A Journey Through The Digestive System

Digestive Wellness for Children – Chapter 3

DIGESTION. In very basic terms, the digestive system is a 25+ foot tube that starts at the mouth and ends at the rectum. It includes the mouth, esophagus, stomach, small intestine, pancreas, liver, gallbladder and large intestine. It is the basis for the body’s nutrient supply system – turn food into particles the cells can use for energy, maintenance, repair, growth – and a block, malfunction or failure in one part impedes the effectiveness everything downstream. We never really think much about our digestive system, unless we have a problem.

MOUTH. It is an amazing, intricate system. It actually starts with our mouth and how well we chew! Foods need to be broken into small particles, not swallowed as large chunks, so that enzymes can later finish breaking them down.

ESOPHAGUS AND STOMACH. The esophagus is a tube that takes food from the mouth down to the stomach. In the stomach hydrochloric acid (HCI), enzymes, and the contractions of the stomach work to kill bacteria that can cause food poisoning, break protein bonds and begins breaking down fats. The stomach has completed its job when food is liquefied into chyme.

SMALL INTESTINE. Averaging around 17 feet long, if stretched, the small intestine in the primary area where absorption of nutrients takes place. However, that isn’t all that takes place – a lot happens in the small intestine. Digestion of food is completed and nutrients are absorbed through the intestinal wall and into the blood stream. It also blocks the absorption of harmful things like chemicals, large food particles, etc. Also in the small intestine are billions of beneficial microbes that are critical to general health and to a strong immune system. 70% of the immune system is located in the gut.

PANCREAS, LIVER, AND GALLBLADDER. These organs all play a role in the digestive system. The pancreas although often thought of in its role of balancing blood sugars also plays key roles in digestion and absorption of nutrients through the production of enzymes.

The liver creates bile to emulsify fats, breaks down hormones, is critical in the processing of nutrients, chemicals, and drugs that are in the blood, determining which to keep, which to change, and which to eliminate. If the liver is congested, these functions can be greatly compromised.

The gallbladder stores bile for when a supply is needed. Bile emulsifies fats and breaks down fat soluble vitamins.

LARGE INTESTINE. The large intestine is primarily responsible for reabsorbing water back into the body and eliminating waste. Like the small intestine it contains beneficial microbes, necessary for health, digestion, disease protection, and the production of certain vitamins. The main issues to be aware of with the colon are frequency of movement and transit time. Ideally, you should have two to three bowel movements a day. And food should take between 12 and 24 hours from mouth to elimination. Anything less (diarrhea) or more (constipation) will have effects on health.

MY COMMENTS. The digestive system is a critical basis for health. The simplest things can make big differences – chewing food well (drink your food and chew you drinks!), taking digestive enzymes or eating raw foods, making sure the gut bacteria is balanced with beneficial bacteria, keeping the liver decongested.

For all children with multiple allergies, and for a huge percentage of autistic children, the health of the digestive system is the key to reversing the issues, particularly regaining the functioning of the small intestine and enzymes. At least 70% of the immune system is in the gut, specifically the small intestine. One of the common supplements used for autistic kids is L-glutamine, one of the reasons is because the small intestine uses L-glutamine (an amino acid) to repair itself and for energy. The small intestine is also where yeast starts to overgrow and can create leaky gut syndrome, a huge issue for many of these kids, but more about that in a couple of weeks.

Elimination is also key. These kids are sick because they are toxic. They have to eliminate toxins. The 4 avenues of elimination are: the lungs, the skin, the colon, and the urinary system. As relates to the digestive system, toxic kids need a decongested liver and bowels that move regularly. The liver needs to be able to filter the toxins out and the bowel needs to get rid of them, otherwise the toxins just keep recirculating.

Is It Worth It? Healing Allergies & Autism is a Daily Battle!

My dad and brother both were amazed at Jordan. Dad went on and on about how Jordan would run up to him and look him straight in the eye as he was running around playing and how he repeatedly did that and kept coming back and “checking” and to see what Dad was up to, where he was, etc. Haahum, Grandpa is known to be playful and to be there one minute and hiding around the corner waiting to startle you as you come looking for him the next minute! Dad talked about how you could look into Jordan’s eyes and see him thinking and processing everything, but instantaneously, no pausing needing to think about it or work to figure things out. Just looking at one thing, got it, and on to the next, no pause, no confusion, just alert understanding. It only took Jordan a couple minutes to warm up to him when they arrived – it used to take a couple of days, and even then he would be reserved, shy, fearful, look at his cousins out of the corner of his eye and he certainly still wanted, “Mommmyyyyyyy.” Not anymore! Jordan was all about playing with his Grandpa, uncle and cousins, no reservation, no fear – Mommy, where was she anyway? Who knows? Who cares? We have a very playful, silly, loving Grandpa visiting!

