I strongly suspect I have food allergies. I have heard the best way to determine what I'm allergic to is to go on an elimination diet, then gradually introduce suspect foods back into my diet. But it seems like you have to eliminate practically everything except rice for 2-3 weeks. And I really don't see how anyone can eliminate wheat and sugar. Am I just being difficult in this? I'm just not sure I could stick to a diet that strict. Any help or recommendations would be appreciated. Are there any good reading materials that describe exactly how to go on the elimination diet?

I was on this diet for a week. I stuck to it. And when it was over, I was still alergic to something. I'm guessing something airborne.

Yup - you are pretty much being difficult. If the allergies are that bad, you'll stick to the diet. And you are correct. You can't eat much. To eliminate sugar and wheat - basically you are not allowed to eat any prepared foods at all.

I'm sure that you can find some books on the subject. If you want to find out, you're just going to have to do it.

Believe me, when I was done with this diet, I was so glad I was not allergic to food that this was a real joy. The first thing I did after the diet was make a Gin Gimlet. The next day I had a Banana Split at the Dairy Queen.

The worst that will happen is that you'll lose a few pounds.

[This message has been edited by Cut-Throat (edited 03-30-2003).]

you WILL lose weight doing this .... and there are MANY books about the subject. But you dont need to spend the money. they aren't any smarter than we are... basically, all you can eat is chicken and rice and water... after 2 weeks your system will be cleaner and you probably wont get any reactions when you reitroduce foods.. about a week later you allergies will be back just as they were! elimation diet does NOT solove the problem... but if you are overweight.. go for it.. becasuse it is true.. the MOST that will happen is that you will lose a few pounds..

Wake,

This is baaaaaad ! advice. This is not any kind of homopathic cleansing diet. This diet was given to me by my allerigist. The diet is not supposed to eliminate the allergy at all.

It's only supposed to identify 1.) If food is the allergen 2.) And the specific food if it is. And you can eat a lot of different foods than chicken. You can get quite creative. How does Turkey Breast on the grill basted with Pur maple syrup sound? There are also a lot of fruits and Vegies that you can have. Rice is pretty much the only starch. etc.

If you are trying to figure out if you are allergic to a certain food, then you have to eliminate just ONE food at a time. If you eliminate more than one food at a time, and it turns out that you start to feel better, how will you know which one you are allergic to? If you must use an elimination diet to diagnose your food allergy, then that is the only way to find out what food you are allergic to. If you think you are allergic to wheat, eliminate it completely for a week, then see if you feel better or worse. Then, slowly reintroduce it and see if you get a reaction. I did the other diet that you are talking about to "cleanse my system", under the direction of my allergist. It was the worst thing I ever did to myself. I stuck with it for about a month, but I hated the diet so much that all I dreamed about was eating a salami and cheese sandwich. Not once while I was on the diet, did I feel any better from my allergies. In fact, my stomach got so upset from eating so many vegetables that I actually got WORSE while I was on this diet. For the first week I wasn't even allowed to eat rice. I called my allergist and told him that my blood sugar was so low that I was going to bottom out (it was probably around 50) and he told me to start eating rice, as much as I wanted. That stabilized my blood sugar but I was still miserable. I actually had several panic attacks because I was so upset over this whole diet. Finally I just decided that it wasn't doing a damn thing for my allergies, and even though I lost about 15-20 pounds, it wasn't worth it. If I only wanted to lose weight, I could have just stuck with weight watchers. For me, although I need to lose weight, that was NOT the purpose of this diet.

But I have also done the other thing that I mentioned, which was to eliminate one food at a time. That is how I found out what foods I am allergic to. Plus, I got allergy tests.

Please don't think that this diet is going to help you with your allergies, because unless you are allergic to every food under the sun, it is not going to help you and it is not any way to live.

Good luck,
Elyse

MY advice is not bad. i have lived it! and studied it!... those that think that you are curing yourself by an elimation diet are just WRONG... if you only have 1 or 2 foods that you are allergic to, then it is probably best to elimate these foods. IF you are allergic to many foods, then an elimation diet will not do you any good...

This is not an 'elimination diet' as you call it. My allergist called it an identification diet. You do it only to identify if you are allegeric to food at all.

If like me, you don't feel better after a week, you know it's not food that you allergic to. If you do feel better, then you know it's food. Then you add a food item into your diet (1 a week) to see if you feel worse. If you do, you have identified the food allergen.

This diet is not supposed to make you fell better at all. It is only used to identify the food. Get it!!

currently the only treatment for food allergies is ELIMINATION!!! The purpose of elimating a food is to make you feel better! GET IT?

