Hi all, know many are interested in the link between gut health and RSL and wondered if anyone has tried Map My Gut. It’s run by academics who 'map the microbial contents of your gut'. I've not tried it as it’s not available in Ireland (but may give it a crack next time I’m in the UK).
It would be interesting to see if RSL suffers find any common issues.
Anyway the links here if interested - mapmygut.com/
That food map diet is only eating certain foods you can look it up
Hi Beady
I am not sure but I think you are referring to the FODMAP diet which has nothing to do with Map my Gut
Everyone with RLS should give the FODMAP or the Low Chemical diet a trial. It costs nothing and there are no drugs and no side-effects other than a longing for some banned foods. It might help as many as 30% of RLS victims. It has helped me and I hope many others will give it a chance to help them.
Cheers
Graham
Sorry Graham you are right, the foodmap diet is what I was thinking,are you doing it and have you had any luck rls wise, if so I will do my shopping tomorrow and get myself a list together,I have read what foods to have thanks
Tomorrow is a good day to start. I suggest you search this forum for references to FODMAP and Low chemical diet (Note that is fOd not fOOd)
I have had RLS since I was about 15. It became worse at about 50 and really bad about 60 I can't quite remember the timing. I started mucking around with diets about 5 years ago and now I am 71 and sleeping well.
My RLS was making life impossible, principally because of lack of sleep. I was barely able to hold my job and absolutely dangerous driving, particularly when I had to work until 3 am on a breakdown.
I started with a gluten free diet and found it helped but I still had many bad times. I was told about the FODMAP diet by Monash University and it gave me say 80% of a cure. I was then directed toward the low chemical diet by my dietician's father. This gave me 100% relief. After a couple of weeks I had about 16 nights in a row of undisturbed sleep. Since then I have been re-introducing foods with limited success So I reintroduce a small amount of a food and if I sleep alright then I increase the "dose" until I get the RLS back. As an example I found I could drink a cup of full milk per day without a problem but not a cup and a half. Then I go back on the diet until I have 5 days of zero RLS and try something different. Some times my spirit and flesh both weaken and my discipline fails me and I choose to stay on the exclusion diet because I have a lot of work to do and I just can't afford a failure. Usually I have RLS for a couple of days after I resume the diet and then I start to sleep again. If it takes me several nights to get rid of the RLS again then, for the first RLS free night, I might sleep for 12 hours.
I strongly recommend you find a dietician who understands a bit about these diets because they will help you a lot with systematically reintroducing foods. Without their help and encouragement its easy to be a little slack or forgetful. Try very hard to stick to it absolutely. I was surprised how just a half scone or a single piece of onion was enough to spoil my day.
Some people have tried it and it works while others try it and it fails. I hope you are in the successful group.
Incidentally I still take a vitamin B12 tablet and a Folate tablet every morning and a ferrous diglycinate tablet at night, just before bed. I dont think I need them but again I am too scared to risk I waste a week with a re-visit of RLS
Good Luck
Cheers
Graham
Graham thanks for a nice lot of news ,I went shopping and got all food ready to start ,through all my old stuff away wicked but I have got to try my first mistake I bought goats milk instead of soya ,will let you know how I get on
Good move
In Australia we can buy a lactose free cows milk which I use. Its become available in many coffee shops so I order a decaf, lactose free, flat white. Makes me wonder why I don't just drink water! Mentally I am clinging to my old cup of coffee. Incidentally many other people think almond milk is better than soy.
I think the lactose free milk tastes better with my oats in the morning. Be careful of oats because some of them contain residual wheat. Its enough to upset celiacs but I don't know if its a problem for RLSers so I just try to avoid it. I have at least one bowl of oats every day.
Recently, I stopped eating modern wheat. I wondered if it had anything to do with the RLS. It's been a few weeks and I've dropped size and pounds but no effect on my RLS. For me, I doubt there is any connection to food, as I grow all my own fruits, eat only organically and eat no meat, pork, chicken and rarely fish.
I don't have a gluten intolerance. I just noticed that women who were eating this type of diet were generally slender. I still eat durum wheat and ancient grains, but not every day. Not seeing any connection to my diet so far. But that's me...
It sounds like you have found a good diet for weight loss but why would that help RLS? I can't see why you say that diet has no effect on RLS when there are many examples that support that hypothesis. Its apparent that the FODMAP diet doesn't help everyone with RLS but it helps some. Without a professionally conducted study we don't know if that is 1% or 50% A proper study would be just about impossible to perform because of the difficulty in controlling the diet of 100 people for 3 months. Unless they were in jail! In the meantime we can each try and see if it helps us personally and hope it does.
Do you eat apples, pears , onion, peas? All not allowed on the FODMAP exclusion diet. If your body responds to the FODMAP exclusion diet then you might find you can reintroduce these to your food choices. With FODMAPS it depends on quantity as well as the type of food. As an example your body might be happy with half an apple but not a whole apple. Someone else might find they can eat as many apples as they like while a third might have to live without apples at all.
The FODMAP diet was designed for IBS victims and it seems to be a fortunate coincidence that it is useful for some RLS sufferers. FODMAPs have nothing to do with "healthy" food or vegetarian food. Once you have established your allowable foods then you must try to make a healthy diet out of stuff that you can tolerate.
The Low Chemical exclusion diet is similar but looking for different substances that your body can't handle. Again the chemicals referred to generally have nothing to do with organic growing or herbicides and things like that but are chemicals that the food itself creates or contains. Like ripe bananas or well done steak. Slightly green bananas and rare steak do not contain the undesirable chemical.
If your RLS is bad enough then I suggest you try one of these diets and see what happens. You will have an answer in a few months at the most. If it helps you then I think you are lucky enough to have a solution to RLS for the rest of your life. Its got to be worth a try.
I think diet definitely must play a part Graham. Suprised at apples, peas, onions and pears! I thought they were good for me and form quite a part of my vegetarian diet. RLS playing up more at the moment I'm wondering if heat plays a part, so unusual for UK to be this hot. Or maybe just coincidence. But thank you will look into FODMAP.
Patrick😊
Unfortunately this is not available on NHS and costs from £350 to £550.
What! Thats a shame, could be interesting
I think so too. I think what Graham has said about cutting out foods then reintroducing them sounds a great idea. I have a fairly healthy diet but not taken that extra step and done this. Feel it's something I must follow up as RLS is ruining my life at the moment.
RSL advised would be appreciated 
focussing on gut microbiome
Success.. 3 months now without RSL after food intolerance diagnosed
