Anti-Oxalate Diet

Hi. I was wondering if anyone had experience with an anti-oxalate diet. I am symptomatic again after a few years of having done fairly well. This is because my insurance company changed its formulary recently and will no longer pay for brand-name Lyrica. I seem to do better on the brand-name formulation than various generics. While that gets sorted out (hoping it does get sorted out), I thought I’d try the anti-oxalate diet. I remember getting much worse when I upped my oxalate intake. Perhaps seriously reducing it will help? Thoughts?

Hi Jalika. I have to say that I have had great results with lyrica. The generics did not work for me. Had to have my doctor write a letter to the insurance company to get it approved. Still expensive but worth it.
Good luck.

I’ve been on a carnivore diet since the beginning of December. I fell off the wagon a few times but I have recently started to feel better along with taking gabapentine. Lyrica did not work for me. It’s hard to say if it’s the diet or the meds but I’m continuing both as this is the best I have felt in a year

I would like to know more about this diet. Desperate to try anything.

Me too. I found a single set of posts buried in a thread I can’t seem to find again. But the person who tried it had very good results. I’ll try to dig up the thread.

Just a reminder, you should have monitoring by a physician when engaging in diet plans that cut out more than just excess calories and refined sugars. Eliminating nutritious foods requires careful planning to ensure you’re still getting necessary nutrients in adequate amounts.

You’re probably thinking of @Cindy2, who discusses a low oxalate diet in the following comments (in descending chronological order):

Thanks for digging that out of the various threads. Her posts struck me because a few years ago I tried one of those high protein diets (with shipped food) to lose some weight and flared perhaps worse than ever. Turns out it the food was all soy oxalate. I did talk to my doctor about starting the diet and she said it was fine. For now it is just about swapping spinach for kale, raspberries for apples, etc. Start slow and see what happens. I’m also upping my exercise and trying to meditate more.

Very good. What would be the mechanism by which a low oxalate diet would reduce flaring from erythromelalgia? For instance, capsaicin (the “spicy” component in chili peppers) causes neurogenic vasodilation in the skin and is a logical agonist for EM flaring. I’ve experienced that myself after eating spicy foods. Is there a theory for why oxalate would affect EM symptoms?

I am afraid it was really something I dropped in passing. I wish I knew more about the mechanisms by which lowering oxalate levels are could effect EM. I just have two anecdotes (Cindy’s posts and my experience with increasing oxalate) and as I hear repeatedly from colleagues in the sciences — anecdotes aren’t data. I started the thread in the hope that others might know more.