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Health > Wellbeing > Nutrition > Coping with food intolerances

Coping with food intolerances

16th Dec 2011

Coping with a food intolerance over the festive period can be difficult. Even trickier is being one of the many people who don’t realise that they have one, or that there are alternative food choices which can make life more comfortable.

Living with a food intolerance is much easier when you know you’ve got one. Many people live with annoying, painful symptoms without ever being diagnosed. If the symptoms listed below sound familiar, it might be worth a trip to the doctor.

A food intolerance is a reaction to a foodstuff you consume which does not primarily involve the immune system. Food intolerances are not usually life-threatening, whereas food allergies can be. If you think you may have a food allergy you should avoid that food, and see your doctor as soon as possible.

Coeliac’s disease is an autoimmune disorder associated with eating gluten. Coeliac’s disease can often present with similar symptoms to food intolerances, but unlike most food intolerances eating the food that gives you a reaction, gluten, can be harmful. Some people who were diagnosed with Irritable Bowel Syndrome (IBS) in the past are now being diagnosed with coeliac’s disease using a blood test.

Lactose intolerance
Symptoms

Abdominal pain
Bloating
Abdominal cramps
Diarrhoea
Flatulence
Nausea
Constipation
Intestinal noises
Reflux

Lactose is the sugar found in dairy products. Lactose is broken down in the small intestine by an enzyme called lactase. People who are lactose intolerant have less lactase than normal. This allows the lactose to pass through the small intestine and into the lower bowel, where it is fermented. The fermentation process produces gases and chemical substances which cause the symptoms associated with lactose intolerance. Approximately 50 per cent of people who suffer from IBS are also lactose intolerant.

Fructose malabsorption
Symptoms

Bloating
Abdominal cramps
Abdominal pain
Diarrhoea
Constipation
Intestinal noises
Reflux
Nausea
Possible depression
Possible zinc or folic acid deficiency

Fructose is the sugar found in fruits, vegetables and grains. People who suffer from fructose malabsorption are actually sensitive to fructose, fructo-oligosaccharides (chains of fructose molecules) and galacto-olicosaccharides (chains of molecules containing galactose, glucose and often fructose). These sugars are not absorbed properly by the stomach or intestine, and instead pass into the lower bowel where they ferment. This fermentation process produces gas and chemical substances which cause the symptoms experienced by fructose malabsorption sufferers. Approximately 70 per cent of people with IBS also suffer from fructose malabsorption.

Click NEXT for more on food intolerances and for some great gluten, fructose and lactose-free recipes!

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Ozcanoz
21st Dec 2011
10:35am

Can anyone suggest where you can get these breath tests in Sydney as even my alternative MD did not suggest?

lasaboy
9th Oct 2012
10:50am

Contact the RPA Sydney Food Intolerance Centre

lasaboy
9th Oct 2012
10:59am

My whole family has been diagnosed with intolerances (not just to food) so we are doing the food elimination test at the present (which is a challenge of huge proportions) you must be under a specialist or directly under the RPA network to buy the books (as you NEED direction to use them) this is not an easy road, it tries your nerves your patience and pushes you to the limits, but the end result is you know what you can eat, what you can't and what you are able to have little bits of, you can expect major behavioural changes (in both directions) on this diet, the book is by Sue Dengate, the diet teaches you what foods are acceptable only fresh and what foods are a problem either way.
Although I hate the diet, it has made such major changes in my personality (anger issues) I will never go back to eating anything again, a lot of issues are caused by the additives that are put into the foods by those processing them, additives I might add that are banned in most countries in the world except Australia.

lasaboy
9th Oct 2012
11:09am

Here is one of the links to start the ball rolling

http://fedup.com.au/

Pip
19th Oct 2012
10:42pm

Breath tests are usually done by pathologists.

I'm allergic to Belladonna which includes tomatoes, potatoes, capsicum, eggplant and more foods and it used to be in many medications. I had eye drops for vision testing when I was 7yrs old and went on a 3 day 'trip' of amazing imaginings (which I still remember) which is when my allergy was initially discovered. I ignored the allergies till my 40's when I was suffering severe arthritis, had the allergy tests, stopped eating all the Belladonna family and the arthritis went.. definite proof. Also allergic to dairy.

Millie
20th Oct 2012
9:08am

Wheat is another form of intolerance, it may not even be the gluten.
I suspect it is quite common but maybe not diagnosed.
After I stopped eating wheat based products, my symptoms settled markedly.
My diet became much more healthy, my eczema like skin rashes, fatique and fluid retention improved, hot flushes just about disappeared and I lost weight.

lasaboy
20th Oct 2012
12:14pm

An intolerance could be any food, additive or colour additive, it could also be any smells (even something as simple as a fragrant rose), also ask the hard questions of the doctors, we had our daughter tested for Celiac, we were told she was NOT Celiac, but they did not tell us she was intolerant to gluten and dairy, which did show up, but they were of the opinion it was not a problem, so they did not tell us, this proved wrong to the extreme a couple of years later as things are now worse than they ever were, the doctors do NOT know it all, they are not God, they just think they are!
If you have a doctor who will not answer your questions or looks down on you for asking, find another doctor and tell the first one to pull his or her head in, we went through so many doctors over the years, we found two over a sixteen year period that were on the ball, and three that we had to advise what we wanted them to do as they had no idea, but were open to suggestions from us as they realised they did not know it all and wanted to go deeper, currently we have one who mixes being a Specialist GP with a Holistic approach, it works, not perfectly as no-one is perfect, but better than we have ever had before, just remember you know yourself or your child better than these people, you know when you or they are sick and don't always show it, if the doctors won't listen to you, they don't deserve to be your doctor as their minds are closed to possibilities, we need good doctors who will listen and not discount anything we say, they are few and far between

kino
21st Oct 2012
1:00pm

The article should have pointed out that lactose persistence is a mutation caused by prolonged suckling after weaning and unnatural, rather than concentrating on lactose intolerance like it is an abnormal state. It is estimated that 75% of adults worldwide show a decrease in lactase activity during adulthood. The frequency of decreased lactase activity ranges from 5% in northern Europe through 71% for Sicily to more than 90% in some African and Asian countries. It has now been shown that lactase persistence is caused by several independently occurring mutations.

