The Episode Where the Lady Gets the News That Her Son Has Celiac Disease...

So there we were, in the exam room of the pediatric gastroenterologist. I just knew that he was going to examine NCS (our five year old son), review his unremarkable labs, and tell us that he has a slight case of reflux -- or better yet, that maybe he just eats too much junk food -- and is just having the occasional tummy ache. In my fantasy, the doctor would then suggest probiotics, maybe refer us to a speech therapist for some feeding therapy at the most. He would spend about five minutes with us and send us on our merry way, and I would feel a bit ridiculous for even bringing my son to a specialist.

But that's not what happened. At. All. Instead, he says: "Your son has celiac disease."

Um, what??? There is no way he just said that to me. I've had the results of all of his lab tests for the last week, except one. The celiac panel. The results had been faxed to the doctor's office, get this -- WHILE WE WERE IN THE WAITING ROOM. Still, even though I knew it wasn't really that bad of a disease, the pronouncement still came as a bit of a shock.

Surprisingly, I remember everything we then talked about:

• Physical exam includes some classic signs, but he's really healthy. Check.
• Autoimmune disease. Check.
• Neuropathy. Check.
• Hereditary. Damn!
• Scheduling endoscopy to survey the damage. Check.
• Must live gluten-free life. Starting to check... (Where in the world do I start?)
• Have to meet with a nutritionist... Haven't checked yet.
• May possibly have to revisit speech therapy for feeding therapy. Ding ding ding!! I got this one right!

How did we end up here, you ask? My son isn't a sick child. Yes, he missed a few weeks of school last year with bronchitis, but mostly because he went to school in the basement of a building that was built in 1924... hello, mold! He does, however, have this huge belly. Like that cute, round toddler belly that you see on a two year old, except that he's in kindergarten. And every now and then, he vomits. Maybe just out the blue, but sometimes after a pretty painful tummy ache that also just kind of came out of nowhere.

He was never nauseated before or afterwards, and he actually seemed to feel great after he puked. But when he did have to throw up, it was pretty urgent. And the last time it happened, we were getting off a plane. Thank the heavenly gods that he made it into the bathroom, if not completely into the toilet -- Sorry to everyone that had to deplane after us!! But seriously, I didn't even have time to grab a barf bag, it happened that fast. All of this has been going on since the beginning of the summer... three or four months or so.

But let's get back to the belly. My husband thought that he just eats too much food, particularly food that expands (carbs, etc.), but I didn't share his opinion. I thought that it was one of the following: either an obstruction (unlikely), or an inflammatory reaction to something (winner!). Even though my son is not skinny, when he lies supine (on his back), his belly is large and distended, rotund even, but you can see his ribs. Not good. I just really felt that the abdominal distention was telling us something, and I would absolutely not be able to live with myself if we didn't check it out.

We walked out of that appointment with the endoscopy scheduled for the following Monday morning at 7 a.m., and the freedom to indulge in all things gluten until midnight on Sunday.

Live it up, NCS!! Eat those pancakes while you can! Mommy's got some googling to do...