No, the purpose of the elimination diet is to identify the food that you are allergic to. you start out by eliminating ALL potential allergens. Then adding 1 food per week. Until your symptoms reappear.

If it's strawberries you can eat anything you want EXCEPT strawberries. I have been on this diet prescribed by an Allergist, not someone on a Health Board. GET IT!!

Originally posted by Cut-Throat:
No, the purpose of the elimination diet is to identify the food that you are allergic to. you start out by eliminating ALL potential allergens. Then adding 1 food per week. Until your symptoms reappear.



Yes, that is one way to do it. Or, you can eliminate one food at a time. It's really up to you. Neither is right or wrong. I do apologize if I tried to make you believe that there is only one right way to do this, and to force my opinion on you. If I did that, I certainly did not mean to. Reading my previous post, I realize I may have been a little pushy. I think I got a little carried away! Once again, I apologize. I am not a dr, but I have lived with allergies for my entire life and I do have some very strong opinions as well as what I hope is good advice to offer. I certainly don't mean to upset or offend anybody with my views... I feel very strongly about these things, but my opinions are not facts and nothing is written in stone.

Now, I do have a few more things to add to this topic. I hope I am being helpful. http://www.healthboards.com/ubb/smile.gif

Getting back to what Cut-Throat said about identifying potential allergens, my question is this: how exactly are you supposed to know what the potential allergens are? Everything is a potential allergen. It just differs from person to person. From my understanding, the purpose of an identification diet like you have described is to simply identify what foods you are allergic to. The purpose of an elimination diet is to eliminate the foods that you are allergic to in order to prevent you from having an allergic reaction to something, and to make you feel better.

Along with eliminating the food(s) that you are allergic to, you can also get allergy shots and under the tongue desensitization drops to treat food allergies. You would eliminate just those exact foods, and at the same time get shots and drops to help irradicate the allergy. I was born with more food allergies than I can count, and I was on a very very strict diet for several years. While I was on this diet I was also getting the shots and the drops, and I eventually became desensitized and I am no longer allergic to any foods. I am sure you all know what it means to be desensitized, but for those of you reading this who do not know, I'll explain. It basically means that since an allergy occurs when your body sees something normal like strawberries as an enemy, it releases histamines which cause an allergic reaction. In order to be desensitized, you receive minute amounts of whatever it is that you are allergic to, in the form of an allergy shot or an under the tongue drop, sometimes for several years until your body gets used to this substance and no longer sees it as an "enemy". Once you and your dr feel that you have been on the shots/drops long enough, you stop them and very slowly reintroduce the food(s) into your diet. If you no longer get any symptoms from eating it, you have been desensitized. It may not work for all people, and it may not work for every food allergy, but it worked for me. However, I would not recommend it if you get extremely serious reactions such as anaphylactic shock. That is something much different than what I am talking about. If that is the case, then I would say to just avoid that food completely.


Good luck to everyone,
Elyse

[This message has been edited by purple2067 (edited 04-06-2003).]

I see what you are saying BUT,

1 - desensitation shots or drops DO NOT treat food allergies! the most they can do is increase your overall allergy tolerance to environmental allergies. in turn, this may help you tolerate foods. but it doesn't desensitise you to any food.

2 - like I said before, an elimination diet would onl work if you are allergic to 1 or 2 foods. and you eliminate those foods to see if you feel better. Eliminating them from your diet would make you feel better. This is the ONLY treatment for food allergies....it is not practical to try to elimate EVERY allergan possiblity. But if you want to listen to Cut throat then go for it. Get it yet?

Purple,

You asked how do know which foods are potential allergens?


- Some foods are more likely to cause allergies than others. My allergist had a list of foods that hardly ever cause allergies.

The doctor then takes the list and asks you if you ever eat each food on the list more than twice a week. If you answer yes to any food on this list, you cannot eat it when you go on this diet. That way you are eating foods that you rarely consume and eliminating everthing that you have been eating on a regular basis.

BTW - I was not allergic to a food at all. I believe that I am allergic to something airborne, very common, 24/7 , 365 days a year, worldwide.

Cut-throat, now I understand...thank you for clarifying. My allergist has this sort of list also, but a lot of the things that I was allergic to were not on his list! For me, the best way to find out was just by under the skin food allergy testing. Have you tried that?


