Some of the techniques I’ve tried to manage my IBS. Realised that I am fructose intolerant, meaning I can’t eat most fruits, many vegetables and definitely not sucralose — which is in all the common protein powders.

I got this protein instead — it’s meant to be easy on the digestive system and it’s sweetened with stevia, but I’m not gonna lie.. it tastes like cement.

Most expensive protein I’ve ever bought and it doesn’t even taste good.

The taste was not really a problem, as a bodybuilder you just get it down for the nutrients sake. The problem was that pea protein takes 4 hours to absorb, and I needed it for that post-workout protein shake for muscle growth, or maintenance in this case as I was back in calorie deficit having plans for another competition.

I had to try keto again, I used to do it in my early 20s and never had a problem with it back then, no craving and no bloating.

Keto is HIGH FAT, HIGH PROTEIN and NO CARBS. My macros would be 175-200g protein, 70-80g fat & max 20g carbs — that is basically no carbs at all. Spinach, cheese and meat during the day adds up to that. Being on such low amount of carbohydrates makes the body takes extreme measures because it has no idea what is going on more than that we are starving and need to find fuel somewhere else than in the form of glucose. The body starts making ketones, fatty acids, from your fat storages.

Keto worked really good this time around also, except for the lack of fiber that caused even worse constipation. I could go for almost a week without anything coming out. Another problem was sticking to the plan, because it was so restricted calorie wise there wasn’t much food to eat. Normally, I’d just eat some slices meat or cheese, but to stay in such deficit it wasn’t possible. So I stuck to it for about one or two weeks, I did get flat at one point and it was amazing to see my toes again.

I added intermittent fasting to the mix after a while, because I started reading about how to build more muscle, it’s supposed to release more growth hormone, but it’s also good for digestive issues as it gives the system a break.

You need to fast for minimum 12 hours for fat burning and to give the digestive system a break, but you need to do at lest 16 hours for the growth hormone to start. That’s why you’ve probably heard about the 8:16 fasting. You have a eating window of 8 hours and then 16 hours of water and sleep.

First fast went super, no problem at all! Then it got just harder and harder, I can fast for about 12 hours which is good enough but after that my brain function is about zero. I can’t even talk properly, so to even think about doing a workout or handle online clients is impossible.

Need to think about life outside of the diet as well.

At this point it felt like nothing was working, my bloating was just getting worse, my weight was fluctuating and I still could not control my stress eating and cravings.

I was determined to do another bikini contest later in August and September (this was in June-July), that’s why I had to stay in deficit, so my last call was elimination diet, well I did like a liquid diet first for one or two days to let my digestive system get a break while still getting the nutrients.

Elimination diet is just excluding everything that could be harder to digest, or cause gas or be intolerable. In my last post you can see what I ate during these days, it worked mostly, but at the same time not because I had to deal with a lot of stress at the same time and the stress bloating + stress eating + emotional eating just counter acted the whole thing.

All this stress plus calorie deficit and prepping for a contest, it just not possible right now.

I dropped the content prep and started focus on building muscle size and eat low FODMAP foods to heal my gut instead — sometimes you need to re-prioritise, and right now repairing my gut is more important than doing another competition.