Mimha's hair journey : one year of documented growth !

[Mimha]

Hello fellow hair growers !

Well... this is not a true annivhairsary... as I arrived here only in September last year :oops: . It's more what I would call a one-year-documented-growth. But you know... I COULN'T WAIT TO SHARE !! :joy:

Actually, my hair had never been a special concern to me, until I started to shed like crazy in 2012-2013. I had undiagnosed health problems which leaded me to severe anemia and exhaustion. Thanks to my hair giving me a strong warning, I went for a complete medical check up and I had to drastically change my alimentation : total cut of sugar, low carb diet, and complementation with tons of oligo-elements (minerals, vitamins, omega-3, probiotics, etc.) in order to restore my intestinal flora and get rid of the chronic inflammatory state from which I was slowly but surely dying away. The result was an unexpected weight loss that stabilized to my ideal 20 year old weight and the unexpected regrowth of my hair to an amazingly better condition than ever !

So one day of February 2014, I was looking at my shoulder length hair in the mirror and was just "Wow !..." :bigeyes: !! My hair looked so thick and healthy that I couldn't believe my own eyes. How hadn't I seen it before ??? Lol. I was too busy struggling with my exhaustion and my crazy diet, plus my home being under renovation, full of workers, dust, noise, with lots of problems to solve every day.

So since February 2014, my hair became one of my main sources of encouragement to go on with my frustrating diet and recurrent pains. I started to be interested about hair related questions and to browse the web, looking for all possible information... until I found the LHC. Around July, I started to document my growth, and in September I decided to join. So here are some pictures for you :

Here is my growth since July 2014. (Not unhappy about the similarity of the pics ! :cool:)

http://forums.longhaircommunity.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=18056&d=1436362730


(to be continued...)

[meteor]

^ Congratulations, Mimha!

Wow, excellent growth! :applause I adore your hair's natural texture! Those silky waves are absolutely incredible! :thud:

[Mimha]

In order you to figure out the evolution, here some other pics :

This is how my hair was in 2002, a little before it really started to get bad. I was working as a humanitarian in the Middle East and Africa by that time, and knew nothing about existing rules and theories about hair care, tools and hairdos^^


I had beautiful healthy TBL to classic length hair (but I didn't know about specific lengths :lol:) which fairytaled into lovely ringlets

http://forums.longhaircommunity.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=17213&d=1431165681


And here was what I called my "snail bun" (didn't know it was a cinnamon bun, ha ha ha !)

http://forums.longhaircommunity.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=14393&d=1416693794


I whish I can get back to this length with my brand new hair ! :pray:

[Night_Kitten]

Beautiful waves, your hair looks very pretty :D
Glad you caught the medical issues in time and are better now :)

[wilderwein]

Wow longer hair suits you so so well!!! :crush:

[Mimha]

And for you to see the improvement of quality from the bad time to now, here are two pictures :

This is how my hair looked like when I came back to Switzerland. As you can see, my hair is not shiny and quite see-through. It was a slow process and I was not really conscious of it by that time. It's only when I found that picture again that I realized how much my hair had suffered from all my deficiencies, and above all from lack of iron and B vitamins. And on the right, a picture of my hair yesterday evening. The comparison is self-explanatory !!

http://forums.longhaircommunity.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=18058&d=1436367486 http://forums.longhaircommunity.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=18057&d=1436363076


So here I am, fellow hair growers !... Older but with better hair to grow until I achieve my long life dream of terminal length !! :cool:

Lol. I really don't know if I will have the patience to grow until there, but I already enjoy every day of the journey with all of you here. LHC is really a nice place to boost your motivation !

Thanks to all of you for your kind words and support. :flowers:

[alexis917]

So happy to hear you've healed up! Your hair looks beautiful, too. I like how uniform the waves look!

[Wusel]

What a growth! Great! Congratulations!
And you have a cute nose! :)

[hinabelle]

Beautiful, Mimha :flower: You'll get back to your long tresses soon enough! :D
Your hair is so thick and lovely!

[Madora]

Mimha, your hair looks fantastic! Congrats!

[Arctic]

You have one of the prettiest wave patterns I've seen here, congrats on better health and nice growth!

[Wosie]

I love your hair and waves, Mimha! It looks like you put lots of time and effort into creating those waves of yours, they're nothing short of amazing. :D Your hair has grown a lot too, looking as beautiful as ever! Here's to the next year. :toast::bottomsup:

[LongCurlyTress]

Your hair is so thick and gorgeous! Just beautiful!! :)

[diddiedaisy]

You have beautiful hair, congratulations :)

[TrapperCreekD]

:thudpile: Looks amazing!

[Mimha]

Aw, thanks a lot for your kind words, everyone ! :o

Actually I'm not so sure that my hair is much thicker than before my bad period, when it was just normal, but the keratin is in a noticeably better state. I have almost no tangles in the morning, after one night with hair loose, whereas I always braided my hair in the past. I have very few splits too and no white dots at all, which is also new to me (I had a lot when I was in my teens).

Concerning my waves, they are also more bouncy since my keratin is better. And I don't spend any time on "shaping" them at all : they come out by themselves all the more better that I don't touch my hair after I wash it. My hair dries into long ringlets, and the waves appear when I brush them out to detangle, once it's almost dry. I only use very little diluted organic shampoo and no conditioner at all. I apply a ACV rinse instead, with some drops of antifungal essential oil such as lavender, tea tree or rosmarinus. Less is really more to me ! :)

My goal when I opened this thread was not only to celebrate one year of growth but also to show how a change of diet (from a poor one to an appropriate one) can influence a healthy growth. Stress and exhaustion, unusual hair loss, lack of shine and dryness, itchy scalp, dandruff, all this must be considered as a warning. Your hair talks to you : listen to it !

