A friend of mine recommended I look into possible thyroid or autoimmune stuff to explain why I can’t gain weight; her daughter was diagnosed with Celiac disease without any prior symptoms other than being skinny despite however much she ate. I doubt I have Celiac (wouldn’t my OBGYN have noticed something in the bloodwork I had while pregnant?) but it got me wondering. Is it like an allergy where the immune system is overreacting?
In: Biology
So the easiest way to explain autoimmune disease is this. Your body cells all have tags on them that identify them as belonging there. So when your immune system finds a bacteria cell that doesn’t have this tag it attacks that cell. In autoimmune diseases the immune system stops recognizing the tag, sometimes specefic parts and sometimes everywhere. Then the immune system starts attacking the cells because it thinks they are foreign.
Testing for Celiac disease isn’t a standard thing to do for pregnant people. If you don’t have frequent belly pain, diarrhea, constipation, and obvious problems when you eat bread or pasta, then you don’t have Celiac disease.
We aren’t entirely certain why people get autoimmune disease. The gist of it is that your body starts recognizing certain cells as enemies, and attacks them. There are many places this can happen. If it happens to your pancreas, you get diabetes. If it happens to your brain and spinal cord, you get multiple sclerosis. There are genetic factors that contribute to it, but seems to also have environmental factors.
Most people that “can’t gain weight” simply aren’t eating enough. They think they are, but they aren’t. Get a food scale, weigh all of your food, and track it for 1 week. Visit r/gainit for tips.
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