I often read folks here mentioning they're allergic to wheat and dairy. How can you tell? What are the usual symptoms?

For me it was easy, I went on a GF diet and my IBS cleared up in about 2 days and hasn't returned. A gluten intolerance can have almost any symptom you can imagine. There was one little kid I saw on TV that had delayed development and seizures. No GI problems at all.

My main symptoms were: IBS, thyroid disease, tendency towards autoimmune diseases

Here's a good web site for ya: http://www.celiac.com/st_main.html

See what happens.

After a while of clean time (maybe a week, maybe three) introduce them back into your life, one at a time. See what happens.

My heartburn went away when I quit eating wheat.

My face breaks out (and I get stupendous gas) when I eat milk or some dairy.

Pretty clear here.

Same here. I went clean on wheat and my "hay fever" went away. Now, every time I have something with wheat (like low carb wraps last night), I end up sneezing a lot and having a runny nose.

Oh yeah, I used to get really thick ropes of mucus crawling down from my sinuses every now and then. Really hard to expell. I haven't in 2 months! Some people say that their arthritis, joint/bone pain and muscle cramps get better. I'm hoping for that result too.

If you want an official diagnosis of Celiac disease don't go on a GF diet. Get tested for antibodies and get a small intestine biopsy first. But I think a lot of people gluten intolerant would get missed by this process, and just going on a GF diet really seems to be the ultimate in diagnosis. Unfortunately medicine doesn't see it that way.

I just paid a lot of money for a gluten intolerance test that uses intestinal antibodies and checks genes. They also do milk product intolerance testing too. It is VERY expensive however. The main reason I decided to do it was so I could tell my relatives to get tested if I turn out to be positive. It is genetic.

Big article very recently about how US doctors are learning to diagnose celiac disease and it's much more prevalent than formerly believed. In the US, we thought it was 1 in 5000, and it's turning into 1 in 100. Doctors in Europe diagnose it MUCH more often.

Given that the treatment is free--quit eating gluten--there are unlikely to be any big drug companies behind it.

So many magazines through my life I can't remember which one it was in.

I find that I crave butter, cream and cheese intensely, but consistently overdo it if I indulge... I could eat a whole stick of butter, even if unsalted, it's like I get a kind of high as if I were eating rich chocolate. Cheese, I also could eat a whole brick, or a whole container of cream cheese . And cream, I get a high buzzy feeling having it in my tea, and sometimes after having too much get sleepy and headachey and carb cravey.

I don't care for rice or potatoes, or even pasta for that matter, but seeing bread makes my mouth water. I CRAVE bread in a big way. I get a pleasure high when I eat it, and want to keep eating it until it's all gone, even if it's low-carb. The moment it touches my tongue I become a fiend, no matter how 'multi-grain' it is. I have been fighting MASSIVE pizza cravings (can you say dairy AND wheat!) Does this behaviour indicate allergies or just extreme intolerance?

When people say allergy with wheat, they usually mean gluten intolerance, but some are truly allergic. Most of us are intolerant. You don't get a typical allergic reaction like hives, but you don't completely digest the protein. And those proteins cause your body to mount an immune defense which leads to leaky guy, then those partly digested proteins get into the bloodstream and can cause immune reactions just about anywhere in the body.

In "Dangerous Grains" the author mentioned that the partly digested proteins resemble opiates in structure and do cause some people to get a nasty addiction. This one little boy (celiac) I saw on TV would absolutely cram wheat stuff in his mouth and then zone out. Looked like he had gotten a fix.

I could eat absolutely enormous amounts of wheat. I can't really do that with any other starch.

My Dr did blood tests for IgE and IgG antibodies. He said most people have antibodies to at least a dozen foods. I didn't have any symptoms and the tests showed no allergies.

I saw a list of symptoms in an alternative medicine book and was shocked to see I suffered from every one.

Lacking health insurance and money, I decided to cut all wheat and starches out of my diet just to see what would happen. Lo and behold, my whole life changed -- for the better. It was amazing. You couldn't pay me to eat breads and starches now. I feel like a brand new person without them.

Oh -- for me, the symptoms I suffered from were:
1. edema of face, hands, feet
2. heart running away with me, even at rest
3. SEVERE migraines
4. frequent sinus infections
5. extreme fatigue

There were a few others, but those were the top five.

When I go on Atkins, my dry, flaky skin vanishes. I quit itching all over.

I had the same dry, itchy skin to! My skin looks 10 years younger on Atkins.

I have every bad sypmtom known to man from wheat and other grains. Stomach, joints, muscles, sinus with stopped up ears, heart palpitations, eyes swelling etc., etc.

I can hardly believe the difference in how I feel when I stay away from the bad stuff! It's hard to fathom sometimes that something that you are supposed to eat and is so readily available can make you feel so bad in so many different ways.

I could have written both those paragraphs. I gave up 99% of wheat 6 mos ago, and I haven't had a piece of bread in a YEAR and still when I smell fresh bread I want to dive in head first.

I'd say you absolutely have a sensitivity.

I agree...definitely a sensitivity.

It's one of the peculiar things about food sensitivities...that we crave it. With most allergies/sensitiites, we want to avoid the thing we're bothered by, but not so with food.

He didn't do a TgA test? I think that's the better blood test nowadays.

But I think the ultimate test is to try a GF diet for a couple of weeks and see what happens. Doctors are too reliant on blood tests.