Is Depression Really a Chemical Imbalance or Does Gluten Play a Role?

Patients with depression are told they have a chemical imbalance.  If someone else in their family is also

depressed, the “gene card” is played.  “Your depression is genetic”, they are told.

I have been in practice for over 20 years and I find the above data to be false.  Consistently we find patients who are suffering from depression and anxiety to be gluten (and dairy) sensitive.

How could a food cause depression?  Let’s take a look:

After the digestive tract, the most common system to be affected by gluten is the nervous system. It is thought that depression can be caused by gluten in one of two ways. 

First, gluten causes inflammatory changes. The immune system in an individual with glutensensitivity or celiac disease responds in a negative, inflammatory fashion to the protein gliadin.  Unfortunately, that protein is similar in structure to other proteins present in the body, including those of the brain and nerve cells. A cross reactivity can occur whereby the immune system “confuses” proteins in the body for the protein gliadin.  This is called cellular mimicry and the result of this confusion is the body literally attacking it’s own tissues. When inflammation occurs in the brain and nervous system, a variety of symptoms can ensue, including depression.

Research shows us that patients with symptoms involving the nervous system suffer from digestive problems only 13% of the time.  This is significant because mainstream medicine equates gluten sensitivity almost exclusively with digestive complaints, a mistake that causes millions to suffer needlessly.

In a study examining blood flow to the brain, 15 patients with untreated celiac disease were compared to 15 patients treated with a gluten-free diet for a year.  The findings were amazing. In the untreated group, 73% had abnormalities in brain circulation while only 7% in the treated group showed any abnormalities. The patients with the brain circulation problems were frequently suffering from symptoms such as anxiety and depression.

In addition to circulation problems creating symptoms of depression, other research has looked at the association between gluten sensitivity and its interference with protein absorption.  Specifically, the amino acid tryptophan can be deficient. Tryptophan is a protein in the brain responsible for a feeling of well-being and relaxation. A deficiency can be correlated to feelings of depression and anxiety.

Is it worth it to discover if your depression is being causes by something in your diet? Absolutely, in my opinion.

Our society is too willing to accept a “chemical imbalance” as an explanation for their symptoms and instead of getting to the root cause of the condition, simply opt to swallow a pill – a pill that in the case of anti-depressants has very dangerous and sometimes lethal side effects.

The frequency with which we are able to successfully taper patients off their anti-depressants is considered “unbelievable” to many mainstream doctors, yet we do it regularly.  How is that possible?  We actually diagnose the root cause of the depression.  Frequently the culprit is gluten.

I hope you found this informative. If you or someone you know is suffering from depression, consider calling us for a free healthanalysis – 408-733-0400. We are a destination clinic and we treat patients from across the country and internationally. You don’t need to live local to us to receive assistance. We are here to help!

Need Help? We're Here for You! 

If you felt as if I was describing you above, you are not alone. As I mentioned earlier, adrenal fatigue/exhaustion is almost epidemic. If you would like assistance and don’t have a clinician whom you feel can assist you, consider contacting us for a FREE Health Analysis. We are a Destination Clinic and treat patients from across the country and internationally. We would be delighted to help you as we have been doing so for over two decades.

Visit us at www.RootCauseMedicalClinic.com. If you have questions or need any help, I’m here for you! Call 408-733-0400.

I look forward to hearing from you.

To your good health,

Dr Vikki Petersen, DC, CCN, CFMP


IFM Certified Practitioner

Founder of Root Cause Medical Clinic
Co-author of “The Gluten Effect”

Author of the eBook: “Gluten Intolerance – What You Don’t Know May Be Killing You!”

Gluten Intolerance and the Benefits of Breast Milk – Good and Bad?

I have always been a big proponent of breast feeding. Children who are breastfed are found to have higher IQs and a better overall health status. The benefits that Mother Nature packs into mother’s milk has not been successfully mimicked by any man-made product. Far from it in fact –the formulas on the market are quite atrocious when it comes to nutritional standards for health.

Does breast feeding reduce your child’s chances of developing celiac disease?

It turns out that the risk of developing celiac disease was shown to decrease by a whopping 63% for children breast fed for more than two months compared to those children breast fed for less than two months. I will admit that I would have lost that bet – I would have assumed that two months wasn’t long enough to make that large a difference. But apparently a little goes a long way when it comes to the value of breast milk.

Another study looked at children fed breast milk for three months or more and found an even better result. These children were five times less likely to develop celiac disease as compared to those babies who fell within the less than three month mark.

We used to think that celiac disease was a yes or no proposition, with no gray areas. In other words it was believed that you were born with the disease or you were not. That is incorrect and recent research has proven that celiac disease can develop in those who have the genetic predisposition at any time during their life. In fact the incidence of celiac disease in the general population is known to increase from 1% to 4% (or 5%, depending on the research you look at) with age.

This tells us that the presence of genes for celiac disease and the ingestion of gluten in the diet, are not sufficient to cause the disease to manifest itself. What’s the third factor? The health of the GI tract is the final link. A healthy GI tract will have adequate healthy probiotics to keep the celiac disease genes turned off, thereby preventing the disease from expressing itself. The unhealthy GI tract no longer has robust good bacteria and their weakening numbers makes them incapable of keeping bad genes turned off. The result is the ‘turning on’ of the celiac genes.

Getting back to breastfeeding, it is known that breast milk is a wonderful colonizer of healthy probiotic organisms within the gut. The colostrum mothers produce helps their baby’s immune system mature, thereby preventing disease, especially digestive infections that could create a leaky gut and increased predisposition to gluten intolerance as well as other food reactions.

What about the timing of introducing gluten to children?

