I Gave Up Dairy for Four Months
Here’s my plan for bringing it back–and what I’m hoping to avoid
Sick of congestion and post-nasal drip, I gave up dairy for four months. Now I’m introducing it back to see how much of a relationship there is between my mucus, phlegm, and nose crud and my love of yogurt, butter, and ice cream.
My four-month dairy detox
This isn’t the first time I’ve gone off dairy temporarily, although it is the longest test run. I went without dairy for 30 days when I was traveling in Alaska, because I wanted to save on food costs and everything there is expensive, due to the high cost of shipping. I noticed I was less phlegmy than usual, then repeated the experiment at home to see if I’d get the same results in my usual environment.
I could breathe clearly and the awful post-nasal drip was gone. But it was so difficult not to eat dairy products that soon after my thirty-day mark, I ended up going out for pizza with my book club. My throat closed up that night while I was watching television.
Panic that I was choking subsided once I realized it was just the phlegm, returning in a big ball. If I doubted there was a link between dairy and my constant congestion, this had just confirmed it. But as a mostly-vegetarian, yogurt and cheese were some of…
