As someone who grew up on a dairy farm, I feel your pain!! :-} To "dairy products and bread" I would add bacon, ham, POTATOES, pork loin, pork chops, cabbage, PEANUT BUTTER (I know... it's a Yank thing) -- not to mention the orange juice, strawberries, blackberries -- coconuts from Korea smuggled in by my brother -- and homemade pies, cakes and cookies every day. Skipping a decade: it was bagels and cream cheese. Let's pass on!

I guess you and I both know now that these food groups will make us sick and keep us there. How do other type Os do it? Cold turkey with no looking back, in some cases. S-L-O-W-L-Y, one toe into the swimming pool at a time, for others.

Making one's own bread from alternative flours, or finding a local or online source of 100% sprouted grain or quinoa or kamut or rice or rye breads and/or pastas is the easiest intermediate course to take. Many of us make ghee to use instead of butter... it tastes the same! The essential thing to discover, though, is that bread for type Os is at most a temporary sugar rush. To maintain your energy, base your meals around meat, and fill up on squashes, sweet potatoes, broccoli, onions, any sturdy root vegetables on the type O food list. Your body has some adjustments to make from metabolizing a heavy starch supply to comfortably maintaining its balance on a higher protein/vegetable, lower grain diet. Using L-glutamine as a supplement can help get you over the hump. Your energy will return in a week or so without wheat bread and dairy. The anemia should disappear with adequate red meat intake. I would expect the thrush to recede, as well -- it just adores grain and sugar.

Coffee... well, it is a singular substance, not easily replaced. I liked mine with heavy cream. Lovely, isn't it? I've quit coffee several times in my life, and the only good thing I can say about it is, at least I had no withdrawal symptoms. If you do decide to let it go, a good quality green tea has enough theine to ease any discomfort you may experience. Your local health food store may carry a number of coffee substitutes: try them out. No, they're not coffee, but some of them taste darned close to it. I'm not sure what is readily available in NZ, but Roma Kaffree, Teeccino and other roasted barley blends are common here in the States. There is also an herbal blend called Raja's Cup which tastes quite coffee-like to me, if a bit licoricy, and confers health benefits as well. It has high antioxidant activity.

Vicky, we all go through this. You are by no means alone! We look at avoid foods we love and think we'll never get through life without them. We think of gathering places, traditions, favorite outings, holidays, friends, family... so much of it comes down to shared food, and emotional attachments to the anxiety-alleviating habits we have formed. We all do the best we can!

I have great admiration for Registered Nurses, and your note reflected many of the fine qualities I have found in the best ones. You have discovered a health plan that will guide you toward accomplishing your goals. Don't give it up. It is worth tackling. Let us know how you do!