We spend so much time talking about allergy symptoms and allergy remedies that we often overlook the most basic question of all - that being what is the cause of allergies?
And in using the word, "cause" I do not mean one of the multitude of allergy triggers whether they are environmental triggers such as pollen, dust mites and pets or food allergens such as eggs or cow's milk.
The trigger starts the process of the inflammation and swelling that we see in the allergy symptoms but is not responsible for the tendency of the patient to react in such a dramatic way. Some of that tendency is genetic and some of it is down to lifestyle.
In just about every account of allergy we are told that the cause of an allergy is down to one thing, so let's look at that now and we'll start with an interesting question.
Is Your Immune System Really Broken?
We are told by expert after expert that the body is mistaking your corn or your beef for an enemy; that the immune system has been fooled and that your allergy is down to a mistake or malfunction. And that's what I mean by using such a blunt question. Let's ask some more questions.
If my immune system gets such a simple task so very wrong why is my general health good? Surely if my immune system was so easily fooled I would not be able to fight off germs and viruses that i come across every day. And if my immune system is so incapable why am I still alive?
Or Are You a Tad Leaky?
Whether we are leaky or not comes up mostly in discussing food allergies and the whole complicated area of indigestion and food intolerance. School science tells us that proteins are broken down to their building blocks, called amino acids in the stomach and small intestine. That sounds simple and it is but how come allergy is usually explained by saying that our immune system is fighting food proteins?
Where is the fight taking place? Because food proteins cannot get into the bloodstream according to normal ideas. The protein should be digested before they get into the blood.
But suppose you are just a bit leaky, not enough to wet the carpet, just a tad, then food proteins might be able to leak out of the digestive system into the bloodstream.
There the immune system will find these food particles and take care of them. You can call this a fight or a clean up, your metaphor is your business, but the body is properly, cleverly and correctly removing proteins that should not be in the bloodstream...only to be blamed by everyone looking on.
What is at fault here is not the immune system - that is actually doing far more work than it should. The fault lies with the digestive system for not containing food particles adequately until they are sufficiently digested.
And that is called "Leaky gut".
Leaky gut is commonplace and is easy to diagnose. There are simple laboratory tests which are low cost and non invasive.
It is equally easy to cure, but that is for another day. In my view "leaky gut syndrome" is the main cause of Food Allergy.
Or Perhaps You Are Just Intoxicated?
The word "toxin" means poison, so intoxicated means poisoned. This may not mean that you'll die. Whether or not we die when we take in a dose of a poison depends on how strong the poison is and how much we take.
Have you taken the LD 50?
When testing how powerful a chemical toxin is, doses are fed to laboratory animals. As the dose level is increased the animals die. The amount that kills half the animals is called the LD 50, where LD stands for lethal dose.
How About YOUR LD 50?
If some one consumes the LD 50 level of a toxin they may well die. Alcohol is a good example here and the word intoxicated is used to mean that someone has taken a lot of alcohol. If they consume more than the LD 50 they have a fair chance of surviving and whether they do depends on their liver.
The major job of the liver is to grab the toxins it gets and to change them into something else. This is called detoxification, often shortened to "detox" The word detox does not mean anything to do with street drugs and intoxicated does not just mean, "drunk".
The liver has to do something that sounds fairly magical - it has to take poison and turn it into something safe. It needs enzymes to do this and it needs amino acids and nutrients. Like any good construction worker it needs the right tools for the job.
You could be suffering from multiple toxins in your blood stream from industrial exposure, street drugs or pharmaceutical drugs - all of which have to be detoxified your liver is struggling already.
And on Top of That....
And if we add allergens from food allergies or from other sources we raise the demands on the liver. Like anything else it has a limit and we may begin to get allergy symptoms when the liver is working at full capacity dealing with a list of toxins listed above and has little or no spare capacity.
Removing any of the toxins would help the liver cope with all of its other tasks. Detoxification is a complex step by step process of assessing and helping the liver and other organs of detoxification gradually eliminate toxins from the body. Most references to "detox" are wide of the mark and show little real grasp of the science involved.
This is not rocket science but it is liver science and has to be approached carefully with all the right tools and preparation.
So what does cause allergy?
The 3 theories here all have some merit. The immune system is fighting food particles and the reason it is doing so is that allergy patients are somewhat leaky and toxic.
Rather than simply saying that the immune system is at fault or is over reacting it seems wiser to fix the leak and do some detox. Both of these need a Naturopathic Physician for you to get the maximum health benefits, but it can be done.
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