F*ck you, subby. Some people cannot consume gluten without terrifying health problems resulting.

It's not an issue of them being "precious little snowflakes", it's an issue of them lacking the ability to safely consume an extremely common food protein.

Bathia_Mapes: Sid_6.7: F*ck you, subby. Some people cannot consume gluten without terrifying health problems resulting.

It's not an issue of them being "precious little snowflakes", it's an issue of them lacking the ability to safely consume an extremely common food protein.

So much this.

Except that these college kids are now grown-ups. Sooner or later they're going to have to go out into the world and learn to handle their celiac disease all by their little selves. What bothered me about this story isn't the kid's gluten intolerance, it's how mommy and daddy are still obsessing over him like he's a fragile toddler unable to manage on his own. So what if he can't eat the cafeteria food? (Very few of us ever could) He's a MAN now, mommy. He needs to learn how to find his own food without you being there to check labels for him. If he wants to live on ice cream instead of salad, that's going to be up to him. Can't find food in the vending machines? Maybe he'll have to learn how to bring his own snacks to class or whatever, like EVERYONE ELSE with celiac disease.

I'd never minimize the horrible effects of celiac disease. It almost killed a friend of mine in law school, after her intestines finally went completely insane and started attacking themselves. But she was able to manage all by herself to find things she could eat and avoid the stuff she couldn't; and if that meant she had to bring her own snacks to a study session because she couldn't eat the catered food, well, that was life. This kid better start learning that, because not everyone is going to provide him gluten-free food all his life, unless he never leaves his nest.

Incidentally... if gluten puts you in the hospital, please don't breed.

I'm not saying harm yourself, I'm saying don't pass on your horrible condition to future generations.

if your college age child cannot feed themselves properly they probably shouldn't be in college. they are idiots. just like you.

stick your special kid up your arse. no one cares.

Sid_6.7: F*ck you, subby. Some people cannot consume gluten without terrifying health problems resulting.

It's not an issue of them being "precious little snowflakes", it's an issue of them lacking the ability to safely consume an extremely common food protein.

The problem is its become a fad. I know one person who is truly gluten intolerant, and another who I'm convinced says she is for the attention (she's like the "always sick kid" we all knew growing up... for attention.)

The guy that is truly gluten intolerant doesn't make a stink about it. Just goes about his life, and doesn't impose on others. If he attends a party and there's nothing he can eat or drink... he just doesn't. He doesn't expect anyone to cater to his needs. Of course, he's my friend, so I always make sure there's stuff he can eat and drink... but he doesn't expect it.

Similar to my wife... she doesn't eat red meat. If we go to a BBQ where there's only beef hamburgers... she grabs a drink, enjoys the party, and eats when we get home. She doesn't raise a fit, yelling "why the fark don't you also have chicken or turkey burgers you assholes!"

bigworld2000: There was one kid in our son's 4th grade class who had to be accompanied by a teacher with an EpiPen whenever he went outside. And although kids could bring their own peanut-containing lunches, they could never share and nothing of the sort was allowed for school parties,

Fast forward to the end-of-the-school year party and in conversation with the parents I casually said something like, boy, it's kind of odd that your son is allergic to both bees and peanuts.

"Oh, we've never had him tested, we just don't want to take any chances."

People like this need hit repeatedly in the head with a blunt object until all the stupid is knocked out.

EmmaLou: I work with a girl who says she's allergic to gluten. She cannot be around it in any form. Even being in the vicinity of a donut makes her sick. Obviously myself and my other sane co-workers think her problem is mental and probably somewhat related to her hair pulling/eating.

Oh, it most certainly is total BS. Even the worst gluten alergies are not like severe peanut allergies. You can hang out in a bakery all day... just don't eat the stuff that includes gluten.

Peanut allergies affect you if you come into contact with it anywhere in your body, or if you breathe it in.

Gluten allergies affect you when the stuff hits your guts.

vudukungfu: I worked in a bakery for 12 years and we had not only people walking in who had diabetes and Celiac disease, but employees with diabetes and Celiac disease. We sell farking bread and sweets, people.
DIAF.

Sheesh, you must have been awesome at customer service. Or local bakery provides tons of gluten free treats. Know why? Because people want them and it makes them more money.

Same reason restaurants now more often have a vegitarian section of their menu.

