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ORIGINAL EMAIL QUESTION:
Our 12-year old daughter has missed enough school over the years due to
health-related problems that she has real gaps in her education.  She
was diagnosed with celiac last April, and still is not 100%.  Most
recently, in October, she was diagnosed with acid reflux as well, and
has taken Nexium (40  mg) for two months.  Since her symptoms and
diagnosis with reflux, she has missed so much school that we have
decided to homeschool her or seek homebound schooling to fill in her
educational gaps and keep her current.  I was concerned that we
couldn't qualify for homebound schooling because the most recent doctor
we saw in her pediatric group dismissed symptoms including acute
stomach and head pain, insomnia, dizziness, inability to regain lost
weight,  and said she was just depressed.  I didn't think that we could
get the letter we would need in order to qualify for homebound
schooling.   I wanted feedback on whether anyone had experienced this
type of roadblock to their child's education and what we might do.

UPDATE
Since then, we found a wonderful nurse practitioner at our daughter's
pediatric group who said she would get us any letters or forms that we
needed for homebound education.  However, we may not need any letters
or forms because, instead of homebound education, our daughter's school
wants us to pursue an arrangement where they would modify her IEP (her
education plan for her learning disabilities) to allow for her to stay
home and learn - they would provide her with online curriculum and
assessments.  We are considering this arrangement since it would
provide us with additional resources to teach our child.  However, she
gets headaches from looking at a computer screen for any length of
time, so it is possible that we will simply homeschool and sever our
connection with the school.  We will decide next week.  Our daughter
recently halved her dosage of Nexium and doing OK with it -- also she
is seeing a Naturopath who is providing her with supplements to help
her to heal and get off the Nexium.   She seems to be doing better on
the lower dosage of Nexium and has had a couple of pretty good days
recently (a pleasant change!).

SUMMARY OF COMMENTS RECEIVED
Several respondents expressed concern about the Nexium - that it wasn't
gluten free (I doublechecked and it is according to their website),
that it can cause headaches, hurt digestion, and Nexium or drugs like
it have caused severe health problems for several listmates.

Many respondents said that we need to find a new pediatrician (we are
looking!).  Several empathized with our experience with the
pediatrician and had their own stories of frustration in dealing with
the medical profession.

Most seemed to feel that there must be some other problem going on to
cause her ongoing health problems - some areas that were suggested were
exposure to hidden gluten, gallbladder, food allergies, environmental
allergies, and food intolerances.  We had thought that perhaps her
symptoms were part of the recovery process -- but based on the comments
I received, we no longer believe this is the case and will pursue
further diagnosis.  A couple of people said not to disregard the
possibility that our daughter is depressed.

Among those who responded to the homebound schooling portion of my post
- only one person had pursued homebound schooling for her daughter
while she was recovering from celiac.  The school district put up a
fight because celiac doesn't neatly fit into their concept of a
condition for homebound education, but our listmate persevered and was
victorious eventually.  Others said that homeschooling is preferable to
homebound education, and several indicated they had or were currently
homeschooling their children.

Thanks to all the kind and caring people who emailed their thoughts
about our daughter's health, homebound schooling and homeschooling.  I
appreciate your support, your ideas, your advice, and loved hearing
your inspiring stories and your hard-earned experience.

You are terrific!

Jackie in AZ

* Please provide references to back up claims of a product being GF or not GF *