Towards the end of 2011, I found a delicious gluten free cereal recipe that I started making in the weekends and having it each day for breakfast.
However, I started having stomach issues at about the same time as starting to eat the cereal each day but it also coincided with having a ten day course of the pain killing drug Celebrix. I had numerous specialist visits and numerous procedures but nothing definitive was found to be the cause of the stomach distress and exhaustion.
Around the middle of last year I realised that after eating my cereal, the stomach pains would get worse and sometimes I just had to lie on the couch for an hour or so before I could get up. So one day I said to Haitch, I think there is something in the cereal that my body is not coping with and I think it is the brazil nuts. Don’t ask me why I thought it was the brazil nuts. It was a hunch. A bit like if you have ever had food poisoning, the culprit food is usually very clear in your mind and you feel unwell each time you think of that food. Well, I was feeling sick each time I even thought of eating brazil nuts.
So I stopped making my cereal. I was so sad about this and I whinged to Haitch about how unfair life was. My home made cereal was one of my daily food pleasures I had left and it was being taken away from me.
That was July last year. I hadn’t had my cereal since and had experienced no regular stomach issues. So last month, (January) I decided I was ready to start making my cereal again. This time I would leave out the brazil nuts. Oh how glorious. I can now eat my cereal again and no stomach pains and other such symptoms.
But last weekend I got silly. I bought some brazil nuts and added them to my new batch of cereal. I only added 1/3 of a cup. I used to add 2/3. This cereal lasts me a week, so it wasn’t a lot of brazil nuts being eaten each day.
Yesterday at work, I had an upset and bloated stomach shortly after eating my cereal. It lasted all day. So I searched online to see if brazil nuts can cause stomach pain and this is what I found. Yes, brazil nuts can cause stomach pain. It is the selenium. How very interesting. I am guessing that my next batch of cereal with NO brazil nuts will not cause me any stomach issues.
Time will tell.
Oh no! Well at least you know the cause
I’ve been having stomach issues for a few months now. I have a specialist appointment next month, thankfully. I couldn’t seem to find any trigger foods until a couple of weeks ago… Two definites are coffee and corn! Chocolate and soy are also on my suspicious list. I don’t know if it’s a food intolerance thing though, it could be something like gall stones that’s triggered by food..? :/
It is so unfair, isn’t it. But once we know, it becomes easy to avoid the food and therefore the pain. Good luck.
I’m coeliac and intolerant to brazil nuts.. showed up in my blood work. Maybe they’re hard to digest on a coeliac stomach? Funny coincident if nothing else anyhow
Interesting. I thought something similar.
Wow, that article is interesting, I didn’t think there was a recommended limit on the number of brazil nuts per day. To be honest I don’t really like brazil nuts anyway, they’re a bit strong tasting for me. P.S. I wish I had asked for a batch of your home made cereal for my birthday
I should have thought of that earlier.