You sound bad at running a business.

Sid_6.7: F*ck you, subby. Some people cannot consume gluten without terrifying health problems resulting.

It's not an issue of them being "precious little snowflakes", it's an issue of them lacking the ability to safely consume an extremely common food protein.

So much this.

I work with a girl who says she's allergic to gluten. She cannot be around it in any form. Even being in the vicinity of a donut makes her sick. Obviously myself and my other sane co-workers think her problem is mental and probably somewhat related to her hair pulling/eating.

downstairs: Horray for eugenics!

I assume you have nothing bad you'd pass on to your kids? Because 99% of people do, even if its minor.

Call me a cynic, but I don't see the world always working so that every person can eat anything they want all the time. At some point, the world will go back to slightly more localized, natural foods (as opposed to buying any exotic product one can think of and processing any "bad" stuff out of it), at which time wheat will once again become (as it should be) North America's staple crop.

But sticking to your argument, if you had a condition that would kill any offspring you may have by the age of five or ten, you'd have kids? Just for teh lulz? Only slightly more acceptable, what about a genetic condition that would result in your children being in pain throughout much of their lives? Just so YOU could have kids? I mean, that seems... horrible. And selfish.

Incidentally, eugenics are forced. You can go ahead and continue to pollute the human gene pool with digestive problems all you want, because that's exactly the same as, say, Hitler.

Tunacrab: I hate when people hide behind "allergies" and "intolerance" when the truth is they simply don't like something or are avoiding carbs. It is frustrating in the service industry, because everyone in the last 5 years has developed these "conditions," and we have to take them all seriously for the one guy out of ten that has a legitimate condition.

Also there's something I call the "always sick kid" syndrome. Sometimes kids learn that when they're sick, they get more sympathy/attention. This evolves into adulthood, where the person *ALWAYS* needs to be going through some physical ailment... because it means people will pay attention to them.

Its sad, because it makes people who really suffer from a condition suspect as faking it for attention.

puffy999: Incidentally... if gluten puts you in the hospital, please don't breed.

I'm not saying harm yourself, I'm saying don't pass on your horrible condition to future generations.

Horray for eugenics!

I assume you have nothing bad you'd pass on to your kids? Because 99% of people do, even if its minor.

Canton: Allergies are weird

QFT

You can get them out of the blue at any age.

Yeah those snowflakes with Celiac Disease are just faking, like "diabetes" and "peanut allergy". Pfeh! Subby knows what's up.

FriarReb98: xanadian: Isn't it strange how much more common things like Celiac are these days? Never heard of gluten intolerance when I was a kid--either diagnosed or "hell, why do I crap hot-and-sour soup when I eat bread?"

There's something in our processing or something to do with what we use to eat with. The people who figure it out will get Nobel Prizes and probably ruin 99% of junk food for everyone.

\though I tend to think the peanut one has more to do with lack of built-up immunity than anything else

I wish someone could explain why I suddenly developed allergies to both peanuts and shellfish when I was around 16-years old. Ate both with no problems before then, and BAM, got two new allergies within months of each other.

I grew up in the 50s & 60s and was constantly playing outside, getting dirty, etc., just as any average child of the time did.

GAT_00: Ah yes, it's time once again for the people who raised my generation to biatch about how terrible my generation was raised.

It isn't even that- the article illusrates a family that requires a gluten free diet for medical reasons.

But making sure your kid goes to a college where he can get his special dietary needs met is concidered " helicopter parenting"

As for the pic: That kid's not getting laid anytime soon, and I'm guessing at least one of his first semester grades will be argued by those parents. Probably in an elective that he didn't care about and got a B- or some such shiat.

beantowndog: Charge double and mark everything gluten free, problem solved.

kid has celiac disease....dude

uatuba: How about those with medical issues take responsibility for them and make sure they eat what is allowed? If I have a chocolate cake allergy, I'm not going to demand that someone figure out a way to provide me with chocolate cake I can eat. The kid has a disease that prevents him from eating lots of different types of foods...guess what, HE'S GOING TO BE LIMITED IN HIS FOOD CHOICES! Life sucks. If he wants special meals, he can prepare them. Otherwise, he needs to eat what he can eat based on what is offered. If the salad bar is there and it's all he can eat, then his medical condition dictates that he's going to be eating at the salad bar.

