Friday, May 18, 2012

Daddy GIANT is Getting Bored

On Wednesday I made a delicious Organic, Vegan, Gluten free, Dairy free meal. We had Quinoa seasoned with taco seasoning in Brown Rice tortillas, with black beans, lettuce, onions re-fried beans, salsa, dairy free cheddar cheese, Mexican rice and organic corn tortilla chips. It was soooo good!!! The flavors were so fresh! Our Princess little GIANT (who happens to be the pickiest) enjoyed it all. Middle little GIANT had a hard time with his tortilla because the brown rice one's are a bit more stiff and need to be heated in the micro for about 15 seconds before filling and folding. Being the first one I made, his kept falling apart, but he still ate the whole thing. Even our littlest GIANT scarfed down 3 helpings of the Taco Quinoa and the Mexican rice. He hasn't sat that quiet or still for a meal in a long time! It made me feel so good to see our little GIANTS eating a meal that was so good for them and to have them actually enjoy it without complaint. The prayers for taste buds to change is working, thank you God!

Thursday we had run some errands after school and work and I was not in the mood to cook anything! We also had lots of leftover's in the fridge. We had leftovers from the previous night, some Quinoa and Brown Fried rice, a bowl of organic rice noodle spaghetti and some veggies that were getting close to their final days. When I told Daddy GIANT that leftovers were for dinner, he was not too thrilled. He has never really been a big fan of left overs, but as he informed me that night, he was getting burnt out on the only 2 Vegan, Gluten free/Dairy free meals I know how to make. He officially told me that I needed to find some new recipes to try! I promised him that I was working on it and would come up with some new meals for him. It's a learning process and definitely more time consuming to cook this way than the modern way.

So, on Saturday, we are going to try Gluten free/Dairy free, Organic/All-natural PIZZA. Pizza has been a huge favorite in our house of GIANTS, so I am really excited to see how this turns out! It will be fun too because the little GIANTS will be able to participate. I am also going to try my hand at baking Organic Gluten free/Dairy free Apple Muffins.

Slowly, but surely I will find more recipes to try and perfect so our Daddy GIANT doesn't get too bored. In the mean time, I will try my best not to over do it on the things I do know how to make. Living Life with 3 little GIANTS and keeping Daddy GIANT happy isn't always easy, but it's a job I love and will keep trying to succeed at!

Monday, May 14, 2012

A little GIANT"S Battle with Diaper Rash

Our littlest GIANT has suffered from some pretty serious bouts of diaper rash. Our two oldest little GIANT's never got diaper rash when they were babies. Baby little GIANT's rashes have been so bad that his skin cracks and bleeds, he even has a little scar on his bum. :( It seems to be the most painful thing for him because he absolutely dreads diaper changing time, even when he is rash free.

When he first started getting these rashes, we asked the pediatrician what might be causing them and she said that most likely it's the acid in his poop caused by teething. So we trusted our doctor and applied the recommended creams and have been for the last 6 months.

Last night, our little GIANT woke up in the middle of the night screaming and crying in pain! We went to him and found that he had, yet again, another diaper rash. We got him cleaned up, creamed up and calmed down. Then, the rash got me thinking...the little GIANT isn't teething, he has all the teeth he will have until he is 2yrs old. I also started thinking about the last time he had a rash and it was before we took him off cow's milk. So I started talking to my mom about it and we rehashed what he had eaten in the last 24hrs. Due to the craziness of the (absolutely AMAZING) Wedding this weekend, we did whatever was easy and available to us.

Saturday, the day of the Wedding, my mom fed him some cottage cheese and applesauce (one of his fav's!) as a snack before leaving for the wedding. We are still trying to use up what we have around the house before we do the complete switch and she knew it was something he'd eat, since he is a picky little GIANT! At the wedding, he ate the cheddar and white cheddar popcorn party favor's as a snack while waiting for dinner to be served (he was STARVING). For dinner he was served mac and cheese, all of our little GIANT's favorite! None of what he ate had alarmed me, up until last night.

It all of a sudden made sense, the little GIANT had not had a diaper rash ONCE before he was put on cow's milk and fed dairy products. While I nursed him I avoided dairy to help keep his gas down as it seemed to bring him discomfort when I did eat things that were. Once he was old enough to eat dairy and have cow's milk, that's when the eczema and diaper rash began. Over the last few weeks that he has been drinking Almond milk and eating very little to almost no dairy, he's been diaper rash free and eczema free. In one 24hr period he had more dairy combined than in the last few weeks and ended up with another severe rash.

