Cognitive Challenges & Career

[YoloGx]

Bea,

What a long, hard road you've traveled--so many celiacs have met with similar difficulties. I wish I could just spend the rest of my life training doctors, nurses, psychiatrists, and patients about celiac and gluten sensitivities. Advocates for this disease are so essential, but we don't fit into the medical community the way it is presently established. I plan to pull out this article as many times as necessary to educate people about the dangers of gluten.

So, the doctors recognized that you had celiac when you were little? You're so lucky! Unfortunately, they still didn't realize back then that the diet had to be a lifelong one. My mom suffered from her first celiac attack when she was five months' pregnant with me after she had to undergo an emergency appendectomy. As a result, I was born with Rickets and spent a childhood and young adulthood with horrible bone, joint, muscle, and tendon pain. I also suffered from horrible migraine headaches that came on every few days and lasted 2-3 days. I had three miscarriages and infertility issues....and still the doctors were clueless. Even after a lifetime of iron anemia, broken teeth, and night blindness, not a single doctor put all the clues together. All I have to say is "thank goodness for the Internet"; otherwise, the doctors would probably still be scratching their behinds.

As for your myelin sheath problem, I responded on another thread that you started that you should seriously consider taking 1000 mg of L-Lysine daily. I had fairly severe myelin sheath impairment, too, but my research indicated that I need to take L-Lysine and maintain a low L-Argynine level (which means that you should definitely NOT be eating many eggs!).

By the way, Bea, where do you live? I notice that you use British spellings...do you live in Britain or perhaps Australia? I live in California, but my daughter lives in Australia (which is a wonderful place to live a gluten-free life!). Everyone on this forum seems to live so far away from each other....

Take care!

Hi Rosetapper,

Thanks for the long post! We both have been through it, eh?

By the way, is it the "eh?" that made you think I am British? I am not though I have a dear friend and co-worker who is and may have picked up a few of his sayings.

I had forgotten about the L-Lysine vs Argenine. What is the Lysine supposed to do? I need to look these up. From what I I recall, Lysine is good against herpes, and Argenine needs to be avoided for that... But it seems you are positing that Lysine is also good for building up the myelin sheath on one's nerves.

The eggs are low salicylic acid by the way... though as you say they are high on the Argenine list. I figure if i have them once a week that is a vast improvement...

I found a list of salicylic acid foods finally. Seems the whole thing is a bit confused. Once again trial and error are in order. Some react to one thing and another to something else. Nevertheless they suggest choosing the no salicylic acid to low and not above.

I have not tolerated bananas or pears in recent years, whether ripe, cooked or not. Both of which are very low in salicylic acid. But maybe that is another story... Nevertheless, if I avoid the water filtered by charred coconuts and avoid other high salicylic acid items, maybe, just maybe I will be able to eat bananas and pears in the future.

I just sent you an email--drop me a line if you'd like! I am impressed with your comments and story. We might have a lot to talk about.

[gifree]

Hi Rosetapper,

Thanks for the long post! We both have been through it, eh?

By the way, is it the "eh?" that made you think I am British? I am not though I have a dear friend and co-worker who is and may have picked up a few of his sayings.

I had forgotten about the L-Lysine vs Argenine. What is the Lysine supposed to do? I need to look these up. From what I I recall, Lysine is good against herpes, and Argenine needs to be avoided for that... But it seems you are positing that Lysine is also good for building up the myelin sheath on one's nerves.

The eggs are low salicylic acid by the way... though as you say they are high on the Argenine list. I figure if i have them once a week that is a vast improvement...

I found a list of salicylic acid foods finally. Seems the whole thing is a bit confused. Once again trial and error are in order. Some react to one thing and another to something else. Nevertheless they suggest choosing the no salicylic acid to low and not above.

I have not tolerated bananas or pears in recent years, whether ripe, cooked or not. Both of which are very low in salicylic acid. But maybe that is another story... Nevertheless, if I avoid the water filtered by charred coconuts and avoid other high salicylic acid items, maybe, just maybe I will be able to eat bananas and pears in the future.