:blossom:

[Jennah]

http://forums.longhaircommunity.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=17213&d=1431165681


This is so adorable!!!!!!

Love, love, love your journey!

Your hair is looking stunning and the long hair in the picture even if it was thinner it was also gorgeous.

Imagine how it´s going to look now!

Love to see your older pictures, you look so cute with that attire! :heart:

[momschicklets]

WOW. Your hair is just amaaaaaa-zing! Thank you for taking us on a little "tour" of your hair and your growth journey...I have always been a huge fan of your gorgeous, thick, shiny waves, and if I weren't such a nice person I would totally steal it and make it my own :wannabe: Can't WAIT to see what it looks like in another year!

[Mimha]

Thank you Jennah ! It's so sweet of you to say ! :)

The dress is a syrian djellaba robe made out of cotton damask. For years I could not wear it because I had put on weight. But now I'm happy to be able to wear it again, thanks to my low carb diet ! :) :)

[Mimha]

(...) if I weren't such a nice person I would totally steal it and make it my own :wannabe:

Ha ha ha ha, Momschicklets ! :lol: Thanks for your compliments. But your know, my hair is a war treasure. I fought for it, it's not to donate !!! :guns:

[lapushka]

Great progress for a year, and I love the texture of it. Congrats. :D

[Nebulae]

I always admired your smooth waves, so beautiful! I didn't know you had such long hair before, it seems it will be in a much better state this time around though, I'm happy for you! :)

[Pinni]

Congrats, your hair texture is prettier than ever! Very beautiful hair.

[two_wheels]

Fabulous progress Mimha! I love your hair :)

[Horrorpops]

Mimha your hair is so beautiful - the colour, thickness and texture reminds me of the screen sirens hair from old black and white films. It is just gorgeous. And tbh I love sugar (lol) but your hair is so gorgeous its the only thing thats made me interested in cutting sugar from my diet. :)

[Mimha]

Thank you again for your compliments, ladies ! (Never had so many in my whole life !!!^^). It's a huge encouragement for me to go on in my growing process ! :)

Horrorpops, if my hair can be an inspiration for anyone to think about his/her health more deeply, I will be pleased ! :)

Hair is a health indicator. It's now a well known fact. Long shiny healthy looking hair is attractive because it is unconsciously recognized as a sign of health. So when your hair start to look sad, it gives you a warning.

Sugar has become so much part of our life since a century or two that we have completely forgotten that it is a food concentrate. Sugar is extracted from the fruits and vegetables by pressing them to get their juice. Juice is therefore totally deprived of the fiber part. Then juice is evaporated and refined to get only the sugar part. Sugar is therefore deprived not only of all fibers, but also from vitamins, minerals and oligo-elements. Sugar is pure carbohydrate, i.e. sugar is pure energy. Nothing else.

During millions of years, the people and their ancestors had to find their energy out of unsweetened food. Their life was hard and very physical. So their body was equipped to get this energy from what they ate : wild berries, roots, leaves, wild seeds, birds eggs, and some meat when they could capture an animal. The very lucky days were when they'd share some honey stolen from wild bees. So our DNA makes us still fully equipped to live without added sugar whatsoever, and our body goes on considering sugar as a super luxury food so rare and desirable that it absolutely has to be stored for bad days. So when we eat EVERY DAY extra sugar that our body is not supposed to get, not only we overload our liver with an unnecessary extra job to do to, but we also stock it under the form of grease. (Our body is indeed equipped to face hunger much better than to face overload). So imagine after 10-20-50 years of overload of super energetic food ? We end up intoxicated and obese. The problem is not only sugar under the form of sugar : it's also under the form of any refined starchy product (flours) with a high glycemic index, and all those ultra sweet sodas that people drink every day. Some people hardly ever eat fresh raw fruits and vegetables. They eat pastries, pizzas, hamburgers, chips and drink Coke (instead of water). No fibers at all, no vitamins, no oligo-elements... and tons of pure energy under the form of sugar that their body will have to treat and stock because they don't even walk or move at all anymore. And I don't even mention saturated fatty acids, hydrogenated fat and all this kind of s****. Our bodies are getting saturated, and sooner or later will have to pay the bill of the "easy/sweet/fast-food an sodas".

Until I wasn't sick myself, I didn't pay much attention of all this. But since I had to start being very careful about what I eat (because otherwise I was simply sick and unable to live a normal life out of pain and exhaustion) I have realized on myself how much I had suffered from the "modern life and food". I could not imagine that I could have deficiencies due to bad food income in terms of vitamins, minerals and oligo-elements because I didn't know to which point what I ate was "empty" of anything really heathy and nutritive ! And believe me : my food was from far not amongst the worst.

I was the first one amazed when I saw my hair improvement. And not only my hair : my whole body, my skin, my teeth, everything ! When you stop adding sugar to your food, you loose weight to come back to your normal shape. You don't have acne and pimples anymore. No more greasy/itchy scalp either. You are less tired. Less depressed. Your teeth become fantastically clean (no more dental plaque and tartar at all !!). And I don't even mention the amazing deceased of the allergic reactions ! :) :)

Yes, the benefits are tremendous !

