Autoimmune Awareness Month: What Living with Coeliac Disease Has Taught Me About Healing

Autoimmune Disease, Gut Health & Acupuncture: My Journey with Coeliac Disease.

March is Autoimmune Awareness Month, and it feels like the right moment to talk about something that has shaped my own journey into healing.

I live with an autoimmune disease: coeliac disease.

For anyone unfamiliar, coeliac disease is a condition where the immune system reacts to gluten and attacks the lining of the small intestine. The only medical treatment is a strict lifelong gluten-free diet.

But living with an autoimmune condition is rarely as simple as removing one thing from your diet.

Growing Up with Coeliac Disease

Food is such a central part of how we connect with people. It’s how families gather. It’s how friendships form. It’s how celebrations happen.

So growing up with coeliac disease wasn’t just about avoiding gluten - it was about constantly feeling slightly outside of those moments. Birthday parties, school lunches, holidays, dinners with friends… food was always involved. And I often felt like the difficult one. The person asking questions. The person needing something different. The person everyone had to adjust things for. Sometimes people were understanding, but other times it made me feel like a nuisance. Like I was making things complicated.

Over time, that really affected my relationship with food. Food stopped feeling simple or joyful. It became something I had to constantly manage and think about. I was reading ingredient labels everywhere I went, worrying about cross-contamination, navigating restaurants cautiously and trying to do everything “right” to feel well again.

And yet even after removing gluten completely, I still didn’t always feel well.

I often felt exhausted.

My digestion felt delicate.

My nervous system was sensitive and easily overwhelmed.

At times it felt like my body was working against me.

When I Started Looking at Health Differently

My experience with coeliac disease is actually one of the things that led me into studying acupuncture and holistic medicine in the first place.

When you live with something long-term in your body, you start asking deeper questions.

Why does the body react this way?

What actually helps the body heal?

And how do we support the immune system without constantly fighting against it?

When I began studying Chinese medicine, something clicked.

In Traditional Chinese Medicine, the digestive system is seen as the centre of health. The Spleen and Stomach are responsible for transforming food into energy that nourishes the entire body. When this system becomes weakened, the body can struggle with things like inflammation, fatigue, brain fog and immune dysregulation. Reading about this felt strangely familiar. It described so much of what I had been experiencing.

Rather than viewing the body as “broken”, Chinese medicine looks at the patterns underneath symptoms and asks: where is the body out of balance?

That perspective completely changed how I related to my health.

The Gut in Ayurveda: Everything Begins with Agni

Alongside Chinese medicine, I also became deeply interested in Ayurveda, the traditional medicine of India.

In Ayurveda, health begins with something called Agni, the digestive fire. Agni isn’t just about digesting food. It’s about how we digest everything in life: food, emotions, stress and experience. When Agni is strong, the body can transform nutrients efficiently and maintain balance. But when Agni becomes weakened or disrupted, toxins (known as Ama) can accumulate in the body and contribute to inflammation and chronic illness.

For someone with an autoimmune condition affecting the gut, this perspective resonated deeply with me. It reinforced the idea that supporting digestion is one of the most important foundations for health.

The Role Acupuncture Has Played in My Own Healing

Acupuncture became one of the most powerful tools in helping me support my body. It helped regulate my nervous system when I felt stuck in stress or overwhelm. It supported my digestion. It helped me reconnect with my body in a much gentler way.

And perhaps most importantly, it shifted the way I thought about healing. Instead of constantly trying to “fix” my body, I started learning how to support it.

Autoimmune disease can often feel like your body is fighting against itself. Holistic medicine offers a different perspective, one where we focus on restoring balance, strengthening the body’s systems and calming the underlying stress responses that can drive inflammation.

Acupuncture doesn’t “cure” autoimmune disease. But it can create the conditions where the body begins to feel safer, calmer and more resilient.

Why I Treat the Way I Do

One of the reasons I care so deeply about the work I do is because I know what it feels like to live with a body that isn’t always predictable. I understand the exhaustion of trying different things to feel better. I understand the emotional side of chronic illness, the social side and the feeling of not quite fitting in sometimes. And I understand how powerful it can feel when you finally start finding tools that genuinely support your body.

This is why I treat the way I do.

My goal in the clinic is never just to treat symptoms, but to support the whole person - their nervous system, digestion, energy and emotional wellbeing. Because healing is rarely about one single treatment or one single answer. It’s about gently bringing the body back into balance.

Healing Is Not Linear

Living with an autoimmune condition has taught me that healing is rarely straightforward. There are periods where everything feels balanced, and moments where symptoms flare up again.

But through acupuncture, Chinese medicine, Ayurveda, Reiki and other holistic practices, I’ve learned to listen to my body in a completely different way. My experience with coeliac disease is actually one of the reasons I feel so passionate about supporting others through acupuncture.

Because when you live with a chronic condition, being truly heard and understood matters.

Acupuncture Treatments in Somerset

I offer acupuncture, Reiki, and holistic treatments from my clinic just outside Castle Cary in Somerset.

If you’re curious about how these approaches may support your health, you’re always welcome to reach out or book a treatment.

You can learn more here:

www.minnieflorencehealing.com

Love, Minnie x