Oct 19, 20223 min read

Food intolerance or sensitivity - symptoms and testing

Updated: Apr 22

I thought I’d do a blog to explain how I – as a kinesiologist – might know when there's an issue happening with food intolerances, or insensitivities in one of my clients.

When it comes to looking at a person's health, we look at all the different meridians – your stomach and spleen in particular sit in the earth element. We can use the meridian wheel below to identify patterns of symptoms and imbalance in relation to the time of day and the muscle-organ-meridian connection.

Identifying an imbalance in the stomach meridian

Within the stomach meridian, there are all of these different muscles:

Pectoralis major clavicular - which is located on the chest just below the collar bone.
Neck extensors and flexes – which are located on the neck at the front and back.
Brachioradialis - located on the forearm.

So what happens is if there's any food intolerances, is that muscle-organ-meridian connection in the stomach is affected. And when we muscle test, the muscle will either ‘lock’ and won't switch off or unlock, if there's too much excess energy and tension in that muscle. Or alternatively, when you muscle test, the muscle won't lock, it unlocks - like it’s depleted, switched off, signal not getting through effectively.

Food sensitivities and intolerances will imbalance the muscles, so there is an excess of energy and it's over stimulated (think of having the dial turned up to 10 or a Duracell bunny, going and going and not able to switch it off) your nervous system and adrenaline putting the body in overload. Alternatively the imbalance is a circuit is blown and muscle-organ-meridian connection is disrupted, so signal to activate is unable to get through. Think of the wheel that spins on the computer when it is trying to locate or carry out an action…..sorry unable to complete that action at this time.

Identifying an imbalance in the spleen meridian

Within the spleen meridian we have the following muscles which are important for stabilising the shoulder girdle: Latissimus Dorsi, Middle Trapezius, Lower Trapezius, Opponens Policis and also our triceps.

These big major muscle groups are needed for our posture, to help us keep our back upright and in an ideal alignment. But if they're under challenged because the electrical energy meridian-organ-connection is off, then actually it makes it really hard for us to function effectively. And that's where compensatory movement patterns start coming together or coming in.

Physical symptoms of a food intolerance

As a Kinesiologist, if you have any food sensitivities or intolerances, I would often see imbalances, something going on in these two meridians, stomach and spleen.

Physical symptoms may include:

Indigestion and digestive issues including acid reflux
Sugar cravings / imbalanced blood sugars
Neck and mid back pain
Arm, Hand or Wrist pain including carpal tunnel
Poor immune function

Food sensitivities or intolerances affect the body’s ability to efficiently take the nutrients from those foods, taking more energy to process them, which in turn affects the connected muscles. So, if you're feeling a bit low in energy and fatigued, it can actually be down to food intolerances. Consider a food intolerance like eating something that is an irritant to your body causing protective and inflammatory responses.

Food intolerances and sensitivities are just one piece of the puzzle when it comes to causes of imbalance. We also look at electrical, emotional and structural issues that can be causing imbalances.