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A few months back I downloaded the 'Dietary Cure for Acne' and have been slowly moving the entire family over to the Paleo diet. This month we have begun the elimination diet, our primary motive is to journey along with, and support our 15yr old son who suffers from moderate acne. Not hurting our other teens either. Our son's acne is more of the red inflamed acne over his face predominately, breaking out with pimples when he goes on a sugar binge.

Some difficulties we encountered whilst graduating over is 15yr old trains 4xwkly for swimming. At 5am what does he eat? Finally he consented to trialling leftovers with an egg and is finding energy is fine, just as good as with the processed carbs and dairy.

The other to be frank is cost, we are a large family and the children are consuming vast amounts of fruit and vegies. Managing to keep within budget though, but problem is they say they are still hungry particularly the boys and husband, who do burn far more fuel. They are missing bread and potatoes.

I'd love to hear from others who have done this journey. How long before you saw a big difference with the acne once you began the elimination diet? How do you keep big fuel burners satisfied?

Much thanks Erin

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Write his sample menu for three days. – Ikco Nov 15 2010 at 13:29
If the diet allows some starches such as sweet potatoes, you'd probably be better swapping them for much of the fruit both for expense and sugar issues. – Karen May 26 at 11:01

9 Answers

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I used to have inflamed acne, but before I even started the diet, I was already taking medicine to help with that. I would still have a break out once every other week, but it wasn't quite as severe. With that said, I did not see an almost complete elimination of my acne until around a month and a half of being full paleo. Still, he is 15, so he may still have some acne for a while. (I am 22)

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Personally, with my kids I still do potatoes and rice. Also, you can stretch the budget making bone broth soups. We have 3 kids...

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Acne is the body attempting to rid it of toxins that have been acquired in utero and/or since birth. The most common toxins we take in are wheat products and sugar products. The elimination of both will result in a properly functioning gut with all the good flora that is necessary to get rid of the toxins and therefore the acne.

Edit: Other toxins are corn oil, soybean oil, canola oil, sunflower oil.

Regarding the hunger issue...your family is missing protein and especially fat. Consuming "vast amounts of fruits and veggies" for energy is counter productive to paleo. You are feeding them esentially sugar...carbs being sugar molecules bonded together and fruit, which is half sucrose and half fructose. Limit these and feed them a diet of 75% fat and 25% protein and they will eat til full and no more and they will not run out of energy.

Breakfast 3 eggs cooked in butter or better yet, coconut oil, along with bacon or sausage. The best value for bacon is at Wal-Mart..Wrights brand bacon ends & pieces for $4.97 for 3 pounds. I microwave mine for quick preparation and I save the fat for cooking soups. My Coconut oil from Amazon Nutiva 54oz $22.00. Salads always with olive oil and vinegar. Need the fat to absorb the salad nutrients.

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Dexter has it dead on. They need far more fat and protein than veggies and fruit. Think of veggies as an awesome side dish and fruit as dessert. You certainly wouldn't be feeding your kids dessert to fill up on, right? The fat and protein will do the trick. They will be roaring with energy, not over eating and not hungry at all.

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Regarding the acne--I had horrible acne as a teen and in my early 20's. Not until 2 years ago when I changed to traditional foods did it start to subside. I found that my skin responds well to coconut oil applied topically on a daily basis. I buy mine from Tropical Traditions when they send a sale email. They tend to have killer deals on the gallon and 5gallon.

Regarding cost-- cheap cuts of meat, organs, potatoes fried in tallow or bacon fat, veg fried in bacon fat or coconut oil, eggs, bone broth soups with coconut milk can really keep the cost down. Ive also found some great cheap coconut flour recipes on the tropical traditions site that I can throw in cheaply for snacks or alternate breakfast ideas.

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If you want them to be full, up the fat! Try some sweet potatoes fried in coconut oil or ghee. Lots of fat. Potatoes would work well too, and they're quite cheap. Do you do fatty dairy? heavy cream is a calorie bomb. As is coconut milk. Nuts can get you lots of calories too, juts be careful with the n-6.

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if your doing full elimination then you are not allowed to eat potatoes...

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Try an omelette cooked in organic coconut oil. The oil will suppress his hunger, but energy levels will be high. You can add spinach or other preferred vegetables to that. It's interesting that you say the children remain hungry because this is the reverse of what they should be experiencing. Potataoes and bread are carbohydrates which spike insulin levels - not good for acne!

One thing you might like to try are some raw snacks. These are satisfying and in line with Paleo. Happy to send you some.

Our interest in Paleo stemmed from another health issue other than acne, but, what we found was an amazing turnaround in small, niggly health issues that we'd just learned to accept. We enjoy amazingly good sleep patterns, energy for exercise, are able to put in long work days (writing, after work, about Paleo and the likes) and despite not needing to particularly lose weight, we all did. There's a terrific book called 'Nourishing Traditions' by Sally Fallon. That may alos give you some ideas! good luck!

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I must admit, this diet did not help me. It did not inflate the acne but it did not help either which I was sad about.

I do belive that certain foods cause acne, it's just finding that food that effects you personally.

This expert helped me, maybe it will help you ?

http://jaydenrivers.com/acnearticle

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