Sorry for the long blabla, but I really wish my experience may help other to think it over and may be go for their own improvement. Your hair will reward you by revealing its true potential of beauty... and you'll save a lot of money in useless chemical care ! :blossom:

[momschicklets]

Coming back to this thread to look at your gorgeous hair again :eye::eye: Beautiful Mimha! And no worries I won't steal it...but I wanna LOL

[Mimha]

Coming back to this thread to look at your gorgeous hair again :eye::eye: Beautiful Mimha! And no worries I won't steal it...but I wanna LOL

You are so sweet and funny momschicklets ! :lol:

I have not seen many pics of your hair, but from the few I have seen, your hair looks very similar to mine (almost same wave pattern and thickness), as you noticed it yourself. So just keep on the good job and no doubt it will be amazing ! :flowers:

[moontree]

Ohh Mimha I love seeing your hair! :heartbeat Your health really is so evident in the shine and wave. I am terrified of needles and doctors, but you almost have me convinced to go have tests done to make sure my own health is ok. I eat pretty well, but I do have hormone imbalance problems and sometimes shedding/dandruff issues.

Thank you for sharing your journey, and happy growing with your lovely locks!

[Nesoi]

Mimha, something I love about your hair is the beautiful, timeless, soft, uniform-y wave. It's absolutely gorgeous and beautifully complements your lovely shade. Congrats on great growth and gorgeous locks!

[squirrrel]

Wow! That's great growth. Hope that you do reach your tbl hair with the health your hair currently enjoys. :)

[Laura_F]

I have always loved your hair, Mimha! So beautiful and thick; definitely one of my favorite heads of hair at LHC.

[FallingDarkness]

Your hair looks soft, and so utterly thick, I'm jealous! Your hair really is just gorgeous. Congrats on its condition, and on it's growth! You'll get back to where you were originally eventually :)

[vpatt]

Your hair is beautiful. I love your waves. I'm so glad you found a healthy way to eat and improve your health.

[Ingrid]

Congratulations on your progress! I have also admired your hair from afar, like many others who have already commented. Beautiful, thick waves and what a difference prior to your lifestyle changes. I've also struggled with hair thinning due to iron deficiency anemia so I can understand how overjoyed you must have been when you noticed the improvement in your hair! Also, you say that you've completely cut out processed sugars and now have a low-carb diet, but I'm wondering if you could perhaps offer some more detail on what your diet includes and excludes?

[Horrorpops]

Mimha - that is truly inspirational! I really struggle with a sweet tooth but definitely see the addictive side of sugar as well! Its scary stuff when you stop to think about it, and don't apologize for the "long blahbla" :D I found it very interesting and informative!!

[Ambrielle]

Hello fellow hair growers !

Well... this is not a true annivhairsary... as I arrived here only in September last year :oops: . It's more what I would call a one-year-documented-growth. But you know... I COULN'T WAIT TO SHARE !! :joy:

Actually, my hair had never been a special concern to me, until I started to shed like crazy in 2012-2013. I had undiagnosed health problems which leaded me to severe anemia and exhaustion. Thanks to my hair giving me a strong warning, I went for a complete medical check up and I had to drastically change my alimentation : total cut of sugar, low carb diet, and complementation with tons of oligo-elements (minerals, vitamins, omega-3, probiotics, etc.) in order to restore my intestinal flora and get rid of the chronic inflammatory state from which I was slowly but surely dying away. The result was an unexpected weight loss that stabilized to my ideal 20 year old weight and the unexpected regrowth of my hair to an amazingly better condition than ever !

So one day of February 2014, I was looking at my shoulder length hair in the mirror and was just "Wow !..." :bigeyes: !! My hair looked so thick and healthy that I couldn't believe my own eyes. How hadn't I seen it before ??? Lol. I was too busy struggling with my exhaustion and my crazy diet, plus my home being under renovation, full of workers, dust, noise, with lots of problems to solve every day.

So since February 2014, my hair became one of my main sources of encouragement to go on with my frustrating diet and recurrent pains. I started to be interested about hair related questions and to browse the web, looking for all possible information... until I found the LHC. Around July, I started to document my growth, and in September I decided to join. So here are some pictures for you :

Here is my growth since July 2014. (Not unhappy about the similarity of the pics ! :cool:)

http://forums.longhaircommunity.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=18056&d=1436362730


(to be continued...)

Wow! Amazing growth and what an amazing head of hair you have! I love how thick and wavy it is! :crush:

[Sarahlabyrinth]

Mimha, your hair is so gorgeous! And amazing to see the difference in condition from before to now. Thank you so much for all the information about the nastiness of sugar - I found it most informative reading, and I battle with a sugar addiction myself.

[Jennah]

Loved to read your post about the healthy eating.

I´m really bad with my diet and eat tons of sugar and I´m overweight. (And my hair looks sad).

What you say makes so much sense, but let me ask you.. Do you eat any cookies? Pastry? Cake? Most baked goods have sugar in them.

Also, pizza or no flour at all? Do you bake yourself your own stuff with better ingredients?

:)

[Sarahlabyrinth]

Loved to read your post about the healthy eating.

I´m really bad with my diet and eat tons of sugar and I´m overweight. (And my hair looks sad).

What you say makes so much sense, but let me ask you.. Do you eat any cookies? Pastry? Cake? Most baked goods have sugar in them.

