Posts Tagged ‘food intolerance’

Migraine and Food Intolerance Testing

What do parties and migraine have in common? You will probably jump to one of two conclusions (alcohol or late nights) and while you could be correct there is another common link, according to food intolerance specialists YorkTest Laboratories.

Apparently as the party season approaches there is an increase in the number of patients suffering from the symptoms of food intolerance – such as arthritis, IBS and bloating. This could be because people are eating foods to which they are intolerant without knowing the ingredients, or because they are consuming larger amounts of a particular food than usual. Often it can be a previously unsuspected intolerance that is suddenly triggered.

Being aware of any susceptibility to an intolerance could prevent  much inconvenience and discomfort.  Research in conjunction with scientists at York University shows that chronic inflammatory disease is linked with food intolerance and simply becoming aware of problem foods and excluding them from the diet can bring relief.

It’s well known that there are links between migraine and food intolerances and there are many methods of testing; my preferred method is described in this article on food intolerances and migraine.

Prevention is better than cure, so if you’d like to take a low cost test to check if you have a food intolerance probably the best price is available from Amazon. Click here and go to  the bottom of the page that opens for an ordering link.

If the test identifies that you have an intolerance you can look at alternative methods of finding out the particular foods implicated and how to avoid them in future.

Migraine and corn

Those people who have subscribed to the free migraine mini-course on the right will have seen my article on migraines and corn.  If you’d like to see the whole series, please subscribe.

One 19 year old reader (Sally – name changed to protect client anonymity) contacted me to tell me that she’d been baffled by the migraines she had been getting for as long as she could remember. Her Mum was a migraine sufferer and had discovered that hers were coming from spicy foods and chocolate. However Sally can eat all those things without getting any problem.

After some excellent detective work, Sally discovered that on eating certain cereal based foods and pies she always get a headache but didn’t when she excluded those foods. Reading the ingredients in both foods one common ingredient was corn starch.

Sally checked all her food to see what had corn starch in them, and found out pretty much everything contained starch. She says: “I don’t know any foods to eat without corn starch, and without cutting out half my diet.  I am petite and also trying to gain weight. How am I suppose to do that when I have to cut out pretty much all my food?”

This is a common problem. My first suggestion would be to confirm that corn starch IS the problem, by following a diet that excludes it completely for three weeks, and see what effect this has on the migraines.

Sally – you can still eat a healthy and varied diet for such a short time, following a plan such as this No Starch Diet on an Internet forum. (Any-one who is in under medical care, pregnant or breast-feeding should consult their health-provider before changing their diet.)

Follow the above plan for three weeks and see what happens to the migraines. (Be aware that any intake of starch in the exclusion period will put you at risk of a migraine.)

If you decide that corn starch IS the culprit you can decide whether the corn based products are worth the migraines!

Another thing to try is re-introducing individual culprit foods one at a time, to see if it is one food in particular or just corn starch in general that triggers your migraine.  It may be that eating the same cereal based product every day is the problem, and rotating them with different cereal bases (say wheat, corn, rice, soya) over several days can remove the problem. If you eat these foods only occasionally, the problem may go.

Hope that helps, Sally.

Migraine and Dairy Intolerance

A more unusual migraine trigger

A more unusual migraine trigger

Subscribers to my migraine mini-course will be familar with my series of articles on migraine and some of the more unusual food intolerances.

Some of these articles have been published more widely and I was delighted to receive a comment on the article about migraine and milk. You’ll see Aimee’s comment about her son’s experience if you read to the end of the article, and I’m so pleased that my article has helped.

Anyone who did not receive the free mini-course on migraine and food intolerance, click on the link to receive the whole series at no cost whatsoever. You’ll also receive a free monthly healthy eating newsletter.

Your privacy is important to me and your contact details will never be sold or rented, and you can unsubscribe at any time.

Perhaps like Aimee’s son, you’ll discover that avoiding one of the more unusual migraine triggers will cure your migraines.

If you found this post interesting please subscribe to my free monthly, Health and Well-being Newsletter. You’ll received a free migraine mini-course revealing some little known dietary triggers for migraine.

If so, please do comment here or directly on the article.

Discounted Food Intolerance Test

It’s well known that there are links between migraine and food intolerances and there are many methods of testing.

My preferred method is described in this article on food intolerances and migraine. But don’t buy from the link in the article, because (at the time of writing) buying online from this blog post gives you a special offer on a food intolerance test.

In fact it’s half the original price when you order on-line from the special offer link above!

I can’t promise how long the supplier (YorkTest) will keep this discount available, so don’t delay.

Free Migraine Information

A short and sweet post today….

I’ve been putting up a series of free subscriber emails giving information on migraine and food intolerance, one of the migraine topics that attracted the most interest, according to my website statistics.

While you are on that site, do have a look at the extensive range of other topics covered in my ebook.

Subscribe, for free, at : www.StopTheMigraineMadness.com