ReneeBTX

  On 3/21/2010 at 2:28 PM, Heidi Elaine Dowding said:

I've been gluten-free for almost a year now and originally started the diet in a weird way. I live in South Korea as a teacher, and started seeing a traditional doctor because of my all-around poor health and fatigue. He recommended losing wheat from my diet, and I found it to be incredibly helpful. I know I eventually need to go to a proper doctor and get tested, but it's difficult to find one and know what I should be testing for.

I feel a million times better now that I'm gluten-free, but it's really demanding to stay gluten-free while living in South Korea (finding food can be a pain, and reading labels in hangul takes forever, etc etc). I find that my boyfriend isn't very helpful, and sometimes I'm sure that he thinks I'm crazy- I feel incredibly high-maintenance because of the diet. How much support should I expect from him at this point?

I could really use any advice as I feel a bit adrift out here in SK, with absolutely no friends with food allergies...

How much support should you expect? Total and complete support. And nothing less than that. Just because you have no been diagnosed with some deadly disease does not mean your significant others shouldn't support your decisions for your health 100%. If there's anything less than 100% support for your decisions in a relationship......then that relationship is doomed anyway. This would just be the beginning. What if he didn't support how you felt about how to raise children, or what if he didn't want kids but you did? How about if he didn't like your religion? Two people who expect to share their lives, HAVE to support each other 100%, no ifs, no ands, and no buts. So, I don't think you're expecting too much, on the contrary. You are not high maintenance, but I wonder how he'd feel if it were deadly for your to consume a particular food....would he still think you were "crazy"?? Might be a red flag, might not be.

Since going gluten free I've lost 35 pounds. They say that most people gain weight but I think that's just a generalization. I wouldn't worry unless you start to look ill or something. I've only been gluten-free since October.

  On 3/14/2010 at 2:53 PM, canutillomom said:

I have been gluten free for a few weeks now and had finally started healing (the first 2 weeks or so were sooo very bad). I explained to my family what was going on and thought I had their support.

Well, my cousin had our family over for dinner 2 nights ago and swore to me that everything would be gluten free. While we were there I questioned the safety of one dish and she said she had used a mixture of corn starch and potato starch and not wheat flour.

After dinner she asked how I liked it and how I felt. I said that everything tasted it very good and I felt fine. Then she started saying I don't have celiac disease because that was wheat flour!

24 hours after that I started itching like crazy and feeling like I had been rolled up in barbed wire and I spent most of last night in the bathroom for "different issues."

I am furious! And extremely uncomfortable! I have new outbreaks on my inner thighs and across my stomach.

Why would someone do that? (she said she did that because I didn't receive a "clinical diagnosis" just the doc saying what it was and wanted to prove to me that I could eat gluten). Are there other people out there doing stuff like this???

That would be the very LAST time I EVER ate at her home, or had her over to mine. I'm sorry, but you don't mess around with food sensitivities or allergies! You don't play games with diseases that are fatal if not taken seriously! She is DANGEROUS. I'm not even remotely joking. I would never step foot in her home, and never have her in mine. That's just how it is. If this were a deadly allergy......she could have KILLED YOU. And actually, it needs to be explained to her that way. I don't mean to sound like I'm yelling at you, I am not, but people like that just tork me right off. Playing games with other people's lives will land them in jail, in court, etc. I'm sure she felt like a real winner that night, but I feel differently on that matter.

I am so sorry you have to deal with family members like this. Sadly, I can relate because all of mine think I'm a complete and utter hypochondriac, and I refuse to eat at their homes or allow them to cook for me or have access to my food because I have no doubt that they'd probably try some little stunt like this.

I have not read all the replies, but I have no doubt that you'll handle this the way I probably would. I can't stand people who think they know everything.

I am getting incredibly frustrated. It seems that everytime I turn around, something comes out about the multivitamin I want to take and how it won't help and isn't good. So, I'm at my wit's end.

What brands of multivitamins are good for people with celiac? What kinds are you all taking, or do you just take certain vitamins and skip the all encompassing multi? Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

RBTX

I've been gluten-free now for 4 months. I was just diagnosed with Celiac a week ago. No testing, just the basis of my health issues improving with gluten-free diet. I've been struggling with health issues since 1996.

My problem is family members. Some of them rather loud and rude. The word hypochondriac is frequently thrown in my general direction when speaking about the food I have to eat now. Or the food I can not eat. Even after informing them about Celiac Disease, and before that generalized gluten intolerance, I can not make them understand that Celiac is no laughing matter. I have had comments ranging from "wow, you're really taking this too seriously..." to "if it's not an actual allergy, it's not real".

How can you get family to take the disease as seriously as it should be taken, and how can you teach them that it's not something to snicker at? Any ideas or advice is appreciated! Thanks, in advance!

RBTX