I went to Gallatin, and Howard quickly amazed us with his announcements of Aron’s symptoms without having asked me any questions about why we were there. He correctly identified every problem Aron has been showing us. His diagnosis was lactose intolerance. I brought home a few herbal supplements and have looked up some diet suggestions online. All in all I was happy with our visit. I realize that he could be wrong and I’m not opposed to a second opinion from a medical professional at all. What I will do for now though, is remove milk and excess bread from his diet and see how he does. I will gladly give him the vitamins and supplements we were recommended as well.
After our visit and as the day progressed yesterday I became more and more resistant to this diagnosis. Not because I believe Howard to be wrong, but because I don’t want Aron to walk through the rest of his life with this limitation. I don’t want him to be well because he’s restricted, I want him to be whole because he’s a child of God, living abundantly and under the provision of Christ’s sacrifice for us.
I wrote the following in my journal this morning:
“Yesterday we were told that Aron is lactose intolerant. I found myself bowing to those words. Preparing and reading the words of sickness, warning and medication. By nightfall I was reminded that our home is not under any name, save Jesus. His name is above every name. I was determined and continue to be determined that His name will be lifted up in this house and no other name shall have His place. We will not worship the idols of any condition or remedy, but we will delight in the purity of Christ in us the only hope of Glory. We will rejoice, for we know that He has borne our infirmities, and as foreign as it would be to tolerate sin in our home, so it shall be with illness and disease. We will conform to the Word of Christ, allowing His plans and purposes to dwell in us richly, believing that there is no room for sickness if His truth is rooted, established and flourishing within us.”
So we are at this. I am not ignorant of the fact that all of us could use a change in our diet and that the things he shouldn’t have aren’t exactly good for any of us. I am not opposed to making changes. I am simply opposed to a life sentence of nothing fun in his diet. Limiting ourselves out of fear that Aron will get a tummy ache. That’s not a life abundant if you ask me. We will make changes, but I am motivated to make changes that will grow us, not changes that will inhibit us.
I’m sorry about Aron. As someone with food issues I understand being frustrated. And I’m sure if it was one of my girls I’d be unwilling to accept it as well.
I have many more thoughts but we can talk about that later. Saturday?
When I went through all of my testing, I was told that some food intolerances can change – especially in children. For me, I had trouble with dairy for a while, but when I eliminated other foods I was “allergic” to, my system healed nicely and I can consume dairy without a problem now.
Ya know…that makes sense to me. He does have a lot of allergy issues so maybe working on that as well as leaving the milk out for a time will help out. We finally had a full night of sleep last night with no tummy aches. That was nice.
So glad he could identify the problem – that’s so amazing that he could do that from looking at his feet! Cheese is hard to do without so I hope that by leaving dairy and bread off for awhile, he can tolerate a little of it. Check out pro-biotics, they might help him.
He has been fine with cheese so far. I have pretty much just left off actual milk and a lot less wheat, and that has seemed to help. Gluten is apparently difficult for lactose intolerant tummies also. I am taking it one day at a time with what I have. I haven’t been to the grocery store since seeing Howard, so I will be purchasing some alternatives for him when I do. I am sort of seeing this as an opportunity for all of us to change a few habits.