Hey guys!!
Wow I haven’t written a blog post since 2019 before my life blew up and my parents got ill and everything turned upside down.
BUT I have a new theory, so I needed to come back here. I haven’t had a theory since 2019 or 2018. Maybe 2017. This is a big one (but I’ve been wrong before so who knows).
We moved to Nashville from Canada in September 2020. Technically I moved to Franklin (just south of Nashville). And immediately I got strep throat I couldn’t get rid of with multiple rounds of antibiotics. I had pretty severe tree allergies in Franklin pretty rapidly after we moved and after a month we moved to Nashville to a condo to escape the allergies. It kind of worked. The allergies improved. My strep throat however, didn’t. On antibiotic round three the strep throat changed into bronchitis and in December I ended up with pneumonia along with Scarlett (my 4-year-old poor thing) and fiance Jordan Fuller (more personal stuff later – a lot happened in the last few years – I went through terrible family illnesses, got divorced and met the love of my life).
Anyway, we all ended up on antibiotics and steroids. It was pretty brutal. Nothing compared to having a full-blown autoimmune disorder and depression… Nothing is that bad. But not good.
We finally recovered in December and I was healthy for December (except covid (for the third time) for a week) and I was healthy for January.. The only two months there aren’t allergies in Nashville. Then as soon as tree allergies started again late February I got “sick” almost immediately and Scarlett got a cough again and it occurred to me I was having an asthmatic reaction, something I haven’t really experienced since I was a teenager, caused by these ridiculous tree allergies. Scarlett unfortunately also has similar allergies. She’s had a chronic cough, and rhinitis since February, poor thing. Can’t wait until we’re out of here.
I’ve been allergic most of the time since late February. Aching body, bronchitis, cough with a tickle that keeps me up at night, hoarse voice, itchy ears, stuffy nose, itchy eyes. Unbearable really. I had to cancel so many podcasts. By April this year (2022) the tree allergy illness had progressed to actual joint pain and my arthritis was bugging me for the first time in years. Nothing like what I’ve experienced before dietary changes but still very scary. To the point of tears multiple times scary. It’s terrifying not knowing if things could progress. Terrifying to think the diet might stop working when it’s kept me in remission for years. Why on earth would I have mild arthritis for the first time since I went on the lion diet? Could tree allergies really be doing this? How!? I thought tree allergies were confined to lungs and itching and eyes and ears. Not joints and mood. What was going on?
For people who don’t know (like I didn’t), Tennessee has some of the worst allergies out of anywhere in North America. People literally go there to study asthma. Not ideal for me, at all.
So I went to an immunologist who specializes in allergies. The first doctor I’ve been to in years. I did a prick test on my back and as you can see, I am very allergic to trees. So is Scarlett, poor thing.
Then it occurred to me.. What if I am so allergic to pollen, latex, dust, etc., that I’m having allergic reactions to foods that have similar proteins to those allergy proteins? This is something I had considered briefly in 2016 but for some reason forgot about it.
If you have a severe birch allergy for instance, you can have cross-reactivity issues where your body will react to proteins that are shaped like the protein causing the birch allergy. Most doctors would tell you not to worry about this. “That’s just called oral allergy syndrome (OAS) and it’s confined to the lips, mouth, and throat.” 
I was up last week at 3 am from this stupid cough wondering why I had pain all over my body including joint pain from tree allergies and I thought… If you can have oral allergy syndrome from foods that have proteins shaped like pollen, pet dander, latex, or dust, couldn’t those similarly shaped proteins induce more of an immune reaction? Not just oral allergies? What if I’m not reacting to the food exactly, but the protein in the food that’s shaped like what I’m truly allergic to? The other crazy thing.. I used to react to cane sugar terribly. But not beet sugar. It made no sense at the time and I did think, “what if this is a grass allergy?” But after the lion diet, I kind of forgot about that because I’m not eating those foods anyway. Now that environmental allergies are triggering my autoimmunity though, it’s back to the drawing board. I’m not nearly as sick as I was but it’s not tolerable with the allergies.
What if consuming those cross-reactivity foods trigger minor allergic reactions that contributed to leaky gut (along with gluten and gut damaging foods) and then that resulted in Type 3 Hypersensitivity reactions (I wrote about those in 2017 here). That’s worth a read too. It was a theory back then but it turns out Type 3 Hypersensitivity Reactions can cause autoimmunity so that part of my theory was right. Ha.
