Side Effects

I was warned not to remove all gluten and dairy cold turkey but that is exactly what I did. The caution was given as advice so as not to fail or so I thought. Maybe it was actually a warning that by going cold turkey the person on the new diet would turn into a monster. I wish I had taken the advice to heart but I'm just such an "all or nothing" kind of person that lacks patience. So when I was armed with a little information and a partially stocked pantry I just went for it. It wasn't really planned to go down the way it did. I really just planned to remove Becca's dairy and go from there. Instead I had some new food and just sort of ended up doing a full day of dairy free and gluten free. Once I had accomplished a full day I didn't want to soil Becca's stomach with anything bad the next day either. Thus began the immediate cut-off of all gluten and dairy.

After about the second day the awful diarrhea started. I won't go into much detail because I'm sure no one wants to hear about the horrific poo incidents we have endured with Becca. However, I have to say that it has been a ridiculously tough 10 days or so. We are convinced that Becca's body is "de-toxing" which is why her digestive system is so unpredictable right now. It has taken both John and I to change some of her diapers because of the incessant squirming, hysterical crying and jerky body movements. The one upside for Becca is that she has had multiple baths everyday which she loves. However, there was one bathing incident that turned into diarrhea soup which was the grossest thing ever. Since the diarrhea has been going on for so many days we have begun to become a bit concerned so I went to Walgreens to see what they had. I bought some probiotics but didn't realize till I was home that they contained casein so they weren't allowed. Kids Pepto Bismal doesn't say that it relieves diarrhea. The only other thing I could see was Immodium which wasn't recommended for children under age 6. Oh conundrum. I ended up not giving her anything and dare I say (knock on wood) it seems like it just may be clearing up on its own.

I haven't even mentioned the barfing. I'm not sure it is even slightly related to the diet or the diarrhea. Maybe Becca caught a bug of some sort. All I know is that at 3:00am on Thursday morning Becca was puking her little guts out. It was rough because we were staying in a hotel. John and I rushed Becca into the bathroom and cleaned her up and tried our hardest to calm her down. After a very stressful half hour I gave up and decided to pack the kids up and head home. We had been staying down in Lakewood with John at the Homestead Suites. John is having meetings down there this week and next so the NPS is putting him up and giving him a per diem. We thought it would be fun to join him and let the kids play hookie for a few days. The weather has been gorgeous and the Zoo and other outdoor adventures were calling our names. It would have been great if not for the monstrous side effects. Alas, the kids and I are home now sans John. He'll be home for the weekend and then will return down to the Federal Center next week. I just hope I'll have healthy kids because I'm getting so tired of doing laundry, changing linens every night (sometimes more than once) and cleaning up these horrid messes by myself.

I can't end on a bad note though. I have some really good news. The last couple of days Becca has begun chattering. Baby talk sounds. It sounds like she is speaking her own little language. She hasn't done this for over a year. The only sounds she has made regularly are simple vowel sounds and nothing remotely like language. We are so excited! This breakthrough is exactly what we were hoping for. We are hoping and praying that this is the beginning of continued language development. We are excited that her speech therapy might actually become beneficial. We know it is only chattering but when you haven't heard your child even try to do anything of the sort for so so long it is just such a beautiful sound!