not dark chocolate. I love creamy, delicious, soothing milk chocolate. My diet? Was going to have to go through a drastic shift for this dairy-free experiment.
But I did it. I went a week without eating dairy. (Mostly, I had some oops-I-didn’t-realize-this-contained-dairy-until-I-ate-it moments.) It was a good week and it was a bad week, and I want to start with what didn’t go so well.
- It was boring.
I derive a lot of enjoyment from food, and I love looking forward to a meal. I did not look forward to any of my meals during this experiment. What I ate was fine: Nutrigrain waffles with peanut butter, salads, clementines, chicken and rice, etc. But it was just… food. It tasted good, but it didn’t excite me. I want my food to excite me.
- Dairy is in every good thing in this world.
Eating out was fairly impossible, which is why it only happened twice for me. I even had to turn down pizza and cake at my nephew’s birthday party, and I think I may have hurt my sister-in-law’s feelings in the process. (Oof. Not intentional!) And dairy is in everything. I didn’t realize this until I started taking a look at the ingredient list for many of my favorite foods. How does someone with a sweet tooth eat dairy-free? Riddle me this, Batman, I want to know.
- I was so hungry the whole week.
This was probably the hardest part of this week. I was hungry every single day. It makes sense, though: dairy has a lot of protein and in the process of eliminating dairy, I essentially eliminated a good chunk of protein. Rookie mistake.
- The first few days were outrageously hard.
But aren’t they always? It was hard not to give up. I desperately wanted to in those first few days when I was so hungry. I knew I just needed to get over a hump, and it would be smooth sailing from there, but man, getting over that hump is so damn hard.
Okay, so now that I’ve laid out the difficult parts of last week, let’s dive into the positive aspects of my dairy-free experiment!
- I enjoy eating healthy
I know this contradicts my first point above, but hear me out. Eating healthy does not come naturally to me. I don’t reach for fruits and veggies, lean meats, and brown rice. I reach for the bad stuff and I love eating the bad stuff. I do not naturally love eating the good stuff, but when I do force myself to eat it, I realize I enjoy healthy foods and it’s tasty. Healthy food can taste good! (Rinse and repeat.)
- I slept better and felt more energized than I have in a while
Sigh, this always happens when I clean up my diet and start exercising more frequently. My sleep improves! I feel great! My energy levels are up! And yet… I’ve never been able to stick with eating healthy for the long term. But this week… let’s just say I finally slept soundly, which leads to the next point.
- My congestion (mostly) cleared up
!!!!! Okay, okay, I was sorta hoping the congestion wouldn’t clear up because I didn’t want to actually have to consider eliminating dairy full-time. But my congestion really cleared up. Not completely, but enough to make a huge difference in my sleep and, to be dramatic, my life.
So, where do I go from here?
Essentially, eliminating dairy from my diet did exactly what I wanted it to do – it helped to clear up my congestion. That said, I am going to see a doctor about my congestion. My congestion never fully went away, so I think it’s time to get a specialist involved.
Even still, I am truly interested in eating mostly dairy free. It was a hard week, I won’t lie, but it also felt really good. I lost 3 lbs, which is a feat for me lately, and I was sleeping better. I want to aim for the 80/20 rule – 80% of the time I eat dairy free with 20% allowed for indulgences. Pizza with friends, dessert at book club, things like that.
My plan for the week after my dairy-free experiment was to begin reintroducing different dairy products into my diet to test how my body reacted to them. And I’ve been doing that, and in the process, my congestion has come back with a vengeance. It is quite frustrating, but it just shows me that my body is now reacting differently to dairy than it has in the past. That’s life, right? Bodies are weird, complex organisms and we have to learn how to adapt to them.
I’m really glad I experimented with eliminating dairy, and now I’m excited to figure out how to lead a dairy-free existence. I’ve already discovered vegan mayonnaise (“Veganaise”), which I find to be incredibly delicious. This weekend, I’m going to try my hand at vegan baking (<– something I never thought I’d say.)
Also? I’m really proud of myself for sticking with eating dairy-free, especially when it was intensely difficult, and not giving up. That’s something to be proud of, no matter what.
Have you ever experimented with eating dairy-free?
Congrats on making it through a week without dairy. I know that is tough as it’s in SO many things! I went dairy free for most of a year a few years back. It really helped my complexion improve. But then after I had my stress fracture my doctor wanted me to be careful about getting more calcium so I added it back although I try to limit how much I eat as I know it doesn’t agree with my stomach. I’ll be doing Whole30 at the end of March so will be eliminating dairy as part of that.
I accidentally made myself lactose sensitive — when you go without cow’s milk for a while, you lose the enzymes that process it well (same happens when cutting out meat from your diet). I mean, I was supposed to reduce dairy anyway, but meh. Did you just cut it out cold turkey for this week? Or did you replace it? (Other than the veganaise.) I cannot rave about almond and cashew milk enough. I cook with almond milk (the original, occasionally original unsweetened), and really have not had much difficulty using it rather than cow’s milk. And chocolate cashew milk is my favorite beverage treat. There are dairy-free cheese, or sometimes people find they can’t handle cow’s milk but are ok with sheep or goat’s milk. Also, there’s AMAZING dairy-free ice cream. Even at my Kroger, there’s what looks like normal ice cream, but a small label saying it’s dairy free. It’s totally possible to be excited about food and not deal with cow’s milk. But I also suggest doing exactly what you’re doing: test your limits. For me? I can handle certain amounts of cheese in moderation, and butter has no affect on me at all. I also keep lactaid with me if I know I might consume more cow’s milk than I’d planned. Anyway. It’s totally possible and you can completely do this if you want to! 🙂
I’m happy the experiment cleared up your congestion and mostly made you feel better!
