Food Sensitivity Signs

The gold standard in food sensitivity testing is an elimination diet. There are food sensitivity tests out there however if you are suffering from any type of chronic symptom or chronic illness, you can assume you have something termed intestinal permeability, or leaky gut, which must be healed in order for those tests to be relevant. Taking out inflammatory foods and reintroducing them in a systemic way when the gut is healed is the most powerful and accurate way of knowing what foods are good for you and which are causing inflammation.

Science knows that intestinal permeability is one leg of a three-legged stool for expressing autoimmunity. If your gut is “leaky”, this means that the foods you are eating are not being processed correctly. Instead of absorbing the vitamins and minerals through what are called tight gap junctions, which separate your intestines from the rest of your body, large chunks of those food particles are being leaked through now open junctions into your bloodstream causing the inflammation.

80% of your immune system surrounds your gut, also called your enteric nervous system, so when things are floating around outside of where they are supposed to be, the immune system does what it’s supposed to do and throws inflammation at it (think what happens when you sprain your ankle). Chronic symptoms are an outward sign of internal inflammation in the body. And inflammation manifests in myriad ways depending on the person and everything that has gotten them to this point in their life. Food sensitivities, very different from a literal food allergy, are a sign of inflammation.

This food sensitivity list is not comprehensive but should crack the door on potential areas of note in your own body. I will also mention that it can take up to 7 days for your immune system to react to a food sensitivity. This means if you eat a food on Monday, you might not experience any symptom until Sunday. For this reason, elimination, and protocolled reintroduction, is the gold standard in learning your own body’s reaction to a specific food.

Non-Exhaustive Food Sensitivity List

• Achy

• Acid reflux

• Anxiety

• Asthma

• Bloating

• Burning upon urination

• Burping

• Brain fog

• Chest tightening

• Constipation

• Coughing

• Dark circles under the eyes

• Diarrhea

• Dizziness

• Extremely hungry

• Feelings of anger/rage

• Feeling grumpy

• Feeling off

• Feeling sick

• Flu like symptoms

• Gas

• General body pain

• Headache/Migraine

• Heartbeat irregularities

• Heart palpitations

• Hives

• Indigestion

• Itchiness in the ears

• Joint pain

• Knee pain

• Low energy

• Mouth itching or tingling

• Muscle spasms

• Nausea

• Neck and upper chest turn red

• Nose dripping

• Rashes

• Red or warm face

• Rising antibodies

• Rising temperature

• Rough skin in places

• Seeing spots

• Sinus problems

• Sleep disturbances

• Stomach burning

• Stomach grumbling/gurgling

• Stomach pain

• Stuffy nose

• Swelling (face, eyelids, hands, body, etc)

• Sweating

• Tinnitus (ringing in the ears)

• Tired/fatigue

• Vaginal pain

• Water retention in tissues

References

Bowthorpe, Janie. Hashimoto’s, Taming the Beast. Laughing Grape Publishing, 2019.

Disclaimer: Information on this site is not intended or implied to be a substitute for professional medical advice. Always consult with a healthcare professional before beginning any diet, supplementation or exercise program. Statements and opinions contained on this website and other related sources (blog and social media platforms) are provided as informative and educational tools only. Whole Body Health & Healing cannot and does not guarantee the accuracy or effectiveness of the information to your unique circumstance.