kbtoyssni

Gosh, I'd be nervous about the Pringles can. They're hard to clean well. Maybe you could use a cardboard tube from wrapping paper or get one at a craft store instead?

Hay rides - I guess it really depends if it is wheat hay. I know I've seen some other parents on here say their child got sick from a hay ride. Is there a way you can call and find out what type of grass the hay is made from? A farmer should know if it's their own hay, but places that buy baled hay probably wouldn't have a clue.

Hot dogs, brats, chicken sausage, burgers or chicken breast wrapped in foil and grilled. *Most* brands are gluten-free, but you obviously have to check to be sure. Oscar Meyer is gluten-free (they're owned by Kraft) and so are most Johnsonville brats. Use foil so you don't have to worry about CC from everyone else's food and the charcoal. I usually do a chicken sausage and eat it right out of the foil, a bottle of ketchup handy to put a bit on each bite. It's easier than sitting down with plate to eat a grilled chicken breast.

Corn still in the cob is good and baked potatoes (also in foil), although they take a long time to bake so I microwave them until they're nearly cooked and then grill.

What do you usually have at a tailgate? I try to eat pretty much the same thing I used to eat with slight modifications.

This is a very personal decision. Some people need the "official" diagnosis from a doctor to be able to stay gluten-free, some don't. Some are ok with an enterolab diagnosis being their "official" one and don't feel the need to do traditional testing.

Some pros of pursuing further testing is that it may be easier to get a 504 plan for him when he starts school. But it is possible to find doctors who will diagnose based on dietary response and/or enterolab testing. You may have to search for one, but it's still possible to get an official note from a doctor.

Some cons are that it ma affect his ability to get individual health insurance and life insurance later in life.

There's also the fact that you may not get a positive blood test or scope in a 4-year-old. I'm assuming he had some symptoms if you did enterolab, so I'm guessing you'll keep him gluten-free even if the blood test is negative?

Most pet food contains gluten. What about the personal care products of other people in your household? Lotions? Do you share areas at work?

Even for those with shared kitchens, flour is probably the one thing I would recommend never allowing. That stuff gets everywhere and floats up in the air and settles as a fine powder that you can't really see and can't cleanup well.

Doctors are way to quick to treat the symptoms without addressing the cause but with the damage to the esophagus I wonder what else they could have done. I really want to get off the Nexium, they have tried weaning me off before but the acid reflux rebounds with a vengeance. Viscous cycle....

I wonder if there's anything more natural you can take to decrease the acid? Like you can get the HCl pills to increase acid - is there a basic yet more natural substance you could take instead?

I've also read things about most people not having enough stomach acid suggesting that some people need to take HCl to increase acid. The latest book I read (can't remember the name off the top, I can look it up if anyone wants the name) talked about carnivores having much more acidic stomachs in order to better digest meat. The author argued that humans were never originally designed to eat meat partly due to the lower stomach acid, but also because we really don't have carnivorous-type teeth. Not to take this thread too off-topic, but I'm wondering if most people need more acid because we tend to eat a lot of meat.

So Nexium is meant to decrease stomach acid to relieve symptoms of acid reflux and heartburn. This obviously doesn't get to the cause of the problem. If someone takes Nexium, do you think the reflux is still there, but is no longer uncomfortable because it's not acid coming up but just the food you eat?

I've never taken Nexium long term. I took it for a few weeks years ago when I only had mild celiac symptoms, but it made me feel much worse so I stopped taking it.

You could try getting yourself on a 504 plan. It's a legal document that will require them to provide food for you, and I'm sure you could put something in there about fruit and salad and the same meal over and over not counting as providing proper food. If they can't provide food, I think they'd have to either put you in a dorm with access to a kitchen or allow you to opt out of the meal plan.

Thanks for posting that link to the safe alcohols. The only problem I have with that list is that it lists Vodka but the majority of Vodkas are distilled with wheat, barley or rye.

You have to be careful to find the ones that are potatoe or grape based.

I found this out the hard way. I had a long discussion with a "pro" and he said that most of the vodkas that say distilled with grain are a gluten based grain.

Isn't this similar to the distilled vinegar debate? The distillation process should eliminate any gluten that was present. I drink all vodkas with no problem, but if you're very sensitive you might still have trouble with alcohol distilled from gluten grains.

wine coolers are safe??

since when?

You probably have to read the label. I personally have never found one that is safe - not that I've looked very hard - I thought they all contained malt.

Every one I've ever checked on does NOT put wheat in the chips. Some do fry them in oil that's contaminated, but that's a different story. Now please help us out with the names of the Mexican restaurants you've found that adds wheat flour to chips. That would be a comment that would actually be useful.

I think I have run into restaurants that use wheat flour to prevent their corn tortillas from sticking, though. Can't think of any names off the top, though.

I've also run into corn chips fried in contaminated oil, but never ones that have wheat added.

Also, with the shredded cheese, using flour to prevent clumping is now pretty much a celiac urban legend. If you look at labels, you'll see that pretty much every cheese uses cellulose to cut down on clumping. Cellulose is gluten-free. If they did use flour, at least in the U.S. the wheat would HAVE to be listed in the ingredients.

I was actually at Don Pablos restaurant a few months ago, and they use wheat flour to prevent clumping. I, too, thought it was somewhat of an urban legend, but I guess not! I've never seen any grated cheese at the store contain flour and never heard of another restaurant doing this, either.

