Washingtonian: Living with a Gluten Allergy

I am gluten intolerant and have been diagnosing celiac disease and non-celiac gluten reactions for over 13 years. It can be the cause of literally hundreds of health problems. 

Food allergies should always be considered when it comes to chronic health issues that seem to defy explanation. Food has a far more profound impact on your health than just the nutrients or calories it contains.

Image and excerpts from Washingtonian.com:

It was a nurse in my internist’s office who raised the question: “This sounds like it could be gluten-related,” she said after listening to my list of ailments from rashes to stomach discomfort. “Have you considered that?”

That was two years ago. I’d barely heard of gluten intolerance, let alone the array of symptoms it was capable of triggering. All I knew was that, since returning from a vacation in Maine, I’d felt crummy. Nothing—rest, vitamins, doctors’ visits, medications—seemed to help. The old symptoms kept returning or new ones would emerge.

In the ensuing months I would undergo a battery of tests and begin my own investigation into why I felt so bad. By the end, I’d know more about gluten than many doctors. At age 48—after a lifetime of eating foods containing gluten without incident—I would be diagnosed with non-celiac gluten intolerance, also known as gluten sensitivity.

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For two months before my diagnosis, I experienced brain fog and anxiety that made focusing on work difficult. I was tired and fell into the habit of taking naps. An avid exerciser, I had whittled my workouts—on the rare occasion I felt up to one—from an hour down to ten minutes, due to muscle aches and weakness. My skin itched all the time, to the point of interfering with sleep. And my sinuses were so congested that I rarely went out.

Fasano’s study, published last year in the journal BMC Medicine, provides the first evidence of key differences between gluten sensitivity and celiac disease. Fasano says the two conditions are part of a spectrum of gluten-related disorders.

An estimated 18 million Americans, or 6 percent of the population, suffer from gluten sensitivity, according to the Center for Celiac Research, and Fasano expects the number to climb. Meanwhile, there’s been a fourfold increase in celiac disease over the past 50 years, with just under 1 percent of the population—about 2.5 million people—affected today.

“We don’t know why the numbers are up,” says Peter H.R. Green, director of the Celiac Disease Center at Columbia University. “Gluten just may be more powerful now or there may be other environmental factors.”

This article continues at Washingtonian.com

More information on gluten allergies at IBSTreatmentCenter.com