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There are no medical tests to detect this kind of intolerance. The only method of detection is exclusion dieting, leaving out foods and reintroducing them systematically, while monitoring symptoms. Almost any food can cause intolerance but the most common culprits are also those which often cause allergy. Why this should be so is not understood.

Some people seem to be intolerant to specific groups of foods. Some people do not tolerate proteins (for instance, meat and poultry) but have no problem with other types of food. Other people find, by contrast, that they do not tolerate fruit and vegetables well, but tolerate proteins or grains better.

Most people with food intolerance are sensitive to only one, or a tiny number of foods, and find that their problems can be resolved by avoiding those foods. Sometimes it can be something as simple as leaving out tea, coffee, chocolate, monosodium glutamate, alcohol or sugar. People with multiple food sensitivities often find that totally excluding their main troublemakers helps their overall tolerance level and they react less severely to foods that sometimes upset them. The ‘load factor’ that applies to chemical sensitivity appears to operate with food intolerance as well.

The only treatment for this type of food intolerance is managing your diet with the aim of reducing or totally avoiding the foods upset you. Advice on managing diets is given below. Some people are also helped by high doses of vitamins and minerals, especially if they are also chemically sensitive. Again, why this should be so is not known. Some people respond to neutralisation – a form of desensitisation.

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Reducing your load of common allergens, taking certain precautions with general diet, and limiting your exposure to chemicals can help generally in managing multiple sensitivity, and in preventing further allergies developing if you or your family have the tendency.

House dust mites and moulds both thrive in damp, poorly aired environments. Keep your surroundings as dry, warm, and aired as you are able to help keep them at bay. Ventilate properly and, in particular, keep beds and bedding (which harbour mites and moulds) aired and dry. Dry laundry (and anything else damp) outside the home and avoid creating damp and steam where possible. Gas and paraffin fires, heaters and cookers create damp when burning and it is best either to avoid their use altogether, or to take extra care in ventilating and removing condensation if you do use them.

To remove allergens, and to avoid dispersing them when cleaning, use filters on a vacuum cleaner or a special vacuum cleaner. This helps enormously to protect against all kinds of allergen which are usually blown back into a room by the exhaust. Over time, vacuuming with filters helps to remove allergens already lodged in furniture, flooring and furnishings. Also ‘damp dust’ – do the dusting with a cloth that is slightly damp, so that dust and allergens do not disperse into the air.

Avoid keeping pets and animals if you can. If you do have pets, make sure that they sleep outside the home, if possible. Above all, do not let them sleep on beds or in bedrooms (even during the day).

If you are allergic to pollen or mould spores, take care about going out at seasons when they are present at a high level in the air. Keep windows and doors closed as much as you can during peak periods.

To help prevent food sensitivity, vary your diet and limit the frequency at which you eat the most allergenic repeatedly each day; keep the whole diet full of choice and variety. Eat fresh and wholesome food and keep your use of processed food to a minimum. Sort out your diet properly if you need to, and avoid any foods that clearly upset you – even if you love and crave them. Variety plus avoidance of troublemakers will do more than anything to reduce your tendency to react generally.

Keep your use of any chemicals to the absolute minimum. Think before you use anything on yourself, your home, or at work or school. Do you really need it or is there a less aggressive alternative? Stop smoking and avoid smoky atmospheres. Take care with perfumed products of any kind. Air and wash anything new, and avoid situations or places where chemical fumes are high.

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Sodium bicarbonate, available from any chemist, is an effective deodoriser. It absorbs smells in rooms, or in enclosed spaces such as cupboards or refrigerators.

To kill smells in a refrigerator, place some sodium bicarbonate in a small glass jar. Pierce the lid and place the jar in the refrigerator. Replace the powder after a couple of months. Fridge Fresh is also a very effective refrigerator deodoriser. It contains activated carbon in an egg-sized, hard plastic container and absorbs smells more effectively than sodium bicarbonate. One container lasts for four months. These are sold in major supermarkets. Fridge Fresh can also be used as a deodoriser in cars.

