What 18 years of celiac taught me about tracking my gut

Personal experience, not medical advice.

In short: my celiac diagnosis started with a doctor asking about my stool, not with a test. Years later, when another doctor told me to “just keep an eye on it”, I learned that keeping an eye on it means writing it down: when it happened, what type it was, and whether it felt complete. That simple record is how I now check my own habits.

It started with an awkward question

I was 13. Mornings were the worst part of my day. I’d sit in the toilet for a long time with the feeling that it wasn’t going to be easy, and I was often late for school because of it. As a child, I didn’t know whether that meant anything.

What worried my family was something else: I wasn’t growing. My height and weight were stuck, my legs hurt, and I was severely anaemic. At the doctor’s, one of the first questions was, “How is his stool? Does it stick to the pan?”

It did. That embarrassing detail turned out to be the one that mattered. A blood test confirmed celiac disease in 2008, and I stopped eating wheat that week.

Noticing came before writing anything down

Going gluten-free didn’t fix things overnight. It took time. I wasn’t tracking anything at 13, but I was paying attention, and the first sign I noticed that things were improving was the same detail that had started it all: my stool stopped sticking to the pan.

Even now, almost 18 years later, my gut has its own opinions. If I eat gluten, or even some cereals, I know about it. I still get spells of constipation and loose motions, and I’ve learned to be extra careful when things don’t feel right inside.

The doctor’s questions were simpler than I expected

When I started my first job, around 2018–19, I was in regular touch with my doctor, and he wanted to know how my bowel movements had actually been. So I started sending him notes on WhatsApp.

They weren’t anything fancy. I wrote down the time. I didn’t record the stool type; I only learned about the Bristol stool chart later, from reading online. My doctor cared about two things:

• When it happened
• Whether it felt like a full movement, or whether I still felt stuck

I also had to pay attention to what had changed in my diet. Around then, a repeat tTG blood test led to more conversations, and I realised I was getting regular bloating.

“Just keep an eye on it”

Then came the sentence I think a lot of people hear: “Just keep an eye on it. Everything looks fine.” I was also advised to start some physical activity.

Nobody tells you how to keep an eye on it. Scattered WhatsApp messages weren’t enough to see a pattern. I needed a proper diary, with the time and how often I went, and now the stool type too, because I’d learned that the type helps a pattern show up.

That’s the gap I built Gut Elements to fill: a simple, private place to log a bowel movement in a few seconds and look back over weeks instead of trying to remember.

What the diary shows me now

Keeping a record helps me with two things: timing and type. When something changes, I look back at what I’ve been doing:

• Have I been eating enough fibre?
• Have I been drinking enough water?
• Has my physical activity made a difference, or not?

I try to connect what I see in the diary with my routine, then make changes and see what happens. That’s my own way of looking after myself, not a rule for anyone else. Your doctor knows your situation; I only know mine.

If you’ve just been told to “keep an eye on it”

Here’s what I wish someone had told me:

1. Write it down when it happens. Memory is unreliable after a few days.
2. Keep it simple: the date, the time and the stool type. Add a short note if it didn’t feel complete, or if your doctor asked about something specific.
3. Give it a couple of weeks before looking for a pattern. One day tells you very little.
4. Bring it to your appointment. A short summary on top is easier for a doctor to read than pages of entries.

You don’t need an app for this. A free printable bowel diary works just as well, and the Bristol stool chart in plain words explains the seven types. When you’re ready to talk it through, here’s how to share your bowel diary with a doctor.

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This is my personal experience of living with celiac disease. It isn’t medical advice, and it isn’t evidence that Gut Elements treats or diagnoses anything. If something about your bowel habits worries you, please talk to a doctor.