Also, pizza or no flour at all? Do you bake yourself your own stuff with better ingredients?

:)

I should like to know this as well. Also how long since you stopped eating processed sugars, Mimha and have you ever weakened your resolve and gone back to eating it again?

[Mimha]

Mimha your hair is so beautiful - the colour, thickness and texture reminds me of the screen sirens hair from old black and white films. It is just gorgeous. (...)


I have always loved your hair, Mimha! So beautiful and thick; definitely one of my favorite heads of hair at LHC.


Your hair looks soft, and so utterly thick, I'm jealous! Your hair really is just gorgeous. (...)


... So many nice sweet huge compliments !... :thud:


Thank you ALL for your kind messages !!

Sorry for not quoting them all :oops: but please do believe that they are going straight to my heart ! :o :puppykisses:
And thank you also for your appreciation about my hair being "thick". My hair is 8.5 cm (actually between 8+ to a small 9, depending on the place I measure it : top of head or nape). So not even flirting with ii/iii !^^ So I feel very pleased about it's volume too. I think it is also a benefit of the keratin improvement : more body and bounciness. :)

Upon your request, I will come back on the health and food questions here after. I just ask you a little patience because I may need a little time to answer all the questions. :flowers:

[Mimha]

Congratulations on your progress! I have also admired your hair from afar, like many others who have already commented. Beautiful, thick waves and what a difference prior to your lifestyle changes. I've also struggled with hair thinning due to iron deficiency anemia so I can understand how overjoyed you must have been when you noticed the improvement in your hair! Also, you say that you've completely cut out processed sugars and now have a low-carb diet, but I'm wondering if you could perhaps offer some more detail on what your diet includes and excludes?

Hi Ingrid ! :)

Thanks for your kind appreciation of my hair improvement. :)

Yes, contrarily to most of the people, I came to LHC to enjoy my newly healthy hair and not to find a solution to some hair problem. But I quickly realized that a lot of people struggled to improve their hair condition and I thought that maybe my personal experience could be an inspiration to some of them to explore new ways and solutions toward what I may call : "the inner factors of hair improvement"^^. Indeed, a vast majority of the people think that they can act on their hair quality simply by applying stuff on it, and that will do the trick. Well, of course a few drops of oil or the use of conditioner can make the hair look nicer, softer, shinier. But it doesn't change its quality, if this quality is poor. Have it washed once without anything else than water and soft shampoo and your hair will just look how it is : dry if it's dry, split if it's split, dull if it's dull.

The only way to get 100% healthy hair is to be healthy yourself, in order to grow healthy hair from inside. And then no need of applying other stuff than a drop of oil when the weather is really too dry (or your hair getting very long), and some ACV in your rinse if your water is hard. Your hair will look nice because your keratin will have been growing nice from the very beginning. Of course we all have a different hair nature due to our personal genes, but we can work on giving ourselves all the balanced nutriments to grow our own personal hair to its best potential.

A balanced food is therefore a key element. (There are others, such as having enough exercise, enough rest, and of course gentle hair care). A balanced food means that you'll provide your body with enough of everything it needs, but not too much either. The problem with our "modern" food is that it is totally unbalanced : too much hyper refined stuff deprived from all fibers, minerals and vitamins content, and way too much energetic content (carbohydrates and fats) for our mostly urban way of life. Another problem is that our food is also super conditioned to resist long conservation and transportation, so it's full of preservatives and other undesired chemicals, or specially treated with heat or radiations (ionization) to make it stay long and look nice. The aim of the food traders is... to sell. Not to provide you with healthy food.

Explaining you all the rules I try to stick to would be long and fastidious, and particularly depressing, lol. So I will just give you the basic ones :
- no more sugar at all, and no artificial sweeteners to replace it (some "natural" ones like xylitol and stevia are allowed occasionally, in very small quantity)
- no food containing added sugar (cakes, marmalade, sodas, etc. and of course no sweets whatsoever)
- no more similar carbohydrates (honey, maple sirup, etc.)
- avoid all food with a glycemic index superior to 60 (all refined flours, pastries, breakfast cereals, pasta, etc.)
- choose fresh, organic, unprocessed food (deep frozen is OK too)
- avoid refined stuff (flour, rice, bread, etc.) - I had to avoid gluten for a while, but now it's getting better :)
- eat as much as possible fresh raw fruits and and vegetables
- choose organic meat when possible, and small wild fish like sardines, mackerels, etc.
- cook gently, preferably with gentle steam (avoid deep frying... and frying in general)

OK folks, I hope I have not made you run away !! :run:

Of course, for any single rule mentioned, there are as many reasons and explanations I could give on the how and why. But well... It a hair forum^^
It should not be dissuasive, ha ha ha ! :blossom:

I will answer to Jennah and Sarah soon, too ! :)

[texangrrl]

I adore the texture of your hair!! And it looks so healthy too!

[Ingrid]

Thanks for your detailed response, Mimha. I've been researching and trying diets for better health (and thus hair) for a few years now (ever since I had a bour of severe food allergies and severe anemia) and have come to a similar "protocol". I'm curious if your diet includes dairy, eggs and nuts/seeds? These are some of the foods that are supposely great for hair (and overall health) that I've been wondering about including.

[Jennah]

The only way to get 100% healthy hair is to be healthy yourself, in order to grow healthy hair from inside. And then no need of applying other stuff than a drop of oil when the weather is really too dry (or your hair getting very long), and some ACV in your rinse if your water is hard.....

