Allergies, skin problems, digestive problems… what do all of these things have in common?
A lot more than most people think, actually.
The fact of the matter is, people only think of food allergies or intolerances as things that cause major problems and severe medical emergencies.
People often ignore the fact that certain foods can cause seemingly “minor” issues such as skin irritation or worsened allergies, or they don’t know that it’s even a possibility.
How To Tell If You Have Food Allergies
The biggest question that people ask when it comes to these foods is “How do you even know?” That is, how do you even know if intolerance to dairy or gluten is causing problems for you? The answer is simple – try an elimination diet.
The elimination diet is a concept that is pretty easy to understand. Cut out gluten, dairy, soy, eggs, fast food and alcohol for 23 days – that’s it. And at the end of that period of time, do an assessment.
Were any of the symptoms that you face on a regular basis – constipation or bloating, for example – resolved? Not only that, but do you feel more energized, or like you have less of a mental “fog”?
If so, then you will know without a doubt that one of the foods that you eliminated from your diet was likely the cause of some of your symptoms. As you start slowly reintroducing these different types of foods into your diet, you can pay attention to your body to see when and if the symptoms return. And if they do, you know which type of food to eliminate from your diet for good for the betterment of your overall health and wellbeing.
But Why These Foods in Particular?
You likely already know about the many reasons gluten is bad for you, and why you should probably start cutting out gluten, if not ridding it from your diet altogether.
What you may not know is that the number of people who are actually lactose intolerant and don’t know it is extremely high – and lactose intolerance can have numerous damaging effects on your health[1].
There are tons of people who aren’t even aware that you can have an egg sensitivity – and yet egg sensitivity has been proven for years to be a cause of eczema[2].
Soy didn’t used to be a big problem, but now it’s in a large number of products – which is great, if you aren’t sensitive to soy.
However, in addition to soy being a major allergen, a strong link has been proven to exist between soy and gluten intolerance – and even issues such as celiac disease – have been shown to exist[3].
As for fast food and alcohol, they’re both pretty bad for your body for much the same reason. The many preservatives, as well as the high sodium, fat, and sugar content of fat food can lead to plenty of health problems.
As for alcohol, too much can alter the flora in your gut, leading to quite a few digestive health issues. Detoxing during the elimination diet could be of great benefit in reregulating your body and getting it back to its best.
It’s recommended that everybody try the elimination diet at least once. You may not even realize that you are facing some issues until they disappear – and the good news is that once you’ve used this diet to determine the cause of any problems you face, you can easily avoid them in the future and optimize your health. What’s not to love about that?
sources:
- https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK44619/
- https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/0091674974900542
- https://www.celiac.com/articles/21961/1/Soy-as-a-Food-Allergen/Page1.html