Hollye

16 hours ago, cyclinglady said:

Thanks for letting us know.    Sometimes, we just assume that gluten is to blame, and often it is not.  I am so guilty of that.  I kept thinking that  I was getting glutened.  Turns out I can not tolerate Xanthan Gum....still to this day.  

 

I know...I find myself always on a gluten witch hunt because I'm so stressed but diligent about my children's health! And yet, they managed to catch salmonella!?! So, Xanathan gum makes you feel glutened? That is very interesting. Sorry to hear this too because it is in nearly everything unfortunately.

On 9 November 2017 at 10:07 AM, Hollye said:

Hi All,

My my family and I just moved to Switzerland from Australia. As an American expat I was very pleased to find out that I could easily order gluten-free Cheerios for my 3 and 5 year old girls for the first time!

Well...for the past two weeks my girls have been displaying signs of being glutened. They are now having terrible  direahea for the past 2 weeks since I've been feeding them this cereal every other day or so. I've desperately been trying to rule out what is causing this but we are a gluten-free household...Now, I'm just waiting for the poo samples to come back because none of thier kindergarten and play group friends are sick but these test won't reveal gluten poisoning...sadly, I've just stopped the cereal for brekkie.

I am am wondering if anyone here has had any problems with the gluten-free Cheerios as of late?

Thank you!

 

Hi All,

so I have an update - my girls had sammonella poisoning! 

I'm fairly confident now that they were not glutened but I will wait for a while to reintroduce the Cheerios now that I know it's a moot point.

thanks all

4 hours ago, Cara in Boston said:

Hi Cara, 

It is a shame! As I wrote to cyclistlady, I’m tired of always having to be a bit skeptical about food labeling.  Well, my kids can eat oats so I know that’s not the issue.  

Halloween was an absolute nightmare for me as well. I purchased some gluten-free candy from the American website and I’m  also having to rule the candy out....as this is around the time my girls became sick. I purchased both the candy and the Cheerios and they’ve never eaten either before. Well.....actually I’ve  just remembered that my second daughter had normal Wheat Cheerios and blueberries at the same time when she was 8 months old in the USA and had full blown hives which brought her to the pediatrician straight away and then vomiting and diarrhea which prompted another trip. We thought it might have been some chemical on the blueberries.....? she was meant to only have gluten-free foods but my sister hadn’t realized when she visited. Who knows, maybe they are just sensitive to the Cheerios brand...

 

2 hours ago, cyclinglady said:

General Mills VOLUNTARILY decided to remove the gluten free label on their boxes of Cherrios in Canada.  The dispute seems to be about the testing methods for oats.  General Mills was on a team of researchers, manufacturers, etc.  to help determine safe and valid testing just for oats.  It appears GM gave up.  

Open Original Shared Link

Something happened, but the public does not really know exactly what happened.  It is all behind closed doors (or beyond my sleuthing abilities).  GM did make a public statement about this topic. (Yeah, the kind their Public Relations Department and their building of attorneys created and reviewed).  

Some celiacs do react to oats no matter how they are processed (pure or mechanically sorted).  Best for this Mom to avoid ALL oats for now (even other processed foods containing gluten-free oats).  Test again later with pure gluten-free oats and not sorted.  

Until this is all “sorted” out, I would be leery of many processed foods (e.g. cereal bars) beyond just General Mill’s products.    General Mills made a substantial investment in their mechanically sorted oat equipment and they did not do this for just one of their product lines.  

The botton line is no one really knows what is going on.  Hopefully, we will hear more as time goes on.  

Hi Cyclinglady, 

thanks for the information.  Really interesting.  My understanding here in Switzerland is that the standards are not as high as they are in Australia or the USA for gluten-free labeling...but again I believe this was from the USA. Honestly, I’m so exhausted with having to constantly double check and wonder about some of the little store shop luxuries ( not cooked from mom)  that I am feeding my children.  Here in Switzerland, there are very little options as compared to Australia and the USA and so believe it or not, the Cheerios are luxury! 

