Episode 06: Should You Go Gluten Free?

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Participant #1:

Hi, guys. Welcome back to the Upbeat Dietitian's Podcast. Hi, guys. Welcome back. Today. We are so excited. We have our first official guest on the podcast. We are joined today by our good friend Anna Kitchen, who is also a registered dietitian. So we're going to be going over today with Anna, talk about the gluten free diet, her job experience as a dietitian, how we all met all that good stuff. Okay, so Anna, I will hand it over to you. Why don't you tell us about what you're doing for work these days, how you became a dietitian and how you got to know Emily and myself. First of all, thank you for having me as your first official guest. I was really excited to be asked to join you guys for work. I am a population health analyst for a population health consulting and analytics company, so essentially, I look through data on the back end and inform different clients and employers on opportunities for where they can get rid of medical centers as well as different population health disorders and diseases that are prevalent among their population and implement different programs that can help their population be healthier. So that's what I do now. But as Hannah and Emily have mentioned before, and that's how we know each other is. I went through school with them at Purdue, and I went through the coordinated program with Hannah. We miss Emily dearly during the course. But then I sat for my Dietetics exam in June 2020, and then I actually worked for winter for a short time. Just wasn't what I wanted to do. And so now I ended up where I am now. I interned with this company a few summers, and so I started in October, and I love it. I think you had taken your exam, like, what was, like, a week before me, right? Wasn't it like, you, me and then our good friend Sophie as well. We're all kind of, like, boom, boom, boom, taking the test back to back. Yeah. We had cram steady session. You sure did. But those days are over. All right. Well, we're going to talk a lot about, actually celiac disease today. So Anna here is a current. What's the word not survivor of celiac. But Anna lived her life with celiac disease. So we're going to be asking her about her experience and how she can navigate that best practices, that sort of thing. So Anna, will you kind of just explain to us, like, what celiac disease is and, like how you came to become diagnosed with it and all of that. So celiac disease is often undiagnosed and a lot of people, and it can also be hidden with a lot of other disease disorders. And it's kind of one of those diseases that can be diagnosed either early on in life or really late in life. And some people never even know that they have it because they don't show anything. So there's definitely quite the progression of the disease. But I think it's actually present in a lot of the population that we just don't even know. And it's probably even higher because it goes so undiagnosed so often. And how it presents is essentially it's genetic in the sense where you inherit a mutated gene. But that doesn't necessarily mean that you will get Helia activities. It just is more likely for you to. So then a trigger comes along and, like, activates that mutated gene, and then the symptoms start presenting themselves. So that's why there's kind of that progression early on or later on in life. And it's a little bit different than food allergies because food allergies have the potential to develop into anaphylactic, which I don't know if you guys have any allergies on that sense. But I know Emily has dealt with some food intolerance I have I have me and milk just don't get along. But a food allergy could, like I said, go into anaphylaxis, where your throat and your Airways close up. That's the difference with you reactivity a lot of the times it can't go all the way into anaphylaxis, but a lot of the same symptoms and other things happen. But Cbact disease is an autoimmune condition that potentially damages the lining of the small intestines. Have all those little micro Villa that increase the surface area and all those, and then you have no more surface area for your small intestines to absorb nutrients. Exactly. You kind of also went into our next question about whether or not Scliac was a food allergy. So that was a very nice description. We appreciate that. Yeah. I'm pretty sure the only difference is the anaphylaxis both present and produce an immune response, whereas a food intolerance doesn't prevent an immune response. But you may have the symptoms. So, Anna, we were discussing this previously on our gluten episode. But since you are an avid expert in this experience, we are wondering exactly what happens when you get, quote, unquote gluten.

Participant #1:

I actually have a shirt that says, you won't like me, you won't like me if I eat gluten, or if you gluten me or something along those lines. Eventually I become really irritable. But then also, I have a really bloated stomach and a lot of gas. And so this kind of reminds me going back to when I was in high school, kind of at my peak of when I didn't know what was wrong. But I knew something was wrong. I couldn't wear normal pants. I had to wear stretchy pants because my stomach will get so floated. But now I take these special enzymes they're called glutenine. So if I get gluten on accident, then I take that. And it kind of helps the symptoms that I'm having and experiencing. But I would never want to purposely take that gluten because it still damages my small intestine. How often would you say you do get gluten? It depends. It's honestly been a little while since I have. It just depends on certain, like, if I go out to eat to a restaurant and they're just not careful and they don't understand. But obviously I tried to limit that if at all possible, that kind of like leads to the next question. So are there, like, different levels of severity of disease? Like, can the symptoms present differently in different people based on I don't know what factors, I guess, but is that a possibility to be different? Every person who has it. Yeah. So there's definitely a lot of different symptoms. Some people could have, like, really bad diarrhea. Some people could experience bad constipation, so that's obviously its own difference in symptoms. But there's also some people who don't have any GI symptoms at all. They only have the more mental emotional symptoms of irritability, depression, headaches, migraines fatigue is a big one, too. But I feel like a lot of people experience the bloating, but it's like later on, as your intestines start to decline and you lose even more of that surface area there to absorb nutrients. And so when your intestines are pretty much fully gone, you can even develop lactose intolerance from that. When I was diagnosed, I couldn't have milk for a while, and then I fully started to introduce it back into my diet. And I was okay with that. But I know some people who continue to have that lactose intolerance even after their reproductive infertility issues that happen. But I've heard that that is more common among if your intestines aren't healed when you're a childbearing ages. So hopefully I'm in the clear. But then there's also dermatitis. Perfectiformis is what it's called. Essentially, you get, like, rashes mainly on the backs of your arms or your knees. I have them on my arms when I was in second grade to 6th grade, and then I started to have more of those GI type symptoms, really nerve wracking, that it could potentially affect someone so much. And they could be diagnosed so late in their life. And at that point, who knows what the damage could be? My fiance's mom wasn't diagnosed until she was in her 50s. Wow. Yeah, I was diagnosed when I was 18, but then it can also cause failure to thrive in children and in children. There's so many different things, feeding issues, even just developmental things that can cause failure to thrive. So it's really difficult to diagnose and really pinpoint what the exact cause is right, because I didn't realize that symptoms such as fatigue could be present. Migraines. Like you had said, I wonder how often that people have just those symptoms and not so much GI distress, and it does go undiagnosed, since you probably don't think of celiac disease when you see a migraine kind of thing. Yeah. A lot of people say that there's like a brain fog, too. And I don't know if I ever really experienced the brain fog, but I know that that can be a problem for some people, too. Well, I did not know all that. That was crazy. I did not either. I always associate it. I always thought everyone experienced the GI symptoms. I didn't know that it was even a possibility that you could not experience GI symptoms but still have that mental inhibition. And I think that's why it goes so under diagnosed a lot of times because some people experience no symptoms whatsoever, which is really scary, because they're not absorbing all the nutrients that they're eating. So then a lot of times they're losing weight and they don't know why. And they're eating just as they were all along. But they just are losing, absorbing all those nutrients that they're eating. Do you know that often if you're born with it or the kind of develops over time, there's a lot of mixed opinions. I think it's one of those things where there's a bunch of different triggers that can cause it for different people. And I'm not sure if everyone is born with that, like genetic mutation, because as far as I know, nobody in my family has it. I don't know how I got it. It also goes hand in hand with a lot of other autoimmune conditions, such as type one diabetes, and there's a multitude of others, even like some of the different arthritis, arthritis, arthritis. So it can go hand in hand. A lot of people who have type one diabetes also have celiac disease and vice versa. So we kind of led into this a little bit. But what is the diagnostic process like for celiac disease? Typically, they'll start out with the blood test, and there's a specific test that they look for for celiac disease in the blood. And it's actually, like, almost 99% accurate, I think, is what they say. So you almost never have celiac disease and don't present that blood test as positive. Mine was actually negative. I have that small little percentage of people who test negative for it in the blood. And so we did the blood test. And then I actually went to see a GI doctor. Just my primary care doctor did the blood testing. I went to see a GI doctor, and they thought that I had IBS, which is irritable bowel syndrome. And, well, that came about they did a colonoscopy, which I don't know why they did that first. How about 15 year old going in there to just scope up your butt?

Participant #1:

Yeah. Usually in your 50s or 60s, right? Yeah. That was the rest of the meeting room. So they did that. And they took biopsies and stuff, and they thought that I just had IBS, but when they do a colonoscopy, they go up to, like, just the end of your small intestines. But they took a biosphere there, and it presented, like, high for whatever they were testing for CLax disease. So then they came back and we're like, okay, we need to do an end after fee, which is a check. But I've heard some people get them both at the same time. I'm like, oh, my God. This is not uncomfortable, like a terrible day. You're out. They put you out. Okay.