THAT'S the problem. It's not that people think he's faking. Rather, it's that reasonable people realize that life sucks, that it's sometimes unfair, and that there are all kinds of diseases that affect relatively few people that dictate that those people live somewhat differently than others who aren't likewise afflicted.

The story does not have the kid demanding anything. He and his family are looking for schools and areas that gives him access to these foods.

The fact there are are enough people who want or need gluten free food that it's economically viable to offer.

Arthur Jumbles: Sid_6.7: F*ck you, subby. Some people cannot consume gluten without terrifying health problems resulting.

It's not an issue of them being "precious little snowflakes", it's an issue of them lacking the ability to safely consume an extremely common food protein.

How did these people not get selected out of the population with the advent of agriculture?

You don't know much about genetics, do you?

Nature doesn't care if you have agonizing stomach cramps when you eat wheat (or die if you eat peanuts or get stung by a bee) as long as it doesn't affect your ability to breed. Any disorder a human may have, no matter how maladaptive it may SEEM to modern humans, is not relevant so long as it doesn't kill you before you can pass your genes along. So sure, little kids who have celiac disease died young, probably right after being weaned, but a lot of times celiac doesn't show up until later in life. Same way with so-called "life threatening allergies": back in prehistory, people could be carrying all sorts of genes around for peanut allergies, bee allergies, shellfish allergies; but as long as they never encountered that allergan, it would never be an issue. You could be deathly allergic to bee stings, but if you never get stung, why would it matter? And if you get stung after you've successfully reproduced, nature doesn't care about that.

It's only recently that a) people know that eating x causes y reaction ahead of actually doing it, and b) people started not dying from so many diseases that we could split out "celiac related intestinal disorder" from "worm related intestinal disorder" that people asked these questions like Why are there still genes for celiac disease? Because it doesn't kill the person before they can make babies, that's all.

Trance750: xanadian: Isn't it strange how much more common things like Celiac are these days? Never heard of gluten intolerance when I was a kid

This. Totally this.

Celiac disease has been around forever- we didn't know what caused it tilll about 70-80 years ago.

"The emergence of celiac disease began 10,000 years ago when humans, previously nomadic, learned about agriculture and started planting seeds and domesticated crops for food. The nomadic diet had been free of gluten up to that point.

Celiac disease was first labeled as such in the first century A.D. when a Greek physician named it after the word for "abdomen," koelia.

In 1887, Samuel Gee, a British physician, attributed the chronic indigestion associated with celiac disease to "errors in diet," yet he did not identify gluten as the source of the problem and often prescribed a diet of toast for his patients. (Good job there Doc!)

Gluten was identified as the trigger for celiac disease following a shortage of bread in the Netherlands after World War II, which caused the death rate among children affected by celiac disease to drop from 35% to zero."

Real celiac is real, self-diagnosed celiac may be real but my bet is on trendy eating disorder.

Coco LaFemme: Some people have legitimate food allergies, and I feel for those people. Other people adopted gluten-free, organic, free range, vegan diets to be trendy, not because if they don't, they'll shiat their intestines out. Those people are annoying. I know someone who makes going out to eat with them absolute hell because they are picky to the point of being absurd about it. They have no medical reason for eating the way they do, they're basically a food hipster.

"We're going to Joes Steakhouse tonight."
"I'm not eating there. You know they don't have X, Y, Z that I MUST eat"
"We're still going?"
"What will I eat?"
"Food. Or starve."
Only way to break these people of this nonsense.

/brother in law is on the whole organic-free range kick
//funnier that his organic garden is next to the neighbors non-organic corn field that is getting sprayed today

downstairs: EmmaLou: I work with a girl who says she's allergic to gluten. She cannot be around it in any form. Even being in the vicinity of a donut makes her sick. Obviously myself and my other sane co-workers think her problem is mental and probably somewhat related to her hair pulling/eating.

Oh, it most certainly is total BS. Even the worst gluten alergies are not like severe peanut allergies. You can hang out in a bakery all day... just don't eat the stuff that includes gluten.

Peanut allergies affect you if you come into contact with it anywhere in your body, or if you breathe it in.

Gluten allergies affect you when the stuff hits your guts.