3 hours ago, Cara in Boston said:

We've tried them several times and each time, we get sick.  It's a shame because we really liked having this easy option.   Didn't Canada just rule that Cheerios CAN NO LONGER be labeled gluten-free there?

We also stay away from other products that rely on some "system" to remove gluten (like some gluten-free beers).  Just stick with things that have naturally gluten-free ingredients.

I was recently in the hospital for several days and was surprised to see Cheerios on the gluten-free menu. 

Good luck to you and your family-

 

cara

 

 

4 hours ago, kareng said:

I am not sure if you are talking about the same Cheerios.  I know there are other brands that make Cheerios in Europe, so maybe in Australia, too?

Hi Kereng,

There were no General Mills Cheerios in Australia and the cereal that I purchased was from an online American food site that is here in Switzerland. From what I can tell, it’s genuine American Cheerios distributed by GM Minneapolis...and it reads on the box that it is a proud sponsor of Celiac.org....?

Hi Ennis,

Thanks for the heads up. Pretty sad that facts get blurred when there’s money to be made....

Hi Ella,

thanks so so much for your email. I am very sorry to hear that you suffer from autonomic neuropathy. You,  sounds like my daughter.  She has very extreme sensitivity to light! I even brought her to an eye doctor when she was 18 months because whenever I laid her on the change table, she would cry that the normal light above, hurt her eyes!!  At this point her eyes did not dialate yet...and yes she has very good eyesight.

she also seems to have difficulty swallowing...she nearly always coughs when drinking and chokes 90% of the time when she eats! ( surprisingly not dessert! ?  She will hold certain meat in her mouth and chew it for ages and refuse to swallow it because she says its chokey. She also drools a lot but doesn't realise and I've always thought it seems she has trouble with her speech because it's as if she can't form her lips properly...

The poor darl, I'm  painting her as below average intelligence here when in fact she's actually gifted.

Did you experience any of the food chewing issues or even drool? Also, do you know if one can have gluten issues without the intestines being effected?

Also, what age did you find out that were a celiac and how does the doctor know that your eye is indeed affected by gluten? This is where our problem lies...being able to link her eye issue directly to the gluten that she is not testing positive for...

Hi, thanks again Ravenwood.

I am not  a huge fan of lollies, etc and my kids get minimal but they were given a lollipop without my agreement when they were with the MIL. Not to blame her because I gave then a couple small ones that are gluten-free to help with potty training ☺️ 

Luckily my neuro has given us the paperwork because the traditional tests came back neg but it's been such a long journey with lack of support from in laws that I question if I'm doing the correct thing everyday!  Also I do not trust that they feed us 100% gluten-free because her meal time episodes flare up when we eat at their house!!

Fortunately my husband is very supportive and so is my family but they are in the USA and not here.

we are moving to Switzerland in a few weeks and I feel that I can now 100% control our diet. I plan on telling her school that she is diagnosed gluten-free as you say to avoid contamination. I can never forgive myself if she does indeed have Ataxia.

As far as the test, We all carry two positive markers for the celiac disease. Her endoscopy came back as reflux only but she was only on gluten for 8 weeks after a few months being off of it.

As far as the blood test, I do not know if it was a low positive? I'm assuming that there was no reading but I will try and find her paperwork.

thanks again for your insight and support. I wish more people would recognise that this isn't some dieting trend as my MIL thinks. In fact, my youngest gained weight and began to grow again and my other daughter is rarely to never sick anymore as she was plagued with hives and severe and constant sinus infections. The neuro could not believe how severe her sinus was when he viewed her mri. ( after the neg endoscopy I put her back on gluten) 

Hi GfinDc and Ravenswood,

Thanks so much for for your support! I just feel guilty because my mother in law constantly gives me a hard time. She doesn't believe gluten is doing this and just thinks the weird dialation with spells are harmless even when all the issues ( yellow poos, big belly, constipation and u digested food, etc ) subside or decrease when she's not eating gluten! It's just a constant battle that I'm pretty dam tired of!