Participant #1:

So they did an endoscopy because that one goes through your esophagus, through your stomach and into your small intestines. And the GI doctor, he took up biopsy, obviously. But then he even just said that he knew I had Celia activity just by looking at my small intestines on the scope, my intestines were probably pretty flat. So do the intestines kind of, like, heal after you do start following a gluten free diet, they get better over time. Yeah. So my doctor advised me to get another endoscopy about six months after I had followed a gluten free diet to make sure that my intestines had healed and know that it wasn't something else, some other things that it could have been with Crohn's disease, which would have been terrible. But so, yeah, they did another endoscopy, and my intestines were healed. Awesome. It's amazing what eating a gluten free diet can do for you for people with disease. Yeah, that's really good. But it's cool that it healed, or you could have seen that much progress in six months. Yeah. And there's tons of different organizations that are actually trying to find a cure for it so that you could take, I think it's kind of similar to, like, a vaccine. And then it doesn't allow your body to attack those cells. And I think they're trying to do the same thing with, like, type one diabetes and that kind of stuff, too. That'd be really cool. Science, man. We've talked a lot about how it affects your small intestine and how it'll affect the surface area, and this will affect nutrient absorption. So what specific nutrients are of concern or common with celiac disease that they've seen deficiencies in all of them pretty much all nutrients, even like the big main nutrients, not even just vitamins and minerals, protein, even carbohydrates and fat, those that give you the energy that you need. You're not absorbing that energy. So it essentially just goes through your system without doing anything without completing its necessary job. So instead of just getting rid of waste, you're actually getting rid of things that your body needs food. I would eat and not getting a pound was ridiculous. Well, yeah, I think so much is digested in the small intestine. That's like a major part of the digestive process, so that's not functioning properly. I guess it really makes sense that there would be a lot of deficiencies. I was in sports at the time, and when you do intense exercise, it kind of agitates all of your insides. And so I would experience, like, really bad cramping and bloating when I would exercise. And that was terrible because I was like, what is wrong with me? Why am I experiencing such bad symptoms when I'm exercising? And then also after exercise, I knew I would need to eat. I just worked out and burned a ton of energy, but I wouldn't want to eat because I was already in pain. And I knew that the food I was going to put into me was going to cost me even more things. So it's kind of like a double edged sword. Yeah. Well, how about going out to eat? We change a little bit already. But are there certain places that you do feel comfortable going to and like, how do you determine if it is going to be a place that probably is safe for you? It's hard because really, no place is a safe place in terms of celiac disease, because every place there's risk for cross contamination, even just going to, like parties with your friends or like going to outdoor gatherings or like barbecues and that kind of stuff. Even the things that you think might be gluten free sometimes have hidden gluten in them and sauces and that kind of stuff. So honestly, it's really hard because I don't want to be difficult. One, but two, I kind of have to live my life. And so I see it as most places I can likely find something I can eat on the menu. But I'm also always at risk for that cross contamination. Now, some places are better than others. I feel a lot more comfortable at the types of places where the chef comes out and talks to you. Obviously, those are the more expensive places that I'm not going to go to eat. Like, every weekend. There's a place that actually just became 100% gluten free. It's called Bibi back. It's like a Chipotle or Qdoba for Asian food, so you can get Asian noodle bowls and rice bowls, but all their sauces and everything is gluten free, which is awesome. It's really cool, and it's delicious. They have purple rice. Have you ever heard of purple rice? No. Is it taste the same as regular? No, it's delicious. How is it purple? Is it naturally purple? Yeah, it looks purple, and I don't understand the whole brain principles behind it because I'm guessing it has, like, the whole Bran and end of sperm and all that stuff. But there's also black rice. That's true. I've seen that. But they're like, chewier and more flavorful than rice. That's cool. I never heard of that. I think it's a chain I was just going to ask for, like, a local thing or a chain. I think it's a chain. There was one that opened locally a little bit ago, but it looks like it is a chain in Ohio, Indiana, DC, Maryland, Illinois, Missouri, and California. Okay. All over, east to west. What's the place? I don't know. I always try to pull your school phrases out, and then I just, like, slop them. Terrible. How'd that go for you? I'm not good at that. You should just stop and use basic vocabulary. Part of the charm of this podcast. Emily and I also kind of already went over this in our episode about gluten free and celiac and that sort of thing. But we are curious about what you know about the differences between CIA disease and then a gluten intolerance how do they differ? And I guess the biggest symptoms of them as well. How do you tell if you have one or the other when you are diagnosed with celiac disease? When you're kind of going through the diagnosis process, you have to continue to eat gluten to be diagnosed with them. So if you don't eat gluten and you go in for an endocracy, even if you might have celiac disease, it won't show up because your intestines have already started heal. So a lot of people, even if they might have celiac disease at the end of the day, they're not officially diagnosed with it because they don't want to continue eating groups. So that's part of the problem one. But with the sensitivity, there's no immune response. So like Emily's issues with dairy, her and dairy don't get along. But it's the same thing with gluten. For me. It kills my small intestine. But if Emily were to eat it, I'm just using this as an example. If Emily were to eat it, she might just have those symptoms. She might have bloating and gas, but her intestines won't die off, essentially. So that's the major difference. And you can't really diagnose per sensitivity in terms of this. You just have to rule out if they have heliocrates or not. And so with the sensitivity, there's no genetic information or anything like that. That has been identified, whereas with Heliosity and most of the people that have heliocapties also have the genetic mutation for it. I also think that with the sensitivity, they only experience the GI symptoms, whereas with celiac disease, like we mentioned before, you can get the brain fog, the headaches and all those other things that we mentioned. Very interesting. I feel like that is a common misconception as the differences between those. Yeah. And then also, I think sometimes if you have a sensitivity, if you diminish, like your overall carbohydrate intake, sometimes that helps your symptoms as well. Whereas with celiac disease, you can continue to eat as many carbohydrates as you want, as long as they're gluten free carbs for life. You're yeah. Eat your card. Eat your card should be our catch phrase. Well, as a person who has to eat gluten free, what are your thoughts and feelings of people who just go gluten free for, like, say, weight loss, for example, just don't don't do it. No, not a good thing. Essentially, what you're doing is people who are going gluten free for weight loss. At the end of the day, they're pretty much just cutting out what they used to eat. So they used to eat bread. They used to eat pastas and all the pizzas that are causing their weight in probably because they're eating them extensive quantities. And so when they go gluten free, they cut all that food out. And obviously they're going to lose weight or deficit. They're not necessarily on a gluten free diet for the same purposes that I am. I still eat pizza. I still eat pasta. I still eat bread. They're just using different grains to make those products that I eat for weight loss. Now, one I will say it has brought more attention to the market, and there's been a lot more new products that have come on the market, which is great for people like me. But at the same time, I feel like if you go out to eat and you say you're gluten free, they don't understand quite as much in terms of like, oh, I mean, like gluten free in terms of I can't have a second gluten or I'll blow up and look like a toad.

