I’ve recently discussed how the majority of food intolerances, whether to FODMAPs, histamine, nightshades, fructose, etc., are really manifestations of dysbiosis and SIBO. Here is another way to view these phenomena: Food intolerances are your body’s signal to you that serious deterioration in your health is coming.

In other words, if all you do is choose to reduce or eliminate the offending food, you are still left with the massive disruption of your intestinal microbiome that caused the food intolerance in the first place, along with increased intestinal permeability and endotoxemia. So say you eliminate fermented foods because they contain histamine, or apples and pears because they contain FODMAPs, or tomatoes because they are nightshades, but still have, for instance, overproliferation of E. coli, Klebsiella, Staphylococcus, and Enterococcus species in your colon, ileum, jejunum, duodenum, and stomach—30-feet of trillions of unhealthy species of microbes that live and die in rapid succession (since they survive for only hours to days), eroding the protective mucus barrier, inflaming the intestinal wall, some bacteria penetrating into the intestinal wall to worsen inflammation, some bacterial debris entering the bloodstream (endotoxemia).

What is likely ahead in your health future when you leave SIBO (and related conditions such as H2S-producing SIBO) uncorrected?

The list of health conditions that emerges when you fail to take action to correct this situation reads like a laundry list of common modern health issues that includes:

• Food intolerances and food allergies
• Depression, anxiety
• Ulcerative colitis, Crohn’s disease
• Irritable bowel syndrome
• Fibromyalgia
• Metabolic deterioration—increased insulin resistance, fatty liver, increased blood sugar and blood pressure, increased triglycerides; pre-diabetes and type 2 diabetes
• Diverticular disease and diverticulitis
• Colon cancer, other gastrointestinal cancers such as biliary and pancreatic
• Autoimmune conditions such as Hashimoto’s thyroiditis or rheumatoid arthritis
• Neurodegenerative disorders such as multiple sclerosis and Alzheimer’s dementia

If you therefore have any form of food intolerance or any of the other telltale signs of SIBO, it is time to take action. You will find more discussions on what actions to take here in the Wheat Belly Blog, in my membership website Undoctored Inner Circle, as well as in my new book Super Gut: A Four-Week Plan to Reprogram Your Microbiome, Restore Health, and Lose Weight to be released February 1, 2022 and available now for pre-order. In Super Gut, I show readers how to recognize SIBO in all its forms, whether it is advisable to confirm or whether just proceeding based on your best judgement will do, which herbal antibiotic products have been shown to be efficacious, how to strengthen the intestinal mucus barrier for added relief, even how, in our preliminary experience, we are now using a collection of specific microbial species in what I call “SIBO Yogurt” that, so far, has been eradicating SIBO in the majority. 

Bottom line: If you have a food intolerance, take it very seriously, even if you feel better by eliminating the offending food. You have been given a powerful warning of what lies ahead in your future, so take advantage of it.

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