Anyway, one of the major symptoms my dad and I both have that make whatever reactions we get (and have mostly avoided with diet) horrifying, is an impending sense of doom. The only place I’ve really found scientific literature on an “impending sense of doom” was during anaphylaxis. A severe allergy attack. Dad had an anaphylactic reaction to a bird when he was young. He gets pain all over his body when he’s exposed to down. I had an anaphylactic response to a spider bite when I was 17 (right in between my hip and ankle replacement – great summer). But neither of us has had full-blown anaphylaxis since. However, we’ve been plagued by these stupid “reactions” if we eat anything that isn’t ruminant meat, and now I’ve had similar symptoms around long exposures to tree pollen.
I actually do get most of those above symptoms without the obvious lip and throat swelling and tightness in the throat. Everything else is there (except vomiting and loss of consciousness). So could these reactions actually be allergies? Seems like it.
I also get a majorly not cute puffy face (see here when I was having tree allergies vs. when I’m not – crazy eh?). The left side is no allergies and the right side is when I do have allergies.
You know how frustrating podcasting with a face that randomly puffs up with trees is? It’s frustrating.
When I eat something I can’t tolerate I get itchy everywhere too. That hasn’t happened for years since I’ve been on the lion diet but before the diet when I reintroduced soy prior to that I had a full body itch. And before I started any diet I was constantly itchy. Itchy enough that I used to scratch my legs in my sleep until they bled.
So this seems like an allergy but every doctor I spoke with said “you can’t be allergic to everything”. And fair enough. But I’ve had severe environmental allergies since I was a kid and it makes more sense that I’m having allergies to similarly shaped proteins in almost all plant foods than having allergies to the actual foods. (All plant foods that I know of and most animal foods too – I haven’t been able to reintroduce anything successfully other than wild salmon, sardines, and a specific brand of honey is okay-ish). Still can’t eat dairy, eggs, pork, or chicken either. That theory is at least more logical than an allergy to all foods.
SO what if I’ve just had severe environmental allergies the whole time? And because I was in an allergic state since forever, and eating the wrong foods on top of that, (that contributed to leaky gut, gluten, etc.) which made the entire situation and the allergies worse. Then I had proteins from foods shaped like proteins from trees I was allergic to leak into my body and that triggered a type 3 hypersensitivity reaction where antibodies surrounded these proteins to protect me from them? But because I was producing too many of these complexes I couldn’t get rid of them fast enough and they started building up in tissues and caused tissue damage (resulting in tissue damage and therefore joint replacements). See my post on type 3 hypersensitivity reactions from 2017 here.
Great. Finally a logical explanation behind the inability to eat anything that isn’t lamb. Kind of. Doesn’t exactly explain the inability to eat aged meat… That could be a mold allergy though so maybe that’s the explanation there. Maybe the inability to eat aged meat is more of a mold allergy than a histamine intolerance, but the verdict is still out on that.
This theory almost explains everything.
So, more importantly, what to do about it?
Well I’ve started taking low-dose naltrexone at 1.5mg per day. It’s only been two days but I’ll write an update on this soon. People see amazing changes with this and so far I don’t seem to be reacting to it (unlike almost every other medication out there other than opiates). So I’m going to give LDN a good shot and also do allergy shots too.
It’s been used to treat chronic fatigue, autoimmune disease, potentially cancer, and allergies. It seems like a miracle cure but miracle cures don’t generally exist, so… who knows. So far it isn’t giving me side effects too, that’s fantastic. It might actually be making me feel good but stay tuned because sometimes it feels good at first and then WHAM a problem.
If you have severe allergies you can get allergy immunotherapy shots where doctors will mix a tiny bit of the allergen in a concoction and inject you with it. The point of this is to expose yourself to a very low dose of an allergen so you can desensitize your immune system. It’s a pain though you have to do it twice a week or once a week for years. I wanted to do this a while ago when I was 18 but I was told that I was so allergic to trees that the doctor was worried about inducing anaphylaxis. And at that time I could still tolerate antihistamines so we didn’t do allergy shots.
However, I haven’t been able to tolerate medications since I stopped taking all of them in 2015. Antihistamines make my skin crawl terribly and give me that horrible impending sense of doom. The only medication I can take without horrifying side effects are opiates without sodium metabisulfite. So morphine or codeine basically.
So it would be interesting if naltrexone – which almost works in the opposite way opiates work – would help. Plus allergy shots.
