Auto immune disease is so interesting and not as complicated as they sound.

We  all have have an immune system. A group of  cells and tissues and organs. Working together. Making saliva, gastric juices,  skin, white blood cells, chemicals,within our bodies. Neutrophils. Eosinophils. Monocytes. Basophils. Lymphocytes. Antibodies.  A special team, protecting all of the body from infection from everything.

Autoimmune disease is the immune system, the special team, becoming over zealous and it begins to attack the body it is supposed to be fighting for. The body attacks itself. It actually starts working against the rest of the cells, tissues and organs. Instead of just attacking foreign invasion, the germs and viruses, pollens, and poisons it begins to attack every part of the body the germs, viruses, pollens, and  poisons have touched.

An allergy is stage I of the immune system overreacting.  A harmless something comes in contact with the body. The pollen from a sunflower, or seed from the peanut plant. The immune system doesn’t like it so it calls the B-cells and tells em to make the antibodies IgE or IgG. B cells get over excited and make too many antibodies and then the immune cells , basophils and mast cells, which release the inflammatory chemicals, like histimine. Eyes start running, noses start sneezing. This is class I,II and III of the reactions. Then if the immune system really gets into it, it goes to Class IV reaction, and the T cells are called, T cells are like kamikaze’s they damage themselves or will activate macrophages and eosinophils, these will damage the host cells- Kind of kill the host then the invader will leave tactic.  IE, the throat starts to swell.

The next stage of a manic immune system is when those B cells and T cells get to working together, to wipe out the invader, which is now the gut, the skin, the muscles, the nerves, the bones, the liver, the pancreas, whatever ‘they’ have decided is invaded with some toxin.  The immune system is doing it’s job. It is battling what ever it deems as unhealthy.  The body is now unhealthy, because it is infected with something. This is an autoimmune disease.

Take someone who is Celiac or Gluten intolerant. Gluten which is not digestible, by anyone, is causing issues in the gut, which is leaking and not absorbing properly, so the hyper sensitive B cells start producing antibodies to attack the gluten. The gluten has leaked out of the gut into the blood and is attaching  to what ever the blood goes to.  So the antibodies start to mess with the gut, the skin, the organs trying to get to the gluten. The immune system tries to fix what it sees as damages to the body it sends, more gastric juices in the stomach, as it is supposed to do. But it sends it over and over, an over abundance,  then there is an ulcer and or GERD.

Autoimmunity is either organ-specific or systemic.  Type I diabetes is organ-specific, caused by immune cells mistaking insulin-producing pancreatic β cells as foreign. Yet, lupus, can be,  antibodies that recognize antigens being expressed by  healthy cells. Genetics play a huge role in Autoimmune diseases. If grandma had it you do too.  It is just that now we have a name for it, and a way to stop it. Instead of taking a pill for whatever ails you, you change what you eat, change what is going in the body and you heal. You give those B’s and T’s a rest.