Larry's test

We had a frustrating day on Wednesday. Larry's scope went fine. The doctor came to talk to us before we left and with a big smile told us that his blood test had been negative so it looked like good news but she biopsied to be sure we weren't missing anything. We will get those results at his appointment on January 7th. She also mentioned that she saw evidence of acid reflux and we told her that heartburn was a very new symptom for him that had just popped up recently. I told her that we, of course, don't want him to have Celiac but at the same time we were disappointed to not have any answers. She told us that all of his symptoms are anxiety related and basically said he needed to live with it and move on with life. HUH? I couldn't believe that she in no way wanted to consider anything else and just wanted Larry to live with it. If he could live with it do you think we would have gone through all of this?!

She said he probably had IBS. I told her that he had already been diagnosed with that and been medicated for it and it didn't work. She said medications don't always work. OOOOK...... So then I asked how she would explain Evan's symptoms. I told her they were clearly food related. I could give him certain foods and expect a reaction in 12-24 hours. She said our foods are highly processed and we need to start cooking from scratch and buying organics. (Insert shocked look on my face that says "come back to the real world where time and money aren't exactly in abundance"). I then explained that one of the items that bothers Evan is an Organic pasta sauce. She then replied that we still can't know what is in it.

It was at that point that I realized that she in no way wanted to help us find answers so we said "Thank you very much" and got out of there. So what does all of this mean? Well, first we want to wait for the biopsy and see if anything comes back. To assume that Larry's symptoms are anxiety related is not completely out of the realm of possibility. There is no doubt that he has been under a great deal of stress in the last couple of years. At the same time we have not in any way eliminated all possibilities including food allergies so I will not accept "live with it and get on with life" as an answer at this point. After we get the biopsy results Larry and Evan will both be going back to our primary doctor who specializes in allergies and we will be asking what the next step is. I assume he will test them both for food allergies.

In the mean time I'm also not completely ignoring her comment about over processed foods. One of the foods that is clearly an irritant for Evan are frozen biscuits. I plan on making some from scratch this weekend to see if he still has a reaction. Also, about 5 months ago the Lord blessed us with a wonderful brand new bread maker so I am going to start making many of our breads from scratch to see if that possibly helps. If not, it sure can't hurt and it really isn't that time consuming to throw the ingredients in the machine and hit START.

So her comments weren't completely lost on us but the delivery of them and the lack of care for the seriousness of the symptoms was bothersome to me. In the end we are not a whole lot closer to having an answer. Frustrating.