How Do You Check For Gluten?

[Guest gillian502]

I've been gluten-free for 8 months, and consider myself to now be extremely well informed about this disease. So why is it that my antibodies have not even dropped at all in all these months? I have gained almost 20 lbs., so it can't be Refractory Sprue, and have recently had another endoscopy and a colonoscopy to rule out secondary problems (I don't have the results yet.) So, the question becomes, where and how am I getting gluten?! I must be, according to my blood work, and I swear I don't know where! How does one check for gluten? I'll tell you my method: I buy only a few pre-packaged foods, and the rest is fresh. I look at the labels for anything that sounds suspicious, although admittedly I'm not all that familiar with every single forbidden ingredient. 90% of the time, whether it looks suspicious or not, I call manufacturers to ask about gluten, even on such things as salt, pepper, and sugar. Am I doing this right? Is there a way to check for gluten that I am missing? What should the guidelines be in checking out our foods? Clearly there's somethign I'm not doing.

[gf4life]

Hi Gillian,

What are the few pre-packaged items you buy? Sometimes the item is gluten-free by ingredients, but there is cross-contamination on the lines. You may be very sensitive to it. If you make a list of those products maybe we can all share our own personal experience with those products or companies. It couldn't hurt and we may just get to the bottom of it.

Another question is do you eat out or live with non-celiac people? You may be getting contaminated that way. It is really hard to tell sometimes, especially since you haven't gotten relief from symptoms yet.

I am praying your biopsy shows that your villi are healing.

God bless,

Mariann

[Guest gillian502]

These are the foods I eat right now that are not completely fresh foods:

Smucker's Peanut Butter

Trader Joe's Raspberry Jam

Ballpark 100% Beef Hot Dogs

Mother's Rice Cakes

Trader Joe's Applesauce

Pocono Brand Buckwheat and Kasha

A1 steak sauce, Heinz ketchup, salt, pepper, sugar,

Mountain Dew or Sprite

and various meds which I have double checked. I don't know what here is causing the problem but something must be. I'll find out on May 3 if at least my villi have healed.

[lauradawn]

What about things like gum, mints, toothpaste, mouthwash, lipstick, floss...?

[mechimellow]

Are monodiglyeride(?) bad? They are on the forbidden list but I did a search for them are and the company states there are no derivitives. Anyone know?

[YankeeDB]

Envelopes, stamps, communion wafers? (Just to be thorough!)

[lauradawn]

monodiglyercides are an ingredient to be aware of. My understanding is that if it is made in the us is most likely gluten free. Espeically in it's liquid form. In the powdered form, such as in coffee creamer or something like that there is a possibility, but again unlikely if US product. For me, it was something I doubled checked through the company, but if they say it is fine, I bet that it is. If you need I can probably track down my info on it. I think I had found a site that talked about the questionable items such as...this one, and then explained why it was an ingredient to be consious of.

[Guest gillian502]

My toothpaste is mentadent, and they told me it is gluten-free. It could be the floss and/or lipstick, because I haven't checked either of those. Could that tiny amount really keep my antibodies so high, though? That's hard to believe!