Elimination Diet With Trace Amounts Of Gluten?

[superfob]

Hi everyone,

I was wondering if anyone had experience with an elimination diet that included trace amounts of gluten/other allergen which improved their symptoms. Trace amounts as in soy sauce/other substances containing gluten in small amounts.

I have recently been suspecting that a food allergy is possibly causing symptoms which I have been experiencing: constant light sleep, brain fog & difficulty concentrating throughout the day, constipation & foul smelling stool, loss of weight despite normal diet, increased hair loss, constant thirst. These symptoms have noticebly shown up during the past three months or so, but I remember often having brain fog and fatigue starting from childhood. I use to experience these massive food comas, where I pretty much could not do anything for 3 hours following a meal which was not ridiculously big.

The main reason I am wondering is that I want to try eliminating wheat, dairy, corn, potatoes, nuts, soy, and eggs for a week or so. But this restrictive diet would make it impossible for me to eat a meal with others, so I'm wondering if trace amounts are ok, as in I completely stop eating the significant sources of these, but continue to have things like soy sauce, butter, supplements with soy/corn, vinegar, etc.

Thanks

[ravenwoodglass]

Because celiac is an autoimmune reaction I think at least for gluten you need to be completely gluten free. Even a small amount will keep the antibodies going and keep you symptomatic. Have you gotten any testing done yet? If not you should think about getting a through checkup including celiac screening and screening for diabetes and thyroid issues to start.

[Charlotte R. Lafer]

if you are going to elimination diet w/o going through testing you will want to do this an item at a time to see if there is improvement. yes, doing a total elimination of suspected items causes social eating "issues" but there are ways to deal w/ it. you can always ask for things like a salad w/o crutons & the dressing on the side.

as for your list of condiments to keep - those are all major problem foods that if you are doing an elimination you really need to eliminate. if anything, those are the items to get out of your diet FIRST. often they have multiple culprits that you don't know about. (for example, if you are going to cut out soy you NEED to cut out soy sauce as it has both gluten AND soy.)

i came up negative when i was tested, but have many of the symptoms. additionally i have MANY food allergies. there ARE restaurants that everyone can enjoy together, even when people in the group have food sensitivities, allergies, ciliacs, & other food related disorders.

on a side note, if it IS ciliacs, then potatoes can stay on your food list, but you may need to look at their preparation. baking them on a sheet of foil vs frying keeps them w/in the ciliacs diet.

hope this helps