July 17, 2010
I want to start off by saying “please remember I am not a doctor and that these are just my opinions and my non-scientific observations”. I cannot stress that enough.
Now, for my opinions and non-scientific observations! Some of you may remember that I decided to put myself on a gluten free diet similar to the boys. I haven’t gone casein free yet, but I think that will be coming soon. I’ve started to eliminate a lot of milk products from my diet. My change to a GF lifestyle came after I realized that Matthew had a single mutation of the MTHFR gene. What that means is that either Larry or I or both of us have the same mutation. That made me think about the fact that if certain interventions were working for him, they may also work for me.
I have, for as long as I can remember, always loved baked goods. I would crave cookies, cakes and breads. I could eat bagel, after bagel, and still not feel full. I remember hearing diet experts speaking about how if you eat a certain way (but not by eliminating gluten) that you shouldn’t be hungry and that you will lose weight. This NEVER worked for me. And they would talk about just adding a little exercise in, about 30 minutes a day, and that would help boost metabolism and therefore facilitate weight loss. It NEVER worked for me. The only way I could lose weight was to restrict my calories to such a low amount that I was miserable. And I was always hungry.
You would think that I would make the connection between my food addictions and gluten after reading about autism and leaky gut. It would seem to be apparent that I might have a gluten issue if I crave baked goods and my ASD son seem to have an addiction to them that exacerbated his autistic behaviors! I couldn’t see the gluten for the trees.
Well after going gluten free I have noticed many wonderful things. I am no longer exhausted all the time. (I am still very tired, but I think that has more to do with a 5 month old that still wakes to be fed.) I have started a mild exercise program and it seems to be working. I am doing an in-home walking program by a well known walk at home exercise guru. It is not high intensity but this time I’m seeing progress. Before going GF I was doing the Jillian Michaels 30-day Shred, which is extremely intense and I saw no results. Nothing. Since going GF I no longer crave bread, pizza, cakes, cookies, donuts, nothing. I have no cravings at all. I used to have almost daily cravings.
I decided to Google “gluten causing weight gain” just to see if any of this made sense and this is what I found.
I think this is what was happening to me. And if you read the article I pulled that from (it is a link to the article) you will see that this also appears to be related to pre-diabetes/insulin resistance which I also suffer from. That opens a whole other discussion of how ASD seems to be related to autoimmune disorders such as diabetes, but I won’t get into that here.
Anyway, I just thought I’d pass this along. I had a terrible time controlling my cravings and my weight has always been an issues. Barring starvation, I could not lose weight and even with exercise I saw no real results. Now that I have removed gluten I am starting to get control of my food addictions and I’m seeing a change. I don’t know if it is truly directly related, as I have said this is certainly non-scientific observations, or if this is just a coincidence and things will change again. But I truly hope I have figured out a core problem that will help me live a healthier life.
