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Hello All,

        I haven't been diagnosed as being Celiac yet (getting biopsy in 2 days)
but if I turn out to be one (and all my doctors think that I may very
well be) it would answer all my never-ending health problems.

        I'm 16 now, but started problems at age 0 when my mom hardly fed me but
I was quite fat. My pediatrician kept saying "You must stop feeding her
cookies and sweets between meals!!!" And my mom always felt embarrassed
because she hardly fed me at all, and I never even tasted refined sugar
until I was over 2. Anyway, I was still fat until the age of 9 or 10
when I became insane about running. But I still should have been much
thinner for the amount of food I was eating. Has anyone else had this
problem?

        Then at age 2, food allergies started. They still haven't ended. I'll
get to that later. Also, does anyone know if gallbladder problems could
be related to Celiac? I had mine checked because of my really severe
intolerance to grease, burping up problems and pain 2 years ago and
tests came back negative. Has anyone had that problem?

        Now, because of all allergies, I got the blood test (which is said to
be accurate- the ONLY accurate food allergy testing) and my tests
revealed that I am severely allergic to gluten and gliadin (as well as
eggs, milk, wheat, blah blah blah blah.......) My big question is: Does
this necessarily mean that I am a Celiac? I've asked some people but
nobody seems to know.

        So, in January of this year, I went on this rotation diet of foods that
I am "not" allergic to, and started to get the runs all the time. I
thought it was a virus, then I though it could be salmonnella poisonning
(from our iguana) but after 2 months, you really start to wonder. Plus
bowel tests just said that I was low in acidophilous, no salmonella. My
problem with the runs ceased when I went on a gluten-free diet. Now, my
other big question (the point of this letter) is: Is Quinoa safe or not?
Does it contain gluten? because I get the runs when I eat it. And that
is NO fun. So could someone please tell me everything they know about
quinoa. Thanks!!!  :o)