[Karas mom]

Hi,
This is my first time to post and I hope this works.
I'm looking for some emotional support regarding my daughter's endoscopy and colonoscopy in the next few days.
My daughter is 8 years old. She has dental enamal defects on her permanent front teeth (discoloration and mottling) and her 6 year molars are also defective and are chipping away. She was not ill in the first year of her life, I never took any medications during pregnancy, and I have never taken Tetracycline. She has had intestinal problems off and on for years (cramping, gas, loose stools). Her celiac panel was negatine except that her total IgA was 31 (normal 33-236) and her IgG was 80 (normal 0-15). Her iron/plasma was 45 (normal 50-120) with MCV and MCH also lower than normal. Her absolute eosinophil count was .24 (normal .01-.19) She had a barium study which did not indicate any IBS. She has sleep problems and very obvious mood swings with irritablity. She seems to have a lactose intollerance.
Any feedback before the endoscopy/colonoscopy? I am fearful that her Peds GI will not see any Villi damage and therefore discount all of the other indications/problems that we are having. Any suggestions?

[luvthelake21]

Hi Karas mom and welcome to this forum you will great info and support on this site. My daughter was 10 when we found out she has Celiac. She is now 13. She had a Endoscopy and it was probley worse on her father and I than on her. The worse problem was when they had took her back for the procedure they left her gown open in the front some, and she was so embarrased that we ended up finding a new doctor after some time. Her stomache hurt when we came home from the procedure because I beleive they put air in your stomache to do the test. I wish we would had been warned before we went home. Gave her some pain med and she finally went to sleep. Just get all the info you can up front and everything should be fine. Good luck to her.

[ravenwoodglass]

She will be fine. The hard part will be the prep the day before the colonoscopy. Make sure you have lots of stuff that she can read or coloring books etc in the bathroom as she will spend much of the day before there. The prep can give a bit of cramping when it first works but usually it is not a painful experience. The tests themselves will be easy as she will be asleep for them and they usually don't take very long. You can start her on a trial of the gluten-free diet as soon as she has the endo done. Her response to the diet may give you the answer before you even go back for the test results. Her positive blood work strongly indicates that she needs to be on the diet, IMHO so do give the diet a good strict try no matter what the test results from the endo are.

[nmlove]

Hi Karas Mom, I can't help you with the colonoscopy but my four year old son just had an endoscopy. He did great and everything went really, really fast. He didn't seem too nervous until we had to leave him but the doctors and nurses said he did great and hopped up right on the bed in the procedure room. The GI doc was out in about ten minutes (maybe even sooner) with the news that he saw damage and took four biopsies. All of which came back positive just this week. His recovery was super too. No sore throat, no upset stomach, nothing other than being groggy on waking and a little cranky - probably from not eating! He was himself 100% within a few hours. Good luck, I'm sure it'll go fine!

[Karas mom]

luvthelake21, on Nov 1 2009, 12:55 AM, said:

Hi Karas mom and welcome to this forum you will great info and support on this site. My daughter was 10 when we found out she has Celiac. She is now 13. She had a Endoscopy and it was probley worse on her father and I than on her. The worse problem was when they had took her back for the procedure they left her gown open in the front some, and she was so embarrased that we ended up finding a new doctor after some time. Her stomache hurt when we came home from the procedure because I beleive they put air in your stomache to do the test. I wish we would had been warned before we went home. Gave her some pain med and she finally went to sleep. Just get all the info you can up front and everything should be fine. Good luck to her.

Thanks so much for replying. Your daughter sounds just like mine. She would have been mortified with the gown incident. How difficult for a young girl. Thanks for the reminder that we need to be proactive and ask specific questions. I can't wait till this is over and we can move on to helping her!
Thank you!

[Karas mom]

nmlove, on Nov 1 2009, 09:21 AM, said:

Hi Karas Mom, I can't help you with the colonoscopy but my four year old son just had an endoscopy. He did great and everything went really, really fast. He didn't seem too nervous until we had to leave him but the doctors and nurses said he did great and hopped up right on the bed in the procedure room. The GI doc was out in about ten minutes (maybe even sooner) with the news that he saw damage and took four biopsies. All of which came back positive just this week. His recovery was super too. No sore throat, no upset stomach, nothing other than being groggy on waking and a little cranky - probably from not eating! He was himself 100% within a few hours. Good luck, I'm sure it'll go fine!

Thank you for the reassurance. I had been wondering about the sore throat. We have a 2 hour drive back home from the hospital, so I imagine she will sleep it off. Thanks for the support!

[Karas mom]

ravenwoodglass, on Nov 1 2009, 07:17 AM, said:

She will be fine. The hard part will be the prep the day before the colonoscopy. Make sure you have lots of stuff that she can read or coloring books etc in the bathroom as she will spend much of the day before there. The prep can give a bit of cramping when it first works but usually it is not a painful experience. The tests themselves will be easy as she will be asleep for them and they usually don't take very long. You can start her on a trial of the gluten-free diet as soon as she has the endo done. Her response to the diet may give you the answer before you even go back for the test results. Her positive blood work strongly indicates that she needs to be on the diet, IMHO so do give the diet a good strict try no matter what the test results from the endo are.

Thanks for the support. She is actually doing a 4 day prep which has been a bit gentler, but I expect tomorrow will be spent in the bathroom, as you said. Do you feel that just the IgG being positive would indicate the diet? That's kind of my plan, regarless of what they find. Do you think a child being officially diagnosed is less frequent because the villi take longer to become damaged as compared with an adult who has suffered many years? It's hard to only rely on the tests when your "gut" (no pun intended) is telling you what is liikely best for your child. Thanks for the support. I'm looking forward to it being over so we can move on and help her to feel better.

[mamaw]

as everyone said all will be fine & you will do the suffering not the child! Parents do the suffering & worry its all natural.
Our kid was 2 1/2 & did both as well...... just pray & it will all be okay. God is great.
blessings

sande

[Karas mom]

mamaw, on Nov 1 2009, 07:46 PM, said:

as everyone said all will be fine & you will do the suffering not the child! Parents do the suffering & worry its all natural.
Our kid was 2 1/2 & did both as well...... just pray & it will all be okay. God is great.
blessings

sande

Thank you for your kind words!