I’m vegan and eat dairy free as much as I can. Vegan baking and cooking is easy, and if you follow your 20% idea you should be able to get by with eating dairy in restaurants. Let me know if you need any help with alternatives – veganaise is great and there are MANY other great options!
I am a dairy eater, I admit it! That said, since starting my macro-friendly diet I’ve been acutely aware of where/how I eat my dairy as in, reduced fat cheeses, opting for lactose free milk with less fat, things like that. I look forward to hearing more about your dairy-free/vegan cooking as it progresses, and keep us posted on what the specialist says since your congestion was better but not all the way gone. Hope they have some good answers for you!
I think this could end up being the smoking gun that you’ve needed. If a lot of the junk food that you eat is dairy, then having to cut it out could make it easier for you to lose weight. So yay no congestion and weight loss, that’s pretty awesome that your body reacted that way!
I had no idea that dairy can cause congestion. You always learn something new every day. I applaud you for experimenting and cutting out dairy, because it’s something that would be impossible for me to do (I think)… although, I totally agree with you: your well-being deifnitely depends on what you put in your body (even if it’s not always the most exciting food!) and feeling good (and maybe even losing weight) should be the most important thing when it comes to nutrition.
I hope you can find some acceptable alternatives.
I don’t think I could give up dairy. ALL THE CHEESE!!! That being said, my husband has a sensitivity to cheese and it’s amazing how many meals I can’t/don’t make anymore as a result! It’s SO tough!
But at least you’ve made some headway on what’s causing your congestion. Going through the process of elimination is tough, so at least you have some answers now!
You should be so proud of yourself! It’s not easy to make diet changes, especially with something you eat so regularly. As people have mentioned, there are definitely some really good alternatives out there to dairy that you might want to try if you still feel like you’re really missing it. But you might just find that after awhile you won’t really crave it as much as you used to.
Also, mayonnaise is already dairy free so no need to switch to veganaisse (unless it’s the eggs that bother you).
Paleo baking > Vegan baking. Just saying. Check out Paleomg, Clean Eating with a Dirty Mind, Primal Palate, just to name a few. And coconut milk/almond milk based ice creams are awesome. So Delicious makes some bomb desserts that are sold in most grocery stores.
Ugh, doubled edged sword! Awesome that it helped, pity what you have to trade off 🙁
I tried a week of cleaner eating (so I think just grains and veggies, possibly eggs?) and I was quite frankly miserable. Starving and grumpy all the time. Gave up about 3 days in. However the best I’ve ever felt physiucally was the month I spent volunteering on a farm in Italy and eating vegetarian. Again, constantly hungry, but my body responded really well. I am like you and don’t gravitate toward good foods but I can tell when I need to lay off and I really do feel the difference when I eat well.
This is such a great post. I’m a dietitian so I help people with their eating all the time, so I love reading about people trying different dietary changes for their health (especially when the change is health and not weight loss related. It’s refreshing when people change their diet for something other than just trying to lose weight).
I go on and off dairy. I’m currently on a tight budget so that means little to no cheese (it’s expensive here in Canada) but I do use milk as opposed to almond milk (again milk vs. almond milk = $$ difference).
So many people react to dairy. Lactose intolerance is more common then it is not common.
Love that you also discovered healthy eating can be a pleasure because I sure believe it can be! 🙂
When I dropped dairy from my diet I had the same struggle as well because like you said it is in EVERYTHING. But even with healthy eating and exercise, my weight never moved. It started dropping after losing dairy.
Have you ever tried adding some local raw honey to your diet? Some people find that it helps with allergies. I live in a big city and thought this was something you could only find in the country, but there is a bee farm here that sells local honey. There might be one in your area.
I’ve been eating loosely dairy free and gluten free for about 5ish weeks now. I actually found eliminating gluten WAY harder than eliminating dairy! I don’t really feel *that* much difference but I am eating much cleaner foods in general and I’m definitely a lot less bloated. I’ve had a few dairy slip-ups, mostly in the form of sauce (for example tonight I had sweet potato fries and did have a few dips of chipotle mayo with them) but I’m certainly not eating slices of cheese or glasses of milk anymore. For me, I’m having hormone issues, and our conventional dairy has an insane amount of hormones in it, so I’m really hoping that not eating any will help with my hormone issues! Cutting cream out of my coffee for the first week was hard but now I like drinking my coffee black!
Hope that it gets easier as time goes on.
Congrats on completing this difficult challenge! After doing Whole30, I totally know how hard it can be to eliminate things you love from your diet from all angles – mentally, emotionally, physically, and even socially (your nephew’s party).
Today I am starting a no-dairy diet for I’m not sure how long. I’m doing it because I’ve always struggled with seasonal allergies and they’ve gotten worse these last few years because of the drought here in CA. If eliminating dairy helps me to not have allergies, then I’ll continue this eating style until the end of spring. But if it doesn’t work for me, then well, PASS THE ICE CREAM.
Congrats again. So proud of you!
Dairy free – welcome to my world! Since Parks has a sensitivity to it and he eats what I eat through my milk I haven’t had dairy since mid-May of LAST year. In the beginning it was HARD and I felt like I couldn’t eat anything – however, it gets better and I’ve discovered lots of tasty treats so I feel like I haven’t been deprived.
Once I’m done pumping I think we’re still going to try and live a mostly dairy-free diet – he will still have an issue with it and I don’t want to eat things and tell him “you can’t have this,” but I’m at my lowest weight in YEARS so obviously my body responds well to no dairy too! If you need tips/ideas email me – happy to share!