Finding your Food Allergies

"Hi excuse me does the chicken salad have ..." (insert a long list of foods that I cannot consume), "I am just calling to see if your kitchen would accommodate..." (insert slew of allergens that need to be avoided).

I'm sure if you're here on this page those phrases don't sound unfamiliar to you.

Living with food allergies is tough, but finding your food allergies is even tougher.

Everyone has their story of how they traveled from point A to point B in their health and wellness journey. Many individuals use alternative medicine and self testing, while others rely on the health system and take the medical route. Whatever the path you have chosen, neither is easy, nor clear.

I am going to share my story of how I found (and am still finding) my food allergies and my process of healing my symptoms through diet and lifestyle.

At about the age of 11 I began to wake up with horrible joint pain, and when I say horrible I mean I suffered from an elderly disease at age 11; there were even days where my mother had to help me from my bed.

We went to seek medical help, testing upon testing was done, only for the results to be inconclusive , thus began the weekly trips to specialists, doctors offices, and the drug store to fill prescription after prescription.

Throughout the years my pain never seemed to fully go away.

Not too long after, I began to develop Psoriasis which was equally as painful and difficult to deal with as the joint pain that I was experiencing. I went to the dermatologists only to be put on hormone cream and injections, never fully allowing the psoriasis to heal.

Fast forward a couple of months and I began to develop severe acne, so severe that I can list at minimum five different prescriptions I went on in order to clear it, thus in my desperation I succumbed to taking Accutane, a very harmful and powerful drug for acne treatment.

Now years later, none of my symptoms healed, my anxiety heightened and it was affecting my ability to be as productive as I would have liked.

So maybe you can fill the blanks, I went to the doctor, went through the process, but the one thing that was different this time was my refusal of one more pill entering my already exhausted, young body.

My refusal of medication sent me on my journey of finding the root cause of all my issues and symptoms.

I've always loved food and nutrition trying out different foods, recipes, and lifestyle choices; but this was different.

I attempted the poor advice of a wellness consultant to attempt Veganism to heal my issues. Now I fully believe in a plant based life style and think it can work wonders for some, and definitely the environment, but for me it was harming me rather than saving me.

After one full year of attempting the life style, with persistent symptoms I went back to the doctors where the Celiac test was done.

Here is my beef with the health care system. It was not brought to my attention that there needs to be a sufficient amount of gluten in the system for a significant amount of time for the test to be accurate. Thus, my result was negative and I started to eat bread again as though it was the last food on earth.

Through tedious research, networking, and playing around with my diet I began to discover that my body just did not like certain foods.

Chance would have it that through an impromptu encounter with a woman whose daughter suffered the exact same symptoms as I, healed herself through her realization of her Celiac disease and food intolerances.

Through seeing a new dietary consultant I made the leap to cut out gluten and what do you know? Within a two week period my symptoms began to dissipate.

My skin became better, my joints were free of the constant burning sensation, my brain fog was gone, and for the first time I could think clearly- my anxiety was disappearing.

The real test was when I accidentally ate a meal which had been cross-contaminated. I was unaware the meal had been made with the same oven pan, and I could not figure out what had caused my bout of sickness: stomach pain, migraine, rashes, and fatigue. I did not think, nor did I expect my body to react to such minuscule amounts of gluten.

I contacted my dietary consultant who confirmed I am the perfect case for misdiagnosed Celiac disease.

I am still in the process of healing my stomach from years of damage, I have been using healing foods such as bone broth, collagen, and lots of grass-fed protein.

I am also avoiding most inflammatory or immune damaging foods i.e. nightshades and dairy.

Soon enough I will be eating all of the deep-fried, saucy, chocolate and caramel filled, gluten free goodness.

Due to many years of damage, my body needs to heal. This is why Celiac testing awareness is so important; so that individuals do not further damage their body in eating a food that is attack their own tissues!

I hope my journey can help or inspire someone else to take their health into their own hands, or aid in forming a system where we don't have to!

Below I linked some easy to find elimination diet cheat sheets so that you can do some self testing at home and help your body feel your best.