Leaky Gut Syndrome

[misstraci]

Has anyone been "diagnosed" with or suspected this condition before? I know that a lot of traditional MD's are not even claiming it as a true thing but dieticians as well as alternative MD's say it is causing issues for a lot of people. Issues from diarrhea to headaches to dizziness.

I wanted to address a personal issue of mine which I think is real and that is sugar addiction!!! I checked out lots of books from the library and was reading this afternoon and there was a quiz about which type of sugar addiction that you fall under. I fell under two different ones but one was the one for candida in the stomach. You crave sugar because that is what feeds the bacteria and the more you eat, the more you crave, a vicious cycle.

I guess I was just curious if this sugar craving/addiction/leaky gut was real and if it has anything to do with my POTS symptoms, etc. Hahaha, this shows I am researching all ends to figure this out and heal myself. If I have to give up chocolate, it's going to be hard, but I'll do it

[Kellysavedbygrace]

I've wondered about this too. I have no info on "leaky gut" but I'd definitely say I crave sugar at times and am quite sure the salt I ingest is not absorbed properly bc I eat 6-9 grams a day and my serum sodium levels are normal. Weird.

[songcanary]

I have addressed this with my allergist and he agrees that I very likely have this. I have an endless list of food allergies and leaky gut could explain why. So I take digestive enzymes with every meal and went gluten free in June. In addition to avoiding my known allergens. I am hoping with time the allergies will lessen. Too soon to tell, but I believe leaky gut is a real condition.

I have a sweet tooth as well and recently had a hard time kicking a yeast infection, even after monistat and Diflucan. So in desperation I started adding cider vinegar to my drinking water and it worked!! Now I need to knock off the sweets obviously ;(

[spinner]

Most doctors sneer when you mention it. They view it as quackery. Just more prejuidice on their part.

Ive always suspected POTS, leaky gut, bacterial/viral infections, deficiencies, sleep disorders, and stress all play

a synergistic role in getting sick. Combine enough of those things, and youre going to get sick, and the symptoms

overlap so its almost impossible to figure out the initial underlying cause. It would also explain why there are so

many varying chemical helps and lifestyle management techniques.

In my limited two years with this, I would humbly say that its a serious mistake to assume you only have one

condition causing all your problems.

Leaky gut can wreak all the havoc POTS can. I once heard a quote: a food allergy can mimic ANY sickness in the human body

[Dizzysillyak]

Traditional mds who are smart enough (by this I mean obviously these people have no trouble learning) to become integrative or functional medicine doctors treat

leaky gut. These are mds who use traditional and holistic medicine. I see an integrative doctor and Medicare has paid for all my testing. Which has shown us what's really going on unlike traditional tests.

I've had candida and treated

it but found most of my symptoms were from food intolerances not candida. From what I saw Candida was responsible for

yeast infections. I'm sure it added to my fatigue when it was really bad but that's just common sense. I'm now finding that treating my allergies / mast cells all the time is helping my oi.

imho, Foods like gluten, dairy, soy and all

chemicals, esp caffeine, should be eliminated from our diets. In fact, I keep hearing the ER doc on The Doctors

telling us this.

The idea that treating leaky gut is quackery is outdated much like the idea that chronic illnesses are psychological.

Especially if it's a woman who's sick.

Imho There are people who find it impossible to learn anything new despite evidence.

Tc .. D

[misstraci]

Thank you all for the responses. That is some good information. Spinner, that is crazy the the food allergy can mimic any illness; I believe it!!! And Dizzy, yes it is impossible for some people to learn anything despite hard core evidence. Canary, It's going to be hard for us to knock the sweets but we can do it! Glad the vinegar helped your infection to get better. Kelly, that is weird your levels are normal if you're ingesting that much. Our bodies are so crazy......

[spinner]

I've had candida and treated

it but found most of my symptoms were from food intolerances not candida....::"""""

But what caused the underlying initial problem? Its the same stone age medical procedure. Treat the symptom instead of finding

the root cause.

It would be like treating POTS with drinking lots of water and saying youre cured. It simply helps with the symptoms.

[Dizzysillyak]

Hi spinner,

It looks like you quoted me. So ..

I'm a celiac who ate gluten for 50 years. So in my case the root cause is more than likely

gluten damage. Theglutenfile explains this.

There are other ways to damage gut linings and cause leaky gut.

The DAN (defeat autism now) community has some great info on this. I like "healing the 4 a's".

Btw, I haven't seen anyone say that drinking lots of water helps pots. Some are helped by saline ivs, but not everyone.

The homepage here has some great info on pots.

Tc .. D

[FarmerAmy]

I have been going to a new doctor for about 3 months. She is an MD, but practices functional medicine. I've done blood, urine, and stool samples and have sent them off to labs. I don't know how to refer to these labs. They are scientific, but a regular doctor or hospital would never use them. The labs we've used so far are Metametrix, Rheim, and Genova Diagnostics. I have found their web pages interesting, and the web pages can also help you find a health practitioner in your area.

Some of the tests have shown that I have low adrenal function (a diagnosis that traditional doctors would poo-poo). Now I'm waiting on results to see if I have Candida or fungal G.I. problems or food allergies. I am about to go on a very restrictive diet--no sugar, carbs, gluten, etc. I really think it will help me at least some.

I think my problems were caused by a number if factors. But about a year ago I did invitro fertilization and I think that really ruined me. I took a lot of anti-biotics and also hormones. Both of these can cause severe G.I. problems.