I know that my children have a gluten issue but because the typical testing came back negative, I have to defend this.

 I know that my youngest just wouldn't eat the gluten products at 17 months during her challenge and for some reason my then 3 year olds test came back neg except that it showed reflux which she's had since she was a baby when I was still eating gluten and breastfeeding. It took the eye issue with staring spell for her to be diagnosed with gluten sensitivity. In fact our pedi neurologist knows and respects our pedi gastroenterologist but flat out disagrees with him. 

Last question, can a lollipop made with wheat glucose contaminate them? They are getting yellow poos and constipation again! Not sure where the contamination is??

Thanks again again so much!

G'day all,

Living in Australia, I have two children age 2 and 4 that have been diagnosed with gluten intolerance ( initially presumed  celiac before all the test which came back negative a year ago)  due to a failure to thrive in the 2 year old at 7 months and severe constipation and staring spells which is very likely silent seizures only during dmealntimes in my now 4 year old. 

My question, do any parents have gluten intolerant or celiac children that appear to be having silent seizures or having staring spells where one pupil dilates during meal times?

My 4 year old went through many test to determine why her pupils were doing thus and all the test came back good, ( no brain tumour, etc.) our Neurologist discovered our youngest had severe gluten issues so he told us to restrict gluten from our 4 year olds diet. When we did, we realised her constipation cleared and her pupil stopped dialating about 90% of the time during meals.  She still has these issues but we think being tired possibly also triggers it.  Our neurologist says he would treat her with meds if these spells interfered with her safety or learning but otherwise he doesn't want to diagnose her officially due to long term effects in her life with the label, however, he is quite convinced this is due to gluten. I'm worried that I'm forcing her to be gluten-free like myself and her sister if she truly isn't gluten sensitive.

I'm really curious if gluten can cause this? And if any parent has experienced this?

Also, what age should I consider retesting? 

Thanks for your help!

Hollye 

Hi, I am hoping to get some insight.  I have a 13 month old daughter who has just been diagnosed with failure to thrive.  She was born late and weighed 3.1 kilos. Quite normal. Up until about 7 months she was positing quite often (more then just spit up) and coughing incessantly . I brought her to the drs quite a few times because I was so worried about this dry cough.( 9 months they thought possibly Cystic Fibrosis but luckily thats been ruled out). Her poos were also quite explosive and slimy but I chalked this up to exclusively breastfeeding and her shots.  Other than that she was a very content baby. She still is content and happy and meeting her milestones, except for her weight and height.  She is the size of an average 7 month old. I exclusively breastfed her until about 7 months until when she managed to pick up a croissant dropped by another child and began teething on it.  I decided to give her croissants thereafter along with the normal first baby foods.  From that point on, she's stopped growing but that was unnoticed until about 9 months.  Anyway, since I'm not gluten sensitive I kept eating gluten and breastfeeding her but I did take her off of gluten.  I noticed that her poos thickened a bit sometimes but all the food that she did ingest comes out EXACTLY the way it looked going in.  Even in color.  I decided to mash half of her food and keep half cut up because she preferred the finger foods and even the mash came out the same color!  From 9 months to 12 months I did strictly gluten-free for her and most of the time for myself but she never put on weight!  She then was given a handful of cheerios by mistake and 20 minutes after she had a full body rash that lasted a week!  (we cannot confirm if its from the wheat because she had tofu (soy) for the first time the night before.  She then had the blood test but all came back negative though she was tested for gluten without having gluten....Finally we are currently seeing a paediatric GI specialist and he's asked me and her to stop eating Dairy and Gluten for 6 weeks. He suspects she might be celiac.  MY QUESTION: Can my small amounts of eating gluten (4 small random servings a week)  create failure to thrive in a celiac baby?  As a side note, when I was pregnant with her I could not stomach gluten foods (bread, crackers, pasta, etc - any relation?)  Thank you!!