Intolerance To Cayenne Pepper

[poopedout]

I have been on a gluten free diet for 4.5 months. I think I have gluten intolerance or celiac and am waiting to see the GI people. My diarrhea got better for one month but now it is back. Recently I have been keeping a record of what I eat and when the diarrhea is worse. It looks like whenever I have something with cayenne pepper in it, the diarrhea is much worse - like 7x after midnight last night after having halibut with cajun spice. For some reason it does not always happen after eating hot curry, maybe sometimes but not as bad as last night.

I like spicy food and was always able to eat it before with maybe a mild reaction afterward, but nothing like this.

Has anyone else experienced this?

[SLB5757]

  On 5/14/2010 at 1:49 PM, poopedout said:

I have been on a gluten free diet for 4.5 months. I think I have gluten intolerance or celiac and am waiting to see the GI people. My diarrhea got better for one month but now it is back. Recently I have been keeping a record of what I eat and when the diarrhea is worse. It looks like whenever I have something with cayenne pepper in it, the diarrhea is much worse - like 7x after midnight last night after having halibut with cajun spice. For some reason it does not always happen after eating hot curry, maybe sometimes but not as bad as last night.

I like spicy food and was always able to eat it before with maybe a mild reaction afterward, but nothing like this.

Has anyone else experienced this?

I envy that you were able to eat Cayenne Pepper (As I sit here eating my cream of rice with a little butter and salt). That surely would have landed me in the hospital with severe pains.

Was the halibut made at home or in a restaurant? Was it cooked properly? Did it have some sort of butter baste on it and you are lastose intolerant? Those are a few things I would wonder if it gave you such horrible diah.

[poopedout]

  On 5/14/2010 at 2:29 PM, SLB5757 said:

I envy that you were able to eat Cayenne Pepper (As I sit here eating my cream of rice with a little butter and salt). That surely would have landed me in the hospital with severe pains.

Was the halibut made at home or in a restaurant? Was it cooked properly? Did it have some sort of butter baste on it and you are lastose intolerant? Those are a few things I would wonder if it gave you such horrible diah.

The halibut was made at home and it was cooked properly. In my food diary I see that I reacted to it before, but I did not clue in.

I grow and dry my own thai dragon hot peppers and I use them in spaghetti sauce, pizza, etc. Lately I have had problems after eating spaghetti and pizza (gluten free of course). The common ingredient is hot peppers.

My question is why now? Is it due to the possible gluten intolerance or celiac?

[knittingmonkey]

  On 5/14/2010 at 1:49 PM, poopedout said:

I have been on a gluten free diet for 4.5 months. I think I have gluten intolerance or celiac and am waiting to see the GI people. My diarrhea got better for one month but now it is back. Recently I have been keeping a record of what I eat and when the diarrhea is worse. It looks like whenever I have something with cayenne pepper in it, the diarrhea is much worse - like 7x after midnight last night after having halibut with cajun spice. For some reason it does not always happen after eating hot curry, maybe sometimes but not as bad as last night.

I like spicy food and was always able to eat it before with maybe a mild reaction afterward, but nothing like this.

Has anyone else experienced this?

Cayenne's known to take digestion up a notch. While not a classic laxative, it tends to speed things up.

[ravenwoodglass]

You may have an intolerance to cayenne pepper or the spice blend may not have been gluten-free however that right now is not your biggest problem. Your biggest problem is that you have gone gluten free while you are waiting for testing. You need to get back on a full gluten diet today. You have to be eating a full gluten diet for testing. If you are gluten free or gluten light the tests will be a false negative. IF going back on gluten makes you incredibly ill IMHO you have your answer.

[poopedout]

  On 5/14/2010 at 3:11 PM, ravenwoodglass said:

You may have an intolerance to cayenne pepper or the spice blend may not have been gluten-free however that right now is not your biggest problem. Your biggest problem is that you have gone gluten free while you are waiting for testing. You need to get back on a full gluten diet today. You have to be eating a full gluten diet for testing. If you are gluten free or gluten light the tests will be a false negative. IF going back on gluten makes you incredibly ill IMHO you have your answer.

It's our own spice blend and it is gluten free.

I wrote about going gluten free on another post - "wrong test for celiac". I would never go back to eating gluten as my diarrhea was much worse then, if you can imagine that. I am not going to have an endoscopy with a biopsy as it would probably be negative after being gluten free for so long. I have been told that I could have the Ttg IgA along with the total IgA and if the TtG IgA is even slightly positive, that would mean probable gluten intolerance given the time I have been gluten free. If it is negative, it does not mean anything.

I am trying to find out now what else is bothering me and cayenne pepper seems to be one thing. I was wondering if anyone has an explanation for why now. Is it because of damage done to the small intestine from gluten?

[missy'smom]

Cayenne pepper is on my list of things that I've kept out of my diet due to a positive skin test for food allergies. Halibut is too. I haven't reintroduced the pepper yet so don't know what my symptom may be. When I saw the list of things that I reacted to it was clear to me that leaky gut syndrom is to blame for at least many of them. They are foods that I had started to eat mor often or in larger quantity since making some dietary changes. The allergist also said that some of them might not be true allergies because the serum is raw, making peopl more reactive than they might otherwise be. However, I seem to have problems with about half of the things I've tried reintroducing. Others I kept out long enough that my body seems to have quite reacting, when I clearly did before.

So, in addition to the advice about celiac disease testing, I think you might get some answers through allergy testing with an allergist who is up on food allergies and intolerances-mine happens to be up to date on celiac disease-lucky bonus. Look for one who believes in eliminating foods even if you don't have an anaphalactic reaction and one who will help you with an elimination diet.

If you have any simple ways to use cayenne pepper, I'd love to hear them! When I reintroduce, I have to eat it every day for a week. Not quite sure what to do with it.