Ever since I was 8 or 9 years old I have had trouble swallowing. I would be happily eating something delicious when suddenly it would feel like a bite was stuck in the middle of my throat. I could still breath, but nothing would make the food continue its journey down. I would try to drink water, but liquids wouldn't go down either - it was as if the water had hit the food and bounced back up! My mouth would start to fill with saliva and I would panic. I learned pretty quickly that my best bet was to try to regurgitate the stuck food. Because I loved food, even back then, I never developed any food aversions from these incidents. Instead, I became an obsessive chewer, essentially liquefying my food, thus lowering the chance it could become stuck. I quickly became known as the world's slowest eater, but no one suspected it was much more than a personality quirk.
Even though my food impaction incidents continued into adulthood, sometimes happening as frequently as weekly, I never sought medical care for them. Honestly, I felt a little crazy. I couldn't swallow pills, I was an embarrassingly slow eater, and I occasionally had to sneak to the bathroom in fancy restaurants or at dinner parties to throw up my food. Finally, at age 30, I had had enough. I brought the situation up to my primary care doctor and she immediately referred me to a gastroenterologist. The GI doc suspected eosinophilic esophagitis (EoE) right away, and performed an endoscopy to confirm the diagnosis. Not only did I have eosinophils flooding my esophagus (>30/HPF), but a section of my esophagus was so badly scarred that it was only 8mm wide - 40% of the normal width!
My first thought when I received the results: At least I'm not crazy!
My second thought was "now what?" After a number of follow up appointments with GI and allergy specialists, I've arrived at the answer: the 6 food elimination diet. I'm scheduled to start the diet on June 8th, 2017. Join me as I explore a world without wheat, dairy, eggs, soy, nuts and fish, and hopefully discover a delicious world made up of everything that's left!
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