Is Gluten intolerance real

[Growly]

@Schizophonia

@Leo Gura

@Princess Arabia

@Nahm

@Zero my Hero

 

[Leo Gura]

Of course it is real for certain people.

There are blood tests to measure antibodies to gluten.

Edited 3 hours ago by Leo Gura

[joshuahuebner]

I thought I was gluten intolerant for years and avoided gluten. But there's actually more to the story.

First of all, gluten sensitivity is definitely a real thing. Around 1% of the population has celiac disease, an autoimmune condition in which the immune system reacts to gluten and damages the lining of the small intestine. These people have to avoid gluten for life. There's no way around it.

But here's where it gets interesting: Around 15% of the population believe they're gluten sensitive. And research suggests that, for many of these people, gluten might not actually be the problem.

In some studies, people couldn't distinguish between gluten and a placebo, but they did notice a difference between gluten and fructans, a type of fermentable carbohydrate found in wheat.

In other words, some people who think they're sensitive to gluten might actually be reacting to fructans instead.

One study even found that among people who believed they were gluten sensitive, only around 16% actually showed gluten-specific sensitivity under the study conditions.

And there's another important factor: expectation. Research suggests that expecting to experience symptoms after eating gluten can have a substantial influence on how people actually feel.

In my experience, if you don't have celiac disease, it's worth looking beyond gluten itself. For example, underlying digestive issues, such as IBS or SIBO, may contribute to symptoms after eating wheat. But that doesn't mean a damaged gut lining is necessarily the cause, or that gluten is never responsible.

[something_else]

There''s literally a disease called Coeliac which makes you violently ill if you eat even a tiny bit of gluten.

[Schizophonia]

Yes even though there is also a trend.

In general nutrition (and related practices like fitness) attracts and is manipulated by people's neurotic tendencies. This is evident in the magical thinking that "whatever tastes good is bad for you, and vice versa."

Consequently since wheat often tastes good and has a pleasant texture it will gets demonized in favor of something blander "because the gluten"; pork is vilified in favor of dry, bland options like chicken; peanut butter is shunned in favor of flaxseeds "because of O6/O3 ratio etc", and so on.