Coeliac Disease Support

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I wish CoeliacUK had a forum where we could all chat and swap tips but as they don't I thought we could start one here.
All welcome.

Irish company McCambridge Brown bread sell online a pack for making your own gluten free brown bread. Available across the world. My coeliac family members use it a lot and love it.
Also in lreland we can offset extra cost of gluten free food against tax . Can you do that in UK?
And Quality Street Chocolates/ sweets are gluten free!!!

Once you get the hang of it all, and much more confident about knowing which actual ingredient items contain gluten, you will rely less of gluten-free substitute items that cost so much and taste like disappointment. Honestly, they’re often really high in sugar as well, and Coeliac disease has a closer link to diabetes than I am comfortable with. Maybe get him his own toaster, chopping knives and boards and introduce him to Pinterest. You may foster the next Masterchef.

Coeliac can be limiting sometimes, but once you get used to the extra planning that's needed it doesn't get in the way so much. Checking labels becomes second nature and you get to know your new favourites fairly fast. It's got so much better even in the last six years that I've been diagnosed - loads more in the free from aisles, Aldi and Lidl have some great things sometimes, and lots of normal products have now become GF as rice flour is used as a substitute thickener (for example). Watch out for barley malt extract - that bugger still gets in everything. Echo posters above about M&S bread being the best, and supermarket pastas are fine (DO NOT get Heinz, gloopy rankness).

Make sure you get new wooden utensils and chopping boards that are only used for GF food - cross contamination can happen when utensils are used for both.

My DH is great with our kitchen going almost entirely GF - the only normal stuff he has is bread, and things like HP sauce and branston pickle. I do miss things every so often, but I prefer not being ill

Good luck, and feel free to @ or DM me if you have questions

Magnums are gf so if out and want an ice cream they are a good go to. I've never come across a mr whippy yet with gluten in

For the iron have you tried the spa tone, it's a bit gentler

McDonald's fries are fine, yes. They cook them in a separate vat to everything else. I've eaten them very frequently and never been unwell. The dips are all ok except for sweet and sour but I get them in the tubs rather than using the communal sauce just in case someone has stuck the nozzle in a burger bun!

Breakfasts/ burgers without buns are dodgier - you need to get it well communicated to the kitchen and they will change their gloves/ wash their hands etc. DD1 works there as a manager so I tend to go in when she's on shift and she oversees it. Even then, the sausage and egg mcmuffin (no muffin, obviously) doesn't always suit me. I think the sausage has up to 50ppm gluten rather than the 20 required for gluten free.

Burgers without the bun I've never had an issue with, though they don't guarantee. DD reckons there's less general cross contamination risk around after breakfast time as the buns are a bit more self contained than the muffins. The veggie burgers are also gluten free, as is the mcflurry ice cream.

McDonald's was my favourite ever thing before diagnosis , can you tell? If and when the coeliac vaccine comes in my sole purpose of getting it will be to eat McDonald's!

On the subject of ice cream, many mr whippy places will sell you it in a little tub rather than a cone and I've never found one that wasn't free of gluten.

If anyone bakes cakes, I've found that rich fruit cake (e.g. Christmas cake type cake) is really easy to make gf. Lots of cakes don't substitute well with gluten free flour but because rich fruit cake has so little flour compared to fruit, it comes out really well. Add a bit of xanthan gum to hold it together. I made a simnel cake for Easter and DSis said it was the nicest rich fruit cake she'd ever eaten - and she normally won't touch gf cake! I've found that GF fruit cake does not improve with age like normal rich fruit cake, so make it the day before you want to eat it. If you don't bake cakes, M and S rich fruit cake is amazing!

The other cake that goes down really well with friends who don't even realise I'm serving them something gf is delias chocolate squidgy cake
We were actually making this as a special occasion cake long before I had my diagnosis and never even realised it was gluten free! The cocoa acts as flour. We do keep it for birthdays etc, however, as it's expensive and time consuming (or at least, it is when DH makes it - I suspect I could make it much quicker!)

So, as of today, my 10 year old DD has a confirmed diagnosis. She is very anxious and tearful about it all and keeps thinking about all the things she can't have. I'm sure that she'll get used to it, especially as we try out new recipes etc, but I think we may have a difficult few weeks. Doesn't help that the timing coincides with Y6 SATs. Those of you who are already GF, or who have children who are, how didnyoinfind the transition? Any tips?

It'll pass, but it will be tough to start with. It's like a kind of grieving process. I was in utter denial at the start, thinking it was all wrong and I'd be eating all my faviourite stuff very soon. Then I went through terrible anger, mainly at the doctors who didn't pick it up and my GP who kept telling me I was just depressed. I put in a complaint and for a long time wanted to persue compensation etc. I was angry at my parents for ages because they would hold birthday gatherings and completely forget I couldn't have cake, or because mum would say "want a biscuit?". I got angry at my friends for barely understanding what gluten was. I was furious at food manufacturers for putting wheat in stuff that should not need wheat in it, such as sausages and in chocolate and on chips. I was generally quite angry, for some time. Then I cried a lot, mainly in supermarkets. More than once I broke down sobbing going past the bread aisle and when family went to McDonald's.

It probably took a few months to get past all that and accept it. Whilst it still feels unfair, I get that life is unfair sometimes. Most of the time I'm so used to gf substitutes now I don't even notice. We don't have gluten in the house which makes it easier. I've found lots of new favourite foods I never would have known about. And when we have family celebrations I get a Tesco free from caterpillar cake (which is yummy) and even better, I pretty much have it to myself! I've made peace with the whole thing, the failure to diagnose, the lack of understanding, the fact that it's forever. I've pretty much forgotten what gluten stuff even tastes like and it isn't such a big deal any more.

At least now you have it confirmed your DD can start feeling healthier and stop doing further damage. Maybe she can find other young ones in her position - I know there is a children's page with coeliac uk. Focus on the positives - you can discover new foods, there are lots of great substitutes, and things are getting better and better for coeliacs. There has got so much more stuff in the supermarkets even in the two years I've been diagnosed. In the future things should just get better and better. But as well as the positives, allow her to grieve, as she may well need to.

@musicposy thank you so much for such a thoughtful post. It was really helpful to read the point of view of someone who has been through it.

I think your description of it being a grieving process is spot on. As well as the foods that she will miss, DD has also spoken about being different, being singled out etc and I know that this will happen to a certain extent. She has been crying and saying that things won't ever be the same, and I can't deny that because while it's a bit dramatic it's also true.

But then at the same time, I know that we're lucky, it's something that's treatable, it could be much worse. I feel like I can't moan to friends or family because the response is 'Oh yes but it's easy being gluten free now because there's so much choice.'