Foods your body mistakes for gluten!

Are you coeliac or gluten intolerant and strictly following a gluten free diet but still suffering from symptoms such as brain fog, bloating, diarrhoea, constipation, headaches, joint pains, disturbed mood or low energy? If so it may be that although you are gluten free you are still eating foods that your body mistakes for gluten and therefore mounts a similar immune response to.
This phenomenon is known as cross-reactivity and is thought to occur because the proteins in some foods are very similar to the proteins in gluten. The foods most likely to be involved in gluten cross reactivity reactions are dairy foods such as milk, cheese, cream, butter and yoghurt, corn, millet, oats, rice and yeast
Because these foods are seen as similar, the immune system reacts to their presence by producing antibodies and creating an inflammatory response in the body similar to that experienced when susceptible individuals eat gluten. If that sounds like you then you may wish to eliminate those foods from your diet to see if your symptoms improve and then reintroduce them one by one (eating them three times a day and allowing four days between introducing each new food) to see if they cause symptoms. It is also worth bearing in mind that because of the gut damage caused by coeliac disease or gluten sensitivity that you may have short term issues tolerating certain foods for a while after you are diagnosed. If this damage (rather than cross-reactivity) is causing your symptoms then issues should subside once the gut has healed again