Let me start off by being basic and saying…”I LOVE FOOD”! Yes, just like Oprah and her bread.
Unfortunately I have noticed that a lot of the foods I love don’t love me back. From my love of cheesy garlic bread to every carb under the sun, I frequently experience stomach probz.
So when my workplace announced that they were bringing a Mobile Medicine service to do wellness and food sensitivity tests, I thought… why not?
I honestly was pretty nervous about my results. I really truly very much love to stuff my face with pizza and I knew that I would be sad if I told me that I was sensitive to my favorite cheesy vice.
My job hired Mobile Medicine to come in and conduct these wellness and food sensitivity tests. They came in and our blood, then came back to read our results with us in person (individually, of course!).
Here is an explanation of what the test detects, in fancy doctor lingo.
“Blood tests measure the presence of IgE antibodies to specific foods. (IgE, short for “immunoglobulin E,” is the antibody that triggers food allergy symptoms.) In the past, these tests were called “RASTs” (which stands for radioallergosorbent tests) because they used radioactivity, but modern tests do not.” – Foodallergytest.org
I was so scared when the doctor was reading my results to me. I was thinking, “please Lord, don’t let it me be sensitive to everything!”. My doctor was awesome. She went through the results of my test while I held my breath. She handed me a paper that showed my lab results with the most sensitive foods highlighted in red. Here is an example results sheet below. These were not my results, but wanted to show you what a sample report looked like.
Dr. McMurray helped me decipher my results. Basically, I am sensitive to the following:
- rice/oats/grains/gluten,
- dairy
- almonds
- cashews
- pineapple
- clams
- kale
- yeast
- mushrooms
- Oh yeah and eggs. Yes people, you heard it correctly. I said E.G.G.S.
I was devasted.
I eat eggs every.single.freaking.morning. Scrambled eggs on the weekend and hard-boiled eggs at work on the weekends. I was SHOOK by these results. Eggs turned out to be the food that had the highest sensitivity for me. So sad. I immediately though “if I can’t eat gluten, dairy or eggs, what the heck do I eat?” Ugh. So many emotions.
Luckily, Dr. McMurray came prepared with recipes tailored to my new restrictions. There were quinoa hot cereal and tofu scrambles galore. Ha-lay-loo. This women knew her stuff!
Honestly, in my heart I knew that I already I DEFINITELY had a sensitivity to dairy and gluten. Possibly almonds too. But eggs. Lordt, that was too much. Dr. McMurray recommended that I do the elimination diet, which would mean I needed to eliminate all the foods that came up with sensitivity results for 4 weeks, then introduce them back one by one. Every 2 days you test a new food and wait 2 days for a result. Sensitivities can include sluggishness, skin irritation or acne, stomach pain, gas, diarrhea, etc. She recommended logging how I felt after introducing each food.
February is a busy month for me with a trip to the Bay Area planned, Valentine’s Day and my beau’s birthday. Basically it would be hard for me to have a strict diet at this time. So I made the decision to try the best I could to avoid my food sensitivities until March, when I would go hardcore and start the true elimination diet. The cool part is that I am pretty convinced that I will lose around 5-10 lbs!!! I want to lose 14 more lbs before my big 3.0. this year, so bring on the spinach!! I want to be more fit than I was before I got pregnant.
Gabby is always goals! Hoping I get a six pack like hers after this elimination diet. A girl can dream, right!?
I do want to talk a little bit about the validity of the test. Some say that the test has 30-50% margin of error. My dietician friend said that the results also are dependent upon the health of your gut. So if things are off and the wrong bacteria is in your gut, then you could test more sensitive for certain foods. She said the truest indication of sensitivity is the elimination diet.
I am glad that I decided to take this test, even thought it will make breakfast a bit of an initial struggle. I know that it will make me feel better to try to eliminate these foods for a month, but jeeeeeez it will be some work! I will keep you guys updated with the recipes I end up trying how my elimination diet turns out!
I would love to hear if any of you have tried an elimination diet or a food sensitivity test!
xo
Simone
