May is Coeliac awareness month in the US and Canada,

Good morning everyone,

Being a diagnosed coeliac I know how hard it was for me to get diagnosed and it took many years as Dr's thought that I was too healthy and I was suffering from tension. This is because gluten is toxic to coeliac (celiac in the US) so its bound to make us tense and when a coeliac ingests gluten the villi collapses and we have to expel the toxin and after a while malabsorption follows. So many coeliac suffer from osteopenia and worse osteoporosis and other auto-immune disorders.

Processed gluten free foods/free from foods aren't necessarily healthy as the name free from implies and the free from aisles are packed with high fat/sugary foods with lots of additives.

In some areas UK coeliac can still get bread and flour on prescription, the majority is codex wheat that has been washed repeatedly in solvents to remove the bulk of the gluten and this is renders it inert and of very low nutritional value, so it has to be fortified. There is another problem and thats how prescriptions are procured which means that a 400g loaf of GF bread costs the NHS a whopping £8.40 when I can pop into Tesco's and either get 6 loaves on prescription for £50.40 from their pharmacy or I can go to the free from aisle and buy exactly the same product for £2.80. This is still a lot but 1/3 of the cost to the NHS so the CCG's (Clinical commissioning groups) are stopping prescription foods, for obvious reasons.

In my opinion a naturally gluten free diet based on fresh food cooked from scratch is far more beneficial health wise than consuming these Franken foods.

Here's some links and if anyone thinks that they have coeliac disease then ask your GP for an IGA blood test.

whathealth.com/awareness/ev...

beyondceliac.org/celiac-awa...

celiacedmonton.ca/events/ce...

There's a coeliac awareness week in the uk later in May.

Jerry. 😊

[dede7]

Yes I tested positive for both coelic genes thanks for the information

[Hidden in reply to dede7]

It's good to know for sure so good luck with all things gluten free, there's a GF topic section on HE as well. 😊

[Activity2004 Administrator]

Great information, Hidden !😀. Will read the websites this afternoon.

[Hidden in reply to Activity2004]

thanks Leah, I thought it would appeal to you being gf and in the US. 😊

[Activity2004 Administrator in reply to Hidden]

Thank you for saying that, Jerry!😀👍 I really appreciate it.

[Zest]

I am still admiring how great your bread bun is. It looks really tasty.

Zest

[Hidden in reply to Zest]

Thank you Zest. 😊

[Blath]

And that soup looks amazing too!!

[Hidden in reply to Blath]

And thank you Blath. 😊

[andyswarbs]

Although I am neither ceoliac nor intolerant I have cooked an increasing GF lifestyle for around 30 years. This stems back to a good friend whose second child started screaming almost continuously from I guess aorund the age of 3. Researching the subject and defying doctor's advice she eventually had a biopsy on herself which proved it was ceoliac. Her son has grown up and lives a full life currently in New Zealand. Following what he did throughout his school life he carries around sufficient stocks of GF foods to ensure he is not caught out.

Amongst other health challenges my friend is very worried about bone breakage. Besides taking calcium tablets she drinks cows milk products. On the plus side I am pleased as time has passed that she is moving more towards whole-foods, but coming from a meat-eating family it is a long slow process.

[Hidden in reply to andyswarbs]

Hi Andy, this is interesting about your friend, we as coeliac are made to feel paranoid about calcium as many suffer osteoporosis and or osteopenia. I have borderline osteopenia and have had for years and I won't take calcium as its basically calcium carbonate (chalk) and very hard for us to absorb and they estimate absorption of between 0.3% and 3% and the rest our kidneys have to work harder to remove...I eat sesame seeds as they're high in calcium.

Dairy is an odd one as many coeliac cannot tolerate dairy/lactose and my body does not like cows milk so I've used alternatives for years and lots of my gf baking is literally an egg away from being vegan.

But I've felt that I have so many foods to avoid I try not to restrict it a lot further but only eat organic goats dairy, free range eggs and raw honey now.