THE RESULTS ARE IN. I’m not sure why I’ve waited so long to do something like this but I guess I’ve never food sensitivity symptoms and sensitivities in general until now. EverlyWell so graciously allowed me to partner with them and gave me some answers! If you’ve been following along on the ‘gram you’ll know that I’ve been struggling [majorly] with my skin. You’ll also know that I suffer from everyday headaches and migraines around that time of the month. I’ve had a slight inclination that dairy messes with my skin (as it does with a lot of us) and that gluten instantly gives me a headache almost immediately. I guess I was just looking for some validation, Enter EverlyWell.
What is a Food Sensitivity Symptom?
Don’t get it twisted – a food sensitivity is NOT a food allergy. A Food sensitivity results in immune responses (IgG antibody reactions) like headaches, bloating, dry itchy skin, etc. Sometimes with food sensitivities symptoms might not even show up for an hour – days later.
What is a Food Allergy?
A food allergy triggers the IgE antibodies in your blood, activating histamine in your body – when this happens you can experience tons of different allergic reactions, potentially life threatening ones like anaphylaxis.
What is a Food Intolerance?
A food intolerance happens when you don’t have enough of the right enzymes in your body to breakdown a certain food. For example, lactose intolerance. These don’t involve an immune system response.
How Does EverlyWell Food Sensitivity Test Work?
Now that we’ve gotten that cleared up – I want to tell you how the test actually works. Everlywell sends a kit right to your door step with step by step directions on how to properly collect your blood sample. It’s a tiny prick of the finger you guys – nothing serious. Even though, I feel like finger pricks hurt more than actual shots, am I right?! Wtf is up with that?! Anyway once you’ve been through those 30 seconds of pain, you package everything up and ship it off to the lab.
What Do They Test For?
The Everlywell Tests for the IgG reaction to 96 different foods. Once you get your results they are categorized by normal, mild, moderate and high. All of the ones I thought I had food sensitivity symptoms to were on there, so I’m sure yours will be too.
THE RESULTS
Each food, no matter which category is also rated by number on that specific scale so you can see if it’s higher or lower. The rest of the food items in the Mild category are sesame, swordfish, tuna and tarragon. This definitely validated a few things for me, but I’m not stopping here. I’m going to do an elimination diet next.
What is an Elimination Diet?
An elimination diet is when you completely eliminate all of your high or moderate reactivity foods for 30 days and then slowly add them back in one at a time to further pinpoint where the food intolerance symptoms are coming from.
This is next on my list! So expect another post all about that and what I can find additionally. If you would like to try the test for yourself I have 20% OFF for you!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! YAY!!!!!! Also, feel free to DM, comment, message me with any questions you still have!
Are you struggling with headaches? I have all of my tips and tricks to combat them in my headache journey.
