Hi All,
I'm new to the forum, but have a pressing question. When I was 3 years old I was diagnosed with DH (my paternal grandmother and paternal aunt have celiac). From the age of 3-19 I took dapsone orally and topically. I had lesions on my buttox and back mainly-still have the scar on my back where my mom said my first rash happened. When I was 19 the lesions just stopped. I never had a gluten free diet (parents didn't understand what DH was or that my diet needed to change).
I'm now 37 and have a slew of issues that I need to determine if I have celiac or returning DH. First, I'm heavy, let's face it, I'm obese (so is my grandma with celiac and she's been gluten free for 40 years). First, my doctors don't think I have celiac cuz I'm heavy. They claim skinny people have it. However, in doing my own reading I see that obesity and trouble losing weight can be symptoms. Also, I have depression and anxiety (for which I'm medicated and have a doctor). I have tingling in my fingers and muscle weakness in my legs and sometimes my arms. Granted I'm heavy, but I've always been strong, like freakishly strong, but sometimes now I feel like my legs are tired before I even start my day. I crave sugar, all the time. I have unexplained infertility. Even after having my endometriosis removed, we weren't able to conceive. Also, I saw pictures of lesions of DH and the ones I experience now are different than in my youth. They are no longer big patches on my back and butt, but are on my middle finger, small pimply bumps (thought it was psoriasis, but it itches like crazy), and along my hairline and sometimes I get them in my hair. Also I get pimple like spots on my face that I call my stress spots because they aren't pimples, they are oozy crusties that take forever to heal (they don't really itch though).
In addition, I have terrible allergies, and break out in the hives all of the time (especially if I rub on my skin or gently scratch a spot).
So this leads to the question...If I was diagnosed with DH at three but went into remission at 19, do I still have DH/celiac disease???
Please help!!!
Thanks
Dani