As with many people, I only found out that I had a gluten problem by giving it up. After a year on a wheat free diet I was in relatively good health - unfortunately this made diagnosis extremely difficult.

So began the numerous tests and lengthy diagnosis process.

The first test I had was to check for antibodies in my blood but, it came back inconclusive because of the lack of gluten in my diet.

Next I had the DNA test for coeliac disease, which also came back inconclusive because I have some of the genes for the condition but not the entire set.

It was then I had the choice to go further down the road towards a diagnosis, which meant a referral to a consultant and frequent hospital visits, or I could leave it and see what happened. At this point I was feeling fairly well, so the decision against numerous hospital visits was an easy one to make.

However, as the following two years went by, I became more and more sensitive to gluten. At this time, having decided to open a gluten free business, I was back in university taking a second degree in food and it was here that I began learning more about coeliac disease, about the long term health problems it creates such as recurrent anaemia and the quiet killer that early onset osteoporosis can be.

At the point that I could no longer eat normal oats, I decided enough was enough and I was going to proceed with a formal diagnosis.

So, back once again to the doctors and I was referred to a consultant, who put me on a high gluten diet for six weeks. I had to eat a minimum of eight slices of bread a day or the equivalent such as Weetabix or bran flakes.

This horrible diet was meant to increase the number of antibodies in my body and damage the gut lining of my stomach, in preparation for my endoscopy test.

When it came to the test, which should have confirmed me as a coeliac, there were no conclusive results. The diet had taken its toll and I felt awful, but six weeks of eating gluten had not been enough to cause sufficient damage.

The following year I was put on a high gluten diet again for another test. This time I became much more ill. I was run down and had extremely severe asthma, to the point that I became concerned that I would die of it. This time the test was a colonoscopy but, yet again it yielded no definite results.

So, onto more testing; the barium meal test and finally, the barium milkshake test. In these tests I had to ingest food or a drink that is laced with the element barium, which shows up on X-rays to allow technicians to check its progress through my body by taking constant shots.


Somewhat dramatically they also had to make the food and drink slosh around my innards, which they achieved by tilting and rotating the platform I was lying on. Luckily, seatbelts were provided!

After all this the tests were still inconclusive, so I sat down with the consultant for a diagnosis summit. Thankfully, he diagnosed coeliac disease even though the tests had not given definite results. It was a discretionary diagnosis on his part and I was lucky to get that.

I regularly hear from a large number of people who had the same, difficult path to diagnosis but whose consultants and GP refuse to diagnose, leaving them unwell and feeling like cranks.

As it turns out, not only am I coeliac, I am a very sensitive coeliac. I react to products over 20ppm gluten and I cannot eat anything made with Codex wheat starch.

I have adopted a very, very strict gluten free diet and the positive results of this have changed my life for the better.

Now I dedicate my time to creating foods that allow people with wheat and gluten allergies to live as freely as possible. I am determined to experiment with high-quality, safe wheat and gluten free foods and to see these products be used creatively by chefs and sufferers alike.