Gluten Sensitivity Can Cause Belly Fat

Where did my flat tummy go?

Below is a case study from our book, “The Gluten Effect”. This patient had some very common complaints, but the common treatment she was receiving was having no effect. Did you used to have a flat stomach but can't seem to “find” it anymore? Gluten intolerance could very well be the underlying cause.

J.W had developed a big belly that she could not get rid of. She felt bloated all the time—and no matter how often she exercised or how closely she watched her caloric intake, her weight remained the same. She felt and looked four months pregnant.

A Successful 30-pound Weight Loss!

We diagnosed her with gluten sensitivity, and after being off gluten for several months, she went from a size 14 to a size 6, with a thirty-pound weight loss. She not only lost the weight, but it came off her problem areas first—her stomach and face.

She now had a flat belly, which she had never enjoyed before. J.W. also noted that her bloating was gone, and that she felt “clean” inside.

Lab tests revealed several infections, which were treated successfully, and that removed other chronic stressors from her system.

In J.W.'s case, the distribution of weight around the mid-region of the body was typical of excessive cortisol (a hormone) production with adrenal (your stress gland) exhaustion, secondary to a food sensitivity. Once gluten was removed, the stress on her body subsided, and a normal weight distribution returned.

Do You Have a “Spare Tire” or “Muffin Top”?

What we've discovered after working with patients for over 20 years is that much of that “tire” can be due to swelling of the small intestine from the inflammation caused by gluten and the adrenal fatigue ensues from malabsorption of nutrients.

You have about 23 feet of small intestine—with the surface area the size of a tennis court.

Look down at your abdomen. That's a lot of track to be laid down in a relatively small space.
Now imagine, that 23 feet is swollen, due to irritation created by a diet that doesn't suit your body, or an infection. Infections in the intestine are very common secondary to gluten intolerance. When it swells it has to go somewhere—welcome spare tire!

What's the Solution?

The solution is to discover the underlying cause of the swelling. Now I'm not against exercise, quite the contrary. But I can promise you that all the crunches in the world will not flatten a tummy that's swollen from a food intolerance or irritation from an untreated parasite or bacteria.

5 Things You Can Do

1. Discover if you're gluten intolerant for starters. There are tests available for this and remember we're talking about finding out if you're sensitive to gluten, not just if you have celiac disease.

2. If you already know that you're sensitive to gluten, then realize that you must be perfect about removing if from your diet. Being good “most of the time” is just not enough.

3. If you have not had a comprehensive stool analysis to check for the presence of infectious organisms, this really is something you should look into. It is rare that a gluten sensitive individual DOESN'T have some type of infection due to years of assault on the immune system from eating gluten.

4. The damage created by gluten in the intestines results in a condition known as a “leaky gut”. This is very common. Removing gluten from the diet is usually not enough to restore the integrity to the intestine. Such treatments as probiotics, herbs and other supplements may be needed to repair the lining of the gut to it's normal healthy state.

5. Get an idea of how your adrenal glands are functioning. Adrenal fatigue or exhaustion is quite common in our society. It is especially associated with malabsorption of nutrients and unstable blood sugar, which is definitely an effect created by gluten sensitivity.

The good news is that with some help from clinical nutrition, including dietary changes and lifestyle management, restoring that nice flat tummy is within reach—no surgery required!

Please let me know how I can assist you. Or call us to schedule a Free Health Analysis: (408) 733-0400.

Here at HealthNOW we are a Destination Clinic and we see patients from across the country as well as internationally. We are here to help!

Visit us at www.RootCauseMedicalClinic.com. If you have questions or need any help, I’m here for 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!”

Is Gluten Causing Your Hormonal Imbalance?

What Do Fatigue, Overweight, PMS, etc All Have in Common?

Fatigue is the most common symptom plaguing most patients. Trouble sleeping, weight issues, PMS, headaches, fertility or libido issues, and achy joints are also very common and can all be affected by hormonal imbalance that continues after gluten has been removed from the diet in the gluten intolerant individual.  The trouble with trying to resolve such symptoms is that the root cause can vary. If every patient with fatigue had a thyroid problem, it would be easy to correct because we would know exactly where to look.

