SCD Continual State of Becoming: Chocolate is NOT legal on the SCD... so my frustrations begin :)

Before my book arrived from amazon, Breaking The Vicious Cycle by Elaine Gottschall, I relied on her online website Legal/ Illegal List to find foods that were okay to eat. I had lost 10 pounds despite trying to follow a BRAT ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BRAT_diet ) diet and only putting "gentle" things on my stomach. Everything went right through me. Everything. I had to start very slow. At the beginning.

The beginning of the SCD. The beginning calls for homemade chicken soup which is essentially a whole chicken simmering for 4 hours with carrot puree. After 4 days of Chicken Soup, dry curd cottage cheese, homemade yogurt with honey and pressed apple cider I was finally starting to feel like I could add a few other things. I still took it slow as my symptoms were extreme. Diarrhea. Blood. Cramping. Pain. I eased into adding one or two foods at a time to make sure I tolerated them. Mostly fruits and vegetables. Cooked. Then raw. Then eggs. First hard boiled. Then over hard with butter in a cast iron skillet. Then I found uncured, unsweetened bacon. Delish :). My staples for breakfast have become eggs, bacon, yogurt with honey/ fruit/ nuts, and juice. I have branched out. My mother gave me an SCD recipe book. I purchased a second book. I started reading SCD blogs for inspiration and more recipes. Most of my recipes are adapted from these sources. I was feeling successful in being grain, starch and refined sugar free. Then my mind wandered to cravings for chocolate.

Choooocoolate. I am pregnant. Is that a valid excuse? No, I know it's not. But I attempted to adapt as best I could and so far only one weakness. No croissants. No traditional baked goods. No more bakery runs with Jenni. I felt defeated. Then I realized I was the one in control, not the diet. We all make decisions we have to live with. This is mine.

I have to say one of the first things I looked up was chocolate. Chocolate: ILLEGAL. Shit. Dr. Haas advised not to use cocoa or chocolate and this still goes, it isn't just the sugar he was worried about. So I look into this further. This blog post sums up many sources on why cocoa/ chocolate may be illegal. http://thescd.wordpress.com/tag/chocolate/. Regardless, 4 weeks after initiating the diet I have decided to make my own chocolate in the most SCD-friendly way possible, but mind you it is still illegal. This is where my perseverance fades.