My metabolic disorder began in my mid twenties, but it presented no deleterious symptoms -- I simply ate more food to compensate for my increased energy. In fact my extra drive seemed to serve me well as I began my graduate studies at the University of California, Berkeley. This is one of the best, and most challenging mathematics programs in the world, so I had to spend many sleepless nights over algebraic geometry and point-set topology, just to keep up. No matter -- the material was fascinating, and I didn't need much sleep anyways. I was enjoying life, and life was treating me well.
Then, with my 30th birthday in sight, my heart began to pound inside my chest, for no discernible reason. The pounding sometimes kept me awake, even when I desperately needed sleep. I didn't have ready access to medical equipment, but I suspected my blood pressure was dangerously high. My pulse, which could be measured using a low-tech watch, was often over 100, just sitting in a chair. In addition, I was always running hot. My body temperature was normal, but I generated a great deal of heat, and radiated it away just as quickly, to keep my core at 98.6°. I took a shower in the morning and needed another one at night. Everything was running hot and fast. What was wrong?
A wise mentor would have advised me to see a doctor right away, and have my thyroid checked, but I didn't have a mentor, and graduate students rarely seek medical help. Instead, I asked my friends, who were even younger and less experienced than I. They all agreed it was stress. Although I was doing well in my classes, I was having trouble coming up with anything remotely resembling original research, as required by the Ph.D. program. I had already decided to take my Masters and move on, but to where? I had no plans, no prospects, and no close friends or relatives within 2,000 miles. In addition, I had an on-again off-again relationship with a woman whom I loved very much. All these factors made stress a likely candidate, or so it seemed.
Near the end of the spring semester I noticed a pattern. The symptoms were much worse after eating. In fact, my pulse and metabolic rate were almost normal in the morning, until I ate breakfast. Apparently my body treated every meal as a stimulant. One evening, a nearby clinic sent a representative to our dorm to offer free blood pressure screening. Intrigued, I deliberately waited until after dinner. I ate seconds, and then thirds, and my heart began its usual pounding in my chest. "You need to see a doctor right away." warned the nurse as she took a second reading in disbelief.
There was no denying it -- I had a life threatening chronic condition that was somehow connected with food. It was not a product of stress! Unfortunately I had very little control over my diet. I had no idea what went into those dorm meals, and I certainly couldn't vary the ingredients in a systematic fashion. I simply had to endure for another three weeks.
Throughout summer break my mother was kind enough to give me a place to sleep and some much needed advice on food sensitivities. She contracted arthritis several years earlier, and she already knew that certain foods aggravated her symptoms. Her personal library contains dozens of books on nutrition and symptomology. Together, we began a process of systematic investigation, sometimes known as the "elimination diet". (Note, this phrase is also used to describe other diets, and has become quite ambiguous through overuse.) Under this regimen, the patient avoids all foods that he normally eats more than once a week. Having removed wheat, corn, dairy, beef, and chicken from my diet, I now ate fish, seafood, lamb, artichoke, asparagus, and mangos. There are so many wonderful foods out there -- this revised menu isn't really a hardship at all. To my surprise and great relief, my symptoms disappeared, almost over night. My pulse plodded along at 65, a number that most Americans would envy.
Over the next month I ran a series of "challenges", introducing one food after another. Some symptoms don't appear until the next day, so the patient should, ideally, reintroduce one new food every 48 hours. I brought wheat back into my diet, and still felt fine. Two days later I was ready to try corn. Still off dairy, I ate two ears dry. (July corn is tasty enough on its own -- who needs butter?) Within fifteen minutes my pulse jumped from 65 to 95. BINGO!
Looking back, my long history of institutional food made a corn sensitivity almost inevitable. There is corn syrup in the juice (which I started drinking instead of pop and milk, because I thought it was healthier), corn starch in all the sauces and thickeners, corn meal in the batter (seems like everything is breaded), corn as a side dish, corn bread/muffins, and more corn syrup in the deserts. I knew nothing of this at the time, but I was eating corn in ever increasing quantities. Over exposure to a food is one way (though not the only way) to acquire a food sensitivity, and this was a textbook example.
Over the next nine months I avoided corn altogether. Mistakes were made of course. One day in late August my Mom baked a rhubarb pie, using fresh stalks from the garden. "There's corn in this pie." I declared as my heart began its old familiar pounding. My Mom had to apologize. "I'm sorry -- I forgot. I had the arroroot powder out on the counter for you, but I used corn starch instead. Just habit I guess." Despite these occasional setbacks, my program of abstenance paid off. By the time I graduated from Berkeley I could eat corn again, in moderation, with no ill effects. Nearly a decade later, I enjoy corn on the cob whenever it is in season, and I even drink Coke once a week. I still have to be careful with concentrated corn meal products such as corn chips and corn bread, but this is a minor consideration that barely makes the list of the top 500 inconveniences of life. Contrast this with my earlier chronic condition, which would have led to a stroke before my 35th birthday. Drugs were not the answer, nor relaxation therapy. I just had to change what I ate.
Another common phrase is "food intolerance", as in "he is wheat intolerant." This usually describes a generic reaction. The patient might be allergic to wheat, or sensitive to wheat, or unable to digest or metabolize certain components of the grain (yet another category). We simply lump all these together under the phrase "wheat intolerant".
If you think your illness is aggravated by wheat, be sure to tell your doctor, "I think my system does not tolerate wheat.", or, "I seem to react to wheat." If you use the word "allergy", when you are in fact not allergic, your physician will immediately assume you are medically illiterate, and probably consider you a hypochondriac in need of counseling. If you couch your suspicions in generic terms, and kow-tow as required, "It's just my opinion -- what do you think?", the doctor might, just might, take you seriously.
To add to the confusion, some people don't react to a food or food chemical for three or four days. Still others don't react unless they eat that chemical, from various sources, every day for a week. These issues will be addressed in future articles. Untangling the mystery of your food sensitivities is often far more complicated than my simple corn anecdote suggests. Still, it serves as an excellent introduction. If you have a chronic condition that might be affected by foods, the elimination-challenge procedure described above is certainly easy to implement. It won't do any harm, and it might perform a miracle.