Some days I wonder, “Is it worth it?” It seems like everyday I wake up to do battle. A battle for the well-being of my son. Every meal, every snack, every grocery trip, specialty food stores, supplements, vitamins, everytime I clean or wash something I work to keep things as toxin free as possible and the food allergen free, nutritious, and healing  snacks and meals – and that means from scratch with unusual ingredients! And that’s routine, then there are the other battles – the insurance company (they still haven’t paid a penny for his treatments, even mainstream allergy and GI issue treatment), the doctors, friends and society and the perception of what we are doing. Many who think I’m wrong. Battling to find or create a treatment plan that will work for him. Most days it feels like uncharted territory and for us to discover it is the only way to move forward.

The sacrifice of a social life and friends. We don’t often get together with others. Food is usually involved. Most people don’t get excited about dairy free, yeast free, gluten free, color free…do I really need to keep going? And, well, I’ve lived in a cave for 2 years – a cave called allergies, developmental delay, autism, toxins, neurotoxicity, nutrition, health, and recovery. My every waking moment dedicated to the care of my boys and research. Not exactly uplifting topics for casual conversation.  Yet, I don’t have much else to talk about. I can listen. But, I nearly go insane as I listen to new mothers go on and on about how awful their life is with their colicky 6 week old baby and how they can’t sleep through the night and they are so exhausted. Yet, who don’t want any real help – just a pill to cure it.

I’ve become a conspiracy theory person (the kind I use to look at cross-eyed because I thought they were crazy, yup, that’s me now)- Big Pharma (the pharmaceutical companies) having the power to control gov’t, the CDC (Centers for Disease Control) vaccine recommendations, the AAP (American Academy of Pediatrics) who still won’t acknowledge that Autism is treatable, and the FDA (Food and Drug Administration) and what they do or don’t approve as safe, and of course the media. Yes, I’ve completely lost my trust in much of the information from these sources. Yet, this is who everyone else listens to so I feel like it’s a battle against all of them (gov’t, it’s agencies, media, pharma, mainstream medicine) plus against all of the misinformation everyone else around me believes from them and hits me with (as if I haven’t heard it and looked into it already). I try to look at these as educational opportunities the problems is – who would you believe? A mom with a kid with developmental problems or the CDC, AAP, FDA, the media, and your doctor? I know who I used to believe and lets just say, I thought the mom was craaazy. So, most people don’t really want to be educated. They like their comfortable bubble with their misinformation. Who can blame them. I’m exhausted fighting this fight and if it wasn’t absolutely necessary, if I had had any other option, I would have taken it. My options were let my child starve, feed him foods he was allergic to and watch him vomit, scream, writhe in pain, and not develop mentally, or find another way – one nobody knew about. But since I didn’t have any other option  I stand and I fight not just for my son but for all those who currently have other options (reflux meds, ear tubes, nebulizers, allergy meds, seizure meds, speech therapy, occupational therapy, physical therapy, etc) and keep trying to take them, but many of their kids aren’t getting better – for the few who will seek other solutions, I fight.

A WORD OF ENCOURAGEMENT
Is it worth it? So often, I just get tired. Just plain tired. But also tired of fighting the system and seemingly everyone and everything (except my husband, of course – he’s an incredible warrior too!). Some days I just want to give up and give in – let’s go to McD’s and get chicken nuggets, fries, and some fruit punch!  Let’s stop on a great summer day and get an ice cream cone! Ah, the relief not to have to pack all meals and snacks ahead of time, to stop and get a treat that wasn’t specially planned for, prepared, and saved for the occation.

My family visited a week ago – my parents and my brother and his family. The last time we had seen them (except Mom, she was down for a visit in between) was for one week around the 1st of January, so it has been just over 4 months. Other than the diet, which we have done all along, we started his new treatments in December - cranial sacral, supplementation, and a little detox (started in April).
My brother noticed the difference in Jordan too. He commented that it seemed like Jordan had grown a year’s worth in the 4 months since they had seen him last! Ahhh, all words that do a warring mommy’s heart good – and I have to agree with his assessment. Jordan does seem like a 2 year old now.