I just sent you an email--drop me a line if you'd like! I am impressed with your comments and story. We might have a lot to talk about.

Warms my heart to see everyone's comments. Have people gone beyond diet and had any testing conducted -- i.e. SPECT scans or neurofeedback, etc.? In my initial quest, I read a number of books by Daniel Amen @ ADHD and he uses somewhat controversial SPECT brain scans to diagnosis specific ADHD subtypes and then recommends a regiment of medication, supplements, therapy, exercise, etc. It's a bit expensive though, so I haven't barked-up that tree. I have gone for neurofeedback however and not surprisingly, found that I had very underactive Beta & Alpha waves (waking state) and overactive Theta & Delta waves (near/sleeping state); not sure how any of that is related to Celiac?

What I do know, is that fatigue sucks! After each work day, I was often fried and for a while there, had only two alternatives: (1) go to the gym and blow-off nervous energy for a bunch of hours or (2) come home and nap most days. Regularly staying late at the gym was no longer an option, so I typically would come home from work, but didn't feel very conversant or alive. I'm very curious and love to learn, so I would often plop myself on the couch to watch something educational, but often didn't/don't have the energy nor alertness to fully attend to what's on the tube. Does anyone find that they need an overwhelming amount of down time? Regardless, of the sort of work I do, I just feel spent. I don't think my brain takes too kindly to work of any sort.

I have a child on the way, and desperately want to be the best possible me, so that i can be the best possible father!! I'll do anything to figure out what the heck is wrong, whether it's simply acknowledging that the healing process may take some time for someone whose likely had active Celiac for decades and/or whether thyroid issues, shot adrenal glands, etc might also be contributing factors. Let's keep this thread going -- love all of the responses and 'me toos'.

BTW: In rereading my own thread, I thought hmm, this doesn't sound like someone suffering from legitimate memory issues. Give it a year or less...I'll likely have no recollection of this thread . This is all stuff that I've very recently beat into my uncooperative brain. It's like an unruly child that I need to behaviorally modify. In all seriousness, I've thought about my memory apparatus in visual terms and beyond the few retained broad brush strokes, I see a brain that only operates on the first floor and has a limited amount of space. Once that space is filled, the first (old) memories must be removed in order to make room for the most recent (new) memories...and this loop continues over and over, with only very few memories making it long-term.

[rosetapper23]

Yes, I agree--the fatigue and malaise can feel life-sucking. I've always needed more hours of sleep than other people, and there have been times in my life when I simply fell asleep every night on the couch immediately after arriving home from work. Those days are behind me, thankfully. It sounds as though you may be deficient in any number of nutrients and/or hormones. I suppose that your doctor tested your ferritin levels since you have celiac (??). If not, you should really have that done--being low in iron can cause both physical and mental problems.

BTW, one of the supplements I forgot to mention that I take for memory and cognitive health is Gotu Kola (people also take it for its anti-aging and anti-cancer properties).

You may think this is far fetched, but for me personally, what worked best to make me feel more energetic and clear headed was taking a ratio of parent Omega 6s and 3s, which supposedly causes the body's cells to become fully oxygenated. This is a new concept to most people, but I attended a lecture on it by Brian Pectin after I'd completed chemo for breast cancer. I read his book and was convinced that he was on the right track. I've been taking the blend of oils for 3-1/2 years now, and I'm still amazed at how much energy I have and how much better my cognitive abilities are--it really helped me overcome chemo-brain, too. If you're interested in learning about this concept, you can take a look at www.brianpeskin.com. He provides a lot of articles online that you can read if you don't want to buy any of his books. I do other things, too, to increase my body's oxygenation level, such as using essential oils in all of my personal care products and taking Cordyceps, since studies have shown that this mushroom (in capsule form) increases oxygenation. Since a fully oxygenated body is essential for staving off cancer, I've done a lot of research into how to increase my oxygen rate. I just thought I would mention this because of how helpful it's been to my health, but I realize that not everyone might be convinced that this is the way to go. However, I think most people could agree that a fully oxygenated brain operates a lot better than one that is oxygen deprived.

