2 years on GAPS: Part 3
I am doing a series of blog posts on our first 2 years on GAPS. There is one for each of us. This is part 3. It is the story of my youngest. She was our impetus for starting GAPS when we did but since her story is more complicated I have saved it till now to tell. To read part 1 about my older daughter go here and part 2 about me go here.
This ended up being a very long post so I have broken it down into two. Check back tomorrow for the rest of the story.
Eventually the GI decided that she had nothing else to offer without knowing what was going on for sure so we scheduled a scope to check for EE. If she was found to have EE the recommendation at this point would be to pull all foods from her diet and put her on an elemental formula for all of her nutrition. She was 21 months at the time. I decided that I really did not want that recommendation to be made and I was going to do whatever I could to prevent it so the very day that we scheduled the scope we began the GAPS diet. I didn’t even have the book yet but I had read online and had done SCD previously with her sister so I knew the basics. It was really crazy. To make things even more crazy we were going out of town for 10 days, starting 5 days after I put us on GAPS. Thankfully it was to my parent’s house and they were confused and overwhelmed but supportive.
I don’t recommend starting GAPS like this but my deadline of that scope scheduled 3 weeks out make me feel like I had no choice. In the end she scoped clean and our GI kind of washed her hands of her. I didn’t want the drugs anymore and she had nothing else to offer her so we moved on. Thankfully GAPS had already begun to work.
J had been on an elimination diet and hadn’t ever eaten grains so GAPS really wasn’t a big change for her. The biggest change came when I realized that I needed to eliminate all fruit and higher carb veggies from her diet long term. We did start the diet with intro so there wasn’t any fruit at first, but when we tried to reintroduce it I realized that any fruit caused her candida to flare up again. Her reflux still wasn’t controlled and so in desperation I tried HCL with her. Thankfully we quickly figured out her dose and she did well on it. After about 5 weeks she easily weaned off of it since she was making enough stomach acid on her own. This was very early on in the diet.
At about 3 months in we did the family treatment with Vermox that is suggested in the GAPS Guide. The first dose seemed to go ok but we were all getting a cold 2 weeks later when it was time for the second dose. That second dose seemed to increase our sickness and J became the sickest I have ever seen her. She ran a fever and was having trouble breathing. I held her listening to her breathe all night long worried that she was going to stop breathing and worried that we would be treated badly at the hospital (or that I was over reacting and fearful for nothing). I hadn’t ever had to consider if I needed to take an ill child to the hospital before that night. I didn’t get a wink of sleep. In the morning we called my Dr and he was absolutely amazing with her. He can be a bit gruff at times but this day he was so tender. He is a homeopath and he spent a long time figuring out just the right homeopathic remedy for her. He also sent me home with a script for a rescue inhaler so that we had a treatment for her if she didn’t get better. His diagnosis was viral asthma. Thankfully the remedy worked right away and she was much better that day. Interestingly enough the homeopathic remedy that fixed her is commonly used for treating parasites. It was a treatment for parasites that seemed to have triggered this illness.
Once she recovered we simply coasted along for months with the diet waiting for healing. At some point I was able to introduce dairy and she did ok with it. Eggs also. I’m sorry that at this point I just can’t remember how long it took. We all did intro again about 9 months into the diet and suddenly she developed constipation. It took a long time (and lots of enemas) to figure out that her constipation was usually triggered by cucumbers. It is one of the early raw vegetables that is suggested so I never suspected that was causing all of her problems. We removed them from her diet and she became regular again.
One frustrating thing was that her bowel movements were always mushy, full of undigested foods and very foul smelling. I knew something wasn’t right in her gut but finding answers wasn’t easy. At about 9 months after we started GAPS I did a stool test on her through Metametrix. This revealed an unknown parasite. This wasn’t a big shock after her response to the vermox and the homeopathic. We tried various approaches with herbs, and probiotics to fix her digestion and finally after more than a year on GAPS I put her on BioKult. To my surprise (and delight) her bowel movements improved right away. They smelled better, they looked better. I was amazed. We had been using other probiotics and none had that kind of impact on her. Biokult doesn’t seem to be helpful for my DH or my other DD so they take other probiotics. It does benefit me but not nearly so profoundly as it benefited her. She now has very normal bowel movements, for the most part, and doesn’t take biokult much anymore.
I’m pretty sure she still has a parasite problem. We have treated it with herbs and diotomaceous earth but she continues to have a round bloated belly that points toward an unresolved parasite issue. She is better than she was. For a long time she was skinny all over except for her belly that was distended all the time. Now she has been able to put on some weight on her arms and legs and looks healthier than she did but just tonight I was noticing her round distended belly. It is like a pregnant woman’s belly. It comes and goes. She was very ill last week and ate very little and I noticed how flat her stomach was but now that she is eating again it is distended again. It can be hard to unravel what is really going on inside of a 4 year old. I asked her to describe her tummy pain while she was ill and she couldn’t come up with any words for me other than that it hurts.
Come back tomorrow to read the rest of her story.
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I am wondering what the connection is between having gut issues and parasite and lyme issues. Why does she have all 3? I know the connection to oxalates, but the other two I don’t know much about. Thanks.
It is all interconnected and I really don’t know which is the chicken and which is the egg in our case. All three damage gut and each can lead to the other. It is likely that she inherited all three from me at birth. I must have left that out of her story. I have each of those issues as well and they easily pass to the baby either in utero (lyme) or during the process of being born (parasites and oxalates).
