ABC "Dancing With the Stars" Mirrorball
A “Dancing With the Stars” champ is sharing a recent medical diagnosis.
Shawn Johnson, who took home the Mirrorball Trophy during the show’s eighth season, shared a bit about what she’s been going through in some candid posts uploaded to her Instagram Stories on August 30, 2022.
“Update from my self-help-self-improvement journey I’m on. I’ve struggled with hormone imbalances, headaches, aches joints, sinus/congestion/mucus, and severe fatigue on and off for a long time so went on a DEEP journey to find out why and hone it all in,” she shared.
Johnson explained that she went to an allergist to try to figure things out and she finally has some answers.
Here’s what you need to know:
Johnson Said She Has ‘Severe’ Allergies
Johnson said that she had several tests done and tested negative for “all environmental allergies.” However, she learned that she has very bad food allergies that has been causing inflammatory and histamine responses in her system.
“I found my answers,” she shared. “SEVERELY allergic to dairy. Wow. And other foods I can no longer eat because of inflammatory response… barley, buckwheat, nutmeg, paprika, basil, honey, vanilla, chicken, shrimp, clams, corn, white potatoes, sweet potatoes,” she wrote in a list.
While many people think of allergies as strictly sinus-related there are actually many symptoms that can affect different parts of the body when someone has a food intolerance.
According to the Mayo Clinic, symptoms of food allergies can present by way of “tingling or itching in the mouth, hives, itching or eczema, swelling of the lips, face, tongue and throat or other parts of the body, wheezing, nasal congestion or trouble breathing, abdominal pain, diarrhea, nausea or vomiting, dizziness, lightheadedness or fainting.”
There are several reasons that a person may have an intolerance to certain foods. “You may not have adequate amounts of some enzymes needed to digest certain foods,” the Mayo Clinic reports.
Johnson Still Has Another Test Lined Up
Johnson explained further why she decided to do the allergy tests and find out the root cause of her health issues.
“I felt like I got to a point where I was so blindly medicating myself with over-the-counter remedies, allergy medicines, etc. To help my 20+ year old diagnosises (is that a word haha) and nothing seemed to be fixing the problem as it was just masking it or temporarily dealing with it. SO, I wanted to go back to the start and make sure I was treating my body properly for the right reasons and healing the real issues,” she continued.
Johnson will be making some changes when it comes to her diet to see if she can get her body back on the right track and start to feel more like herself again. It may take some trial and error, but she seems to be going about it the right way.
In addition to making these dietary changes, Johnson is still going through some tests — she has a GI tract analysis coming up, she said. She will more than likely share the results with her followers on Instagram.
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