Nothing taste as good as...

by Glen Depke, Traditional Naturopath

...as feeling good feels!

Just in case you missed me putting together the title of this article with the first line, let me repeat.

Nothing taste as good as feeling good feels!

While you may have heard this in the past and though, yeah right, I have a recent story to share with you that will help you understand this comment.

For those that have been following Depke Wellness for some time, you already know that I am not shy at all about sharing when I have a health issue personally. You may remember when I first tested for gluten cross reactive sensitivity in February of 2013.

To refresh your memory, a cross reaction test will assess your potential sensitivity to proteins that are similar to the proteins in gluten. This  potential sensitivity is to the food choices listed below.

• Rye, Barley, Spelt, Polish Wheat
• Cow's Milk
• Casein
• Casomorphin
• Milk Butyrophilin
• Whey Protein
• Milk Chocolate
• Oats
• Yeast
• Coffee
• Sesame
• Buckwheat
• Sorghum
• Millet
• Hemp
• Amaranth
• Quinoa
• Tapioca
• Teff
• Soy
• Egg
• Corn
• Rice
• Potato

Well, out of this list I was personally sensitive to the foods listed below.

• Casomorphin
• Milk Butyrophilin
• Whey Protein
• Yeast
• Coffee
• Sorghum
• Millet
• Hemp
• Amaranth
• Tapioca
• Teff
• Soy
• Egg
• Corn
• Rice

If it seems as though I was repeating the list, that is because out of a possible 24 different cross reactive foods, I was personally sensitive to 15 of these.

As I discuss with all of my clients, once you have a recognized gluten cross reactive food sensitivity, you should eliminate this for anywhere from 12 to 18 months prior to reintroducing. I say this because it takes this time period for you gut to reestablish itself on a cellular level. Yes that's right, in about 1 year to 1 1/2 years, you will have a brand new gut. 

So what's next?

At this point, you can go on a rotation type of diet to add in the foods that you have originally eliminated while watching for symptoms and preparing for a retest. Well, here I am 18 months out and a have been rotating these foods in over the past 3 weeks. I have to say, I originally was very excited about this! After all, it has been more than 1 1/2 years since I have had cheese, butter, corn tortillas, eggs and rice, all of which I had missed on some level.

I started by adding back eggs and rice both of which did not seem to create any issues for me, but I did recognize that I had put on about 2-3 pounds at this time. I figured this could have been due to some other life event and didn't think much about it. 

Well than dairy came up next. Yikes! I had dairy along with my favorite birthday treat, which is a gluten free chocolate cake with a homemade whipped cream frosting. First of all, I was shocked by how much this simply tasted like cow. I know this may sound funny but that is the only way I can explain it. That was not the scary part though, since what happened after was the "yikes." After eating this I put on about 3 inches of girth around my waist and I felt like this ripped me up. All from the butter in the cake and the whipped cream frosting.

That was nothing though compared to the corn added in this past weekend. I originally was very excited about this because I have always enjoyed corn and have missed some corn products over the past 1 1/2. The though of having a taco on a corn tortilla sounded amazing and I always enjoyed an occasion treat of some corn chips with salsa and guacamole. This past weekend's trip to Mexico was the perfect place to add some corn in and "holy cow." Not only did I gain almost 10 pounds over the weekend but the amount of pain and discomfort I felt from this was truly not worth it. My whole body felt inflamed. I could not comfortably fit into my cloths, my gut was extremely bloated and I felt aches and pains in both my knees and ankles. Heck, somebody even asked me what I did to my ankle since it looked so inflamed. I laughed and told him that I ate corn and dairy.

So even though I was very excited about adding back in these foods again, it truly was not worth it. While off these foods my health has hit new heights, my weight reached levels that I have not seen in almost two decades and aches and pains that I have had for some years have almost completely diminished. But within three weeks I put on a bunch of weight, gain many inches in my gut and have reestablished some levels of pain and discomfort.

So do you get what I am saying when I shared, "nothing taste as good as feeling good feels!"

Thankfully my reintroduction period is over and I will retest to see what I am still sensitive to. Obviously I already know that both corn and dairy are still out and to be honest with you, if I do not get any of these foods back into my diet this would not be a concern at all, I simply love feeling health and happy. That's what is most important!

Please use my experience to look deeper at your food choices and how this can be affecting you. Most do not understand that eating foods that you are sensitive to will most often lead to:

• Inflammation
• Weight gain
• Inches gained
• Aches and pains
• Detoxification issues
• Immune system dysregulation
• Leaky gut
• Adrenal insufficiency
• And more....

There are three ways that we assist our clients at Depke Wellness in understanding food sensitivity. We either recommend a Cyrex Labs (array #4) gluten cross reactive blood test or an Immunolab Bloodprint154 blood test. For those that do not have the available finances to complete these blood tests, I always recommend a book "The Plan" by Lyn-Genet Recitas. This is one of the most comprehensive books I have seen to walk you through the process of discovering food sensitivity.

Remember, nothing taste as good as feeling good feels!

If you have any comments or questions in regard to this email, feel free to post below for us to respond to personally.