Hope you guys are well! I will solve this one day. I’m also moving to Miami where the tree allergies aren’t going to plague me as badly. Can’t reduce my productivity with autoimmunity again! I have too many great things going on.
Stay well fellow sickies, I’ll figure this out yet. So far at least I have a diet that works to keep me in remission, and others in remission, just need an actual cure now. Let’s see what LDN and allergy shots do.
Mikhaila
UPDATE: 2023 – turns out it was mold that was giving me serious allergies to everything environmental. LDN didn’t work out – I didn’t like how it made me feel (completely numb). I wrote biotoxin.com about my experience with mold if you’re interested. If you’re experiencing environmental reactions like this I would seriously look into water damage in your home. Most homes have some degree of it and it can cause insane immune system illness.
I know some people can only eat beef, and only if it’s: organic, grass-fed and grass-finished, non-aged and frozen within 24 hours, and medium fat ratio (85%/15%). I’m one of them, and I don’t miss the variety at all, or worry about if it’s right or not, because I feel so great! ;]
Another random thought to add to all the other ones already posted here is: someone should research EMFs and their affect on human digestion. I personally live mostly “wired” and “off”, and I notice a huge difference in how my body feels and what my mood/mental-state is!! ;]
Very interesting. I have been plagued with allergies since birth. I’m curious how the new med works. I have been on allergy medications since as long as I can remember (circa 3 yrs old). I’m on the beef/lamb, salt, and water lion diet now after 4 months on carnivore trying to pull myself out of an IBD/UC flare. I am also a fellow Floridian (St. Pete area).
Dear Mikhaila, Have you heard of NAET? Nambudripad’s Allergy Elimination Technique? It’s worked for me and my husband. Wishing you the best!
Hello Mikhaila. Thank you for your enlightening and informative blog. Most of my diet consisted of apricots, oats, water, raw meat, and coffee. I’ve avoided dairy, wheat, most yellow vegetable and fruit, pineapple, oranges, lemons, onions, pork. People thought I was picky. I suffered with crippling muscle pain, vision problems, gut cramps, mouth pain and burn sensation absolutely every time I ate citrus, pork, white bread, pineapple or dairy. After my husband’s death and other trauma, I was prescribed antidepressants. That triggers a series of cardiac problems, heart attack, defibrillator implant surgery and a boot up the bum medication in the form at Bisoprolol. Fumarate. The gift that keeps on giving. I suffer with painful arthiritus, muscle pain, month long conjunctivitis, hair loss, vision problems, pleurisy, difficulties in swollowing, breathing and muddled thinking, insomnia with hours of extreme fatigue, low self esteem, dental problems, tinnitus and more. The Ted talk encouraged me. Thank you. My low opinion of doctors, the medical field and pharmaceutical companies is sinking further. You are as brilliant, intelligent, informed, empathetic and strong as your father. A family of shiny diamond and tungsten backbone.
Hey Mikhaila,
I also got allergy shots for years as a teenager, but I’m very skeptical about them.
Because in the time I got the allergy shots, my chronic hives (water allergy) started, till now.
But I don’t know, maybe the allergy shots were also needed, because otherwise the pollen allergy would be too severe to be bearable.
However, I’ve definetely noticed strong improvements following a carnivore/keto/paleo/blood-type-0 -ish diet.
Also I’m currently waiting on my igg4 food allergy test.
I also have the theory that most health problems today are caused by food intolerance/allergy and foods that actually are bad for humans, regardless whether you allergic to them or not.
So, it was a really interesting read and cool to see that you have a similar theory.
Best,
M. A.
This is all so interesting. Thank you for all you have done. I have a very good sense of listening to my body and I have been gluten and dairy free for seven or eight years now. It changed my life. I then found your father, who I admire greatly, which is how I found you! I have been on the Lion Diet (or carnivore) for eight weeks or so. In that time, I have stopped getting these headaches I have been having for a year (maybe Covid related, who knows?) , my severe allergies have subsided and I have been confident enough to go off my antidepressants (four) that I have been taking for twenty years. I want to sincerely thank you for enlightening, informing but mostly, giving me the courage to do something I have wanted to do for years, going off my meds. I knew they haven’t been working for years. I have many issues (arthritis, allergies, autoimmune disorder, MDD, panic disorders, bipolar, among others) and I have never felt better at 37. Hope is a special gift to me, and you and your father have given it to me. Thank you again.
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