**I am not a health care professional, a nutritionist or a dietician. This blog post contains scientific research + my personal experience, but is not meant to tell you how to eat for your body. Please consult a professional if you need help navigating the right diet for this season of your life + illness!
Okay, sweet friend. I’m going to level with you here. If you’re reading this post, I bet you’re hurting. I bet you’re desperately searching for THE THING that is going to make a difference in your symptoms + my heart goes out to you. I have been there.
When I was diagnosed with endometriosis in 2019, I was so lost + struggling so much. I was willing to do any and everything to help improve my debilitating symptoms. And as a girl who’s spent much of her life + her healing journey in the kitchen, I knew that my diet + what I ate was where I wanted to start. It felt the most tangible to me. I really do believe in the power of food + what it can do for us. I’ve seen how my body responds both positively + negatively to what I put into it + so, I knew there must be a best diet for endometriosis + I was going to find it.
Before we dive into the best diet for endometriosis, I want to really give you a full picture of how I used the research + my personal experience to bring me to the point where I am today – living more freely with food + with less endometriosis pain than ever. I promise it’s possible for you too…it just might look different than you expect.
Jumping In + Making Changes
As soon as I knew endometriosis was making me sick, I dove into all the research I could find. I ordered books, I watched YouTube videos + I scoured social media. I wanted to know the exact things to eat (and not to eat) to make myself better. But do you know what I found?
A lot of conflicting information.
Guess what happened when desperate me tried to make all of the “recommended” changes? I actually made myself sicker. Because what you put into your body matters, yes, but so do your stress levels. Following strict guidelines felt like the right thing for me to do at the time, the thing that I knew, but the stress of maintaining dietary perfection actually flared my digestive symptoms, increased my anxiety + negatively impacted my Endo pain.
I wonder if any of this sounds familiar to you? I was afraid to eat anything I hadn’t prepared myself. Meals out at restaurants or people’s homes caused me so much fear. And I stressed so much over each individual bite or ingredient, that I wasn’t really able to tell what food was or wasn’t affecting me because EVERYTHING was making me sick. I felt guilty when I was tempted to eat something not on the list + was sure that it was my fault that I wasn’t getting better.
I’m going to say something counterintuitive here, I know that most of us think the best diet for endometriosis has to be something restrictive, but eliminating things from your diet might not be helpful for you or your endometriosis. Hang with me, I’ll explain:
Why Eliminating Foods isn’t Always Right
Eliminating foods, for many of us, is born out of a place of fear. And when we make choices about our diet and the way that we feed and nurture ourselves from a place of fear, restriction, or deprivation, we aren’t actually making the best choices for our bodies. It FEELS like we are because we’re desperately hoping for improvement, but you cannot battle your body into wellness or shame yourself into healing.
Any time we talk about eating for healing, most people naturally jump to removing all sorts of foods from their dietary repertoire. And I get that, I really do. There is research that points to some foods being more helpful or unhelpful than others, particularly when we’re talking about endometriosis. In all honesty, my body did need to remove certain foods to fully heal. Sometimes removing foods from our diet really is helpful + worth it.
But, as someone with a history of disordered eating, who has fought her way tooth + nail to a real place of food freedom, it’s been a delicate balance, managing my symptoms through diet. I talk to so many women who have a very short list of foods that they feel safe eating. They’ve eliminated item after item in hopes that their sickness will improve…but it hasn’t. Instead, they feel sick + stressed by maintaining a diet that more than likely has them deficient in calories and nutrients + leads them down a road of a potentially damaged digestive system + learned restriction.
And I believe that making the choice about which camp you fall into, whether being a bit more strict with your diet is actually a healthy choice for you, really comes down to knowing yourself + the season of life you are in with your illness. Often with diet + lifestyle changes, we make sweeping recommendations for people without taking into account our seasons of life, our budgets, our schedules, any other medical or mental conditions, our sleep, our family life – all things that impact how our bodies feel + how they behave.
There are times in our lives when removing food groups in the hopes of feeling better is the right choice, but there are also plenty of seasons when it’s not. It’s up to you to really determine which camp you fall into right now! You have permission to be either!
The Best Diet For Endometriosis
If you’re feeling in a really healthy space with your relationship with your body, but are hoping to see an improvement in your symptoms, there ARE things that you can do to feel better. This is not an all inclusive list + PLEASE talk to your health care provider if you’re unsure about making changes to your lifestyle, but here is what the research + my personal experience have shown me:
Caffeine: Looking at your caffeine intake is perhaps the easiest way to make a small change + see a huge impact. Eliminating caffeine was one of the best things I have ever done for my endometriosis. I actually wrote an entire blog post just on caffeine, it’s effects + what my new relationship with it looks like.
