The purpose of this diet is to remove foods from the diet that could be causing a food sensitivity that can be expressed as an excess inflammatory or immunological process.  All foods that are typically eaten on a regular basis must be removed from the diet for a minimum of two weeks.  If the original complaint has not resolved during Elimination, this phase will need to be lengthened.  This time period allows the body to calm down the aggravated responses so that a reaction to a food sensitivity will be more easily seen. 

Positively, some symptoms experienced are: weight loss, loss of abdominal bloating, more frequent or more complete bowel movements, or the original complaints begin to disappear.  Occasionally, however, some clients will notice that their body begins to detoxify during this time period.  These symptoms could include headache, body aches, fatigue or other symptoms of discomfort.  If these negative symptoms occur, Dr. Williamson has remedies to ease any discomfort.

The Reintroduction phase slowly adds in foods that were eaten regularly prior to the Elimination phase.  The purpose of this phase is to test the body’s reaction to a food one at a time.  In addition, this reintroduction tests the body’s long term reaction to a food (IgG), as opposed to the standard medical practice of testing the body’s immediate reaction (IgE) that typically expresses itself as anaphylaxis.

During Reintroduction, it is important to keep a diet diary of the food that was reintroduced and any symptoms that are experienced for the following three days.  No new food should be introduced more often than every 4 days and only if no symptoms have occurred.  If symptoms have returned, or new symptoms are experienced, the food should be removed from the diet for a minimum of six months before reintroducing again.  Also, within the sequence of reintroduction, no new foods should be introduced until the symptoms have disappeared.

Finally, as foods are reintroduced, they should be done in the simplest form possible.  For example, when introducing wheat back into the diet, it would be more diagnostically beneficial to introduce cream of wheat made without cow’s milk than it would be to introduce bread or pizza, since these foods contain many ingredients that could possible cause a food sensitivity.  In addition, it is best to buy organic foods during the entire diet to assure that the symptoms are not being caused by preservatives, hormones, pesticides or other unnecessary chemical contaminants.