The high numbers of the test usually correlate with more severe damage in the intestines, although it's not a 100% correlation.
The disease - it's impact is huge. It can be life threatening if not treated, and life altering in a wonderful way if you stick carefully to the gluten free diet. I put a link in below that lists 300 potential symptoms of the disease.
The basic issue with this disease is that it destroys the villi in your intestines, so you stop absorbing nutrients. The problem with this is that every, single system in your body becomes nutrient deficient and stops working properly, stops re-building cells properly, etc.... Your brain, your bones, your muscles, your immune system, everything.
My father went undiagnosed until his hips and every disc in his spine were destroyed. My immune system tanked from this disease and so I caught a DIFFERENT disease that usually causes a nasty cough and instead it escaped my lungs and infected other areas of my body that I can never eliminate it from. I know people who, before being diagnosed, have had organs removed, developed other diseases, had permanent brain damage - the impact of this disease is huge, truly.
That said - going gluten free will likely make a huge impact, too. You'll likely find that many problems you thought were 'just you' have actually been gluten and the celiac disease.
Re: the diet, though - unfortunately, there is no compromise in the diet. A celiac's body reacts to extremely small levels of gluten, just like a severely allergic peanut allergy sufferer reacts to tiny amounts of peanuts. Cheating on the diet, or going 'mostly' gluten free only, will keep your body sick. And unlike an allergy, a celiac's reaction tends to take quite a while to recover from - it can be weeks to fully heal from just one gluten contaminated food, and while healing, your body is once again nutrient deficient.
See if you can get a good, celiac Knowledgeable Dietician to help you with this. Celiac.com's website has a forum with a huge number of celiacs who can be of great help to you in figuring out the diet, what's good to eat, and some of the pitfalls to avoid, as well.
Good luck. As someone who just went through this a few years ago, I can tell you that is is hard to adjust to, but the benefits are really, really worth it.
The disease - it's impact is huge. It can be life threatening if not treated, and life altering in a wonderful way if you stick carefully to the gluten free diet. I put a link in below that lists 300 potential symptoms of the disease.
The basic issue with this disease is that it destroys the villi in your intestines, so you stop absorbing nutrients. The problem with this is that every, single system in your body becomes nutrient deficient and stops working properly, stops re-building cells properly, etc.... Your brain, your bones, your muscles, your immune system, everything.
My father went undiagnosed until his hips and every disc in his spine were destroyed. My immune system tanked from this disease and so I caught a DIFFERENT disease that usually causes a nasty cough and instead it escaped my lungs and infected other areas of my body that I can never eliminate it from. I know people who, before being diagnosed, have had organs removed, developed other diseases, had permanent brain damage - the impact of this disease is huge, truly.
That said - going gluten free will likely make a huge impact, too. You'll likely find that many problems you thought were 'just you' have actually been gluten and the celiac disease.
Re: the diet, though - unfortunately, there is no compromise in the diet. A celiac's body reacts to extremely small levels of gluten, just like a severely allergic peanut allergy sufferer reacts to tiny amounts of peanuts. Cheating on the diet, or going 'mostly' gluten free only, will keep your body sick. And unlike an allergy, a celiac's reaction tends to take quite a while to recover from - it can be weeks to fully heal from just one gluten contaminated food, and while healing, your body is once again nutrient deficient.
See if you can get a good, celiac Knowledgeable Dietician to help you with this. Celiac.com's website has a forum with a huge number of celiacs who can be of great help to you in figuring out the diet, what's good to eat, and some of the pitfalls to avoid, as well.
Good luck. As someone who just went through this a few years ago, I can tell you that is is hard to adjust to, but the benefits are really, really worth it.
Source(s):
symptoms - http://glutenfreeworks.com/gluten-disord…