Child Temperature Change After Gluten-Free

[lanlanonearth]

Hello, I stumbled across this site after accidentally discovering my four year old child has gluten intolerance. He has always been difficult to gain weight (although height has always been above average) and after three days of feasting on gluten (buns, dumplings, sandwiches, bread, and pizza) in an (ignorant) effort to make him gain weight, I noticed that he became even more skinny and had a sickly appearance. With all the new knowledge, I put him on a gluten-free diet and noticed some changes immediately. Some I can try to understand and some are interesting phenomenas that I hope someone here may be interested in further technical/scientific discussion (I am still in the "amazed by what gluten can do" phase).

1) This summer I have always thought that his hands and feet are warmer than usual (but didn't really think much of it). After his unusual weight loss, I thought of hyperthyroidism where one‘s metabolism becomes way too fast and reading articles about gluten and Grave's disease connection confirmed my idea. After gluten-free, his hand and feet temperature dropped to normal the next day! I also noticed that he began to sweat a lot more after gluten-free where as before, he would get very hot (if I touch him) when the weather is hot but with very little sweat. I wonder what has happened to create this change?

2) After we started gluten-free, I made all the mistakes like everyone else, such as feeding him soy sauce, buckwheat noodle that's not certified, and sausages that had flour ingredients. And every time he gets accidentally glutened, I can tell because 1) his hand and feet temperature gets warmer (but never again as warm as before gluten-free 2) his belly would sank instead of looking full 3) he would pee frequently 4) mood changes. And that reminds me, this past summer, he has been peeing very frequently in the morning which disrupts his sleep where as he used to sleep through the night with extremely long hours. He also had to pee every time I take him down our condo building to pick up packages even if he had just peed five minutes before leaving the house. This phenomena disappeared immediately after gluten-free and only reappears when he mistakenly eats gluten. Does anybody have any scientific explanation? 

3) This one I get. His belly sunk after three days of (ignorant) gluten feast and the same three day constipation. That's when I got suspicious. Now, I notice that if he eats gluten-free, even if he only eats a light meal, his belly would look full. Otherwise, even if he eats a lot, his belly looks empty or hollow inside. This is also the indicator that I use to look for any hidden gluten source. I think I understand this one to be the villi as well as enzymic activities that normal digestion would promote. 

Would appreciate any thoughts anybody would like to share. Thanks!

[Scott Adams]

I think it would be good if you can take him in to a doctor and go over these symptoms. I realize that you've self diagnosed him, and that his symptoms have improved on a gluten-free diet, however, if he does have celiac disease then he is more likely to have other autoimmune conditions, so it would be a good idea to run some tests if your doctor agrees.

Regarding #1, some people with celiac disease have reported temperature issues as a symptom, but it would not be a typical symptom. A thyroid condition is certainly possible, as well as other things, and the only way to know is to get some tests that his doctor could order.

Regarding #2, frequent urination can be a sign of diabetes, and many people with Type 1 diabetes also have celiac disease. Again, his doctor might want to explore this symptom with some tests.

Regarding #3, bloating is a common symptom of those with celiac disease, along with other gastro issues. Unfortunately since he's been gluten-free for a while now you can't have tests performed because their results would be false negative. He would need to be eating gluten for a few weeks before any blood tests to get a formal diagnosis.

[lanlanonearth]

Hi Scott, thank you very much for your thoughtful input! I am not interested in taking him to the doctor especially that diagnosis would require putting gluten back in him. What I have witnessed is more than enough for me to proceed with the gluten-free diet. The symptoms that I mentioned only appeared within less than a month and disappeared immediately after I took out gluten so I don't worry about any autoimmune condition. I believe if there are such conditions, his body will take care of them as it has already demonstrated. So I am less interested in medical advice, and more interested in understanding what exactly is happening with his body that's making it behaving in such amazingly different ways with and without gluten. For example, why would gluten increase his metabolism and make hime warmer? And retain all that heat instead of sweating it out? And urinate frequently? Simply because of nutrient deficiency? How exactly? I just find this whole thing mind blowing and want to learn more about it.

[knitty kitty]

I would add dehydration.  The body needs water to digest all those carbohydrates, hence the constipation.  