[FarmerAmy]

Here is a good article on Leaky Gut Syndrome http://drjakefratkin.com/articles/leaky-gut-syndrome-a-modern-epidemic

It explains things both in terms of Chinese and Western medicine.

[misstraci]

Thanks FarmerAmy for the link, I'm going to go read that. Sorry I never responded to your previous message, I'd love to see an integrative/functional medicine or someone other than mainstream in the hospital kind of doctor. Since my insurance more than likely doesn't cover it, I can't afford it right now. Did you receive your test results back yet? I'd love to hear how it went. How is the no sugar/gluten/carb diet going? I really feel that the sugar is terrible and I also feel that I personally am really addicted. I told myself that today is the day and I'm going to withhold it from my diet. I really hope I have the strength and willpower to do it. I know that it would benefit us all to quit eating so much of it.

[songcanary]

Hi Farmer Amy,

The leaky gut article was a long one but really interesting. I suspected long ago that I had this and since I've been addressing my food allergies I am feeling so much better. Granted, it's not my only problem but it sure does explain a lot. Thanks for posting!

[lukgar1]

Hey guys,

How were you tested for leaky gut syndrome? My integrative medicine doctor gave me a kit she said with some sort of sugars that shouldn't be in the urine. Did you do the same thing? Hope to hear from you soon.

[ramakentesh]

Two points about the 'leaky gut' hypothesis that don't make basic sense based on physiology:

1. How do toxins and food products that supposedly leak into the blood stream enter the central nervous system and cause neurological disturbances? The blood brain barrier stop nearly all blood born particles from entering the cns. If it were also compromised you would not be able to take many medications without dying and you'd have meningitis in five minutes. Docs spend years developing drugs with small enough molecules to cross the blood brain barrier yet apparently with leaky gut large toxic molecules just float up and into the brain no problem??

2. If nearly any of the products of food digestion leaked directly into the blood stream you would die if septicemia.

this is why most docs realize that this theory makes no sense.

[misstraci]

Very good points made Rama, thank you! makes you really think about it.

[Zap]

Two points about the 'leaky gut' hypothesis that don't make basic sense based on physiology: 1. How do toxins and food products that supposedly leak into the blood stream enter the central nervous system and cause neurological disturbances? The blood brain barrier stop nearly all blood born particles from entering the cns. If it were also compromised you would not be able to take many medications without dying and you'd have meningitis in five minutes. Docs spend years developing drugs with small enough molecules to cross the blood brain barrier yet apparently with leaky gut large toxic molecules just float up and into the brain no problem?? 2. If nearly any of the products of food digestion leaked directly into the blood stream you would die if septicemia. this is why most docs realize that this theory makes no sense.

I honestly feel that the "leaky gut" diagnosis is usually given to a subset of people with a number of specific ailments that seem to jive together. My theory here is that there is a common syndrome at play (which the mainstream medical seem to dismiss completely regardless of cause). I do think there is enough evidence to suggest that some syndrome is at play.

The other problem is, as Rama states, that the theory as described does not seem to make scientific/physiological sense. I propose, instead, that the real cause of what is known as "leaky gut syndrome" is our common but poorly understood friend, bacterial imbalance. Allergic reactions, yeast infections, raised levels of pro-inflammatory cytokines (e.g. IL-6), nutritional deficiencies, digestive distress, autoimmune disorders. The immune system is in the gut, and when it starts to malfunction everything else can quickly fall apart.

It has come up in my research, but I'm not sure if anyone here has ever discussed the emerging research on fecal transplants. Probiotics can't touch this one with a 1000 foot pole. This is a direct transplant of all gut flora from another healthy individual, into someone who is sick. The thousands (or more) of different strains of bacteria that all work in a delicate balance to keep the body operating, in a symbiotic sort of way. When one realizes from the research, just how many things the various bacteria impact, we realize how little is known about this environment. So the old natural doctors that said that all disease begins in the colon had no idea how right they were!

Thus, they are simply taking a working ecosystem and transplanting it, because at this point there hasn't been enough research to figure out what bacteria do what just yet. Hopefully sometime in the near future they will be able to find a more efficient way to perform this procedure, maybe even by creating a broad spectrum probiotic containing all the strains that can be taken in enteric capsules. For now, they are stuck separating fecal matter to isolate a bacterial culture.

The study at the address below has astronomically high success numbers for normal medical intervention. We're talking 2/3 - 3/4 of people seeing very positive results and many of them maintaining those results for CFS, something that, like POTS, has proven very resistant to many attempted treaments.

http://www.eventscribe.com/2012/acg/ajaxcalls/postersinfo.asp?title=6110

Some food for thought.

[spinner]

As the article indicated the LIVER AND KIDNEY AND SPLEEN are the detoxification instruments that sufffer.

We dont die from ALLERGIES (except in the case of bee stings etc) but they make us deathly ill including food allergies.

It creates an immune reaction in our bodies.

Besides, many LGS or FM patients ARE deathly ill and no doubt some have died. No doubt some allergies

have killed people through malnutrition and the destruction of the immune system.

Intestinal permeability makes sense because the premise is INCOMPLETELY UNDIGESTED molecules.

We already know that the food enters the bloodstream but it is not ideally broken down. Then this becomes

not only a nutritional problem but an endocrinological problem and eventually potentially a nervous system problem.