Which sugar alcohol do you use if you can't have gluten?

#1

I have a friend who is gluten free and can’t eat any of the keto sugars. Does anyone else have this problem? Is there any of the sugars that work for you or do you just have to give up sugar completely? She’s also lactose intolerant.

(Joey) #2

Someone else can correct me if I’m wrong, but gluten and “keto sugars” are not the same thing.

Why can’t this person eat other carbohydrates (i.e., “sugars”) which are gluten-free? I’m not recommending eating carbs, I’m wondering what the actual constraints are that your friend is trying to implement through diet.

#3

She can’t eat erythritol, allulose, stevia and xylitol. So anything that is gluten free but has these sugars she can’t eat. Being lactose free also limits any of the desserts I might fix.

(Joey) #4

Ah, thanks for clarifying. Now I think I understand the nature of the question.

These are various “artificial” sweeteners. Of course no one needs to eat them from a nutritional metabolic standpoint … they feed the “sweet tooth” not the body’s genuine energy/health requirements.

Perhaps the unwelcomed response is that this friend’s body is rebelling against “sweet” (writ large) by being unable to adequately digest these refined sugar substitutes - while also rejecting gluten and lactose.

I’d reframe the question to your friend: Do you intend to listen to what your body is telling you? Perhaps you really need to give up on sweets ?

I’d recommend going carnivore.

#5

Oh she’s fine with eating regular sugar. I just thought it would be nice if she could eat some of the keto items I’ve been making for my son. Thank you for helping me sort this out.

#6

I don’t tolerate sweeteners - sugar alcohols and others - my stomach doesn’t like them. My solution is to avoid them. For lactose, I use lactose free products - thankfully, there are many of them nowadays. They often taste a bit sweeter because the lactose is already split into glucose and galactose. So you could use that for a dessert.

(Joey) #7

You’re too kind … I don’t think I was of much help :wink:
Apparently her body only lets her eat the worst of the bunch - refined sugar.

Forget everything I said about “listening to her body” :laughing:

#8

Yep, it’s too bad white sugar doesn’t give the same obvious symptom the other stuff does, gluten, lactose. Sugar is the slow killer without symptoms for a lot of people. Then, all of a sudden there it is. All the way up to cancer.

And you did help me sort it out. So thank you for that :thinking:

#9

She already does control the lactose with lactose free. She’s at a good weight so the sugar she does eat isn’t showing up…yet. It would be nice if the food industry would figure out a way to make the sugar alcohols more tolerable. I’m sure they will in time…when there’s enough money to be made :roll_eyes:

#10

Given that sugar alcohols don’t contain gluten, all of them.

Are you sure your friend isn’t one of those hypochondriac that claims she simply can’t have anything?

Erythritol and and Xylitol are both sugar alcohols. Stevia isn’t a sugar alcohol or a sugar, and Allulose is a REAL sugar, that is simple is ignored by the body, none of those 4 contain gluten.

So even if her gut is messed up and she has methane / gas issues, that (may) explain them creating an issue (which can and should be addressed), but as far as Stevia and Allulose, that just doesn’t make any sense.

#11

No, it doesn’t. Sugar can FEED cancer cells simply because it’s a fuel source, but in no way causes it.

#12

She’s been through a lot so it’s possible there’s an issue there. She says she’s fine as long as she stays away from them. I know none of them contain gluten so it could be a methane issue. I’ll have to ask her if that’s been addressed. Good to know.

Anyhow, thank you for defining each of them for me. It’s much clearer now for me at least.

And most of all for clarifying that sugar is a fuel source and not a cause of cancer. That I did not know.

#13

No prob, as somebody that’s dealt with a ton of gastric issues, as well as being wrongly told I’m lactose intolerant from more than one doc (I wasn’t) she’d want a food sensitivity test and a stool analysis. Both can be done DIY style. There’s a ton out there but I used the Everywell food sensitivity test (there’s 2, the bigger one is worth it) and I used Viome for the stool analysis.

Seeing your bodys actual response to things is priceless, so many people (think) they can’t have or are intolerant to so many things that they’re simply not. The stool side of things shows a lot as well as far as what your metabolism is doing, what it’s not, and what foods are showing problems.

