Bryce's Latest Doctor Visits.

*warning*-Life is not sunshine and roses and neither is this blog entry.

Bryce has had diarrhea since birth. It is hugely abnormal and has been difficult to diagnose. When he was a nursing baby, "loose stool" is attributed to nursing, as breastmilk has a slight laxative effect on babies. Then he had worse diarrhea with the c.diff last year--prior to the c.diff diagnosis, this diarrhea was written off as "Toddler Diarrhea" and attributed to him not chewing his pureed foods thoroughly enough. (insert sarcasm here--not "chewing" pureed foods? Seriously?)

During the course of the c.diff testing, something called "reducing substances" were found in his stool. This was ignored due to the greater problem of c.diff. The c.diff was treated, defeated, but the chronic diarrhea remained.

At his 2 year well child visit, the chronic diarrhea was chalked up to "Toddler Diarrhea" again-against my better judgement. I asked for more stool tests to be run. I was promised that at 30 mos, if it was still a problem, they order more tests.

At 27mos, the pediatric GI tells me that I should let Bryce starve so he would learn to eat table food instead of purees. That was why he had diarrhea-the pureed food. I was also told to stop giving him his bottles of soy. The Dr told me he had plenty in reserve and was just manipulating us. Needless to say, we did neither.

30 month well child visit, the pediatrican orders the promised stool tests. They come back positive for reducing substances-again. He has gained weight and grown and is pretty happy. Pediatrician orders a trip to the Pedi GI.

31mos-visit to the Pediatric GI. Diarrhea continues.He has lost 2lbs 3 oz since his 30 month well-child visit. Another (different) stool test is ordered, and I sign consent forms for another endoscopy. Dr is concerned about the weight loss, his gagging, and the overall problem of diarrhea. Dr suspects EE again, even though his last endoscopy (jan 2009) was clean.

Yesterday was the bi-annual visit to the Pediatric Allergist--Allergist reports that he has read the notes from the GI doc and is in agreement. He is very concerned about Bryce's weight and instructs me to increase his bottles back up to 24 oz and to schedule them into his day. All of his known allergens have increased in number (meaning they are potentially growing "stronger" or "more allergic") but his dairy numbers have decreased enough that we can talk about retesting it at age 3 and maybe food challenging him at age 4. His egg is the highest level he's ever seen.

What does all of this mean? I don't know. We have to get this final stool sample run (looking for pancreatic amylase) and the Pedi GI assumes it will come back negative and then we'll scope. The GI doctor is also thinking that while Bryce has had diarrhea all of his life, it might currently be caused by EE and not anything else. The EE diagnosis is particularly devastating as the treatment includes removal of all foods from his diet, drinking an elemental formula, then slowly adding in foods over the course of years. We're thankful we have U of M Mott Children's Hospital in our backyard and we'll just keep on raising Bryce as though he were no different from the other two. That's really all we are capable of at this point.