Another way to reduce smells in a refrigerator or freezer is to wash down the surfaces with a solution of sodium bicarbonate or domestic Borax (one dessertspoonful to a bowl of warm water). Domestic Borax is stocked by or can be ordered from Boots the Chemist.

To remove smells from a carpet, sprinkle sodium bicarbonate generously over it. Leave for a couple of hours, then vacuum or brush vigorously to remove.

To remove smells from a cupboard or room, you can use Fridge Fresh (see above) or place sodium bicarbonate in an open bowl and leave it for a few days, or permanently. Replace every few months.

Persistent smells from a toilet are caused by bacteria and moulds in the bowl and under the rim. Either clean with an oxygen bleach (see Bleaches, above) or with a solution of Borax, as above.

To kill smells from a drain, place a tablespoon of washing soda (available from supermarkets) on top of the drain and pour very hot or boiling water down the drain.

To kill dustbin or wastebin smells, sprinkle neat sodium bicarbonate and Borax in the bin. Wash the bins regularly and leave to dry in the open air.

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If the baby shows no sign of reaction after the food tested on the first day, wait four days before retesting that specific food. On the fifth day, repeat the test process. A baby may not react to a food the first time around, but may have been sensitised by that first eating. So test the food systematically second time around as well. If the food then seems fine, include it on your list for the baby’s permanent diet.

The reason why you wait four days to retest is that it gives your baby’s system time to clear a food. Any symptoms which might be masked by eating every day then become clear when the baby eats the food again. In addition, eating a food at a fixed interval in this way (called ‘rotation’) can help control mild allergy and intolerance by moderating the baby’s system’s exposure and controlling any overload. It helps to prevent sensitivity developing.

Test the next foods

On the second day of introducing foods, try a different food from the first day, follow the same test and monitoring process, and wait for a four-day period before testing that food again. Follow the procedure of testing and waiting four days with four foods, one per day, consecutively.

By Day Nine, unless your baby has reacted to any of the first four foods, you should have identified four tolerated foods which can form the core of the baby’s diet. If this is the case, see page 261 for advice on how to build up and expand your baby’s diet.

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Some of the most adaptable allergenic moulds are also found in indoor environments. Their presence is not a sign of insanitary conditions, inadequate cleanliness, or poor housekeeping. They simply thrive invisibly in particular conditions. Indoors they cling to damp surfaces in bathrooms or showers where they can feed on tiny traces of soap or human skin. Kitchen or other damp walls also provide a feeding ground from paint, glues or wallpaper. Moulds can feed on dusty objects like art treasures or old tapestries. They thrive in damp cupboards; they cling to damp clothes and shoes; to drying laundry and used tea-towels. They waft up from waste pipes, lurk under the rim of lavatory bowls and sit in pools and drops of condensation. They feed on old dusty books and paper, especially if damp. They sit in the soil of pot plants. They grow in the encouraging dark damp of pillows, duvets, upholstered furniture and cushions. They are keen on damp, poorly ventilated areas. They prefer warmth but will tolerate colder parts, even freezers and refrigerators.

The little patches of sooty grey-black deposits that are often found on window frames or in pools of condensation are perennial moulds. The pinky-grey slime that you see around sinks, taps, on tiles, lavatories and bathroom walls contains moulds.

Moulds are usually found close to the environment where they feed and grow, but their spores can be carried long distances by winds and then deposited in areas far from their source. Thus people who live in cities can be allergic to moulds and suffer attacks on days in summer and autumn when mould spores are swept into the atmosphere and carried distances by strong winds. Even though you apparently live far from their source, you can be affected by moulds in the atmosphere.

Remember, though, that although some of the allergenic moulds are ubiquitious, most of the time they will not cause you much harm. They will be producing spores quietly and gently at a level that is unlikely to cause you to react. At times, however, they produce spores in high concentrations and it is these situations that will give you severe reactions.

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