Celiac Disease Support Group

Hello,

In October my son who is 15 years old was admitted to a mental hospital with Psychosis. He spent 12 days in a psychotic state and then cleared. spent another 2 weeks in the hospital and released. All was going fine for about another 2 weeks when he relapsed into Psychosis and was readmitted to the same hospital. He spent another 10 days in a psychotic state kept in the hospital for another 2 weeks and released. was home for 2 weeks and relapsed again. He just cleared after another 10 days. The funny thing we figured out was that the day before each episode of Psychosis my son had eaten a whole pizza. Could there be a correlation between the Psychosis and Celiac intolerance? We just read that this is possible and also read that studies show that children with long eyelashes tend to have Celiac disease and my son has very long eyelashes! Allot of coincidences. Please, Any thoughts? I understand there is a blood test called a TTG blood test that can rule this in or out.

Tomorrow i am going to ask the hospital to give him that test. Has anybody heard of a similar diagnosis of mental disorder caused by Celiac disease?

Thanks

Neal

Wow. Your poor family. I feel so bad for you guys.

Celiac effects everyone differently. I know I feel like I'm going insane after I eat gluten. My brain feels foggy, tired and woozy. Later on, I end up with a chemical imbalance and depression. It's highly likely that this is his problem. My problem is very minor compared to his, but everyone's body reacts in different ways to the autoimmune reaction caused by celiac's disease and the malabsorption causes different vitamin deficiencies for everyone. I think you might be on to something.

If you're willing to try a gluten free diet for him, be sure to edjucate yourself on what ingredients contain gluten (malt, caramel coloring, natural flavorings, modified food starch, etc...) and read every label before he eats it. Otherwise, your results won't be accurate.

God bless.

Post edited by: LaMich, at: 12/27/2009 09:10 PM

Thanks.

we are going to talk to my sons case manager today and request that a blood test be preformed to tetermine if it could be Celiac.

It may be a long shot but someting that has to be looked at. We are suffering with him.

Neal

I've never heard of this but you never know.My son whose 20 now has been dx with bipolar since he was 7 and I do know we had to watch how much he ate some foods,particularly those with caffeine and sugar because they'd make him more hyper.

Leanne

I really feel for your family and the struggle that your son is having. THe link between celiac disease and mental health is very well documented. I think that basically when your body cannot handle gluten, your body can no longer function properly in any of its systems. I was hospitalized with bipolar disorder several years ago three different times during about a year and a half period. I was going through some huge life changes. However, my diet contained lots of whole grain pastas and I lived three doors down from a bagel shop.

It's really hard to know if it's life, if it's a person's chemical makeup, or if it's gluten. When your son gets out of the hospital this time, I would consider keeping a food journal that will give you an idea of any correlation of what he's eating when he starts to have an episode.

I'm anxious to know what your doctor says. Good luck and our best to your family and son.

The Ironic thing is that each episode of psychosis followed a large pizza the night before each time!

The doctor told me that he doubted that the problem is Celiac but he tested anyway as to leave no stone unturned. Results pending

Neal

It's odd that none of the doctor's have suggested a gluten free diet to you before. Asperger's is a form of autism and I've read and heard that the gluten free diet is recommended--in addition to low sugar and dyes for autistic people. I think it's a good idea to give a gluten free diet a try. Just keep it up for six weeks at least. If there is damage in his small intestines from gluten, it can take that long for him to heal and begin absorbing nutrients properly. Processed vitamin supplements can help in the meantime. If he has Celiac's disease, a healthy, balanced diet isn't enough. He could eat fruits and veggies constantly and still be unable to absorb them right now.

It is very odd that the doctor's have not considered that the pizza (gluten) was one consistent factor in each of his episodes. Lately, and lately for me means in the past year since I've become educated myself about gluten, it's really hit or miss with doctors who even take the "gluten issue" seriously.

I've talked to a couple of doctors who hadn't even heard of gluten. Last Summer, I saw my regular doctor about something unrelated and talked to him about the allergy testing, etc. that I had done. He was very concerned and very serious about gluten and celiac. He was very informed and really emphasized the importance of seeing him regularly to check for this and that.

But really, in your son's case Neal, I can't understand how the doctors would not consider gluten. ESPECIALLY, when they have no other explanation for his psychosis.

I am glad that he is getting tested though. I would definitely think a gluten free diet would help him.

He was tested, with negative results. He also had a CT scan this week that was also negative. We have an EEG next week and a spinal tap the following week. After all this testing if all is negative , I will have to start believing the bipolar diagnosis. What else could I believe?

Hi Neil,

A lot of us here have gone undiagnosed for celiac's meanwhile we have it. Celiac's is tricky. For whatever reason. Also he may just have a gluten intolorance that affects him that way. In that case tests will not show those results becuase cd is in the small intestine while gluten intolorance doesn't affect the small intestine it affects another part of the gi tract. At least that's what my natrualpath told me and she's been right on about pretty much everything. It took her to do all the tests for me to get diagnosed. My regular doctors all said it was in my head. Elisabeth Hasselbeck's book the g-free diet has a very logical explanation for why this happens. It seems that if drugs can't treat it regular doctors don't care to much about it.

Going g-free never hurt anybody. It only makes you stronger and healthier. Give it a try and see what happens.

Good luck and God bless