Oh, I don’t know, probably gluten. Maybe it was dairy and possibly even eggs. Upon waking, I found the skin on my cheeks to be inflamed with rough and reddish patches of what looks like some sort of rash.
“Great”, I thought. ” I have a new client to meet in a hour. Fabulous.”
This is how I started my morning with a food reaction that looked and felt not to hot. Yet this is what can happen because when you’re sensitive to certain foods, as I am, it can be a crap-shot as to how your body will react when you’ve eaten something that’s on the avoid list especially by accident. Sadly, a lot of gluten-free foods contain things like dairy and eggs to help bind them together so they aren’t always entirely avoidable for me if I choose to indulge.
The point is that often we think that non-digestive symptoms are completely unrelated to what we eat. Think again. Food is a foreign substance, just like drugs. There can be side effects, but unfortunately you can’t look them up on included paperwork disclosing everything that possibly could be at stake with your body’s homostasis (natural balance) as you would with drugs. I’m not saying that food and drugs are the same because they aren’t. However, they can and do affect the the body.
Even non-digestive issues such as acne, rosacea, psoriasis, anxiety, depression, arthritis and asthma can be a consequence of a food sensitivity. Though the list is much longer than this, I wanted to take a moment to point out that issues with food like gluten can show up in many different ways that you might not expect.
And it’s worth mentioning that you don’t even necessarily need to consume the foods you’re sensitive to to illicit a reaction. For example, I’ve found that shampoo that has gluten in it will trigger a horrible scalp reaction that’s not only unsightly, but also uncomfortable. That’s why checking out your bodycare products is incredibly important for keeping gluten out of your life.
Either way, it’s worth considering because long-term consumption can lead to all sorts of problems and health issues that you probably would rather not deal with. I know from experience because it just so happens that this time it was starring me in the face.