Lymphedema is a diagnosis used to describe swelling that is focused in the lymph system. It is often associated with the removal of lymph nodes or with cancer treatment. But what if you have lymphedema and you haven’t had those issues, or you had them long before those procedures? That’s what post is about.

Although my specialty is treating people for irritable bowel syndrome, I often get to see other symptoms that my patients are also experiencing. And I consider any other symptoms super important, because they often tie together with any digestive problems that we’re helping people with.

One of those symptoms is lymphedema.

Lymphedema may occur after you’ve had some lymph nodes removed in your armpit or in your groin, which is often done related to cancer treatment. Or it may be caused by the cancer itself, or the radiation treatment.

You need your lymph system to drain fluids from various areas of the body. Once your lymph nodes are blocked or gone, then your lymph system is compromised, and you may not be able to drain fluid from those areas of the body.

In some cases, this can lead to swelling in your arm or leg, which is known as lymphedema. But it’s also possible to experience swelling in the core part of your body due to lymphedema.

Some people get swelling throughout their body, even when they haven’t had any known lymph damage.  Or they get swelling in particular areas or joints for no known reason.

When they are diagnosed with lymphedema, it implies that there is something wrong with your lymph system. But I have found that this is not always the case.

Over my 25-year career I have worked with many patients with various types of edemas, and one in particular with very significant and long-term lymphedema.

As a result of her treatment program, her edema reduced dramatically and has continued to be reduced for over 10 years. In fact, I just saw her recently, which reminded me to do this video.

We found that her edema was primarily being triggered by food allergies. Or what a lot of people refer to as food sensitivities or food intolerances.

These are not the kind of food reactions that your typical allergist is going to diagnose. You are going to need to work with someone who’s an expert in IgG and IgA food reactions, not just the IgE reactions that most people think about when they use the words “food allergy.”

In my experience, the food reaction can be very different from person to person. In her case, it was primarily an egg and a dairy reaction. And interestingly the elevations on her lab results were not dramatic, but they were noticeable.

She also had a Candida overgrowth in the gut, which required some extensive treatment and may have also been contributing to her lymphedema.

The result was that not only did this patient’s digestion improve tremendously, but so did her lymphedema. I originally saw her in 2011, and to this day she continues to have much less swelling than she did when she first came to see me.

She hasn’t been the only patient who has responded this way, and it’s been my experience that people with lymphedema do much better when we look at their entire health, not just one system, and do everything that we can to improve their overall inflammation.

If you have lymphedema, I hope that sharing this patient’s story here has given you some hope, because there is reason to be optimistic that you can improve this and other types of edemas.

Thank you for reading and remember to take good care of your body. It’s the only place that you have to live.

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