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Thread: COVID, Food Intolerance/Allergies, and Hormones

  1. #1
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    Default COVID, Food Intolerance/Allergies, and Hormones

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    Rip, this is not a question, but rather a point of discussion and information, though incomplete, I'd like to draw attention to with your permission.


    Backstory: while deployed to Afghanistan, I contracted a virus that caused severe gastrointestinal distress. I lost around thirty pounds over the course of two weeks, and had to receive IV fluids with nutrients. I was almost sent back to Germany. After my deployment, over the course of around two years, I separated from active service and began to gain weight. After diet and exercise failed to have any effect, I went to a doctor who, at my request, checked my testosterone. I was at 92, and over the course of several labs fluctuated between 88 and 120 (far below the minimum range of 330). Over the next 6 years, I went through many specialist and diagnostic procedures, but never received any real help or a solid diagnosis. I start the Novice Program in 2013, and while I saw significant gains it never resolved the other issues:
    • Chronic Fatigue
    • Low Testosterone
    • IBS (both)
    • Body Weight and Composition
    • Sleep issues.


    I finally looked into it for months on my own, and I came across the effects of food allergies and intolerances. I started a two-year elimination diet, and at its conclusion (and a food allergy panel through an immunologist) I found that I had undiagnosed minor food allergies, that I was legitimately, mildly intolerant of gluten, and that I was extremely intolerant of dairy (never determined if it was caesin, lactose or both). I also either do not make enough or any of the enzyme that breaks down sucrose.
    The elimination of dairy (I saved it to the end because I love cheese and whole milk) had immediate and large effects -- essentially, all of my issues improved within two weeks by at least 80%, and over the course of the next six months continued to improve.


    I say all of this because it gave me plenty of perspective, experience and knowledge to recognize the issue. Others in my family sought treatment for food issues, and it may have even prevented my aunt from developing stomach cancer as she had many undiagnosed allergies and intolerances that her doctors said likely lead to the development of precancerous spots in her stomach (successfully removed).

    It also allowed me to recognize issues with my wife's health. As I discussed in the current events post, we both contracted the SARS-COV-2 Omicron variant over Christmas in December 2021. Afterwards, it became apparent within a few months that my wife's menstrual cycles were significantly disrupted (she discontinued birth control six years ago). When she went to her OB-GYN, she was told that every patient in that office that had received the vaccines or been infected with any variant of COVID had experienced the same significant disruption. My wife monitors her ovulation cycle closely with the inexpensive strips, and we observed that her progesterone cycles were all over the place before, during and after the ovulation window. A protocol of progesterone for ten days in her cycle for four months had some significant impacts that varied, but were ultimately transient and did not recreate a stable cycle. So, I took stock of her issues:
    • Chronic Fatigue
    • Disrupted Hormonal/Menstrual cycle, especially progesterone
    • IBS
    • Inflammation w/ severe and unrelenting right hip pain (old horse riding injury)
    • Disrupted sleep cycle
    • Body Weight and Composition
    • Face/throat rash with coughing/clearing of throat


    I took a couple of days to look for recent research regarding COVID and food allergies, and found that it was a fairly common occurrence to develop food allergies after infection with the most common allergy being gluten. I spoke with her about it, and after having been so involved with my issues she immediately cut gluten out of her diet as a place to start elimination.

    Within five days, her pain in her hip had completely abated. Her sleep cycles are returning to normal (she can easily sleep 6-7 hours without waking now). Her recent progesterone levels during her ovulation period were a textbook spike over the day it should have occurred, and her menstrual cycle now seems on track. The only issue was some acute intense pain and nausea while ovulating, but we have a working hypothesis that it was caused by multiple ovarian fistula developing from a lack of full ovulation for several months. She hasn't experienced any IBS or rashes, and her body weight without training (though she now feels like starting back) has adjusted significantly over two weeks. She's lost thirteen pounds and two sizes in her clothing, and we attribute this mostly to systemic inflammation abating and higher function of her digestive tract.


    I urge people who have had similar issues and experiences to consider food allergies, sensitivities and intolerances developed from COVID or other viral infections. They now have in-home tests available for affordable prices that allow you to skip the headache of months-long elimination diets and the doctor's office, and through my efforts I learned the average diagnosis time for these issues is roughly ten years. My wife's primary care doctor told her they were inundated with food and other allergies this year, so she is on the waiting list to see an allergist next year. I would also welcome any input from others as this likely isn't a full explanation or understanding of all the factors that may be influencing our situation.

