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Undifferentiated Connective Tissue Disease
Autoimmune Diseases | Last Active: Nov 16 5:37pm | Replies (52)Comment receiving replies
Interesting and helpful to read this thread. I've been in process of tests and identifying autoimmune diseases, I have had positive ANA for about 7 years, in the last 3 years have had elevated CCP, positive Early Sjogren's Profile test, HLA b27 and a few others. Because my symptoms fit RA, Sjogren's and Lupus but not all the standard tests have come back elevated for them, I have been given the Undifferentiated Connective Tissue diagnosis. My rheumatologist (who I trust), said that UCT is used due to the similarities of these diseases and there's even discussions about them being the same disease with different manifestations (similar to Alzheimer's, Parkinson's dementia and Lewey's Body Disease). He's said it may progress to a more distinct disease process, like RA, etc., or it may not. I'm taking Hydroxychloroquine because it covers these various autoimmune diseases. I'd love to make a shift to a more antiinflammatory diet, everyone says it helps!
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@fairn if you are ready and willing- I’m all for the dietary changes!! I am a convert after at least 15 years of resistance.
I would start with racking your brain for things that you can identify that- for you- you are pretty sure you know cause inflammation/ gut reaction (literally ALL puns intended).
For me: almonds. I would try out almond milk at my sisters’ or mom’s or friend’s house every few years over the past 20 years “just to see” if I continued to have that same reaction… and yes, I DID continue to always have diarrhea within about 30 minutes of ingesting it. It was not just “a bad batch” coincidentally those dozen times I did that experiment. (I have to beaten over the head with info like this). I used to tell myself I could eat regular almonds, but no… it’s just that blending them up into milk made the proteins so available that my gut reacted immediately instead of slowly.
I did go into my very helpful allergist to check for almond (and dairy) allergies after I had some mouth burning after eating almond paste and almond flour (I was just having general mouth burning inflammation). I do not have almond or dairy allergies- and Dr. W reminded me of something that as an NP I should have known and I talk to people about all the time: when we say “allergies” we mean an IgE reaction to something. So, I don’t have an IgE reaction to almonds or dairy- I’m not going to get anaphylaxis- my throat won’t close off and they won’t kill me. But- there are plenty of other immune cells that react!! IgE is just one type. So, the diarrhea I always get is an immune reaction, just not an IgE immune reaction.
Actual dialogue went something like:
Dr. W: you don’t have an allergy to almonds.
Me: cool, so I’m not gonna get anaphylaxis and die, I can still eat almonds!
Dr. W: you literally just told me you get diarrhea every time you drink almond milk…
Me: yeah, but I’m not gonna DIE…
Again, my threshold used to be too low. Dr. W reminding me that the diarrhea was an immune reaction was what I needed to remember… oh right!! I am increasing my immune response and adding inflammation when I eat those almonds. Duh.
So start with your low-hanging fruit if you already have foods that upset your digestion (again, all the puns intended). Almonds and dairy were very obvious for me.