“Don’t make me be gluten free. I know how you people always tell everyone that they have to be gluten free.”

This was my first clarification at the initial visit to the naturopath. It seems that any ailment can lead to this burdensome dietary restriction. If a planter’s wart was risky, my broken lips were a definite threat to cookie consumption.

I had come to a naturopath to sort out my angular cheilitis, the chronic cracking at the edges of my lips that had gone on for 6 years and was getting worse. The appearance of having constant oral herpes, when I didn’t, fell suspect in my lack of a love life. Allopathic MDs only offered topical steroids, and I needed a real solution.

The doctor pointed to her own healthy smiling mouth and replied, “Well, this is the end of your tube. So if something is inflamed here, it might also be down the line. Don’t worry though, we won’t do anything until we get some tests done.”

I pondered for a moment on this tube she was talking about, almost as if it were an epiphany that my mouth and anus were related. Sometimes the most obvious things are the most remarkable.

Two weeks later, the GI Health Panel results were in.

“You are definitely going to need to be gluten free,” she said. I slumped and groaned

“And dairy free. You have a parasite called cryptosporidium and your saliva shows extremely low immunoglobulins.“

A new vocabulary was upon me, as anyone who has had gut troubles knows. At least this pest had a fun name that sounded like a dark and mysterious, erm, spore. Nice nemesis for a superhero to step up to. “You’re going down, Cryptosporidium!”

Better yet, being protozoan, it had no eyes or legs, which spared me the deeper creepers. Little did I know yet of the havoc it had wreaked since it had become a stowaway on a trip to Central America.

For the next three months, I was put on a regiment of a strict diet with caprylic acid, homeopathies, and immune boosters like glutamine. It was an incredible challenge to give up so much of my standard food so quickly. I succeeded in ridding myself of the crypto, but this little freeloader colony had lived in my intestinal tract like an unemployed hippie in his enabling mom’s basement. Thus the journey to clean and heal began.

If I understood that I would be still riding this challenge four years later, I might have had an emotional breakdown. First, I would rid myself of the parasites, then the yeast came. I would eradicate them with the challenging candida cleanse and anti-fungal meds. Yet again, a new candida variant would emerge like the opportunistic bastards they are.

These reoccurrences led me to find that I had heavy metal poisoning, a relationship common in many chronic candida sufferers. I chelated, and the yeast finally seemed to go away, but my lips were still inflamed and eczema had cropped up along the way on my hands.

Most recently, I tested positive for SIBO, small intestine bacterial overgrowth, and found that the crypto and the yeast had left behind a resort town for bacteria in my small intestines. I have just completed my second round of antibiotics, and decided to protect myself further from yeast by cutting out fruits. I am presently on an incredibly strict diet that consists primarily of meat, green vegetables, and nuts.

Come to think of it, I have had some pretty powerful emotional breakdowns along the way. I also have learned to cook, to refuse sugar treats, and to honor that I have impressive patience. I also shamelessly share about my intestines at parties. Thus, the blog.

I hope that this place will become a haven for those of you who are diving into your guts to find freedom from ailments. Come by to remember that you’re not alone in your experiences. Even if you’re gassy today, you’re still welcome here.