Food allergies are one of the most prevalent, least understood, and least often diagnosed problems in America. Millions upon millions of people suffer from food allergies that they aren’t aware of, and experience a host of unpleasant symptoms as a result. The most common of these symptoms include:

Irritable bowels
Chronic sinus congestion, even outside of allergy season (food allergies also worsen seasonal allergies)
Acid reflux
Frequent gas/bloating after meals
Breakouts and bad skin generally
Chronic fatigue
Difficulty paying attention
Insomnia

How can so many different conditions all be caused by one thing? We’ll, your gut is the biggest organ system in your body. Your small intestine alone stretches over 20 feet. Food allergies create massive amounts of inflammation in your small intestine, as your immune system attacks the food that you eat. This is what an allergy is – an errant response by your immune system to something harmless. An innocuous substance, like a bit of egg protein creates a full blown immune reaction the same way that an infectious bacterium would.

Have you ever experienced seasonal allergies to grass and tree pollen? If so, you’re well aware that, in addition to your nose becoming stuffy, you tend to feel tired all over, and sort of generally out of it in the midst of an allergy flare up. This is because the immune response your body creates to pollen in the air doesn’t stay confined to your sinuses. Critical chemicals involved in the immune response (cytokines, histamines, and other chemical messangers that tell immune cells when to go on the alert and when to chill out) end up getting released into all sorts of different areas of your body. These chemicals create  inflammation, and this inflammation is responsible for your symptoms. The funny thing about allergies is that usually the thing that is causing the allergy (say, some grass pollen) is completely harmless. If your body just left it alone, there would be no problem. It’s your body’s own response that creates all of the unpleasant symptoms.

Your gut is about 100 times bigger than your sinuses. If an errant immune response to some pollen in your sinuses is enough to make you feel tired and out of it all over, imagine what the same response magnified over your entire gut can do? This is exactly what happens when you have food allergies and continuously eat foods that you are allergic to. Your immune system in your gut ends up attacking the food you eat, and the result is that your gut ends up chronically inflamed. This inflammation spreads to other tissues, and your whole body ends up running less efficiently.

Further, when the gut is inflamed, it can’t really do its job. Digestion slows down, allowing microbes in your gut to ferment the food that you eat. This creates gas and bloating. It also allows these microbes, especially a particular type called Candida Albicans, to reproduce at higher levels and start to take over your gut. Overgrowth of Candida Albicans is a huge problem in its own right that is complicated by food allergies, and if you experience any of the symptoms of food allergies, there’s a good chance you suffer from Candida overgrowth as well. Take a look at our Dealing with Candida tutorial for more. 

Beyond creating gas and bloating, and allowing the overgrowth of pernicious microbes,  an inflamed gut can’t extract nutrients from the food you eat as effectively, so you end up losing vitamins and minerals. Further, chronic inflammation due to food allergies also begins creating holes in the gut and leading to so called “leaky gut syndrome”, in which undigested food stars getting outside of the gut into the surrounding tissue. When this happens, there is generally a massive immune response as your body attacks that food, creating more inflammation, further damaging your gut, and and leading to a vicious cycle.