Allergy Avoidance Diet
Although food reactions and allergies were discussed in a few ancient medical papers, it was only in the 20th century we started seeing them in scientific journals.
If you are suffering from a kind of food allergy, you are not alone. Up to 5% of the world population suffer from allergies of different degrees of severity.
Allergies do certainly come with challenges and your life won’t always be easy with them, but you will still be fine as long as you are aware of your problem and be careful to avoid problem foods.
People with food allergies have immune systems that attack certain proteins found in foods, as if they were bacteria or viruses, causing a chain-reaction of chemicals and they lead to the common allergy symptoms.
Allergies affect adults and children of all cultures, risk being higher with a parent who suffers from food allergies, hay fever, asthma, eczema and the allergy problem can begin any time at any age. But sixty per cent of allergies still appear in the first year of life.
Allergy is nothing to joke about, people call in sick from work or fall asleep during the day because of food allergies or side effects of medications they use.
It is not always easy to work out what type of food allergies you have and it may take a while- four to six weeks for a typical allergy avoidance diet. But when you do find out your allergy trigger foods– peanuts and tree nuts, milk, fish, eggs, soy, wheat, prawns and lobster being the most common , you’ll have to do your best to avoid them.
*Keep in mind that gluten free and wheat free can mean different things. Gluten free may contain proteins of wheat and wheat free may well contain gluten from other type of grains.
In allergy avoidance diet, first you will keep track of the foods you eat, read labels at the supermarket, know what goes into your meal when you eat out in restaurants. You will need to eliminate certain foods that you are suspicious about and if your allergy symptoms go away, they may well be your trigger foods. You will need to stop eating them but find good substitutes, perhaps with the help of a dietitian.
Then you will slowly start eating those foods that you quit recently, one by one and observe the allergic reactions you may encounter.
Lastly you will remove these foods gradually from your diet and see if the symptoms disappear again.
But do be careful with what you cut out from your diet as you may be deprived of essential nutrients and this can lead to other health problems. So seek professional nutritional advice or your diet will lack essential vitamins or minerals that you need o be healthy.
Food allergy symptoms can happen suddenly and can leave you feeling very ill: Coughing, nausea and vomiting, diarrhoea, breathing difficulties, wheezing, tightness in throat, skin rash, swelling of the lips and throat or even anaphylaxis, which can be fatal.
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