New celiac diagnosis and lab results

[AlyssaM]

So yesterday a dr told me I tested positive for celiac disease. My Tissue Transglutaminase IgA came back positive and was 30 U/L. I asked what now and she said I just need to change my diet that’s it. So I said okay and asked about why my ALT would be slightly elevated and my ANA would be positive. I know celiac disease is an autoimmune disease. Can celiac be the cause for my ALT to be 62 u/l and my ANA to come  back positive with a titer of 1:640 and the two patterns were homogenous and speckled pattern (mixed pattern) my ferritin is 20. I’m very lost and confused. Is this normal for drs to be like yup your celiac change your diet and none of the other results they are worried about because it’s simply celiac. I just wanna feel better if it’s celiac great I’ll learn how to deal with it but I’m tired of being exhausted, irritable, weak, nauseated, getting full so fast and staying full a long time, I’ve lost 80 lbs in a year roughly, my memory is horrible i forget words and will forget what I’m talking about literally mid sentence, I have no libido at all, any thoughts from your own experiences? Do I just stop eating gluten and hope things get better? A lot of people say it’s just celiac it’s an allergy to wheat not a big deal well from what I’m reading it seems a bit more serious then that. I know okay maybe not the end all but how do you know how bad it is? How do you know if it’s done damage? Any info is great

 

[trents]

Welcome to the forum, @AlyssaM!

Almost 20% of celiacs experience elevated liver enzymes (hence, your high ALT). I was one of them and it was what actually led to my celiac diagnosis over a period of about 13 years, however. Upon eliminating gluten from my diet the liver enzymes were back into the normal range in a few months. By the way, celiac disease is not an allergy. It's an autoimmune disorder. If you get serious about the gluten free diet you will begin to feel better and have more energy within weeks or months. But you can speed that up with some high potency vitamin and mineral supplements. B12, B-complex, D3, magnesium glycinate and zinc are the standard ones we suggest around here. Make sure they are all gluten free. Costco is a good place to shop for them. Look at their Kirkland and Nature Made lines. If they are gluten free they will say so on the packaging.

 

[knitty kitty]

Welcome to the forum, @AlyssaM!

Celiac Disease is an autoimmune reaction to gluten meaning that when we are exposed to gluten, our bodies produce antibodies which attack gluten.  Unfortunately, some of our own cells resemble segments of gluten and our antibodies attack them, too.  So our bodies attack gluten, and there's collateral damage to our own cells.  The villi cells in the small intestine suffer the most damage, resulting in a decreased ability to absorb nutrients, vitamins and minerals from our food.  This results in nutritional deficiencies.

Many of your symptoms can be related to having insufficiencies in the eight essential B vitamins, especially Thiamine and B12 Cobalamine, which can affect brain function and cause memory problems and difficulty thinking, and weight loss.  Low libido can be caused by low Vitamin D. 

1 hour ago, AlyssaM said:

...being exhausted, irritable, weak, nauseated, getting full so fast and staying full a long time, I’ve lost 80 lbs in a year roughly, my memory is horrible i forget words and will forget what I’m talking about literally mid sentence, I have no libido at all...

It's important to correct deficiencies quickly so that our bodies don't sustain further health effects.  

Checking for nutritional deficiencies is part of proper follow up care.  Discuss with your doctor and nutritionist about the benefits of supplementing with essential vitamins and minerals while your intestines are healing.  

Paleo diets, like the Autoimmune Protocol Diet, help our bodies heal.  Most see improvements within three weeks.  

We're happy to help you begin your journey! 

[Wheatwacked]

2 hours ago, AlyssaM said:

Is this normal for drs to be like yup your celiac change your diet and none of the other results they are worried about because it’s simply celiac.

Yup.     Sadly, it seems to be the norm.  But that's why we are here.  

The villi damage in the small intestine from Celiac Disease causes malabsorption of about 20 essential vitamins and minerals.  So depending on your diet you will be deficient in some.  Trents mentioned some.

Boosting your choline intake by eating 4 eggs a day will help your liver enzymes, energy, contipation, brain fog.  Choline intake can compensate for low folate in reducing homocysteine, an indicator of cardiovascular inflammation.  Choline

Low B12 may be the cause of your low ferritin and Low vitamin D can cause low B12. Around 40% of US, Canada, UK, and Ireland have levels of vitamin D.  Low B12 is a special concern for vegetarians.

Low vitamin D can slow down your stomach emptying, dental problems, comprimise your immune system, cause bone loss, mental problems. 

In the US in 2020 28% of our children get less than adequate Iodine.  20% of adult females and 11% adult males are below Estimated Average Requirement. 

Iodine levels indicating a mild deficiency were found in 22% of Canadians aged 3 to 79 while a moderate deficiency was found in 7%.  That's 29% total!  

[AlyssaM]

1 hour ago, Wheatwacked said:

Yup.     Sadly, it seems to be the norm.  But that's why we are here.  

