SIL thinks I made her sick :(

[FlappingAboutTheFuture]

SIL and family came round after an activity on Saturday and had dinner with us.

SIL is strictly wheat and gluten free, awaiting testing but already knows she has a severe intolerance. I take that seriously but I know lots of family members don't and SIL is quite sensitised to the idea that someone isn't taking it seriously. Which I understand, so I do my absolute best and have successfully made meals for her in the past and she does, sort of, trust me with food now.

I made a meal of: jacket potatoes, grated cheese, baked beans, houmous, guacamole, and salad.

I checked the ingredients on the beans and houmous, no wheat or gluten. I made the guacamole myself so know what went in it (avocados, lime juice, fresh coriander, fresh chilli, fresh tomato). I even checked the ingredients on the mustard that went into the salad dressing to make sure that was GF (which it was!) - salad dressing was lemon juice, olive oil, fresh garlic, and mustard.

So as far as I could establish the meal was completely wheat and gluten free but apparently SIL spent all of Sunday and yesterday being sick and rang DP past night to quiz him about what was in the meal. Obviously our kitchen isn't really a 100% safe environment as we do eat wheat and I'm an ingredients cook so there could be all sorts of cross contamination, but I did my best and she was the one who said eating here would be fine so long as the actual meal itself didn't have wheat or gluten. I feel terrible now but I'm sure it wasn't my fault but I don't think SIL will ever trust me again...

Yes, but some people would be too sick to undertake this exercise!

Everyone else seems to have survived my filthy butter dish without succumbing to endless sickness bugs. One of my DC has even made it to their mid twenties 😱

I am totally prepared to accept it might have been cross contamination from the butter which I'm also prepared to accept I didn't even think of. However SIL also didn't think of it and and was happy to use butter that it would have been obvious wasn't freshly opened there and then!

Don't know what to say about the mustard. I checked the label and it wasn't even a "may contain", so what with not being psychic I didn't know it might be a problem.

I am intolerant of wheat and many other foods and chemicals, as a result of heavy exposure to pesticides. She needs to go on an exclusion diet, and reintroduce foods one at a time to work out what else she is reacting to.

If the mustard doesn’t list any wheat oats barley or rye (and these will be in bold) then it doesn’t contain gluten. By law, they HAVE to be listed, as do all allergens.
It could possibly be cross contamination from the butter dish.
Or something she ate outside.
But please do respond kindly to your SIL. Navigating this is horrible.

My mum is coeliac. I have tried and tried over the years to be intensely careful about food prep when she is here. Everything checked, everything scrubbed down, ALL food served that day being gluten free so there is no cross contamination or confusion. But everytime she complains of being ill afterwards. So a few years ago I said enough, I clearly can't do this well enough for you. So we meet at her house or picnic somewhere or (bizarrely) go to a Wetherspoons, which she has decided she can tolerate, but not anywhere else). I have now visited many Wetherspoons branches around the country with her. I know she has a diagnosed issue, but do wonder whether some of the reactions are more in her head than coelic-related. It must be a worry to not know if you are going to be ill every time you eat something.

Not saying you are psychic just that it’s new to all of us at the beginning and things like mustard etc can contain wheat without realising it , the powdered one is safer,

you tried hard but it can catch all of us out it’s all learning, main thing just apologise and move on
I had someone give me gluten free oats in a dish something which I cannot tolerate, she thought because it said gf it was safe and therefore didn’t mention it when telling me about the meal but many ceoliacs cannot tolerate even gf oats.

So what. She's being incredibly rude.

Tell.her that you think it's probably best you dont cook for her again. Job done. It's up to her to manage her own food issues.

My mum can eat non gluten food and still get really ill. It could be because of all the rubbish that’s added to free from foods, it could be because the food is prepared in a kitchen with gluten. It could be simply a knife that was used to cut some bread not cleaned properly. She can’t blame you, you absolutely tried but there are so many things beyond your control. There are times when a meal she eats is absolutely fine then she eats it again and there’s a reaction. It’s a terrible terrible disease. Your SIL is about to embark on a journey of Russian roulette with food.

OP, other than your SIL asking your DB for exact ingredients (something she unfortunately needs to do if she's trying to sort out a food allergy or intolerance), what has made you feel like you're being got at/blamed or not believed?

