Diarrhea and Celiac Disease - But it's not from Gluten! Ep. 97

If you have cut out gluten but are still suffering from diarrhea, I am covering off some of the other possible causes.

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Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:24

One of the things I never would've predicted when I was diagnosed with celiac disease was just how much I would talk about bowel movements and it kind of become normal. So thanks for tuning in to today's episode where we are actually talking about bowel movements, which as you may be aware by now becomes very normal when you have celiac disease. And it's usually a common topic that I discuss with my clients, and it's something that I guess is a bit weird for people without celiac disease to understand how important it is for us to understand our bodies and understand what our bowel movements are actually trying to tell us. So I thought it would be good to share with you today about diarrhea and talk about why you might be maybe still suffering from diarrhea every now and again and why it might not actually be gluten. So for years, every time I would get diarrhea, I would freak out and think, oh my God, I've eaten gluten. And I would backtrack and I would try and figure out what ha I had eaten to work out why I was feeling this way and why I was having this symptom. But as the years went on and I learned more and more about my body and I learned more and more about why our body reacts this way, I figured out that it wasn't always gluten. So you might be every now and again suffering from diarrhea and thinking that yes, you've actually had a little bit of gluten or that there's something else going on. So today I wanted to talk about some of the reasons that can cause this symptom for you. Now, as you are very well aware, most people do suffer from diarrhea, from consuming gluten. So if you are pretty confident that you have got a hold on your celiac disease diagnosis, you have completely cut out gluten, you are all over the cross contact. You are pretty sure that there's no gluten sneaking in. But every now and again you suffer from this symptom. It could be from one of the other reasons that we are talking about today. So this is to help you now and well into the future when and if you do suffer again from diarrhea, and you might be able to pinpoint it a little bit easier than straight away jumping to conclusions and and thinking that you've had gluten. Now, the first one is from viruses. So if you get a virus, you may suffer from a bit of diarrhea and not realize that you've got a virus. You may not get any other symptoms, but it can be from that. So if it goes away after a couple of days, it's probably that if you don't suffer from any other symptoms, you can also suffer from diarrhea from, I'm gonna keep saying this word over and over and we're gonna become immune to it, okay?<laugh>. So you may also get it from

Speaker 2: 3:23

Having bacteria or some parasites in your gut. You can get bacteria and parasites from things that you may have consumed, such as water, even food. So sometimes they get on the food and in the water that you consume and it goes into your gut. And then you have these issues. So depending on where you live, this may not be something that you struggle with, but perhaps if you've gone on holidays somewhere and it's in a country where it's not as clean, you can usually pinpoint it pretty quickly. Uh, my husband got very sick when we were in Bali one time. He was very, very you and it was from the water. So yeah, it, it's easy to get that and pinpoint it I guess, much easier when you know, you know, you're in a country that this is a, this is generally a common thing such as Bali, but you could get it even from drinking rainwater. You could have rainwater and there's a parasite in there and you get ill from that. So the next one is medications. So you may find that you have started a new medication and that it messes with your gut. So it could be that. So have a think about the times where you maybe started a new medication, whether it's been for a temporary illness or whether it's a long term thing. So some people find that when they take the pill, they find that that gives them, uh, gut issues from that. So you know, that's something that you've gotta look at what you're taking and realize that whether it's that or not. And of course you need to be making sure that your medications are safe for you and not have gluten in them. So I'm not talking about whether they've got gluten, I'm just talking about a reaction to those medications. Okay. Alright, the next one is lactose intolerance. So you might have heard my story about lactose intolerance. I live with celiac disease, but a number of years before I got diagnosed with lactose intolerance, I cannot have lactose anymore. It is nasty<laugh>, it does not agree with me at all. There's certain dairy products that I can have, but they need to be very, very low in lactose or lactose free for my body to be okay and not suffer the consequences. So for me, I'm a bit like with gluten now, I just avoid anything with lactose in it because it really doesn't make me feel good at all. And I can, again, I can pinpoint that and I can see that I've had lactose and I know and it the, yeah, the effects of that are pretty immediate. So you might have originally not had lactose intolerance, but over the years your body has decided, hey, let's just throw another spanner in the works and give you lactose intolerance as well. So if that's you, I feel your pain. But<laugh>, don't

