I Sneeze Like Crazy When Exposed To Wheat Flour

[Mom to Many]

I have a question.

I have always been a baker at heart. When I bake for my family I sneeze terribly when I measure wheat and white flour. I stuff all up and feel like I have a cold after I bake. I've even had asthma like symptoms after I bake with wheat flour. I can eat it fine so it seems.

Has anyone else experienced this kind of reaction?

If I wear a filter mask when I bake I seem fine. Is this a precursor?

My daughter has celiacs so it makes me wonder.

[Ursa Major]

Those are symptoms of an allergy you're having. I believe you may be allergic to wheat, and should probably stay away from it.

And you may be having a reaction in your bowels without having any obvious symptoms. You should consider being tested for celiac disease, as well as for allergies. And definitely stop baking with wheat flour!

[Kaycee]

Hello,

I am not sure of the answer to your question. I know for a long time the thought of me having coeliac didn't even enter my head, as I too thought eating bread was fine for me. I never even considered myself as being ill. You can have coeliac and not have any symptoms so to speak, but my symptoms built up over the years until I was diagnosed with this disease at 49, after only being what I would call sick for about 5 or six years.

So it is possible you could have coeliac.

I know at times I think I start coughing and feel I have cold like symptoms when I have eaten gluten, but I cannot be 100% on that. I somehow think it could be something else that sets me off coughing and a bit mocousy for about an hour at the most, then when that is over I am fine. But it does sound like flour sets you off sneezing, but I am not sure how or why it would, as those symptoms are more allergy related.

As your daughter has coeliac, have you yourself been tested for the disease? My doctor recommended that all of my close blood relatives be tested for coeliac. So far no-one else has been diagnosed.

Cathy

[Mom to Many]

As your daughter has coeliac, have you yourself been tested for the disease? My doctor recommended that all of my close blood relatives be tested for coeliac. So far no-one else has been diagnosed.

Cathy

I tested negative. But, as a young woman, I had a lot of gas bloating and diahrea. But, when I started having my children it got better. I do have shoulder strap pain (gas pain felt in your shoulder area because it refers) a lot now at age 35. But, no diahrea.

I seemed to have a milk and egg allergy as a young woman also. Since my mother has celiacs I was Gluten Free, Egg free and milk free,for a about a year. (This started three months before I got married and then through my 1 st pregnancy, which started 3 months after we married) Then after my first baby was born I began eating all three again.

Oh, I hate the thought of it. I have so much to take care of now.

I should just go gluten free for a time and see if I feel differently.

[Kaycee]

From reading a lot of posts here, there is a chance of getting a false negative, but the chances of getting a false positive are less likely. So really your negative might not necessary rule out coeliac.

Not everybody gets diahrea with coeliac, you could be constipated instead, and or like me be overweight. The disease has no guidelines it sticks with, and each person has a different set of symptoms, and that is what makes it so hard to make sense of it.

Maybe try gluten free, and see if you do feel better.

Good luck, and I do understand how you hate the thought of it, I have 4 sons who are terrified they might eventually have to give up bread, and beer.

Cathy

[Guest cassidy]

My mother gets asthma type symptoms. She feels like she can't breathe and her throat is closing. She had a blood test to test for a wheat allergy and it was negative. She can't even walk by cookie baking places in the mall or she will get symptoms. Last year she literally baked 100 loaves of bread and was so sick that she had to leave her house for a few days. She also has dh and said she never had intestinal symptoms, until I pointed out that you don't have to have explosive D, if you have several bowel movements in a day (like 10) that is not normal. She had lived with that for so long (as had I) that she didn't think it was a symptom. She never got tested for celiac but just went gluten-free.

Benadryl does help her when she gets glutened. It may seem obvious, but even though you like to bake, you probably shouldn't do it or should wear a mask.

[chrissy]

anything that irritates the nose can make you sneeze, so i think that sneezing, in and of itself, is not necessarily a symptom of celiac disease.

[CarlaB]

That sounds like an allergy ... similar to an allergy to ragweed or grass.

The reason I would suspect celiac is not because of the allergy, but because of your family history and your personal history of bloating and diarrhea. The blood tests are known for having false negatives ... it also doesn't help that many doctors only take the IgA, and leave out the total IgA, Ttg, and IGG. Some people are IgA deficient, so will have a negative test all the time! I'd be tested again after you've been eating lots of gluten for months. I assume the tests before were not done when you were gluten-free ... they definately would have been negative then.

[Aharen]

HI

I just wanted to say that the same thing happens to and only just recently. I really have never researched having a wheat allergy until now. I baked my own bread for the first time on Thanksgiving and sneezed my head off, blowingmy nose every 5 seconds. then again I made fry bread...same thing and again today (making fry bread). Does this mean I have the chance for Celiac? I have several food allergies actually to fruit and nuts but wheat? Ugh. I have never had a problem with baking before but I switched to organic wheat and wonder if that is the problem.

Thanks.

[happygirl]

You could have Celiac (not all Celiacs have diarrhea!) AND a gluten allergy. Or non-Celiac gluten intolerance (which wouldn't show up on the bloodwork) and an allergy. Or any combination thereof. Same treatment though----Gluten free