What Do You Do When You Realize You Are Eating Something Bad?

[colorado]

In the past getting glutened meant thinking and researching after the fact what I may have eaten that made me...sick.

Tonight we made tacos, like we do every week. I am big on my spicy salsas and we have really been enjoying a locally made one that per the ingredients is gluten free (as far as I can tell). I have never had any problems with it.

Last night I bought another kind of salsa to try, again, locally made. I never even looked at the freaking label. I look at labels on everything, but I didn't this time.

So I am taking the last bite of my first taco which has about a tablespoon of this salsa on it. My fiance stops eating and looks at me and says "Did you know this has barley malt?"

At least the salsa was damn good, not hot enough for my tastes though. So I opted to continue eating more tacos but with my known good salsa.

If you have in the middle of eating realized you made a mistake, what do you do? Obviously I am just waiting for the symptoms to kick in. I guess I thought, well to ideas here. One eat a whole bunch of food to try and dilute the small amount I ingested, or stop eating all together to potentially lessen the blow?

My problem is I have hard hardly any protein today. I had Vans waffles for breakfast, and Amy's Baked Ziti, a banana and a cocoa loco for lunch.

I really needed some protein so I opted to keep eating. It's been about 1:45 minutes since I finished my meal. I suppose the symptoms should start any time now. I'll update you all on what happens.

Just when I said to my fiance this evening, I think I am FINALLY all healed up, things are happening...um..normally.

[Sweetfudge]

i usually cry

this is a hot topic of debate between me and my husband. i was under the impression that once you get gluten in your system, a crumb or a foot long sandwich will cause the same reaction. that being said, if i know i've been glutened, i say why stop? but he says that the more i have in my system, the worse my reaction will be. seems like it's always been the same though...

i know it causes damage to the intestines, but will 2 doses in 24 hrs do the same as 1 dose? like, accidental gluten ingestion, then purposeful binging at Wendy's?

i got glutened the day before thanksgiving, and thought about just attending MIL's dinner without my gluten-free substitutions. husband said this was a very stupid idea. why would i cause further damage to my already-suffering body? decided to forego the "stupid idea", but i still don't know if i'm convinced. maybe someone here can help clarify

[tarnalberry]

I say, it's chemistry. If you give your intestines more catalyst, you'll have more reaction. (I'm speaking chemical reaction, not necessarily "manifested physical symptom".) Is it one-to-one? Sure doesn't seem that way. Is it some other variety of linear or geometric? Hard to say. But I can't fathom, physiologically, how it would be unrelated.

So, I conclude, you stop eating the gluten containing item, and continue on eating - as you normally would - things you are *certain* are gluten free.

[home-based-mom]

" What Do You Do When You Realize You Are Eating Something Bad?"

I immediately stop eating it and take at least one GlutenEase capsule.

Continuing to eat something you know isn't good for you and will make you sick - or even sicker - just doesn't seem like a good idea to me.

Depending on what else you have eaten during the day, and what your individual "normal" reaction to gluten is, finishing the meal sans gluten may or may not be OK. I personally probably would have done what you did because eating more food that is safe would not make things worse (for me) and the damage had already been done and could not be undone.

The GlutenEase would hopefully minimize the damage.

I definitely would NOT have eaten more gluten on purpose.

[Offthegrid]

In the beginning, when I got accidentally glutened, I tended to say, "Oh, well, what does it matter now that I already ate some gluten" and then go on a little gluten binge. That would leave me feeling sick for days. Stupid!

These days I stop eating it and get something else. (One time I realized it after I ate something and tried to throw up but wasn't able to, so I gave up on that idea.)

No one's perfect, and this diet is hard with a long learning curve. Especially if you have other food intolerances.

[Glutenfreefamily]

In the very beginning I did a few times like offthegrid said I would figure well since I have been glutened Im going to enjoy it instead of getting sick off stupid cross contamination and eat a krispy kreme or an arbys sandwich but it only made it much worse and my joint aches lasted for days.

Now when I get glutened which thankfully isnt too common I chug a couple of red bulls since it helps with the tiredness and migraines.

[VioletBlue]

When I realize I've eaten something with gluten in it I stop eating it. Bad is bad is bad. I've even spit out what was in my mouth if I realized while I was chewing. It never occured to me to just keep eating because the damage was already done. I wouldn't keep eating gluten anymore than I'd keep eating poison if I realized there was some in my food. It has nothing to do with logic or amount for me. I know the stuff causes damage, makes me sick and affects my mood. Knowing that I wouldn't knowingly eat it or keep eating it. That just follows for me. It's the way my brain works.

[babinsky]

still new to this....what is GlutenEase......what does it actually do and where do you get it?

[darlindeb25]

After 7 1/2 years of being gluten free, I still panic if I think I have eaten gluten and I stopped eating the food, whatever it is, no matter how good it is. I can't rinse my mouth out fast enough and then I stress over it. Usually, if this happens to me, it is just a threat of gluten and actually not gluten at all and I worry about nothing. Which, by the way, makes me much happier in the long run. I used to be so sick all the time, that gluten will probably always freak me out. I realize that I was being glutened by Xanax and my reaction was nothing like when I used to be so very sick, yet I do not want to take that chance either.

[Leslie-FL]

I'm also curious about GlutenEase. Does it help reverse the effects?

I've also wondered about Red Bull. Does it counteract the really bad fatigue? I occasionally use 5-Hour Energy and it really clears up brain fog, but I get such awful acid reflux reactions to it unless I take it with food.

Edited: I just did a web search for GlutenEase. This could be a good thing to take whenever eating out, just to be on the safe side. Have many people here tried it?

[Cinnamon]

We've never tried Gluten-ease, but we've had a different brand which sounds like the exact same thing, it's DPP-IV and other enzymes. I think it helps. I wouldn't purposely eat gluten, but if you accidentally ingest it or think there may be some CC, I think the enzymes are definitely a helpful thing, at least for us.

[Sweetfudge]

Where do you find gluten-ease anyway? RX or just at the pharmacy?

[Leslie-FL]

Where do you find gluten-ease anyway? RX or just at the pharmacy?

I'm new to the forums here, so I don't know if it's ok to put links here, but I did a web search and found it. I think I saw a post somewhere else where someone said they got it at their health food store. I'm going to check with mine this weekend. The health food store I go to is really good about ordering things if they don't carry them.

[hathor]

This has only happened to me one time. Usually I figure out the cross-contamination (or my failure to be paranoid enough) after the fact. But one time Maggiano's brought me the regular pasta, rather than the gluten-free stuff I had ordered. I was too busy drinking wine and people watching to notice until I had eaten a substantial amount.

On the way home, we stopped at a store and I bought senna tea. I had a couple cups at home, plus lots of water, magnesium, and some ibuprofen. Surprisingly enough, the next day I didn't feel too bad at all. Excedrin helped with my head. I wasn't completely normal for a couple days, but it was far better than I've felt when the full blown gluten reaction has hit me unawares, after consumption of a tiny amount.

My gastro reaction to gluten, though, is constipation, which is what the senna counteracts. My thoughts were to get the gluten out of my system as fast as I could, rather than letting the contents of my bowel turn to concrete and having the gluten sit there ready for absorption, bringing on the brain fog, etc.

This approach might be counterproductive if someone reacts to gluten with diarrhea. If your problem is that, I wonder if it is best to let your body eliminate the gluten as quickly as it is trying to do, rather than to take immodium or something, which would hold the gluten in your system.