I know every parent deals with their kids “thing”. For some it’s kids who won’t sleep, or always wake up at 5am, or one who constantly have some sickness, picky eaters, screamers and criers. And while I’m sure there are a few seemingly “perfect” kids out there, most parents will agree that their kid has some “thing”.

And my kid definitely has a thing too. It’s start with an A and ends with LLERGIES. Honestly, he’s pretty great, he’s pretty much always slept great, eaten great, napped fairly well, loves to play by himself, follows directions, doesn’t usually cause a rucus, loves his “mama” and “dada”. But man alive, do we have allergies.

Anyone that knows me, knows Keaton is allergic to a lot of food items, he’s also highly allergic to dogs, and anything fragranced or made of chemicals. By nature I am a researcher, so I have really been on top of this from the beginning, but sometimes it feels overwhelming today is one of those days.

We have been undergoing NAET treatments for about a month now. I don’t want to get to into it, but it’s a natural allergy elimination technique using accupressure. It has been highly successful for a lot of people, but of course nothing is full proof.

At the source of Keaton’s allergies we believe are 3 things. One, genetics (while neither Jake or I directly have food or any allergies) we do have milk allergy in our families. Two, Keaton (though treated with penicillin while laboring contracted a form of GroupB Strep at birth). See my birth story for the details. This lead to him being in the NICU for 11 days, and undergoing serious rounds of antibiotics that of course would majorly mess with his gut flora. Gut health is the source of most immune disorders (eczema, asthma, and the list goes on). And three, vaccinations- Keaton was showing extremely sensitive skin from birth, and was showing some mild signs of eczema. If your baby has eczema delay vaccinations til your kids are much older and their immune system can handle them! Keaton had his 2 month vaccination and his eczema got MUCH worse immediately after. I of course didn’t recognize any correlation. The doctor prescribed cortisone, and when I said I didn’t want to band-aid it, but instead try to find the trigger he looked at me like I was crazy. The week of his 4 month vaccination, he literally started breaking out in splotches and rashes all over his body after every time he nursed.

This was at 3 months, and then just a few weeks later at 4 months this came out of nowhere. Insane.

(The day this happened was the day I eliminated dairy). 🙁

The trifecta had finally occurred those preexisting chances that he might have dairy or some allergy, combined with extremely poor gut health from all the antibiotics despite being breastfed, couldn’t take it anymore. When we did that second round of vax, his immune system couldn’t handle anymore. Literally overnight he showed insane food allergies. By 5 months (in just several weeks) I had identified eggs, dairy, wheat, chocolate, nuts, strawberries, coffee, and several other foods as triggers and eliminated them from my diet. After I eliminated these foods from my diet, the splotches, cracked skin, and eczema almost completely cleared up.

Those were the foods I had to eat to see a reaction, but his own personal list is much longer (tomatoes, oranges, broccoli, pineapple, all berries, nuts, seeds, anything processed and the list goes on, and on).

We are currently undergoing NAET treatments like I mentioned, and that’s a post for another day, but I’ve simultaneously started reading the Gut and Psychology Syndrome book. And I must say it is so good. I have pieced together hundreds of articles via the internet and blogs and if someone had just given me this book last year, I wouldn’t have had too, because seriously it’s all in one book. It is so interesting, and has some really crazy things to say about gut health and our modern diet. I think probably like 50% of people in the United States could do the diet and their lives would be changed. For the better, because alot of people are so unhealthy it’s insane.

The GAPS book, diet, and even alot of similar schools of thought like “paleo” have really changed the way that I look at our diet.
– There is so much information that meat, good fat, and vegetables are the way to go. We are definitely not there yet, but if it can help Keaton, we’re on our way.

The GAPS book has one thought that immediately when I read about it, I knew I wanted to blog about, so expect that soon.
For now the journey continues, but God it can end any day and we’ll be OK with that.
🙂