CELIAC Disease

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Most of the things you used to eat before can be recreated as gluten free versions using almond flour, coconut oil, and stevia, if you are so inclined. It helps in the beginning to do that, so you don't feel deprived and you don't freak out and then go on a gluten splurge. This site has many gluten free recipes that work really well:

http://www.elanaspantry.com/

Apart from that I cook a lot of asian food and latino food, as neither of those rely on gluten as a staple.

A lot of local stores, including the major chains, around here have small sections just for gluten free food. Cookies, crackers, noodles, mac & cheese, bread, cakes, brownies etc. Ever since the whole gluten-free fad, the amount of gluten-free food available has exploded. Companies are constantly coming out with new stuff (in fact, I'm looking at brand websites right now and they have way more stuff than I remember). It's now really easy to get fat off gluten-free food because there's so many choices and they taste so good. Hell, there's a local pizza delivery place the will deliver GF pizza. It ain't half bad and I'm yet to feel ill from there.

Glutino makes GF chocolate covered pretzels which are to die for. Kinnikinnick makes all sorts of frozen donuts and cinnamon rolls. Udi's, in my opinion, makes the best gluten-free bread available (nuke it in the microwave for about 10 to 20 seconds to make it warm or better yet, spread some butter or fat on a slice and toast it on the stove). Annie's Homegrown makes the best boxed mac & cheese on the market. I've even been told by my gluten eating family members that they prefer it over Annie's regular mac & cheese. Bisquick makes a surprisingly simple and tasty pancake mix. There's a lot more companies out there with great products.

For booze, there are GF beers, but they're kinda disgusting unless you're already drunk. As a substitute, I drink apple ciders like Woodchuck and Carlton Cyderworks. Wines are naturally gluten-free. They say harder alcohols are naturally gluten-free too, but I wouldn't bet my life on it. If I go for a harder alcohol, I make sure it's made from a non-grain source. Those alcohols tend to be of higher quality anyways.

Also certain companies, like Kraft, have a "Hide No Gluten" policy. If there's gluten in the product, they'll label it.

For any person with Celiac Disease, I recommend Gluten-Free Girl. She released a book that's sort of an autobiography but it's also a cookbook too. After I got diagnosed with Celiac Disease, I literally had an irrational fear of food and I was cursing at my luck. It was a nightmare. Her book eased my mind quite bit and made me a little more open to trying other foods. Suddenly having Celiac Disease wasn't so bad after all. It's also pretty entertaining.

Wish someone told me that when I got first diagnosed. I spent years with my candida infection. Couldn't eat popcorn, any nut, seed, potato skins and a handful of other foods. Taking diluted apple cider vinegar a couple of times a day in combination with probiotic supplementation turned it all around. Supposedly ACV raises the acidity of your stomach acid and candida can't live in more acidic environments, unlike probiotics that, I hear, thrives in it.

I've been gluten free for about over a year, although I've never been tested to see if I had celiac. I would love to get the testing, but I don't know if Medicare pays for it. However the main reason why I avoid getting tested is because the awful effects gluten has on me. It gives me bad headaches (it feels like the inside of my head is on fire and my brain is being squeezed) I become extremely irritable to any annoyance and I lose interest in people almost completely. I also become prone to just sitting somewhere and getting stuck in a crying fit, and I have no idea why. Plus I become extremely ravenous and lethargic, and I'll eat like food is going out of style. It messes up other organ functions too, unfortunately.

It's wouldn't be so bad if I got to endure this at home or somewhere quiet, but at work I'd be tempted to rip someone a new orifice once glutened up. It sucks.

Prebiotics will make candida worse, probiotics will not - just for clarification purposes.
And probiotics help enormously, I don't know what I would do without them.

Eating out is a whole new mine-field. Sure, Dominos Pizza now has a gluten-free crust....but it's prepared by 18 y/olds who have no idea what cross contamination is...let alone that Dominos probably isn't training them/providing un-glutened pans & equipment to cook it in.

I did try a local Greek restaurant...but the shish-k-bob wasn't ever skewered (no holes in any of the meat or veggies) they'd just cooked it all on the same grill top that they toast pita bread on. I wasn't even done with my meal before I had to run to the ladies room!

So, it's May 1, 2013 & my dx no longer exists here in the good ol' U.S. of A. I'm now an Autistic (adult diagnosed) with Celiac disease (as this whole thread is about).

I came back on after some time away because it is 5/1 & I'm trying to see if I feel different as an Autie rather than Aspie?

Re-read some of my posts & realized I need to add ANOTHER dx to my ever-growing list: Diabetes. Looks like an auto-immune situation (so, not T1 or T2....some say T1.5 or T1a/b/c or LADA or MODY) who knows? My Doc doesn't seem to care WHICH type it is. (and this is my SECOND Dr., I fired the one that dx me....they didn't see the need for me to test my blood glucose...WTH?)

I'm not sure why your doctor didn't test you for multiple things after you were DX'ed with CD.

I got tested on a bunch of things - blood sugar, blood pressure, Diabetes, thyroid testing, Hashimoto's & Graves, hormones, lactose and casein intolerance, and almost every vitamin and mineral level known to mankind was tested too.

They've been monitoring them ever since too - when I first got there after being DX'ed, I was on the verge of developing type 1 diabetes and Hashimoto's, not to mention my iron deficiency was the worst they had ever seen. After a lot of treatment, all the things listed have mostly normalized, although they're all still on the lower side, but stable.

Had they not tested me straight after my DX I surely would be a diabetic by now.

Having CD puts you at risk for other things - better to get tested and get treatment if necessary than risk them becoming permanent conditions, or developing more autoimmune diseases.

Try the GAPS diet.

I was tested for many auto-immune conditions at that time. But my Diabetes 'popped up' on the night of January 4th of this year. I woke up with a RAGING thirst that I couldn't slake with 6 glasses of water over an hour.
Kept an eye on myself & that same thing happened 2 more times over that next 2 weeks....the 4th time was one morning after I'd had a piece of left-over birthday cake for breakfast....SCARED the you-know-what out of me & I called my Dr's office for an urgent/same-day appt.
Had the fasting blood tests the next day. My OGTT was 295 at 2 hours & my HbA1c was only 5.7 (because I went in w/in 3 weeks of onset of symptoms)
The good news is that my 2nd HbA1c (taken last week) was at 5.4. (Neither of my HbA1c's "say" Diabetes....but my 2 hr OGTT puts me solidly with it.)
So, it seems my STRICT low-carb, low sugar diet & exercise (along with the Metformin) is doing the job I don't drink any sugar-sweetened beverages (OR use any chemical/artificial sweetners...just Stevia) and I have greatly restricted my eating of sweets (I pass on candy at the movies & have pretty much given up desserts).

Vegetable oil contains gluten too. Switching to olive oil has helped my stomach a lot. Nothing worse than having your food deep-fried in something you're allergic too. Olive oil is healthier anyway.

! !! Seriously? I've never heard that one before! I wonder how it might have gluten?? Of course, olive oil is always a better choice regardless!

Why would you say that? Unless you mean that the oil in the fryer got cross-contaminated by breaded meats (chicken nuggets) or onion rings, then no, Vegetable oil is not manufactured with any sort of wheat/barley or rye product in it.