Repairing The Damage

[apitbullnamedplug]

I was diagnosed with this as a wee child, thought I grew out of it in high school and could be a normie, so subsequently lived a glorious life of pizzas, cakes and breads.

But 10 years later, a confounding lethargy and balding pate made me rethink my habits. Since then I'm 100% poison, er gluten, free and have never felt better.

My question to anyone else who may frequent this post is this:

What can be done to repair the damage done from those years of gluten? Is the damage permanent, or will my insides heal themselves?

[Guest jhmom]

Hi and welcome to the board!

I am sure you already know this, but Celiac is NOT something we outgrow, unfortunately we have to adhere to a strict gluten-free diet for the rest of our lives! You can still enjoy all your favs like pizza, cake, cookies and brownies, they just have to be gluten-free!! Open Original Shared Link sells a number of yummy things. Mi-Del makes gluten-free animal cookies, chocolate chip cookies and a couple of others. Amy's Organic makes a chees pizza on rice crust, it's pretty good too!

From what I understand it takes some time for your villi to heal, but I am pretty sure they do (please someone correct me if I am wrong).

Good luck to you and I hope you find some gluten-free treats that fix your sweet tooth

[Guest gillian502]

yes, the villi do heal after several months gluten-free. Sometimes it will take about 2 years for your insides to heal, depending on the amount of damage done. My villi were very damaged, and I have been gluten-free for 8 months now and have just had my second biopsy, which will show me if my villi have begun to heal. I certainly hope so, though I am different than most Celiacs because I am not doing so great on this diet, in many ways it has made me feel worse. Guess my GI tract has to get used to eating in a whole new way. But at least our insides do heal eventually, though we must never go off the diet unless we want all our damage back again!

[britbear]

Just read a recent article that reasearch is finding that the damage to the small intestine is probably irreversible. Here is the link in case anyone is interested.

https://www.celiac.com/articles/1090/1/Neurological-Damage-Caused-by-Celiac-Disease-Not-Reversed-by-Gluten-Free-Diet/Page1.html

Makes it more important than ever to have my very young grandchilddren checked and watched for symtoms.

[rosetapper23]

L-Glutamine purportedly helps heal the gut according to several celiac experts. I've tried it myself, and it helped a great deal.

[psawyer]

Just read a recent article that research is finding that the damage to the small intestine is probably irreversible. Here is the link in case anyone is interested.

https://www.celiac.com/articles/1090/1/Neurological-Damage-Caused-by-Celiac-Disease-Not-Reversed-by-Gluten-Free-Diet/Page1.html

Makes it more important than ever to have my very young grandchildren checked and watched for symptoms.

That article is about neurological damage, not intestinal damage.

I had severe damage to my small intestine (Marsh 4) when tested by biopsy in June of 2000. Five years later a follow-up endoscopy and biopsy found that my intestines had completely healed.

The only neurological symptom I had was migraine headaches. I had them regularly for decades. I have not had one in the more than ten years that I have been gluten-free.

Please note that this topic is originally from 2004, and information in it may be out of date.