Mosaics' Blog

Wow, after reading a few blogs here and the suffering that so many celiacs have endured, I realize that I've had it easy!I have a very close family friend that had a mental breakdown when he was in his 50's. He was subsequently diagnosed with celiac disease so that's how I became familiar with the disease.Fast forward about 12 yrs. later and I happened to be talking to my uncle (mother's youngest brother) who, at the time, was about 54. He told me he had been losing weight by default. When I questioned him about it he told me it was because of this diet he was on and he described it to me. I said, "Oh, you have celiac disease?!" He couldn't believe I knew about it because his doc had told him it was "so rare". Well, I knew that celiac disease is genetic and that some of my family members exhibited symptoms. So I sent out a mass e-mail to my family with info on celiac disease and said that everyone needs to get tested. At the time, my oldest brother was suffering from such bad acid reflux that he had a nodule on his vocal chords. He also had an internal hemorrhoid that was giving him terrible pain. He had been trying to control his symptoms through diet...just not the right kind of diet. The doctors said, "more fiber, more fiber" which meant more and more grain (wheat!) and they wanted to operate. Well, my brother didn't take the time to get tested. He went gluten-free ASAP. He said that within two days he was 95% better. About a month later, I had myself and my two children tested and we all tested positive. We had no noticeable symptoms...at least none that I attributed to celiac disease at the time, so I was sure we didn't have it. I had acid reflux which caused me to take a Zantac almost every night. Since going gluten-free, I have never had to take another Zantac. I had been waking up in the middle of the night with stomach pains and nausea, but had attributed it to the reflux. Now I know better.My son was small for his age and had a huge growth spurt the year after going gluten-free. I don't know if his diet had anything to do with it or not, but I'm glad to not have to find out. He also is lactose intolerant, but is recovering from that. He never has to take a Lactaid pill anymore, but we all still drink Lactaid milk just because we're in the habit. Both my kids suffered with bone pains that the doctors called growing pains. My 21 y.o. daughter still has them. She also had insomnia, very low calcium, and dangerously low B12. All those symptoms have improved, but aren't entirely gone.The more I learn about celiac disease, the more I realize that I had symptoms, but just didn't recognize them because I thought they were normal since I lived with them all my life. Thankfully, they weren't terrible debilitating symptoms and I've discovered the disease before it cause more damage and before it could harm my children even more than it already has. The disease definitely came from my mother's side of the family and I've since learned that she had two or three uncles (on her father's side) die from colon cancer (years ago) so I figure that the disease came from her father's side.Well, that's my story in a nutshell. Not quite as dramatic as some others here, but that's OK by me!