I Can't Eat Anything!

[heidi g.]

I think i have some withdrawal symptoms- Well maybe all of them~ Whenever i eat rice and vegetables i hardly have any digestion problems. I had a boiled egg tonight and i suffered since 7pm to now (finally starting to feel a little bit better) which is 12:30am. I eat about twice a day if even that. I ate gluten free noodles and that was h e double hockey sticks last night. I want a slice of pizza! i look at rice and want to gag because thats all i been eating. I can't eat soy, dairy, seeds/nuts, eggs apparently, any processed gluten free foods such as the noodles and bread, avocados, sometimes apples, ground beef, sometimes chicken, and alot of candy. What the heck am i supposed to eat? I cant eat another bowl of rice. I need protein somehow and i cant eat eggs or chicken or dairy so i dont know how to get it. Is this even a sign of gluten intolerance? someone help me before i lose my marbles! I apologize for the bad punctuation im writing on a phone

[mushroom]

Sometimes it does get that bad, Heidi, that we have to go back to a very basic diet of things we know we do tolerate, and then slowly add things in one at a time as we heal. You know you tolerate the dreaded rice, so make that the basis of your meals. You can make a beef, vegetable or chicken broth (a crockpot is good for this) and cook some celery, carrots, and rice in it. Try a little tuna or fin fish in it for protein and see how that goes if chicken is out, although the chicken might work if it is well cooked in the crockpot. Just use olive oil, salt and pepper for seasoning. Get your stomach all calmed down. Try some canned applesauce, same canned pears, things that are easy to digest. I know, this is not your normal diet and it will not continue to be your normal diet, but you have to get things calmed down now to get it in a state where it can handle other foods. Don't eat anything out of boxes, anything with tough skins like raw apples, tomatoes, even cooked broccoli or cabbage. You might try some green beans or peas in your crockpot. You can eat three meals a day from your crockpot at first until you can expand your range of what you tolerate. Add in a new food every four days and see if you tolerate it. Keep a record of what you're eating and what is disagreeing with you. Pretty soon you will be expanding your range quite a bit.

Take some probiotics, some digestive enzymes perhaps, and some L-glutamine to help heal your gut. Be kind to your tummy and it will reward you with less and less pain and distress.

[domesticactivist]

You got good advice from mushroom. On the blog linked from my profile there is a summary of the first 5 stages of GAPS that might give you ideas of nutrient dense, easily digested foods to try.

[Di2011]

In my early days of gluten-free (about 3 months ago) I had a couple of weeks of not even being able to eat a bowl of plain rice. My stomach and brain were so screwed up that it seemed like food was absolutely unbearable - nauseating and toxic. I stuck to very basic soup for about a week. Pumpkin was easiest to cook and digest for some reason: fry off onions or leek, add salt/pepper and gluten-free stock -powder or whatever is easy, water to fill the pot and then throw in cut up one or two potatos -to thicken- and loads of pumpkin. If you don't have a blender (I don't) then use a potato masher to mash the soup. Potato and leek soup is probably a good one for you too. (same recipe but omit the pumpkin, use onion instead of leek if you need cheaper/easier option) But my brain had a problem with any vaguely white gluggy stuff so I couldn't handle the idea of potato soup. Taste it along the cooking process and add more stock / salt/ pepper etc so you get the flavour right. The only other thing I seemed able to eat and tolerate was raw carrot. Don't by them under ripe - deep orange like a carrot should be & not woody and pale like its been too early picked or way too old, stored too long etc.

Stick with it - the first weeks are really hard and we are here to help. Get online here as often as you need. I had a mini-breakdown/breakout yesterday and the DH community were so helpful. Not sure how I would have coped in the past few months without them.

[Di2011]

And I just remembered: I started adding (little bit at first) rice into the soup pot after about 4-5 days, replaces the potato as a thickener/filler. From there I moved on to risotto in the rice cooker which again tends to soften the rice better than straight cooked/steamed/boiled rice.

Fry onion, garlic, a little (splash) white wine ((not necessary but I was getting desperate for flavour; alcohol at boiling point no longer alcohol)) salt pepper salt then add a bit of water. Put this in the rice cooker (or add rice to your pot) and add enough water to fill or cover rice and about 2-3 cm above rice.

Risotto like soup is so versatile. Add vegetables / spices etc that you can tolerate and all are softened so less harsh on the stomach.

[svs]

Some very good advice! My body went super sensitive after awhile, but it adjusted...I know the feeling of never wanting to eat a certain food again because that's all you can eat but it will get better! Hang in there!

[Simona19]

I just want to add something that might be helpful. If you are fructose intolerant, the apple sauce, or pear would give you problems. Even leek and onion is high in fructose. Only fruit that you might tolerate are berries, small banana or citrus fruit (I can't tolerate them).You can have the similar reaction to them as to gluten.

Check this:

Open Original Shared Link

Here are some older posts about rice recipes:

http://www.celiac.co...rice-more-rice/

http://www.celiac.co...s-to-make-rice/

I was at the point myself when I was reacting to everything - bloating, cramps, a lot of pain. Now, that I'm gluten and casein free for year and half I can eat more things. From the beginning I was eating only plain rice, cooked potatoes with plain meat cooked in salty water, homemade chicken or vegetable soup, bananas, berries, Glutino pretzels and plain water. Now, I can eat almost everything (except things that I'm intolerant, or allergic too).

As others sad, it will get better. Now you just need to do things to survive.

I have one more idea. I also had SIBO. Check the symptoms for this. I read somewhere that many people with celiac disease will also have this.

[Bubba's Mom]

You poor baby! It sounds like so much is bothering you.

