Dietary Problems and AS

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My mom told me there is supposedly a link between certain dietary problems and AS, so I thought I'd "ask the masses" about this.

I cannot eat popcorn, pizza, anything that's too fried (lightly fried stuff doesn't phase me much), or french fries. Pizza makes me nauseous and the others give me stomach pains.

None of these phased me until I was 21 years old (except popcorn, which first struck at age 7).

Any connections here?

Probably a link, most people on the spectrum have very restricted diets, or are very picky eaters. I know I'm one of them as well haha.

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My only dietary problem is with milk. No other.

That sounds like a gall bladder problem. I've had that since high school, it's not as severe these days. I couldn't go anywhere without having to use the restroom. I've always had hyperactive bowels, but fried foods and whole (fresh) dairy are like TNT for me.

My mom got her gall bladder removed in her 30s, maybe it's genetic?

I have dietary problems, as well. If I see food, I eat it. :O)

^Ditto.

I used to be a very picky eater as a kid, but not so much anymore.

Lol. I'm known around my office as "The wild woman", "The girl who eats bugs for dinner", "Tarzanna", "Bush lady" etc interchangeably... I will pretty much eat anything, and HAVE eaten all manner of odd things.

As a child, I lived on chips... that was it. Funny how things change!

I can't eat egg though, and I can only handle a very small amount of dairy (like a bit of milk in my tea or butter on my bread, which I only eat occasionally anyway). That said, yoghurt I'm fine on (apparently it doesn't affect lactose interolence anyway). I instinctively avoid gluten foods anyway... bread, wheat, etc, so only have a limited intake of them.

Anything else though... yum!

After the gall bladder surgery, I didn't experience too many issues.

However, there is one that does bother me. I used to forget to eat for two or three days at a time. Usually after two or three days I would start to get miserable headaches and would have to eat.

After my gall bladder surgery, if I forget to eat for one day or even just don't eat enough, I'll have a brief diarrhea diarrhea the next morning that hits me almost instantly.

In the surgery, they apparently just dump bile from your liver into your intestines. I wonder if the bile, without anything to work on, builds up until it causes a brief diarrhea.

I have a colonoscopy coming up in a bit more than a week. For that, no eating the day before. I'm not looking forward to this even though I have had no problems with colonoscopies previously.

I thought the dietary issues related to AS is either gustatory sensory processing issues or particular digestive sensitivity issues like certain food allergies, or stuff like having celiac disease or related to enzymes like lactose intolerance...


The former is something I still deal with.
It's still the same reaction, still the same habits. I still have a kid's palette.

The latter, I don't actually have. I only got them worse since puberty, then starting to disappear over time.
And just became way less severe all the sudden as soon as I'm no longer suffocated by pent up emotions and figuring out some of my hormonal issues.
Common AS related gut issues don't work like that.

And I hadn't truly changed my diet at all.

Only change that seems similar to the OP is me consuming too much pork belly...
Literally nothing else, not in any different dishes of pork nor in any different oily dishes.

And I was told it's mostly because of my rising cholesterol...
And also told me that it's common with aging -- losing tolerance for consuming oily and fatty foods; not related to AS.

Lastly, knowing my family history...
I won't be surprised if it's related to metabolic issues related to diabetes, or something either linked to the liver or gallbladder.
None of them are autistic, nor particularly neurodivergent.

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Celiac disease affects autistic populations at a higher percentage rate than neurotypicals. There are a number of studies which have replicated this.

In my family: I am celiac, (both celiac genes present in my case, though most celiacs have only one), my son is celiac, one of his adult female daughters is celiac. All of my grandchildren (5) have some autistic features, though no overt signs of celiac (they are now aged in their late teans to early thirties).

Even if you are born with celiac genes, it can be years before they "switch on". I think - in my case - extreme stress activated mine and I became "full blown celiac" in my late 30s. However as a child I was constantly fed gluten rich food, in a stranger family, and had many miserable nights bringing up food in the midnight hours - which was wrongly attributed to allergies.

I am not sure why autistic people are dominant in the celiac population.

A lot of my food aversions stem from traumatic experiences
Like, I cannot eat sushi because one time it gave me food poisoning so even smelling sushi makes me nauseated.
Do you have any traumatic experiences with popcorn or pizza prior to you not liking it?

It does actually sound like gallbladder.

But also people on the autism spectrum and some other kinds of people do seem to get easily traumatized by food. As a neurotypical person, I can tell you that we are not like this. There would have to be some other terrible thing going on and the food item would be secondary to the main terrible thing. There is a deep experience of the food or beverage itself that can be overwhelming to non-typical people and I do not think we NTs can empathize with that. You kind of have to find your own way around things in order to get a semi-balanced diet.

In late 2021 my bride came home and discovered me exhibiting some signs of strong pain. She took me to the Emergency Room (ER). The pain was pretty much gone by the time they announced that it had been a gallbladder attack and they wanted to remove my gallbladder.

They considered it urgent enough that they kept me in the hospital until they could do the surgery. They did not consider it an emergency, however. I had to wait until an operating room and crew was available. And a few real emergencies came in so my surgery was delayed for more than a day.

My biggest complaint is that they kept me on IV until they could do the surgery, then they almost immediately discharged me. That hospital has good food and I didn't get any!!

I don't know that Autism was a factor in all of that...unless it affected my perception of the pain.

Autism is almost certainly a factor in my diet, however. I never got interested in cooking. Therefore, I eat a simple sandwich, or a simple heat-it-and-eat it packaged meal, or I eat out. So the variety in my meals is very limited (if I know how to get a meal I like, why would I do something different?).

My bride, however likes to cook. Usually I like what she provides. But whether I liked it or not I typically don't see it again.