When dehydrated, the body will retain any water it has, hence the warm extremities and lack of sweating.  As the body acquires more water, frequent urination may occur.  

As Scott said, diabetes may be occurring.  With such a high intake of carbohydrates, the body is overwhelmed and can't process the high influx of glucose, so the cells become resistant to insulin.  This is prediabetes.  The pancreas can't make enough insulin to keep up with so much glucose and under stress and lack of vitamins, becomes dysfunctional.  

https://www.walmart.com/ip/The-Paleo-Approach-Reverse-Autoimmune-Disease-and-Heal-Your-Body-9781936608393/22897626

I found this book by Dr. Sarah Ballentyne to be most helpful in understanding autoimmune conditions like Celiac Disease and Graves disease.  

The information in this book about proper nutrition is invaluable.  To gain weight you need healthy fats and proteins more than carbohydrates.  You've already seen what a high calorie high carbohydrate diet can do to your son's health.  It explains what to feed your son to provide his body the vitamins and minerals it needs to grow properly.

The information in this book can help answer and explain all of your questions much more concisely than I can here.

Do keep us posted on you and your son's progress.  Celiac is genetic, so the diet may benefit you as well.  We'll be here for you.  Welcome to the forum! 

 

 

[lanlanonearth]

Hi Knitty Kitty, thank you for your comment. Dehydration definitely makes sense. I can start to see the link between those symptoms a little better now. And thank you for the book recommendation, it seems super useful for me.

I've started on the gluten-free diet as well, first simply out of curiosity (as I have no health problems), and now seriously because I've had some very unusual reactions right away as well. For myself, I felt strangely depressed and vulnerable for a few days which is very unlike my optimistic character. Then, a few days later I had intermittent instances of "mind freeze" sensation. Literally I felt my head freeze or tighten that I couldn't think or move for like 10-15 seconds or so. Sometimes I also felt that tightness in a particular area of my head, once the top area, and another time at the back. It resolved very quickly and I feel that it could have been some sort of mercury detoxification. 

My son is doing a lot better, many many positive changes as long as I don't accidentally give him something with hidden gluten. I'm so fascinated with how quickly he changes with the diet. I use all his prior symptoms to check if his meal accidentally contained gluten and it works every time! The food and symptom dairy is really interesting.

Yes, I also read about how Celiac is genetic, but personally I don't believe that. I personally believe that modern wheat has been damaging the human race for as long as it existed, and while some are damaged to the degree that it is reflected in their gene, it does not mean others are foolproof. I think other people are just damaged to a lesser degree that it is only reflected in minor symptoms at this point in time. IMHO I even believe that humans could've all lived longer if wheat was not in our diet. Now that I am in the "gluten mindset", I see everyone around me being Celiac to some degree. I know I'm not using that term correctly but I mean that we could all have some malfunction in the gut that's affecting different nutrient absorption and disrupting body functions with a gluten diet. My close and extended family are all healthy people in terms of not having any major health problems, but everyone has some inconvenient health problem that's very stubborn, like overweight, leg weakness, throat irritation, etc. If everyone went gluten-free, we could see if those symptoms resolves or not.

Rambled a bunch as you can see I'm new to this and still excited with all the discoveries.....

 

[J3ssica899]

Those are definitely strange and not your typical celiac symptoms. Celiac disease is not a gluten intolerance, it is a very scary autoimmune disease. It literally is your body attacking itself. There are no benefits to eating gluten free unless you have celiac or non-celiac gluten sensitivity. As others have said, I strongly suggest ruling out other conditions and visiting the doctor. 

Even if he is doing well without gluten, usually there are underlying nutrional deficiencies that should be checked out. 

I wish you luck and please keep us updated with your son's condition. 

[J3ssica899]

Also forgot to mention, usual celiac response after eating gluten is bloating not sunken stomach. 

 

As someone else mentioned, carbs break down into sugar and this could be a sign of pre-diabetes with the frequent urination. Check the other symptoms of diabetes as well. Such as itchiness, tingling hands/feet, excessive thirst, slow wound healing, blurry vision etc. I realize some of these may be hard to figure out with a 4 year old, that's why you should contact your child's pediatrician. Most are doing virtual visits if you don't feel safe going to the office. 

 

Best of luck. 

