The Exciting World of Fructose Malabsorption

Delicious Poison
photo courtesy of Maggie Smith at http://freedigitalphotos.net

It’s funny how things work out sometimes.

I thought MPI and an IgE Egg allergy were horrible.  Then I learned how to cook, what to avoid, and I mastered the challenge.

Then we got FPIES.

I thought I was going to lose my mind over that (and I may feel that way again) but we were blessed to quickly find a baseline for Mr. Happy and I’ve started to relax.

Then I realized there was something more wrong with Mr. Charm.  And my suspicions lead me to believe it is Fructose Malabsorption.

And I feel like I’m losing my mind again.

Why do my boys BOTH have to be stricken with conditions that so little is known about?   Huh?  Geez!

I did what I always do when faced with the unknown medical conditions of my kids: visit Dr. Google!  Quickly I found a great blog called “Life With Fructose Malapsorption”, and one paragraph really struck me: “Many people with FM are left undiagnosed for years before they finally stumble across FM, often after having tried many different medications,  diet changes, and evaluated what they are eating for quite some time.  Some people are fortunate enough to have a doctor who is aware of FM and will send them for the test, but many doctors are not aware of FM or that there is a test for it.  There are also many doctors who believe that there is no such things a FM (leaving patients extremely frustrated and “lost”).  There is slowly becoming more awareness of FM, but it is still widely unheard of.”

Take out the fact that there is a test for this condition, and substitute “FPIES” for “fructose malabsorption”, and you could be talking about FPIES!

Based on this lovely ladies wisdom, we’re starting a NEW elimination diet just for Mr. Charm.  For about two weeks, he will be eating only the following foods:

• Beef
• Pork
• Chicken
• Fish
• Turkey
• Seafood
• White Potatos
• Zucchini
• Spinach
• White Rice
• White Rice Noodles
• Oats
• Quinoa
• Millet
• Tapioca Starch
• Buckwheat
• Salt
• Pepper
• Olive Oil

Then we’ll expand.  We should be able to trial new foods about every 4-5 days, so I’m hoping we’ll build his diet up fairly quickly.  Compared to the 4 week wait we’ll have to do for each new food for Mr. Happy, 4-5 days is nothing!

I did go through those lists of safe foods that I found online and my original diet for him was much larger than this, but, based on my experiences with FPIES I’ve learned it is best to start smaller than you’d like and work up from there.  No sense wasting time, and if you don’t go small enough you may have to start over from scratch.

So now I’m back to trying to learn new things to cook with a limited ingredient list.  Mr. Charm will be happy, though, to finally be able to eat bacon again!  (Well, if I can find any without any sweetener added!)

This is going to be a real challenge for me; I haven’t had any difficulty staying on my elimination diet for Mr. Happy whatsoever…but cooking bacon, my homemade sausage, and shrimp and crab is going to be TORTURE for me!  Not to mention convincing Mr. Charm that he won’t wither and die without his “Mo!” – Mr. Charm speak for “Orange Juice” (because he always asks for “More” – love toddler-speak!).

Also, my house is suddenly going to go on Red Alert for food sharing.  I won’t have an “FPIES Friendly” kitchen any more!

Plus, I attempted to ‘wing it’ on a lemon pepper chicken dish a few nights ago for Mr. Charm and he flat refused to eat it.  The Geek tried a few bites and made some hysterical faces – apparently I really stubbed my toe on the lemon juice!  It’s SO HARD to know if what you’re cooking is any good when you can’t taste as you go!

Well, I’ll get the hang of it.  I’m sure I’ll find and create some delicious recipes out of this challenge!

Most importantly, the next few weeks will tell us – testing or no testing – whether Mr. Charm actually DOES have Fructose Malabsorption.  Please cross your fingers and send some prayers that his diapers clean up their act (hah!) and he starts acting like a two year old…and not a two year old with a tummy ache!

Anyone else dealing with Fructose Malabsorption that has any brilliant advice to share?