Eating Copious Amounts Of Sugar And Your Skin

[sdsdsm1971]

I have been gluten free since May 2006. My skin cleared up almost immediately after years of suffering from eczema all over my arms, legs and hands. I also gave up eating candy in May (I ate A LOT of candy before. Yucky, I know.)

Anyway, for the past three days I have had a little candy binge. Well, I'll be damned, but my skin is all itchy and I can feel a rash coming on. What do you guys think? Has anyone had a reaction like this to sugar? I totally thought it was the gluten (I def. have celiac), but seeing this skin reaction makes me wonder if sugar is more of a trigger for my skin problem.

[Aerin328]

I've actually had minor ecsema on my hands my whole life and was always aware that certain food caused it (namely for me, vanilla, maple, honey, chocolate, peanut butter, etc. maybe sugar too?). When I recently was struck down with the celiac saga starting in April, my hands got really bad! Since going gluten-free 6 weeks ago, my skin is improving again... but it still reacts to certain foods.

I don't know how exactly but I definitely think they're related. If I had to wager a guess I'd say as celiac can commonly cause perforations in the intestines (aka "leaky gut") , sugars and certain hard to digest molecules (such as chocolate, for instance, which is a complex molecule) seep out into the blood. As the skin is the body's second primary way to excrete toxins, I think the ecsema is somehow a symptom of the body trying to get rid of that undigested food. I'm quite sure that processed sugar is really bad for my own "leaky gut" and I'd definitely recommend to stay clear of it!

[lonewolf]

I don't have DH, but I have psoriasis and excema. (Eating gluten-free doesn't clear it up.) I have noticed that when I eat a lot of sugar my skin flares up all over - arms, legs, stomach, scalp, inside of ears, etc. I always thought that it might be related to yeast somehow - that they were getting a feast on the sugar and were multiplying and causing troubles. Avoiding sugar and starches helps to keep my skin under control a bit.

[gfp]

Having free sugars in your blood causes cell degradation of the bonding collagen.

This is one of the least frightening aspects of eating lots of sugar.

[Flotenspieler]

  sdsdsm1971 said:

I have been gluten free since May 2006. My skin cleared up almost immediately after years of suffering from eczema all over my arms, legs and hands. I also gave up eating candy in May (I ate A LOT of candy before. Yucky, I know.)

Anyway, for the past three days I have had a little candy binge. Well, I'll be damned, but my skin is all itchy and I can feel a rash coming on. What do you guys think? Has anyone had a reaction like this to sugar? I totally thought it was the gluten (I def. have celiac), but seeing this skin reaction makes me wonder if sugar is more of a trigger for my skin problem.

I was just recently diagnosed with gluten intolerance - unfortunately I was already gluten-free for months so I won't know for sure if I'm celiac or not because the blood test was inconclusive, but my doctor has confirmed the intolerance so I need to be gluten-free regardless. I could go back on wheat for a few months and take the blood test again but my doctor said "why make yourself sick when you know you already have a problem with gluten?" and I agree. I don't EVER want to suffer like I did the year before I finally went gluten-free. However, when they did the blood panel on me last month, they did find another food I am reacting to negatively - cane sugar. Not honey, beet sugar, maple or any other kind of sugar extract, just cane sugar. I hadn't been eating a whole lot of cane sugar but I was taking an awful lot of Splenda - have been for years. The doctor said that because Splenda is made from cane sugar it has the same proteins even if it doesn't have calories, so I'm reacting to it exactly the same way as if it were regular cane sugar. I've had horrible exzema on my hands for about four years now. When the celiac symptoms erupted almost two years ago, going gluten-free helped those symptoms enormously but the exzema, while improved, still hung around. I've been Splenda/cane sugar free for about two weeks now (and of course remaining gluten-free), and I see improvement in my hands daily. The hot spot on my left hand that has hung around all summer is finally fading, and my right hand is almost completely healed after being just horrible since mid-June.

You might want to experiment with eliminating different sugar types and see how your skin reacts to it. I haven't had beet sugar since the diagnosis, but at some point down the road I'll give it a try. It does limit the kinds of candy I can eat because unless it's specific, I have to assume they're all sweetened with cane sugar (just as well, lol). What's weird is I can't have Splenda, but I can have saccharin and equal (yuck). So I've pretty much abandoned these kinds of sweeteners altogether and am using alternative natural sweetners like stevia, agave nectar, xylitol, and maple sugar. So far so good. Now if I could only get back to being able to eat dairy again. ; )

[tsomo]

Do you have DH? If so, as far as I know it is caused soley by gluten. Therefore, you must have had gluten. Unless its not DH but another rash and then i dont know what affects it.

