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Boyfriend In Denial About Celiac Disease

ginny1138

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ginny1138 Newbie
ginny1138
Posted

Hello.

My boyfriend of about two years has Celiac disease and always cheats on his diet. About a year ago his denial caused him to have an irregular heart beat and malnutrition. He had no energy and could barely walk up a flight of stairs without becoming exhausted and nauseous. Since then he has been better about his diet but is still not 100% gluten free. He doesn

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hockeymomofceliacchild Rookie
hockeymomofceliacchild
Posted

Hello.

My boyfriend of about two years has Celiac disease and always cheats on his diet. About a year ago his denial caused him to have an irregular heart beat and malnutrition. He had no energy and could barely walk up a flight of stairs without becoming exhausted and nauseous. Since then he has been better about his diet but is still not 100% gluten free. He doesn

Jungle Rookie
Jungle
Posted

I guess you have to decide if this is what you want to sign-up for a lifetime of.

If he doesn't want to take care of himself, can you depend on him to take care of you? It is not your job to rescue him. There are many things in life that are hard to deal with. As annoying as celiacs is, it is a very simple medical diagnosis. Don't eat gluten and you will be better. How many other things do you cure as simply as that. No side effects, no surgery.

Life will throw you twists and turns. If he can't step up and look after himself because it is hard, how is he going to sacrifice his wants to support you and the family you may have?

You have gone above and beyond by being supportive of him and trying to make this a way of life for you as well as him. I don't think there is anything more you can do. Only he can change his behavior. You might have to consider he might not.

ElseB Contributor
ElseB
Posted

Hello.

My boyfriend of about two years has Celiac disease and always cheats on his diet. About a year ago his denial caused him to have an irregular heart beat and malnutrition. He had no energy and could barely walk up a flight of stairs without becoming exhausted and nauseous. Since then he has been better about his diet but is still not 100% gluten free. He doesn

mushroom Proficient
mushroom
Posted

To get some possible insight to the male thinking, you might be interested in reading this recent thread:

Guys are not like gals :P

eatmeat4good Enthusiast
eatmeat4good
Posted

When people show you who they really are...believe them.

--Maya Angelou

I think it speaks to his problem solving, judgment, and willingness to ignore something really significant regardless of the consequences.

You have to ask yourself how this will work in the long term. Not just with his Celiac but with other things.

AzizaRivers Apprentice
AzizaRivers
Posted

I do want to say I think you're being an awesome girlfriend for being supportive of him, and especially going gluten-free for solidarity. I think sometimes people don't realize how good that makes us feel, someone saying "I'm in this with you, we'll do it together."

Have you had a long sit-down talk with him about this, or just bits and pieces here and there trying to get him to understand? I don't know what the rest of your relationship looks like, but I could never imagine saying "Sorry, looks like if you can't take care of yourself you can't take care of anything. Bye bye!" This is something he needs help with, and unless your relationship is strained in other ways, I could not imagine it would be the best thing to break up with him over this. No disrespect of course to those who advise you to think about your relationship (we all need to be evaluating our relationships) but I simply see a different point of view.

First of all, he needs to understand that celiac is not impossible to live with. It does not rule my life, and it doesn't really stop me from doing anything except eating gluten. There are so many worse things that can happen to a person besides celiac! I can go somewhere with friends and either bring my own food, or just enjoy their company and not let the food issue get in my way. There are so many things he can still eat, and he needs to learn how to appreciate them. Humans tend to compose too much of our diets from carbs and starches anyway, so there's no need to bother too much with replacements unless it's the occasional treat.

What are his favorite foods? Sometimes you can make really good alternatives if you do it right, if that would help him cope. I think one of the biggest things he needs is to realize this is not the end of the world. It's just gluten...who needs that, anyway?

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    • rei.b
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      By rei.b · Posted

      Okay well the info about TTG-A actually makes a lot of sense and I wish the PA had explained that to me. But yes, I would assume I would have intestinal damage from eating a lot of gluten for 32 years while having all these symptoms. As far as avoiding gluten foods - I was definitely not doing that. Bread, pasta, quesadillas (with flour tortillas) and crackers are my 4 favorite foods and I ate at least one of those things multiple times a day e.g. breakfast with eggs and toast, a cheese quesadilla for lunch, and pasta for dinner, and crackers and cheese as a before bed snack. I'm not even kidding.  I'm not really big on sugar, so I don't really do sweets. I don't have any of those conditions.  I am not sure if I have the genes or not. When the geneticist did my genetic testing for EDS this year, I didn't think to ask for him to request the celiac genes so they didn't test for them, unfortunately.  I guess another expectation I had is  that if gluten was the issue, the gluten-free diet would make me feel better, and I'm 3 months in and that hasn't been the case. I am being very careful and reading every label because I didn't want to screw this up and have to do gluten-free for longer than necessary if I end up not having celiac. I'm literally checking everything, even tea and anything else prepacked like caramel dip. Honestly its making me anxious 😅
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      So you're saying that you think you should have severe intestinal damage since you've had the symptoms so long?   DGP IgG antibodies are produced in response to a partial gluten molecule.  This is different than what tissue transglutaminase antibodies are  produced in response to.   TTg IgA antibodies are produced in the intestines in response to gluten.  The tTg IgA antibodies attack our own cells because a structural component in our cell membranes resembles a part of gluten.  There's a correlation between the level of intestinal damage with the level of tTg antibodies produced.  You are not producing a high number of tTg IgA antibodies, so your level of tissue damage in your intestines is not very bad.  Be thankful.   There may be reasons why you are not producing a high quantity of tTg IgA antibodies.  Consuming ten grams or more of gluten a day for two weeks to two months before blood tests are done is required to get sufficient antibody production and damage to the intestines.  Some undiagnosed people tend to subconsciously avoid lots of gluten.  Cookies and cakes do not contain as much gluten as artisan breads and thick chewy pizza crust.  Anemia, diabetes and thiamine deficiency can affect IgA antibody production as well.   Do you carry genes for Celiac?  They frequently go along with EDS.
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      I was tested for celiac at the same time, so I wasn't taking naltrexone yet. I say that, because I don't. The endoscopy showed some mild inflammation but was inconclusive as to celiac disease. They took several biopsies and that's all that was shown. I was not given a Marsh score.
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