Anyone doing this to heal their leaky gut?

NQHS1981
NQHS1981 Posts: 7 Member
in Food and Nutrition
I'm just starting my journey. Today is day 1of healthy eating. Was diagnosed with psoriasis 4 years ago and have had steroids and other meds pushed at me that do not work. Some believe psoriasis is due to leaky gut and is not a skin condition or an auto immune condition. Personally, I don't believe the immune system "attacks" itself, rather it's just not strong enough to heal - so this is where the healthy eating comes in. I understand healing your gut can take a year or more. Putting in the work. For me this is a lifestyle now and not a diet.

In the last month I've eliminated dairy, sugar, coffee, alcohol, most gluten and eat fruit, protein, vegetables, half my weight (in oz) of PH 9.5 alkaline water, take probiotics and other supplements (apple cider vinegar, spirulina, triphala, multi vitamin, fish oil, hemp oil and a few others I can't recall. For exercise I swim in a salt water pool, yoga, hit the speed bag, walk and do weight bearing exercise.

I'd love to hear from anyone who is suffering with an auto immune condition and hoping to clear it with diet vs meds and see what you're eating and how you're coming along.

Best,
~K
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Replies

  • hesn92
    hesn92 Posts: 5,966 Member
    edited November 2018
    My husband also has psoriasis. The only thing that works for him is medication (humira). I'm not touching on the leaky gut thing. He does have some digestive issues but it's more likely to be a mild form of crohns which is caused by the same auto-immune disease.
  • mor72
    mor72 Posts: 83 Member
    I have ulcerative colitis, and been in remission for nearly 5 years. I eat low carbs and no artificial sugar as i belive that affect me. I dont take any medicine for it now. This site might be a good one to look at. https://scdlifestyle.com/2018/01/ulcerative-colitis-natural-treatment-and-prevention/
  • JenRunTriHappyGirl
    JenRunTriHappyGirl Posts: 521 Member
    janejellyroll wrote: »
    JenRunTriHappyGirl wrote: »
    I have celiac disease which is an auto immune disease. An auto immune disease is not where your immune system attacks itself, it is where it is attacking something that it thinks is a danger when really it is not. In my case that is gluten.

    I am not taking medication for this as I do not see where medication would help me at this point. Right now my symptoms are very manageable with a gluten free diet, exercise, and working to help keep my stress levels low(ish). When things start to flare up I simply take a day to rest and usually that is all I need.

    I know that some day I will probably need medication to help me but for as long as I can go without it I will. I do not have anything against medication or those who choose that route, but for me it just is not what I want to do at this point.

    Auto immune diseases are not curable, so it will always be with you, but you can manage the symptoms. I wish you all the best!

    My understanding is that *some* autoimmune disorders do involve the body disabling or destroying functions of the immune system (like T cells in patients with AIDS, for example). Not an expert, so if this is wrong, please correct.

    I am still pretty new into this myself. But, from what I understand, the body is attacking something in itself that it thinks is damaged, diseased, bad, etc. Like in celiac disease, gluten triggers the body to attack the cells in the small intestine. In chronic iritis, the immune system attacks cells in the eye because it thinks they are diseased. I guess in some diseases, the immune system does attack itself but not it all. Does that make sense?
  • ccrdragon
    ccrdragon Posts: 3,373 Member
    janejellyroll wrote: »
    JenRunTriHappyGirl wrote: »
    I have celiac disease which is an auto immune disease. An auto immune disease is not where your immune system attacks itself, it is where it is attacking something that it thinks is a danger when really it is not. In my case that is gluten.

    I am not taking medication for this as I do not see where medication would help me at this point. Right now my symptoms are very manageable with a gluten free diet, exercise, and working to help keep my stress levels low(ish). When things start to flare up I simply take a day to rest and usually that is all I need.

    I know that some day I will probably need medication to help me but for as long as I can go without it I will. I do not have anything against medication or those who choose that route, but for me it just is not what I want to do at this point.

    Auto immune diseases are not curable, so it will always be with you, but you can manage the symptoms. I wish you all the best!

    My understanding is that *some* autoimmune disorders do involve the body disabling or destroying functions of the immune system (like T cells in patients with AIDS, for example). Not an expert, so if this is wrong, please correct.

    I do not know about the immune system attacking the immune system, but the immune system does attack other parts of the body in some of the autoimmune disorders. My daughter has linear scleroderma where the immune system attacks connective tissue in the body (her disorder is in remission, thank God).
  • mor72
    mor72 Posts: 83 Member
    The hospital consultant who is specialist in ulcerative colitis and bowl cancer.
  • janejellyroll
    janejellyroll Posts: 25,763 Member
    JenRunTriHappyGirl wrote: »
    janejellyroll wrote: »
    JenRunTriHappyGirl wrote: »
    I have celiac disease which is an auto immune disease. An auto immune disease is not where your immune system attacks itself, it is where it is attacking something that it thinks is a danger when really it is not. In my case that is gluten.

    I am not taking medication for this as I do not see where medication would help me at this point. Right now my symptoms are very manageable with a gluten free diet, exercise, and working to help keep my stress levels low(ish). When things start to flare up I simply take a day to rest and usually that is all I need.

    I know that some day I will probably need medication to help me but for as long as I can go without it I will. I do not have anything against medication or those who choose that route, but for me it just is not what I want to do at this point.

    Auto immune diseases are not curable, so it will always be with you, but you can manage the symptoms. I wish you all the best!