If you’re gluten intolerant you may have suffered from some of the complaints listed above prior to discovering your celiac disease or gluten sensitivity. But perhaps now, despite your gluten-free diet, some of these same symptoms continue to plague you.  If so, read on.

Do You Have Any of These Symptoms?

• Fatigue
• Trouble sleeping
• Weight trouble
• PMS
• Migraines
• Infertility or miscarriage
• Achy joints or muscles
• Allergies
• Light headedness
• Frequent illness, weak immune system
• Asthma

While the list is long, believe it or not, there is a common cause to all of them.  I’m not saying it’s the only cause, but I want to discusswhy someone can be found gluten intolerant, successfully institute a gluten-free diet, and yet continue to suffer from many of the above symptoms.

The Problem May Be Your Stress Gland

There is a gland in your body, of which you have two, called the adrenal glands. They sit atop each of your kidneys and they are the master of multi-tasking! If I asked you if one part of your body was responsible for:

• Providing you with strong energy
• Maintaining a healthy weight, 
• Keeping your immune system strong,
• Decreasing inflammation
• Maintaining stable mood, 
• Anti-aging, 
• Controlling sleep quality, 
• Balancing hormones, 
• Handling allergies, and more… 

 What would you say?

You might think to yourself that if there was one body part responsible for all those things then you better start treating it well! You’d be very right in your analysis.

As you’ve probably guessed the aforementioned adrenal glands are responsible for handling that very long job list and, unfortunately, those very same adrenal glands tend to be quite stressed in the gluten intolerant individual.

Gluten Intolerance Can Damage Your Stress Glands

Why? Because adrenal glands are sensitive to, and get very stressed with, unstable blood sugar. Stable blood sugar comes from eating healthy food that your body finds nourishing. As you well know if you’re gluten intolerant, gluten, for you, is a poison. Therefore years of eating gluten created unstable blood sugar and thereby put a tremendous strain on your adrenal glands.

Due to the many, many jobs that the adrenal glands are responsible for, simply removing gluten as a stressor is typically insufficient to restore them to normal function. They need to be ‘re-set’ with a nutritional and dietary program, to restore their good health. This explains why many who are gluten intolerant continue to suffer with the symptoms mentioned above.

Therefore, even if your gluten intolerance has been diagnosed and you’ve instituted a strict gluten-free diet, if you haven’t also found a clinician who understands and specializes in restoring health and function to the adrenal glands, you may very well continue to suffer with the symptoms associated with adrenal stress.

Treatment is Easy and Drug-Free

The good news is that the treatment to normalize adrenal function is not at all difficult.Here at the Clinical Nutrition department of HealthNOW we utilize a natural program that involves no dangerous drugs or surgery. There are lab tests to determine the level of adrenal malfunction occurring, and these are called functional specialized lab tests. They differ from traditional adrenal lab tests that only look for disease, not malfunction. I mention this because I want to ensure that there is no confusion created when I mention adrenal function lab testing. We are measuring 'function' and therefore are looking for signs of malfunction rather than only looking for disease, which in the case of adrenal glands is quite rare, although dangerous.

If you ask your traditional medical doctor to test for adrenal malfunction he or she will test for adrenal disease – once again a rare occurrence – and will likely pronounce your adrenal glands ‘fine’ because they are not diseased. While adrenal gland disease is rare, adrenal gland malfunction is extremely common. It is this latter condition that we are speaking of here.

This is an important distinction because I want to make sure that if you are suffering from adrenal fatigue that you aren’t given a ‘clean bill of health’ incorrectly. Unfortunately this happens often. If it took you a while to receive a diagnosis of gluten intolerance then you understand this phenomenon. Sadly this area of health is fraught with misunderstanding and it is the patient who ultimately suffers, unnecessarily.

We Can Help!

If you need any help finding a clinician to help you, feel free to contact me. Normalizing adrenal function is one of our areas of expertise and patients visit us from across the country as well as internationally at our destination clinic to receive this treatment. If we cannot find a clinician close to you that specializes in this then we are more than happy to see you here. The good news is that the treatment is natural and inexpensive.

