tried this diet and struggling - need help/advice

November 5, 2006

Hi,

My son has been on the GFCF diet for about a year and has done well,

but I really want to do the SCD diet as he is a leaky gut kid and we

always have yeast issues. I tried it for a short while a few months

ago and my son would only eat at the point of complete starvation.

Even then, he would only take a few bites here and there. He got so

scrawny in the 2 weeks that I tried this diet that my hubby and I

got in an enormous fight over the whole thing. To top that off, when

I got his IgG test back recently, it showed that he was severely

reactive to most nuts and highly reactive to eggs and pumpkins (I

assume this means he will react to squash and zucchini as well). He

has always had issues with dairy so it was no surprise that he was

reactive to casein as well. Unless my son is starved to the point of

fainting he will not eat meat or veggies - the only way is if they

are pureed and mixed into a sauce which is poured over rice or

pasta. Is pureeing the only way to go? And what would I pour it

over? I want to get my son on the SCD diet, but am discouraged. I'm

sure I'm not the only person who has been through this so how did

you all do it?

November 6, 2006

Hi ,

First thing I want to say is that kids with leaky guts will often have test

results that show sensitivities to MANY foods. Probably the most important

thing is to heal that leaky gut.... then many of those sensitivities could

disappear. That has been the experience of quite a few families here.

If your son has any obvious reaction...... and especially anything that even

faintly resembles anaphylaxis..... you do not have to feed him that food, even

if it's an SCD legal food. If, however, it's a " sensitivity " that shows up only

in tests, you might decide.... as some other parents here have.... to go ahead

and use that food, but stick strictly to SCD in an effort to heal the gut, once

and for all. That is up to you.

It sound like one of your major hurdles is that you really need to have your

husband fully on board..... and in support of doing this diet. If he's not, you

are setting yourself up for failure. Here's a paper you may want to print out

for him to read:

http://www.geocities.com/momtobandj/SCD-autism-summary.html

It's basically a synopsis of SCD as used for kids with autism, written by Jody

Goddard.

There are different ways you can approach beginning SCD.... and believe me,

there are a number of kids we've seen here that are stubborn, picky eaters who

" refuse " to eat any of the SCD foods at first..... demanding only their carb of

choice (pasta, rice, potatoes, etc.). This is VERY common. Their parents come

here convinced that they will NEVER be able to get their child to eat only SCD

foods.

You have to realise that, in part, it's the bad guys in his gut that are

basically ADDICTED to those foods. The starchy carbs are what they need to

survive... what they CRAVE.... and they will literally drive a kid crazy to get

them to go in search of those foods that will help them continue living (and

wrecking the gut of the " host " .... YOUR CHILD).

These food addictions WILL go away..... if you're strict..... and he will begin

to eat food you never thought he would. But, it is difficult at first.

For some families, the best approach is to " ease in " to SCD..... if the intro

diet period, and going " cold turkey " , would be too traumatic and difficult. You

simply experiment with replacing *some* of his favorite foods with SCD

recipes..... until you have a number of mainstays that you know he WILL eat

regularly. There are some great ideas of picky eaters on the website,

www.pecanbread.com .... and some good kid-friendly recipes. Some of them cater

especially to those carb addictions.

Once you've finally made the complete transition over to all legal foods, you

can always go back and do the two days of intro diet, to get a jump start on

further healing. Just remember, true gut healing can't happen unless you have

complete compliance..... with all legal foods.

And do keep in mind that a leaky gut won't heal on it's own.... but will likely

get worse. And there is really no other method or diet or medication that can do

this healing work better than SCD.

Go read up at the website.... under the " Overcoming Difficulties " section... and

the " Food Preparation " section.

If he would be one of those kids that would drink smoothies/milkshakes..... then

I do have some ideas for sneaking all kinds of good legal foods into those. Just

let me know.

Patti