The villi damage in the small intestine from Celiac Disease causes malabsorption of about 20 essential vitamins and minerals.  So depending on your diet you will be deficient in some.  Trents mentioned some.

Boosting your choline intake by eating 4 eggs a day will help your liver enzymes, energy, contipation, brain fog.  Choline intake can compensate for low folate in reducing homocysteine, an indicator of cardiovascular inflammation.  Choline

Low B12 may be the cause of your low ferritin and Low vitamin D can cause low B12. Around 40% of US, Canada, UK, and Ireland have levels of vitamin D.  Low B12 is a special concern for vegetarians.

Low vitamin D can slow down your stomach emptying, dental problems, comprimise your immune system, cause bone loss, mental problems. 

In the US in 2020 28% of our children get less than adequate Iodine.  20% of adult females and 11% adult males are below Estimated Average Requirement. 

Iodine levels indicating a mild deficiency were found in 22% of Canadians aged 3 to 79 while a moderate deficiency was found in 7%.  That's 29% total!  

They did check my B12 and it was 359 pmol/L

[knitty kitty]

Vitamin B12 and Vitamin D are the only two vitamins capable of being stored in the liver for a couple of years. 

The rest of the B vitamins and Vitamin C cannot be stored for longer than a few weeks at most.  We need to replace them every day. 

The malabsorption that occurs in Celiac Disease is due to damage to the villi in the small intestine.  Villi absorb our vitamins much like anemones filtering sea water.  Damaged villi are not be able to absorb sufficient vitamins from our diet to replenish the lost stores.  We can become depleted gradually over time as our Celiac symptoms and malabsorption worsen.  

One can have B12 deficiency symptoms long before low levels of B12 are detected in the bloodstream.  

The bloodstream is a transport system.  Vitamins are absorbed and go into the bloodstream.  Blood tests for vitamins can reflect vitamins recently absorbed from meals, and from vitamin supplements and nutritional drinks recently consumed.  Vitamins temporarily stored inside tissues and organs can be ordered into the bloodstream so that important organs like the heart and brain can keep functioning properly.  Those tissues and organs can become depleted of vitamins and cannot function properly. 

Blood tests for vitamins don't reflect how well vitamins are being utilized inside cells.  The eight essential B vitamins are interdependent.  They all don't work properly if one or more are in short supply.  For example, B12 and Folate B 9 work together.   B12 is found in meat. Folate is found in leafy green vegetables.  If you have meat at a meal, but don't eat your spinach or kale or turnip greens, you may not have sufficient Folate to work with B12, leaving B12 at "normal" blood levels.  Just because B12 is normal, that doesn't extrapolate into meaning that the rest of your B vitamins are at sufficient levels.  Some B vitamins can only be tested for by biopsy.   

During seven to ten years in medical learning institutions, doctors are only required to take twenty-four hours of education in nutrition.  They are taught that vitamin deficiencies are old fashioned and nutritional deficiencies only occur in starving third world countries. 

Doctors are taught to prescribe pharmaceuticals.  Pharmaceutical companies fund medical learning institutions.  Pharmaceuticals can be patented.  Money can be made on patented pharmaceuticals.  Vitamins cannot be patented because they are naturally occurring substances.  

One of my doctors refused to test for more vitamin deficiencies despite the fact that my Vitamin D was so low he was shocked.  He said "I can't make money prescribing vitamins."  Guess who got a new doctor. 

Gluten containing products are required by law in the USA to be enriched with vitamins and minerals removed during processing.  Food manufacturers replace those vitamins with vitamins that are "shelf-stable".  Vitamins are destroyed when exposed to light.  That's the reason milk is in an opaque bottle, so the vitamins aren't destroyed.  (Same goes for vitamins in a bottle.) 

These shelf-stable vitamins are difficult for our bodies to use.  For example, in the eighties and nineties, folic acid, the shelf-stable form of folate, was added to wheat products after an increase in babies with spina bifida caused by insufficient folate during gestation.  Folate is the natural form found in foods.  Folate breaks down when exposed to light and heat.  Our bodies can utilize folate easily.

Folic acid is the man-made version.  Folic acid does not occur in nature.  Folic acid is hard for the body to break down and utilize.  Recently, prostrate cancer in men has been connected to folic acid metabolites that can't be broken down by our bodies. 

Many of the "normal" levels of vitamins were set back in the Thirties and Forties, pre-WWII.  These levels were meant to be the lowest level of vitamins needed to prevent deficiency diseases.  Vitamin levels for optimal health are much higher.  Our diets now are drastically different from the diets at that time, too.  After WWII, research on vitamins was abandoned in favor of research on patentable pharmaceuticals developed from petrochemicals.  

Gluten free facsimile foods are not required to be enriched with vitamins and minerals.  GFFFs are full of sugars and saturated fats and fillers.  Most are not healthy for us, but the manufacturers make a profit.

When we switch to a gluten free diet, we need to buy our own vitamins and minerals to ensure we are absorbing sufficient amounts for health. 

Learn all you can about meeting your nutritional needs on a gluten free diet.

Hope this helps!

