Allergies....

Life at our house changes all the time. I mean when your family is in the ministry life is always changing. But our sweet youngest daughter has had a rough go of it lately.  Over the course of a few years Olivia has experienced some digestive issues. We have had her belly x-rayed and checked out. They encouraged us to use Benfiber and Miralax to help control the problem. It seemed to work for awhile. However, recently her belly pain became intense and almost nonstop. Her appetite had diminished (which if you know Olivia she loves to eat) almost like she knew if she ate it would hurt. Something had to change and quick.

Our pediatricians (which let me brag on them for a minute), are GREAT!!!! Greg and Abby Blackmon have a heart for children like no other. They really listen and will try what a parent asks.  So when we saw Dr. Greg the first time, we tried it his way. When we saw him the second time we did another x-ray. And when we had to go back the third time he started looking for the needle in the hay stack. He sent her for an ultrasound of her gallbladder (uncommon at this age but not unheard of), the ultrasound was negative and looked great. He also had 7 viles of blood drawn and had a RAST (http://www.foodallergy.org/diagnosis-and-testing/blood-tests) test run on them. We were looking for food allergies or anything that could be causing these problems. When her RAST test came back she is allergic to milk, eggs, peanuts and wheat. Holy moly.....all the things my child loves! My girl drinks at least 24 oz. of milk a day. She loves it. She loves cheese, sour cream and most anything dairy. Allergies to one I can handle, no problem, even allergies to 2 but milk, eggs and wheat! What am I supposed to feed this child?

We are a week past the news of these new allergies and since we have removed the allergens from her diet....no more belly pain. We have found a few things that we can get "premade" at the store for quick meals but those are not good long term options and most of those do not exclude all the major culprits she can't have. If we find a gluten free item a lot of time it has milk or egg. (Keep in mind a gluten allergy is different from a wheat allergy (gluten vs wheat) but to get wheat free you have to buy gluten free.) Reading labels is so much more important now and educating myself on all the different names that all 4 allergens can be listed under is mind boggling. www.foodallergy.org has been very educational. We will get a better idea of the depth of her allergies when we see the GI doctor at the end of the month. Apparently he will go over how sensitive she is to each item. That will make meal planning and preparation much easier. 

So if you have any recipes that are free of all those allergens send them to me, please. Breakfast is our meal to find something she can or likes to eat. So I am on a mission.

We just want this little girl smiling again. I'll update as we go.