Do You Suffer with ‘Wheat Belly’?
glutenWheat is woven into our food experience. It’s almost essential to our lifestyles, we have toast with our breakfast, sandwich for lunch and cake for dessert and many are suffering with an unknown gluten intolerance.
Wheat belly is the kind of fat tissue that surrounds the organs like the kidneys, liver and the intestines, and is known as visceral fat, and one of the main reasons today that people suffer with bloating and flatulence.
This fat is different than say, fat on your thigh or arms because it’s surrounding vital organs so can lead to heart disease and diabetes.
Modern wheat has been hybridized, and the plant now has stronger roots in order to survive under challenging conditions, and it no longer resembles the wheat of our ancestors. It’s also much higher in gluten (Latin for “glue”), which gives bread it’s fluffy and stretchy like texture.
Wheat contains Amylopectin-A which has been shown to increase blood sugar, as it is quickly and easily digested and absorbed into simple sugars. Research shows that starchy foods high in amylopectin have been shown to cause the development of insulin resistance in less than 12 weeks. This could eventually lead to the development of Diabetes II.
Gluten also has been shown to interact with Zonulin in the gut and interfere with the tight junctions of our gut lining, leading to gut permeability, and this “leakiness” begins the autoimmune process. The flood of foreign peptide/proteins, bacterial lipopolysaccharide and grain proteins themselves cause immune responses to be launched against these foreign factors. But the removal of gluten free foods might not be enough to reverse auto-immunity.
If you suffer with bloating, headaches and/or constipation/diarrhea, try eliminating going gluten free to observe whether or not you feel better. Remove wheat and then re-introduce it again after two weeks to see how it makes you feel. Be aware that gluten is hidden in many foods, such as condiments, meats, flavourings, and processed foods.
For information on Food Intolerance Testing.