Participant #1:

Yes. It's kind of like the same idea as, like, the Keto diet. It works for weight loss. It's cutting out an entire nutrient that you would normally be eating. So it's kind of frustrating, I'm sure, especially for you, someone who actually has to be avoiding that nutrient. Yeah. And if you look at the nutrient content of gluten free foods a lot of times, they're actually higher in calories than it's non gluten alternative or gluten alternative, because they fill it with a lot more fat and sugar to make it taste better. Exactly. I really like your point about the restaurant and talking about when you say you're gluing them free because trying to explain when you have celiac disease the severity of the response you can receive from eating. Gluten is so much different than someone who is just on a gluten free diet for weight loss. So if they're trying to explain that to a server, they might not take it as seriously. If everyone suddenly, like, overall or like, these specific people are gluing free for this reason. And it's really important that there's the education behind what contains gluten and why gluten free diets are appropriate for people. I normally frame it when I go out to eat as I have a gluten allergy or a wheat allergy that seems to resonate with people a lot better than saying I have celiac disease. For some reason, allergy clicks in their brain. Better now, obviously, it's a little bit different because it's technically not an allergy because I won't produce anaphylaxis, but it will still hurt me. But at the end of the day, I have to think I'm like, Well, it won't kill me if I am accidentally exposed to it. Now, if I was exposed to shellfish, I have a shellfish allergy, so that would actually kill me. So it's really hard to navigate restaurants a lot of times too, because they don't put all the ingredients on the menu. So say it's a salad, for instance, they might say, oh, it has tomatoes, cucumbers and carrots. Now, nowhere on the menu does it say it has croutons, so I don't know to ask for no croutons then comes to me with croutons. Now some places will try to take it back and pick off the croutons. I'm like, no, there's still gluten and residue on that salad. I cannot eat that. So you really have to advocate for yourself that first. That's hard to do. Like when you're newly diagnosed and you're not used to doing that should be not very confrontational. I was diagnosed right before I went to College. I was diagnosed in April and I left for College in August, and that was just terrible. Yeah, College presents enough issues with figuring out who you are. You don't really need to add on being particular about your food, even when it's warranted, because it's in the best hopes for your health. Yeah. Now I'm going to look for that menus whenever I go to a restaurant next, I'll be like, what ingredients are you hiding? A lot of restaurants do have, like, especially if it's a chain. Not so much if it's like an independent restaurant, but they have not a nutrition ax panel, but like the ingredients and it'll say, like, the food item and then across the top, it'll have all of the allergens. By the way, did you see there's apparently going to be a nine top? I guess you can't call eight anymore. Nine allergens. No. Is it gluten or no? I think they're adding sesame.