Is it worth it? Oh to stop and enjoy that summer ice cream cone or see cookie crumbles on the edges of his mouth :)  But, then I remember where we’ve been and how far he has come, and the blueberry coconut milk smoothie mustache – made at home (with some supplements added in it too) - is just great!

Enter Dr. P - A New Doctor for Recovery from Autism & Allergies

Jordan's typical expression.

We’ve been waiting for a consultation with a new doctor in Pittsburgh. Well, we had that consultation yesterday – we got moved up on a cancellation! Before I jump into that news, I’ll review. 

RECAP
I pursued a new doctor to check into alternatives to the protocol Dr. K had Jordan on. Which was:

1. Nutritional Support – Dr. K added a couple supplements to what we were already doing when we first saw him – that’s it
2. Yeast Overgrowth Treatment - we rotated between 3 different ones, including 2 prescription anti-fungals. The prescription anti-fungals made him regress horribly in his speech and behavior. After being on the prescriptions for a month, I took him off to give him a little break and he started speaking more the first day he was off of them and putting 2 words together again. However, it took an entire month and continuing cranial sacral & chiropractic neurology appointments to regain the lost development of the month on anti-fungals.
3. LDA Shots – That’s Low-Dose Antigen for allergies. It requires prescription anti-fungals and a somewhat complicated 17 day protocol. And total, it takes 3 years. Part of the purpose for these is to calm the inflammation in his body and help to reverse the Th1/Th2 immune response. Jordan has an overactive Th2, and an under-active Th1 – opposite of what it should be and needs to be. This step was required before beginning chelation.
4. Chelation – treatment to pull heavy metals out of his body, which he is toxic with.

So, basically, with Jordan’s horrible regression on the prescription anti-fungals and my refusal to continue to give them to him (without first checking out other available options), he couldn’t get the LDA shots, which means he couldn’t get the chelation. This basically means, he wouldn’t get treated, at least not with this protocol. It all hinged on the prescription anti-fungals. Bummer, huh. Well…maybe not.

In my mind, I thought, surely there is a way to treat the yeast with natural anti-fungals. And are the shots really necessary? Isn’t there another way to go about calming inflammation and reversing the confused immune system? Hence, I contacted Dr. P’s office and we’ve been waiting for the appointment. Everything I could find online about him and his protocols, it looked like that’s how he treats these disorders. But I couldn’t tell for sure… 

NEW DOCTOR – WELCOME DR. P!
Are you keeping all these doctor’s straight? That makes: Dr. R., Dr. K., Dr. P, and Dr. B. And I haven’t mentioned Miss T and Miss K. for his therapies. Okay, moving on. The new doctor – Dr. P…
I filled out a lengthy questionnaire, including essays, fully expecting to have to repeat verbally everything I had written when we actually got into the consultation. Not so! I like this doctor already.
The first thing he asked was, “Where are you at with Jordan’s treatment right now?” So I told him what happened with the prescription anti-fungals and told him I had taken Jordan off of that protocol and was giving Jordan a break while we waited to be able to talk with him. (But had kept Jordan on the other supplements and had just put him back on the non-prescription anti-fungal earlier this week.) Dr. P. said, ”Great. I don’t like the prescription anti-fungals, many kids don’t react well to them. I don’t use them.” Now I’m really liking this doctor! He affirmed my “against medical advice” decision – whew. And, he does treat the yeast, but he uses alternatives, not prescriptions! And he has about 5 he uses, so if Jordan reacts to a couple there are other options to try. That gives me some peace of mind.

Then he went on to explain several other supplements he wants to put Jordan on, what they are, who makes them, what they do, and the order in which to start giving them to Jordan. He asked about Jordan’s diet, said what we are doing sounds great. He emphasized getting good fats in him, using hemp seed oil and nut flours in his diet along with the ghee and hemp milk we were already doing. Does this sound science-fiction yet? I had never even heard of these foods before Jordan. Anyway…
A few of the supplements he is putting Jordan on are specifically to calm the inflammation in his gut & body, help stabilize the cell, and to help switch the Th1/Th2 dominance around. So that replaces the main purpose of the LDA shots!!! No prescription anti-fungals necessary! No shots! No 3 year treatment plan just for shots! No 17 day protocol for each and every shot!

