i get similar symptoms from my (multiple) food intolerances. some of them hit right away, but with some of them there's a lag time, i eat them and it takes a few hours for my body to react. i used to feel like like crap all the time, same symptoms you're describing... brain-fog, fatigue, dizziness, skin irritations, nausea, bowel-issues. my doctor just said i had IBS and left it at that because she didn't know what it was, by my naturopath recognised intolerance symptoms and got me off gluten, which is my biggest problem... and OMG i'm a whole new dilettante. amazing. eliminating a few other things has capped it -- i now feel really healthy, for the first time in years.
look, i know i sound like an infomercial, but seriously, you need to catch this as early as possible, or you'll damage your gut. at the start, my symptoms would come and go, like what you're describing, and i kept thinking "oh, i'll just eat better" or "oh, maybe i'm depressed?" or "hey! this new vitamin will fix it!"... and so by the time i did get around to trying an elimination diet, i was really, really sick. i'm not a doctor, and even if i was this is hte interwebs so what would i know? but what you're describing sounds spot-on like a food intolerance.
suggested things to do: -- keep a food diary. -- try eliminating some of the usual suspects for at least a few weeks ('coz of the lag-time) and see if that helps -- i'd try gluten first. -- take some kind of aloe juice and a probiotic. -- if you can afford it, see a naturopath or homeopath or some other health-care provider who recognises a wider range of illnesses than mainstream medicine.
just thought of something else -- this may be obvious, but is your BF or the co-op or both using anything (a sauce, maybe?) that has MSG in it?
if it's happening mostly when you're relying on convenience foods or packaged foods, it could be a flavour enhancer or preservative or colourant or something that you're reacting to?
Interesting. I will definitely give that a try, too :)
Did things improve for you when you took multivitamins, or when you ate something? I usually got the symptoms when I hadn't eaten in an hour or two.. Or when I ate very limited foods. I'll ask the Co-Op about the MSG, but I suspect it's fairly free of it because they're also an organic/natural foods type place that's very picky about what they use in their foods.
I have a friend who's a naturopathic doctor. I'll ask him if he can think of anything :)
"Did things improve for you when you took multivitamins, or when you ate something? I usually got the symptoms when I hadn't eaten in an hour or two.
yes, but for me that was a symptom, not a cause -- it was more a matter that my body didn't have the resources to maintain a stable blood-sugar level, and was too damaged to be absorbing nutrients very effectively; so smaller things would tip the balance one way or the other.
if you do have an intolerance, you're damaging your innards. if they're damaged, they're not working at optimal efficiency. if they're not working at optimal efficiency, your nutrient requirements will be higher, your blood-sugar will be less stable, etc, etc.
as i understand it, most deficiencies and other nutritional issues are cumulative problems -- they build up over a period of time, so the pattern would be more of gradual build up and decline of symptoms and not the rapid cycling you're describing. it really does sound like you're reacting to something in your diet rather than missing something in your diet -- although the former can then also cause the latter.
for myself, i really really wanted the cause to be something i could just take a pill for and have it go away; food diaries and elimination diets are a Pain In The Arse, and a deficiency would be so much simpler. but i also wish i'd taken the possibility of an intolerance more seriously earlier -- say before it reached the point where eating anything would cause my limbs to go numb followed by me passing out. that was not so much fun.
"I have a friend who's a naturopathic doctor. I'll ask him if he can think of anything :)"
that sounds like a brilliant idea. maybe mention that some nut-case on hte interwebs suggested that it sounded like a food intolerance and see what he thinks?
some of them hit right away, but with some of them there's a lag time, i eat them and it takes a few hours for my body to react.
i used to feel like like crap all the time, same symptoms you're describing... brain-fog, fatigue, dizziness, skin irritations, nausea, bowel-issues.
my doctor just said i had IBS and left it at that because she didn't know what it was, by my naturopath recognised intolerance symptoms and got me off gluten, which is my biggest problem... and OMG i'm a whole new dilettante. amazing. eliminating a few other things has capped it -- i now feel really healthy, for the first time in years.
look, i know i sound like an infomercial, but seriously, you need to catch this as early as possible, or you'll damage your gut. at the start, my symptoms would come and go, like what you're describing, and i kept thinking "oh, i'll just eat better" or "oh, maybe i'm depressed?" or "hey! this new vitamin will fix it!"... and so by the time i did get around to trying an elimination diet, i was really, really sick.
i'm not a doctor, and even if i was this is hte interwebs so what would i know? but what you're describing sounds spot-on like a food intolerance.
suggested things to do:
-- keep a food diary.
-- try eliminating some of the usual suspects for at least a few weeks ('coz of the lag-time) and see if that helps -- i'd try gluten first.
-- take some kind of aloe juice and a probiotic.
-- if you can afford it, see a naturopath or homeopath or some other health-care provider who recognises a wider range of illnesses than mainstream medicine.
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if it's happening mostly when you're relying on convenience foods or packaged foods, it could be a flavour enhancer or preservative or colourant or something that you're reacting to?
Reply
Did things improve for you when you took multivitamins, or when you ate something? I usually got the symptoms when I hadn't eaten in an hour or two.. Or when I ate very limited foods. I'll ask the Co-Op about the MSG, but I suspect it's fairly free of it because they're also an organic/natural foods type place that's very picky about what they use in their foods.
I have a friend who's a naturopathic doctor. I'll ask him if he can think of anything :)
Thanks for the info!
Reply
yes, but for me that was a symptom, not a cause -- it was more a matter that my body didn't have the resources to maintain a stable blood-sugar level, and was too damaged to be absorbing nutrients very effectively; so smaller things would tip the balance one way or the other.
if you do have an intolerance, you're damaging your innards. if they're damaged, they're not working at optimal efficiency. if they're not working at optimal efficiency, your nutrient requirements will be higher, your blood-sugar will be less stable, etc, etc.
as i understand it, most deficiencies and other nutritional issues are cumulative problems -- they build up over a period of time, so the pattern would be more of gradual build up and decline of symptoms and not the rapid cycling you're describing.
it really does sound like you're reacting to something in your diet rather than missing something in your diet -- although the former can then also cause the latter.
for myself, i really really wanted the cause to be something i could just take a pill for and have it go away; food diaries and elimination diets are a Pain In The Arse, and a deficiency would be so much simpler.
but i also wish i'd taken the possibility of an intolerance more seriously earlier -- say before it reached the point where eating anything would cause my limbs to go numb followed by me passing out. that was not so much fun.
"I have a friend who's a naturopathic doctor. I'll ask him if he can think of anything :)"
that sounds like a brilliant idea.
maybe mention that some nut-case on hte interwebs suggested that it sounded like a food intolerance and see what he thinks?
Reply
Thanks!
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