Participant #1:

This just in. That's so interesting. I didn't realize it was that common. We're going to change a lot of posters and handouts. They've been saying top eight for, like, since I've known about it. I know. So are we going to have to call it top nine? Man, imagine, like being someone who works with allergies day in and day out in the works. There we go again with my touch phrases. So, Anna, moving on. More fun sesame conversation. How does labeling come into play with Celiac? We kind of talked about it with menus and how they might not always disclose the entirety of the ingredients included. But is it true that when foods are labeled as gluten free, they have to be 100% gluten free? In our last episode, when we are looking up the regulation, we saw somewhere that it has to have less than 40 parts per million, I think. Was that Hannah? I think it's 20. Is that right? Oh, 20. Yeah. So we were wondering, then, is the reaction with Celiac that it has to be less than 20 in a food or is any gluten going to stimulate a response? It's really hard question, because it's different for everybody. So you were right in saying that it's 20 parts per million to have something to be labeled free. If somebody labels something as gluten free and it is not actually tested and it has more than 20 parts per million, they can be by the FDA is a regulated term in terms of food products. Now there's no specific labeling or logo that they put on it. They can just say gluten free. Now, if it isn't gluten free, then obviously they're penalized for that. But a lot of companies have taken advantage of that because people are using a gluten free diet for weight loss. So they'll slap like, gluten free on broccoli or green beans. And you're like, well, heck, gluten free. It's broccoli or green beans. There's no wheat, barley or Rye in green beans or broccoli. Even like chicken sometimes will say, like golden fruit. But at the same time, you do have to be careful because, say, for instance, it's like a prepared or packaged food. It might be corn, for instance, but it might have some crazy like sauce on it. And sometimes those have hidden Woods in them or use flour to thicken them. So then what would you say for people who are shopping with Celiac disease? What's the best way to ensure that the product doesn't have gluten? So great question. There's actually some different agencies who have created their own gluten free label, and I think they're actually changing the look of it here pretty soon. But sometimes they'll say, like, certified gluten free, and it's like a little circle almost. But I think that those can also just have up to 20 parts per million. Now, some things to watch out for is if a food has that or if the food doesn't even have a gluten free label, like Blatantly stated on it. But you're like it should be gluten free. Some hidden things to watch out for our soy. And then, like hydrolyzed wheat and those kinds of ingredients. But then also modified food starch is another one that can be from either wheat or corn. And I believe it was updated in the FDA guidelines or labeling guidelines that they have to specify if it is from wheat. So those should be okay. But there's, like, those hidden ingredients that you wouldn't even think about that can really harm people. The other thing to really watch out for is alcoholic beverages. Those have no labeling guidelines whatsoever. And the only ones that can be penalized if they don't say gluten or if they say gluten free and they're not are the FDA regulated foods and actually supplements do as well. But medications are another thing you really have to watch out for. So interesting. Well, and then there's, like, beauty products, toothpaste, all those things, too. Now they say that it's okay to use those products. I've heard a lot of mixed opinions about that. I wanted to ask you that actually, if that was a thing like you should do a voice, like mascara that has gluten in it. So it just kind of depends on the person, I guess. Well, the other problem is like those kinds of products, nobody says that they have it in it or not. So it's more of those, like specialty companies that make their own lipstick or whatever. And they're like, oh, I didn't put any gluten in here. So those companies will advertise that they are gluten free. But a lot of times you don't know. Another thing is oats are a trouble food, too, because oats are naturally gluten free, but a lot of times different plants that process oats also process other grains. So this oats could be constantaminated. That is one glutenfree like natural gluten free grain that you will want to make sure to buy the gluten free version of so that you don't accidentally get more than that 20 parts per million. And gluten free oatmeal, even though it's like the same exact thing cost about five times, of course, because they can. I see a lot of times in my practice with patients that if a patient is diagnosed with CIA disease or this is not the same thing, but patients who should follow, like a low FODMAP diet, for example, not every doctor, but oftentimes they will just kind of give that diagnosis and send off the handout about how to go gluten free. And when they come to me. I also want to know this question or this answer. But how can we best serve those patients or clients who are coming to us, whether it's as a dietitian or a doctor or nurse practitioner or whatever? How can we best serve and best to treat those patients that do have CDs disease? Like you said, even when I was diagnosed, they didn't even give me a handout or anything. I got nothing. I was sent on my Merry way and said, good luck. And I think the most important thing is to just educate, educate, educate one, educate the patients just on the importance of it. I think that that will matter a lot more to the patient if they really understand the importance of it. But then also educate yourself. But