My Sis-n-law claimed she was both gluten and lactose intolerant (as well as a laundry list of others) testing showed neither was the case. In my case, lactose intolerance was being mimicked perfectly! In the end it came down to screwed up gut bacteria. I still don’t have it perfect, but have it 90% better. Only thing left really is bloating from time to time, but the biome test did show that I’m a big methane producer, so anything that contributes to that works double time on me. But hopefully the stuff I’m doing is addressing that. Couple months I’m doing a follow up to see what’s changed.

Also keep in mind even if the sensitivity test shows a decent reaction to something, it doesn’t mean you’re intolerant of it. I showed Whey pretty high, Casein no reaction at all, Eggs were decent, Egg whites were way higher. A follow up after slightly backing off them dropped those significantly.

(KM) #14

I am wondering if she really has an intolerance to stevia, or if it’s the commercial stevia Products, which can be as much other stuff as actual stevia, that she’s sensitive to. In its purest form stevia is simply a leaf, an herb which happens to have a sweet taste. Probably further than you want to go, but I grow my own and harvest the young leaves, have 100% confidence in the purity.

#15

I appreciate the further info. I suspect she’s had all the testing etc. She goes to a Naturopath and Chiropractor and has done so much work on herself being dx with rheumatoid arthritis at 25. She’s been off all meds for several years now and “just” has some hand deformity but is able to do just about everything anyhow. She’s 56 now and does so much!

#16

You could be right. I don’t know what she’s basing it on. I suspected much of what she’s tried with the alternative sweeteners has been commercial. But understandably she’s not willing to try any of it anymore. Even a bite of my divine chocolate silk pie :grin:

#17

I came a long way since my sweets-eating carby days but even since my early keto years when I half-lived on sweets…

Now my chosen woe that I try to stay close to most of the time is carnivore. No force can take me my desserts but they don’t need sweeteners. I use dairy in them and they are often sweet, some lactose free products even more so (sometimes the lactose free version doesn’t have a big difference in sweetness but sometimes it does). The flavorings help too, vanilla instantly make something more of a dessert to me…

And if it’s really unbearable without sweetness, one can use other sugars (lactose is already sugar. it’s so strange, I could eat erythritol galore on keto but on carnivore I need to use sugar :smiley: oh well, it’s little). Many ketoers eat fruits. Many uses a tiny table sugar too, actually, at least in condiments or chocolate but probably some put it in desserts. There is a difference eating sugar galore or using a few grams in a bowl of pudding… I wouldn’t do the latter (except if it’s coconut sugar, that tastes amazing… I do that once in a blue moon) but I don’t need it.

It helps that quitting sugar tend to drastically change our sweetness perception. The old sweetness feeling can be reached with a fragment of the old amount of sweetener. I noticed that carnivore started this process anew, it comes handy. But training ourselves not to need much sweetness is useful too. When I make an ice cream without sweetener (inculing my old fav ice cream sweetener and flavoring, banana ;)), I do feel it’s not as sweet as in the past but I don’t care. Sweetness is overrated :wink: It’s still good.
It took years though.

It’s probably harder with cocoa or coffee as they are more bitter. Though chocolate can help with the dessert feeling. And some of us can enjoy unsweetened chocolate. Eventually and often only if we work for it.

(You've tried everything else; why not try bacon?) #18

Not precisely accurate. Excessive glucose over time can cause the metabolic damage to cell mitochondria that leads to the cells’ becoming cancerous. Mitochondrial fat-burning, while an old trait in evolutionary terms, is not as ancient as glucose-burning, so the damaged cells must now live off of glucose and glutamine. Dr. Seyfried claims his research shows that it is the metabolic damage that comes first, and that the genetic mutations observed in cancerous cells are an after-effect.

#19

Thanks for the clarification. Sugar is a slow killer. If people only realized.

#20

Right, but that’s still secondary. Sugar in of itself won’t cause cancer, excess sugar, inflammation, constant abuse, metabolic damage, cells going zombie, then being able to become cancerous isn’t the same as eat sugar get cancer.