Hi Patty,
Just went to the natural Pediatrician today and because of her symptoms and because we’ve tried so many other things to no avail, she agreed to put my 10 week old on a trial of zantac. I feel so guilty, like I’ve failed in some way but I just can’t survive on 3-4 hours of sleep a night with her crying all day and night and distress.
I’m wondering though if using HCL with her would be helpful? I guess I should wait till we are done with zantac? She gets very distressed to pass gas to the point that she tenses up and keeps all the gas and poopy in. We have to give her a glycerin suppository every day (which comes out within minutes undissolved) to help her with it. After filling her diaper, she often relaxes and may even fall asleep.
Do you have any suggestions?
Thanks for your blog,
Betty
I think she is too young for HCL. Have you had her evaluated for a tongue tie? That can be a big contributing factor in reflux that I so wish someone would have looked into with my kids. Have you read my post on it? http://www.lovingourguts.com/tongue-tie-2/ That should help you get started in being able to identify it yourself. Her difficulty stooling may also be related to a tongue tie. I feel for you. I remember those days being up with my sleepless baby. It is hard to cope! Thankfully my worst sleeper was my first so we could just build our lives around what it took to get her the sleep she needed (and me) but you don’t have that luxury. Have you been to a chiropractor? They can often make a big difference in reflux as well. And your own stores of copper and zinc (low zinc/high copper can lead to low stomach acid production and therefore reflux).
Yes, we had her PTT clipped a few weeks ago. She has alot more movement now. I have trouble getting enough calories right now so I’ve kept the yogurt. I’ve been afraid of having reggae everyday tho I wonder if BAB would help. When I’ve replaced dairy with coconut for a week, it seems like baby struggles even more. The kinesiologist found that she is only reacting to corn and my B supplements (garden of life brand). And we’ve been seeing a chiro once a week for her hoping anything will help her.
How frustrating. So glad you found a Dr who knew about ptt. My friend had a baby with a tt that was clipped the first week of life and just had to have it clipped further (she is a few months old now). Corn is incredibly difficult to avoid. I am allergic to it and it is hidden in a lot of things. You may be passing corn to her without realizing. If you use coconut milk with a gum in it that has corn. Prewashed salad, regular salt, waxed vegetables, most store bought chicken those are all contaminated with corn enough for me to react to them. Anything with the ingredient “citric acid” is likely to be made from corn. Even if it says that it is corn free. You need to call the company and ask what their citric acid is made from. Most vitamin c is made from corn. And then there are the animal products you are eating. Some are sensitive to even animals fed corn. If the milk comes from grain fed cows or your eggs from corn fed chickens it can be a problem.
You’re an awesome mom Patty! I love hearing these stories. Just to hear children progressing is so wonderful.
My daughter has reflux to not diagnosed but I can hear food still come up sometimes and she will just randomly choke and cough so I”m assuming that’s reflux. She’s 1 and doing more solids now which has messed her bowels up. She didn’t poop for 3 days then when she finally did there’s was a good amount of blood in stool. She didn’t want me near her bottom for days
She had bright red lines around her anus that looked like big scratches….any ideas? She’s better now but not pooping twice a day like she used too. She has also been a VERY restful sleeper. Still wakes sometimes 5+ times a night. She tosses, turns and kicks her feet ugh it’s miserable. She’s still nursing but even that doesn’t get her back to sleep most times. Just wodnering If you have any ideas?
I will be traveling to Japan and staying there for 7 months which really makes things diet super difficult.
Keep a journal of everything both of you are eating. Often a pattern will emerge. It always amazes me what can be so obvious when I put it all down on paper that I just couldn’t see at all living it. Keep track of everything consumed and anything else you think it important (mood, poops, sleep, rashes, etc). I usually make a spreadsheet in excel and add whatever categories I need to make it work. I personally find it easier to type than to write long hand so I far prefer that method (plus I can easily add another line if I think of another aspect to track or make a space bigger to accommodate more information.) I was shocked to realize that my younger dd was constipated by cucumber. And her reaction to almonds (and ultimately all high oxalate foods) became so clear from a food journal when it just wasn’t before I kept track.
Any chance she has a tongue tie? http://www.lovingourguts.com/tongue-tie-2/
Good idea Patty. She had a slight tongue tie and lip tie at birth but they were lasered when she was a month old. I was hoping that I would notice a difference in the reflux after but I didn’t notice a difference with anything. I have been slacking on probiotics so I’m getting consistent with that today! She’s on custom probitoics infant formula I wonder If I should add in Bio gaia too??
Did you do the tongue exercises with her after the procedure? She may have not been cut far enough. My friend’s dd just had to have her tongue tie redone.
No we didn’t do exercises. When he clipped her tongue he said she barely had a tie very very small. Her lip was the tight one. I can always have it checked again I suppose.
Can she stick her tongue out far and does it have a pointy tip? Has she been checked for a posterior tongue tie? (it requires feeling in her mouth, not watching mobility). Both of my girls have minor classic tongue ties but significant posterior ties.
I’ve tried to check her but she’s 1 so it’s a little difficult to get her to leave her tongue long enough to check. I don’t know If she has been checked for that or not. Can I check for it?
Yes you can check her. Put your finger under her tongue pad side down. You shouldn’t feel anything there but soft tissue. If you feel something that feels like a band or a string or even a thick cord that is a posterior tie. It is also described as feeling like a speedbump. Sometimes when my dd lifts her tongue just right I can even see it but I don’t think that is common. Feel in your mouth and see if you have one first and then check her and compare. I checked my girls several times before I could feel it and then it was just so obvious so give yourself time to figure it out.