Reaction Time?

[Mey Marie]

I just stopped eating gluten a week ago and I was already feeling really good. My husband got some gluten free oatmeal for me and I ate it 2 days ago. I was so tired all day and At the end of that day I had some diarrhea. Then I had diarrhea yesterday and now again today. Other then the oatmeal I have been very, very careful. Should the reaction be lasting this long? I feel so bad rite now.

[lovegrov]

Different people react in different ways. My reaction is much shorter, but others have very long reaction periods.

richard

[rawvegan]

I would avoid the oatmeal. I know there are peer-reviewed studies floating around proclaiming oats are "safe" for people with celiac, but the reality is many oats are manufactured in facilities that contain wheat, so risk of cross-contamination is present (and likely higher than opting for other cereal grain alternatives like Quinoa, buckwheat or roasted kasha, amaranth, all of which have stronger nutritional profiles).

Another thing to flag is country legislation relating to gluten free labelling. All countries have different legislation surrounding what constitutes gluten free, they usually measure it in parts per million. The problem is there is no way of telling how sensitive you are, some people react to less than 200 parts per million gluten presence and others don't. Even if you don't detect an overt reaction, it is possibly you've had a subtle reaction such as mood change or a pimple, meaning toxins were pumped into your system at a nano scale. Moreover, having phoned swaths of companies to check if there was any risk of cross contamination, there seems to be sparse understanding of what that actually means. Some companies have it down, they understand gluten flour in the air issues, have separate facilities for their gluten free products, and they may even throw in batch test (where they test for gluten presence). Yet, there are also a slew of other companies who continue to pride themselves on gluten free frivolities, when they have a poor understanding of what gluten free should mean to keep people with serious gluten allergies safe.

So, whether or not oats are safe for celiacs is debatable. I choose to avoid them, but others don't. Another one of those risk assessment games. Happy assessing...and feel better.

[kera87]

I would definitely say that you're still healing and even though you're extremely careful you may still have some episodes. It's been two and a half years for me and I still get D once in a while - I never know if its something I ate, or just my body (people without celiac get it too, i often overlook that I might just be normal now.) Give it some time I'm sure you're doing everything right. When I got diagnosed the first week on the diet I never felt better, then after that I had some D again and it was a long process to feel back to normal.

I definitely can last a while, it depeneds on the person, but your situation is very normal. I usually take something to stop it because I don't have patience haha.

[miles2go]

Oy, I had trouble with oats before going gluten free. I've been gluten free for almost 4 years now and still can't do the oats no matter how gluten free they proclaim themselves to be. It takes about nine days for my system to get back to normal, hopefully yours won't last that long.

I do miss the oats, though.

Feel better soon!

Margaret

[jerseyangel]

Sadly, I can't tolerate the gluten-free oats either. My reactions used to last much longer in the beginning, although everyone's are different. They can last anywhere from a few hours to weeks.

Mine used to take 2-3 weeks and now after 4 years they are generally pretty much over in a day or two. I think part of that is that it's easier now to figure out what caused the reaction--earlier on, not as much. I still make it a point to only try one new thing at a time. Every time I have ignored that, I've gotten into trouble