Wake, I get the feeling that you think I am lying when I say that food allergy shots and drops worked for me... Maybe shots/drops for food allergies didn't work for you (have you ever tried them?) But I KNOW for a fact that they worked for me. I was on an elimination diet for years and years as a child (and hated every minute of it!) and while I was on the elimination diet I was getting allergy shots and some under the tongue drops. For people with food allergies, there is no choice but to go on an elimination diet and avoid all of the foods you are allergic to, unless you want to get sick. IF YOU ARE ALLERGIC TO A FOOD, YOU HAVE TO ELIMINATE IT, no matter how many foods you may be allergic to! I eliminated several foods for many many years, but at the same time I was also getting shots/drops. I was given under the skin food allergy tests (not the scratch tests) as a child and was found to be allergic to about 15 or 20 foods. I was given the same tests a few years ago as an adult, by the same dr and was found to not have even one food allergy. On my list were milk, cheese, eggs, cocoa, oranges, tangerines, cantaloupe, corn, celery, tomatoes, wheat, sugar (including any food that may have contained it, which really makes it about 50 foods!), yeast, soy, peanuts, and proabably a few others that I am forgetting. For about 7 years I was on the strictest elimination diet possible. Thank heaven for the one health food store in my neighborhood, because at that time the grocery stores didn't even carry rice cakes! Health Food store to the rescue! I was the only child in my school who brought rice cakes with cashew butter for lunch, or cold hamburgers! (I cringe at the thought!) I guess when I was about 12 or 13 I had been on the shots/drops long enough that my dr thought it might be safe to start reintroducing some foods back into my diet. So, I would be allowed one egg a week. Then if that didn't cause a reaction, I was allowed two eggs a week, until I was eating eggs a few times a week without a reaction. Then he slowly reintroduced another food, and another, and another. He said that part of it may have been that I got older and possibly grew out of some of the allergies. But without the food allergy shots, I definitely would not be able to eat all of those foods today. I am now able to eat all of the foods that I once tested positive for allergies to. In fact, the only thing that I have a problem eating now is the dairy products, but that's only because I am lactose intolerant... nothing to do with allergies. I haven't had an allergic reaction to a food in about 8 years. I was actually re-tested last year by the same allergist for all of the food allergies, and was found not to have any. (I started having some new symptoms, so he re-tested me. But it turned out to just be my environmental allergies.)

So Wake, let me try to say this in a polite way...
Don't tell me that shots/drops can't work for food allergies, because they CAN! Maybe they don't work for very many people, but it is possible! I have experienced it first hand, so there is nothing that you can say that will change my mind.

I won't say that I am completely allergy free because I still have my environmental allergies. But at least I can eat what I want to without getting sick! Like I said, food allergy shots will not work for everybody, and even while I was getting them I still had to be on an elimination diet. But, eventually I was able to stop both the shots and the diet and resume normal eating habits.

I realize that not everybody can be as fortunate but that doesn't mean that food allergies cannot be treated.

[This message has been edited by purple2067 (edited 04-06-2003).]

First off, I am glad your allergies are better. But everything I said is true. Shots/drops do NOT treat food allergies directly. There is NO prescribed treatment for food allergies and the only way to deal with it is to eliminate the food completely. it make sense that over years of not eating foods you were allergic to that you could tolerate it better. your body's chemistry can even change over time. It doesn't change the fact that there is NO medicine for food allegies. The shots and drops only were used to ONLY treat the airborne allergies. try asking your doctor. IF you find out a treatment for food allergies (i.e. not shots/drops that treat airborne) that I have missed, then I'd realy like to know...and yes I have had all the tests, this is NOT something new.

What makes you so sure that shots/drops cannot treat food allergies? That is all you keep saying, but you're not giving any information to defend your position. If I am wrong, then I bite my tongue and I apologize. But PROVE to me that I am wrong.

I don't have to PROVE I am right. BUT it is easy enought to prove.. go to ANY allergist and ask them for shots or drops to treat food allergies and see what they say... the fact that you won't find this type of treatment IS the Proof that I am right! BUT as I said before, if you do find anything that "treats" FOOD allergies, please let us all know!

oops, posted the same response twice!

[This message has been edited by purple2067 (edited 04-09-2003).]

Originally posted by Wake25:
... the fact that you won't find this type of treatment IS the Proof that I am right!

But I HAVE found this type of treatment!!!!!

I actually saw my allergist today... he said that the shots are more for environmental allergies, but that as a child he absolutely gave me sublingual drops to treat my food allergies. And I have seen at least two other allergists who said that although they do not specialize in treating food allergies, there are doctors who give sublingual drops for them. Until now I could not think of the perfect word for what this does... it neutralizes the allergy symptoms. This is an excerpt from food-allergy.org and it describes exactly what I am talking about, from the testing through the neutralization. It's not copyrighted as far as I know, so I don't think the moderators will remove it. And yes, I have also seen several websites that disagree with this and say that food allergies cannot be treated with sublingual drops. I just disagree wholeheartedly. Even if I am the only person in the world (which I am not) who this has worked for, the fact that it worked for me proves that sometimes (not in all cases) it CAN work.

