I am considering quiting the gluten free diet I decided to undergo some months ago. I have benn gluten free for nearly 4 months now. I want your advice on this.

THe gluten relation to autoimmune disease is not widespread here and it is not known by any physicians. I visited a nutriologist and she agrees thre can be health benefits from being gluten free for a while, but just for a while, because acording to her, gluten is also necessary.

I never take any blood tests and just decided to be on the gluten free diet by myself. I dind't follow it perfectly though because i took some products that may contain gluten such as yogurt, chocolate and others.

It is becoming more and more difficult to follow this diet. So i don't know if i should continue doing the diet for a bit longer or not. My pain is pretty much the same...

On the other hand, i wanted to ask you about the tens machine. I bought a machine las saturday and i used it for 30 minutes. I felt considerable releif. But yesterday i used it at night and today i am feeling a lot of pain. Could this be related to the TENS? Should i stop using it? Thank you

Being gluten free is not easy. I have negative blood work, but decided to try it and wore myself out with the cooking....hubby could not cook gluten free for me, and many days he cooks.

16% of Idiopathic Neuropathy is thought to potentially be due to Celiac Disease.

I think that you can live a healthy life without gluten, so I disagree with your nutritionist. However, the gluten free lifestyle is not without challenges.

On the TENS. I had one, and it never helped me one iota, however, many people get a great deal of relief. Perhaps you used it too long or at too high of an intensity. TENS does stimulate muscle to contract if on a high enough setting....I could if I wanted get my whole arm to move...now this was 20 years ago, and I hope technology has advanced since then.

Take a few days off from the TENS and then try using it for a shorter time, and keep the intensity low.

Yes, your nutritionist is totally wrong. NO ONE NEEDS GLUTEN IN THEIR LIFE! There is not a single nutrient in gluten that anyone needs. Nothing. This "whole wheat" craze that the industry is trying to push on people is just another way to make money. More and more people are becoming gluten intolerant all the time. I am a celiac and I belong to a celiac support. Every month we have at the very least, 10 new members. I find that very sad. The wheat they are growing now has been so scienitifically messed with that the majority of us can no longer tolerate it--it is not the wheat that our ancestors grew.

Monica, 4 months really isn't long enough, especially if you are not going totally gluten free and only you can do that. Many yogurts are gluten free, so are many chocolates, you just have to read ingredients. I am not sure where you are from, but most countries know more about celiac disease than the US does. The best celiac doctors in the US are not home grown, they are from foreign countries.

My neuropathy was caused by my vitamin and mineral deficiencies from undiagnosed celiac disease. If you are gluten intolerant and you do go back to eating gluten, then you will only being causing more damage to your system.

There is so much evidence that wheat is just not good for the body. Even tho I am negative for gluten antibodies I am gluten free now. My disease was considered stable when I went to Mayo a year ago. I was tested there and told I had no issues with wheat. I added wheat back into my diet. I have gone to the bad place and back with problems related to my diseases in the past year. Did wheat play a part in that? I don't know. But on the oft chance that it did, I am gluten free since Jan. 1st this year.

If it takes even a small amt of this inflammation down and makes my life more bearable, it is a small sacrifice to bake my own bread. It just takes a brain shift to do it.

Billye

Could you suggest a book that you thing would be of help with this Diet.
Thanks Sue

Thank you for your replies.

This is so dificult to understand. I am 23 years old and was perfectly healthy for 21 years so.... why did gluten sudenly become a problem to me?? If i was intolerant to gluten, wouln't this intolerance have apeared earlier?? Or can something triger this intolerance?

It makes me so sad delicious cookies i love are full of this damaging substance: gluten... I love bread, cookies, oatmeal, pasta, beer, soy sauce... but i think the most difficult part of the gluten free diet is being around people who are offering you to eat this or eat that... I hate to disapoint people, sometimes when i reject somthing people feel that i am picky... i could explain, but it is uncomfortable to be explaining everyone your health issues... I have decided to tell people i am allergic to wheat. That is somethin easier to understand....

There is somethin else that has been dificult. I don't know how to know if somethin has gluten or not. It is not as esasy here because many labels don't mention ingredients properly. Do you know any easy guidelines? Or should i refrain from eating anything i am not sure has gluten or not??

