As I wrote yesterday, we are working under a new theory, which is that even 1/2 tsp. of sauerkraut juice was way too much for Ellie. So today I literally started dosing out sauerkraut juice with a dropper. It's kind of ridiculous. BUT! It also worked.
This morning I went to drop the kraut juice in Ellie soup and she refused to eat anymore soup! So that told me she too has made the connection that the juice is making her sick. So at lunch I had to be sneaky about it and got two drops on a spoonful without her looking and which she happily ate. At dinner I was really bold and put three drops on her food. Results? Her face rash (which I'm pretty sure is due to excessive detox) has completely cleared, she took a longer nap than usual and woke up from that nap crying, but not hysterical. Hey, I'll take progress in whatever form it wants to come in. Then tonight at bedtime she went down without a fuss. Over the past week she's been crying for at least 30 minutes each night at bedtime and tonight she did great.
Last night Ian and I stayed up late into the night talking about GAPS and the challenges we've had over the past two weeks. It was sort of a "come to Jesus" meeting - to use my mother's phrase. Meaning, OK let's put all the cards on the table and honestly evaluate whether this is working. Are we going to continue with this? Should we quit? Should we just jump into some Ellie-modified version of full GAPS? That would be a pretty pathetic version of full GAPS since she can't tolerate egg whites (yet), any form of dairy, legumes, fruit, honey, nuts ...
Two things we agreed on after last night's conversation: we should start dosing the kraut juice with a dropper and that we should try to increase the solid/liquid ratio of Ellie's food. She has always suffered from terrible reflux and one thing that aggravates reflux is too much liquid in the tummy. So today her lunch soup was more of a puree than a liquid-y soup and tonight for dinner I jumped ahead to a stage 3 preparation method and made pork roast with roasted veggies.
One of the best things that came out of our conversation was that Ian told me he is really, really concerned about Ellie and feels very frustrated that we're not able to discuss our concerns with a doctor. I thought this was totally valid, but pointed out that our pediatrician is not going to be able to fulfill that role. Our ped is actually fairly supportive of all of this - or at least happy that Ellie is growing at a healthy clip now. But she is not familiar with gut health or gut dybiosis at all and had never heard of SCD or GAPS. So we will likely start the search for a naturopath who can - if nothing else - ease Ian's mind about our little girl.
Going on GAPS Intro has brought up a lot of emotion in both Ian and I. This is a very intense experience. My health counselor used the term "healing crisis" the other day and I really liked that phrase. Ellie and I are healing and detoxifying but on the surface it just feels like we're sicker than we were before. I know I've felt worse during some parts of GAPS Intro than I have in recent past. And Ellie has definitely had worse symptoms. It's been hard to tell how to manage the detox process so she's comfortable - I think Operation Kraut Drop will help with that. The trick will be remembering that "this too shall pass" and we will come out on the other end of Intro healthier than ever. (Right?)
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