Thanks so much for all of this! I´ve been eagerly waiting to read what you were doing. :D

[Mimha]

OK, here I am again, for those who are interested in the food-health aspect of my health-and-hair-recovery", mainly Jennah and Ingrid.

I will try to answer all your questions in the most explanatory way, which is not always easy as the problem is rather complex.

To sum it up, why all that fuss about sugar, and what is my problem with it?

As I said previously, sugar brings nothing to the body but empty calories, meant to be used and burned. And as explained, our bodies have evolved to manage with scarce resources, unsweetened food and a lot of physical activity, which is no longer the situation we have today. But we are still « programed » to eagerly look for sweet and fat stuff to eat. If we add to this the fact that the food industry has very well understood our attraction for sweetness, and is therefore selling more and more refined, pre-processed, sweetened food, we quickly understand the problem : our present food is totally inadequate to our needs and has made us sugar addicted victims.

The problem with sugar is the amazing quantities we consume every day without even realizing it, as the major part of it is "hidden" sugar (like starch stuff, for ex.). It’s all the more tremendous that it is totally useless. Imagine the task we ask our body to do : filter and stock all that (and leading to obesity), or find a way or another to burn it to avoid self-poisoning (and leading to hyperactivity and permanent inflammatory state).

Another disastrous consequence of high carbohydrate diet is the fact that it changes your intestinal flora into a sugar-friendly one. Among all, the Candida albicans. This micro-organism is a normal component of our flora, and it is usually very discrete, at least as long as there is a high and balanced biodiversity in your intestine. But this little guy LOVES sugar as much as you and will spread like fire on a dry grassland if you feed it with what it loves: carbohydrates. Result: the rest of your flora will slowly regress and disappear, and the Candida will finally infest your entire body. To migrate outside the intestine, it changes its form to a mycelian one (= fungus) which produces neuro-toxins that have very bad consequences, both on your physical performances (a lot of fibromyalgia come from there), but also on your nervous system and brain, immune system, endocrinal system, and whole metabolism. It destroys your intestinal function by making it become inefficient:
- inefficient in digesting (no good flora = no good digestion)
- inefficient in protecting you from unhealthy molecules (it becomes “porous”)
So not only you will not be able to assimilate the essential nutriments any more (hence the anemia and other deficiencies), but you will also develop allergies to many unexpected things because unwanted molecules will pass through your bood system and become a hard job for your liver to filter out. (Hence the skin problems, like acne and psoriasis)

Candidiasis is a very common problem, and the specialists think that a good third of the population is more or less concerned, among which almost all the overweight persons. It doesn't mean that these persons will be as sick as I have been, because the degree of infestation and the resistance of each person is different. But the major part of the population today has a poorer flora than a few decades/centuries ago, and the problem is increasing. An unbalanced woman will not be in a position to transmit a well balanced flora to her baby. Generation after generation, we are losing our intestinal flora biodiversity for a sugar-friendly one. It is becoming such an undermining public health concern that the OMS is working on it.


Mimha’s battle plan

OK, I think now you understand better why I was so motivated to enter into such a restrictive diet: I was slowly becoming a zombie. I had to fight on 2 fronts: get rid of my candidiasis and come back to a non-inflammatory state. For both, I had – and still have – to eradicate sugar AND all products with a high glycemic index from my food. So it means:
- No sugar whatsoever
- No similar products (honey, maple-syrup, etc.)
- No refined cereals or rice, which means no refined flours as well
- No food made with the above mentioned products (i.e. bread, pizza, pastries, cookies…)
- No sweets at all


What the heck a "high glycemic index" is ??

Even if unsweetened, a lot of food stuff naturally contains a sugar load under the form of natural sugar (like fructose, for ex.) or starch. It means that once transformed by the digestion, this starch will become a sugar like any others, with exactly the same consequences. That's why we should refrain from adding extra sugar to our food. There is ALREADY all the necessary load to live, even with a highly physical life.

All sugars are not equally available for our body : some are highly assimilable, and some need a complex transformation by the digestive system. The quickly available are all the --ose stuff (glucose, saccharose, fructose, etc.). They are called highly glycemic because they end up in your blood system right after you eat them. But some others will be slowly made available by your digestion, like the starch. They have a weak glycemic effect, on a longer time. They are interesting because they don't make your blood sugar level explode. Too much sugar in a short time obliges your liver and pancreas to filter and store very quickly, because the body cannot resist to a high quantity of sugar in the blood : it is simply toxic.

So, to sum it up : in order to remain healthy, we should chose as much as possible non refined and unsweetened food stuff, which have a low glycemic index, allowing our body to use all the sugar made available by digestion, instead of stocking it in useless fat.

Apart from my sugar problem, there are other aspects I had to consider :

I have to be careful with my protein income too, by not taking too much red meat and give priority to fish and poultry (organic, if possible). I can eat eggs and dairy stuff too. (In the beginning, I had to restrict my choice to lactose-free products, but it’s ok now). I am very careful with fatty acids too, to restore my omega-3 and omega-6 balance. I use a lot of first cold pressed organic oils, such as olive, linen seeds, walnut, sesame, etc. And of course, I eat far more fruits and vegies than ever before in my life. I try to cook everything with more care, avoiding long duration boiling or deep frying. (Except when I cook Indian or Arabian food !^^). I have become a fan of my little soft-steaming marmite!