Thank you for posting this thread--it really has started an interesting conversation.

[gifree]

Yes, I agree--the fatigue and malaise can feel life-sucking. I've always needed more hours of sleep than other people, and there have been times in my life when I simply fell asleep every night on the couch immediately after arriving home from work. Those days are behind me, thankfully. It sounds as though you may be deficient in any number of nutrients and/or hormones. I suppose that your doctor tested your ferritin levels since you have celiac (??). If not, you should really have that done--being low in iron can cause both physical and mental problems.

BTW, one of the supplements I forgot to mention that I take for memory and cognitive health is Gotu Kola (people also take it for its anti-aging and anti-cancer properties).

You may think this is far fetched, but for me personally, what worked best to make me feel more energetic and clear headed was taking a ratio of parent Omega 6s and 3s, which supposedly causes the body's cells to become fully oxygenated. This is a new concept to most people, but I attended a lecture on it by Brian Pectin after I'd completed chemo for breast cancer. I read his book and was convinced that he was on the right track. I've been taking the blend of oils for 3-1/2 years now, and I'm still amazed at how much energy I have and how much better my cognitive abilities are--it really helped me overcome chemo-brain, too. If you're interested in learning about this concept, you can take a look at www.brianpeskin.com. He provides a lot of articles online that you can read if you don't want to buy any of his books. I do other things, too, to increase my body's oxygenation level, such as using essential oils in all of my personal care products and taking Cordyceps, since studies have shown that this mushroom (in capsule form) increases oxygenation. Since a fully oxygenated body is essential for staving off cancer, I've done a lot of research into how to increase my oxygen rate. I just thought I would mention this because of how helpful it's been to my health, but I realize that not everyone might be convinced that this is the way to go. However, I think most people could agree that a fully oxygenated brain operates a lot better than one that is oxygen deprived.

Thank you for posting this thread--it really has started an interesting conversation.

Interesting. I'll definitely look into that...along the list of potential cognitive impacts. As for next steps, I'm off to a psycho-pharmacologist on Monday...will let you know what she says. I'd really like some more conclusive testing conducted, to, at the very least, either corroborate the cognitive issues that I'm perceiving or dismiss, with evidence.

[GFinDC]

Hi Gifree,

I have had plenty of problems with short term memory myself. Long term memory also. I used to have a heck of time remembering peoples names, although I could recognize their faces. And short term memory doing tasks on the computer was abysmal. Like switching from one application to another to look for some information I would forget why I had switched to the other application within seconds. It is very frustrating stuff. I found that my memory has improved since going gluten-free though, and also soy free and dairy free. Another thing that affected me a lot was not being able to sleep. And that seemed to be related to the soy and several other things, like food colorings and dairy. I went on an elimination diet, several times over the last 3 years to figure out what things were affecting me. Every time I would identify one more things that I needed to avoid. Now that I am free of the bad foods that bothered me, I can sleep, I can remember things better, and I am much more relaxed. I used to have thot loops where I couldn't stop thinking the same things over and over. And a racing mind went I went to bed that prevented me from sleeping. Later I found that dairy would keep me awake for days on end, although after I was off soy a while I could at least tolerate dairy to some extent. Not enough to eat it again though. I also used to have a tick above my left eye that stopped after going gluten-free. For a while last summer I would pass out while sitting at the computer for no apparent reason. The doctors couldn't find anything with their tests including an EEG on the head thing. But I did an elimination diet and stopped the soy and that fixed the fainting problem. It took a few months to get completely better but it happened. Now as long as I stay clear of my food intolerances I feel pretty good and can think ok too. But if I get into any of them the problems start re-appearing. My latest mistake was buying some Food for Life gluten-free bread with carrot fiber. Carrots and I don't get along and yesterday i was pretty out of it. So it's back to the brown rice tortillas for me. Things can get better so keep working it and keep trying to find the food culprits that cause you problems.