References:

Nutritional Imbalances in Adult Celiac Patients Following a Gluten-Free Diet

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8398893/

And...

The Gluten-Free Diet for Celiac Disease: Critical Insights to Better Understand Clinical Outcomes

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10537989/

And...

Micronutrients Dietary Supplementation Advices for Celiac Patients on Long-Term Gluten-Free Diet with Good Compliance: A Review

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/31277328/

 

Edited December 30, 2023 by knitty kitty
Typo correction

[AlyssaM]

7 hours ago, knitty kitty said:

Vitamin B12 and Vitamin D are the only two vitamins capable of being stored in the liver for a couple of years. 

The rest of the B vitamins and Vitamin C cannot be stored for longer than a few weeks at most.  We need to replace them every day. 

The malabsorption that occurs in Celiac Disease is due to damage to the villi in the small intestine.  Villi absorb our vitamins much like anemones filtering sea water.  Damaged villi are not be able to absorb sufficient vitamins from our diet to replenish the lost stores.  We can become depleted gradually over time as our Celiac symptoms and malabsorption worsen.  

One can have B12 deficiency symptoms long before low levels of B12 are detected in the bloodstream.  

The bloodstream is a transport system.  Vitamins are absorbed and go into the bloodstream.  Blood tests for vitamins can reflect vitamins recently absorbed from meals, and from vitamin supplements and nutritional drinks recently consumed.  Vitamins temporarily stored inside tissues and organs can be ordered into the bloodstream so that important organs like the heart and brain can keep functioning properly.  Those tissues and organs can become depleted of vitamins and cannot function properly. 

Blood tests for vitamins don't reflect how well vitamins are being utilized inside cells.  The eight essential B vitamins are interdependent.  They all don't work properly if one or more are in short supply.  For example, B12 and Folate B 9 work together.   B12 is found in meat. Folate is found in leafy green vegetables.  If you have meat at a meal, but don't eat your spinach or kale or turnip greens, you may not have sufficient Folate to work with B12, leaving B12 at "normal" blood levels.  Just because B12 is normal, that doesn't extrapolate into meaning that the rest of your B vitamins are at sufficient levels.  Some B vitamins can only be tested for by biopsy.   

During seven to ten years in medical learning institutions, doctors are only required to take twenty-four hours of education in nutrition.  They are taught that vitamin deficiencies are old fashioned and nutritional deficiencies only occur in starving third world countries. 

Doctors are taught to prescribe pharmaceuticals.  Pharmaceutical companies fund medical learning institutions.  Pharmaceuticals can be patented.  Money can be made on patented pharmaceuticals.  Vitamins cannot be patented because they are naturally occurring substances.  

One of my doctors refused to test for more vitamin deficiencies despite the fact that my Vitamin D was so low he was shocked.  He said "I can't make money prescribing vitamins."  Guess who got a new doctor. 

Gluten containing products are required by law in the USA to be enriched with vitamins and minerals removed during processing.  Food manufacturers replace those vitamins with vitamins that are "shelf-stable".  Vitamins are destroyed when exposed to light.  That's the reason milk is in an opaque bottle, so the vitamins aren't destroyed.  (Same goes for vitamins in a bottle.) 

These shelf-stable vitamins are difficult for our bodies to use.  For example, in the eighties and nineties, folic acid, the shelf-stable form of folate, was added to wheat products after an increase in babies with spina bifida caused by insufficient folate during gestation.  Folate is the natural form found in foods.  Folate breaks down when exposed to light and heat.  Our bodies can utilize folate easily.

Folic acid is the man-made version.  Folic acid does not occur in nature.  Folic acid is hard for the body to break down and utilize.  Recently, prostrate cancer in men has been connected to folic acid metabolites that can't be broken down by our bodies. 

Many of the "normal" levels of vitamins were set back in the Thirties and Forties, pre-WWII.  These levels were meant to be the lowest level of vitamins needed to prevent deficiency diseases.  Vitamin levels for optimal health are much higher.  Our diets now are drastically different from the diets at that time, too.  After WWII, research on vitamins was abandoned in favor of research on patentable pharmaceuticals developed from petrochemicals.  

Gluten free facsimile foods are not required to be enriched with vitamins and minerals.  GFFFs are full of sugars and saturated fats and fillers.  Most are not healthy for us, but the manufacturers make a profit.

When we switch to a gluten free diet, we need to buy our own vitamins and minerals to ensure we are absorbing sufficient amounts for health. 

Learn all you can about meeting your nutritional needs on a gluten free diet.

Hope this helps!

References:

Nutritional Imbalances in Adult Celiac Patients Following a Gluten-Free Diet

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8398893/

And...

The Gluten-Free Diet for Celiac Disease: Critical Insights to Better Understand Clinical Outcomes

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10537989/

And...

Micronutrients Dietary Supplementation Advices for Celiac Patients on Long-Term Gluten-Free Diet with Good Compliance: A Review

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/31277328/

 

Thank you so much I will for sure be reading these I have a lot t learn and figure out