Celiac-lou

  On 3/19/2011 at 6:58 PM, ravenwoodglass said:

Sometimes the best thing we can do is to bring our own food or eat before we go and just enjoy the company. Don't let people guilt you into making yourself sick it just isn't worth it.

I agree! I just bring my own food so that I don't have to endure any negativity towards my needs. It makes it all the more special when people DO ask what they can bring for you or are careful enough to label dishes at a potluck or get together etc. I found that it really is no different then when I was vegetarian for 13 years prior to being diagnosed or the special considerations I need for the few things I am allergic to. Look out for number one and enjoy being with other people.

Very interesting mushroom! I think the immune system parasites I heard about were in fact things like worms, flukes and protozoans of other types. I also grew up in pretty normal kid conditions BUT my mother was a clean freak due to allergies that my brother had. She did smoke while pregnant and continued that until I was almost 16 years old so I often wonder about environmental influences such as that. Not that I am blaming anyone, just curious.

I agree with your comments re:population control to some extent. I have often jokingly made the comment that I am no longer "fit to survive" should there be any immediate crisis to the human race...especially one that limited the food supply. I guess I could start by moving out of the prairies where I am surrounded by mono-culture wheat crops! LOL

Thanks for your comments!

  On 3/17/2011 at 4:57 AM, mushroom said:

I am a strong believer in the "messing around with wheat" theory. I am very anti GMO and think it spells disaster for our population - maybe this will be the new population control: Only those whose immune systems scan adapt to genetic modification will survive; the rest of us will die out through Darwinian selection. In fact, if it had not been for modern medicine developing along with GM engineering,so that we can test for this autoimmune reaction and thus know to avoid these products, maybe we would already be well on the way. As it is the epidemic is still rising to pandemic levels. Otherwise infertility (without IVF) would be modifying procreation rates and the population would be dropping instead of rising to unsustainable levels.

The three products that send my body into the greatest tizzy are wheat, corn and soy, three of the most genetically modified crops on the globe (except6ing cotton, which is not edible thank God). Until I reached the United States I had never to my knowledge had genetically modified corn - the only corn I had ever eaten was straight off the unmodified cob right out of the garden, and I was right as rain. As soon as I hit the Americas I started having problems. My hub's grandmother (Welsh) always complained about the American flour, that it didn't "behave right" when she was making Yorkshire pudding. Now presumably this was because of the tetraploid and hexaploid modifications done to the basic diploid wheat protein. And as for soy, well my poor little deprived bunch of genes had never been exposed to it before hitting US shores

As for the immune system theory, well I grew up on a farm, a BIG farm, and ate my fair share of dirt and was exposed to animals and didn't wash my hands (like most kids) and I didn't get sick until I moved to the city where I was exposed to city germs - came down with - chicken pox, English measles, scarlet fever, and every G**D*** respiratory virus that was within coo-wee of my neighbourhood.

So I am sure I was exposed to plenty of parasites, but not the big city "germs". Don't know where that leaves my position on this issue. I think my susceptibility to the respiratory viruses was because my immune system was already compromised by the gluten. And that makes me more susceptible to the others too, I guess - I just was not exposed out in that pure country air But I was certainly not a bubble-wrapped kid - hell, my mother didn't even know where I was every day from the time I was 2 years old until the time I came home for food

I have been hearing some about some interesting theories on why people in the west and developed nations have so many auto-immune disorders and/celiac disease. I am very curious as to what others think!

Basically, the theory is that our immune systems are not really challenged on a continual basis due to good hygene and quality of food we have. In the not so distant past, it was common for almost everyone to have a parasite of one kind or another. The presence of the parasite kept our immune systems working to eliminate 'foreign bodies' and therefore working on the things that could really harm us. The absence of this challenge causes our immune systems to over react to normal proteins or tissues in the body, thus causing some kind of auto-immune disorder. Apparently, some people have had success but introducing a parasite that enables their body to re-focus on the real issues.

Secondly, and more specific to Celiac disease, I heard that the refinement of flour over the past 200 years has caused our bodies to become 'sensitive' to gluten. This practice apparently became common in europe in order to take flour milling business from the independant mills and make it more commercial. This practice came over to North America soon after settlement and had been a part of our diets for generations.

SO, any thoughts on these two ideas would be appreciated. I am not saying that I buy into either...just looking for a discussion and hopefully some other insight and information.

Sincerely,

Celiac-Lou