[lizziejean]

My kid is just 4. He's PDD-NOS. He's been off dairy, soy, wheat and eggs for 18 months. Ever since he was teeny we've had off again on again problems with diarrhea. It definitely got better since he started the diet. But it still hasn't gone away. He doesn't have any other food sensitivities according to the ELISA test from York Labs. And it's not a frequency issue - he doesn't poop more often, but when he does it's runny, anywhere from sloppy to soupy (sorry). And to help things, most times he does it in his clothes - we finally potty trained him just before his 4th birthday, so he's in underwear, so it's really getting me down, all this poop everywhere. BUT - if it's runny, does that mean he has less control over it? On the other hand, he never, but never, poops at school, and the bus picks him up at 8.20 and drops him off at 2.40 which means he has control. He doesn't poop at night either, just in the morning, or in the pool!!!! or when he's out with me.

He doesn't eat many fruits or veggies, any idea how many is enough to support proper stool production? He's on Darifree, but I try to add fat to his diet, he eats salami, I pour olive oil on his rice pasta etc.

I also think he is super sensitive to stomach viruses and they affect him for longer than other kids...

Does this sound like yeast? Does this sound familiar to anyone? Suggestions please!!!

 

[krissi]

We deal with that all the time, I fear.

I could count on two hands the number of times I've seen solid well formed stools from DD in her whole life. Have you looked into the Specific Carbohydrate Diet? Regular diarrhea type poops can be a sign of gut problems and it's hard to diagnose this with any kind of accuracy. For most people, the SCD can clear that up but we're still seeing runny and mushy poop even after a few months on the SCD. We may have to cut out all fruit or something...I don't know yet. But it seems like poop is a good judge of intestinal health or lack thereof. I recommend checking www.pecanbread.com if you haven't already. There's also a gut healing thread in the Health & Healing forum on this site with a lot of knowledgeable people posting in it.

 

[Finch]

I was going to say, it sounds like possible yeast and since you're well into elimination, do check out the healing the gut thread.

I'm starting to sound like a broken record here, but have you looked into enzymes? One of the enzymes we give ds helps with the digestion of fats and sugars and helps firm up the stool.

My ds used to have very runny stool like that, it stopped when we took him off soy, fortunately.

I would say go for the healing the gut, and maybe consider enzymes. It still just amazes me how many kids with autism have gut problems. The correllation is undeniable.

 

[SoVeryCherry]

I agree with enzymes, but not all. I have had DS on Kirkman Enzyme Complete for 2 months and not seen any change in poop. We took citrates out of his diet (he was gettng them though vitamins) and that helped somewhat. I have heard a lot of parents have firmed up stools with Houston Nutraceuticals enzymes. We just started those 2 days ago, so I can't comment from personal experience.

We finally have all our labs done and are in line to see Dr. Krigsman at Thoughtful House in Austin. He is a pedi gastro, and I've heard many parents say that his protocol helped their kids heal gut-wise and they have normal stools now.

 

[buttercup]

It sounds like he may have yeast overgrowth or he may have developed an intolerance to another food. Is there any specific food or beverage that he consumes abnormally large quantities of? I know of parents who will switch their kids off of milk to soymilk or almond milk. The child consumes an abnormally large amount of those products and eventually develops an intolerance...like an allergic reaction.

However, I tend to think it may be yeast. So many people havve yeast overgrowth issues and don't even know it. Are you giving him any probiotics (combo of various'good bacteria' that occurs in your gut)? You can get them from a health food store. The refrigerated ones are always better. The good bacteria fights the yeast in your gut. They both naturally occur in your gut, but there should always be an equal amount of each. Too much bacteria or too much yeast is not good for you.

THe enzymes can also help fight the yeast. The link I am providing describes how it works in detail. But in short, there are enzymes that can break down protiens and there are enzymes that can break down carbs. Heavy use of antifungals can make the shell of the yeast build tolerance to antifunguls...much like the issue with bacteria becoming resistant to antibiotics. The shell of yeast is made of protien and other stuff. The enzymes can break down that outershell therby killing the yeast or weakening the shell so the good bacteria, antifunguls or other outside agent can destroy the yeast. http://www.enzymestuff.com/conditionbacteria.htm#2 This website also has info about the use of digestive enzymes for other things such as the break down ot wheat, soy, and milk protiens.

There are a variety of enzymes. I know parents who use Houston Nutraceuticals in place of the gfcf diet. Kirkmans and Integrative Theraputics also make enzymes. Just make sure it has the enzymes you need.

 

[lizziejean]

Thanks for the info guys. I haven't really thought about enzymes. I have got Serenaid from Klaire Labs, I never really figured out how to get it into him and gave up, maybe I should give that another try. I'll check out the other stuff too, boy imagine being able to give up the gfcf diet!! that would be cool. However I have heard of some who do that and it just comes back even worse a year or so later.

How do you test for yeast overgrowth? Is that something the pedi can check for?

Also I would love to see a pedi gastro who was worth the visit. Any recommendations in the Westchester / NYC area welcome.

 

[krissi]

Quote:

How do you test for yeast overgrowth? Is that something the pedi can check for?

There doesn't seem to be any real definitive means of doing this yet. You can get a high reading on one test and no reading on another. We are positive DD has yeast overgrowth; she had a couple of markers for it in her blood tests and had an extremely high reading for D-Arabinitol in the organic acid urine test. But she had no yeast at all detected in her stool analysis. The doctor we were seeing at the time said that the stool analysis wasn't terribly accurate for yeast...she said something about it being coated in IgA antibodies by the time it comes out in the stool and that causes it not to grow. Our experience with yeast is that is makes DD's stools rather spongelike and semi-formed/mushy and then she tends to have more diarrhea-like poop after we start giving her antifungals and the yeast starts dying off. I don't know how reliable of an indicator that is though.

We've tried anti-yeast enzymes but have had better luck with antifungals like GSE and fluconazole. The antiyeast enzymes can be hard to administer because they have to be given on an empty stomach away from food in order to work. For us, even having tried that with Candex, the yeast is just coming back the instant we stop the antifungals and the Candex is making no difference.

:

For replacing the GFCF diet enzymes do work for some but not others. We tested a dairy product with DD last week...I really wanted her to take Activator X Butter Oil because of the WAP protocol that says it helps protect the teeth, and I have her extra Houston Peptizyde, but even with enzymes she was up all night acting drugged out and only finally back to normal now. And that one was made from raw milk supposedly which is not supposed to cause as much of a reaction...*sigh* But everyone's different. I'm starting to think DD's leaky gut may be more extreme than some other kids with ASD...I hope you find something that works!

 

[buttercup]

As Krissi says the type of treatment really varies from child to child. With my kids, their tests showed high levels of yeast and they had the loose sour smelling stool to prove it. We were doing antifungals and probiotics. I had taken them off of enzymes because there were no more undigested food in the stools (not realizing the importance of the enzymes). Their stools were runny again and they had negative effects from the yeast (showed all the signs - bloatedness, gas, runny stools and appearing fatigued) As soon as I started the enzymes, they went through yeast die off and their stools returned to normal. At this time, I was perplexed until I found more info on it (i posted it in my initial post)

 

[Finch]

The zyme prime from HNI really helps to firm up stools.