I know that there's a lot of different diagnoses and different medical diets or really just medical ways of eating kind of like the term diet, but there's a ton of them. And there are a lot of different allergy or specialty dietitians or even just like physicians that specialize in certain GI disorders and stuff like that. Those would be great tools and people to reach out to if you do have questions. But then also there's tons of resources online. But I do feel like it is a great area because a lot of times people send Johnny away, and they're like, go fuck. And a lot of times, doctors, dietitians don't live the life of someone who has to eat that way. They don't understand all the nuances about it, too. There's tons of different things that it's like, oh, well, a dietitian might know what's gluten free, what's not gluten free, but they won't know how to navigate what's eating out and all of the just random cross contamination in the home even. And so I feel like a specialist or something like that would be a great person to turn to in that situation if you're not comfortable educating the patient yourself. Yeah, that's a great answer. And Anna, send us a lot of great links. So those of you who are listening who are interested in all this will attach a lot of links about resources on gydex disease. But I feel like that's sadly, so common, like I had someone just this week who had come to me and we're working on weight loss with my whole job. We're working on her weight loss. And she was told by her doctor to follow a low FODMAP diet, and they just gave her a handout, and she came to me and she was so frustrated and confused because she's, like, all these dudes you're saying are okay to eat for weight loss, but not okay to eat the FODMAP diet. So what the heck should I be doing? And so we had to kind of go and break down all the different foods that would cause GI distress and ones that were okay for her weight loss schools. And that kind of stuff, too. But she was just really frustrated because her doctor just given her handout and away. Yeah. And I was saying even early on, it was really difficult to because I had no idea what I was doing. It was kind of like trial and error at that point, which is terrible, because I was still harming my body. And there's tons of glutenfree products out there that just taste essentially like cardboard they're not very palatable. And so I had to go through a lot of random products that just tasted terrible, and I hated it because I was, like, Take a bite and just throw it in the trash because it tasted so bad. So I was wasting a lot of money. But in that trial and error, I found a ton of promise that I do enjoy. And that's the most important part. I want to put food in my body that tastes good. And I do the trial and error thing. It'll take time to kind of figure out what's going to work for you. Also, you have to kind of go through a phase two because do you make one dinner for yourself and a different dinner for the rest of your family? Or do you kind of morph it into? The rest of the family will eat the gluten free pasta, but they might have a separate bread option or something along those lines to keep it normal for them, too. But then also, you don't want to be cooking two different dinners. That's just crazy. Exactly. Actually, it's kind of the same with my weight loss patients, too. They're often concerned they have to be a totally different meal. I'm like, no, you can still eat all the foods you love for weight loss. I know different what you have to do. You can't have gluten, but it's the same idea where you can have those foods. Just monitor your portions and change little things here and there, but no need to have a totally separate meal because I could just be a lot of work and just cause more stress. And then two, like, I felt like, I don't know. You kind of almost feel isolated and in a sense, especially like in high school and College. And I'm like, oh, I don't have to eat. That's the thing, too. Like, well, I can't go there. I'll go with you, but I can't eat anything. And then they're like, asking me a million questions. I just can't, like, and then two, it's difficult to help people understand. They're like, oh, did you just have a little bit? No, that will still damage my son's testing can't imagine you found a way the life I live. So we're going to attach a link to all the resources and recommended. But are there any you'd like to just highlight right now that you would say are the best ones for anyone recently diagnosed with Celiac, or they've been working with Celiac for so long and still haven't figured out something that works for them. So there's a bunch of different bloggers, and I honestly, I'm not big on the whole blog page, but I know a lot of people have an Instagram page, but then attach their blog to their Instagram page. So I follow a bunch of different people on Instagram. And honestly, a lot of people have written books. And so in terms of, like, a day in the life living stuff like that. I feel like I would have really dedicated reading a book of someone who had three activities and their experiences. So I would have a better understanding of what I was going to go through. But that's in terms of stuff like that. But then I've also found a ton of different. I've also found that it's easy to make recipes gluten free. There's, like gluten free flour blends now that you can pretty much substitute for regular flour and recipes. And I found that that's really helpful because I don't want to get rid of all my family recipes. I found that I can just kind of tweak them a little bit and then I can use them. How much has been great and then also Pinterest is awesome. You can pretty much just purchase gluten free and whatever you're trying to look for and somebody will have a recipe out there. But in terms of different, like grocery store, that kind of have more gluten free options