Hydration: While not necessarily food related, getting enough water in your diet is ESSENTIAL for dealing with painful periods and endometriosis. You can click here to read more about all the ins + outs of just why hydration is a key part of the best diet for endometriosis.
Gluten: Gluten and I have had a tumultuous relationship over the last decade. On my doctor’s orders, I removed gluten from my diet in 2010. This dietary change helped me to shake the chronic migraines and chronic diarrhea I’d been struggling with for years. I’ve chosen to remain gluten-free after my own experimentation + I do believe it helps keep my endo pain at bay. For the many people who report gluten sensitivity (different than a gluten allergy), eating a gluten-free diet can offer substantial relief.
If you’re not sure if you’re sensitive to gluten, but if you’re struggling with endometriosis, the research on the relationship between gluten + endometriosis is not extensive. However, it is impactful. One study found that when a group of 207 women with endometriosis removed gluten from their diet for 12 months, 75% of them reported experiencing less pain + a better quality of life.
The good news, if you want to try going gluten-free, is that there are so many gluten-free alternatives available for everything from pasta to bread. And honestly, there are plenty of healthy non-gluten containing carb sources like rice, potatoes + veggies!
Dairy: Much like gluten, my relationship with dairy goes all the way back to babyhood. My poor tummy has never been able to handle the stuff. Lactose-intolerants unite! So, for my own personal digestive health, I largely avoid dairy. As I’ve navigated my own healing journey + my gut has reached a much healthier place, I will occasionally include some greek yogurt or sneak a few licks of my husband’s ice cream with no impact 🙂
In terms of the research, there isn’t a ton of conclusive information. Anecdotally, many women report finding some level of relief from symptoms like bloating or digestive troubles when they remove dairy, but these claims are not yet backed by hard science. However, because dairy can be an inflammatory food for some people, it’s logical to assume that any level of inflammation can trigger the already painful inflammation of endometriosis tissue. However, as with all things, this will be hugely individual! Milk or cream may cause discomfort, but hard cheeses or yogurt might be fine for you. It’s all about experimenting + figuring out what works best for your body + your disease. If dairy doesn’t bother you, then leave it!
Red Meat: Many women with endometriosis claim to see relief by limiting their intake of red meat (or even of animal products all together). There, again, isn’t a lot of scientific evidence that limiting red meat will lessen pain, however one study DID find that higher red meat consumption did significantly increase the risk for endometriosis in patients.
I personally struggle with maintaining adequate iron levels + ferritin stores, so I choose to leave some red meat in my diet for the heme iron! (This is common for women of child bearing age, especially those who bleed heavily during their period.) If you didn’t know (it’s okay, I didn’t know until someone told me!), there are actually 2 forms of iron: heme iron, found in animal sources + non-heme iron found in plant foods + fortified foods. Heme iron is more easily absorbed + used by the body, which is why I tend to make it a priority!
I probably consume red meat 1-2 times a week in something like this Paleo Sweet Potato Sloppy Joe Skillet + I’ve never had a problem with it. But if you’re really struggling + you won’t miss it that much, going red meat free for a few weeks could be an interesting experiment for you!
Inflammatory Foods: An anti-inflammatory diet is often touted as the best diet for endometriosis, and I have to agree. The challenging thing is that each person responds differently to different foods, so your inflammatory foods might be different than mine!! Foods like gluten, diary, sugar, high fod-map foods, alcohol, legumes or even eggs could all fall into this category. When I started trying to determine what my trigger foods were, I partook in a Whole30. Again, whether or not this will be helpful or hurtful for you will depend on where your mental and emotional state is currently. For me, it was an incredible tool to collect information about my body, but it was not a long-term solution. Working with a naturopathic doctor or a dietician might be more helpful for you!
Hope for your Best Endometriosis Diet
If you’re reading this and feeling overwhelmed, sweet friend, let me offer you some hope: you do not need to change your whole life overnight to feel better. Small changes add up to really big, lifelong improvements + your mental and emotional health matters just as much as your digestive health or period health.
When I was in the thick of it, I thought there was never, any way that I would be able to eat more than vegetables, meat + rice cakes. I thought I HAD to find the best diet for endometriosis or I would never heal + that just wasn’t true.
The honest truth is that as I’ve learned to listen to my body, trust what it’s telling me + have LOTS of grace for the journey, I’ve continued to see improvements in my endometriosis symptoms + more freedom in my diet. Hang in there, friend! The same can be true for you!
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