I quite often watch the One Show, as it is quite good humoured and a genteel accompaniment to one’s ‘early evening’ compared to soap operas, the Weakest Link (which, in my opinion, is Anne Robinson on that show!) and the news.  However, last night, a feature on food intolerances really disappointed me.

The suggestion was, that food intolerances are a bit of a trend, or, as they suggested, a glamourous alternative to being on a diet without calling it a diet – “yet another excuse not to eat”, as pioneered by “size double zero models”.  They talked about food tolerances and whether many people actually did have them, or whether it was just misguided self-diagnosis.

They then went on to show “someone with a genuine problem” – an extreme case of coeliac disease (gluten intolerance).  Whilst this was a very genuine case, I felt that it belittled those who are made to feel unwell as the result of eating certain foodstuffs.

As I sit here on my bed, barely able to move for the third or fourth evening running whilst trying to fight extreme pain, bloating, nausea, fatigue and discomfort caused by eating food in general, (I have a combination of spastic colon and mid-gut motility disorder, which are two forms of IBS – the latter being very difficult to treat because it is basically caused  by eating, which is a necessity), I can’t help feeling a bit peeved by people’s general ignorance.  It is all very well if you don’t suffer from these things to say “it is all in the mind” but I beg to differ – it is all in the gut and it is extremely painful.

I understand what the One Show was trying to say – don’t fanny around with specialist diets unless you are well-informed as to how to replace the nutrients that you are cutting out, but their explanation was not very clear and it almost made a mockery of those who ‘claim’ to be sensitive to various foods.
If we had not pumped our foods full of chemicals in order to preserve them way beyond their organic shelf life and if we did not pump all foods with MSG (one of my most vile offenders!!) then I am pretty sure that half of these problems would not exist.

I was also not convinced by the recommendation to seek help from the doctors.  I was referred first to a food allergy clinic and three tests and £269 later, they decided that I was intolerant to most of the supermarket.  Next I was referred to a dietician, who proceeded to randomly select a draw, pull out a ‘diet’ and put me through low fibre, high fibre, dairy-free, gluten-free etc until I finally gave up.  All of the literature said what you can’t eat but not how what you can eat can be turned into realistic meals.  Perhaps a nutritionist is a better bet, but there is a lot of help out there on the internet for IBS sufferers.  The doctors told me to use the internet because that is where most of the research is.  The One Show, kindly called this practice some derrogatory fusion of web and hypochondria, can’t remember the exact word.

</rant>