Once Jordan gets established on these supplements and there is time to see how he does on them and make sure he adjusts and isn’t reacting, and then we will start chelating!!! That means getting the heavy metals out of his body, cells, and brain. He is going to use OSR as the chelating agent. It’s new. It is fat soluble instead of water soluble (other chelating agents such as DSMA are water soluble) which means it can get INTO the cell, and get metals and free radicals out of there – very critical. Being fat soluble also means it crosses the blood/brain barrier so it can get the metals out of the brain – also very critical. And it’s totally non-toxic. Very cool. He may use another agent as well, depends on the heavy metal test I do and the results. Yes, me, I do the test. Since Jordan’s problems started so young, it’s a safe bet that his heavy metals resemble mine fairly closely, with some metals from vaccines added to him.

And the best news of all…this is a doctor who “gets me”. In 2 ways:
1) He jumped right in to exactly where we are at with Jordan’s treatment, no more waiting and going through all the first steps of the dietary measures, cleaning up the home environment, etc yet again.
2) He immediately picked up on the fact that I’ve done tons of research, pay very close attention to Jordan and to what is going on in his body, and know what is going on with his treatment. Dr. P. gave me the guidelines – which supplements/medicines to use, what they do, and what order start giving them to Jordan in – and then “set me free” to proceed with Jordan’s treatment. I get to watch Jordan in order to determine which ones Jordan can tolerate or not, how often to rotate the ones that need to be rotated (within guidelines), determine when Jordan is adjusted to the main supplements to where he would be ready to start chelation, etc. Of course, any questions I have they are available to answer them. But it is such a HUGE relief to know that when I sense something is not right for Jordan - I can stop it or change it! No more waiting for doctor’s orders. And when I see something is really good for him – I can keep it up! No more waiting an entire month for the dr’s appointment to get them to change one little bitty thing (or huge thing as the case may be). No more paying lots of money to not be listened to when I tell them something is very wrong. No more not being able to ask, “This doesn’t seem to be working, is there another way to go about accomplishing this goal?” Yes, I’m VERY excited about this new doctor!

After he went through ALL of these things – and there was A LOT, he asked me if I was overwhelmed with it. Nope! Not a bit! It’s so great to have someone who knows be able to tell me which supplements Jordan needs, which ones are the best, what order to do them in, etc. What a relief! I don’t have to figure that all out on my own. Now the thought of that - all the research, all the intricacies of medical treatment and the tremendous load of responsibility - is overwhelming. And I’ve certainly thought it. I haven’t just thought it, I lived it for the first year and half of Jordan’s life and I don’t want to go back. Maybe that’s why I’m so confident moving forward. It doesn’t overwhelm me or scare me a bit to be this involved in decisions about his treatment. I wouldn’t want it any other way. I know Jordan the best of anyone. Who better to see how he’s responding and adjust accordingly. Sure there will be moment of doubt. Moments, even days, of unknowns as we go through ups and downs and when some supplements/medications work, it may look like a bad reaction instead of the good that it is actually doing. I’ll certainly need wisdom. And the new regimen of supplements, timing them throughout the day – with meals, empty stomach, on food, in drink, through syringe, rub on skin – and tracking them through weeks and months for rotating, starting, stopping, restarting, and dosing changes is daunting. But, that’s okay; we’re up to the challenge! It’s way better than figuring everything out on my own! But still pray for endurance, wisdom, and cooperation from Jordan :)  Poor little guy doesn’t always love supplements being mixed into every drink or bowl of food (actually he hates it, but tolerates it as long as he doesn’t have to watch you add it) - although he generally loves drinking anything out of a syringe and having things rubbed on his skin :) Hopefully, nothing we add to his regimen will change that.
I like the new protocol. It addresses what needs to be addressed (same issues as the other treatment protocol), does it with more natural means, and we can begin chelating a lot sooner. We’ll see if it works and if Jordan can tolerate it…

Roadblock! Autism Treamtment and Allergy Shots

We have hit a roadblock in Jordan’s treatment and progress. Jordan’s doctor first wants to treat his allergies then his toxicity issues, including heavy metal toxicity. So we are starting with shots that are suppose to reduce or eliminate his allergies (over the course of a couple of years). For about 6 weeks we’ve been working on a treatment protocol for Jordan to receive on of these shots - an LDA shot. That’s Low Dose Antigen, an enzyme-potentiated allergen shot. In order to receive it there is a protocol he has to meet for the 9 days before the shot. It goes something like this. 9 days before – stop fish oil supplement, start on prescription anti-fungal drug. The day before, the day of and the day after the shot, stop ALL supplements and prescriptions and all food or drink has to be cooked or boiled. Well, we’ve made it through to day 8 or 9 a few times. Day 8 is the day before the shot, day 9 is the day of the shot. Only to have him get a cough or runny nose or diarrhea – all reasons that prevented him from getting the shot.

