New here, please help with elimination diet

[Guest Tina H]

Being new, I'd first like to start with how much I adore this forum...I have been reading the posts for weeks and trying to learn as much as I can to help my son. Many physicians have recommended natural remedies but I've never attempted to understand the chemistry behind it before now.

 

My 8 year-old son began an elimination diet (wheat, dairy, all additives and colors, corn, tomatoes, citrus and most sugar) 2 weeks ago. This was recommended by our naturopath as she suspected his anxiety, emotional outbursts, OCD, and tics sounded like a food sensitivity- at the time we went to see her, tics were mild and not the #1 concern.

 

She also recommended we try Gaba Calm for the anxiety/mood instability. After taking the Gaba Calm he had severe full body tics for a few hours, something we had never seen before. Thankfully the Gaba Calm leaves the system quickly and the full body jerking stopped. However, he has now added this skip/hop which has been waxing over the past few weeks. And it is particularly troublesome bc he is a hockey player and it is interfering with his skating.

 

Back to the elimination diet...over the past 2 weeks on the diet we have noticed an improvement in his mood stability but nothing with his tics. They had not increased or decreased. Today we started a trial of adding back dairy, so far mood is fine. But tics are much, much worse. We are now supposed to wait 3 days, assess effects of dairy and then add back another item.

 

To make matters worse he has been on 2 weeks of antibiotics for an ear infection that will not clear up, started with amoxicillan then got prescribed Augmentin 1 wk later when he was still having pain. He was also negative for Strep. I should also mention he regularly takes Cod Liver and Probiotics.

 

After his negative response to the Gaba Calm, the naturopath ordered a urine test of his neurotransmitters. (Results are not back yet.)

 

I'm not even sure what to do next, we've put so much work into the elimination diet - some part of it must be right (bc of the mood part) but why are the tics so bad again???

I've kept notes of what seems to work for others...Magnesium, B-Vitamins, Enzymes, Taurine and wonder should I explore these with the naturopath now or just be patient and finish the elimination diet. If mood improves but tic worsen could that possibly be a good thing?!

Thanks in advance for any ideas or advice!

Tina H

[faith]

hello Tina,

I would think you need to be on an elimination diet for at least a month. then you can see if things improve further, I really don't think two weeks is enough. Then when you re-introduce foods, you will be able to see if it has any adverse effect. it may not. but if you are already introducing dairy today and you think he is reacting, then what did she say to do? I would not give dairy after today and continue with elimination for another two weeks. tics may take a longer while. Also, some things may not have any adverse effect right away, it may just be when they get "too much" of it. that's the way it is for my son. so rotation will be important too.

 

If you are anxious, I'm sure giving some magnesium without the naturopaths say so should be okay. but the thing is that you want to know what is the thing that is helping and what is not, so using supps right now may skew what you're trying to find out about the food sensitivities. good luck, try to stick with it, I know its hard, mostly the waiting.

 

Faith

[laurena82]

Tina,

 

My experience with elimination diets has been that when you add the one food back, (you need to eat it at more than one meal) you see the results very shortly after the second meal of it, up to the next day or later. And....the symptoms you get are what it normally causese...only MUCH more dramatically.

 

????I'm wondering if the gaba calm has any of the things you'd been eliminating in it? You'd hope not, but it is very common to use corn starch as an agent in tablets, or maybe something else you had been avoiding....and it's this "inert" ingredient that might have been causing the increased ticcing?

 

Anyhow....if you do have the symptoms with dairy, I"d think you eliminate that again...for at least three days.....then try adding a different one.

 

Corn was a huge one for us. And it is in EVERYTHING....often unrecognized (e.g. many things say "food starch"....but that's corn.)

 

I would think you could call your doctor for better clarification on how to proceed as well....

 

BEST WISHES!!

[Guest Tina H]

Thanks very much for your replies.

Funny thing, after the second meal of dairy...he started complaining of a headache and stomache pains. We went back to the strict elimination diet today and I think we'll stay on it until I get a call back from the naturopath. I also decided to make an allergist appt. for testing today. One step at a time, thanks for the encouragement. Patience is hard.

 

Thanks again,

Tina