After doing some research and finding that a milk allergy and gluten allergy CAN be a definite cause to diaper rash as well as eczema, I am convinced that what is best for my little GIANT is to be Gluten and Dairy free without having to have a doctor tell me so! My own personal observations have pinpointed more probable cause than what my pediatrician has found. I find it frustrating and irritating that my pediatrician didn't help explore further the cause to his rashes. Just like how the Dr. said his eczema was due to the use of a pacifier, even though the eczema didn't go away when we stopped using it like the pediatrician said it would. I am a firm believer in medicine and do vaccinate my children, but I just wish that doctors wouldn't take one glance at a kid with a binki in his mouth and bumps on his face and assume that it's irritation from the binki they think they are too old to be using. Or, take a look at a red bum and see drool constantly dripping from his mouth and say it's a rash due to teething. It just seems like a cop-out of them actually doing what we're paying them a lot of money to do, which is take a look at the symptom and closely and carefully explore what the proper cause and diagnosis is. Believe me, after working in the medical field and being a manager of a well known bank, I know that it all comes down to time and money. They need to see lot's of patience in one day to make a good profit, which means they need to get them in and out as fast as possible and leads to the quickest most generic diagnosis that may not even be the actual cause!

I am taking a stand for my little GIANTS and refuse to stop with the basic diagnosis that is the first thing to come to the pediatrician's mind. I am committed to this journey to see if their specific health problems and overall health improves simply by eliminating processed, non-organic, unhealthy food. God called me to "Living Life with 3 little GIANTS" and it is a call that I won't refuse or take lightly. I am honored to be their mama and won't give up on providing them a life full of faith, hope, love and health!

Wednesday, May 9, 2012

3 little GIANTS Go Get a Treat

Yesterday we took our middle little GIANT to try on his Tuxedo, as he is to be the "Ring Man" (he coined this phrase because he did not like the title of ring bearer) this Saturday in my cousin's wedding. Afterwards we decided to take the little GIANTS to get a treat at the self-serve frozen yogurt shop called ZOYO. We decided it was the perfect opportunity to teach them that even with this new way of eating, every now and then, we can still get YUMMY treats!

Before we walked over to the yogurt shop I had a chat with the little GIANTS. I explained to them that this place would have lots of flavors to choose from, but that we were going to find the Gluten free/Dairy free flavors and that would be what we choose. If for some reason they didn't like those flavors, we wouldn't be able to eat any frozen yogurt. I also explained the topping bar to them and said that the same went for that, only Gluten free/Dairy free toppings allowed. The little GIANTS nodded their heads and said " Yes Mom" with a very surprisingly understanding  and excited tone of voice! We held hands and were off to find our delicious treat with Daddy and baby little GIANT following behind.

We entered the shop and got our taste cups and yogurt dish in hand and ready to fill. As we looked at all the different flavors we found that most of them were Gluten free, but as suspected, not Dairy free. We kept  looking. They asked if they could have Chocolate, the Root beer flavor, and Vanilla. I calmly told them that those flavors were not Dairy free and that we needed to keep looking. There was not one protest! At last, we had found it, the one and ONLY, Gluten free and Dairy free flavor. The flavor was Pomegranate Raspberry Sorbet. I filled their taste cups and in unison they said "MMMMMMM!!!!" So we filled up our big cups and then proceeded to the topping bar.

Now this is where I thought things were going to get hairy. I could picture a meltdown and tantrum in my very near future. As they looked at all the chocolate chips, candy, sprinkles, pretzels, cookie pieces, gummy worms and gummy bears, their eyes lit up! Again, I calmly explained that we needed to find the Gluten free and Dairy free things. So at the end of the topping bar we found lots of fresh fruit. The middle little GIANT and I decided on fresh strawberries and pineapple, while the oldest little GIANT chose cherries and strawberries (Daddy was the only one who put cookies on his sorbet, LOL!). We paid and then sat down to enjoy! Our youngest little GIANT took a taste and puckered up since it was a little tart, but then came back for more, and some more, and some more! I think he ended up eating more than me!

Our first outing trying our best to pick Gluten free and Dairy free was a success! Now, I know that the ingredients probably weren't organic and most likely contained some artificial sweeteners, but we're okay with that, in moderation. We want our little GIANTS to be able to enjoy being  little GIANTS and for some reason going for ice cream (or in our case, frozen yogurt) is a mandatory part of childhood! This is something that we will only do every so often and on those occasions, will allow the few non "wholefood" elements. We don't want our little GIANTS to feel as if they've been deprived of things throughout their childhood to the point that they completely go over board when they're BIG GIANTS. We want to educate them on how they can find balance in eating this way and help them to see that they're not really missing out on anything. So far, it seems to be pretty well understood by the little GIANTS as they all left with smiles on their faces and our middle little GIANT with a purple pomegranate raspberry sorbet goat-t surrounding his! 

As we proceed on this journey, I'm sure there will be days that don't end up as successful! But as we do continue down this path God has us on, we are committed to covering  it in prayer. I've been praying even for the simple things like the little GIANTS taste buds changing and finding joy in eating these new foods and that the cravings for the old food would go away. God is faithful and we will continue to seek and follow Him while Living Life with 3 little GIANTS!

