New Here With Questions!

[RebeccaJeeper]

Hello everyone!

I am writing as I have a few questions, and I thought this would be a good place to learn more about this topic and hear from those with experience!

Here is my situation: I have, for probably 7-8 years, had on and off symptoms of intermittent diarrhea and constipation, abdominal pain and cramping, very hyperactive (noisy) bowel sounds and gas. I have also been anemic consistently for over 8 years. I was anemic while pregnant with my daughter who is now 8, but was just told to take iron supplements, and attributed it to the pregnancy, however, it has never improved. I have attempted to donate blood twice and been turned down due to low Hgb, and my doctor has had it checked for a couple years and it is consistenly low. I am also very lethargic, tired, and at times irritable. I have no family history of celiac disease.

Now, the odd thing, is that I don't have symptoms consistently with certain foods, particularly those with gluten. Is this normal for celiac? I can eat things with gluten sometimes and be fine, then other times have horrible cramping and pain. I ate a handful of vanilla wafers last week and had the most horrible cramping, bloating and pain ever!

I have an appointment with a GI doctor in a few weeks-I assume he will likely do an upper endoscopy, but not sure yet. My regular doctor made the referral after I had a bout of a week of mucousy, blood tinged diarrhea, (which was likely a virus), but with all the other issues, she thinks there is something underlying, such as celiac, that needs to be figured out. I was surprised when the GI office called, they said the Dr. was going on vacation in August, but wanted to make sure he saw me before he went! I was glad, but it made me worry a bit more!

Sorry for the long post..thanks for reading this far and thanks in advance for any advice, help, and answers!

Rebecca

[vbecton]

Hello and welcome. As far as the intermittent symptoms, that can definitely be the case with Celiac. That was my problem. I'm a rigid, planned eater so I eat mostly the same things over and over again. Sometimes I would eat a sandwich and get awful bloated, gassy, rumbling, nauseous, headache symptoms, etc... Then, I eat the same sandwich 2 days later without any reaction. My other symptom was uncontrollable blood sugar. None of my doctors ever suspected Celiac or put two and two together that my blood sugar and bowels were connected. Just recently did my endocronologist suspect Celiac and sent me to a GI. So, my diagnosis is in the works and my endoscopy suggested Celiac. I would definitely look into it if I were you. Good luck!!

[Skylark]

Fooey. double-post.

[Skylark]

Hi and welcome.

My symptoms were intermittent too. Sometimes I would be fine, other times I would eat pasta and run for the bathroom a few hours later.

Keep following up with the GI doctor. Once you have all the testing done, even if it comes up negative you have enough symptoms that it's worth trying the gluten-free diet. The false negative rate for the tests is estimated to be as high as 20%, and that's not counting all the people who are not celiac but still feel better off gluten.

[RebeccaJeeper]

Thank you for the replies! Even being a registered nurse, I realy didn't know much about Celiac disease until my Dr. mentioned it as a possibility, and I started to do more research! After all these years of problems, maybe I will finally find a solution! I am a little worried about this diagnosis, as I know it will mean major diet changes, which can be difficult when you have to make meals for a fmaily, and not just yourself!

Until the work-up, I am just eating normally-I did dtart bringing some gluten-free snacks to work at night (I work midnight shift right now) as this seemed to be a very bad time for me to have symptoms, and it has helped. Otherwise, I will just keep eating what I usually do until testing is done.

Thanks again!

[Skylark]

Thank you for the replies! Even being a registered nurse, I realy didn't know much about Celiac disease until my Dr. mentioned it as a possibility, and I started to do more research! After all these years of problems, maybe I will finally find a solution! I am a little worried about this diagnosis, as I know it will mean major diet changes, which can be difficult when you have to make meals for a fmaily, and not just yourself!

Until the work-up, I am just eating normally-I did dtart bringing some gluten-free snacks to work at night (I work midnight shift right now) as this seemed to be a very bad time for me to have symptoms, and it has helped. Otherwise, I will just keep eating what I usually do until testing is done.

Thanks again!

Don't worry too much. If you like to cook, the diet is not a big deal. Celiac is genetic and the highest risk factor for celiac disease is a first-degree relative that has it. If you turn out to be celiac, removing some wheat from your kids' diets would not necessarily be a bad thing.