Yesterday was a pretty good day for Nathan. Aunt Lisa (Kramarchyk) came to visit and he was really excited to see her. Nathan kept telling me to move, and sit in my bed while Aunt Lisa was allowed to sit in his bed with him and color and read all day.
The doctors seem to think they've figured out his diarrhea, and they seem to think the worst is over. Here goes my explination.
Nathan initially got sick with C. Diff that was hard to treat. It required 2 courses of antibiotics and the antibiotics along with the C. Diff made his gut weak and sick. His gut was tired and worn down from all the bad bacteria and wanted a break. It was also more susceptible to infection since it was weakened. He seemed to improve while he was on his 2nd course of antibiotics and that's when we went to myrtle beach. While we were in myrtle beach all the adults ate at Chick-Fil-A and seemed to get food poisoining when in reality we all got norovirus which is essentially the same thing. It's highly contagious and has the same symptoms as food poisoining. Because all the adults had a healthy gut to begin with none of us got all that sick and recovered quickly. We still had to feed Nathan while we were sick and because Nathan's gut was weak and sick from his C. Diff he got norovirus easily and much worse than the adults had it. He was also more prone to dehydrate quicker because he was too skinny to begin with. So that along with the diarrhea from the norovirus made him get as sick as he did as quickly as he did.
Then we brought Nathan home to Albany Med and when they tested his stool they didn't test for norovirus, they just assumed it was C. Diff again. When they realized it wasn't that they didn't do more testing they just called it a milk protein allergy and called it a day. He seemed OK for a couple days after bowel rest because his gut was happy with the rest. Then the diarrhea came back and we came to Boston where they tested for norovirus in his stool just a few days ago and he was positive.
The doctor said he doesn't still actively have norovirus he is just shedding it in his poop, his body is getting rid of it still. Since he had diarrhea for so long and how his gut is sick and weak from diarrhea for 7 weeks he isn't absorbing sugar the way he should be. Due to that he is on a formula that doesn't have fructose in it, it only has glucose in it. He will need to avoid fructose for a while, hopefully not forever. The doctor said his gut just needs a break and to rest for a while. While his gut is healing he will continue to have intermittent diarrhea but it will evnetually go away completley. He needs time to heal and gain some healthy, normal bacteria back in his gut but it's going to take some time - probably a few months. So now we have an answer for the diarrhea. But his blood sugar has been droping to the low 50's (it should be between 80-120) and no one seems to know why.
The endocrinologists came by yesterday and didn't have a great reason why it would be so low sometime. They put him on a schedule to check his sugar but he hasn't been on that for a full day yet. So yesterday we got some answers and some more questions. Hopefully the blood sugar gets figured out quickly and he can go home later this week.
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