Blog: Thinking & Planning as a Gluten Free Mom

Chasing the cause of night time vomiting…only the most exciting evenings here!

For a few weeks running now our 10 year old has been vomiting every single night. And it happened on days when she had been in great spirits with no stomach aches to forewarn us.

It’s been very strange- at first I thought it was the remnants of a stomach virus that just hadn’t cleared up, but then it just kept happening. Was she getting glutened? Was something new in our house that contained hidden gluten?

Now for context- our 10 year old is a sweet delight of a child, but she does have a bad habit of putting things in her mouth or licking objects that most of us as adults would not lick. So that table with salt on it, definitely licked it. That piece of chocolate her 4 year old sister was just holding, certainly eating that. The necklace she’s wearing, yep definitely putting that in her mouth too! So….this is obviously a habit that we need to continue to help her to stop as it makes me very nervous given that she’s super sensitive to any gluten. And keeps me fully grossed out as I totally imagine her licking the cafeteria table should there be something interesting there that she dropped or wants to taste. YUCK.

I searched all over our house to see what new condiments, snacks, shampoo, makeup we had bought that might be the culprit. Came up with nothing. And still the vomiting continued. Like clock work- every night after dinner and dessert she would go upstairs to take a shower before bed and throw up IN THE SHOWER. Was it the change in temperature? Does she have acid reflux? Was she sitting down & then standing up too quickly in the hot water? And a million other random questions kept swirling.

Finally I decided that the only way we were going to get to the bottom of it was for her to keep a food diary that also noted when she felt ill or threw up (along with date/time). Now let’s be honest- kids HATE keeping lists of things and really hate keeping food diaries. I have made my children do this on multiple occasions because a lot of the mystery is in knowing exactly what they have eaten, where and when. I gave her a cute, tiny notebook and we started the food diary journey. When we do this exercise, I do help her to kick it off by trying to recollect with her what she ate the last 3-5 meals prior and just writing it down together. It helps to get my kids really thinking about all the things they eat throughout the day.

After about 10 days we took a look at the diary together. One thing was startlingly consistent- chocolate. Every time she ate chocolate (of any kind, candy, nutella, cookies, cake, ice cream) she inevitably threw up that same evening. I went and took a look at any chocolate that we had in our house to double check that it was all marked as gluten free- yep! But given the trend in her food diary, I asked that she give it a try and just stop eating any chocolate things for a few days to see how she felt and if she continued to throw up.

And then started to do some research. Overall most websites agree that chocolate is generally considered to be a safe food for celiacs to eat. Healthline notes that chocolates marked as gluten free should not cause issues (Healthline: Is Chocolate Gluten-Free?). While I couldn’t find anything definitive - I did find that many celiacs do have trouble with chocolate- particularly milk chocolate for the following reasons:

• Cross contamination from candies being manufactured in shared facilities
• Hidden gluten from malt flavoring, barley malt used in caramel flavored candies
• Lactose intolerance (common for celiacs)
• High histamine levels in chocolate can be hard for some celiacs to digest/break down if the gut was very damaged

I didn’t find anything that directly states that chocolate sensitivity is tied to celiac disease but I did find quite a lot of anecdotal information on Reddit (r/celiac) and via friends who confirmed that they also as celiacs cannot eat milk chocolate.

For now we are only a couple of weeks into no chocolate eating and I will see if this continues to solve the vomiting at night situation. But I think I will ask if the GI doctor can do a test for Mast Cell Activation Syndrome (MCAS) which has similar presentation to celiac disease in the GI distress, but is triggered by foods with high histamine levels (Cleveland Clinic: Mast Cell Activation Syndrome).

And in the meantime I will keep the Celiac Disease Foundation list of “Gluten Free Candy”: Celiac Disease Foundation: Gluten-Free Candy List handy so we don’t make any sweet missteps!

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Planning a trip to Boston/Cambridge

We took a little weekend trip up to the Boston/Cambridge area to visit the girl's cousins for Memorial Day Weekend and everyone was so excited! I haven't been to Boston in a few years and so I was deep in restaurant research for our weekend.

Fenway Park

First thing is first- we went to a Red Sox game and of course that is during dinner and of course I did not want to pack a huge bag of snacks/food for the game. Luckily Fenway Park does have provisions for gluten free needs.

Gate A Concourse: right behind home plate there is a dedicated gluten free stand! They serve hot dogs, burgers, turkey subs and gluten free beer. Of course this was all the way on the other side of the stadium from our seats, but so worth it for peace of mind. And of course the popcorn is all gluten free which made for an easy, quick snack as well.

We were staying near Cambridge and so I kept an eye out for easy breakfast and lunch options near our hotel. This time I didn't get a hotel with a kitchen as we were visiting family, so I also knew we would be able to keep some snacks and have some meals at their home.

Best Breakfast: Revival Cafe & Kitchen

Revival Cafe & Kitchen

Really nice option to be able to get any of their breakfast sandwiches made on gluten free bread, the girls had an amazing (and beautiful) avocado toast!

They also had two gluten free baked goods that we tried (an almond flour cake and a chocolate walnut scone) - however these were kept in a shared space with non-gluten free items, so if you are very sensitive to cross-contamination I would not recommend this.

Best Lunch: Fattoush

Fattoush

This is a takeout option- but had the most delicious mediterranean food! The girls both were able to get gluten free pita wraps with chicken shawarma and with haloumi cheese. I would even go so far as to say that the gluten-free wraps were better in taste/texture than the regular versions!

Many menu items are available gluten free and they were very careful about the preparation and understood clearly the cross contamination risks. Definitely more expensive than your typical wrap, but the quality/flavor was SO good I highly recommend it.

Road Trip Stop: Blackbird's Nest

And the only other restaurant I will call out was actually somewhere we stopped on our drive up to Boston. I was literally shocked by how good it was- because honestly how often do you stop somewhere off of a major highway and find really great gluten free food??? Pretty much never.

So in Connecticut there is a wonderful bar/restaurant that I would recommend:
Blackbird's Nest

Everything on the menu (aside from the pasta dishes) could be made gluten free! They had really great food and the girls were SO excited to be able to get things like calamari, homemade tortilla chips and wings. There were also good healthy options as well- we all really enjoyed both the food and the atmosphere.