Gluten sensitive?

[LaurynGF]

I'm new to this forum so I apologize in advance! 

I'm a 22 year old female. I recently was seen by a gastroenterologist because I've had adominal pain with distention/bloating and change in bowel habits that was onset about 11 months ago. At first I assosicated this with the stress of school and a dirty diet that consisted of mostly takeout but I realized it was much more serious because it's been persistent and hasn't gone away..... ever. 

My GI specialist ordered labs and sent me for a abdominal ultrasound and said everything came back looking good on my blood work and ultrasound other than an overgrowth of "bad bacteria" she gave me an antibiotic and reassured me that I didn't test positive for celiac. My GI doctor is under the impression that this is either IBS or that I'm very much "gluten sensitive" so now I have to do a trial and error of cutting gluten from my diet completely for 8 weeks. My chief complaint is the adominal bloating associated with pain. My question is has anyone experienced common symptoms, and did going gluten free help? 

[GFinDC]

Hi Lauryn,

Do you know what tests they did for celiac disease?  There are several antibodies that are part of the complete celiac disease test panel.  But often a doctor will do only the initial ttg IgA screening test and call it a day.  The ttg IgA is a good test, but it doesn't catch every celiac.   Maybe you can get a copy of your test results for celiac disease and post them in this thread?  The results should include the actual tested values and also a range of values to check them against.

I don't suggest giving up on celiac testing until you are sure they did the full celiac disease panel, including the DGP IgA and DGP IgG.  Plus total serum IgA which is tells if your body makes IgA antibodies at all.  Some people do not make much IgA at all.  In those people the IgA tests are useless and they have to look at IgG instead.

Welcome to the forum Lauryn!