Well i guess i will just put uo with the "side effects" of being gluten free

Thank you

Going gluten-free is not easy--simply because wheat, rye and barley products are used as thickeners and extenders in so many processed foods, and they are often well hidden in the ingredient list (modified food starch? malt flavoring?).

The best thing to do is to try to eat as UNprocessed a diet as possible. Fruits and vegetables, plain meats if you want them, eggs, if you tolerate those, dairy if you can handle that (although many people with gluten sensitivity also have caesin--dairy protein--sensitivity as well).

I miss bagels, pizza, cake . . .but there are some gluten-free varieties out there. These are often available at places like Trader Joe's or Whole Foods, and a little cheaper than at the specialty health food stores. One of the problems with gluten-free baked goods is that they are considerably more expensive. But some good choices can be found, and I urge you to post to the gluten board here, and read the Useful Websites section on it--there are many food/recipe/product suggestions/links.

Any doctor who says gluten is NECESSARY for human nutrition loses my respect immediately. There is NO one single food that humans must have--there are always other sources of calories, vitamins, minerals. Water is essential, but beyond that, there are many choices.

More and more evidence is accumulating that gluten can allow autoimmune reactions to be triggered by influencing the action of zonulin, which is a substance that mediates cellular spacing. Too much zonulin, and the spaces between intestinal cells becomes too large, allowing not so-friendly molecules to pass into the system and trigger reactions. (People forget that the real first line of immunoprotection in the body is the gut.)

of steroids and NSAIDs leads to gluten intolerance. These drugs suppress Cox-2 enzymes in the lining of the gut, which are the gatekeepers to keeping things from passing into the blood stream like the gluten peptide and and other large
immune stimulating things that are in food. (there was a paper printed on this in 1999).

So yes, many may develop this with time. You had the very high dose of prednisone for 3 months and it could have damaged your GI tract.

Tinkyada pasta is just excellent IMO and even for non-gluten diets. It has a lower glycemic index being from brown rice.

In the final analysis, it is your decision, Monica.

There are some very good books out there. "The Gluten Free Bible", "Gluten Free For Dummies", I love the Dummies books, they are very well written, "Allergy Free", by Konrad Kail is another good book, I have another one, but I loaned it to a friend and can't remember the name of it. There are forums online that are very good, there is a froum here, but it isn't very busy. This is an excellent forum, with very informed people: http://www.glutenfreeandbeyond.org/forum/ , another forum, which is more talky is www.celiac.com . I am always available to answer questions. I have been gluten free for 7 1/2 yrs, my sister is also celiac and a dietician too.

I agree, it's not always easy, yet, it's not as difficult as it used to be. Many more companies are listing gluten free on their products now. You don't have to buy processed products. Eat whole foods. Eat potatoes, fresh meats, fresh veggies and fruits. Stay away from processed foods. If you like spaghetti, there is Tinkyada brand, which is gluten free and very good, and can be found quite often in the supermarket, they also make macaroni. You can make your own sauces. You can go online and find the companies that make gluten free spices, McCormacks have always been gluten free. I am not sure anymore about the spices, I am intolerant of so much that I eat very simple and stay away from all spices. I wish I was a "normal" celiac. I am intolerant of all grains, no nightshades, no cruciferous veggies, no red meats, no shellfish--so actually, going gluten free was the easy part for me.

You can google "gluten free foods" and find so much now. When my sister and I were trying to figure out what was wrong with us 8 yrs ago, the info was much harder to find and the doctor's knew less than nothing. When she asked her doctor to test her for celiac disease, he laughed at her. She insisted he do the testing and after he found celiac disease and realized how bad the damage actually was, he fell all over himself apologizing for his ignorance. Doctors still do not get it here. They are getting better, but they have a long way to go.

Ask away, if I know the answer I will be happy to help, if I do not know the answer, I will get it for you.

Deb

I can personally vouch for these products: http://www.glutenevolution.com/

The pumkin bread is so wonderful and they will be coming out with a new rosemary bread soon. Can't wait for it. And the pie crust makes wonderful apple pie (and fruit pies). I tried all the mixes I could find and this one was the best by far. Sure beat all the rice breads. It tastes like a good wholewheat bread. And they are easy to do.

Billye