Dangers of Ribonucleotides #635 – The ‘Ribo Rash’
An unhappy sufferer of the Ribo Rash – - – Reclaiming my health (no more rash!)
This is my personal story of hell on earth, all thanks to one of those tiny little numbers on the labels of our foods, which are actually meant to be tested and deemed safe for human consumption – ha!! The good news is that even though I suffered terribly, I did eventually figure out what it was and I am now FINE as long as I eliminate #627, #631 and #635 from my diet. The most important thing that I did during this entire ordeal was I LISTENED TO MY BODY. The doctors told me it was in my head, even my family and friends started to believe it, but I KNEW that there was a cause for my suffering. Your body always tells you when something is not right. You must learn to listen.
In 2004 I arrived in Australia and I embarked on a cycling journey up the east coast of the country on my push-bike. That may sound like a huge undertaking, and it is, but it’s kind-of par for the course in my lifestyle. See my other epic adventures in onegirlworld.com. Anyway I was riding for about 4 weeks or so when I started to develop a very itchy red rash on my body. It started under my arms, in my inner arms, on my lower back, on my breasts and around my eyes. I naturally thought it was heat rash associated with the cycling as it northern Queensland and I was riding up to 100 km every day. I started using Prickly Heat Powder in an effort to sooth the heat, but the rash seemed to only get worse. I had previously cycled through Asia and had gotten heat rash then; the Prickly Heat always worked before, but this time it did nothing. I pushed on despite the discomfort. What I noticed in comparison was this ‘new’ rash was extremely itchy whereas I did not recall the heat rash in Asia ever being itchy. The itching was quite maddening at times; in fact the rash helped me make the decision to stop cycling in Cairns and head back down to winter in Sydney to help the rash ‘calm down.’
When I got to Sydney, the opposite occurred. The rash got worse. It seemed to spread like fire actually, itching like crazy and making me mental. I had never experienced anything like it before, and there seemed to be no rhyme or reason to what would trigger it. I was no longer sweating so it couldn’t be heat rash; creams seemed to make it worse – somehow they felt like they were ‘trapping’ the rash inside of me. I could not control my desire to tear my skin off from the itching; I especially enjoyed scalding my skin with hot water – what a sick feeling of relief that provided!! I also started getting heart palpitations…at any time my heart-rate would increase from 60 beats per minute to 140, and I had no history of anxiety whatsoever. I felt like my heart was going to explode out of my chest. Often it would wake me up from a deep sleep. I also experience spontaneous bruising – I would wake up in the morning with HUGE bruises on my torso or thighs – it would take 3-4 days for them to go down. That’s when I thought I had cancer. What else could it have been? I was generally eating quite healthy (at least so I thought); I didn’t smoke, barely drank, exercised (obviously), so how could I be so sick?
Friends told me to meditate. Doctors told me it was a simple case of excema. I had a complete round of testing done and everything came up fine. I was tested for heavy metal poisoning, various viral infections, standard food allergies (milk, wheat, eggs, gluten, etc); I had chest x-rays and EKG’s done – and they found nothing. The only thing that came up suspect during that time is my URIC ACID levels were high. The doctor suggested that I go on medication to bring down the uric acid; he said I was in danger of having gout. I now that that Additive #635 Ribonucleotide can cause uric acid levels to rise.
An unhappy sufferer of the Ribo Rash – - – Reclaiming my health (no more rash!)
Eventually, out of desperation, I started my own ‘elimination diet’ in an effort to narrow down the possibility of it being a food allergy. I really had no idea why; it was just a gut feeling I had (yes, listen to those – they are generally spot-on!) – I just had this feeling that the rash was being cause be something I was eating. I had tried all the changes of soaps, washing powders, etc etc, and I felt like I had no other option to even try. It was at least 1 year of suffering with the rash at this stage, not always as bad as the photos mind you, but always present and always itching like hell. The elimination diet was worth a try.
I started off by telling people at my new job that I was a celiac (i.e. no wheat or gluten). This was a pretty easy transition for me because I had just started working on Lizard Island on the Great Barrier Reef and we only had food prepared by a staff chef so I had someone doing all the work for me really. I also started keeping a food diary, writing down what I ate daily and when I had an outbreak. I noted my emotional states as well to further rule out the notion of it being linked to stress. The wheat and gluten-free diet helped tremendously, and now I know it is because ribonucleotides are often found in products containing wheat. About once a month or so I would still have an outbreak, but it seemed manageable – I kind-of got to the point where I accepted the rash as a part of my life and decided I could tolerate it in the small amounts I was getting.
At the same time though I started to get more of an anaphylaxis reaction in addition to the rash, so when I had an outbreak, my lips and throat would swell. I started to take anti-histamines and I carried them with me where-ever I went. It is crazy to think back now how I just carried on living through all of that!
