What to Do if the Diet Succeeds 133Trouble comes, however, when foods fall in certain combinations.
Some have a tendency to interact with each other and cause definite
symptoms when in the right (wrong) combination.
As with drugs when administered together, it is possible that
the combined effect of two is more than twice the effect of each singly,
perhaps many times more. This is called potentiation. You may have heard
that a combination of alcohol and barbiturates can be fatal even in modest
doses. This is a poor example because it comes from the world of garish
murder stories and television ‘thrillers,’ but it happens to be quite valid. It is
an instance of potentiation, and food intolerances may behave in the same
way.
I sometimes use the example of an hypothetical individual allergic
to cats, dust, chocolate and milk. All may be well until one day he drinks a
chocolate milk shake and then strokes a cat in a dusty attic: at that moment
all four allergies come into play, and he sneezes. The victim carelessly
observes: “I must be allergic to cats.”
But without the milk there may have been no sneezing. If he tested
himself with the chocolate, milk or dust, nothing would appear untoward.
In general he has no symptoms, but next time he strokes the cat nothing
happens and this might be puzzling. Another day he has a glass of milk and
a bar of chocolate quite close together and develops a runny nose. But there
is no cat in sight, and now he doesn’t know what is wrong; he hasn’t heard
of food allergies anyway, and thinks he’s getting a cold! It is only when all
the allergens occur together that sneezing occurs.
So it can be with food. You may observe no particular reaction on
performing individual challenge tests, yet slowly you deteriorate and revert
to your original condition. This is because moderate food intolerances are
potentiating one another.
If you suspect this situation, then go back to the elimination diet
until you feel well. Then proceed as for delayed reaction testing, allowing
several days between each new food. As soon as you begin to feel less
than optimum, suspect the last combination. Say you introduced bread the
first week, egg last week and milk this week and that you are now noticing
something is wrong. Suspect the egg/milk combination. Instead of stopping
the milk, stop the egg. If it clears up, it means that egg and milk together
don’t agree. Obviously, milk is tolerated – you got well again while still
drinking it. Egg alone was also OK because you ate it for a whole week with
no ill effect. (In this example, if you didn’t recover by stopping egg I’m sure
you can deduce that either milk must have been the culprit or the culprit is
not a food at all.)