How long does it take to know if you have been glutened?

[97133620]

Hello, I was diagnosed with Celiac Disease about 2 months ago.

If I am accidentally glutened, how quickly will I know?  Is it an hour? does it take until the next day? Does it vary?

Thank you

[kareng]

There is no one answer for this.  And it may even change for you from one time to the next.

when I was first diagnosed it seemed to be about 4 hours.  Now I think it’s more like 12.  But I so rarely “ get glutened”.  People who claim to know almost instantly, probably aren’t having a Celiac reaction to gluten.  Gluten has to leave the stomach and enter the small intestines before a reaction can even begin. 
 

Some factors might be -

how healed you are

Amount of gluten

How long since you last had gluten

maybe even other food eaten with it

 

these are just some thoughts based upon my years of experience and what I have heard others tell me

 

[97133620]

Thank you so much for your input!

[kareng]

And here’s another thing to think about - maybe the “ reaction” has nothing to do with gluten. Unless you know you ate something questionable, it’s not always easy to tell.  
 

Mild food poisoning, a virus, eating too much, etc.  can seem similar.  I know people swearing they were glutened by something gluten-free but they just got excited and ate a lot of salty and heavy food - so they felt bloated, gassy and had a bit of diarrhea .  Maybe gluten?  Maybe just the amount of food?

 

[CMCM]

I think it varies from person to person.  My mother was a double celiac and if she got even a smidgen of cross contamination in something, her reaction would be within the hour of eating it and she'd be horribly sick for a couple of days.  For me, I can feel sick fairly quickly, but sometimes my reaction can be 4 or 5 hours later.  My son gets a reaction within an hour or two.  I'll also add that for both my son and me, the time frame of a reaction can also vary from exposure to exposure.

[Fenrir]

For me, most of the time it depends on the amount I'm exposed to. 

Cross contamination typically takes longer, maybe 8-12 hrs and I get headaches and reflux. 

I ate two pieces of gluten bread thinking they were gluten-free once (a lot of gluten)after being gluten-free for two years. This one took about 1 hr to start not feeling right but at 3 hrs I was totally incapacitated.  I started getting severe gut pain, puking, migraines, and reflux. I was down for the count for a couple of days with that one. 

[NNowak]

On 12/31/2019 at 1:24 PM, CMCM said:

I think it varies from person to person.  My mother was a double celiac and if she got even a smidgen of cross contamination in something, her reaction would be within the hour of eating it and she'd be horribly sick for a couple of days.  For me, I can feel sick fairly quickly, but sometimes my reaction can be 4 or 5 hours later.  My son gets a reaction within an hour or two.  I'll also add that for both my son and me, the time frame of a reaction can also vary from exposure to exposure.

Just curious, what is a double celiac?

[CMCM]

3 hours ago, NNowak said:

Just curious, what is a double celiac?

You get one gene from each parent.  You could get a celiac gene from your mother, but a non-celiac gene from your father.  However, if you get a celiac gene from each parent, you are a double celiac.    In my family, my mother and my nephew are both double celiac, and both get extremely sick immediately from any gluten exposure including an imperceptible amount of cross contamination.   Being a double celiac like my mother was means that all of her children have a 100% certainty of receiving a celiac gene from her.

[NNowak]

Aah. I see. I have both genes, too. My 2 boys have the HLA DQ8 gene and my 2 girls have the HLA DQ2 gene. 
 

So your question regarding how quickly one reacts.......depends on the amount of healing that’s already taken place, the amount of gluten ingested, stress, etc. I tend to get itchy hands a few hours after ingestion, a dull headache around the same time that eventually turns into a migraine overnight. The stomach pains start overnight as well. Other GI symptoms develop within 12 hours. 
 

In my conversations With other celiacs over the past 25 years (since I was diagnosed), a celiac with one gene reacts the same as a celiac with both genes. In fact, my son was diagnosed at 14 months and reacted far worse than I did at that time. He’s asymptotic now and tests the boundaries of being a normal 21 year old.