[lanlanonearth]

Hi J3ssica899, thank you for your concern. My son doesn't have any of the other diabetes symptoms, and the frequent urination is not clinical-level. It's just that he gets up like twice in the morning to pee rather than sleeping all the way through (during the few weeks before going gluten-free) and tends to have to pee one more time in addition to just having peed before leaving home (which I remember having a phase like that myself when I was a teenager and I don't have diabetes, neither does anyone in the family). I only noticed it because I tend to be very observant and my interest increased when this behavior vanished right after the day he went gluten-free. 

Yes, his symptoms are not typical yet are strongly connected to eating gluten. That's what makes me so interested in it. He does not get bloating or anything like that, and instead a sunken stomach after eating gluten (which is probably only noticeable now because he used to be semi-chubby). I take it as no digestive action, no enzymes, no bacteria to bulk up stool etc. Also no absorption results in further weight loss thus even more sunken. I don't see a need to consult his pediatrician because the symptoms were temporary and mild (I think most parents would just dismiss them) and also I wouldn't put gluten back into him just for the sake of a diagnosis. I diagnosed him and it's convincing.

He's been gluten-free for over a week now, although hidden gluten has been discovered every other day or so, so he has not been truly gluten-free for very long yet. But I can already see that he appears to be growing rather than shrinking, he naturally sits up more straight, he is better in control of his emotions, sleeps through the entire night without having to pee in the morning, no more need to pee multiple times if we have to leave home, normal hand/feet temperature, less daydreaming, better appetite, less picky about food, and willing to eat more meat! (Since new year this year, he started to gradually dislike meat more and more and I started to make bakeries and buns and dumplings for him more and more, which is probably how this all started)

Oh, another symptom I forgot to mention. Along with all the pre-gluten-free symptoms, he also had this symptom of sneezing and running nose in the morning, every morning (only). I had thought that it's because we keep the window open for the hot nights and that causes him to have a mini morning flu. But that symptom disappeared I don't even know when. Probably also right after the day he went gluten-free and we still keep the window open during similar hot nights. Now I wonder if that actually was some kind of an allergic reaction. 

I talk to my son about gluten and what I have found out, and to my surprise, he told me that during the gluten-feast days, his stomach didn't feel very good. It felt like he wants to pass stool but can't. But he still wants to eat more buns, even though he doesn't feel very comfortable inside. I thought that he was playing and making that up but he kept telling me he's serious. If so, that's another interesting fact.

 

 

[Bonsai]

Hashimoto's thyroiditis is one VERY IMPORTANT reason to have his blood tested. Insist on having the blood tested for 1.TPO-ab 2.TSH  3.FreeT3  4.T4 Your son could end up in a coma or worse. Please be responsible. Do not self diagnose.  Go to a Functional Doctor if you don't trust traditional medicine. 

[cyclinglady]

I agree with Scott and Bonsai that your child should see a doctor.  Most doctors are doing telemedicine, if you are concerned about the pandemic.  

[lanlanonearth]

Well, it looks like this thread is diverging away from what I had intended to make out of it so I won't crowd it with duplicate responses in regards to seeking medical advice as I personally see no point in that. I'll keep observing and if I notice anything significant I will post them as a reference to anyone interested. If you would like to share similar experiences or shed light on scientific reasoning, I would be more than happy to hear!

[knitty kitty]

lanlanonearth,

I'm sorry this thread is diverging.  We're just concerned and wish the best for your son.  Some of us have gone undiagnosed for so many years developing other health problems along the way, so be forgiving if we're over enthusiastic in our desires to nip it in the bud to prevent further complications.  If only our mothers had been as perceptive as you've been with your son.  

I suggest you read the article linked below.  Don't be put off by the title.  This article provides information on how wheat affects both those with and without Celiac Disease in nontechnical jargon.  I found it very enlightening.  I hope you will, too.  

 

Bread and Other Edible Agents of Mental Disease

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4809873/#!po=15.8088

 

3 minutes ago, lanlanonearth said:

Well, it looks like this thread is diverging away from what I had intended to make out of it so I won't crowd it with duplicate responses in regards to seeking medical advice as I personally see no point in that. I'll keep observing and if I notice anything significant I will post them as a reference to anyone interested. If you would like to share similar experiences or shed light on scientific reasoning, I would be more than happy to hear!