Speaker 3: 6:21

Deny it if it's, you know, I was in denial for a little while. I regret being in denial because I could have been feeling better quicker, and you can feel better from cutting out lactose. So yeah, it's worth looking at. It's worth making sure that you're on top of that as well. All right. The next ones are other gastrointestinal issues. So things like ibs, I B D. So you might wanna look into those if it's something that you are suffering from quite a lot. If you feel like it's not just every now and again and it's just something that you need to pinpoint, if it's ongoing and you know you've cut out the gluten, then I would get checked for IBS or I B D and just make sure that you can rule those ones out as well or any of the other gastrointestinal issues that could be occurring for you. So you'll need to go to your doctor to get support with finding answers for those ones. Okay? Now, you may also be suffering from being unable to break down the sugars in fructose. So you may read on some packets of things that have got fructose in them that if you consume too much, it can cause diarrhea. So you'll find fructose in many different things. So it could be that for you. Um, it could even be artificial sweetness. Some people find that when they have too much artificial sweeteners, again, you'll see warning labels. So things like chewing gum or chewy, whatever you want to call it. You'll see on those, if you consume too much, it will cause a laxative effect. And it's true, these, it's because of the sweeteners, okay? So they could be causing issues for you. So again, looking at what you're consuming and being on top of what you are having so that you know what's causing it. And the next one is too much fiber. You could be eating way too much fiber. Again, this com can completely depend on you, your diet, and you might not be eating the right types of foods for your body. And if you are consuming too much fiber, then you're going to need to learn how to balance that out and to not be consuming so much fiber that it's, it's causing you bowel issues. And the next one is one of my favorite things to learn about and it's our hormones. Our hormones, yes, they completely change our bowel movements. It's crazy that I've gone through most of my life and never really knew this until a few years back. And the thing with hormones is they change, don't they? As women,<laugh>, we have hormone changes through our whole lives. So depending on what stage of life you're at. So I believe I've already started perimenopause, so I'm in my forties and I believe that I'm already going through the early stages of perimenopause, but I haven't found that that has affected me yet as far as the bowel movements. But it can, because of the fluctuations and the changes in the hormones, it can certainly change your bowel movements. So if you are sort of at an age where you think

Speaker 4: 9:19

That might, might be happening for you, then it could be down to that. Now, if you're pregnant, pregnancy is so much fun for hormone changes. And again, it can completely change the way that you, uh, you know, you're all the toilet. It can change from day to day. Every day is a is a new, it's a new day every day when you're pregnant, you just dunno what's gonna be thrown at you. So if you're pregnant, you can probably put it down to changes in hormones for you. That's a pretty easy one to pinpoint. And then of course, for those of us that have got our periods, then there is the lal stage, and this is when estrogen drops and when we have a drop in estrogen that can cause us to have diarrhea. So you might find that every month you are going, what's going on here? I've got diarrhea again. And you can pinpoint it and you can just go, yep,<laugh>. It's just the time of the month. And that's what's causing it. So that's a really easy one, and I know for a fact that that affects me every single month around the time of my period. So that's a simple one to pinpoint. If you are looking at what's going on for you, you're tracking what's happening in your life and your health and you can see what you are eating, you can see when you're getting your period, things like that. Blame those things, blame hormones, blame anything that I've discussed today with you, and you'll be able to feel better. I guess that you know, it's not always gluten, there's always another reason for it. If it's not gluten, okay, if it's some of the more serious things that we talked about like ibs, I b d, then you do need to go speak to your doctor. But otherwise there's some, there's some ways that we can look after our body and look after our health. Now, I do recommend if you are suffering from diarrhea for longer than say two days, I would go see a doctor. Because normally if it's from food or hormones, you're not gonna have constant diarrhea for two days straight. So if it's any longer than that, two days or longer, you need to be going to a doctor and getting checked out. Obviously, if it's gluten, that's a different STO story or together. But we are talking about these other topics today. So to keep on track with your health, I recommend you improve your gut health, and we've got ways of doing that. Absolutely. We know the different things that we can do to improve our gut health. We need to exercise, we need to eat a healthy I balanced diet, and we need to lower stress because stress can also cause gut issues as you may or may not be aware. So that's a big one for me. Stress is a big trigger for me, and I know that it clears my bowels out if I'm under some serious stress. So I hope these subjects have helped you today. Thanks for listening to me to say that word over and over<laugh>. I hope it wasn't too painful for you to listen to, but I do hope that this helps you see that it's not always gluten. We don't always have to blame gluten, and you may need to be looking into some of these other areas to help you pinpoint what's going on for your gut and your life. So thanks for tuning in and I look forward to sharing more with you again very, very soon. Take care.