Continued on next post...

[Mimha]

... Rest of previous post :


Has it been difficult and have you gone back to eating like before?

Yes: it was – and it still is – VERY VERY difficult! So difficult that I doubt I would ever have started if I hadn’t been in a desperate situation (and losing my hair by handfuls!!). But I felt so bad, so sick, so handicapped in my everyday life. It was not a life anymore: it was survival. I really had no choice. And as I told you, it took a hell of a time : it has now been 3 years, and I am attacking the 4th year.

The first year I was hyper strict and totally paranoid : I was feeling bad one day out of two and never knew for sure what was the cause of it. I also felt very lonely in my struggle as nobody in my family considered it seriously, except my mother. But she was afraid I would become anorexic. Me!... Lol, I love food way too much!! :D

But the first year paid off: my deficiencies improved a lot. My fibromyalgia became “workable” and I could concentrate again and work several hours without feeling completely cooked or having migraine. And above all: I could sleep again! You cannot imagine what it means to be deadly tired and unable to sleep!

The second year, my doc readjusted the posology of my food complements as per the results of my exams to go on for one more year. It was a little easier as I knew my body and needs far better. I had also a better idea of how to deal with the few ingredient I was allowed to cook and I had discovered some other interesting ones.

At the end of the second year, encouraged by my progresses (and fed up with my restrictions), I stated to slowly fall again into the bad habits : eating more and more starchy things (pizzas, and from time to time pastries or hamburgers :oops:) and finally, at the end of the trird year, I had even started to eat some sweetened food again (chocolate pasties that I love and some crème caramel :()

So at the end of the third year, my deficiencies had almost all disappeared and my food intolerances to lactose and gluten almost gone. BUT... my candidiasis had spread again, even worst than before. :( So now I am again on a super low carb diet. In the same time, my "sugar appeal" is much less difficult to control because I had been used to eating almost only non-sweet food, except fruits. The good point is that now I feel the appeal of fruits when I'm hungry, whereas before I just wanted to east a chocolate stuff or a cereal bar.


Mimha's cool stuff with no sugar to enjoy

When my doc said I had to give up ALL sweet things whatsoever, and ALL white wheat stuff too, my world fall apart. WHAT was I going to eat ?? No more bread ? No more pastries ? No more white rice ? No more pizzas ? NO MORE PASTA ??? No more beloved spaghetti ???!!...
:thud: Yes, no more. And not even with gluten-free flour : too glycemic, period. Believe it or not : the thing I missed most was my morning croissant, ha ha ha !

Lol. I was tying to cheat by all means, desperately looking for substitute ingredients. I tried xylitol (extract from Finnish birch bark sap) and stevia (natural vegetal molecule) as sugar substitutes. I still use them, but very unfrequently. Mainly to cook some low-carb cakes, when I feel desperate, but less and less often. Some interesting stuff I have discovered : quinoa, chick-pea flour, caroub powder, coco milk, and my soft-steam marmite. I use it every single day ! I steam tons of brocolis, green beans, leeks, fennels, Brussels sprouts, spinach, etc. Whereas I eat carrots, celeriac and turnips raw, because they have a very high glycemic index when cooked, and a very low one when raw.

With chick-pea flour, I prepare my own pizza, and it's delicious and non glycemic at all. With caroub powder, I prepare my evening substitute of hot chocolate, with some coco milk in it (good point : M. Candida hates it !). No sugar and no fat at all and tasting deliciously sweet and rich. I became a bean lover too, eating tons of beans, broad beans, chick peas, lentils, etc. The good point : very low glycemic index and very high nutriitive value, + tons of fibers. My intestine has become good at working it : I never had any problem with gas^^. If you have problems digesting beans, it means 1) either you don't chew long enough 2) you intestinal flora is poor due to the fact that you don't eat enough fibers. :poot:

I have also increased my knowledge of international cooking. There are treasures in the other cultures ! I cook a lot of Indian, Arabian (mmmh Egyptian foul and Libanese tabouleh !!), Mediterranean food. If you are interested in some of my easy-and-healthy low-carb/low-fat recipes, I'll post my favorite ones for you ! :blossom:

[BrightEyes]

Congrats on your beautiful hair! I love the waves and thickness. I've enjoyed reading your thread, and it's evident you have had wonderful results from a healthier eating plan (I'm saying this while I gobble up gummy worms:rolleyes:) Maybe I ought to try eating a little healthier now lol

[Mimha]

Thank you BrightEyes ! :)

I'm using my hair as an advertisement tool to promote healthy food, ha ha ha !

So for the comparison, here is again my old pic of 12 years ago, and 3 recent pics showing my hair today on different moments of my washing schedule. The difference with before is also striking.

http://forums.longhaircommunity.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=18058&d=1436367486
http://forums.longhaircommunity.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=17753&d=1434455588

Ok, my hair was much longer. But hey, I was not yet 40 year old, and now I am 50 ! So it means there is hope ! :)

Concerning my thickness, I have measured it this morning, because it seems indeed quite thicker in my hand. And you are all right : I have gained 0.5 cm since last year, so now I am at 9 cm ! :) :) (I don't know how much I was 12 years ago, though). But I prefer to remain prudent about this : I am at the end of my non-shedding period, so my thickness is at its maximum. It seems that I start shedding a little more since a week or two. By Christmas it may have dropped. If not, it means that it will be one more good point to my hair improvement ! :cheese:

[meteor]

Thanks a lot for sharing your diet details and pictures of your stunning hair, Mimha! :D Interesting stuff! :D


Thanks for your detailed response, Mimha. I've been researching and trying diets for better health (and thus hair) for a few years now (ever since I had a bour of severe food allergies and severe anemia) and have come to a similar "protocol". I'm curious if your diet includes dairy, eggs and nuts/seeds? These are some of the foods that are supposely great for hair (and overall health) that I've been wondering about including.
Sorry for butting in :flower:, but I'm really curious about this: Ingrid, you noticed a link between sugar, processed, high-glycemic-index foods and anemia, am I understanding correctly? Could you please share more details? :)
I didn't know about this direct connection to sugar, I only knew about upping iron + Vit.C and caffeine/calcium avoidance around iron consumption.
(I've been suffering from anemia for a while, too. :oops: )

[Mimha]

Thanks a lot for sharing your diet details and pictures of your stunning hair, Mimha! :D Interesting stuff! :D


Sorry for butting in :flower:, but I'm really curious about this: Ingrid, you noticed a link between sugar, processed, high-glycemic-index foods and anemia, am I understanding correctly? Could you please share more details? :)
I didn't know about this direct connection to sugar, I only knew about upping iron + Vit.C and caffeine/calcium avoidance around iron consumption.
(I've been suffering from anemia for a while, too. :oops: )


I think I have given the explanation in this thread :

Sugar is a major cause of intestinal flora impoverishment, as it has as a result to select only the sugar friendly micro-organisms, among which the Candida albicans which is a very problematic one : it takes all the space, sticks to the intestine inner lining and hampers both a proper absorption of the nutriments, AND weakens the intestine hermeticity to toxins. It means that sooner or later, you'll suffer form lots of deficiencies, among which iron is particularly noticeable.

High-glycemic food and industrially processed food are equally prejudicial : high-glycemic means it will rise the sugar level in your blood, helping the Candida to develop even more, and processed food also because it is both usually very refined and deprived of valuable nutriments and also very often - as a consequence or being refined - very glycemic too. That's why a highly glycemic food (too much sugar + too much refined food + too much processed food) in the long run will cause the intestinal flora to be entirely overwhelmed by the Candida and not be able to help you digest properly and benefit of all the nutriments.

Does it sound more clear to you now ? :)

[meteor]

^ Sure! :D Thanks a lot, Mimha! :flower:

So since it "hampers proper absorption of nutrients", ideally, you would severely limit all sugar then, even for totally healthy people, not just for specific conditions or deficiencies? :)
Sounds pretty hard to do in today's world, though I understand its benefits. :)
I really admire your dedication! :applause

[lapushka]

Explaining you all the rules I try to stick to would be long and fastidious, and particularly depressing, lol. So I will just give you the basic ones :
- no more sugar at all, and no artificial sweeteners to replace it (some "natural" ones like xylitol and stevia are allowed occasionally, in very small quantity)
- no food containing added sugar (cakes, marmalade, sodas, etc. and of course no sweets whatsoever)
- no more similar carbohydrates (honey, maple sirup, etc.)
- avoid all food with a glycemic index superior to 60 (all refined flours, pastries, breakfast cereals, pasta, etc.)
- choose fresh, organic, unprocessed food (deep frozen is OK too)
- avoid refined stuff (flour, rice, bread, etc.) - I had to avoid gluten for a while, but now it's getting better :)
- eat as much as possible fresh raw fruits and and vegetables
- choose organic meat when possible, and small wild fish like sardines, mackerels, etc.
- cook gently, preferably with gentle steam (avoid deep frying... and frying in general)

We've eaten like that my entire life (except for the bread, the "organic" stuff and the frying part, sometimes we eat French fries). And I can't even stand overly sweet stuff. Sugar: yuck.

[Mimha]

(...)
So since it "hampers proper absorption of nutrients", ideally, you would severely limit all sugar then, even for totally healthy people, not just for specific conditions or deficiencies? :)


Yes, of course ! As I have said, the impoverishment of the intestinal biodiversity becomes a public health problem, as it gets poorer and poorer at each new generation, mainly due to the industrial food lobbies who are pushing us to consume cheap and worthless stuff, in which they add tons of sugar to make it attractive. One of the first measures against this should be to prevent the school canteens to serve sodas to the kids, and stop cooking them hamburgers and fried potatoes. In some countries, they have already started to promote healthy food in the schools. The kids are in better shape and they have much less cases of unmanageable hyperactive/inattentive children. I think it's a much more responsible attitude than to tame the kids with Ritalin ! But well, it's another story. :wink:

[Mimha]

We've eaten like that my entire life (except for the bread, the "organic" stuff and the frying part, sometimes we eat French fries). And I can't even stand overly sweet stuff. Sugar: yuck.

You have been lucky to have good educated parents, lapushka ! Your hair talks for yourself too ! :) In my family, most people think that the important thing is to fill your stomach. I am the only one with a university degree and I know that my nutritional concerns make them see me like an over-thinking fragile urban intellectual^^

When I was a child, we ate tons of cans and cheap products. I had lots of teeth problems, fragile bones, was asthmatic and suffer from multiple allergies. But I was the only one and nobody asked themselves the question to know if our food was appropriate : as long as we had enough of it. A kid eats what his parents give to him. And if the parents are ignorants... poor... uninterested... convinced to do their best... :shrug:

The yuck against sugar is a very health-saving reaction. I admit that now I could hardly eat some of the stuff I ate before without feeling nauseous. I consider it as a milestone in my struggle ! :cool:

[Luminaria]

Your waves are so thick and beautiful! Congrats on your growth!

