Food Allergies...my story

My family has suffered from unknown food allergies all their lives. For me, my biggest frustrations started every year at Halloween and went through the winter flu season. Right after Halloween my children would usually come down with a cold that would last about 2 weeks. They would recover in time for Thanksgiving, and shortly thereafter continue on with more colds and/or ear infections, which would get even worse after Christmas, if not before. I'd usually have a cold or two too myself at some point during this time!! Even though I knew that dairy products were a problem for us, I did not correlate the annual bouts of illness with a consumption of dairy and sugar. It was later in life that it finally occurred to me that most forms of chocolate contain milk. The sugar and chocolate binges started at Halloween and continued through January when we were usually so sick we were forced to stop eating junk food and welcomed the taste of good homemade chicken noodle soup. The year I cut out chocolate during the holidays was the first year that I did not end up with a cold or an ear infection by January. 

Elimination Diet

 Although we have limited dairy from our diets for several years now, my husband and I began to suspect that we have other food allergies. So we decided to go on the Elimination Diet mentioned in Doris Rapp's book, Is This Your Child, to see if there were any other foods that were causing us problems.¹ For seven days we cut out all dairy, wheat, sugar, eggs, cocoa, food colorings, corn, citrus, peanuts, and additives. On day eight we were ready to begin adding foods back into our diets, one food at a time each day. Well, I should say almost ready to begin. My husband saw one hot dog that had been left in the refrigerator and decided he couldn't let it go to waste, so he had eaten that on day seven, and ended up feeling sick to his stomach during the middle of the night. Thinking it could be the flu we decided to wait one day before beginning the next step of the diet. He was fine the next morning and we began to suspect that the hot dog actually did cause the stomach upset, especially since we had been on the first phase of the diet for almost a week. Our bodies try to quickly eliminate invading unhealthy substances if they aren't overloaded with too many others at the same time.

Dairy

So, by day nine we were ready to add dairy back into our diet. Already knowing that I have a dairy allergy, I didn't participate in this day. My husband however wanted to see to what extent his reaction to dairy would be. Shortly after the first half cup of milk that morning his nose was running. And it continued on throughout the rest of the day. It seemed to be worse with milk than it was with cottage cheese. However, overall he had a runny nose most of the day. Doris Rapp states that most symptoms will be noticed within the first hour after ingesting an offending food, and will increase throughout the day as more of that food is consumed.

Wheat

The next day was “wheat” day. I sent my daughter to the specialty bread store to pick out a loaf of honey whole wheat, containing whole wheat, honey, yeast and salt. (Since we still haven't added back the sugars and we know that we have a problem with diary we had to be careful in choosing the type of wheat product to be consume for the test.) That day we enjoyed thick slices of whole wheat bread for breakfast. During that first hour my husband noticed his ear was feeling clogged, and we thought it might have been from the dairy he had consumed the previous day. His ear seemed to clear after a little while and so we continued on. However, by the time I was in the car headed to work I now noticed that my ear was popping and my sinuses felt swollen. Now, I'm beginning to suspect that we both might have a problem with wheat too. After my morning snack of more bread I noticed my ear beginning to pop again. It couldn't be anything other than the bread for me, since I had not had any dairy the day before. About noon I got an email from my husband saying that he too was experiencing ear and Eustachian tube problems after eating more of the bread and by afternoon, he began to notice that he was developing a low grade fever.

How could this be? We've been living off of wheat products all of our lives: toast for breakfast, sandwiches for lunch and whole wheat spaghetti at least once a week for dinner. Not to mention the muffins, cakes, cookies, etc. Life without wheat was going to be a challenge. Was there going to be anything left to eat by the time we got done testing for sugar, corn, and the rest?

Sugar

The next day we both ate 3 teaspoons of white sugar before breakfast and had more sugar in our oatmeal and coffee. Well, we both had a headache before we got to work. We decided to cut that day short, and avoided sugar the rest of the day. It was much later in the day before we started feeling back to normal again. We felt much better the next morning and decided we needed a break before adding any more suspect foods back into our diet. We both had renewed energy and clear thinking on that day.

Eggs

Eggs were next on the list. So the next morning we ate a nice breakfast containing eggs. I got queasy almost immediately after breakfast and as I ate more eggs later that day I continued having digestive problems most of the day, which included much belching. My husband on the other hand seemed to have no symptoms at all. Eggs are out for me, and OK for him.

Cocoa/Chocolate

Next came the cocoa test. Well, since I reacted to sugar and milk, I had to find chocolate without sugar or milk. I ended up with a bakers chocolate bar and smeared honey on the top of the two chunks. Not bad. I ate this for my test that morning...time for another headache. This was one of the most disappointing discoveries for me. Like many women, I love chocolate. I had been purchasing the 85% cocoa chocolate bars because they do not contain dairy even though they do contain sugar. I didn't want to give up chocolate. I contemplated putting up with the headache from the chocolate, but could not figure out how I would consume any more chocolate without eating sugar, and realized it would be almost impossible unless I was willing to make my own desserts. I decided it isn't worth the time and effort. So, I relented to the fact that I would try to switch over to eating carob powder. It's been a few weeks now and I will on occasion have some chocolate. And, yes, I still get a headache after eating it. I'm sorry to say that I am currently lacking much willpower, and I am willing to put up with the occasional headache. I do not know if honey would have an affect on me like the sugar did.  At any rate, I can't eat chocolate without some type of sweetener.  So, it looks like I will be avoiding both.

Food Colorings

My husband didn't experience any difficulties with food colorings or chocolate. I did not test for food colorings, since I couldn't find any food that contained colorings that did not also contain some other item on the list that I could not have.

Corn – Citrus - Peanuts

The last three items were corn, citrus and peanuts. Thankfully, my husband and I did not seem to react to corn products, and it seems that we can handle peanuts in small amounts. (We discovered that we cannot eat peanut butter every day for several days in a row.) I had digestive upset once again when I tried to add citrus into my diet. And, honestly, it doesn't bother me that I could not have citrus, because it just doesn't appeal to me. Citrus did not seem to affect my husband.

New Diet

We have yet to begin the strict rotation diet that we should be on in order to completely discontinue the foods to which we are sensitive, but we are moving in that direction. And now that I am aware of my sensitivities I am becoming more aware of how foods affect my health. I would some day like to have the advantage of receiving treatment from an allergy doctor, but until then I know that the modifications that I can make in my diet to restrict and eliminate the major food culprits will bring a great improvement in the quality of my life. I believe that if you put forth the effort to make the modifications needed in your life you will see positive results too.

For additional information:

Can Allergies Affect Learning?

Is this your child? By Doris Rapp

Helpful Links:
http://foodallergies.about.com/od/dairy/p/dairyallergies.htm
http://www.bellaonline.com/articles/art36696.asp

References:

1. Rapp, Doris. Is This Your Child. New York: William Morrow and Company, Inc., 1991