Meg Haworth

I’ll never forget the day the nutritionist broke the news to me.  I sat in her office feeling hopeful, absorbing her knowledge, wisdom and general advice.  Then she said something really awful.  She said, “You have the worst case of leaky gut syndrome I have ever seen.”

I’m sorry, what was my gut doing?  Leaking?  How do guts leak and what do we do about it?  Luckily, the tests to determine said condition were the least invasive and most palatable medical tests I had ever submitted to.  All I had to do was spit in a cup or two and swab the inside of my mouth with a Q-tip and place it in a zip loc bag. 

With irritable bowel syndrome, gastritis & prolapsed hemorrhoids, I had been to gastroenterologists and proctologists.  Both groups of doctors never had an easy test.  It was always, “drink this”, “bend over that", "this will only hurt a little”.  They were just your general half-naked moments of humiliation.  Spitting in a cup was much easier.

In a healthy person without gut leakage, nutrients will permeate the intestinal wall.  In someone like me, the intestinal wall had become like Swiss cheese, and the body was overabsorbing the good, the bad and the leaky.  I was a toxic waste dump.  The more toxins I had building up, the sicker I got and soon enough, the diseases piled up like water leaking from a faucet in desperate need of a new washer. 

It turned out that the new washer my gut needed was a dietary adjustment.  Cutting out gluten (that binder found in wheat) and dairy products, according to my nutritionist, would likely solve my leaky gut issue.  She had found this to be true in 99% of the cases she had worked with.  Those were excellent odds so why not go for it.   

   I did and here I am today, over a dozen years later, to tell you that if you are suffering from bowel distress, you may want to consider that your diet is playing a big role in that.  Then know that this is just the beginning.  In future blogs, I will explore the deeper issues possibly associated with your intestinal health.  For now, let’s focus on fixing the washer  . . .

Do you have any questions, stories, suggestions for a recipe you would like me to try or a recipe you would like to share?  Please submit it here on this blog.  For more information about Doctor Meg and how she can help you navigate your way through healing your gluten and dairy dilemmas, please go to www.DeliciousAndHealthy.com , sign up for her e-mail list and receive your free special reports, “A Glutton for Gluten” and “Drowning in Dairy” to learn more about how gluten and dairy products may be affecting your health.