than others. Treasure Jones is really good. Aldi has its own live G free line and also May is Dealer Activities Awareness Month. So Aldi has more products for Glen Free. I just saw their like sneak preview and they're having cheesecake and egg roll. That sounds so good. Well, Anna, it has been so great to hear all of your insights on all of this. It is so eye opening and interesting. Is there anything else you kind of want to talk about in terms of your gluten free lifestyle that you live in? I think that we should catch on the different things that you have to think about in terms of what could cross contaminate in your own home. So some different things that are tricky are toasters. I have my own gluten free toaster. Now I know people travel sometimes and obviously you're not going to have a toaster to go, but they do make toaster bags that you can put your bread in. Then the bread doesn't actually touch the side of the toaster. So that's a great product. And then some other things that you also should think about are your colanders and stuff like that that you use to drink pasta, because a lot of times those don't get cleaned very well, and those little specks of gluten could get in your body and harm you. Also different cutting boards, nice, even pot. It's hard because essentially the whole kitchen should be gluten free, but obviously that is a difficult timeline to kind of jump across and jump on because there might be some other people in your household who don't have to eat that way. They have to compromise a little bit, but then also different things that could cross contaminate are tongs. If one tongue, one set of tongs is used for pasta and then also the vegetable. Now the vegetable might be gluten free on it by itself. But if somebody used those tongs to get the pasta and then the vegetables and those vegetables are now contaminated. So a lot of times, if it is like a family style buffet that you do have control over, I prefer to go first so that I can get those foods that are gluten free and not have to worry about that cross contamination. So many things that you would never think about if you didn't have to listen to that. That's crazy. Yeah. You kind of learn as you go, and that's the problem is it's overwhelming at first. And then you start to think about everything and you're like, oh, wow. Another thing to watch out for is sauces. Gluten likes to hide a lot of sauces. You have to get gluten free soy sauce, for example. Now there are some brands that are naturally gluten free, like Choy, but then a lot of others aren't. You have to get a special one of those different salad dressings and things like that. Gluten likes to hide in those food items to thicken them. And so you really have to get extremely good at label reading and kind of know what all these ingredients are, which is difficult in a world that we live in, where there's a lot of crazy ingredients that are added to food. So personally, when I'm cooking at home, I like to stick to the more whole food ingredients just because I know that those will be safe for me. Man, this is way more in depth than our Gluten episode. No, I'm glad we're doing this. Me too. He'll be good for the listeners who, like, don't know what it is or have a loved one who lives with it or live with it themselves. You don't know these things until either know someone who has it or do you live with it yourself? Also crazy expensive. But luckily, since Luke's mom has daily activities, she's, like, new kind of ins and outs when we started dating. And he really, I felt like understood the differences and what kind of he would have to go through with me in terms of, like, we can't just go out to eat and do stuff like that. No, traveling gives me a lot of anxiety because I'm like, Well, what am I going to eat? What am I going to eat? And there's not a lot of fast food restaurants that have gluten free food. Yeah. And you got to eat every darn day. So I can imagine how stressful that would be because I can't just survive on salad. So this episode bonus question is a very fun one, in my opinion. And it is what is the best style of French Fry? There are a lot of different styles, and I feel like we probably won't agree. I actually don't know either of your answers. So this will be fine. Yeah. But since you're our guest, you can start off. All right. I'll go ahead and start. I can't exactly come up with one favorite style of French fries, because let's be real. I like them all, but my personal preference is potato wedges, and I like to make them. You take a potato, you cut it up into, like, eight wedges. You put in the oven with a little olive oil and garlic salt or garlic powder and pepper. And you just, like, roast them for a long time, 45 minutes. Then they come out crispy on the outside, nice and soft on the inside. Delicious. Okay, so that's number one. Have you never had a potato wedge? I do it all the time with what you just said. Either put in the oven or air fryer. Oh, yeah. See, I don't have an air fryer, but my parents not lucky anymore. Emily, you're serious? You've never had a potato wedge? Oh, no, I have. Well, last week, she stunned me, and she's not a fan of peanut butter, so I no longer know where friendship. I like peanut butter. I don't eat that one. I actually just had. I just made a peanut sauce for my spring roll. That was really good by that. I thought of you. I thought of you. Okay. What's your other one? Yes. Tell us the other potato properties. The other favorite potato form, French fried form is a tater tot. Classic. People might call them Potato Jim. No, it's a tater totem air fryer. That's really interesting, because I always thought tater tots were a different category. But even though that I'm thinking about it, it's like, essentially a French Fry. Probably called a vegetable in elementary school. Yeah, true. Well, what category would it be in? It's not like a sandwich.

