Poor Goose has been complaining of her stomach hurting for almost three weeks. We hadn't been able to figure out what was going on with her. She was also experiencing some pretty bad diarrhea and was even sent home from school last week. In trying to figure out what is going on with her we started to explore the possibility that her pain was anxiety induced. Even though the school year is off to a great start and she really seems to be loving first grade we have been experiencing some not so fun behaviors at home. We are not surprised by this at all. We figured that the transition into all day school was going to come with a period of adjustment. But when she started complaining of these stomach pains everyday I really began to worry that her anxiety issues were beginning to manifest into physical pain. It's a scary thought for a parent. How do you help your six year old learn to deal with their anxiety especially if they don't even know they are anxious. I was concerned that we were headed down a slippery slope. The next step was to rule out any actual physical reason for her pain. So the first set of doctor appointments led to an abdominal x-ray where they did find a significant amount of gas in her intestines. The doctor was concerned that if her pain didn't get better she may need to have further testing and even surgery for a condition called intussusception. So we watched her like a hawk and her pain seemed to get better so we figured she was fine. A few days later she started complaining again and was sent home from school. This time I called the doctor and based on her symptoms we treated it as a stomach virus. Putting her on a bland diet with lots of liquids again seemed to help and she was on her way. Then Monday night she woke up at 3:00 a.m. complaining again that her stomach hurt really bad. She had lots of diarrhea and even vomited. I knew then that this can't just be an anxiety issue so first thing Tuesday morning we went back to the doctor. All of her symptoms point to a condition called clostridium difficile. She had this once before when she was about 20 months old after being on lots of antibiotics. At the beginning of September she was put on zithromax for an upper respiratory infection which is how she probably got c-diff this time. Basically the antibiotics clean your intestines of all the "good" bacteria and leave only the bad which overpopulate and release toxins into your abdomen. Poor baby girl has really been ill. She hasn't even completed a full week of school yet this year. We have her on another antibiotic that gives the intestines the opportunity to grow all the "good" bacteria again and she will be taking probiotics daily until all her symptoms are gone. We also have to bring in a stool sample to be tested just to confirm the diagnosis. Hopefully she will be feeling much better soon and of course the next time she is on an antibiotic I will be better prepared if this happens again.
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