I know food starts to feel like the enemy and you don't want eat. You really should eat more than twice a day though. Eat small amounts, more often.

Take a look at the GAPS diet. It's designed to heal the gut. Once healed you can eat more of a variety.

One of my hardest things to give up was candy. I found soy was giving me reactions and that da*ned stuff is in everything. I would love to have chocolate back.

It's possible you have a yeast overgrowth going on? It can make you feel just awful..and causes reactions to any of the sugars or carbs that might feed it.

(((hugs)))

[alicewa]

It may be fructose malabsorption, that is making you react to apples.

[Skylark]

The GAPS diet is at Open Original Shared Link in case you can't find the link. You should get the book if you want to try the diet because the book explains how to do heal yourself.

[heidi g.]

I cant find what SIBO stands for anywhere on the internet. What's its full name?

I have one more idea. I also had SIBO. Check the symptoms for this. I read somewhere that many people with celiac disease will also have this.

[Simona19]

Sibo is Small intestinal bacterial overgrowth

Open Original Shared Link

Open Original Shared Link You need to take stronger antibiotics for it.

[heidi g.]

thanks. I just had to vent a little and i ended up having a panic attack which lead me to come on here! Its gotten bad im going home from school i cant attend if i feel like this. People tell me to suck it up and finish and get a job. I try to suck it up as it is! Ill feel so sick sometimes and then ill feel so hungry out of no where. I never thought as food to be important but id really like to eat some cheese. Now its like im just eating to live & i don't even want to eat. Before i got diagnosed i was almost put in an eating disorder clinic in highland park hospital- against my will- I had to convince my doctor the reason i was 35 pounds below my weight limit and why my sternum was sticking out was because my stomach felt sick and i didn't want to eat, not that i thought i was fat. & Thanks bubba's mom. You are such a nice person & i wish i could eat chocolate too. I thought about having candida too but i think the symptom was having yeast infections and i don't have any but i do feel bad when i eat candy. Right now the only thing above my head is a big ?

[heidi g.]

Hmmm ill have to ask my doctor about that

[ravenwoodglass]

thanks. I just had to vent a little and i ended up having a panic attack which lead me to come on here! Its gotten bad im going home from school i cant attend if i feel like this. People tell me to suck it up and finish and get a job. I try to suck it up as it is!

Sorry your having such a rough time of it right now. There is nothing wrong with taking a break while you are healing. School will still be there when your feeling better. Do make sure to talk to your advisor and withdraw formally so it won't impact your grades. Your doctor may even be able to write a letter stating that you are too ill right now to attend if it is almost semesters end and too late to withdraw.

[Skylark]

People are so cruel with the "suck it up" stuff. They have no idea how ill you might be feeling. Do what you need to do in order to get well and ignore the people who have no idea what it's like to have celiac.

[heidi g.]

The worse thing is my mom came over today and i was asking what she is going to put in her turkey for thanksgiving and she uses some chives or sage (something like that) and i told her i cant eat it if its the dried processed spice and she looked at me like a weirdo and i tried to explain to her that it contains traces of wheat and she goes "yea but its only used as a binding." i really wanted to smack my own forehead. I can't complain because i was a total moron and knew nothing of this until i was told to try a gluten free diet. But seriously if your allergic to nuts are you going to use anything that has traces of nuts in it? C'mon mother use your noggin! Im going to just eat her potatoes just to be safe.

[kareng]

The worse thing is my mom came over today and i was asking what she is going to put in her turkey for thanksgiving and she uses some chives or sage (something like that) and i told her i cant eat it if its the dried processed spice and she looked at me like a weirdo and i tried to explain to her that it contains traces of wheat and she goes "yea but its only used as a binding." i really wanted to smack my own forehead. I can't complain because i was a total moron and knew nothing of this until i was told to try a gluten free diet. But seriously if your allergic to nuts are you going to use anything that has traces of nuts in it? C'mon mother use your noggin! Im going to just eat her potatoes just to be safe.

I buy McCormick or Penzys spices. They don't have wheat in them. Plain spices are usually just spices.

[mushroom]

Kareng is right - it is usually only the spice/herb seasoning blends that have gluten; single ingredient spices and herbs should be safe. But that would eliminate a specific "stuffing" blend even if your mom used gluten free bread and gluten free flour for the gravy. Is she on board with these kinds of modifications? Even so, thanksgiving dinner may be too iffy fo you at this point

[heidi g.]

It's ok though i will be ok with her mashed potatoes, sweet potatoes, cranberries, and turkey I can;t over eat anyways or ill feel sick. But good news i called my doctor and told him whats going on and im scheduling an appointment with him tomorrow to get a blood test and i believe he said stool. Both are to test my genetics. So hopefully i can get some definite answers. I couldn't really understand him though he's from India so his accent is quite confusing.

[ravenwoodglass]

It's ok though i will be ok with her mashed potatoes, sweet potatoes, cranberries, and turkey I can;t over eat anyways or ill feel sick. But good news i called my doctor and told him whats going on and im scheduling an appointment with him tomorrow to get a blood test and i believe he said stool. Both are to test my genetics. So hopefully i can get some definite answers. I couldn't really understand him though he's from India so his accent is quite confusing.

If this is gene testing don't let them tell you that you can't be celiac if by some chance you don't have one of the two most common genes. There are many more celiac associated genes than they commonly test for here.

[Skylark]

Dried single spices are usually completely safe. It's the mixes that sometimes have flour to make meats brown nicely and the wheat must be declared on the label as an allergen. If you're really nervous, go to her house with a gift of fresh chives and sage for the turkey.