To think she doesn't *really* have coeliac disease?

Eating gluten free isn't expensive. Lots of foods are gluten free, you don't have to live on special freefrom foods. You need to stop eating gluten, you are damaging your intestines, and setting yourself up for all kinds of problems, from osteoporosis to increased risk of bowel cancer.

It's a blood test followed by a gastroscopy& biopsies.

There is such a thing as Silent Coeliac disease, people with this don't have the classic gastric symptoms from eating gluten, but it's still damaging their intestines.

Some people also really struggle with the change of lifestyle and dietary restrictions and 'cheat' even though it makes them poorly.

Or she's lying.

She does it v v rarely.

Try Tamari sauce - it's gluten free and a good soya sauce replacement, I use it. As for a Marmite replacement, you can get GF Vegemite, that's similar (imo nicer!).

Except she could have CD. It can 'trigger' at any age so if MIL has been diagnosed quite early she could still be eating gluten and not getting many observable symptoms. It's incredibly dangerous though because the long term consequence of that is what your friend went through as it sounds like she sadly went undiagnosed for a long time.

Tamari soy sauce, Aldi own brand Marmite and rice paper spring roll wrappers as pancakes if you want to make it yourself. All gluten free. Or lots of Chinese takeaways do gluten free if you ask them to.

You can have gluten free tamari soy sauce, @LoveSandbanks,. And Tesco Yeast Extract tastes just like marmite (on toast). Both are Gluten Free.

I’d be inclined to jump in “OMG MIL - don’t eat that, it’s got gluten in, you’re going to get terribly ill”.

The pancakes are made with rice flour,so are gluten free.
If he has even a may contain he is often in agony. Luckily we know our local chinese well, and they sat down and went through ever dishes ingredients, they make his in seoetate area of kitchen etc

I can’t tolerate the soy sauce. I can’t even eat marmite anymore. I definitely couldn’t eat spare ribs in sauce or pancakes.

My friend who has coeliac disease has had to have multiple abdominal surgeries, is on medication for her liver and kidneys, has developed ulcers along her colon, and developed early onset arthritis, possibly needing a knee replacement in her early 30s, all attributed to undiagnosed coeliac basically causing havoc with her organs. Your mil maybe gets a bit bloated and uncomfortable when she eats bread, she doesn't have coeliac.

For anyone diagnosed CD that still eats gluten for cost reasons, I'm not judging, I know it's hard but gf pasta is the same price as regular in some supermarkets and rice cakes can be a good cheap alternative to bread. Lots of things can be bought from the regular aisles if you check the packets like some own brand crisps, stock cubes, rice noodles etc. Or see if there are any food banks that can help. I know it's easier said than done but statistically the gluten is likely to kill you eventually and if you get cancer I imagine that's pretty expensive!

I didn't have obvious symptoms pre-diagnosis but my bloods showed my liver function was very poor and I could have ended up with liver disease if I kept eating it. Theoretically I could have done and not had obvious symptoms but I didn't because I value my liver! Now I've given it up I vomit for hours if I have the slightest trace so she could have it but be bad at sticking to it because she thinks it's not affecting her but that's very dangerous long term.

I'm not coeliac but am either gluten or wheat intolerant and cannot touch it or else I get a nasty reaction. I don't know whether a few molecules would do it, maybe not as I live with someone who eats gluten, so probably I do encounter it although I use a separate cutting board and so on. I'm not going to experiment to find out!

There's nothing quite the same as bread made with wheat but honestly I won't touch it now, not worth it, I just stay GF all the time, life's too short to be spending it in the loo in pain!

I had this happen to me 12 years ago. Blood test said yes but biopsy said no. 3 yrs ago during COVID I lost 8kgs over a couple of months whilst living on a diet of cake and sandwiches at work and had another round of blood tests. Blood test said yes and I was convinced it was wrong. Had a biopsy and this came back positive! Absolutely gutted and it’s taken a long time to come to terms with.

@LoveSandbanks When I was at CDUK, if we went out to eat we'd often go to Wagamama - they had an alternate menu of all their dishes that they could make gluten free - usually substituting rice for noodles.

No, you can't have a mild form of CD that's absolutely fine if you happen to fancy a biscuit.
I used to work for Coeliac UK - we had someone that worked there that was inadvertently served something with a trace of gluten & was off sick for a week.

Can still have a Chinese. My husband has a severe gluten intolerance, and has special fried rice, spicey ribs, duck pancakes, vermicelli noodle chow mean, seaweed, sweet and sour (non battered) and various other items. Only things he can't have are the noodles and anything with batter

I am diagnosed Coeliac, by blood test and endoscopy. I never had any of the classic symptoms but l got very anaemic. My sister is diagnosed too, also one of my children who also didn't have the classic symptoms but does feel better on GF diet.
My diet is strictly GF and I'm very surprised to read on here that others diagnosed as Coeliac don't strictly stay GF .

I could eat an ordinary sandwich without any obvious effects like a PP but l would not do this. I don't want to damage my gut.
Yes , tell your Mum that perhaps you should get tested too , also relatives as it runs in families and you need to know what tests her doctor did.

Not everyone is the same, my mum eats bits of it stupidly. Over time she gets ill if she does it too much - anaemia and all sorts. She has diagnosed coeliac.

There’s a slight association between coeliac and chiari malformation if that might mean anything?

I was in almost constant agony with my stomach (didn’t the runs or sickness) but I had a lot of stomach pain and was forever breaking wind.

I had a biopsy which indicated damage, coeliac disease and precancerous something or other. I was in so much pain I had worked out to stop eating bread by the time my GP finally organised a blood test (I had no guidance before the test and so it didn’t confirm coeliac disease). But I was advised to follow a coeliac diet by a hospital Dr to see if it helped improve my symptoms which helped with the pain enormously. I still do follow a coeliac diet. I live in an ordinary family home. I don’t use the toaster at all as feel it is too risky, all dishes and cooking implements go in the dishwasher. I sometimes feel some people feel I am being difficult but I would rather not eat than risk ingesting gluten and going back to living in pain again and damaging my insides further. I am gluten intolerant.

I have clinically diagnosed CD however I can eat very small amounts of Gluten without any outward symptoms. Internally is probably a different matter!