Blood food allergy testing

[Tiff]

Hello all,

I?ve recently returned from a long trip to visit family in Colorado over the 4^th.  Before leaving on the trip I had some blood work done, and I posted it on the personal threads.  Things are mixed, but I have continued to do fairly well at the end of Phase 1 of the MP.  I would say equally well to daily dosing of Mino, but taking much less.  My trip went very well.  I was fortunate to not have a huge reaction to a much higher exposure to the sun, and with reasonable precautions, I did not flare hugely nor did I have other symptoms crop up.

When I got back, I got the rest of my blood tests back.  My vitamin 25D dropped from an original 31 ng/mL down to 10 ng/mL.  This huge drop occurred over about 3 months.  I suspect for me the big sources for dietary D must have been the fish oil I was taking sporadically and the salmon and eggs we have an affinity for!  I did not consume much (if any) vitamin D supplemented foods such as commercial milk prior to this.  My 1,25D did not change significantly.  TM doesn?t require that be retested while on MP, but my doc did it anyway.  I am poised to begin Phase 2 tomorrow.  Hurray. :roll-laugh:

But the other tests I got back were VERY depressing.  In fact, I have not been that depressed over tests since that pesky anti-CCP (now normal) that I felt so horrified about!  I?m losing a lot of confidence in all this medical testing, I tell you!

I had delayed food allergy testing (blood) done by my MP doctor before I started MP.  For about 3 months I have been avoiding the foods that came up on that test as reactive (mildly), as well as D foods.  I just had that test redone prior to this trip.  I am DISMAYED to find that NONE of the foods I avoided dropped off the list of reactive foods.  :crying:  Two of them that I did not avoid well (yeast and cheddar cheese) are now at a higher reactive level, and there are MANY more foods on the list ? foods I need to eat, lots of fruits, veggies, goat milk, and even some foods I did not eat at all (oysters & cod!!).  Why would these things have gotten so much worse all of the sudden?

The frustrating thing is that the foods I ate to avoid the other ones got worse so quickly!  For example, peas were plentiful and delicious, fresh from our garden, so I did eat a lot of those.  Same with garlic.  My hubby grew a bunch over the winter, and we have always eaten a lot of garlic, so having it straight from our garden has been wonderful.  Both of those wonderful foods showed up on the list!  Asperagus, spinach, BROCCOLI!  I can?t avoid these foods!  And why bother if you continue to ?react? to them anyway, even if you avoid them?  And if foods you do eat start reacting, then it is hopeless!  Food = poison.  :sick:  And if I did try, then I think I would be highly at risk for nutritional and calorie deficiencies!  It isn't like this thing tells me to avoid Cheetoes and diet soda!!  I do that, too!

To make matters worse, no meats/proteins were on the list before, which always made me wonder about the push to vegetarian diets for inflammation.  I was avoiding all fish anyway for MP.  Well, now cod, oysters (yuck) turkey and eggs (I only ate egg whites for MP also) are now reactive!!

The only other factor is that I was taking probiotics sporadically on the first test, but I had stopped them about 3 weeks or so prior to the second for the simple fact that I ran out.  I either have to order them or go 150 miles to get them.  I don?t like the idea of ordering them due to the heat they will have to endure to get to me.  Could that be a factor?  I am planning to start them up again, mostly because it does help with regularity in general.  I now really feel convinced they are good.

Another thought I have is that this confirms my notion that these diseases make us sensitive to foods not that the foods cause us to have the disease.  If the foods were the cause, I should have had more reactivity to begin with not mild reactions getting worse three years into the process.  I should also mention that I don?t feel sick or have any problems when I eat these foods ? nothing to make be desire to avoid them.  And I naturally rotate my diet rarely eating the same types of food closer than 4 days apart.  Even those wonderful snap peas were not so plentiful that we ate them daily.

My hubby thinks the test is a bunch of bunk.  He likens it to a horoscope!  I wonder if he isn?t right.  How can I react suddenly to a food I never ate?

Sorry for the long rant, but food gets such a lot of discussion on this board. Vegetarian diets, grass fed meat, raw milk, Indian spices, and yet the news tells us of tomatoes that make folks sick, lettuce and spinach can be a killer.  MSG is nearly unavoidable.  I just want to give up.  Nothing I have done makes any difference to the joint pain I have had, and I miss enjoying my food!  Doesn?t anyone else find this all ridiculous?  I see people every day that eat anything and aren?t sick. What gives!?  :headbang:

[klogan]

I can't help you out, I can only sympathize. I must say, you've definitely convinced me; I will not get these tests! I think I'll just keep trying to eat well, and leave it at that. That's what Richie and Joe do. They're smart and doing well.