Pip
21st Oct 2012
2:07pm

..what?

kino
21st Oct 2012
2:23pm

Lactase persistence
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Lactase persistence is the continued activity of the enzyme lactase in adulthood. Since lactase's only function is the digestion of lactose in milk, in most mammals species the activity of the enzyme is dramatically reduced after weaning. However in some human populations lactase persistence has recently evolved as an adaptation to the consumption of non-human milk and dairy products beyond infancy. The majority of people around the world remain lactase non-persistent, and consequently are affected by varying degrees of lactose intolerance as adults – though not all genetically lactase non-persistent individuals are noticeably lactose intolerant, and not all lactose intolerant individuals have the lactase non-persistence allele.

Sixty percent of adults can't digest milk ( USA TODAY)
There are people who have true milk allergies that can cause deadly reactions. But most people who have bad reactions to milk aren't actually allergic to it, in that it's not their immune system that's responding to the milk

Instead, people who are lactose intolerant can't digest the main sugar —lactose— found in milk. In normal humans, the enzyme that does so —lactase— stops being produced when the person is between two and five years old. The undigested sugars end up in the colon, where they begin to ferment, producing gas that can cause cramping, bloating, nausea, flatulence and diarrhea.

If you're American or European it's hard to realize this, but being able to digest milk as an adult is one weird genetic adaptation.

It's not normal. Somewhat less than 40% of people in the world retain the ability to digest lactose after childhood. The numbers are often given as close to 0% of Native Americans, 5% of Asians, 25% of African and Caribbean peoples, 50% of Mediterranean peoples and 90% of northern Europeans. Sweden has one of the world's highest percentages of lactase tolerant people.

Being able to digest milk is so strange that scientists say we shouldn't really call lactose intolerance a disease, because that presumes it's abnormal. Instead, they call it lactase persistence, indicating what's really weird is the ability to continue to drink milk.

Pip
21st Oct 2012
3:05pm

I'm trying to stop getting comments from this post but it's not working.

kino
21st Oct 2012
3:14pm

Don't give up! Persistence is a virtue

lasaboy
21st Oct 2012
7:16pm

and stupidity is caused my people trying to put names and reasons to things that happen, my daughter was UNABLE to breast feed, YET she has a major problem with lactose and the active protein in all milks (this relates to a large number of people whop have problems with milk) that kills this idea for a start, if a study was conducted on thousands of people it might show a very SMALL possibility of what is happening, but never any proof, it would also cost a small fortune, all these studies are conducted on hundreds of people, not thousands, making them all a joke not worth laughing at, besides Wiki cannot be relied upon as in most cases the stats do NOT add up

kino
21st Oct 2012
7:23pm

Only one of the articles was Wikipedia. If you type in 'lactose intolerance, 'Lactase persistence, 'Percentage of world's population lactose intolerance' 'The dairy danger, 'Allergies to cow's dairy', to name a few you'll get millions of websites to verify the claims. Happy hunting!

lasaboy
21st Oct 2012
7:54pm

yes and they reckon that evolution is fact, not a theory and that carbon dating is accurate and thousands of other things.
Evolution is based on one man's idea of what might have happened, (and he recanted his own idea at the end) carbon dating is based on a guess, they added millions of years, but it could have been billions or even thousands, there is no way of checking, science is just that possibilities and ideas, if scientists can't prove something they ASSUME, when you ASSUME you make an ASS out of U and ME.
assumptions never prove anything, all they do is confuse the issue

lasaboy
21st Oct 2012
7:55pm

That's my last post as I don't like to preach, when no-one seems to be listening

kino
21st Oct 2012
8:41pm

Great idea!

Desiree
22nd Oct 2012
12:49pm

I thought I was lactose intolerant and have since found after trial and error that I am intolerant of the type of protein in the milk. I have started to drink the A2 milk which doesn't create the problem in my system.
As I understand it everyday milk has two types of protein, A2 milk has only one protein. From reading articles I believe that the A2 milk protein was in the cows way back when and the current milking cows have two proteins in their milk. Some farmers are breeding and milking cows that only produce A2 protein milk.

BrianP
3rd Jan 2013
9:41pm

This works for me and my friends. Made from only natural sources, you get everything your body needs for about $3 per day. We are 60 in a few months and have noticed the difference. Have a look at this Navig8.me/3199120

lasaboy
3rd Jan 2013
10:03pm

Desiree
A2 milk is produced by cows that have NOT been interfered with genetically, all others have been altered to produce more milk etc, not to mention the processing that occurs and are making a lot of people sick, just like most foods that the scientists have played with on a genetic level

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Tags: intolerance, fructose malabsorption, fructose, lactose, glucose, irritable bowel, coeliac, coeliac's, gluten free, lactose free, fructose free