"Intradermal or scratch skin tests are used by many conventional allergists and are good for inhalant allergies. However, they are usually not reliable for food allergies because they detect only IgE-mediated food allergies, which make up only about five percent of all food reactions.2 Provocation-neutralization testing is the most common in-office, or in-vivo test for food allergies. A small amount of a dilute extract of the food to be tested is injected into the skin of the patient's arm or given under the tongue. Any symptoms that result are recorded and the skin reaction is monitored. Then injections or sublingual drops of weaker or stronger dilutions of the same food extract are given. The dilution which does not provoke a skin reaction and clears up the patient's symptoms is the “neutralizing dose" and is used for neutralization treatment."

The above statement describes exactly, to a "T" what my dr did with me and my brother

Very interesting... "... he said that the shots are more for environmental allergies, but that as a child he absolutely gave me sublingual drops to treat my food allergies."...

SO, do you now agree that shots do NOT treat food allergies? Next you say he gave you sublingual drops to treat food alleriges. The process you described makes absolutely NO sense at all, but I won't go into that.... the purpose of the DROPS are no different than shots..SO are you are trying to tell me that sublingual drops work to treat(neutalize) food allergies when shots dont???? Most doctors would say that drops don't even work at all for environmental allergies let alone food allergies!!!IT is not even an accepted treatment method in the US.. although in some other countries they do use drops to desensitize... but NOT for food allergies! Who is the doctor? are you sure he has a medical license? you can get sublingual allergy drops at any health food store... Is this all you are talking about???? You don't even need to go to a doctor for that. I'm sure I can find a chinese doctor that would say he can cure allergies with herbs! Give me the name of a real ALLERGY doctor, the name of the treatment, or even an ALLERGY center (not in Germany or France) that uses this type of treatment. Until you can do this, I will continue to prove that you are wrong.

Well now it would be awfully stupid of me to give you my allergist's name if you don't believe in the treatment that he offers. But yes, I can assure you that he is a 100%, honest to goodness medical doctor. He has been published in several books and has even written a few himself. He is affiliated with several of the major hospitals in NYC.

And no, I do not agree that shots can't work for food allergies... reading back my previous post I realize how I was not clear. What I meant to say was that for me, he used the drops. The reason behind that was because I was already getting 3 shots a week for environmental allergies... if he would have given me shots for the food allergies too I would have been getting too many shots to count. I will agree that this is a very controversial issue (as we have proven with our little debate) and most doctors do not agree with it. Maybe for most patients it doesn't work. All I am saying is that it worked for ME, and I really don't care what anybody else thinks because as long as I continue to be food-allergy free, that is proof enough for me.

Sure I don't understand all of the science behind it, but I am thinking that food allergy desensitization is along the same lines as desensitization for any other allergy... you receive a miniscule amount of the extract/serum (at the moment the proper term escapes me) and eventually your body becomes accustomed to this agent and no longer sees it as an enemy? Isn't that the basic concept behind any sort of desensitization? It doesn't work for all people.... maybe it only works for very very few, but I am happy that it worked for me.

[This message has been edited by purple2067 (edited 04-10-2003).]

I knew that you wouldn't give me a doctors name. or anything that I asked... I do wish what you were saying was true though. so I'll stick to my last message.. you have NO proof. you probably just grew out of your allergies through avoidance... good for you!

Hey, if that's true then great! Like I said, when I was going through this I really didn't care what the reason was that I stopped having allergic reactions.... I was just thrilled that I stopped having them! The reason that I feel so strongly that it has something to do with the desenitization drops is #1 because I was on them for years and did gradually get better while I was on them (it happened over a period of time... I didn't just wake up one morning and not have food allergies anymore! I wish!) and reason # 2 is that occasionally when I was on the drops, my dr would change the dosages, etc... and that always affected how I felt physically....sometimes it was the drops themselves that would cause the reaction. For whatever reason though, whether it is that I just grew out of them or from the drops, or a combination of both, I no longer have food allergies. Then again, my body has always been akin to strange phenomena! I have baffled drs for years!

You should have just said that in the beginning! I guess I am not that lucky to have my food allergies magically get better. When you figure out what realy happened then let me know.