I know diet can make a difference, but I do feel at times that the issue hovers on the verge of catapaulting off the edge of common sense. People have to eat. I've tried to adopt a radically restrictive diet, but in the end I'm too lazy – I just can't limit my diet in a way that precludes being a dinner guest.  On the other hand, I know that for A Friend, diet made a tremendous difference for her.

In your case, it sounds like something just threw all the values off or you're just in a reactive state. I know allergiosity (just made that word up) can vary with AP treatment.

Of all the difficult things about these illnesses, I think it is the lack of clarity that brings me down the worst. Am I doing the right thing? Am I doing enough? Is it yeast? Sulphites? Dairy? Mycoplasma? Hormones? Chemicals? Lyme? You get the drift…

The angushing thing is that at some points I've just had to make a decision, a semi-educated one, and live with it.

Good luck!

[Jo]

Blood tests are no where near as accurate as the skin tests, and false positives are not unusual.

Is there any reason (such as antihistamine use) that you could not take the skin tests?

In addition, the skin tests will tell you how minor it is. I personally am allergic to anything in the Bella Donna Family, such as tomatoes. But every now and then I can have a pizza with no problems. 

If you've been eating in restaurants, you may be exposed to food that you weren't aware of.  For example, that cook from Hell's Kitchen- he puts worchister sauce in his hamburgers. Worchister sauce has some kind of little fish that my best friend is allergic to in it.  So she could think she was safe with a hamburger, and end up the hospital, because of these little unknown additions.  Your antigens could have been triggered the same way, without you knowing about it.

Many people who've used the MSM program have reported that thier food allergies disappeared.  If you get too frustrated, you might want to try it.  I consider it the perfect complement to the AP.

Blessings

Jo

[Maz]

[user=45]Tiff[/user] wrote:

Things are mixed, but I have continued to do fairly well at the end of Phase 1 of the MP.  

Why would these things have gotten so much worse all of the sudden?

 

Hi Tiff,

This must be very frustrating and I completely understand your angst. I haven't been able to pinpoint any particular foods that cause exacerbations in my pain levels, at all, by doing elimination diets. Nothing makes any sense, because I can, for example, eat an indian curry one day and feel great the next day and, yet, a month later, have the same curry and feel like crap the next day (that's with no other unusual additions to my diet)! :sick: 

A few years ago, I also had food allergy testing done through a holistic physician. I thought it would be a waste of money at the time, because I'd never had any noticeable reactions to foods. Turned out I was sensitive to wheat, corn, soy and eggs. When I talked to the doctor about this, he asked me how often I ate these things. Well, aside from corn, I thought I probably ate some of these things daily in some shape of form. In fact, I was making fruit smoothies every morning, using soy milk, thinking this was a healthy way to control cholesterol. He told me that eating the same foods, day in and day out, can create food sensitivities, so it's not so much about eliminating them, but being sure to space them out. So, it would be okay to have the occasional fruit smoothie with soy milk, just not every day.

This probably doesn't help much, at all, but just thought to mention it. The other thing that came to mind is that you've just started a new protocol. So, it may be within the realms of possibility that you're herxing and all your hypersensitivities are just ramped up for the time being. I know the MP doesn't really give much credence to the hypersensitivity thing, but from an AP vantage, it's quite possible. Have they had any answers for you about this on the MP board?

Hope you had a nice trip and family reunion!

Peace, Maz

[Tiff]

Thanks for the sympathy everyone.

Klogan, I don't think you are lazy, I just think that dieting is difficult UNLESS you get some really positive results which spur you on.  Plenty of folks seem to have great results from making changes, and that would be very motivating!  I know what you mean about making a decision (semi-educated) and moving forward.  That is what I was trying to do, and while I felt like the diet I was doing was very reasonable, I did expect some improvement at least in some of the foods I diligently avoided.

Jo, I don't think I will bother with skin tests for now.  I'm far away from the MP doc that will do that sort of thing, and my insurance pays nothing for anything he does.  I definitely did not get these results from eating out.  I made sure to have the testing done before our trip for just that reason, because I knew we would be eating out a lot, and I did not want to mess up the results.  I will look into the MSM program when I am feeling less frustrated! 😛

Maz, you brought up the other idea that did cross my mind.  With the protocol change I had a major switch around with my other tests (CCP going to negative, rise in RF), there is good reason to think that my immune system might be putting out some weird signals at this point.  Also, your point about rotating your diet is well taken.  I do try to do this, but some things it is not easy to do.  Once you buy goat milk, you have to drink it all before it spoils (for example).  Same with some veggies and meats.  And I have a family to feed, so I have to make sure we actually eat, something I am finding harder and harder to do!  At this point, if I take this test seriously, I can't have any dairy products (does butter actually count as a dairy product?), no soy or rice substitutes, no almond milk as an alternative.  I guess coconut milk would do, but probably it would show up problematic next anyway.  Get the idea?

