Dr. Mercola January 29 2008 111,155 views
Robyn O’Brien used to roll her eyes when a child with a peanut allergy showed up at a birthday party. Then, two years ago, she fed her youngest child scrambled eggs. Her baby’s face swelled into a grotesque mask.
This led her to an examination of the perplexing world of childhood food allergies, and she soon came to the conclusion that there is a conspiracy that threatens the health of America’s children. And she believes it is up to her and parents everywhere to stop it.
Her theory that the food supply is being manipulated with additives, genetic modification, hormones and herbicides, causing increases in allergies, autism and other disorders in children, has made her a populist hero among parents looking for answers regarding why their children have food allergies.
O’Brien recommends that people throw out their nonorganic, processed, genetically modified, artificially created, or hormone-laced food. Once she did it, her four children’s health problems cleared right up.
Despite this New York Times’ reporter stating that no one knows whether food allergies are actually rising as fast as some people believe, a 2006 study published in the medical journal Thorax found a 400 percent increase in hospitalizations due to food allergies in the UK since 1990. Admissions for anaphylaxis increased by 600 percent.
Food allergies send another 30,000 to the emergency room each year.
The Difference Between Allergies and Sensitivities
Allergies occur when your immune system overreacts to environmental triggers, causing tissue inflammation, organ dysfunction and an array of other symptoms.
Sensitivities on the other hand may include both true allergies and/or reactions that are not triggered by your immune system. So whereas allergies typically trigger immediate antibody reactions in your bloodstream, sensitivities trigger slower responses within your cells.
Signs of Food Sensitivities and Allergies
Are there certain foods you crave often, such as milk, ice cream, pasta or bread, for example? Ironically, the foods you crave are often the foods that cause you problems; that you have sensitivity to.
Other questions that can help you determine whether or not you might have a food sensitivity or allergy are:
Which Foods are the Most Allergenic?
Topping the list of the most allergenic foods are:
If you think you're suffering from a food allergy, avoiding these foods is a good place to start. You can also be sensitive to food additives like artificial colors, preservatives and flavor enhancers (MSG), so avoiding processed foods can also help. And, although the jury is still out on the health effects of cloned foods, I am willing to bet they’re not without ramifications.
How to Figure Out What Foods You’re Allergic to
One of the best things you can do if you believe you are suffering from a food allergy is to do a diet elimination challenge. Simply remove all foods that contain what you believe you are allergic to and see if your symptoms improve over the next few days. You may need to go as long as five days to give it a full trial.
If the symptoms disappear in one day, of course you have your answer. The real clincher, though, is to reintroduce the food or drink (on an empty stomach). If the suspected food is the culprit you will generally be able to feel the symptoms return within an hour.
This can be difficult if you eat a lot of processed foods, as these often contain "hidden" ingredients like corn, milk, soy, wheat, yeast and artificial additives that are often problematic. The most suspect foods will be those eaten daily or more than once a week, as well as foods that you crave or eat at night.
In extreme cases where it is difficult to isolate the offending food, you may even need to go on a fast to see if your symptoms resolve.
Why You Should Always Address Your Food Allergies
After you identify what foods you are allergic to, you will want to avoid them as much as possible. Your symptoms will likely disappear or improve once you reduce your exposure.
If you don't take measures to address food allergies, you can end up with permanent, long-term damage. Allergies can put constant and unnecessary stress on the immune system that will weaken it over time, possibly leading to chronic or degenerative disease.
As an added bonus, eliminating your food sensitivities and allergies can also help you lose weight!
How?
When you eat a food that you are sensitive to, it causes a series of negative biochemical reactions in your immune system and digestive tract that can hinder your weight loss efforts. It also decreases your serotonin levels, which can make you feel slightly depressed, causing you to turn to simple sugars and carbohydrates for relief.
Tips to Resolve Your Allergy Symptoms
In terms of food sensitivities, a comprehensive nutritional approach is vital, and most people's sensitivities dramatically improve when they follow my nutrition plan. This includes avoiding sugar, fruit juices, most grains, and pasteurized dairy products.
If you find that milk (one of the most common allergies) is the problem, it would be worthwhile experimenting with raw cow's milk to see if that still causes a problem. If it does, you can also try other species’ milk, like sheep, goat or lamb's milk.Another important principle is to avoid all gluten for a few weeks. That would mean absolutely no wheat products. We use this approach in my clinic with really great results. It is quite shocking how many people are actually gluten sensitive; their condition radically improves once the wheat is removed from their diet.Making certain that enough long-chain animal based omega-3 fats (DHA and EPA) from fish or krill oils are included in your diet is also helpful, and another trick that also frequently helps is to add some beneficial bacteria to your gut by taking a high quality probiotic.
