Tocopherol and tocopheryl acetate

[Mulders1978]

Ok can anyone please shed light on this subject! I been reading conflicting information. Do I really need to be concerned about products that contain these two ingredients in them like my face products and my body lotions and shower gels?  If I'm not ingesting them can they really hurt me?  Only been diagnosed for three weeks with celiac and I'm trying so hard to follow the guidelines but this seems to be a gray area.  I also check on the list of unsafe ingredients and I don't see them listed there so whats the scoop?  Safe or unsafe please help!!!!

[Ennis-TX]

These can be sourced from various ingredients one being wheat. Please check with the manufacture of your products to figure out if they contain gluten or how they are made....and yes gluten in your makeup, and especially lotion, shower gel, etc is a huge issues. Consider this, gluten contamination can happen from gluten protein residue. How often would you touch your arms, hair, etc or use your hands and touch your food, plate, fork, spoon before putting it in your mouth? Do you bite your nails, sometimes pick up a mint or gum? Hate to say it this way but if you use gluten containing stuff like that s$#& will happen with cross contamination.

Consider changing over to a dedicated gluten-free version of hygiene products and save your self the drama. I use EO products, The Seaweed Co, Savvy Naturals, Hugo Naturals, and Vaseline products products without issues personally.       

[kareng]

They are very highly refined and should not contain gluten.  

If you aren't ingesting it, it is safe.  You could roll in wheat flour - if you could keep it out of your mouth.

 

i stay away from stuff with obvious wheat -usually wheat germ oil.  But I know Celiacs that very carefully use hair products with wheat germ oil for thier curly hair.  I just tend to get shampoo in my mouth .

Edited April 28, 2017 by kareng

[kareng]

Here is a link to a

good explanation below. 

Some people go a bit overboard with the " what ifs".  Even , on the rare occasion the stuff is made from wheat oil, and it has a stray molecule of protein.... then it is .05% ( maybe less?) of a whole 4 oz bottle of lotion-  even if you drank the whole bottle- it isn't enough to gluten you.

 

http://www.glutenfreedietitian.com/vitamin-e-from-wheat-germ-oil/

 

the author of of this article is well respected in the Celiac medical/ research community and has spoken at International Celiac Research symposiums

Edited April 28, 2017 by kareng

[JesLin]

I was just diagnosed in March and I totally feel you. I'm having a hard enough time with determining which lip glosses are safe, let alone all my face products etc. I feel like this 'grey area' is the biggest annoyance with Celiac. So many foods/cosmetics I thought were safe after reading the ingredient list are actually not safe at all! One website says it's safe, one says its not. All these unfamiliar ingredients and even after googling term after term still so many grey areas!!

I'm sure in time it gets easier and second nature and you learn by trial and error but holy this constant uncertainty is super annoying haha.

[gabw]

It absolutely depends on your sensitivity. If you are a coeliac who can be triggered by a tiny amount of gluten, e.g. cross contamination from touch, Tocopherol Acetate is something you should be avoiding. I have coeliac's and dermatitis herpetiformis and I have been triggered countless times by makeup containing gluten that I have inadvertently ingested. Foundations, concealers, lip products: anything that may find its way into your system by accident needs to be gluten free. This is very difficult as most cosmetics companies do not say clearly if a product contains gluten, you simply have to research this of your own volition unfortunately. Tocopherol Acetate, maltodextrin, wheat germ are the most common ones I have found in makeup and they definitely give me a bad reaction. Honestly it just depends on your personal situation as I don't think that amounts of gluten below a certain amount would actually damage your digestive system, but you may feel a reaction if you are highly sensitive.

[Ritamarie]

On 4/28/2017 at 10:59 AM, kareng said:

Here is a link to a

good explanation below. 

Some people go a bit overboard with the " what ifs".  Even , on the rare occasion the stuff is made from wheat oil, and it has a stray molecule of protein.... then it is .05% ( maybe less?) of a whole 4 oz bottle of lotion-  even if you drank the whole bottle- it isn't enough to gluten you.

 

http://www.glutenfreedietitian.com/vitamin-e-from-wheat-germ-oil/

 

the author of of this article is well respected in the Celiac medical/ research community and has spoken at International Celiac Research symposiums

Some people say that I go "overboard" with watching out for gluten.  Here is my reason:  I always liked to bake and thought that my testing my baked products was making my skin crack and bleed.  I also used Aveno hand cream and products.  Once I realized that I CANNOT HANDLE GLUTEN OR FLOUR OR WHEAT BASED PRODUCTS, my skin cleared up.  As long as I don't handle or consume gluten products, my skin doesn't crack and bleed.  I must wear gloves when cooking and baking if flour is involved.  I also need to watch out for gluten in skin products.  Now that I stay off the gluten containing products, my skin is clean and smooth like a baby's.    So please don't say that some of us are "going overboard with this gluten thing".  Sometimes it is needed. 

Edited February 25, 2020 by Ritamarie

[Gemini]

11 hours ago, Ritamarie said:

Some people say that I go "overboard" with watching out for gluten.  Here is my reason:  I always liked to bake and thought that my testing my baked products was making my skin crack and bleed.  I also used Aveno hand cream and products.  Once I realized that I CANNOT HANDLE GLUTEN OR FLOUR OR WHEAT BASED PRODUCTS, my skin cleared up.  As long as I don't handle or consume gluten products, my skin doesn't crack and bleed.  I must wear gloves when cooking and baking if flour is involved.  I also need to watch out for gluten in skin products.  Now that I stay off the gluten containing products, my skin is clean and smooth like a baby's.    So please don't say that some of us are "going overboard with this gluten thing".  Sometimes it is needed. 

Having a topical reaction to wheat is an allergic reaction, not a Celiac reaction. If you have DH, the skin version of Celiac, you would have to ingest gluten to cause the skin eruption. But Kareng is correct.....these two items are so highly refined, they pose no threat to the vast majority of Celiacs.  

I am a sensitive Celiac, have been doing this for 15 years and consume tocopherols with zero issues.  Everyone is different but for the vast majority of Celiacs, this is a non-issue.