Food Allergy Symptoms

A child may present with chronic nose congestion, cheek and ear flushing, a history of recurrent ear infections and tonsillitis, associated with infrequent attacks of abdominal pain and episodes of hyperactivity with temper tantrums. Another child may present with recurrent "flu", fatigue, lymph node swelling and appear to be depressed.

Flu-like symptoms are typical manifestations of the delayed patterns of food allergy - children often complain of fatigue, abdominal pain and aching; parents observe that they are irritable and distracted. Many children say they are "sick-all over". The delayed mechanisms of food allergy tend to produce recurrent or chronic symptoms. This symptomatic process begins with the action of food materials in the digestive tract and continues into the blood stream, and then affects the function of any target organ which receives the food problem. For example:

1.      Symptoms may be limited to the digestive tract-indigestion, abdominal pain, bloating, nausea, vomiting, and diarrhea.

2.      Symptoms may be general or systemic - fever, fatigue, sweating, and chills.

3.      The lungs are the target organ in food-induced bronchitis and asthma.

4.      The joints are target organs in food allergic arthritis.

5.      The skin reacts with itching, rashes, hives, thickening, redness, swelling, and scaling as in eczema and psoriasis.

6.      The brain is the target organ when disorganized, disturbed thinking, feeling, remembering, and behaving occur.

The food problems that concerned us involves a complicated series of body dysfunctions. Since there is no current testing method that reliably identifies the causes of food-related illnesses, we cannot specify a short list of foods to avoid, and assume that everything else will function properly.

Go to page 4 of the Feeding Infants and Children Tutorial Nutritional Therapy is based on removing the cause of illness by correcting a faulty food supply. The Alpha Nutrition Program is standard method of diet revision.