After the last aborted attempt at the shot, I stopped Jordan’s anti-fungal medication to give him a break and started him on his fish oil supplement again. Guess what…that day he started talking MUCH more again. New words. I hadn’t heard a new word in over a month. Two, three, and four word combinations! I hadn’t heard those in a month either. Jonathan took notice too and we both marvelled at what we heard coming from Jordan’s mouth.

So, which is he responding to? The anti-fungal bothering him, or the fish oil helping him? I’m inclined to think it’s both. And it makes me really not want to keep him on these prescription anti-fungals. I spoke with his doctor, but didn’t receive a satisfactory answer. He said to try Diflucan at 1/2 a dose. The appointment before, he had said never to give him Diflucan again because it was giving him diarrhea…hmmm. It was very yeasty diarrhea so I hadn’t been real worried, I figured it was doing it’s job. So, maybe a 1/2 dose will do the trick. But I’m afraid that somehow it is affecting Jordan’s brain since it is affecting his speech so much.

I feel a bit confused and frustrated. I don’t understand why we have to do the allergy shots in order to detoxify him.  I just know that is the order this doctor does it in #1 nutrition (we were already doing all of his suggestions when we started with him) #2 allergies controlled #3 detox and heavy metals. So, I’ve been back to pulling nearly all-nighters researching, and we have been thinking this over.  Our decision – we are going to follow the doctor’s suggestion one more time and see what happens. For now I’m giving Jordan a little bit of a break from the prescriptions before we give it one more try. In the mean time, I’ve scheduled a consultation (a month from now) with yet another doctor – one in Pittsburgh who treats with natural anti-fungals, not prescription,  doesn’t treat with allergy shots, and jumps on getting the toxicity out right away.  I’m more comfortable with this new doctor’s treatment protocol and feel that he is more up-to-date on his research (quite a feat considering Dr. K is very cutting-edge). However, nothing is guaranteed, so I want to give Dr. K a valiant try before switching mid-stream. I know he is a very great doctor, one of the best, with a great success rate. But, if it isn’t working for Jordan…

That’s where we are. Keep praying!

DAN! Doctor & Cranial Sacral Doctor

Cranial sacral is amazing!! I had no idea how it could help or what all it could do. Course, we have an amazing doctor who is MUCH more than a cranial sacral specialist or chiropractor, and that’s always an advantage ;). I didn’t realize in what ways and how much cranial sacral was helping until our 4th week (and 6th treatment) into it, and after we’d been away for a week and a half through Christmas and New Years.

We went to a beach house on the Alabama coast over the holidays for 1 week! That was great, what wasn’t so great was that Jordan went backward in some of his progress and even developed a couple new things he had never done before that are classic autism behaviors – walking on toes, flapping hands when he got really excited, and opening and shutting cupboard doors for an inordinate amount of time. I definitely noticed these things and it really scared me. He also got really crabby and fearful. Fearful, like, if he was not being held by me he’d just scream – forget any independent playing on his own, or being able to make dinner with both my hands and arms available – no, one arm was always full with him, that or he would be clinging to my legs screaming. These irritable, fearful, dependent behaviors were very common and continued for many many months not so long ago, so I didn’t really notice them creep back into our lives. We attributed it to the molds and mildew around the house, and the chlorine from the pool he was swimming in almost every day and how those were affecting him.

Come Thursday after vacation and his cranial sacral appointment. The doctor did some adjusting and stimulation…I don’t know just what…but as we were walking out of the office he said a new word (hum, hadn’t heard one of those for a week). We got outside and he bounced happily down the path – alive, alert, happy, coordinated, not clinging to me. By the time we got home he had said 3 new words! We walked through the door and he ran off to play – ran off, by himself, hmmm, wow! I thought I’d check my email quick. He came up behind me where the bookshelf is and said “Read a book” as he pointed to the bookshelf!! Wow, a whole phrase, and he pointed! A month ago, he couldn’t even point at things he wanted. He would tug on my shirt and indicate a direction with his arm, but not a pointed finger! And then, he patiently waited while I finished my email (and without me holding him), whoa! If I didn’t know better, I would have thought I’d walked out of the doctor’s office with a different boy than the one I went in with – a much happier, alert, active, coordinated, confident one! These great improvements didn’t stick at 100%, and there was a little regression through the following week, but I’d say overall, he retained up to 65% of these for the week.