Tuesday, May 8, 2012

3 little GIANTS go Gluten and Dairy Free

Life with 3 little GIANTS has been busy as usual, but we are now entering into a new season of life that I am actually very excited about and plan to use my blog as a way to share it with you. I hope you will come along side me and share in Living Life with 3 little GIANTS!

Many of you may know that we have struggled with some behavioral and emotional challenges with our Princess little GIANT. Daddy GIANT and I started seeing a family counselor in January to see if there was something we weren't doing that would help her. During our monthly visits we received lots of positive feedback that we were doing things well and handling most of the situations the way she would recommend parents to. We received a couple of tools and were also able to really understand and learn about what the specific challenges are that our Princess little GIANT faces and that she's not JUST "strong-willed", it's so much more than that!

She did suggest that we have our Princess little GIANT evaluated for ADHD because some of the challenges she faces are symptoms of it. So, we did some online evaluations and most of them stated that she was definitely in need of professional evaluation for it. We started researching different treatment methods and really tried to educate ourselves. We made an appointment wit the Pediatrician and was given the "official evaluation" for all of the adults who lived with her to complete as well as her teacher. During this time of waiting to receive the form back from her very busy teacher, we started learning about food allergies. We uncovered that on both sides of our family there are some food allergies to gluten and dairy. We also learned that the allergic reaction to both of these things tends to be emotional and behavioral. When we received the form back from the teacher, we found that we were all on different sides of the form and learned that if a child truly had ADHD they would rate the same for behaviorally at home AND school. Our little GIANT is a remarkable student, is very well behaved, follows directions and is excelling above her grade level in reading and math (I'm bragging just a little as any proud mama should!). So, it seemed pretty clear that she did not have ADHD.

Another interesting thing that happened during this time is that our insurance didn't cover her visit to the doctor, which it did previously when at 2 1/2 she was seen by the Pediatrician for the same reason with the same insurance and coverage and at that time was diagnosed "at-risk for ADHD". We prayed about it a lot and really just felt like God was closing the door on us continuing to test her for ADHD and that He was using the insurance as a way to say "quit going down this road for a diagnosis because you will have to pay out-of-pocket every time and that's because she doesn't have ADHD." So we listened and I am sooooo glad we did, especially since there are so many kids misdiagnosed with ADHD. We didn't want her labeled with something like this that would follow her for the rest of her life.

So, after even MORE prayer, we have turned our focus to food allergies and what form of treatment we are going to pursue for them. Now many of you maybe thinking and wondering, "did they go to a doctor for that diagnosis?" and the answer is NO. Why you ask? First off, money... insurance does not cover the type of testing needed to diagnose gluten and dairy allergies, also many Allergists won't test for it because there are 3 different strands of allergies and it's not found in the common one doctors test for. It could cost over $600 per child for the testing and it's not even guaranteed that a gluten or dairy allergy would show if they had one. We are going to do an elimination diet this summer, which we are slowly transitioning into,  and we are going to see if removing those two things help with our little Princess GIANT's emotional and behavioral challenges. In addition to going Gluten and Dairy free, we are going Organic and pretty much Wholefood/ Plant-based as well.

You may also be wondering why we are making this change for every little GIANT as well as ourselves. The answer to that is because through our research and look back into health history for each of us as well as family lines, we see A LOT of things connected to these allergies. For example, the kids all have a skin condition very similar to Eczema which is a symptom of a dairy allergy. Our littlest GIANT had Eczema on his face pretty bad and with the changes we've already made, it seems to be clearing up. So, we are going to see how much better we all feel after these changes and see if any other health issues clear up because of the changes being made.

All of our little GIANTS are receiving most of the changes pretty well so far. We have done away with all Cow's Milk. Our Princess and Baby little GIANT's love Almond milk while our Middle little GIANT prefers Rice milk. I have also cooked quite a bit with a whole grain very high in protein called Quinoa (pronounced Keen-Wha). It really takes on the flavor of whatever spices your cooking with and can be used in place of ground turkey, beef, and chicken. I made fried rice with brown rice and Quinoa and other organic ingredients the other night and it was a HUGE hit! We have also been teaching the little GIANTS about portion control (the little GIANT's love using the measuring cups to actually measure their food before they eat) as well as what it means to eat Wholefood and Organic versus the food we ate before and why it's good or not good for us. We even watched Forks Over Knives (a documentary I HIGHLY recommend as well as Food Inc.) as a family and the little GIANTS were pretty interested!

I am very excited to see what this change in "diet" does for each one of us this summer. I am going to use this blog as a way to chart this experience. I'll share the good and the bad as well as recipes and foods that are big hit or a big flop. I am open to questions and comments and am in no way trying to push this lifestyle change on anyone else, so in return please respect what we have chosen to do for our family.

No matter how much work being "Gluten free, Dairy free, Organic, Wholefood, and Plant-based" is going to be, God doesn't give us anything we can't handle! I believe that He will provide us the finances and provisions needed to live this way. And if it truly benefits my family in the way we believe it will, I'll DO IT, because I LOVE Living Life with 3 little (healthy) GIANTS!