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     In my earlier post I did say that the subject of
Enterolab was a controversial one in the celiac
community. A ton of replies confirmed it!

     Some went as far as implying that I may be a
sinister mouthpiece for opponents of Enterolab.

     So, I felt I had to set the record straight. The
post is a little long but only as long as it NEEDS to
be. So here is our story:

------------------------------

    I didn't know I had celiac. I found out after two
years of taking my two year old son to GPs and GI
specialists to find out why even though he ate
anything and everything we put in front of him, he had
a bloated belly like a starving child from Africa and
had not gained an inch or a pound from the age of 2 to
the age of 4! The GI specialist said it was
constipation and had us pumping him with laxatives! He
finally developed rectal prolapse from straining so
hard during his bowel movements. Rectal prolapse being
a rare symptom for celiac, the GI specialist wanted
him tested for cystic fibrosis, a fatal disease for
which rectal prolapse is more common.

I wigged out !

I told my wife: " I am not ready to bury my son!"

I took matters into my own hands!

     We let the GI test him for cystic fibrosis (
sweat test ) but I went on the web and using rectal
prolapse as the search item I looked for a more
pallatable diagnosis. One of the links took me to a
page that described celiac disease. I read down the
list of symptoms with tears rolling down my cheeks
because I had each and every one and I am Greek (
Mediteranean ) to boot!

     The CF test was negative and we spent the next
3-4 weeks trying to convince the GI specialist to test
for celiac. She finally did, probably just to shut us
up. And guess what! The test was positive and she
wanted a confirming biopsy. Our son was just 4 at the
time, hated needles, so I was in the examining room
with four other people holding him still so they could
hook up the IV for anesthesia! Then I held his hand
while the anesthetic was administered and felt him and
saw him go dead-limp. I'll never forget it!

     My son's biopsy confirmed the celiac disease. He
went GF, his bloated belly went away and he's been
growing like a weed ever since! A month later I had my
blood test. It came back negative. But I KNEW I HAD
CELIAC! I went GF and ALL my symptoms disapeared in
less than a week!

AND I STILL SAY: " IF YOU HAVE A MEDICAL PROTOCOL YOU
ARE CONFIDENT OF, SUBMIT IT FOR PROPER PEER REVIEW AND
INDEPENDENT VERIFICATION OF THE RESULTS. WITHOUT THAT
WE WIND UP TAKING LAETRIL TO CURE CANCER AND HAVING
MEN IN AFRICA HAVE SEX WITH VIRGIN GIRLS TO CURE AIDS!

     I ache for Enterolab to be right so that no other
parent has to go through what we went through! But as
bad as that was, it would be worse to have a false
negative from an unproven test and suffer the ravages
of gluten, or a false positive that puts a school age
child on a GF diet forcing him to cart his own cake to
every b-day party he is invited to and bring his own
pizza to school on 'pizza day'!

     And what hurts the most is having to recount and
re-live the pain of those two years just to convince
people to demand 21st century medicine rather than
settle for folksy-wisdom-simple,
it-worked-for-my-neighbor diagnoses de-jure!


Regards ...




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* Visit the Celiac Web Page at www.enabling.org/ia/celiac/index.html *