  2. #2
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    Interesting. Can you link to any sources describing food allergies related to C19?

  3. #3
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    Is there any particular test for food sensitivities you can recommend? I am absolutely troubled by food sensitivities and am seeing a naturopath in a month regarding my symptoms.

  4. #4
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    Quote Originally Posted by Mark Rippetoe View Post
    Interesting. Can you link to any sources describing food allergies related to C19?
    I'm having problems finding the particular one that listed specific occurrences of different intolerances and allergies post-COVID. I'm trying to recall what institution it was, but I was using an "alternate" search engine at the time, and it doesn't seem to be cached. The problem of increasing food allergens and intolerances has been steadily increasing in the general population before hand. Here's what I found this evening targeted loosely at viral infection and including information regarding non-Celiac gluten intolerance:
    COVID Mast Cell Activation Syndrome
    Reovirus Dietary Sensitivity - Mice
    Article: Gluten links to Mental Health w/bibliography
    Article: non-Celiac Gluten Sensitivity w/study

    Quote Originally Posted by Johnsonville View Post
    Is there any particular test for food sensitivities you can recommend? I am absolutely troubled by food sensitivities and am seeing a naturopath in a month regarding my symptoms.
    There is no replacement for a full-panel allergy test done at a doctor's office to more specifically determine reactions, but if it were me all over again I'd use one of the IgG blood kits prior to a targeted elimination diet:
    https://www.mylabbox.com/product/foo...rack=143518234
    https://www.everlywell.com/products/...xoCqFIQAvD_BwE


    To clarify my position: When you see a doctor about this, most will be far behind (even Allergists/Immunologists) the curve on these issues, and the response I frequently got for my time and money was "well, try an elimination diet and see if that helps." One immunologist actually went in-depth with me, but I was half-way through my elimination diet at the time. Trying relatively cheap at-home tests to provide you with general guidance on what you can attempt to eliminate and possibly re-challenge with regard to your diet is something you can do on your own. It's a sort of self-sufficient triage with little to no cost.

    There's just not a lot of strong research, guidance, testing capacity/capability or readily available treatments out there at this time, and I suspect the latter is why it's not a big deal -- there's no money in the treatment. Call me crazy or jaded, but I strongly suspect there's also not a lot of money or interest in researching food-based immune issue post-COVID or post-vaccine. I give it another year or two at best before the clinical significance starts to force more effort into determining why what appears to be happening is.

  5. #5
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    Quote Originally Posted by David A. Rowe View Post
    I'm having problems finding the particular one that listed specific occurrences of different intolerances and allergies post-COVID. I'm trying to recall what institution it was, but I was using an "alternate" search engine at the time, and it doesn't seem to be cached. The problem of increasing food allergens and intolerances has been steadily increasing in the general population before hand. Here's what I found this evening targeted loosely at viral infection and including information regarding non-Celiac gluten intolerance:
    COVID Mast Cell Activation Syndrome
    Reovirus Dietary Sensitivity - Mice
    Article: Gluten links to Mental Health w/bibliography
    Article: non-Celiac Gluten Sensitivity w/study



    There is no replacement for a full-panel allergy test done at a doctor's office to more specifically determine reactions, but if it were me all over again I'd use one of the IgG blood kits prior to a targeted elimination diet:
    https://www.mylabbox.com/product/foo...rack=143518234
    https://www.everlywell.com/products/...xoCqFIQAvD_BwE


    To clarify my position: When you see a doctor about this, most will be far behind (even Allergists/Immunologists) the curve on these issues, and the response I frequently got for my time and money was "well, try an elimination diet and see if that helps." One immunologist actually went in-depth with me, but I was half-way through my elimination diet at the time. Trying relatively cheap at-home tests to provide you with general guidance on what you can attempt to eliminate and possibly re-challenge with regard to your diet is something you can do on your own. It's a sort of self-sufficient triage with little to no cost.

    There's just not a lot of strong research, guidance, testing capacity/capability or readily available treatments out there at this time, and I suspect the latter is why it's not a big deal -- there's no money in the treatment. Call me crazy or jaded, but I strongly suspect there's also not a lot of money or interest in researching food-based immune issue post-COVID or post-vaccine. I give it another year or two at best before the clinical significance starts to force more effort into determining why what appears to be happening is.
    Thanks, I appreciate the advice

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