Why sometimes do food intolerances develop later on in life?

What causes them?

[SuzyQ2]

Allergies can develop at any stage in your life, from topical to internal allergies.

I've had eczema all my life - my consultants were adamant that there was no link with diet - yet in my 40s I developed colitis losing three stone in a very short time (every cloud......) - we realised that wheat based foods seemed to be related and I stopped eating gluten - my tummy settled (although have had one attack since) - but the more staggering part was that my eczema cleared - I still get it on my hands and arms, and occasionally more.

Now when I look back on it - this "wheat / gluten" issue was certainly not new - just not bad enough to make the connection.

I developed penicillin allergy through treating my eczema - which may not have happened if the food allergy had been detected earlier.

As for the why, can't answer that (under / over exposure?) - but when I tell my friends allergies can develop at any time, in humans and dogs (my passion) - they look at me very cynically

Hope you get sorted

[BabsyWabsy in reply to SuzyQ2]

Hi SuzyQ2, There are a few theories about this. One is the 'Hygiene Hypothesis'. The idea here is that we live in a sanitised environment and our T1 & T2 helper cells that are designed to tackle pathogens invading the body have nothing to do and therefore attack other things in the body. It has been shown that farm kids have stronger immune systems than urban kids. Another idea is the 'Old Friends Hypothesis' which suggests that we are designed to have certain types of microbes, largely in the gut, that help to counteract pathogens and have many other functions that help the body with numerous things. Lack of these good bugs can cause an auto immune response which may manifest as an allergy. You can help these good bugs by making sure you eat foods that support your gut flora, so lots of veg and fibre can help. There is plenty of stuff on line or books you can read on this.

You are right about them starting at any time. I was in my 60's when I realised I was reactive to wheat, and probably had been for some time. I am much better without it, and making sure I eat extra veg whenever I can. At the moment, I am fine. Long may it reign.

[Fruitandnutcase in reply to SuzyQ2]

No, I agree with you SuzyQ2 I think allergies can develop at any time. I went totally GF five years ago and it has made a huge difference.

Agree with BabsyWabsy too. I come from a ‘farm kids’ background, loads of animals, manure, bugs etc and I know I definitely didn’t wash my hands before every time I sat down to eat. I’d say I had a very strong immune system as a child and was never really ill.

Things happened in my thirties and I went through a very stressful period in my life which I think set off my IBS and shortly after that, asthma. I blame another stressful period in my life for developing Graves Disease which is autoimmune overactive thyroid disease. Then I developed inflammatory arthritis a few years ago - the reason I’d had enough of autoimmune conditions and went totally gluten free.

I’m sure stress must affect the autoimmune system as well as what we eat and like BW says a healthy diet low in sugar and in my case gluten free plus eating foods that will help keep your good gut bugs happy is the way to go.

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Our bodies change/evolve as we age! does a tree not drop limbs or grow in odd directions or disfigure?. Does a car not develop (a mind of it's own?)issues as age&things that wouldn't be normal to happen do as things that wasn't designed right when made?.

Does Windows not crash esp at the wrong dam time!?.Updates/softwear/hardwear faults happen to them as you do updates which causes conflicts with other parts of the op system.

We are no different as we are constantly eating/drinking/breathing and expel it so all these new things we take in cause issues with our bodies if not totally right plus our bodies age/change as things with in our genetics take over along with hormone/enzyme changes and as for one were not the same as we was yesterday!

[Stuart24]

I wouldn't disagree with any of these posts, there are many reasons. But for me and thousands of others it is a result of our modern lifestyles, and in many cases, if it is down to a controllable cause, it is reversible!

This is my general response to help people find a baseline. First, go to the doctors and get yourself checked for intestinal infections, and whatever other tests they want to do. Most people find they are all clear, and that IBS is a condition brought on by our modern diet, freely accessible food, sedentary lifestyles and a trigger of an earlier infection. After 27 years of suffering with IBS I have found that the long-term solution that actually works is all about vitamins and fasting and both are equally important. You are effectively the manager of a “food nutrient extraction factory”, I know that is obvious, but I have found that IBS is not about medicines, but about changing the way you run the factory, and thinking about it in that way.

