A woman, whose wife thought she was always drunk, has revealed how her symptoms were actually due to a rare food reaction.
Frankie Hurley-Peet used to be constantly active, often competing in marathons, with a clean bill of health.
Until one day, when she lost her balance, started slurring her words and her vision went blurry, before fainting.
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The 38-year-old, from Manchester, then developed a numbing sensation down her left calf, which quickly spread across the entire left side of her body.
Frankie initially worried she had suffered a stroke, but tests confirmed this not to be the case, and her wife [not named for privacy reasons], thought she was constantly drunk.
Fearing for her life, she went through more tests and found out she was, in fact, drunk – not due to bingeing on booze – but because of a reaction to eating gluten.
“I hadn’t touched a drop of alcohol, but I felt like I was constantly hammered,” the mitigation team leader told Need To Know.
“I was slurring my words, my head was fuzzy and I was always falling over.
“My words kept getting muddled up; I’d called the remote a ‘brick’ to my wife once, which we laughed about at first.
“But then, I couldn’t even finish a sentence.
“I worried about appearing drunk in public, especially at work – it was like my body was giving up on me.
“I researched my symptoms on Google, which suggested cutting out carbs.
“Miraculously, I felt like myself again.”
Frankie was initially diagnosed with a functional neurological disorder and chronic fatigue syndrome – which both have no cure.
In July 2018, she told her doctor at a follow-up appointment about her symptoms subsiding when avoiding carbohydrates, where coeliac disease was mentioned.
The auto-immune condition, which is treated with a gluten-free diet, causes the immune system to attack bodily tissue and damages the gut.
In Frankie’s case, her condition, gluten ataxia, is a similar neurological form of the disease, affecting those sensitive to a protein found in gluten products.
She said: “As I reintroduced the foods I had been craving; toast, fried chicken and malt chocolates, my symptoms returned immediately.
“A specialist confirmed my diagnosis and said I’d need to avoid gluten at all costs for the rest of my life.”
Frankie, who claims she would currently be in a wheelchair without speech if her diagnosis had been left any longer, is now raising awareness for the rare condition.
She’s taken on a skydive, raising £1,000 for Ataxia UK, and now regularly goes hiking, to the gym and plays tennis.
The mitigation team leader added: “A few months ago, I hadn’t even been able to walk to the kitchen – now look at me.
“I do miss my favourite foods, but I feel much better for cutting them out.
“I thought almost all of my damage was reversed, and while my brain function has improved to the extent my life is so much better, it’s still not normal.
“When I’m stressed out or poorly, I revert to being drunk.
“Had we found out the cause sooner, it would have been fully reversible and fixable.
“Far too many people are suffering without the right help, especially as no one thinks a food item could cause such debilitating symptoms.
“Fight for a diagnosis if you think something is wrong – as otherwise, it’ll be too late.”
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