 

[lanlanonearth]

Thank you Knitty Kitty, yes I understand that everyone here is truly well-intended🙂 When you say some of you have gone undiagnosed for so many years developing other health problems along the way, do you mean Celiac (being undiagnosed for so many years)? It must have been difficult to try to make way with so little information back then. But with today's information, I think it only makes sense to avoid modern wheat regardless if one is diagnosed with Celiac or not (especially with my own dramatic experience). If wheat can prevent the body from functioning normally to this degree, the so-called autoimmune diseases may very much be just the result of this nutrient blocker, not vice versa; And if one's body can behave so radically different with just the removal of wheat, it may very well have all the power to recreate everything and heal itself once the condition allows. With wheat being such an omnipresent factor in our modern diet, I don't think we have even seen what a "natural" human could look like with all potentials fully developed and expressed. 

Thanks again for the reference link. I really appreciate the enlightening information.

[lanlanonearth]

I'm quickly reporting on my son's status as I find this information may be helpful for some. It's been about 10 days since I last posted and about 3 weeks since he started gluten-free (with the first 1.5 weeks being incomplete gluten-free as I was discovering hidden glutens so 1.5 weeks of true gluten-free).

(1) All the symptoms that I described earlier (temperature, frequent pee, runny nose, etc) resolved quickly after going gluten-free as I've already mentioned in the thread, so what I write below are more generic observations on his well being.

(2) I can visibly see that he has gain a little bit of weight that his thighs are getting thicker, knee bone no longer visible, eyes don't seem as big because of more facial fat, waist area not sunken anymore etc. He is still skinny but no longer sickly skinny and moving towards the healthy skinny range. 

(3) His appetite improved as I've previously mentioned and no longer as aversive to meat/egg as before. However, too much fruit or a little sweets could still affect his appetite so I'm working on better controlling that part.

(4) His sleep is improving before my eyes. He used to get super hyper at night and take hours to go to sleep and once awake in the morning can't go back to sleep. Now, his sleep is still not as much as half a year ago, but roughly 10 hours at night compared to 8-9 hours the previous month. He no longer resist going to bed as much and can quickly fall asleep. In the morning, he can get up, pee, drink water, and go back to sleep immediately rather than getting up without being fully rested.

(5) He farted a few times! (haha) Which is actually very very rare for him except when he was little and still on breastmilk.

(6) Dietary wise, we got stumbled over soy sauce, oyster sauce, BBQ sauce (which contained oyster sauce), wheat grass drink, cane juice (which must have been packaged at a facility with wheat), uncertified 100% pure buckwheat noodle and uncertified rice flour (which must also have been cross contaminated), tofu sheets (also cross contamination as WPF said that soy and wheat are frequently harvested and processed together). So I've come to the realization that it's really safer to make everything than buy.

(7) I've started to supplement him liquid zinc, calcium, and iron, and they may have helped with things also.

Generally, things are turning around and I'm just more assured than ever about this modern wheat phenomena. I'm now a gluten-free advocate and have started persuading friends to try it for their kid with malabsorption. Will come back if there's anything noteworthy to update.

 

[Scott Adams]

After I got diagnosed I had several temporary food intolerance issues, including casein/cow's milk, corn, chicken eggs, tomatoes, etc. They mostly went away after a couple of years on a GF diet, but in the meantime I was able to eat duck eggs. You can get duck eggs at farmer's markets, and/or Asian markets (be sure to check and get fresh duck eggs, and not the ones with baby ducks inside...yes, it's a delicacy!).

FYI: Lee Kum Kee makes a line of Asian sauces, many of which are not labelled "gluten-free." There are many GF soy sauces on the market.

[lanlanonearth]

Thank you, Scott, for the suggestion. I wonder why one would develop these temporary food intolerances after being gluten-free. Is it a healing reaction of some sort? I haven't noticed much on my son except I notice that whenever he eats anything too sugary, he gets temporary lazy-eyed for a few seconds, which is a condition he developed earlier this year after a fever, but got mostly better afterwards and only occurred very rarely. Now, with gluten-free, I've noticed this lazy-eye coming back, but only definitively after he eats something sugary. I'm still trying to figure this one out.