Chemical sensitivity is a very real affliction, and those who suffer from it are not making their symptoms up. However, the causes of chemical sensitivity can extend beyond just the physical -- there are often emotional traumas, sometimes not readily apparent to the sufferer, which have set the stage for the major disruptions in the detoxification and immune systems. In these cases, emotional treatments like the psychological acupressure method known as the Emotional Freedom Technique (EFT) can be extremely helpful.
Agree, One has to remember though the Hippocratic Oath states to treat those that are sick, it, also, states that they will respect other doctors and those physicians "in whose steps I walk". Most doctors are not willing to step up and say this is wrong! Amen to people like Dr. Mercola that are trying to change that!
Just another reason I refuse to watch network news. I'm particularly opposed to Fox News (we distort, you comply) due to the Murdoch's media empire ties to world government, depopulation and the police state. Yes, mercury in the form of thimersol has poisoned my 6-year-old son. My wife and I are now in the middle of getting him over his ASD that WAS CAUSED BY MECURY! We are seeing a DAN doctor, and he is slowly getting better.
Citizen Iconoclast-I feel for your son, I'm so glad to hear he's getting better. My neurologist tried to tell me that mercury had no part in the fact that I now have M.S. I saw my MRI images which revealed 2 white matter spots on the left, and one on the right. These are the major areas of pain for me. Well, later on I got my mercury fillings removed and nearly fell off the chair when the dentist said that the oldest and most damaging fillings in my mouth were located like this - 2 on the left, one on the right!! Coincidence?? I think not!! When I told my neurologist about this and that I would be doing a detox rather than the standard M.S. treatment, he literally screamed at me!! Was he concerned about the health that much? Nah. He was upset that I wouldn't be filling that $500 a month script he wanted to write me! There are some doctors who will never get, then there's some who do but won't admit it, too much money lost for them! Well all must be an advocate for our own health because the medical industry certainly doesn't care!
My wife is an MD and I know how hard it can be to "educate" an MD. The best advice I can give is be patient and always keep your cool when presenting information. Avoid confrontation, just suggest the information as a possible alternative and don't loose your cool when the other person violently rejects it. I am surprise how strongly those informations are rejected at first, with a passion, until a point where it seems to sink in. After 2 years of patience and sharing my findings, I can say that I even got her to admit vaccines are bad for your health. She no longuer takes all the "recommended" yearly vaccines for her practice. And, she is even considering not vacinating our kids, when do have some. However, I am afraid some damage has been done since we have been trying to have a baby for almost 4 years now without success... (other) Doctors can't find anything wrong with either of us, it just doesn't work.
Osy_ness, I hope you are right, When people ask me how I stay fit, I use this as an opening to tell them about avoiding processed and nonorganic food. But, many of the people I have spoken to are so brain washed they don't want to believe there is anything wrong with their diet. They usually insist that rather than changing what they eat, they just need to eat less of it.
after 2012 will be free of greed and stupidity
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Aluminum and mercury (vaccine additives) are known to cause food allergies and other problems. Aluminum is added to the vaccines to improve the immune response, making the vaccine more effective at preventing disease. But the response to aluminum is not vaccine-specific...it can cause similar reaction when vaccine and adjuvant are injected in different limbs, and even on different days, or to other allergens. The aluminum in vaccines has been shown to increase rate of asthma in children. Also many foods children love contain aluminum...chicken nuggets, food dyes (known like aluminum to cause hyperactivity), baking powder, flowing agents, rising crust pizzas, pancakes/waffles, cookies/cupcakes, flour tortillas, powdered drink mixes, processed or American cheese, medications...despite the American Academy of Pediatrics warning that infant exposure to aluminum be minimized. Aluminum is naturally found in high levels in soy products and nuts, which are among the most common allergenic foods. Also added aluminum baking powder in many products containing flour could be one reason for the increase in crohn's, IBS and celiac disease. Consumption of soy products has been shown to increase food allergies to other foods as well. Aluminum is common to all of these.
The small amount of aluminum in vaccines and IV solutions is much more dangerous than aluminum in foods, since the intestines prevent absorption of more than 99% of ingested aluminum. Since vaccines are injected, and the safety of aluminum in the vaccines has never been tested, we do not know how much of the aluminum is absorbed into the blood or brain where it causes harm. In fact, no vaccine containing aluminum has ever been tested against a non-reactive placebo like other pharmaceuticals--most trials compare aluminum vaccine to another aluminum vaccine or to placebo containing aluminum (Gardasil). In Prevnar's safety trial, the placebo (hepB vaccine) caused more SIDS and reactions than the vaccine!