You will have heard me use the term ‘gluten whiplash’ before. It describes the time when someone on a gluten free diet starts becoming reactive again. This can either be because:
- they are not so strict on the diet as they were at the (terrified) start
- they become more dependent on gluten free, probably contaminated, convenience foods
- they start to react to other glutens like corn in those replacement foods
- they start to react to other foods which now come to the fore. I wrote a bit about this here: Gluten: Will I Become Less Sensitive?
I see this happen a lot.
Dr O at GFS has just written about the same phenomenon so hop over there to see what he says about it too: Do You Have Gluten Whiplash?
The take-home (being all American-sounding there!): if you start off well as a coeliac or corn free-er and then start reacting again, look at what you have started to eat more of. It might not be a grain – could be soya or nuts, for example – or it could be something cross-contaminated, or very likely another non-gliadin gluten grain that has come to the fore. That’s what happened to me with rice, and happens to most as far as my clinical experience goes. Worth a think.