Food sensitivity becomes more common with age. In addition, stress, GMOs, poor diet, artificial food additives, and medications all contribute to a weakening of the intestinal lining that leads to tiny leaks. Certain foods in your everyday diet can further weaken your wall’s structure—for instance, high amounts of fried and processed foods. In addition, the digestive system just isn’t able to process certain foods in your day-to-day diet, contributing to more inflammation in the intestinal tract.

Normally, the immune system protects the body from invaders such as viruses, bacteria, and toxins. As gastrointestinal health declines, foods do not break down properly in the stomach and undigested proteins make their way into the bloodstream. The immune system looks upon these escaped proteins as invaders and develops antibodies to combat them, resulting in undesirable symptoms such as migraines, brain fog, weight gain, chronic fatigue, irritable bowel syndrome, and more. The longer you continue to consume foods you are sensitive to, the more frequent and prolonged these reactions. Just as proteins can escape out through the leaks in the intestinal walls, these leaks allow bacterial and viral invaders to sneak in, triggering inflammation and all kinds of digestive issues.

People often confuse a food sensitivity with an allergy. They are, however, two different things. For one, food sensitivity reactions may not occur for hours or even days after consumption. While food sensitivity is not life-threatening, it does affect your quality of life. Who wants to be constantly bloated or gaseous if they can help it? 

Allergies are more serious. They produce immediate reactions. Allergies occur when the body views a food ingredient as harmful and defends itself by producing high levels of antibodies called IgE. Food allergies may have symptoms similar to food sensitivity, but also produce other more serious symptoms such as hives, throat swelling, shortness of breath, vomiting, and even anaphylaxis. For a person with a food allergy, eating just a tiny amount of the food can cause a life-threatening reaction.

Food allergies are easy for a physician to detect. It takes a simple pinprick in the office to yield reliable and immediate results about allergies. Not so with food sensitivities. In fact, many physicians completely overlook food sensitivity as the underlying cause of many common complaints.

Food Sensitivity Testing at Aluma Wellness is a minimally invasive blood test. The test analyses over a hundred different foods, chemicals, and additives to precisely determine which items are causing symptoms. The most common food sensitivities are lactose, casein, and gluten, but there can be dozens more that you would never suspect. A Food Sensitivity Test will pinpoint food sensitivities to a high degree of accuracy so the affected foods can be removed. This is known as an elimination diet.

After successfully removing the offending foods from the diet, we work one-on-one with each client to restore and repair the gut. The healthier the gut is, the more robust the immune system becomes. Additionally, most clients will notice a resolution of their symptoms.