Anything I eat, not just gluteny foods, make me sick.

Also, are you still eating gluten foods occasionally? If so you may not be feeling better since eating gluten on occasion will not allow the intestines to heal. I would also explore other reasons for the malabsorption. Celiac isn't the only potential cause, and there should have been another reason (blood test, always sick after eating bread, etc) for assuming it's celiac.

Processed foods are the ones you find on the inside aisles of stores - things in cans, boxes. Things that are single-serving sized. Things that you just pop in the microwave or oven. Things that do not occur naturally in nature. Things that contain ingredients you can't pronounce or don't know what they are. Shop the outside ring of the store. You'll find the most "natural"-type food there: fruits and veggies, plain meats.

I would suggest printing out the list of ingredients you can't have and taking that to the store with you. Once you find an item that's safe, you may have to eat it many times while you're researching other items you can eat. If you aren't sure, don't eat it!

CC is unlikely here. Bob's has a dedicated gluten-free facility. Their soy flour is not made in the gluten free facility so while it's probably gluten-free, it does not have a gluten-free logo on it.

I also don't mind talking about my celiac because I know it might help someone. Years before I got diagnosed someone mentioned to me that they had celiac. I googled it a the time and promptly forgot about it. When I did get sick and realized wheat was a problem after doing an elimination diet, a light bulb went off that it might be celiac. I am extremely thankful for the person who mentioned they had it to me years ago. I also like to emphasize that it's not the end of the world - give up some foods and live a happy, healthy life. That I still eat "normal" food. That nearly everything with gluten can be made gluten-free. That my life is not miserable and awful because I don't eat wheat. I've never been embarrassed to say I have celiac. It's part of who I am, it's just what I do.

I'd be more suspicious of the CC coming from preparation in a kitchen with gluten. If a salad is labeled as gluten-free, I have to think that the ingredients are gluten-free. They could be in big legal trouble if the ingredients weren't checked. It's the method of preparation that can vary.

Most standard "pellet" food for small rodents contains gluten. With some research, I think you could feed a rodent more of a fresh veggies and dried alfalfa diet, though.

Chili always freezes well.

This PB cookie recipe travels well and doesn't go stale - they'll last for a several weeks.

PB cookies

1 c. Peanut Butter

1 egg

1 c. sugar ( I substitute 1/4 c. sugar and 3/4 c. splenda since my husband is diabetic and it works great)

1t vanilla

mix, roll into balls and press out on cookie sheet. Bake 10-12 mins at 375. I make 4 batches at once and am set for about 10 days. They're delicious and EASY and portable.

Thanks Jestgar! They look yummy.

On very energetic weekends I make brazillian cheese rolls and freeze them unbaked (freeze arrayed out on a baking sheet, then transfer to plastic bags.

What are brazillian cheese rolls, and do you have a recipe?

Certainly many with health issues other than Celiac, even so-called 'auto-immune' conditions like Rheumatoid Arthritis, for instance, have found that adopting the SCD has brought them relief and a reversal of the condition. On the SCD thread in the Other Food Intolerance and Leaky Gut Issues section there is a poster who has been on the diet for around a year and has restored her health - her diagnosis of Biplolar has been reversed and other health issues have gone.

It's interesting that you talk about a reversal of the condition. Celiac causes villi damage, but all it takes to "reverse" that and to get the villi to heal again is to go gluten-free. (And obviously one must stay gluten-free to keep this reversed, back-to-normal state). With other autoimmune diseases, is there an easy way to "reverse" the damage already caused? What is the treatment for things like RA? Drugs (which isn't really a good solution - a "cure" in the context of this thread)? And does the SCD just lessen symptoms or truly reverse the damage?

Congrats on going back to school and good luck! I was one semester away from graduating from grad school when I had to drop out due to undiagnosed celiac. In the next year I figured out my diagnosis, my body healed, I got my life back on track and got a full-time job, then went back to grad school one class at a time while working. It took me four years to finish instead of the originally planned sixteen months, but as you can see from my avatar, I finally finished! Going back to school isn't easy, but when you finally do walk across that stage and get your diploma, it's about so much more than the degree. It's a symbol of a life back on track. Good luck and hang in there!

Unless I had a chance to talk with the chef about what was being served and how they were going to take precautions to avoid CC, I would not eat the food beyond the obviously gluten-free stuff like apples and individually packaged chips and things like that. Depending on what type of retreat this is, you may have a proper chef who understands or it may be someone like the organizer of the retreat or volunteers cooking meals and in the latter case I wouldn't attempt to eat the food. Maybe you could ask if you can get a discount for not eating the food.

I go on a ski trip with friends and my one friend is fantastic about making a gluten-free dinner, but I ALWAYS make sure I have enough food with me just in case something goes wrong. I bring those Thai Kitchen "ramen" noodles that are easy to cook up, a few servings of frozen chili, some eggs that I can boil or scramble, some fruit, individual string cheeses, some cereal. Stuff that won't go back if I have to bring it home with me, but I like to know I've got it with me just in case. I do not want to get hungry!

I am tempted to buy a deep fryer. My kitchen is really small and I have storage issues but its SO tempting. I LOVE sweet potato fries and they just aren't the same in the oven.

You could just use a deep pot for frying things in so you won't have to store a deep fryer.