This is based on some excellent publications, and also by observing how healthy people live. But, if you are all clear from the Doctor’s, then the first thing to sort out is your vitamins and the timing of your eating and fasting periods. An incident of food poisoning or infection can start you on a cycle that you need to make a really concerted effort to break out of. IBS causes vitamin deficiencies which are very difficult to overcome in most people’s diets, especially because you are probably eating selectively to manage your symptoms. Your vitamin levels affect the health of your intestines, and the health of your intestines affects your vitamin absorption, so it is a vicious circle that you have to break. Get some really good, expensive, multi-vitamins (ideally constituted for your age) and take them without fail every day before your breakfast. Get a blood test for Vitamin D and get you doctor to judge your supplement level required in IU’s. Do not get the ones with high calcium and magnesium content initially as certainly in large doses these minerals can mess you up as they consume your stomach acid, and you should get enough of these minerals from your diet. If you are on low FODMAPs, go for all lactose free dairy products to boost your calcium. At the same time, sort out your fasting periods immediately. This is normally completely overlooked by GP’s, but is critical. Your small intestine should be practically sterile, and your stomach acid along with bowel cleaning during fasting (called MMC) will usually do this. You need to fast for this to be effective, and by that I mean, ABSOLUTELY NO eating in between meals, only water, or zero-sugar drinks. Imagine that you never washed your dinner plates and just kept putting food on them all the time!, they would be permanently loaded with bacteria. You need to give your small intestine plenty of time free of food for cleaning and maintaining the factory. The modern scenario of have cupboards full of rich foods permanently available day and night is a modern luxury outside of the original design of the human being. Your stomach will sort itself out when you have got control of your small intestine (although if you've got gastritis you'll need to finish a course of omeprazole first), and then your large intestine will improve later as nutrients are more efficiently absorbed from your small intestine. To do this, eat a good breakfast at say 7am (porridge with 50% lactose free milk) or what suits you and then a good lunch at 12 o'clock - absolutely no food in between. After lunch, no food again for at least 5 hours, and eat well again for your evening meal because it has got to get you through the night. No supper or snacks, no food or milk at all until breakfast the next day.

Seek out and try to eliminate “trans-fats”. These cause inflammation of the colon, separately to bacterial overgrowth and you will be more sensitive than most because of SIBO and this confuses what is causing you trouble. Chips, hash browns, butter, popcorn and things cooked in cheap or old frying oil as you find in many restaurants can give you colon pain directly through inflammation. It usually passes in a day or so, but trans-fats are bad for you in a miriad of ways, not only by inflammation of the colon. Ideally, starches should only be boiled, and this is enough. Red meats take a long time to digest, and also contain some trans-fats, only have them once a day, and just a light salad to go with them, not a load of starchy food or grains, as they have long digestion times. You don’t want carbohydrates being held up with these in your digestion by heavy meats.

You will feel hunger in the fasting periods, this is doing you good, and you must NOT respond to it - only with water or no-sugar drinks. This is critical. Importantly, when you are feeling better, do not resort to your old ways, you are still recovering, and you need to make a life-style change to have this level of discipline in your eating and continue with it. Do start doing some exercise if you don’t already, as this will really help with your gut motility, and your general health. It takes a few weeks at least, and you need to persevere. You then need to maintain a healthy and consistent way of eating and always keep the vitamins topped to prevent you from relapsing. In a couple of weeks, you should be able to be getting off the low FODMAP diet, and mixing back in the higher FODMAPs.

There is a lot of support for L-glutamine to help with repair of your intestinal lining; this means buying 500g of the bodybuilder powder type and having a couple of tea-spoons of this a day, one before breakfast and one just before you go to bed, and you can have this in a light cordial drink. A lot of this was taken from this excellent paper below, but it does fit exactly with what I have experienced. For the first time I really feel in control of the IBS mystery that has been a burden for years. Good luck. Please reply if this works for you.

Treatment and Management of SIBO — Taking a Dietary Approach Can Control Intestinal Fermentation and Inflammation

By Aglaée Jacob, MS, RD

Today’s Dietitian

December 2012, Vol. 14 No. 12 P. 16