My first month of low carbing (this time 'round) went great. I lost 11 pounds, I was starting to get my energy back, the indigestion that I often suffered when on a Refined Carb, Hi Fat Diet was gone. (I've suffered from indigestion since I was 12 and, I'm told, colic as an infant. I had batteries of tests done when I was in high school and was told there was nothing wrong; it was nerves. And somtimes it is.)

At the end of that first month, I got a bout of awful indigestion after eating salmon cakes (no breading; I bought them, but from a store where I often shop and that takes care with its food). I've never been quite right since. There will be a day or two when I feel OK, but then I begin to feel sluggish -- I feel like a python who's swallowed a mongoose for a good two hours after eating. I know from past bouts of this that it's the protein and unrefined carbs that are not digested; the refined ones sail through. This coincided with a marked slowdown in my rate of loss -- 3 pounds in December, 1 so far this month. Yes, I've been switching programs and twice went off program, but I did that after several weeks of feeling awful, so I don't think that's the cause.

And now for the question. Doreen wrote something in Nat's Journal this morning that a digestive system accustomed to eating mostly protein produces certain enzymes, and, when confronted with grain, may not handle them well. Ergo, I thought, perhaps it's the opposite. The digestive system of someone who has eaten a diet of, almost exclusively refined sugar and flour may be lacking in lots of enzymes.

Are there supplements one can take, or anything else one can do, to aid a sluggish digestion? (I'm not talking about irregularity, although that follows three or four days of sluggishness. I mean that food is moving out of the stomach in ritardo.)

Alto....

I think what you are looking for is a digestive enzyme called papaine and I believe that it's available in health food stores. The papaya has a lot of these enzymes. When I was in Hawaii I ate a papaya everyday of the 10 days and lost 3 pounds while I was there. I weighed 143 when I went there and 140 when I came home.

Marlaine

Thanks. I think I'll look for the enzyme rather than the papaya (I like papayas, but I think they're very high in carbs.)