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Summary of can gluten or antibodies pass through breastmilk.

A few weekends ago, I attended a gluten-free picnic of my local support
group. I met a woman whose daughter has Celiac. They diagnosed her
daughter while she was breastfeeding. If the mother ate gluten, her
breastfeeding daughter reacted. So the mother went on a GF diet while
breastfeeding.

Here are the responses I received from the list:

Seven people said yes, gluten can pass through breastmilk. Additional
information offered:

1. Celiac isn't triggered by gluten; people are born with it. If you eat
gluten, and IF your son is celiac, chances are he could have a reaction.

2. I've breastfed all 4 of my children (only 1 is a celiac) and have
noticed that whenever I ate something that disagreed with me, they got
fussy too. The pediatrician says that not only do food substances pass
through the milk, but all of your body's reactions (hormones,
antibodies, etc) pass through too!

3. It's been several months since I was faced with this same issue,
but my daughter has celiac and I suspected it long before she started
solid foods. The docs gave me a hard time about it because they said
gluten could not pass through breastmilk, but if you ask the
BREASTFEEDING experts their answer is always yes (without hesitation).
It is a subject that is near and dear to my heart. Incidentally, my
daughter and I both are diagnosed now. I never suspected in myself, but
now that I've been off of gluten for months it is easy to believe. My
advice to you is to breastfeed your baby as long as you possibly can.

4. I've heard of many women who themselves are not celiacs who have
celiac children (or children with celiac symptoms) who must be GF while
nursing. My wife has had to coach two of them this year on how to cook
GF, and bestowed GF supplies on them!

5. My son is 17 mos. old & I breastfed until he was around 5 mos old. I
was diagnosed with Celiac a few months before I got pregnant. I noticed
similar symptoms in my boy when I was gluten-sick (my husband calls it
*whacked out on wheat* -- quite accurate for me). I remember from the
celiac-adults list that gluten does pass through breast milk, so I
believe your observations are correct. I don't know how much or how
little would trigger celiac in him, though.

Maybe the Cel-Pro list would know. By the way, we decided to keep our
son GF until the age of 2 in hopes of holding off celiac until he's
older. Sometimes it helps to let the bowel mature before introducing
potential "allergens". But we've run into the sideline problem of
chronic constipation in our boy. Always hard choices to make...

6. When I was breastfeeding my son, everything that I ate affected him
adversely. As it turned out, those were the foods he ended up either
being allergic to or unable to eat when he got to solid foods. All I can
tell you is go with your instinct. You know more about the condition
than most doctors and there really isn't that much information out there
about breast feeding and celiac I would suspect.

7. Antibodies do pass through the breastmilk in the rich colostrum and
"hindmilk".  But it is also true that a breastfed baby is very in-tune
with his mother's physical/ emotional state.  It is my understanding
that Celiac disease is a recessive trait.  Your child may present with
celiac if your spouse also has some genetic predisposition to an
autoimmune disease, but I propose that your baby senses your discomfort.
The bonding that occurs with breastfeeding provides your infant with
that physiological sense of still being "connected" to mom, almost like
a continuation of being in the womb, because your infant continues to be
a part of your body through the breastfeeding experience.  (mother of
two breastfed babies, one is a celiac, plus many years serving mothers &
babies as a lactation consultation, and neonatal ICU nurse )

The one person who answered no:

One person asked this question of a panel of doctors at a conference of
the Israeli Celiac Association.  The answer was that there is no medical
knowledge regarding the passage of antibodies through breastfeeding to
the child and thus there are no findings to support this assumption.

Thanks to everyone for the information and encouragement!

Karen