Question:
I have always suspected a sensitivity to eggs but before my doctor would
allow me to have a flu shot she wanted to make sure (antibiotics of this
type are incubated in eggs). Following the testing it was determined that I
am definitely allergic to eggs and even more so to the yolk of the egg. I
also suffer from IBS... and I'm thinking perhaps this is a side effect of
the egg allergy. Eggs or egg whites are (it seems) in everything :( It has
never been life threatening (thank gawd) but does cause severe abdominal
pain and I'm thinking skin irritation (as I break out in little itchies
every now and then). As you can tell, outside of never eating "eggs" I
don't avoid processed foods that contain egg. I'm tired of feeling sickie
and have decided to pay more attention to my diet. Is there anyone who can
recommend a cook book or food regime that I can follow that might help me
manage my allergy?
Answer:
As allot of people have already said, the problem with allergy is that often
you are allergic to more than you realise. The best (Although obviously
hardest) route for you would be to go onto a rare foods diet (That's food
that have low allergenic potential and ones you rarely eat) for three weeks
and see how your symptoms are. I know that might sound difficult but it's
not forever and can really help show if hidden allergies are a part of your
problem. Once you have been on the diet for three weeks you can slowly
re-introduce foods one every two days to see if they cause a flare up of
your symptoms. For instance, you may introduce citrus one day, then milk two
days later, then wheat two days after that etc. If that sounds like too much of a mission then maybe just choose one of the
allergy free cookbooks. Your lucky in the fact that egg is a common allergen
and is therefore easily identified in many foods. Also people are becoming
aware of the dangers of using egg in their food and are turning to other
emulsifiers such as soya lecithin (Harsh if your allergic to soya and egg
which many people are). A good book I found useful is "Cooking without" -
Barbara Cousins, or simply looking on the internet for recipes works for me.
Lastly the diet recommended by most allergy trained docs is the rotation
diet. This involves splitting food groups such that you only consume foods
from each group once in every four days. Now, this diet is almost certainly
an overkill for someone with a single allergy as in yourself but making sure
you have as mixed a diet as possible can really help stop future allergies
forming. For instance. Many people realise they are allergic to wheat so
they start eating corn every day instead. Eventually they develop an allergy
to corn so they eat buckwheat every day. This can be avoided by rotating
corn, buckwheat, rice and millet over four days.... As I say, you probably
don't need to do that too strictly but make sure you eat as varied a diet as
possible and don't eat the same thing every day as many people do.
I live on an exotic foods diet ... people have asked me what I eat, it is
listed at http://www.lightlink.com/lark/exotic.html
I found out about things like Latin roots, like taro, yuca, malanga, name
(true yam). Also I get exotic meats like venison from a specialty meat
shop. Since you are sensitive to gluten grains it seems very likely that you are
celiac or gluten intolerant, which means that you should never eat gluten
again. People who are gluten intolerant develop other food intolerances,
gluten causes intestinal permeability (leaky gut) that leads to food
intolerances.
On a gluten-free diet your obvious reactions to gluten will go away after
a few years. But that does NOT mean it's OK to start eating gluten again,
because your body still has the potential to start up this reaction to
gluten again.
Gluten is special among food intolerances, because it's so destructive.
Eating gluten can cause neurological damage, GI tract cancer, many things.
The celiac blood tests don't work on a gluten-free diet. If you want to
check out whether it's gluten you're reacting to, there's a gluten
sensitivity test at http://www.enterolab.com that is valid for a long time
on a gluten-free diet. I don't know how long, you can ask them.
Also, I used to react to sweet foods - anxiety, jitteriness, tension,
irritability. That went away after I did a really careful elimination
diet. Now I can eat sweet foods that I don't have a food intolerance
reaction to (woozy sickness, back pain lasting about 4 days) without this
jittery reaction. Like maple syrup, tapioca starch. After so many
decades of being familiar with this adrenaline zap from sweets, I'm free
of it!
So, you might have food intolerances you don't know about that are causing
the trouble with sweet food. At the moment I am just on as mixed a diet as possible whilst avoiding the
obvious allergens. I try to rotate as much as possible but I do tend to eat
more of the low allergenic foods. I have had several celiac tests including a biopsy several years ago.
According to the NHS I don't have true celiac disiease but I do have the
anti-gliadin antibody which means I do have a wheat allergy of sorts. To be
honest I have avoided gluten now for about 2 years and it really doesn't
bother me much any more. I have heard it is possible to reverese this form
of wheat allergy but I'm so used to it now I doubt I'll ever go back to
eating it. As for the sweets thing I don't really react in an allergic way, I'm just
avoiding it to control yeast overgrowth and as a health precaution. I have
pretty weak digestion and candida is always a threat although it hasn't
caused me a huge problems so far. I do have a soft spot for chocolate and
maple syrup but I'm avoiding them at present until my health is a little
better.
If you had all these tests while you'd been eating a normal amount of
gluten for months, then you wouldn't have had celiac - though maybe
something like pre-celiac. Most people start thinking about testing for celiac when they've already
realized they're wheat-sensitive and they're on a gluten-free diet. When
the testing no longer works.
The doctor who runs Enterolab says the blood tests go positive when there
is already intestinal damage, but there is a disease process
going on before the blood tests (and biopsy) go positive. I don't know
what it means if you just have high IgA antigliadin antibodies, not high
autoimmune antibodies. I had way above normal of both on Enterolab's
test, so I decided to stay gluten-free.