Also, gluten still amazes me that, yesterday all of a sudden my son got cranky, whinny, picky about food, and slightly thin looking. I started to track down the food diary and got suspicious over a few things, but only later to find out that he ate a crumble of his dad's bread in the morning! 

[Scott Adams]

My temporary food intolerance was caused by celiac disease damage, and went away as my gut healed. Once you have leaky gut all sort of immune reactions can occur as different proteins pass into your system, rather than get properly digested.

[lanlanonearth]

Hm.... I wonder why for some people some of these food intolerances show up only after the start of a gluten-free diet. Why won't these symptoms show up before?

Two more notes on my son's change after going gluten-free that I forgot to mention:

1) Somehow he seems to have become an early bird person now, wakes up early and goes to sleep early, which has never happened before. Before, no matter how early he wakes or how active he has been, he wouldn't go to sleep until after 10PM, and that makes him unable to get up the next day, which continues the late-late cycle. Now, he is going to sleep early naturally which came to me as a surprise. 

2) He doesn't ask for water as much during meal time now where as before, once he started a meal, he had to drink a lot of water which makes him full and unable to eat a lot. I just noticed recently that he doesn't seem to need that much water during meal time anymore. He had many meals where he had no water to accompany it.

 

[Scott Adams]

They do show up before...sorry if I didn't make that clear. So for me going gluten-free did not resolve my issues, and it took a food diary and elimination diet to figure out the rest. 

[lanlanonearth]

Okay, thank you, Scott. I did see other people mentioning new food intolerances after gluten-free so that made me ponder a bit.

[lanlanonearth]

I am updating this thread myself to share some additional information after I put my son on the gluten-free (and further elimination) diet. Almost 3 months later, I think I've gotten just about everything figured out!

My son showed immediate improvement right after gluten-free. What others mentioned as pre-diabetic-like symptoms such as frequent urination cleared up the same day we took wheat out of our diet. Other changes like better appetite, weight gain, longer sleep, and more stable mood came gradually and steadily. Even his lazy eye condition which developed within this half year started to disappear from time to time. So I am no longer worried from a medical perspective.

However, after gluten-free and after returning normal, I noticed that he appeared to be perfect on somedays and less perfect on other days. Occasional whining and mood change came and went, which I link to food based on previous experience. At first, I thought it was sugar, but it turned out not exactly so. After a ton of troubleshooting, I finally pinpointed the cause and it gave me a completely new perspective to the gluten dilemma as well!

I discovered that his mood changes were a reaction to grains and beans that have not been properly treated, and also fruits that were not completely ripen. So, in addition to gluten-free, I limited supermarket fruits which are usually only 70% ripen when picked and replaced them with 90% ripen farmer fruits with seeds that are mature enough to be planted. I also soak, sprout, and high-pressure cook all grains and beans so that the anti-nutrients are removed as much as possible. With these additional changes added to the diet, I found that my son became so peaceful that nothing seems to bother him anymore. 

In the past, I had believed that children have different personalities and some are more prone to a certain mood, and now, I think it all comes from the food they eat! With my experiments, I concluded that illness in our modern society come from not complying with the laws of nature when eating plant based food. 

Plants have strong defense chemical mechanisms to ensure their existence and when we humans eat them during stages in which they are concerned with survival, we ingest things that do not comply with our animal system. For example, our modern diets is full of seeds (grains, legumes, nuts) that are waiting to be transformed into life, ripe-compromised fruits which are waiting for their seeds to mature, and roots and leaves that are transferring energy for its plant to grow.......

Our sugar come from sugar cane, which are roots of a grass plant that have originally planed to grow tall and use up that sugar for itself. We altered traditional wheat so that their hulls no longer stick to the seeds for our convenience of processing. A wheat plant without the protection of a strong hull will put more chemical defense into its seeds to compensate the danger of being eaten and loss of existence. Thus the wheat problem of our modern day......

The more I think about this, the more it makes sense to me. And the more I shape my family's current diet around this thinking, the better I notice our physical and mental state. I have not found any cohesive article that talks about this way of eating and coexisting with plants in nature, though sprinkles of information are everywhere, such as the usefulness of sprouting seeds, etc. 

If anyone wants to engage further, I'm happy to join along 🙂