What is an Autoimmune Disease?
What really is an autoimmune disease? While there are many mainstream answers, here is a less known one that could give you additional ways to treat your disease.
The conventional medical explanation and solution for autoimmune diseases is something like this:
The immune system attacks your body by mistake. The immune system is misidentifying its own body’s proteins and attacking them instead of attacking the foreign or microbial proteins causing damage to the body’s tissue. The answer to this would be to put a patient on some sort of suppressive drug that would need to be taken long term
This kind of thinking has its roots in a scientific theory known as the molecular mimicry phenomenon. This theory claims that the immune system does not know the difference between the foreign substances inside the body and the proteins, which have a similar structure (1) (2).
Here are some questions to think about:
- Are you fixing the root cause of this problem or just mitigating the symptoms by suppressing the immune system?
- How long will you need to take these powerful drugs and deal with the side effects?
Let’s explore the other, lesser-known, answer...
What Causes Autoimmune Disease - The Real Reason
Other doctors and scientists in the medical field see things differently. They don’t believe the immune system is confused nor mistaken, alternatively, they conclude it is doing its job as it is supposed to do.
The immune system is an integral part of the body and it recognizes which proteins are part of your body and which are not.
Many pathogenic microbes can produce toxins that attach to proteins in the body and change the molecular structure, thus they become contaminated and damaged.
When the immune system is surveilling the body, it will be able to recognize the part of the body that is not normal due to contamination and damage.
Therefore, it has to deal with this problem by attacking it, otherwise, the damaged area will get worse and spread throughout the body. The immune system will attack through two mechanisms:
1- Creating inflammation to clean the contaminated area- the immune system will rely on this first step for a while.
2- If toxins keep coming and attach themselves to the body’s tissues, creating contamination and damage then the immune system will use another mechanism. It creates antibodies to fight against these damaged tissues in the body. This antibody immune response is usually when the doctor announces that you have an autoimmune disorder (3).
Here is another question for you to think about…
Autoimmune Treatment - That Works
Does the immune system need to be blamed? Or do we need to reduce toxins and prevent them from attaching to our tissues?
Minimizing toxins from both, the inside of the body and from the outside in the environment. I fixed my leaky gut and normalized the gut flora and my health problems went away.
It took more than a year for the body to heal itself so it wasn’t a quick fix like taking a pill. And each individual will have different results regarding healing time, where some of you might take only a few months and some will take them more than a year.
So autoimmune disease treatment is done with food and not pharmaceutical drugs. So what is the...
Best Diet for Autoimmune Disease?
I have not tried all diets nor do I need or want to. But I found out and thousands of other GAPS patients who followed this nutritional protocol that the GAPS Diet for an autoimmune disease is very effective. And very possible it can help you too!
The original diet was designed for autistic children and individuals with mental health problems by Dr. Natasha publishing her first book Gut and Psychology Syndrome. However, the same GAPS diet protocol is as effective for fixing the physical part of the body (such as immunity disorders) and not only the psychological part.
Dr. Natasha found out from years of working with hundreds of patients were not only healing mentally but also physically. For more information, please check out What is the GAPS Diet.
Are Autoimmune Diseases Hereditary or Genetic?
I am not a doctor nor specialize in genetics but what I understood from researching on this topic is that there are few hereditary or genetic diseases such as Down syndrome, cerebral palsy, and Rett syndrome.
But most autoimmune diseases are within our control and can be reversed or at least improved depending on the duration of the autoimmunity and the damage that has occurred.
Other questions I get are more specific if the following is an autoimmune disease or not?
Is Diabetes an Autoimmune Disorder?
Is Crohn’s an Autoimmune Disease?
Is Hashimoto’s an Autoimmune Disorder?
Is Celiac an Autoimmune Disease?
And the list goes on and on. According to Dr. Campbell McBride, these disorders stem from autoimmunity disorders, and they can be fully healed or to a large degree improved, in both circumstances, it's a win-win situation.
I suggest you read the two GAPS books to have a better understanding of your autoimmunity health situation. That way, you can take control of your health destiny.
I believe the $50 investment in getting these two books will be worth it to have a full understanding and appreciation of how the gut flora in your body is in charge. And these microbes are either your best friend or worst foe.
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