Making sense of food reactions
There are three main types of food reactions you will likely encounter: true food allergies, food sensitivities, and food intolerances. True food allergies involve the release of histamine. Food allergies range from mild to life-threatening.
food sensitivity
food intolerance
Food intolerances, while often confused with food allergies and sensitivities, are unique. They do not involve the immune system and are usually due to the lack of certain digestive enzymes.
what causes us to react to foods?
There are numerous factors involved, such as genetics, gut microbiome, and the immune system. If you have severe or an unusually high number of food reactions, there may be an underlying root cause, and your doctor is not likely to explore it. If you have food sensitivities, this may go entirely overlooked because, so few doctors are trained to identify food sensitivities.
signs of food sensitivities or intolerance
should you avoid foods you are reactive to?
If you have a true ‘allergy’ or true ‘gluten intolerance’ such as celiac, then yes.
Otherwise, repairing the gut is the best strategy as…