Dear Captain Jack; I have the perfect solution for you! There is a technique called N.A.E.T. and it is so amazing that I'm telling everyone I can about it! It involves using the energy in your muscles to test you and see what you're allergic to. You can go to a doctor who does this and find out in one visit everything that you're allergic to, without having to go through some year-long ordeal of crap-shooting it and second-guessing yourself. Also, this same technique involves treatment for allergies that is nothing short of miraculous! I'm not sure where you live, but there is a website that explains this treatment... just do a search on N.A.E.T. Sage

[This message has been edited by kitaki (edited 06-11-2003).]

You haven't advised us the symptoms of you allergy. Are they gastro, headaches, sneezing or what? I am a Celiac ( allergy to gluten (grains) There is a simple blood test to determine if you are prone to this disease, I am now gluten free, but became really sick over the summer last year. I found out by myself after they started talking about endoscopys, colonoscopys etc AGAIN. They had already removed my gall bladder which in hindsight wasn't the problem. If your allergies manifest as gasto there is a simple clood test which will indicate whether you are prone to Celiac Disease. It is apparently the most misdiagnosed disease and 1/100 to 1/250 people have it. Try finding a Celiac site and see what your symptoms are. You could also kep a diary of what you eat and how thet corresponds to your "flare ups".

Goof luck...Tagger

Wow, after all this time and all the allergy doctors and reserarch, it looks like the answer is in N.A.E.T and Celiac disease therapy.. yeah right!...It's almost funny to read the replys to this board. Everyone thinks they have the cure but yet no one is cured! If you think there is a simple answer like that, then you are living in a Dream world!

Wake25,

I'm not sure about a cure, but the original question was posted to see how difficult a food elimination diet is. Which is - and I will state again.

"is no cure, but only a technique to see if you are allergic to a food and which food it might be"

I don't think as of yet there is a cure - But I have found a way to cope with mine and have helped a half dozen people on this forum with a similar problem as mine.

In case you haven't noticed.. this thread has evolved with each post. What you just said has nothing to do with the last 10 posts or so... I'll say again, there is no treatment for food allergies! get it?

"I'll say again, there is no treatment for food allergies! "
**************************************** **********
Sure there is a Treatment.

Treatment: Both steps 1 and 2
1.) Identify the allergic food via elimination diet.
2.) Avoid the food identified in step 1.

You're Wrong !! - Got it!! - Now go to your room!

Avoiding the food is the treatment! Get it!

[This message has been edited by Cut-Throat (edited 04-23-2003).]

I guess you need to learn the definition of "treatment"... the elimation diet is NOT a treatment!....Now...go to YOUR room and try reading a book....something with actual pages instead of the internet. Everyone knows I am right. Ask any doctor.

I use to sneeze uncontrollably, had to take allegra which gave me severe back pain. Found out later that the allegra (gel form) had milk in it, and that is what I was allergic too. Also, goose down, I was sleeping with a comforter willed with duck feathers. Allergic to that too. Got a rast test to determine what I was allergic too. I then changed my diet for 2 years. No longer. There are products that you can buy to irrigate the nose with salt water and baking soda. NO DRUGS! I use 1/2 tsp of common iodized salt and 1/4 tsp baking soda (my allergist recommended the baking soda) for each 1/2 cup of warm tap water. My allergist gave ($20) me this nasal irrigator which is a syringe type device with a soft silicon tip which you lightly press against your nose and the whole process is painless and takes less than 2 minutes.
I have been using it for 3 weeks now and have had no allergic reactions to dairy, chicken, or coffee. I can eat anything and my life is back to well normal. No running nose, sneezing, irritability, flush face. I feel great! I feel like I have 30% more energy everyday.


[This message has been edited by kitaki (edited 06-11-2003).]

If you suspect food allergies there is a great new blood test called ImmunoCAP. The great thing about this test is that it is a simple blood test and your blood is tested for all kinds of food, and the results tell you how allergic you are to the food. The nice thing about this is you get result in 2-3days and you don't have to worry about have a reaction to a food that you are allergic to. The test also works for indoor and outdoor allergies also, in case you suspect you have those too. I had the test done and it was the best thing. Skin testing is the worst since you have hives for a week and if you do the elimination diet you might miss something.

I can not believe you guys everybody is different. You talk about this elimination diet well I was thinking about doing this cause I am allergic to food like wheat, nuts stawberries, bananas,pineapple,and alot more the biggest one is the wheat. The reason that diet is not good I HAD a friend that went on it and she died because one of her other friends told her about it, they said it was the best well guest what it wasn't for her. I watch what I eat after the testing I had I eliminated from my diet and I feel great like I said before EVERYBODY IS DIFFERENT. so good luck everyone.