Wheat Allergy

Do you often sneeze, cough, dizzy, nausea or develop this kind of reaction when you consume certain food? I think i “might” have this wheat allergy all this while which i do not have any idea about this at first.I am now eliminating wheat from my diet to see whether i have this wheat allergy disorder. Hopefully not, if yes, i cannot eat bread ever again and so many other food and drinks. In addition, i noticed when i cut red chillies i will start to sneeze all the way too, i am allergic to chillies too. By the way, i am allergic to strawberries too, it gives me rashes..
After i did a deep research from the internet only i found out that there are many people who silently suffering from this “Wheat Allergy”. Now i know i am not the only unlucky ones.
In fact, approximately 1 out of 7 people or 15% people experience this allergy and they are unaware of this disorder all their life. They become ill all the time and no matter how hard they try to change their diet and lifestyle, they will still feel sick because they themselves doesn’t know their body is rejecting wheat.
For your information, wheat is the same family as rye, corn and barley, therefore one who does develop this allergy should avoid these category of food. Wheat consist of quite a big portion of my diet before this eg Gardenia Wholemeal bread, Jacob crackers, biscuits, tarts, cakes, buns, pau, vermicelli, noodles, soy sauce, pepper, mayonnaise, ice cream, candy, sausages, bran and lots more. For drinks such as malt, milo, ovaltine,beer,wine, chocolate and others.
Most of the flours we use everyday for baking are made from wheat or “Gandum” (in Malay).
I always thought wheat is a nutritous food and healthy grain. How come they are detrimental to our health?
Well according to what i found out is, wheat as well as other grains such as rye and barley contains gluten. Gluten is a protein substance that is left after the starch is removed from the grains. The substance is important to food products, like bread, giving the dough cohesiveness to help it to keep shape once it’s is baked, holds the gasses that are released during the rising process and gives it a pleasant chewy texture when eaten.
Gluten in bread also makes it absorptive. Some of our body systems are sensitive to gluten, therefore developing the condition of wheat allergy. Gluten destroys the epithelial lining of the small intestine, resulting in an inability to absorb food elements such as minerals, vitamins and essential fats. The damage caused can also leads to other conditions such as irritable bowel syndrome, lactose intolerance, arthritis, diabetes, autoimmune syndromes and some schizophrenia. Celiac disease is also a common development for gluten sufferers.
Okay, lets put it this way ,your immune system is hypersensitive to one of the proteins in wheat, so your system reacts against the protein as though it were some foreign invader.
Allergic reaction to wheat can range from mild symptoms to life threatening symptoms referred to as anaphylaxis.
Most people suffer this symptoms for years without even knowing their cause. These symptoms are so common that they though is associated with other medical sickness which is actually not!
The symptoms can include:

• Dizziness or faintness
• Nausea and vomiting
• Abdominal bloating
• Skin Rashes
• Fatigue
• Itchy, watery eyes
• Unexplained Coughing
• Joint pain
• Muscle aches and pain
• Depression
• Irritable bowel symptoms
• Chest pain
• Sneezing
• Runny nose
• Hives
• Diarrhea
• Allergic rhinitis
• Eczema
• Sweling around the mouth
• Headache
• Depression/ Mood Swing
• Swollen throat/tongue
• Palpitations
• Psoriasis
• Anaphylaxis – severe reaction involving major body systems

There could be other additional symptoms as different people will have different reactions in their systems. Any combination of these symptoms may be experiences in some people and some, hardly noticeable symptoms.There are also other food intolerance apart from wheat, eg: Fructose, Dairy or Yeast.
Listen to your body as your body will give out signals, and to those who have Wheat allergy, one must observe a strict Wheat-free diet to remain healthy. If you do nothing about it, it can be a serious long term health problems like osteoporosis, anemia and many others.