Two major studies confirm that timing may be quite critical. In one it was found that infants who were receiving breast milk at the time of gluten introduction had a 52% reduced risk of developing celiac disease as compared with those babies who were not receiving breast milk when gluten was introduced into their diet.

The second study was a landmark study conducted in Sweden, unbeknownst to anyone at the time it occurred. In other words, only retrospectively, was it understood what happened. Here’s the story: In the 1980s a change of guidelines occurred as regards when gluten should be introduced into the diet of an infant. Prior it had been maintained that gluten should be introduced while a child was receiving breast milk. In the 1980s the new guideline recommended that gluten be introduced after weaning had occurred.

The result was a dramatic spike in the incidence of celiac disease in the country of Sweden. After much research, the guideline was reversed and the incidence of celiac disease was restored to its prior level.

Can Gluten in Mom’s Diet by found in Breast Milk?

I was very happy to find this study passed along by the Gluten Intolerance Group that confirmed something I’ve seen clinically for years, but heretofore had not seen any research support.

When babies would come in with colic or constipation or vomiting or rashes or a host of other ailments, the first thing we would do with a breastfeeding mom is change HER diet. We saw, that when Mom was no longer ingesting gluten or dairy (or whatever the offending food was found to be) baby’s symptoms resolved. Obviously that points to the fact that these foods traveled in to the breast milk in a form that could bother baby.

Yet many researchers have stated that the gluten protein was not found in breast milk and there was no indication that a mother consuming gluten could affect her child’s health through her breast milk. When research does not agree with my clinical evidence working with patients, I have learned that clinical experience usually wins out. And so it was in this case. The study cited by GIG referenced that indeed gliadin (the protein found in gluten) was found in high levels in the milk samples of 54 out of 80 healthy mothers on a normal, unrestricted diet. While the presence of gliadin would be fine with a child having no tendency toward intolerance, it obviously is a big problem for those little ones that are already expressing a reaction.

In summary, breastfeeding is very important and healthy for baby. The only caveat is perhaps needing to alter what Mom is eating to prevent certain sensitive foods from entering into the milk. This is not difficult however and a happy baby is well worth the effort.

I hope you found this informative and please pass it along to the mothers and future mothers whom you know.

Need Help? We're Here for You! 

If you felt as if I was describing you above, you are not alone. As I mentioned earlier, adrenal fatigue/exhaustion is almost epidemic. If you would like assistance and don’t have a clinician whom you feel can assist you, consider contacting us for a FREE Health Analysis. We are a Destination Clinic and treat patients from across the country and internationally. We would be delighted to help you as we have been doing so for over two decades.

Visit us at www.RootCauseMedicalClinic.com. If you have questions or need any help, I’m here for you! Call 408-733-0400.

I look forward to hearing from you.

To your good health,

Dr Vikki Petersen, DC, CCN, CFMP


IFM Certified Practitioner

Founder of Root Cause Medical Clinic
Co-author of “The Gluten Effect”

Author of the eBook: “Gluten Intolerance – What You Don’t Know May Be Killing You!”

Lab Test Interpretation for Celiac and Gluten Sensitivity

What do you do when your doctor is uninformed?

The question below came from a listener of my recent virtual book tour. It was a bit horrifying to read, I must tell you. Unfortunately I see this type of poor advice given often, but it doesn’t make it any less palatable.

Here’s the question:
“I had positive deamidated gliadin antibodies but did not have any celiac-specific antibodies... my doctor did not recommend I go gluten-free. What does this mean and where do I go from there?”

The deamidated gliadin antibody test IS a celiac-specific test. It is believed to be more sensitive than the traditional tTG test and that is why it is being used more broadly. As you may know, one of our biggest concerns is to have those suffering from celiac and gluten sensitivity diagnosed as soon as possible. Early diagnosis will help to prevent a tremendous amount of suffering, ill health and secondary autoimmune diseases.

Unfortunately this person’s doctor didn’t seem to know what the purpose of the test was and as a result didn’t recommend that a celiac patient remove gluten from their diet! What a tragedy…

On the bright side, I was happy that this individual attended the virtual book tour and shared her question. Now she knows what the test means and will remove gluten from her diet. This will not only improve her current health status but will also hopefully protect her from developing future problems such as autoimmune disease.

Situations just as this occur all too frequently. While such ignorance may not be intentional on the part of the doctor, it is ignorance none the less and the effects it creates can be devastating. We see it here at our clinic, unfortunately, all too often. A patient came in just last week with undiagnosed dermatitis herpetiformis (a skin condition related to celiac disease) who was told that the reason her skin looked the way it did was because she had a psychological problem and she was prescribed antidepressants. Fortunately a friend helper her to find us and we KNOW that her problem is not a mental one.

The bottom line is that it is critical to find a clinician who is really informed about celiac and gluten sensitivity. Here’s a test question for your doctor: Ask him or her if they would recommend removing gluten from the diet due to suspected gluten sensitivity even without the presence of celiac. If the doctor states there is no reason to eliminate gluten from the diet if celiac isn’t present, then find a new clinician. This may sound harsh but I want you to be healthy. There is too much needless ill health from undiagnosed gluten intolerance

I know that I’m located in California and not all of you are. But I do want you to know that I am more than happy to help you locate someone to help you if you are unable to visit us here.

Visit us at www.RootCauseMedicalClinic.com. If you have questions or need any help, I’m here for you! Call 408-733-0400.

I look forward to hearing from you.

To your good health,

Dr Vikki Petersen, DC, CCN, CFMP


IFM Certified Practitioner

Founder of Root Cause Medical Clinic
Co-author of “The Gluten Effect”

Author of the eBook: “Gluten Intolerance – What You Don’t Know May Be Killing You!”