"recovering" From Celiac?

[celiacker]

A person I know, who is the person who clued me into the fact that I might have Celiac (and I do), claims that they have the condition, calling it "Celiac" and saying they've had it for years. But when I asked how they manage to avoid trace amounts of gluten in their diet, their response was this:

"Oh, I've actually started eating things with gluten in them again, and I find it doesn't bother me anymore."

Does it seem crazy to anyone else that this person, who claims to be diagnosed with Celiac, is eating gluten again, just because they don't have symptoms?

It sounds specious to me. I want to believe this person, but I don't.

Also, when I wrote back to them and said, "My doctor told me I can't even eat a trace amount ever again...but maybe you heard something different?" they never wrote back to me, and since then have avoided the topic of Celiac altogether.

[ShayFL]

Some celiacs can tolerate gluten when reintroduced as in they do not have obvious symptoms. But the problem is that the gluten IS doing damage. It is just silent damage for the moment. It can show up later in the form of certain cancers and type 1 diabetes. They are killing themselves by eating gluten. There is "silent" celiac too, people who dont know they have it (lack of symptoms) and do not get diagnosed until they have cancer on their death bed. I wouldnt want that to be me. If you care for this person, you may wish to pass this along. Even if you dont, pass it on.

[aikiducky]

A lot of people with celiac have trouble sticking to the diet after a few years. What seems to happen to a lot of people is that their reactions become milder or non-existent, and so they don't have that natural aversion of "that will make me sick" any more.

It doesn't mean that they aren't doing damage to themselves. But us humans have an amazing capability of living in denial.

Pauliina