[Ingrid]

Thanks a lot for sharing your diet details and pictures of your stunning hair, Mimha! :D Interesting stuff! :D


Sorry for butting in :flower:, but I'm really curious about this: Ingrid, you noticed a link between sugar, processed, high-glycemic-index foods and anemia, am I understanding correctly? Could you please share more details? :)
I didn't know about this direct connection to sugar, I only knew about upping iron + Vit.C and caffeine/calcium avoidance around iron consumption.
(I've been suffering from anemia for a while, too. :oops: )

I think Mimha's explanation is pretty poignant - if the bacterial balance is disturbed, and your gut lining is permeable, it's much more difficult for your body to absorb the essential nutrients that it needs.
In my case, also I cannot handle any standard iron supplements that contain the form of iron which is ferrous sulfate, so it was only when I found a form of organic chelated iron supplements and changed my diet to include foods that contain iron from animal sources (beef, lamb, chicken livers, etc) that I was able to improve my anemia. In a way, these foods have replaced whatever processed or high-glycemic foods that I used to eat, so it was like a substitution of more nutrient-dense foods for less nutrient dense but high energy foods. So I suppose it's not really a "direct" connection but at least in my experience these went hand in hand.

Mimha, I really appreciate your in-depth explanation of your approach! It's so inspiring to learn how your health has improved throughout your journey so far (even if you had some slip-ups). Hair really is a great indicator of a person's general health state. It really helps to learn what lifestyle changes you've adopted, and how they've impacted on your health. I've had many similar issues or symptoms to you ever since I had to have antibiotics (that I was also allergic to...) for an infection when I was 2. I never ate sweets or soda when I was growing up but my diet still included what I was told were healthy foods that everyone should eat (grains, potatoes, honey, lots of fruit) which contributed to increasing the overgrowth of bad bacteria and caused longering infections (for which I had to take antibiotics...) and endless digestive issues the details of which I'll omit. Needless to say, my hair was falling out by the handfulls. It helps now that my parents are also understanding the importance of organic foods, and are more open to changing their diet. Anyway, not to ramble on about myself, I'm so so happy for you that you've found what works, and thank you SO much for being so kind and sharing the details.

[Mimha]

(...)
Mimha, I really appreciate your in-depth explanation of your approach! It's so inspiring to learn how your health has improved throughout your journey so far (even if you had some slip-ups). Hair really is a great indicator of a person's general health state. It really helps to learn what lifestyle changes you've adopted, and how they've impacted on your health. I've had many similar issues or symptoms to you ever since I had to have antibiotics (that I was also allergic to...) for an infection when I was 2. I never ate sweets or soda when I was growing up but my diet still included what I was told were healthy foods that everyone should eat (grains, potatoes, honey, lots of fruit) which contributed to increasing the overgrowth of bad bacteria and caused longering infections (for which I had to take antibiotics...) and endless digestive issues the details of which I'll omit. Needless to say, my hair was falling out by the handfulls. It helps now that my parents are also understanding the importance of organic foods, and are more open to changing their diet. Anyway, not to ramble on about myself, I'm so so happy for you that you've found what works, and thank you SO much for being so kind and sharing the details.

Dear Ingrid,

Your interest is the best reward for the time I spent telling my story and explaining as much as I could the health issues behind food. :flowers:

Yes, there would be a lot more to say... About antibiotics, particularly !... To give antibiotics to a baby child is the best way to damage his intestinal flora (and any other body part flora, by the way). Of course, it will reconstitute. The problem is that it will reconstitute on basis of the most resistent bacterias. And God knows how many of the unknown good ones will be lost for ever, just because they are not as resistent, and will be simply unable to reconquer the place because the other ones will have taken this opportunity to occupy all the territory.

Antibiotics should be kept for major bacterian infections only (= life threatening infection). But you know how it is : people want to feel 100% safe, parents fear for their children, and doctors are afraid to be sued if their patients happen to complain. Not to mention employers who don't want their employees to take sick leaves to "let their body rest and recover". We have the world that we deserve : a world in which the "old" microbes have become so resistent that we won't be able to kill them anymore (like tuberculosis, among others), and a world in which our bodies - which were wonders of the evolution - will no longer be able to do their basic tasks, such as digesting/assimiltating plain normal food.

Wow, I sound rather pessimistic, don't I ? :lol: That's maybe why I find it a personal mission to "raise awareness" if I can. :wink:

[Jennah]

Mimha,

Thank you for spending the time to tell us about your journey. I´m fascinated with your choices! Wish I can emulate some of that.

I´ve been travelling and settling in the resort village again. This is where I do a sort of retreat and take care of my health. It´s been a little spooky with the fog and frost and very lonely since people are gone, so it takes a little while to get installed but looking forward to a transformation and to incorporate your concepts!

[Silverbrumby]

Mimha thank you for the post and its so inspiring. As a woman who battles the sugar demons, organic but still, it's inspiring to hear how it's worked for you. My sons dont drink soda or eat trans fats, fast food except organic burger once a week. We dont have juices at home or anything but organic milk or water. Better they eat the whole fruit than drink the juice.