At Home Food Sensitivity Testing with Helix
(This is a sponsored post written by me on behalf of Helix. All opinions are 100% mine.)
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If you’re following me on Instagram, you may have seen that I recently got the coolest thing in the mail. A company called Helix sent me a DNA test. This particular test is called Food Sensitivity+, made
by EverlyWell and powered by Helix. Together, they’ll tell me if I have
any sensitivities to certain foods, plus measure my genetic
predisposition to metabolize and absorb foods and vitamins. What does
that all mean? Well simply said, Food Sensitivity+ needs just a few
drops of blood (plus some saliva for the DNA part of the test) and it
can test for my reactivity to 96 foods (like gluten, wheat, and dairy)
as well as genetic influences on sensitivity to lactose and metabolism
of caffeine, Vitamin B12, Vitamin B6, and magnesium. That’s pretty rad!
This test is a quick (results come
within about a week!), non-invasive way to figure out what your food
sensitivities are. Helix’s proprietary technology, called Exome+, reads
every letter of all 22,000 protein-coding genes in your body, which
produces 100 times more data than most consumer genetics companies.
Then, once you’ve taken and sent back your DNA sample, they’ll store and
protect your genetic data so you can access and share it with any
partner of your choosing without ever having to provide another DNA
sample. And if you’re interested in finding out more about your DNA,
Helix offers other tests to help you dive further into that information,
too. They offer cool tests for ancestry, family planning, hereditary
cancer screening - all kinds of different things if you’re interested in
exploring further!
Two years ago, I was diagnosed with
‘IBS’ after blood and stool tests plus an endoscopy, colonoscopy and an
ingestible camera found nothing but healthy organs with a lot of
inflammation. Eventually, after many tests and dietary restrictions,
doctors finally figured out that I was having reactions to soy. They
figured that was what was causing all my abdominal pain, content bowel
movements, and eczema breakouts - and they were mostly right. Now I’ve
been soy-free for almost two years and while the abdominal issues,
cramping, and overall IBS symptoms have stopped, the eczema and adult
acne have only gotten worse. And while I’ve tried tweaking my diet here
and there, it can be really hard to pinpoint when you’re shooting in the
dark. With Food Sensitivity+, you’ll learn your body’s sensitivity to
many common foods AND the impact your DNA may have on your ability to
digest certain foods and nutrients. That’s pretty awesome, because it
also gives you the tools to create long-term meal plans and food
awareness for yourself, plus it'll help you understand which foods may
be triggering you and causing your symptoms. You’ll know which foods
your body should be getting more of and what you might want to try reducing from your diet to see how you feel.
?The process was super easy. I ordered
my kits online and they arrived within just a couple days. For the
Helix part of the test, the DNA part, I just needed a simple saliva
sample. Spit in a tiny tube, close it up, and shake it up! For the
EverlyWell part of the test, the blood part, I did a simple finger
prick, then put drops of my blood onto a biomarker collection card. Then
all I had to do was drop my samples into a pre-addressed, safety sealed
envelope and drop it into a mailbox! Two days later I got an e-mail
that my results had been received by the lab, and now I’m just a few
days out from my results. And I can’t wait! You can get 30% OFF any purchase on any Helix product with code: Helixivhk. But
HURRY - only the first 25 unique users get the discount! And stay
tuned - my results will be back soon and I’ll share them here!
See the video below for a sneak peek at contents of the FoodSensitivity+ blood test! ?