Symptoms Continue Even With gluten-free Diet

[Nic]

Hi, I was wondering if anyone has ever heard of this before. I took my son to see the ped. GI yesterday. He has been gluten free for a year but continues to have monthly (if not more) bouts of constipation. He is on a daily stool softener and extra fiber and usuall goes to the bathroom 1-2 times a day. Then, it will just stop and he goes through a week of struggling, spending the whole time in and out of the bathroom. I have also seen this flare up when he is extremely nervous or uncomfortable. The GI said he believes it is still from his Celiac even though he is gluten-free and that we may not ever be able to stop the cycle from happening. He said what I should do is at the first sight of a problem, increase the stool softener and if needed use an enima or supsotory (sp ?) . I feel as though there has got to be a way to gain control over this without having to use enimas. He was so tramatized by them when he was sick before his diagnosis. Otherwise, he has improved greatly. He gained 10 pounds this year and looks very healthy. Does this sound strange to anyone else?

[Guest nini]

it doesn't sound strange to me... I've been gluten-free for over 3 years and I still get ill... I "think" I'm getting exposed to minute amounts of gluten from cross contamination although I haven't quite figured out how... either from my husband leaving his gluteny crumbs around or from a product that isn't quite as gluten-free as I thought... I'm trying to avoid most processed foods and make most of my food from scratch but that is very difficult and I still have some things in my diet that could be exposed to cross contamination.

I still get horrible bouts of cramping and "d" and the occassional "c" but it's def. a lot better than when I was eating gluten all the time.

I would suggest trying to simplify his diet and keep a food journal and see if you can't track the culprit... yeah I need to take my own advice, don't I?!

[TCA]

Since it isn't happeing daily, do you think it could be from cc issues? If my son had gotten D, I've always been able to trace it back to something that might oculd have had some cc issues. Last time it was playing with toys with a friend who had just eaten cheerios. I hope you can figure it out soon!