I can be extremely prone to guilt & self-blame, even when others are definitely not trying to blame me and logically I know I did everything I could to prevent something bad from happening. It's often a struggle to sort out when those are really internally-generated feelings that I'm mis-attributing to someone else, but the best approach I've found is to a) recognize I'm prone to that and that feeling blamed doesn't actually mean others are blaming me and b) try to force myself to assume people aren't blaming me unless someone gives me a pretty objective indication otherwise.

I was vomiting a lot, turned out to be gastroparesis. Took 20+ years to get diagnosed.

So having seen lots of conversations between bakers about why it's difficult to be completely GF (because lots of customers ask for GF and don't understand the issues of cross-contamination) you can't really make a kitchen GF if you have any non-GF ingredients present.

Honestly, I'd not cook for her again if she's that sensitive. I wouldn't want to take the risk.

I think you are taking this far too personally unless your SIL is actually telling you off. If she wasn't deliberately cheating on the diet and hoping she'd be ok, (which I imagine she wasn't) then clearly something she thought was fine isn't. Of course she is wanting to get to the bottom of it if possible, so she knows to avoid whatever it was again.

Sounds like you did a great job OP. As other have said she may have been intolerant to something else or just have another bug.

OP you have contributed enought time and energy to this. You spent time making a meal and ensured to the best of your knowledge that it was GF.

When asked you provided details of the ingredients.

You are not responsible for her illness. If she is sensitive to the point that a crumb causes the issue it is up to her to manage eating i.e. eat at her house first and bring her own snacks.

She is a grown woman, she can handle this.

Mustard is one of the 14 allergens that have to have a warning in the UK.

IP just to add (as a coeliac) I think you were very thoughtful and kind. When I was mid diagnosis I was told I should not cut out any gluten containing foods until after biopsies and scans were all completed and I was diagnosed. So if she’s not diagnosed yet that’s something to consider. I was also told that gluten is in make up, air fresheners, cleaning products, deodorant. I had to strip through my entire house. Maybe someone had sprayed something that your SIL reacted to? It’s v difficult to completely avoid. Post diagnosis I was cautious to the point of being extreme, as I was sick of being ill so often. After a couple of years I learned to relax a bit and found that my system was more robust. So whilst I do still have an autoimmune reaction now, it is no where near as bad as it used to be. Much more manageable.

Wait - you are out at lunchtime? Why is she so certain it was you that glutened her then?!

I would put it down to the butter. One of my siblings is coeliac and we cannot share the same butter due to cross contamination. If anyone uses his butter then we have to say straight away or he will become unwell if they have ‘ double dipped ‘ the knife.

Iam also gluten & lactose intolerant. I have never had vomiting all day when i have inadvertantly eaten Gluten . Diarrhoea yes. I would suggest that she either had a bug or theres other things shes intolerant too , shes yet to discover. But don't blame yourself.

Because apparently the chain they went to is always fine and hadn't caused her a problem before (neither has eating food I've made though so unsure why the chain is off the hook and I'm not!). Not naming it on here but it's somewhere that does serve plenty of wheat containing meals. I suppose a professional kitchen will have a higher standard than a domestic one with cross contamination?

I’d text her about the butter so she doesn’t do the same again. If you cut a bit off a new one before putting it in the dish and keep it in a tub in the fridge with her name on it next time that’s lovely, or she can do olive oil. It’s hard to adjust to.

my mum’s margarine containers all used to have “GF for diplop” written in sharpie then crossed out because my dad would forget. Now if I want it at theirs I open a new one or just use olive oil because my dad will never remember.

I’d trust you extra after this for figuring it out

could have been the baked beans that upset her. They are notorious for some people with delicate stomachs as are all pulses. Not your fault.

not unless they have two kitchens? I belive there are very few places that list themslves as gluten free kitchens. They may put gluten free items on the menu but usually somewhere warn about cross contamination. Also of course if you are sat in the room where other people are eating gluten containing food close by, there is always a crumb risk. While I wouldn't doubt what your sister genuinely believes, something is not adding up!

As someone with a food allergy that sensitive, shes being really rude. You've put more effort in than anyone in my family, except my mother, has put in concerning my food allergies in 40yrs.
Do not let her abuse you. And tell her to get a real allergy test. Obviously she missed one.

Attention seeker.You did nothing wrong.
I have met these people in my 74 years on earth
Get rid.