can it take more than 1 week to see improvement?

[DevaMajka]

I read often that people see improvements in a couple days after removing a problem food. I know that dairy and wheat/gluten can take much longer to see improvements, but in general if I remove a bunch of foods and don't see improvements (or things are getting worse) in a week, should I change directions?

The symptoms I'm looking at here are digestive, behavior, and sleep. I don't know if any are tied together (ie: lack of sleep causing tantrums and major fussiness, or digestive problems making it hard for him to sleep).

[kjbrown92]

For my DS and DD2, MOST of their food reactions last 1-4 days. However, my DS reacts to soy for 10 days (lip rash and major tantrums). So I wouldn't necessarily change directions. What have you removed? Remember it's like the game Mastermind... you're trying to get the right combination of foods... but it might take you more than 10 tries to break the code!

[DevaMajka]

That's funny about the soy (not funny haha)- ds1 has a lip rash, ds2 is having tantrums. hmmm...

I *think* I have a plan. Tell me what you think, if you don't mind.

We were already off of egg, sweet potato, potato, banana, soy sauce, disodium EDTA, pineapple, coffee, and low on chocolate for his eczema. We've been off of raisin/grapes, kiwi, peas, green beans, oranges, and carrots for his digestive stuff.

He hasn't had peanuts or avocado for 3 weeks, just because, and we haven't eaten fruit other than apple for a while.

The things cut out in the last week are: bell peppers, other citrus, almonds. huh. It seems like more than that. I feel really deprived.

His eczema has been super mild for a couple weeks now. It goes from barely noticable even to me, to noticable to me but probably not to other people. We know that there are some environmental triggers, so for now I'm going to consider this baseline.

His digestive stuff is a different story- his poop got solid for a few days, but those were the days he had the ring around the anus and the "rash" (not really a rash, looked more like a burn) from his scrotum to his crack.

Anyways, I'm about at the end of my rope, so that says to me that I need a change. Here's what I'm thinking. Since we're at "baseline" for his eczema, get ready to test those foods. We actually tested eggs yesterday and today.

Since there's not been much improvement with his poop- and actually it's gotten worse in the last week- I'll add back all those foods, other than the two I really suspect (raisins and kiwi). Then I'll start from the beginning, with taking out the top 8 allergens and top intolerances. It just makes more sense statistically speaking that he'd react to a top 8 more likely than to carrots and peas and green beans, kwim?

The last time we added all kinds of foods back, his reactions really improved, so hopefully it will help again!