Seriously, what would I even eat?  Buckwheat is out.  Oats are out.  Hummm… breakfast?  No eggs, no turkey bacon, no bacon, no smoothie (maybe fruit with water only), no almonds or walnuts, no bread.  I can eat wheat (and gluten) but no yeast – so that means only whole wheat pasta?  There is no sense to any of it.  Completely contradicts a lot of the RA literature which is against red meat and grains!

I'm more inclined to take the MP viewpoint that as I kill off the buggers these problems (which are really so mild at this point that I don't actually feel sick when I eat these food) will drop away.  However, I did scare up some more probiotics at a small, local vitamin shop.  I'm amazed they had any!

I'm going to keep up with the “whole foods” diet, avoiding processed foods, and try to be careful to rotate foods, but no more stressing over this for me.  That continues to seem very unhealthy to me.

Thanks again you guys!  And if anyone else has information about allergy testing, I want to hear it!

[casey]

Hi Tiff,

You are sitting exactly where i was with my son a yr ago. (he 13). When all this started with us , i too had him tested for food allergies by blood. Well it came back allergic to over 20 veges and all kinds of fruits and all the good foods as well as some gluten products and dairy.He was then put on a four day rotaion diet of things he could eat which wasnt much. I did that for  8 months and then pulled him off it as as a child, it was simply to hard for him to live that way. In the end i just kept him off gluten totally, and we have a tiny bit of cheese on a gluten free pizza once in a while. He does eat all the other foods that his blood tests had showed a reaction to but never the same thing 2 days in a row. His tests are negative now (ANA and dsDNA and no other food test other than that first one)and things look good however i also question what comes first in these diseases, the horse or the cart?

I believe the reason my son had so many food allergies was leaky gut.  Also, the foods he tested pos for at that time, were all the things he had ate in the previous 3 days prior and on the day of the test so i apply leaky gut to that.  On the other hand, i have no idea how accurate these tests are anyway. He never showed any kind of reaction to anything he ate that he was allergic to. And  hubby and i decided we will not have him tested again for that as he would never eat.

We do abide by the gluten part 110% though. That was a DNA test and you cant get any more accurate that that. Gluten maybe what contributed to this problem big time in the first place allowing for the immune system to weaken, bacteria getting a hold, food sensitivities setting in, i dont know , maybe a hundred things. I do know, that we felt like dogs chasing our tails and now we just went to reg eating, nothing 2 days in a row and no gluten with the odd bit of dairy. We are not as dizzy this way.

I too, wonder about all the tests. Everything made us chase our tails. I gave up on alot of this, did and do what i can and let GOD do the rest. Tests were making me insane so we are on a break. i can see my tail right now. Hope it keeps up.

BTW, did you test pos for any food you have NEVER ate? My son did and never ever ate a food in that food family period so i wonder how you could develop an allergy to it without being exposed to it.

My best to you and i second MAZ on everything in her post.

Take care,

Casey

[John McDonald]

Tiff – I think your husband is wise in this case. Listen to him and listen to your body. If your body doesn't much like some food then quit eating it. Else go for it. When I started AP and continuing on MP I find that my gut gets slightly uncomfortable with good ole bread. I love bread, always have. I can still eat it, but with a slight payment of discomfort. So most days I don't have any and some days I do. I didn't need a blood test for that. Don't overthink this thing. It is hard enough without that. Just be patient and in a bit you will be amazed.

[Susan LymeRA]

Cass said:

I believe the reason my son had so many food allergies was leaky gut.

Bingo!  Leaky gut causes food allergies.  Until you heal the gut, you can develop an allergy to anything. 

Jo, skin test are completely inadequate for testing food allergies.  Must be blood test.

Tiff, how frustrating to be able to eat so little.  I would only avoid things that clearly make me hurt.  In my case, joint pain will begin within 2 hrs of eating dairy or soy.  Every other food seems to be fine now.  I do believe my leaky gut has healed.

Susan

[Tiff]

Casey, A dog chasing his tail – that sums it up! 😕 Many of the foods on the list I had not eaten for months, but some I ate a lot.  Some that I ate every day did not show up though, like strawberries and blueberries!  It had no rhyme or reason that I could see.

You are right, John.  I know I have been kind of stubborn with this diet stuff.  Like for Susan it seems to work so well.  Not so for me. 🙁  I have given it all my best shot, but it is time to let it go.  We have, as a family, developed some really improved habits mostly revolving around less processed foods.  Perhaps that is enough for now!

Yes, Susan, it is frustrating, and I am so petite I can't afford not to eat!  Also, some of the foods on that list I NEVER eat, so I can't help but wonder about accuracy.  Perhaps the samples didn't survive the vicious heat coming from West Texas and were compromised.  I doubt they would be willing to admit that and give me my money back!  They are expensive, too!

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