    My understanding is that *some* autoimmune disorders do involve the body disabling or destroying functions of the immune system (like T cells in patients with AIDS, for example). Not an expert, so if this is wrong, please correct.

    I am still pretty new into this myself. But, from what I understand, the body is attacking something in itself that it thinks is damaged, diseased, bad, etc. Like in celiac disease, gluten triggers the body to attack the cells in the small intestine. In chronic iritis, the immune system attacks cells in the eye because it thinks they are diseased. I guess in some diseases, the immune system does attack itself but not it all. Does that make sense?

    Yeah, I think that matches my understanding that there are a variety of autoimmune disorders and we're still learning about them. Some of them do seem to involve the body attacking the immune system, while others are the body attacking something else.
  • singingflutelady
    singingflutelady Posts: 8,736 Member
    mor72 wrote: »
    I have ulcerative colitis, and been in remission for nearly 5 years. I eat low carbs and no artificial sugar as i belive that affect me. I dont take any medicine for it now. This site might be a good one to look at. https://scdlifestyle.com/2018/01/ulcerative-colitis-natural-treatment-and-prevention/

    You are lucky. Many need medication and surgery even with a "perfect" diet.
  • ccrdragon
    ccrdragon Posts: 3,373 Member
    mor72 wrote: »
    The hospital consultant who is specialist in ulcerative colitis and bowl cancer.

    Do you have UC? If you do, then I would believe that you could have a leaky gut caused by the autoimmune disorder and not the other way around.
  • GottaBurnEmAll
    GottaBurnEmAll Posts: 7,722 Member
    hesn92 wrote: »
    My husband also has psoriasis. The only thing that works for him is medication (humira). I'm not touching on the leaky gut thing. He does have some digestive issues but it's more likely to be a mild form of crohns which is caused by the same auto-immune disease.

    ^Same, except I have psoriatic arthritis. Never had skin plaques. I'm in the small percentage who just has it manifest on their nails. I also have digestive issues.

    I carry a gene for crohn's and also have celiac disease. I too have digestive issues.

    No, it's not leaky gut.

  • singingflutelady
    singingflutelady Posts: 8,736 Member
    GottaBurnEmAll wrote: »
    hesn92 wrote: »
    My husband also has psoriasis. The only thing that works for him is medication (humira). I'm not touching on the leaky gut thing. He does have some digestive issues but it's more likely to be a mild form of crohns which is caused by the same auto-immune disease.

    ^Same, except I have psoriatic arthritis. Never had skin plaques. I'm in the small percentage who just has it manifest on their nails. I also have digestive issues.

    I carry a gene for crohn's and also have celiac disease. I too have digestive issues.

    No, it's not leaky gut.

    I'm on Humira too ( but for Crohn's).
  • Saorn
    Saorn Posts: 1 Member
    I've lived with Psoriasis for over 30 years. When I was in my 20's it was pretty severe and covered most of my body, as I've gotten older it has been slowly disappearing, now mostly only on my arms. For me no changes in my diet has seemed to make any difference. What has seemed to make the most difference was quitting smoking, ever since I've stopped smoking it's been slowly disappearing, this has taken years. I haven't been a smoker in about 17 years now.

    Personally I do not use any of the medications available via prescription or OTC. The side effects don't seem worth it IMHO. Most of the topicals contain some type of steroid and work by thinning your skin which can and will most likely give you stretch marks, I have some from when my Doctor had me using them. The ingestible medications at the time were far more harmful and will not only attack the Psoriasis but your internal organs. They required frequent blood tests to monitor the internal damage that is occurring. I have also been given UVB treatments, those seemed to work the best, but those were costing abut $200 a month and I can get the same results by just spending time in the sun. However, this can also result in skin cancer. This was a number of years ago, I have not tried any of the newer medications that have come on the market and frankly never intend to. The risks for any treatment type just aren't worth it to me.

    Most of the time I forget I even have it since it's purely a cosmetic issue in my life. I honestly will almost completely forget I have it until some "helpful" person points it out and tells me they have the "cure".

    I wish you the best of luck in your change of lifestyle and hope it gives you the results you are looking for.
  • 4Pop
    4Pop Posts: 53 Member
    For whoever chose to call BS:

    https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2898551/
    Glutamine

    Glutamine is presently the best known compound for reducing IP, and nutritional depletion is known to result in increased IP.103–106 Major abnormalities in IP have been demonstrated in glutamine-deprived rat pups.107 Furthermore, glutamine has been shown to maintain transepithelial resistance and to reduce permeability in intestinal cell culture monolayers.108 In addition, glutamine supplementation has been shown to increase intestinal barrier function in malnourished children.109 However, glutamine has no effect if administered parenterally to depleted patients.110 Glutamine is the preferential substrate for enterocytes, and it works in concert with other amino acids, such as leucine and arginine, to maintain integrity and function.111 Several studies have demonstrated the beneficial effects of glutamine on IP. For example, improvements in the intestinal barrier have been shown in experimental biliary obstruction,112 after ischemia/reperfusion113 and even in severe clinical situations, such as in critically ill patients, in whom glutamine lowered the frequency of infections114 following abdominal surgery.115 Furthermore, in IBD treatment, the use glutamine alone or in combination with other amino acids is considered promising.116 In low birth weight children, allergies were improved by glutamine treatment during the first year of life.117 These non-nutritive effects of glutamine have recently been reviewed,118 and these effects have been ascribed to the antioxidant properties of glutamine and the enhanced expression of heat shock proteins.119

    More: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4369670/

    Role of Glutamine in Protection of Intestinal Epithelial Tight Junctions

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