Its a potpourri of topics today. I’ve got a lot on my mind but nothing for a complete post because I just don’t have enough. Here we go…
Pre-clinical celiac drugs – There are about 15 drugs for celiac in the pre-clinical phrase. I’ve been doing research and looking many of these companies up. They all seem to still fit into one of three categories – encapsulate the gluten to pass through the system safely, breakdown the gluten to pass through the system safely, or modify the immune system to ignore the gluten.
Many are still in development and have yet to even do studies in petri dishes. One company even said that they thought celiac was a great place to do research because there weren’t any drugs available yet. Now, I appreciate that, but it make me feel like we are the fanciest, newest pie and everyone wants a piece of the pie.
Also, it can take approximately 5,000 compounds in pre-clinicial phases and six to ten years to get to one drug that is approved for a disease. The more shots we take at the goal of a drug to help cure this disease, the closer to a cure we will be.
Certified vs. non-certified gluten free – In the US, in order for something to be labelled gluten free it must contain fewer than 20ppm. It is a voluntary label and is not required nor tested. In order to have the gluten free label, the item cannot be manufactured with gluten containing items or if it is manufactured with gluten containing items, it must be processed to comply with the 20ppm standard.
If something is certified gluten free by one of the 3 major certification programs, the company has paid to have the item tested and verifies the item meets the below 20ppm standard. Understand that the item may be but is not required to be 100% gluten free, even with the certified gluten free logo. Just be aware that certified does not mean 100% gluten free – only whole foods, proteins, diary, and things processed with no gluten containing ingredients are 100% gluten free.
Halloween – Please consider putting out a teal pumpkin and offering non-food treats. The teal pumpkin indicates that you have allergy-sensitive or non-food treats for your trick-or-treaters. I’m giving out finger lights and temporary tatoos this year!!
Thanksgiving – Stresses me out as I’m sure it does most of you. We travel to my in-laws and it is a 7+ hour drive to visit them. It is always emotionally challenging for me. I don’t think there has been a year since diagnosis that I haven’t cried at some point during that weekend, and I’m not a crier. At times, I’ve gone to the grocery store to buy pans and food for me to cook there because the food choices are limited. I’ve always brought snacks.
My husband and I have already started the inevitable aggressive discussions about what I need and how we can make it work there. We are only 4 weeks before Thanksgiving, so we are a little late with the fights. I try really, really hard to keep it in, but I can’t.
What we have been doing hasn’t been working, so we are going to try something new. We are going to bring a cooler with what I need for at least a day. I’m going to go the grocery store again on the day after Thanksgiving to buy what I need, but for the first day, I will eat out of a cooler. I’m also going to bring my favorite sweet potato with candied pecans casserole as well.