Participant #1:

It's not a cereal. It's not a sandwich. What else is there? I guess. I don't know. It's not a fruit.

Participant #1:

No. Well, I guess. What would you consider, like, mashed potatoes? No, I'm not just saying, like, the category. I agree with you. I don't know what that would be. That would be a starchy bed. Yeah, I guess you have to be, like, fried in some way to become a French fries. If it was a fried mashed potato, then yeah. I wonder if you could take a ball of mashed potatoes and then Fry it. I know what a tater tot is just in a way smaller form and not as mushy. Yeah.

Participant #1:

Emily, what is your favorite style of French Fry? So my favorite style of French Fry is a curly Fry. I've never had a curly Fry that I did not like. I don't really think there's much else to it because they're small and creepy, and the shape is fun. The shape is fun. And let me all explain why, but I feel like you're someone who has a lot of, like, excitement plays a big role in your suitcases. My example is sprinkles those of you who don't know. Yes, I can be won over by the appearance of food. Yeah.

Participant #1:

Okay. Well, I agree with all of both of you, because there's really no wrong way to eat a potato. But I don't know. My first thought was curly fried because they are really good, and they're always seasoned really well. But I'd love, like, it's a classic, like a Wendy style. Like not a shoestring that's way too thin, but just like a regular old French Fry. My favorite is probably like a five guys kind of French fries that has good seasoning on it or rallies. Five guys. French fries are delicious. They're so good. They give you so many, too. It's awesome.

Participant #1:

Into the bag. Amazing. They do not skimp on their portion sizes, and we're here for it. Yeah. Catcher in the game about carbs cards are good. What do we say?

Participant #1:

I'm surprised no one said waffle fries. I feel like those are pretty popular. Those are really good, especially from Chickfila. But other times they're too soft. Yeah, that's true. They're inconsistent to get it right. When they're like that texture. You got to have fried consistency,

Participant #1:

too. Across each bite. Yes. Saltiness and texture and shape. Unless you're Emily, she likes crazy shape. Emily is ruthless. There's no rules. I'm unhinged. It's so interesting how none of us had the same answer. Well, Anna, thank you so much for being our guest of honor today. It was a delight chat about all things gluten with you. Also have you back another time to talk about something other than gluten one of your other interests, because I'm sure you have others than just eating gluten free. I do have a lot of interest. Yeah. Do you have anything you'd like to plug about yourself? I know, like, Instagram anything you want to market yourself for? No. Yeah, nothing. Anna is trying to hide from the public. I am. I'm trying to hide from the population. No,

Participant #1:

I want to eventually get in the allergy front, but right now I'm just chilling. I'm trying to plan my wedding, and that's where I'm at. Yeah, one day at a time. Yeah. Don't worry. I got my giant chariots right here. Good to go. This should be your next fun fact. What kind of carrots do you like? Color? Do you like petite baby carrots? Do you like the giant carrots? I like the giant carrots and just cut them up. They're sweeter. Yeah. One of the girls I work with is very passionate about hating baby carrots because the other ones are way better. Okay. No. Some baby carrots are really fat. Just like, asparagus we ever get fat asparagus it's disgusting. There's another fun fact about asparagus if you take the asparagus beard and you plop off the bottom, then it breaks off right where, like, the nasty part is to where it's too chewy. And you don't want to eat that part. What do you mean, pop it off? How do you pull it off that easily? You take this next time you get a spaghettius. Hold it by like the top, but towards the top and then just pull, like, break off the bottom and it'll break exactly where it wants to. It's one of my fridge right now. That's one of my fridge right now. I'm going to do that today. If you need a tutorial, just call me and I'll tell you how to do it. Okay? I will. That's really interesting. Sounds fun. It's great fact on just for Fun Facts with Anna, I'll do a whole episode. Oh, also, by the way, in terms of the fries situation, you can search for types of French fries, and you can get a sticker for, like, a water bottle or laptop or something that's, like all the different types of French fries. Emily, there we go. We make that

Participant #1:

wait. That's amazing. That's amazing. Good morning now. Fun fact. Savannah Fun PAX Savannah next segment. So thanks for tuning in to today's episode. We hope that you guys tune in next Wednesday for another episode with the Upbeat Dietitians. Bye bye.