I also seem to get DH when I eat candy and I think there are remote glutens in candy. The reason why is because if you look at the list of ingredients in a lot of candies it is very long. All these ingredients come from different suppliers who may or may not be in strict compliance. The chances of getting remote gluten in a mainstream candy, especially ones with food colours, is probably pretty good.

Thats my analysis. Im hoping I am wrong.

Tsomo

[Katie618]

i have eczema and dh... eczema loves sugar for some reason... too much and i get itchy too... if you have dh too some candy's ingredients can cause a rash.

[jerseyangel]

I had eczema on my eyelids for about 15 years. It's completely gone now, I believe that it was a combination of the gluten-free diet, cutting out the other foods I'm intolerant to, eating overall more healthy (less sugar, no corn syrup) and switching laundry detergent and skin care products (no SLS or other harsh ingredients)

In the time I had it, I tried Rx creams and OTC remedies--nothing ever worked for long.

[jnclelland]

  jerseyangel said:

I had eczema on my eyelids for about 15 years. It's completely gone now, I believe that it was a combination of the gluten-free diet, cutting out the other foods I'm intolerant to, eating overall more healthy (less sugar, no corn syrup) and switching laundry detergent and skin care products (no SLS or other harsh ingredients)

In the time I had it, I tried Rx creams and OTC remedies--nothing ever worked for long.

Yeah - what she said! (Seriously, I had exactly the same experience.)

Jeanne

[jerseyangel]

  jnclelland said:

Yeah - what she said! (Seriously, I had exactly the same experience.)

Jeanne

Wow! I'm glad that you finally got relief, too! Sometimes, I thought the itching was going to drive me crazy. It's like my eyes have "calmed down" now, and are completely normal looking.

[jnclelland]

  jerseyangel said:

Wow! I'm glad that you finally got relief, too! Sometimes, I thought the itching was going to drive me crazy. It's like my eyes have "calmed down" now, and are completely normal looking.

I know! I still have some discoloration on my eyelids from when I was young and foolish and didn't know that you weren't supposed to put hydrocortisone cream on them (OOPS!), but I still boggle in amazement when I look in the mirror and see clear skin, and when I realize that I'm NOT rubbing my eyes all day long. I think when I save up some $$, I'm going to look into laser treatments for the discoloration, now that I know it's red for real and not just irritated like it's been all my life!

Jeanne

[dkjones2]

  Flotenspieler said:

I was just recently diagnosed with gluten intolerance - unfortunately I was already gluten-free for months so I won't know for sure if I'm celiac or not because the blood test was inconclusive, but my doctor has confirmed the intolerance so I need to be gluten-free regardless. I could go back on wheat for a few months and take the blood test again but my doctor said "why make yourself sick when you know you already have a problem with gluten?" and I agree. I don't EVER want to suffer like I did the year before I finally went gluten-free. However, when they did the blood panel on me last month, they did find another food I am reacting to negatively - cane sugar. Not honey, beet sugar, maple or any other kind of sugar extract, just cane sugar. I hadn't been eating a whole lot of cane sugar but I was taking an awful lot of Splenda - have been for years. The doctor said that because Splenda is made from cane sugar it has the same proteins even if it doesn't have calories, so I'm reacting to it exactly the same way as if it were regular cane sugar. I've had horrible exzema on my hands for about four years now. When the celiac symptoms erupted almost two years ago, going gluten-free helped those symptoms enormously but the exzema, while improved, still hung around. I've been Splenda/cane sugar free for about two weeks now (and of course remaining gluten-free), and I see improvement in my hands daily. The hot spot on my left hand that has hung around all summer is finally fading, and my right hand is almost completely healed after being just horrible since mid-June.

You might want to experiment with eliminating different sugar types and see how your skin reacts to it. I haven't had beet sugar since the diagnosis, but at some point down the road I'll give it a try. It does limit the kinds of candy I can eat because unless it's specific, I have to assume they're all sweetened with cane sugar (just as well, lol). What's weird is I can't have Splenda, but I can have saccharin and equal (yuck). So I've pretty much abandoned these kinds of sweeteners altogether and am using alternative natural sweetners like stevia, agave nectar, xylitol, and maple sugar. So far so good. Now if I could only get back to being able to eat dairy again. ; )

I have been living with Celiac for 6 years now and still am learning all kinds of new information, SPleanda is made with maltodextrin which is an irritant to people who suffer from Celiac, I am sure that the cane sugars are effecting you also but thats why Splenda react to you.