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 & Overweight - Why They Go Together

Gluten intolerance used to be synonymous with celiac disease, and celiac disease was synonymous with being underweight. Times have changed and being ‘locked in’ to the notion that unless someone is very underweight their chance of being gluten intolerant is next to nil, is obsolete.

Unfortunately, patients continue to be refused testing from ill informed doctors who simply observe their patients physique and from that decide that gluten sensitivity or celiac disease isn’t a likely diagnosis.While I must admit that I truly am tired of hearing stories of doctors refusing to test individuals because they don’t fit the classic celiac profile of extreme diarrhea, abdominal pain and underweight, today I wanted to address an association that isn’t typically looked at - gluten intolerance and overweight. 

Those with the classic type of celiac disease tend to be underweight because they have been suffering with a small intestine that has been incapable of absorbing much in the way of nutrition. We now know that the ‘classic’ celiac disease is not the most common and therefore we see celiac and gluten sensitive patients who have weight to lose.

The human body is very intelligent. If it perceives that it’s under physiological stress, it will tend towards ‘holding on’ to everything it can. Much in the way squirrels store nuts for the cold winter, the human body will burn very few calories when under stress. While it’s ‘smart’ for the body to conserve, it also can  result in weight gain.

Identifying the major stressor for the gluten intolerant patient, gluten, goes a long way towards resolving that stress, and often patients begin to see weight loss occur as a result of initiating a gluten-free diet.

For others the secondary effects of gluten intolerance must be addressed as well. These are such things as:

1.       Hidden infections in the intestine

2.    Nutritional deficiencies

3.       Cross reactive foods

4.       Hormonal imbalance

5.       Enzyme deficiency

6.       Probiotic imbalance

7.       Toxins such as heavy metals

Lifestyle factors can also contribute to overweight in the gluten intolerant patient. Removing gluten from the diet is not an easy task, no argument there.  But ‘being gluten-free’ is not the only important factor when adopting a healthy diet. A daily checklist of good, highly nutrition food consumption would include:

1.       8-10 glasses of purified water, depending on your weight (1/2 your weight in ounces of water is the formula)

2.       7 – 9 servings (or more) of fruits and vegetables, depending on your sex - men need 9

3.       Whole non-gluten grains if they suit you – some people suffer cross reactive problems

4.       Beans and legumes

5.       A small amount of good oils such as olive, coconut oil and fresh nuts

6.       A small amount of hormone-free animal protein, unless you’re vegetarian/vegan

7.       No dairy products

8.       Little to no sugar and no high fructose corn sweeteners

9.       Little to no processed, pre-packaged foods

          10.   Little to no caffeine 
          11.   No fast food 
          12.   No artificial sweeteners – they actually cause you to gain weight and are toxic 
          13.   No soda

Does that sound like a lot of ‘don’ts’? I’m sorry, but I wanted to be thorough. You can concentrate more on the ‘dos’ to stay on the positive side of the equation, but at least look over the things you should avoid, so you are aware of what they are.

Some patients think they are eating a healthy diet but ‘live on’ artificial sweeteners and caffeine, as an example, because they don’t consider it a problem due to their low calorie count.

I am glad that there are so many gluten-free options available to us in our grocery stores. But the truth of the matter is that unless it’s naturally gluten-free, such as vegetables, fruits, nuts, etc then it often falls into the category of a highly refined, pre-packaged food that you should only consume rarely.  The gluten-free breads, cakes, cookies and the like are great for birthdays and holidays, but they should definitely not be part of your daily diet.

Please don’t let this advice overwhelm you. Take it in baby steps and make small changes to start. See how you feel and let me know of any questions you have. 

Finally, I must advise you that some of gluten's secondary effects such as hidden infections, nutritional deficiencies and cross-reactive foods, to name a few, do require the help of a doctor to diagnose and treat. If you feel that you may be suffering from any of these issues or just don't feel good and don't know why, consider taking us up on the offer of a free health analysis. Just call us at 408-733-0400. Our destination clinic treats patients from across the country and internationally. You don't need to live local to us to receive assistance.

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!”