Emotional Aspects Of Food Intolerances

Are You Allergic To The Food You’re Eating? Part Two

Life with a food allergy is relatively easy – in the majority of cases you know exactly what to avoid and are fully prepared in the event of some tiny morsel of the offending food touching your lips if you are severely allergic. There’s no mystery with food allergies and many of the people I’ve met are simply used to not eating that particular thing – often they’ve been avoiding it for many years and it’s no problem in their daily life. They are at ease and at peace with their food choices and their food allergy.

Not so for for both myself in the past and for many people I’ve come across clinically who experience a food intolerance or sensitivity. Often, particularly at the beginning of the journey to understanding your unique body there is some level of stress and anxiety and sense of limitation in what we can or cannot eat. We may experience the pressure of strict control, denial and discipline. There can be a sense of the unknown, some frustration about being a victim to certain symptoms that descend either immediately after eating or 1-2 days after eating some unknown “something” that didn’t agree with us.

Sometimes we don’t really even want to know the culprit because we love eating that food so much. It’s not until the symptoms we experience become too debilitating that we think to experiment. I used to LOVE Sol Breads Organic Gluten Free Rice Bread. They also had a Gluten Free Pumpkin and Pepita loaf which was heaven! 2 slices in the morning, toasted with butter and avocado on top was the YUMMIEST breakfast I could imagine for ages. The bread has this amazing texture – sort of like scones but the edges go delightfully crispy and crunchy. M mmm…. I can still taste it! Anyway, what started to happen after a while was that very quickly after eating I would experience a profound fatigue – I’m talking falling asleep standing up kind of fatigue. Total brain fag. I would force myself to move through it, sometimes I even had to pull over if I was driving and after 30 minutes or so, it would pass and I’d feel fine again. It took me about 6 months of this being an almost daily occurrence to realise that the bread was actually causing my intense fatigue. I didn’t realise this until I had a week away with no access to it.

Food intolerances and sensitivities can often occur in that way – a lot of time can pass between connecting vital pieces of the puzzle, a lot of time where we feel less that excellent. I learned a lot over the years about particular substances that cause and create such havoc in food intolerances and it’s an interesting path to investigate for yourself. It becomes a similar approach to that of allergies – we identify the culprit then seek to avoid wherever possible.

Indeed you may need to do this for certain periods of time as it can be an essential element in the healing process – a strict elimination diet, gluten-free, dairy-free, nut-free, processed food-free, alcohol-free, preservative-free, colouring-free and so on. For more information on the intricacies of food intolerances and what can cause them, have a look at The Food Intolerance Network – an excellent website with loads of information and about what ingredients in food can make us and our children sick.

One of the potential problems with approaching food intolerances and sensitivities very strictly over the long term however, is that food intolerances are often that – intolerances to more than one type of food or additive. We often find intolerance to milk AND gluten together for example and because of the huge array of foods commonly available that contain these ingredients, we can wind up feeling more stressed, anxious and frankly, left out.

My sister-in-law is a study in food intolerances. She can’t have wheat. She can’t have dairy. She can’t have gluten. She can’t have honey. She can’t have anything on the menu. Going out to eat with her is a depressing experience. On my recent 30 Day Raw Food Challenge I had first hand insight into the power of shifting your focus from what you can’t have to what you can have. Sitting down to eat lunch with a group of women, I didn’t even bother looking at the menu. I simply asked for a “Big-Arse Salad with nothing on it, just everything you’ve got in the kitchen that’s even slightly salady.” I received this beautiful and abundantly fresh offering on my plate with olive oil on the side. I loved it. I felt immense gratitude for the people at the cafe who made it so easy for me and immense gratitude for the taste, look, smell and vibrancy of the food. I had SO many flavours to keep my mouth busy, nothing added could’ve made it better!

If you have a food intolerance or think you may have one, beware the trap of feeling limited – this is not a healthy way to feel and (I suspect) is actually more damaging than actually eating the food itself. Us humans have so much choice and variety in the food available to us to eat every day (granted, this does complicate things a bit) so put your attention on the bounty and incredible range of healthy and life-giving food you CAN eat. Let gratitude for each meal be as important as the food you are eating.

The next post in this 3 part series on Food Allergies, Intolerances and Sensitives will be all about practical steps you can take in your life to address any food issues and reactions you may be experiencing. We’ll also look at ways to strengthen and cleanse your body so that even if you choose to severely limit particular foods, you can enjoy them in moderation in the future if you want to.

How have food intolerances or issues made you feel in the past?
Have you ever felt limited by what foods you could or couldn’t eat?
How did you deal with that sense of limitation?

I’d love to know!