We all know that. That's why she's just so damned difficult to work with. Another co-worker (who is also a friend of mine) can't eat soy, but you wouldn't know it (because she's not all dramatica about it.)

And 100% of human beings have "problems." My family has a predisposition toward one serious mental illness (which is why I wish members of my family would stop breeding). Only a tiny percentage of them have diseases that are, literally, life altering and could be deadly under the right conditions. A bit different from wanting kids that look like a faux representation of Jesus.

To be fair, though, medical science is incredible. There is a very good chance that we'll have "cures" (for each individual) or such problems at some point. Hell, if they can do a "colon bacteria transplant" or whatever the name was, medical science is on the cusp of other breakthroughs.

pedobearapproved: On the other hand I know more than a few gluten "sensitive" people and the effects they claim ranging from being bloated (eww yuck), to being tired. In other words they ate a big meal of pizza and suddenly they feel bad....

Hey I ate some beans and got gassy, I don't suddenly need a bean free diet do I? The same thing happened with undercooked rice. Maybe I should start a "woe" is me support group.

Again, its all how people handle it socially. If beans make you feel bad, sure... quit eating them. But, yeah, don't constantly biatch about it for attention... and don't give people dirty looks when they dare to serve beans at a party.

Personally, I'm getting to the point where beer... any beer... makes me feel bloated. I still drink though. A lot. If I go to a party and there's only beer, I don't throw a hissy fit.

I do know people that do, though.

Ishidan: I have in my mind a food item that was once considered THE staple of cheap American lunch fare.

It is now the ultimate thing you cannot serve, for every ingredient is offensive to somebody.

Can you guess what it is?

Yes. The peanut butter and jelly sandwich on Wonder bread.

Offensive to those with peanut allergies, diabeetus, and celiac disease. The perfect triple threat of offensiveness.

I would love to be able to eat PB&J sandwich on Wonder Bread again. Or eat a Reese's Peanut Butter Cup. Or some of my grandma's homemade peanut butter cookies.

Haven't had any of those in over 40 years. :-(

Almond & cashew butters are okay, but they're not as good as peanut butter.

For the vast majority of people who want to be on a gluten-free diet because of some problem they seem to have, they likely have another problem (ie: they don't eat enough f*cking fiber). Gluten-free is the hipster's version of a peanut allergy insofar that most people who claim to have problems are not nearly bad as they let on. A coworker, though, has a pretty bad time of it. He's severely allergic to a number of foods, though, so he has to have a restrictive diet or he'll be in the hospital.

I have a digestive problem with certain processed wheat products. Guess what? When I eat whole wheat that's not mixed with a bunch of other non-whole grain shiat or processed and reconstituted into some completely abstract structure, I have no such problem. Maybe some people could try that before saying "I can NEVER consume one red wheat berry or my asshole will turn inside-out."

jaytkay: Bathia_Mapes: I wish someone could explain why I suddenly developed allergies to both peanuts and shellfish when I was around 16-years old.

Because you're white and middle-to-upper-middle class?

/ Or maybe you really have allergies
// But for most...white people problems

Nope. Not even middle class growing up.

I wonder if I could "weaponize" powdered or aerosol gluten and just fly a crop duster around until all the whining stops. It isn't my fault nature has selected you for extinction.

FriarReb98: xanadian: Isn't it strange how much more common things like Celiac are these days? Never heard of gluten intolerance when I was a kid--either diagnosed or "hell, why do I crap hot-and-sour soup when I eat bread?"

There's something in our processing or something to do with what we use to eat with. The people who figure it out will get Nobel Prizes and probably ruin 99% of junk food for everyone.


It could be one of the pesticides (preservatives) that we started using in the 50's. Or HFCS.

The US needs more glutton-free options.

Midnight Rambler: Max Timmons' parents share a laugh with their son, unaware that it was Max, and not Mittens, who accidentally broke one of the eight Franklin Mint plates proudly displayed on the wall. Max's awkward attempt at replacing the plate with Mitten's red water dish was successful.

Well played, sir.

Isn't it strange how much more common things like Celiac are these days? Never heard of gluten intolerance when I was a kid--either diagnosed or "hell, why do I crap hot-and-sour soup when I eat bread?"

Am I the only one who burst out laughing when seeing this?

Wonder if the cat is Gluten free?

Charge double and mark everything gluten free, problem solved.