Hi there mel:
I have a hiatel hernia that I've had operated on twice...What a pain in the rear!! Before the surgery I had horendous heartburn, I never left the house without checking to see that I had my anatacids with me. Since the surgery I still get it sometimes, but much less severely and it's much more rare. I find that too much coffee, carbonated drinks, red sauce and apples are my triggers. Every once inawhile I'll have an episode that I just can't explain though.....
I have determined that it's not all diet. If anything though, a healthy Sonoma diet is much better than a diet with greasy, sugary and processed foods which so often upset my tummy.......I did some research on a new discovery, a potential THIRD nervous system in the body called the
"anteric nervous system" which is located in the bowel/gut area. There is some very interesting work going on in this area which shows there may be a link between stress/anxiety/mental triggers and gastro-intestinal symptoms. Do a google search and read a little on it. It made me feel a whole lot better about my health issues and made me feel like I actually had some sort of control over things so I could quit obessessing over food diaries and trigger foods. Granted, there are trigger foods, but so often my symptoms seem unexplainable....Anyway, just some 'food' for thought.
Angela