Finally the day of reckoning came to me. I hadn’t eaten anything the previous day and I made a salad using the cheap salad packets at work. About an hour later I started to feel the itchiness start in my face, eyes and lips. Somehow I just knew it was the salad dressing. I quickly did an internet search on ‘food additives itchy rash’ and instantly found Sue Dengate’s site. Actually I sobbed tears of joy while I read countless stories of others who had suffered with the SAME EXACT symptoms as me, and I KNEW that I was not crazy, I knew at that moment that I had found the cause of my suffering. There was no doubt in my mind that I was suffering from the Ribo Rash. I noted the list of foods on her site that contain 635, and when I checked my food diary, EVERY SINGLE TIME I HAD A REACTION I had eaten #635. Even on the wheat-free gluten-free diet, I realized that I had eaten seaweed-flavored rice crackers, the veggie burger at Hungry Jack’s (with no bread), cheap salad dressings, and other flavored tofu products which were causing my outbreaks. Sometimes when I try to tell people what happened to me, they cut me off and say, well I don’t eat any of that crap…and I say YOU HAVE NO IDEA THE CRAP THAT YOU ARE EATING!! I was not eating junk food. If you think seaweed crackers are healthy you are wrong!! If you think flavored tofu is healthy you are wrong!! We are being poisoned slowly by these additives. We must eliminate them from our diets. It was 9 months into the elimination diet when I finally made this life-altering discovery.
It took about 3 months from the time I eliminated #635 from my diet for the rash to go away entirely. It did not itch whatsoever during that time, it just slowly but surely started to clear up. Mind you, I found during this 2-year ordeal that the only cream that ever gave me any relief was calamine lotion. I still used the calamine during those 3 months, more as a habit because I had really developed a fear of needing my calamine and anti-histamines near me all the time. Those days are long gone now!!
After 3 months I finally contacted Sue Dengate personally to thank her and tell her my battle with the Ribo Rash so she could include my story on her site. She told me I had one of the worst cases she had ever seen. Since then I have worked with her to help educate people to the dangers of this chemical. My photo is on her site and is also in her DVD entitled ‘Fed Up with Children’s Behavior – How Food Additives Affect Behavior.’ I can also add that actually during the time I was suffering from the rash, I found my personality to be very different as well – I was moody and irritable and just not myself. One could say it was from the stress of the rash which I would agree with, but I also do believe that it was from the additive itself as well.
When the DVD was released in Australia in 2006, I was featured on Today Tonight, a 30-minute news program, to discuss my story. I really didn’t want to do the program, but I know how important it is to get this information out to people. If anyone had told me during those 2 years that my problem could have been from a flavor enhancer, I may not have suffered like I did. NO ONE should go through what I went through. It it so obvious to me now that I was suffering from an extreme allergic reaction, and it angers me that doctors are so completely ignorant! How could any medical professional shrug off such an extreme reaction and say it was stress?? I went to many different doctors during that time. It is unfortunate that they are not being educated about the dangers of food additives.
It’s been 2 years now since I eliminated #635 from my diet. I have no rash whatsoever, not even the tiniest spot anywhere on my body. People often compliment me now telling me I have ‘amazing skin.’ Sometimes I tell them, ‘You have NO IDEA how much that compliment means to me.’ I think they think I’m crazy, but they just have no idea what I’ve been through. For 2 years I was embarrassed to go out in public; I felt unattractive and uncomfortable all the time. Now I have beautiful skin which radiates from the inside out.
I still have to watch labels and always be aware of what I am eating. Especially in Asia, it is difficult because there are no regulations on food labels and many companies just blatantly do not list additives. I am pretty aware of what #635 is in (mainly savory & salty foods) so I stay away from flavored chips and packets, but here in Thailand #635 and also MSG (#621) are in almost every soy sauce product on the market, so that leaves out pretty much all Thai food for me.
You can now imagine why the thought of an all-raw food diet started to appeal to me. Honestly I had thought about trying the ‘raw food’ thing for a number of years, but I had always made excuses for myself, saying it was too hard to do or too much effort or impossible to maintain; really they were all just excuses for my own laziness. Perhaps this allergy was a blessing in disguise for me because it was really after this whole experience that I decided to try eating all raw. In fact, I started to see the raw food diet in a completely different way – to me it now represents safe and healthy eating in a way that I could have never comprehended before. I now understand first-hand the poison that is in our processed foods and I am so happy to be able to make the choice to not continue to poison myself anymore.
If you think you are having a reaction to ribonucleotides or you want to ask me specific questions about my rash, please do not hesitate to contact me. Also please be sure to read Sue Dengate’s http://www.fedupwithfoodadditives.info/ and educate yourself on the dangers of all of the nasty additives. If you know anyone who has a child suffering from ADHD or Autism, please refer them to this site as well; we are only now just discovering the links between food additives and behavioral problems in children.
For more information on rawfood, fasting, cleansing, detox and natural healing, visit my new comprehensive site on it all at healthybliss.net!