Something interesting happened to me a couple of weeks ago. It was almost 10 pm on a weeknight, I had just gotten home from a school meeting I had to go to after work. I was exhausted and hungry and did not want to go to bed with an empty stomach. Needless to say I didn’t get a chance to cook that night and it was one of those weeks when I hadn’t yet gone grocery shopping, so without thinking much about it, I popped a slice of bread in the toaster and ate it.
The next day I woke up with achy joints, which is what I experience every time I consume gluten. No surprise there. As the morning went by, I was working on something that required focus and attention to detail, and I found myself getting confused easily and not being very patient about it; after it happened for the third time, I started thinking that something was up because this was not the usual “me.” I was experiencing brain fog, irritability, and lack of clarity… and then it hit me that I had consumed gluten the night before. Even though this type of reaction was a first for me, I couldn’t think of anything else it could be. From what I’ve read on this topic, these symptoms are common for gluten-sensitive people. I was amazed!
Of course, everybody can react differently to gluten, and my experience doesn’t need to be your experience. The thing is, there are so many different ways you might react that it can easily be confused with other diseases. In other words, you may be gluten sensitive and not even know it! To make matters worse, gluten can be found in dozens of different foods and not only in bread and pasta.
Continue reading “Could Gluten Be Affecting Your Health?”
