I spent over forty years of my life not knowing I was [wheat] Gluten Intolerant. One doctor even suggested I was faking an imaginary illness, and wasting his time. Instant Illness and recovery was a roller coaster ride with no explanation.
Gluten intolerance when I was young was practically unknown. My father had it and was not aware of it. In the last year of his life, his stomach would swell, looking like he swallowed a basketball. He would be in great pain from the swelling.
The doctors in our area at the time were ignorant of gluten intolerance. All the doctors agreed on, was when a patient's stomach swelled like that, they had between six months and a year to live. My Father was no exception to that rule.
Though I did not know it at the time, my first symptoms came in the form of brutal hangovers. Most people have a hangover that lasts for part of a day. Mine would last two to three days.
At first I thought it was drinking too much. I paid attention to the amount I drank and found it was what I drank, not how much. If I drank wine, the next day I would feel pretty normal. If I drank beer, it was a totally different story. I would be sick for a couple of days.
In my thirties came my insta-sick problem. I suffered from extreme tiredness at times. Feeling like I had been exercising for hours and was completely worn out. I just wanted to lay down and sleep. For no reason I would feel like I had the flu, minus the fever. It would last anywhere from a few hours to a few days.
Some family members had thyroid conditions, with two having their thyroids removed. I was sure thyroid was my problem. Thus started my search for relief from the Doctor's, "Nothing wrong with you", declarations.
After a slew of doctors and continuing negative thyroid tests, my thyroid was boringly normal. They also agreed en mass I did not have Lupus. One doctor offered Seasonal Area Depression as a cause, but that only explained the winter months. Finally, I gave up on doctors finding what was wrong with me.
I was cruising into my forties around this time. I started keeping a food, exercise and illness log. Nothing seemed to relate to my feeling bad. Whether I ate salads, vegetables, or meat and potatoes, sudden flu like symptoms came and went. I had a cycles of constipation followed by diarrhea. Joint pain joined my list of complaints. Then another oddity. I dropped floaters and they smelled sour almost like vinegar. It did not seem to matter what I ate.
One day I received a call, and the caller told me after five doctors they found a cause for their mood swings and our shared flu like symptoms. What was Gluten Intolerance I asked? I had never heard of it. After it was explained to me, I thought, well this can't be me, I generally eat wheat cereal for breakfast, sandwiches for lunch and bread with dinner and I am okay.
I gave it a try. After four days of no wheat products, I woke up feeling literally thirty years younger. I did not believe it was possible to feel so good! To say eating gluten free is a lifestyle change is to say climate change is a minor inconvenience.
If you go through constant periods of bloating, constipation, convulsive diarrhea, illness and fatigue, you may be gluten intolerant. There is of course a blood test you can take, but the simplest test is go on a completely grain free diet for a week and see how you feel.
Gluten Intolerance is a real problem, and hides itself as a cold, flu, allergy, and food poisoning part of your thinking process. Gluten Intolerance hides very well. There is always a reasonable explanation of why you feel so poorly. It was thought to mostly affect people of European descent, but as the years roll by, they know now people from every nationality suffer from it.
There is a blood test you can get. The easiest test is giving up every food with grain in it including liquids for a week. Read the label of every food you put into your mouth. If after a week of not eating, drinking, or ingesting wheat gluten in all it's forms, you do not feel like a new person, wheat gluten may not be your unknown issue.
Giving up wheat gluten means reading labels of every food you eat, even your soap and shampoo and lotion. If you wear makeup, you need to read the ingredients of it too. When you eat out, there may be wheat gluten on your french fries or in your mashed potatoes. Almost always on breaded foods, such as fried fish. Cheese and ice cream contain gluten because it is a cheap thickener. If you can not identify the ingredients as you look at it, it probably has wheat in some form in it. Thank the food industry for this.
This is taken my own experience with Gluten Intolerance, so take what I wrote for what it is worth.
Here are a couple of links for further reading, if this is of interest to you:
8 Foods to Avoid with a Gluten Intolerance (and 7 to Eat)
In my opinion, the food industry is out of control. Almost all, "Oat Cereals" contain large amounts of wheat. Much of the food we eat has some form of wheat gluten in it. About every third bowl of a GMO oat cereal causes me problems. Soaps and shampoos are a minefield of inflammatory dangerous chemicals that make me sick for the sake of profit.
