Thursday, December 17, 2009

Parenting is tough business


This is me lately. A few months ago we put my 7 year old on a gluten free diet because he was generally out of sorts and having gas that would clear a room. I mean it was BAD. We had to make no farting at the dinner table rules. I would have written it off as a 7 year old boy thing, but he came home excited that he had only had to fart once during school one day. So, we went gluten free with him.
He was not happy. This was also an expensive endeavor because I was buying all the fancy gluten free food to try and make it easier on him. In the end he didn't like many of those things anyway.
After 2 weeks his gas was much better, so we did the check and gave him gluten again to see if that changed things. It didn't - right away. It was so much easier to let him eat school lunches and all the yummy things he liked. We were able to deny the antsy, agitated behavior as holidays. When the gas came back I was starting to see. Then last night the following conversation went on at bedtime:
Eli: Excuse me
Me: Oh my gosh - what in the world did you eat child?
Eli: Nothing, I didn't even have Doritos. (Doritos really send his intestines into a spiral)
Me: Does your stomach hurt?
Eli: My stomach huts a lot mom.
Me: (all in my head) bad mom, bad mom, bad mom for being lazy about putting him on a gluten free diet again. Crap.
So, head out of the sand, Eli is going gluten free again. This time I am going to try cooking things myself instead of relying on pre-made things. Good thing Eli wants to be a chef when he grows up!

4 comments:

Megan L. Killian said...

Have you thought about having him tested again before you put him on the gfree diet?
You're not a bad mom!!!!

Kati said...

We are trying to avoid testing if possible. My insurance went up and I won't even get started about life insurance one I had a dx of celiac. If it's all possible to work it out through diet we'd much rather go that route.

Unknown said...

You are not a bad mom!!! It's so hard to know when to do what for our kids...too bad they don't come with manuals!!

Nutrie_1 said...

A gluten free diet can be very hard to follow, especially for kids! Thank goodness there are more gluten free products out these days. Here's a recipe for gluten free cookies, give them a try! They're healthy and taste great, my kids love them.

http://www.allergysense.com/blog/2009/12/13/gluten-free-sugar-cookies-2/

You might also want to check out these other links related to kids with gluten allergies.

http://www.allergysense.com/blog/2009/11/06/raise-celiac-awareness-with-a-2010-calendar/

http://www.allergysense.com/blog/2009/10/28/allergy-friendly-pumpkin-chocolate-chip-cookies/

http://www.allergysense.com/blog/2009/10/27/gluten-free-pancakes/

these are just a few recipes.
enjoy and take care!

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