My stomach has bothered me most of my life. As far back as I can remember, I've had stomachaches and digestive problems. I've been to doctors and asked why, and been told everything from "it's all in your head" to "stop eating so much salt" down to "lose weight". No matter what I've tried, I couldn't lose weight, but my numbers were good, so despite the weight, there was no huge push from the doctor to find out more.
Meanwhile, every time I ate, my stomach hurt. I found myself in pain. Some nights I woke up from the pain - but there were no answers.
I finally sat down with a nutritionist. A newly minted nutritionist who had just graduated with a MS and passed the big national certifications.
I spoke at length about my inability to lose weight and my digestive issues.
I mentioned my allergies to soy and sensitivity to gluten.
After much discussion, he convinced me that I most likely had another food allergy that had yet to be tracked down, and he suggested that I try an elimination diet. An elimination diet is just that - you eliminate a food for a week, and then you add it back in to your diet and see what happens. I told him I didn't have allergies, because I don't have anaphylaxis. He told me that most food allergies don't present at anaphylaxis, but instead as persistent digestive problems.
His first suggestion was milk, as it is one of the big allergens.
Rooting out the source of all dairy was harder than I thought it was going to be. It turns out that finding processed food that doesn't contain milk is even harder than finding processed food that doesn't contain gluten.
At the end of the week, I felt better than I remember feeling in recent years. The bloating in my stomach had gone down, and my joints had all stopped hurting. I'd slept through the night almost every night, and I had energy - oh the energy!
When I put milk back into my diet, I felt like someone was running a knife through my stomach from the inside out. You remember that scene in Alien where the aliens were working their way out of the stomach of their host human? Yeah, that kind of pain. The digestive consequences were massive, and my allergies came back with a vengeance. No amount of allergy medicine could get my allergies under control. The phlegm was a massive problem - from the moment I started drinking my first post challenge milkshake until about 12 hours later.
I've been off of milk and all milk products for 3 months now. It's been rough. Sometimes, I'm not as vigilant as I should be about reading ingredient labels and I find myself suffering the GI consequences for a couple of days after the fact.
The result? My stomach bloating has gone down. I'm sleeping well through the night. I'm losing weight. My joints have stopped aching. The redness has left my face. All of that from one food allergy. Many, many thanks to the nutritionist that was willing to work with me and listen to me. He didn't sit down and tell me anything about carbs or balancing my diet. He listened to my concerns, and gave me real suggestions to see if we could figure out what was going on. He has my eternal gratitude. We are now working together on my diet, and I am learning more about food every day.
(I am really looking forward to Ben and Jerry's Vegan ice cream hitting my local store.)
Here's more information about food allergies from the Food Allergy Research and Education website.
Mild Symptoms (may include one or more of the following)
- Hives (reddish, swollen, itchy areas on the skin)
- Eczema (a persistent, dry, itchy rash)
- Redness of the skin or around the eyes
- Itchy mouth or ear canal
- Nausea or vomiting
- Diarrhea
- Stomach pain
- Nasal congestion or a runny nose
- Sneezing
- Slight, dry cough
- Odd taste in the mouth
- Uterine contractions
Severe Symptoms (may include one or more of the following)
- Obstructive swelling of the lips, tongue, and/or throat
- Trouble swallowing
- Shortness of breath or wheezing
- Turning blue
- Drop in blood pressure (feeling faint, confused, weak, passing out)
- Loss of consciousness
- Chest pain
- A weak or "thread" pulse
- Sense of impending doom
Severe symptoms, alone or in combination with milder symptoms, may be signs of anaphylaxis and require immediate treatment.
source: https://www.foodallergy.org/symptoms
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