Friday, we got the remaining test results and treatment plan from the allergy specialist and DAN! (Defeat Autism Now!) doctor. In addition to his leaky gut and systemic yeast overgrowth, it confirmed what we knew with his gut bacteria – he has lots of bad bacteria, and not much good bacteria, has lots of inflammation (from allergies), and the big one – he has heavy metal toxicity.
That brings us to his treatment plan. We’ll work on fixing them in this order: Correct his GI issues (kill yeast/heal gut/absorb nutrition), treat allergies, detoxify (chelation). So, we came home with some supplements – probiotic, antifungal, cod liver oil, enzymes, and L-glutamine (an amino acid that heals the gut).

That’s where we start for this month – things are in progress!

A Long Road: Summary 3 months - 21 months

Wow, where do I start? The last year and a half has been the most difficult of my life. It all started when Jordan was just 3 weeks old. He started screaming for hours on end (all night), projectile vomiting, got a rash, had a little eczema, raspy breathing, anal fissures, and green poop.  I called the doctor and received no help. It took one week before we figured out I needed to stop eating dairy. (He was nursing). The day I took dairy out of my diet, he stopped screaming. Several days later I substituted soy milk, the screaming came back. So, I took out soy. This process continued for 8 months, by then I had to remove ALL dairy, soy (including soybean oil), all beans, peanuts, oats, and beef from my diet . Then, he stopped spitting up! By then his other symptoms had cleared as well. During this time we saw 3 different doctors, none of them were able to help at all. When he was 4 or 5 weeks old, I had begun asking the question, “What caused this?” Where did these allergies come from?  And, I started researching. I read everything I could about allergies and their causes.

  

When he was 10 or 11 months old, we started trying to feed him some foods directly. He reacted to everything except sweet potato, pears (later to discover it was causing his horrible constipation), and animal crackers.  Behavioral issues (or more subtle reactions) started coming out too: tantrumming – a lot; disturbed sleep, and  fussing and crying constantly unless he was held – I developed great biceps. :)  The doctors still couldn’t help. I was still researching and found some alternative medicine treatments that held some possibilities.

 Jordan turned 13 months old and we embarked on trying acupressure treatments called NAET and BioSET. He had 5 months of allergy treatment through an acupuncturist which has allowed him to eat fruits, vegetables, rice, beans, and some other things. And, it broke the cycle of him developing an allergy to everything he ate.  However, there is still a lot he cannot eat. He also has Autistic-like or PDD (Pervasive Developmental Disorder) symptoms of speech delay, behavioral, and physical issues. But, I was still researching.

  

He is now 21 months old. We have finally found a doctor who understands allergies, the underlying physiology and causes, how it relates to behavioral and developmental stuff, AND how to treat it!!! Wahoo!!! We can officially say that Jordan has a leaky gut (holes throughout his intestines); candida overgrowth (a fungal infection); toxins in his blood, and his immune system is messed up and operating incorrectly.  We are awaiting more tests to come back in January to see what shows up on those, but already know the treatment plan will take 3 years.  This doctor sent us to a cranial sacral specialist who also found that the bones in his head are overlapping, one side of his skull is more forward and larger than the other side.

Prayer. One huge answer/praise is that I’ve been chasing this problem and trying to figure it out for 20 months.  Every spare minute I’ve been researching and finally figured it out a couple of months ago, and found a doctor who can help him!!! So, praise, we have answers and I have help – that’s HUGE!!!

Prayer #1 – the treatment to be effective

Prayer #2 – the treatment program has strict dietary requirements (many of them we were already doing). I’m going to need energy, patience, endurance, etc. and that’s once I figure out how to cook differently and where to get ingredients we’ll need.  We are now gluten, casein, yeast, and egg free – among other things.

Prayer #3 – the down side to all this – these doc’s aren’t covered by our insurance. So that’s prayer #3 – paying for his treatment.

Thanks for caring, reading all this, and praying! I’d love to hear from you, Sarah